Draft Trade Union (Deduction of Union Subscriptions from Wages in the Public Sector) Regulations 2023
Thérèse Coffey Excerpts(10 months, 3 weeks ago)
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Chris Stephens
I listened intently to the Minister, and there are still some questions that have not been answered. In the time that we have left, and I understand that we do have time left, there may be an opportunity—
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
On a point of order, Mr Paisley. Can an hon. Member speak twice? The hon. Member for Glasgow South West has already spoken.
The Chair
The right hon. Lady is a very experienced Member and she will know that the Member may speak as many times as I call him.
Chris Stephens
I am grateful, Mr Paisley. As I understand it, when time is available, Members can speak—
Oral Answers to Questions
Thérèse Coffey Excerpts(11 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
It is not that there is anything wrong with it; it is just that it is not the United Kingdom. And I have to point out to the hon. Gentleman that deterrence works: we know that it works because our scheme with Albania has ensured a 90% reduction in arrivals from that country.
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
I know that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister is committed to energy security and the development of renewables, as am I, and that is why Sizewell C started a development consent order this week. However, there are plenty of other developments happening on greenfield sites, where National Grid plans to use compulsory purchase orders to plough up farming fields used for food and tree production when brownfield sites are available that are connected to the network. National Grid is refusing to publish its study on Bradwell and why they deem it not suitable for the connection of offshore wind farms and interconnectors. Will he meet me and other East Anglian MPs to discuss this matter and use the powers of his office to get that study published?
The Prime Minister
As my right hon. Friend will know, planning applications for new infrastructure are managed independently, so I cannot comment on specific cases, but I agree with her that it is important to listen to the views of local communities, such as those she represents across Suffolk and East Anglia. I know that the Under-Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, my hon. Friend the Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Andrew Bowie) was visiting her area recently to mark the commencement of the project at Sizewell C, and I can assure her that relevant Ministers will continue to pay close attention to her concerns.
Oral Answers to Questions
Thérèse Coffey Excerpts(1 year ago)
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Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
During the pandemic, I could only see the true professionalism of civil servants in a variety of Departments, including the Cabinet Office, and I am very conscious of some of the pain being felt about the victims of that time. Does my right hon. Friend agree with me that the civil service really stood up to the challenge of dealing with imperfect data and a rapidly changing situation? By the way, I include the civil servants of the Department for Work and Pensions in that regard. However, may I also encourage him to consider how we can strengthen analytical skills and capabilities right across the civil service? That is important, and I think it will be one of the key lessons that should come out of the inquiry.
Oliver Dowden
I thank my right hon. Friend for her question, and I pay tribute to her for her many years of service in the Cabinet. I agree with her characterisation of the civil service. Indeed, in my time working in various ministerial roles, I have seen true professionalism and dedication. However, I think she is absolutely right that we need to improve both our data analytics and the data flow into Government. One of the things we learned during the covid pandemic was, for example, that setting up the data centre in the Cabinet Office massively improved the amount of data we received. That enables us to deal with these very fast-moving situations and, indeed, we have used it in subsequent crises.
Oral Answers to Questions
Thérèse Coffey Excerpts(2 years, 1 month ago)
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Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dr Thérèse Coffey)
Through the Glasgow leaders’ declaration, 145 countries, representing 90% of the world’s forests, committed to ending and reversing deforestation this decade, and we secured $20 billion of public and philanthropic finance to help them. We also secured a commitment from the world’s biggest traders to stop buying commodities grown on illegally deforested land. At COP27, the world leaders who made that pledge are gathering again to report back on progress and agree next steps.
Daisy Cooper
The Environment Act 2021 was passed nearly a year ago, but we still do not have the necessary strong secondary legislation to regulate the use of forest-risk commodities in the UK. Ministers are yet to decide which commodities should be regulated, and under every one of their own scenarios the Government will not even manage to halve the UK’s deforestation footprint between now and 2030. With COP27 starting in just a few days, will the Government commit today to bring in regulations within a year that apply across all items that pose a risk to forests?
Dr Coffey
The hon. Lady raises an interesting point. I am new in post as Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, but I spent three years there working on such projects. I assure her that the protection of sustainable forests is key to this Government, which is why we continue to ensure that the £1.5 billion specifically earmarked for forests across the current international climate finance period will be honoured.
Richard Graham
A lot of good work was done at COP26 by the then Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Reading West (Alok Sharma) and others to preserve the world’s forests. The decisions by south-east Asian nations to participate in the declaration were not easy, because livelihoods and the environment are closely allied issues in those countries. Will my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State confirm that our Government remain committed to working with the countries of south-east Asia both to deliver on the declarations and to help them with tricky issues, such as palm oil and the sustainability of timber?
Dr Coffey
My hon. Friend is right to praise my right hon. Friend the Member for Reading West (Alok Sharma) for what he and, indeed, the UK Government as a whole did last year, but I also thank my hon. Friend for his steadfast efforts at rallying partners across south-east Asia behind global forest commitments in his capacity as trade envoy. He is right that south-east Asia is critical to this, recognising that it is home to some of the most vibrant forest landscapes on earth, and we will continue to work with partners in the area to protect the critical ecosystems while supporting local livelihoods.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
It is disappointing that the COP President has not been allowed to answer questions today. I hope that Lula’s election victory in Brazil at the weekend heralds a new era in protecting the Amazon from deforestation. Globally, however, it seems that little progress has been made on the ground since the COP26 promises last year. We have also just heard that the UK has failed to pay out more than $300 million promised at COP to the green climate fund and the adaptation fund. Was the Prime Minister trying to avoid going to Sharm el-Sheikh because he is embarrassed that the UK has not delivered on all its promises?
Dr Coffey
I think the hon. Lady is being ungenerous. All our pledges are still in place, and she will recognise this Government’s work to bring partners together. We established the Forest & Climate Leaders’ Partnership to gather high-ambition partners together to accelerate efforts to reach our 2030 target to halt and reverse deforestation.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
The COP President worked hard in his role and achieved some worthwhile results at Glasgow’s COP26 on commitments such as the declaration on forest and land use, and I commend him for that. I certainly do not think he deserved to be demoted from Cabinet, along with the Climate Minister, just weeks before his handover and at a time when sensible voices on the climate crisis are needed around the Cabinet table more than ever. Does the Secretary of State agree that the PM’s decision sets a poor example to other countries, let alone to us in the UK? Can she tell us who will be driving forward these important international commitments in the future?
Dr Coffey
Indeed, the Prime Minister will be taking the lead on this agenda. That is recognised because, as was announced earlier today, he is attending COP. The hon. Lady should be aware that this is about an implementation process. At the same time, I remind her that Government representatives are already attending COP and the Montreal protocol partnership. This leadership on forests and land use is an important recognition of how nature-based solutions are critical to achieving that, which is why many people from Government are making sure that we achieve net zero and are supporting global efforts.
Sir Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)
Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dr Thérèse Coffey)
Every major report published this year shows progress on bringing down warming projections compared with last year, but we are still far from the 1.5°C pathway. That is why we need more countries, especially the major emitters, to implement their Glasgow commitments. I welcome the fact that 26 countries have new or strengthened nationally determined contributions as part of their response to the Glasgow climate pact.
Matthew Pennycook
The global methane pledge that emerged from COP26 committed its signatories, including the UK, to collectively reduce methane emissions by at least 30% below 2020 levels by the end of this decade. By how much have the Government reduced UK methane emissions in the year since the COP26 summit, and when will they outline a strategy to meet their 2030 commitment in full?
Dr Coffey
I will have to write to the hon. Gentleman with a detailed response, but I hope he will welcome the progress being made. For example, we have people at the Montreal protocol agreement right now. We also welcome the US Government ratifying the Kigali amendment. Other measures, including on gases, will help us to achieve, hopefully, that 1.5°C.
James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)
Is my right hon. Friend concerned that in the Arctic countries the temperature is rising something like four times faster than in the rest of the world, and in some places six times faster? What more can we do to assist the Arctic countries to resist the worst effects of the rise of the oceans and the rise in temperature?
Dr Coffey
I know my hon. Friend has long been concerned about this and he is right to be so. That is why we will continue to work with high-level ambition partners, and work towards our 30 by 30 ambitions around the world, which will also preserve the Arctic and Antarctic.
Owen Thompson (Midlothian) (SNP)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dr Thérèse Coffey)
As I just said to the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook), I will have to get the detail and write to him. I will share the same letter.
Dr Ben Spencer (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con)
Dr Coffey
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to commend the children at Sayes Court and Manorcroft schools. It is the children who are genuinely the future, and leading by example in what they do is an element in reducing waste. Nature-based solutions are fundamental to tackling climate change and, as we embrace them through programmes such as Eco-Schools, they must be the way forward for his schoolchildren and indeed our country.
Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)
Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op)
Dr Coffey
I think that planning is devolved to the Welsh Administration, so the hon. Member may wish take that up with the Welsh Government directly. Of course, we will always ensure that our obligations on improving the environment are honoured as we take forward any potential reforms to planning.
Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)
Health and Social Care Update
Thérèse Coffey Excerpts(2 years, 3 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Dr Thérèse Coffey)
I am pleased today to set out to Parliament our plan for patients. As the Prime Minister said on the doorstep of Downing Street, she had three clear priorities: growing the economy; tackling energy security and support for households and businesses; and the NHS, with patients being able to get a GP appointment.
Patients are my top priority and I will be their champion, focusing on the issues that most affect them or their loved ones. Most of the time, patients have a great experience, but we must not paper over the problems that we face. We expect backlogs to rise before they fall as more patients come forward for diagnosis and treatment after the pandemic, and the data shows, sadly, that there is too much variation in the access and care that people receive across the country.
The scale of the challenge necessitates a national endeavour. As we work together to tackle these immense challenges, I will be proactive, not prescriptive, in our approach as we apply a relentless focus on measures that affect most people’s experience of the NHS and social care.
Today, we are taking the first step in this important journey by publishing “Our Plan for Patients”, which I will lay in the Libraries of both Houses. It sets out a range of measures to help the NHS and social care perform at their best for patients. The plan will inform patients and empower them to live healthier lives; place an intensive focus on primary care, the gateway to the NHS for most people; use prevention to strengthen resilience and the health of the nation; and improve performance and productivity.
To succeed, we will need a true national endeavour, supported by our making it easier for clinical professionals to return to help the NHS, as well as drawing on the energy and enthusiasm of the million people who volunteered to help during the pandemic by opening up opportunities for them to help in different ways. That could be by becoming a community first responder, or by, for example, strengthening good neighbour schemes across the country. We will also explore the creation of an ambulance auxiliary service.
The plan sets out our work on the ABCD of priorities that affect most people’s experience of the NHS and social care. First, on ambulances, I want to reduce waiting times for patients and apply a laser-like focus on handover delays, so that ambulances get back on the road and to patients, where they are needed most.
Our analysis shows that 45% of the delays are occurring in just 15 hospital trusts. That is why the local NHS will be doing intensive work with those trusts to create more capacity in hospitals—the equivalent of 7,000 more beds—by this winter through a combination of freeing up beds, with a focus on discharge, and people staying at home and being monitored remotely through the sort of technology that played such an important role during the pandemic. In addition, when patients call 999, the speed of answering is critical, so we will increase the number of call handlers for both 999 and 111 calls.
Next is the backlog, where the waiting list for planned care currently stands at about 7 million, exacerbated by the pandemic. This summer, we announced that we have virtually eliminated waits of over two years, and we remain on track to reach the next milestones in our plan. To boost capacity, we are accelerating our plans to roll out community diagnostic centres as well as new hospitals, and we will maximise the use of the independent sector to provide even more treatment for patients.
As well as capacity, we are also getting more people on the frontline, making it easier for people to work in and help the NHS. We know that people are leaving the workforce for a variety of reasons. We have listened, and we are responding and addressing a number of those reasons. For instance, pension rules can currently be a disincentive for clinicians who want to stay in the profession or to return from retirement and help our national endeavour. We will correct pension rules relating to inflation; we will expect NHS trusts to offer pension recycling; and we will extend until 2024 measures that will allow people to stay or return to the NHS.
I can announce today that we will extend the operation of the emergency registers for health professionals for two more years. That is, of course, on top of commitments to boost the health and care workforce, such as our manifesto pledge to recruit 50,000 more nurses by 2024. That will sit alongside the design and delivery of our forthcoming workforce plan.
C is for social care. At the moment, one of the key challenges is discharging patients from hospital into more appropriate care settings to free up beds and help improve ambulance response times. To tackle that, I can announce today that we are launching a £500 million adult social care discharge fund for this winter. The local NHS will be working with councils with targeted plans on specific care packages to support people being either in their own home or in the wider community. That £500 million acts as the down-payment in the rebalancing of funding across health and social care as we develop our longer-term plans.
I know that there is a shortage of carers across the country. We will continue to work with the Department for Work and Pensions on a national recruitment campaign. In addition, since last winter, we have opened up international recruitment routes for carers. We will support the sector with £15 million this year to help to employ more care workers from abroad. We are also accelerating the roll-out of technologies such as digitised social care records, which can save care workers about 20 minutes a shift, freeing up time for carers to care.
Finally, D is for doctors and dentists. I am determined to address one of the most frustrating problems faced by many patients: getting an appointment to see their doctor, or getting to see a dentist at all.
Starting with doctors, we are taking five steps to help make that happen: first, setting the expectation that everyone who needs a GP appointment can get one within two weeks; secondly, opening up time for more than 1 million extra appointments, so that patients with urgent needs can be seen on the same day; thirdly, making it easier to book an appointment; fourthly, publishing performance by practice to help to inform patients; and fifthly, requiring the local NHS to hold practices to account, providing support to those practices with the most acute access challenges to improve performance.
Clearly, clinicians are best placed to prioritise according to the clinical need of their patients. In July, 44% of appointments were same-day appointments, but too few practices were consistently offering appointments within a fortnight.
To help free up appointments, we will ease pressures on GP practices by expanding the role of community pharmacies. I am pleased to announce that we have agreed a deal for an expanded offer over the next 18 months. Pharmacists will be able to prescribe certain medications rather than requiring a GP prescription. As well as other measures involving community pharmacists, we estimate that that will free up 2 million appointments. We are also changing funding rules to give freedoms to GPs to boost the number of staff to support their practice. We estimate that that measure could free up 1 million GP appointments.
For patients, we will make it easier for them to contact their practice, both on the phone—we are making an extra 31,000 phone lines available this winter, followed by further deployment of cloud-based telephony—and online, particularly through the NHS app. As I set out, we will also correct pension rules so that our most experienced GPs can stay in practice. By extending the emergency register, we are creating opportunities for people other than GPs to undertake tasks such as vaccinations.
On dentists, there are too many dental deserts. That is why we are setting out an ambition that everyone seeking NHS dental care can receive it when they need it. We have already started changing the dental contract to incentivise dentists to do more NHS work and take on more difficult cases. I pay tribute to my predecessors in this role for their success in beginning to tackle this long-standing issue.
We will also streamline routes into NHS dentistry for those trained overseas so that they can start treating patients more quickly. We will make it a contractual requirement for dentists to publish online whether they are taking on new NHS patients.
These measures, across a number of important areas, are the start, not the end, of our ambitions for health and care. They will help us to manage the pressure that health and care will face this winter and next, and they will improve these vital services for the long term. My priorities are patients’ priorities, and I will endeavour, through a powerful partnership with the NHS and local authorities, to level up care and match the expectations that the public rightly have. Whether you live in a city or a town, in the countryside or on the coast, this Government will be on your side when you need care the most. I commend this statement to the House.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I call the shadow Secretary of State.
Wes Streeting (Ilford North) (Lab)
I welcome the Secretary of State and her team to their new posts. I thank her for advance sight of her statement, but if any evidence were needed of a Government and party out of ideas, out of time and without a clue about the scale of the challenge that our country faces, the statement would be it.
The NHS is facing the worst crisis it has ever seen, with patients waiting longer than ever before in A&E, stroke and heart attack victims waiting an hour for an ambulance, and 378,000 patients waiting more than a year for an operation—and that was in the summer. We have gone from an NHS that treated patients well and on time when Labour was in office 12 years ago to an annual winter crisis, and now a year-round crisis under the Conservatives. But don’t worry: the Health Secretary has a grip on the key issues. She does not have an answer on the workforce, but she has sorted out the Oxford comma. I am sure that the whole country is breathing a sigh of relief about that.
The Health Secretary promised a digital revolution in the NHS. Well, Conservative Health Secretaries have promised a digital revolution 17 times since 2010. [Interruption.] Oh, apparently she did not say that—she is not promising a digital revolution. That is good news, because I do not think that the staff who are slogging their guts out in the most difficult conditions in history will be particularly impressed by the introduction of that cutting-edge modern technology, the telephone. The NHS can finally axe the carrier pigeon and step into the 20th century. I am sure that staff are absolutely delighted.
Madam Deputy Speaker,
“these measures will not come close to ensuring patients who need to be seen can be seen within the timescales set out…they will have minimal impact on fixing the current problems that general practice is facing over the winter”.
Those are not my words; they are the NHS Confederation’s verdict on the Secretary of State’s plans. Are they not the truth? The Secretary of State says that patients will be able to get a GP appointment within two weeks, but her party scrapped the guarantee of an appointment within two days that Labour introduced when we were in government. She made it clear this morning that it is not a guarantee at all, but merely an expectation—and what is the consequence if GPs do not meet her expectation? As we heard on the radio this morning, her message to patients is “Get on your bike and find a new GP.” Are patients supposed to be grateful for that?
Who will deliver the appointments that the Secretary of State is promising: the 6,000 GPs her party promised at the last election but will not deliver, or the 4,700 GPs her party has cut over the past decade? Where will these GP appointments take place? Certainly not in the 330 practices that have closed since the last general election alone. The Conservatives promising to fix the crisis in the NHS is like the arsonists promising to put out the fire that they started.
As if that were not bad enough, the super-massive black hole at the heart of the Secretary of State’s plan is the lack of a workforce strategy. She has no plan to provide the doctors that our NHS so desperately needs. Despite her “Sesame Street” approach to politics, in her A, B, C, D plan—by the way, last time I checked, S was for social care—she has missed the N for nurses. I say to the Secretary of State that without a plan to tackle the staffing crisis, she does not have a plan for the NHS. What is she going to do about the staff shortage of 132,000 in the NHS today?
The Secretary of State talks about £500 million to speed up delayed discharges. Is that a new investment or a re-announcement? She is right to say that if patients cannot get out the back door of hospital because care is not there in the community, we get more patients at the front door and more ambulances queuing out at the front. That is exactly where we are under the Conservatives today. But she misses the crucial point: unless the Government act on care workers’ pay and conditions, employers will not be able to recruit and retain the staff they need. What is her plan to address that?
Patients will have been concerned to read reports that after the Conservatives failed to hit the four-hour A&E waiting time target for seven years, the Health Secretary is planning to scrap it altogether. I notice that she was not brave enough to say that today; I hope that she will not do so. Can she reassure the House and patients across the country that her response to the crisis in the NHS will be not to lower standards for patients, but to raise performance instead?
The Secretary of State is the third Health Secretary in less than three months. The faces change but the story remains the same. There is still no plan that comes close to meeting the scale of the challenge—no plan for staffing and no real plan for the NHS. It is clear that the longer the Conservatives are in power, the longer patients will wait. As Dr. Dre might say: time for the next episode.
Dr Coffey
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his warm welcome to my ministerial team and me. It has been just two weeks—[Hon. Members: “Twelve years!”] Forgive me. Well, in those12 years there have been more doctors and nurses working in the NHS than ever before. We have record funding going into the NHS. The money that the Government spend through the Department of Health and Social Care is about 40% of our day-to-day spending. That is the reality of the Conservative party investing in the long-term health of our nation.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned a variety of things. I can absolutely say that there will be no changes to the target of a four-hour wait in A&E. I believe that it matters. I will give the House a recent personal experience. In July, I went to A&E myself; I waited for nearly nine hours to see a doctor, and I still did not get any treatment. I was asked to go back the next day, so I went to a different hospital just three miles away and was seen and treated appropriately. That is the sort of variation we are seeing across the NHS, and it is the reason for my approach.
Only last week we started getting some data from NHS Digital about what is happening practice by practice, so we can start to understand it and start to use experts in the local NHS to prioritise helping those patients who are not getting the service that they should rightly expect, while giving freedom to those other GPs who are doing a fantastic job of supporting patients in their practice. That is why I do not intend to be prescriptive, but I am determined on behalf of patients to drive up the performance of those who need help to do things better.
On ambulances, I am very conscious of the issue. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that we have been in power for 12 years, and I am conscious that I have been working for a decade on improving things for my constituents as well. With a particular focus on ambulances, I think it would be helpful for the House to learn about our recent analysis showing that 45% of the handover delays are concentrated in a part of the country. Even so, I appreciate that that is not good enough.
I also understand that although similar numbers of ambulance calls are being made, there are many more category 1 and 2 calls and our fantastic paramedics are treating more people at home without needing to take them to hospital. Nevertheless, that brings me the challenge of how we can do more to help ambulances get back on the road so that they can treat patients. As with many other emergency services, we also need to consider the potential extension of volunteers through auxiliary services or community first responders. In London alone there are about 120 community first responders, but I think I have more than that in my constituency of Suffolk Coastal. It is about recognising that for the million people who volunteered to help, we can find a way for them to help us during these particularly challenging times, as well as working with the NHS to tackle the fundamental issues.
On access to GPs, I am conscious that Labour introduced the 48-hour target when it was in power. We were told by the NHS and by doctors that of course they met it—I expect that was part of their contracts—but that it did not necessarily mean better outcomes for patients at their practice; indeed, they got into a routine of not booking appointments more regularly. It is important that we address that.
I am very conscious that the plan for patients has only just been published. I deliberately tried to ensure that we held back important aspects of it, such as the £500 million adult discharge fund, for the House’s interest rather than speaking about them before coming here today.
I can assure the hon. Gentleman that I am very happy to continue to work in partnership with the NHS. Keeping the focus on patients is critical, as is building on the existing NHS winter plan, developing the workforce, and all the plans and strategies that need to be carefully considered as we set about the long-term improvements that I think he will enjoy and will want me to champion on behalf of patients.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I call the Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee, Jeremy Hunt.
Dr Coffey
I thank my right hon. Friend. I remember supporting him from the Back Benches in his passion for the NHS, and I am absolutely committed to continuing that.
I think my predecessors may have committed themselves to publishing aspects of, or conclusions from, the workforce plan, but I assure my right hon. Friend that now that I have spent time focusing on the priorities, work on the plan is already ongoing and I hope to make progress on further elements today, working alongside my new ministerial team, so that we can maximise that progress.
One of the key things that I want to do is make it more straightforward for people—wherever they are in the world, as long as they are of sufficient quality—to be able to come and practise in England. I was astonished to learn that we cannot even allow people who are accredited in Scotland to come here straight away and practise as dentists. We will be laying regulations on the day we return from the recess, which will enable the General Dental Council, for example, to accelerate this aspect of streamlining so we can ensure that when high-quality doctors and dentists are accredited, anywhere in the world, we can take that into account and enable them to help patients in this country more rapidly.
Madam Deputy Speaker
I call the Scottish National party spokesman, Martyn Day.
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
Let me start by welcoming the Secretary of State to her new role and thanking her for advance sight of her statement.
There is no doubt that the NHS, in all four nations, is facing an incredibly difficult winter, with possible rises in covid infections alongside winter illnesses and increases in slips and falls, all of it while recovering from the dire effects of the pandemic and, now, an energy crisis. An inflation-busting uplift is vital to getting our health systems back into good shape, enabling them to get through this winter and support those in need. It has been estimated that the cost of living crisis will add £3.7 billion a year to the cost of social care alone, with far higher rises across the NHS generally. How does the Secretary of State justify her Government’s prioritising of bankers and tax cuts for the rich at a time when investment in public services is more essential than ever, and will she support the SNP’s call for an NHS uplift greater than inflation?
Dr Coffey
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his welcome. I think that one of the benefits of the United Kingdom is our ability to learn from each other, even with a devolved NHS. For example, we are borrowing, or copying, the pharmacist elements, and we will enact those in this country too. As the hon. Gentleman will know, owing to the Barnett formula the amount per head of population for the Scottish NHS is considerably higher—the health money passed over—but it is at the discretion of the Scottish Government to decide how to use that money to help patients.
The hon. Gentleman will be aware of our ongoing challenge: we want to work together as a United Kingdom in tackling global pandemics, and I look forward to working in preparation for that. He will also be aware that we accepted the recommendations of the independent NHS Pay Review Body in making our own pay recommendations. Let me pursue an example that he has just highlighted. When the Prime Minister was on the doorstep of No. 10 Downing Street she wanted to talk about growing the economy, because it is vital for us not to have managed decline, which would be challenging for the United Kingdom as a whole.
Obviously the Prime Minister was already minded to ensure that we had a generous package in respect of energy bills, but one of the tasks that confronted me and on which I worked was ensuring that that was extended to businesses and the NHS, and we have made it happen. One of the biggest concerns with which I was presented when we arrived was the possibility that people’s inability to afford energy bills would worsen the situation. I should like to think we have already addressed that, and today I have explained why it is important for us to focus on the ABCD to ensure that patients, too, receive the service that they deserve.
Dame Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)
I am deeply grateful to my right hon. Friend for her excellent statement. These are issues that are of concern to my constituents, especially the issue of primary care. I welcome my right hon. Friend’s approach of not providing prescriptive solutions to some of these problems, but, while ensuring that there is more access to data on waiting times for primary care appointments in particular, will she also consider more carefully whether patients should be allowed to move to a different surgery if they are unable to access such appointments on a timely basis? Otherwise, the data that she is producing will not result in any action for patients themselves.
Dr Coffey
I thank my right hon. Friend, and I agree with her that access to GPs is important. At present, we only publish data at the local NHS level—the integrated care board level—which is why I want to go further in relation to general practices. I know that the Minister responsible for primary care, my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince), wants to try to make it easier for people to change general practices. Of course, where people already have choice that may be possible now, but, understandably, I want to ensure that that fairly basic standard of provision for patients is a high priority across the country.
Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)
The statement from the new Secretary of State contained three paragraphs on care but not a word about care workers’ pay. I am gobsmacked, Madam Deputy Speaker. I wonder whether the Secretary of State has read the report produced by the Government’s own Migration Advisory Committee, which states:
“Persistent underfunding of the care sector…underlies almost all the workforce problems in social care…Higher pay is a prerequisite to attract and retain social care workers”.
Will she come back to the House with a workforce plan for care workers that will finally give them a decent pay packet?
Dr Coffey
As the hon. Lady will know, people access care, or work in the care industry, in different ways. That is why I am keen to continue the national recruitment programme, working with the Department for Work and Pensions. As for the £500 million that I have announced today, the local NHS, working with local trusts and local councils, will clearly be in a better position to decide, in a more differentiated fashion, on the best way of spending that money through not just buying packages but support for the sector. Let me also remind the hon. Lady that since last year we have changed the universal credit taper rate so that people keep much more of the benefits they may receive. However, I am also conscious of the need for us to continue to try and encourage people to come into the care sector, and that is a joint endeavour.
Damian Green (Ashford) (Con)
I welcome my right hon. Friend to her new post, and I welcome her statement. I especially welcome the social care discharge fund, but, as she knows, the problems of under-capacity in the care sector, which filter into the whole NHS, are not just a winter crisis but a chronic problem. May I therefore urge her to take seriously a suggestion from the leaders of the care sector—I know it is on her desk at the moment—that something equivalent to the Teach First system should be introduced in social care, so that we can get some of the brightest and best young people to take it up as a career in their early years of work? That would not solve the whole problem by any means, but it would be a significant step towards raising the status of the profession.
Dr Coffey
My right hon. Friend is correct to raise this strategic challenge, which I am confident that the Care Minister my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough (Neil O'Brien), will be looking at carefully. Recognising the challenge, the Prime Minister has set out clearly that she wants to see a rebalancing of funding within the health and social care system. I am sure we will make progress on achieving that, informed by how the £500 million fund will be spent and the outcomes it will produce.
Rosie Duffield (Canterbury) (Lab)
I, too, welcome the Secretary of State to her place and thank her for the four-page ABCD statement, but there were two letters missing from it: M and H—mental health. She is the fifth Health Secretary in my five years in the House, and in those five years I have seen hundreds of desperate families trying to access mental health services for young people in Kent. It can now take between two and four years to secure even an initial assessment. Many young people are sent out of Kent—to Leeds, Hertfordshire and Manchester—putting an additional strain on families already at breaking point. Please will the new Secretary of State help me and other Kent MPs get at least beds or assessments for our desperate constituents?
Dr Coffey
Of course, the statement and the plan published today build on many of the other activities already under way. For me, it is about setting up priorities on how I think we can best help the majority of people in this country. I am very conscious of the challenges on mental health and provision. I have seen them myself locally as a constituency MP. The Minister responsible for mental health and public health, my hon. Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Dr Johnson), will be focusing on this important aspect. On the hon. Lady’s local situation, I think it is a case of trying to sort a meeting with the integrated care board to address how it will be delivered locally.
Maggie Throup (Erewash) (Con)
I know that my right hon. Friend is committed to reducing the NHS backlog—the B in her plan. Does she agree that it is far better for patients and productivity to prevent ill health, and that robust policy to tackle obesity, a condition that is proven to increase the chance of suffering from diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer, has an important role to play in addressing the B of her ABCD? Will she commit to focusing on prevention as a key part of her strategy as we move forward?
Dr Coffey
Indeed. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend, who was successful in being a Health Minister. I am conscious that ABCD has caught the attention of many people because it has aspects of real focus, but prevention is of course at the heart of what we do so that people do not need to turn to the health service at all for treatment. That is why we will continue with aspects of the strategy to make sure that people have better care and that it is both strong and resilient for their physical and mental health.
Sir George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab)
I welcome the Secretary of State to her new responsibilities, which, as she has pointed out, are very challenging. I agree with her that there are too many dental deserts. She will perhaps be aware of recent BBC research that revealed that one of those dental deserts is the whole of the Liverpool city region, where not one dental practice is taking on new NHS patients. What measures will she be taking—in the short, medium and long term—to address this disgraceful situation?
Dr Coffey
I set out in the plan today what we are seeking to do with dentists. First of all, it is the role of the local NHS—the ICB—to take responsibility for such provision, and I expect it to do so. I alluded to the contract earlier. We have started to make some changes—only very recently, admittedly—whereby, instead of it being more profitable for a dentist to do NHS care only on extraction or cleaning of teeth, rather than the more complicated elements, we need to make sure that more dentists are offering NHS provision. On other dental practice features, we need to make sure that people are using their qualifications to their full extent by undertaking particular procedures. For example, some people might not be full dentists, but they will have trained as technicians and will be able to undertake care of children. There are different levels and we need to continue to go into the detail, but, practice by practice, I am going to have to work with the NHS locally a lot more in order to unveil that opportunity.
Several hon. Members rose—
Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I warmly welcome the Secretary of State to her role and wish her all the best. Her predecessor talked about a new cancer agenda. Could she indicate whether that is in the offing, and will it be accompanied by a genuine cancer workforce plan? Will it involve what my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Maggie Throup), the former public health Minister, rightly mentioned about prevention in respect of obesity, the second biggest cause of cancer in this country, and, obviously, smoking, the biggest preventable cause of death in this country?
Dr Coffey
I thank my hon. Friend. The Prime Minister has said at the Dispatch Box that we will proceed with the cancer plan. I will, of course, be looking carefully at the other plans with my colleagues. Indeed, the Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care, my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince), has agreed to meet my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine) to talk this through further.
Sir Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)
I congratulate the Secretary of State and will miss her visits to the Work and Pensions Committee. I welcome her recommitment to the four-hour A&E waiting time target—I think she is right about the importance of that. She mentioned in her statement the forthcoming NHS workforce plan. When does she expect to be able to publish it?
Dr Coffey
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his warm welcome and I will, of course, miss our interaction on DWP issues. As I said to my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Surrey (Jeremy Hunt), my predecessors committed to publishing the conclusions of the plan. I am still looking into this particular matter, and we still need to finalise and develop it.
Mrs Heather Wheeler (South Derbyshire) (Con)
I welcome my right hon. Friend to her two new jobs. That is absolutely excellent. I speak on behalf of South Derbyshire residents. She may not know this, but a seventh of all new houses built in England last year were built in South Derbyshire. Could she please use South Derbyshire as a pilot for rolling out more GP services and more dental services?
Dr Coffey
I thank my hon. Friend and appreciate her warm welcome. The House will be aware that, in effect, GPs and, indeed, dentists are private and independent practitioners. This is important. On primary care, we have already seen reasonably good success with the NHS getting doctors right across the country. I think there is a lot more to be done on dental care.
Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD)
This is not a plan; it is an ABC of Conservative failures. GPs are now seeing almost 12% more patients than they were just five years ago; the GP sector is facing a retirement timebomb; and one in five patients can only see a GP for less than five minutes. Patients need to have more fully qualified GPs. The Government set themselves a target of 6,000 by 2024. Have they now just given up?
Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
It is not the fault of successive Conservative Secretaries of State that every time they come forward with a plan, the queues just get longer, the NHS asks for more resources, and more people have to be imported from abroad. The fault is with the system: the last example of collective planning and socialist central control, and ever more targets, like today. It simply does not work. Will the Secretary of State—the Conservative Secretary of State—have an open mind to looking at the social insurance systems of France, Germany and Italy—[Interruption.] Opposition Members can mock but, to be frank, the health outcomes in those countries are far superior to ours. People are fed up with paying all their life and being at the end of the queue. It should not just be the rich who can access private healthcare.
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
My constituents face intolerable delays in A&E, for an appointment, for referral for mental health treatment, or for an ambulance. Those who work in the NHS face plummeting morale, effective pay cuts and staff shortages. The Secretary of State’s response is to aspire to a GP waiting time that is seven times longer than Labour actually achieved. Is it not the case that the NHS is not, has not been, and never can be safe in Tory hands?
James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)
I welcome the Secretary of State to her place. As she considers her priorities, does she agree that we still need to focus on early intervention? I particularly commend the Start for Life programme, which is designed to help young mothers in family hubs. We should not lose sight of that priority as she tackles the other issues in the NHS.
Dr Coffey
I thank my hon. Friend, including for the work he undertook as a Minister in the Department of Health and Social Care. I am conscious of the importance of that care and would be very happy to meet him, along with my right hon. Friend who contacted me today about that issue, in order to make sure that we provide not just emergency services but, as my hon. Friend rightly points out, some of the clinical care where an extended intervention is needed, to make sure that we get proper care overall.
Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)
For some years now, and at any given time, my local hospital has had the equivalent of around one ward of patients who cannot be discharged because of a lack of social care for them. London has the largest shortfall of care workers of any region in the country. It is September—we are on the edge of winter. How will the Secretary of State’s plan ensure that local authorities are able to meet pay and conditions expectations in order to fill that shortfall of care workers and enable our hospitals to concentrate on new patients, as they should?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
It may be helpful if I explain that I am trying to call people first in this statement who perhaps did not get in during the last statement.
Selaine Saxby (North Devon) (Con)
North Devon has a more elderly than average population, with very low unemployment. While I warmly welcome my right hon. Friend’s plan for patients, will she detail how we can recruit for the numerous vacancies we have in dentistry, pharmacy, nursing and social care, especially given the lack of affordable housing available, mostly driven by the surge in holiday lets and second homes.
Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)
I welcome the Secretary of State to her new role. I heard her say earlier that she wants to encourage people to go into social care. Does she appreciate that the main thing discouraging people from going into social care is the very low wages, and that this is a particular issue during a cost of living crisis?
Dr Coffey
That will vary according to the provision that has been in place. I am sure the right hon. Lady will want to be careful and considerate in how she addresses the local NHS in order to tackle the issue of patients who do not need to be in hospital, in order to help them with some of the features that they enjoy.
Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)
I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement. Does she agree that although we are terribly grateful to people from overseas who are among the very best, kindest and most compassionate of carers, we must ensure that we grow our indigenous workforce, and that to do so, it has to be financially competitive for those people to work in the care sector and a professional career structure must be open to them? If that does not happen, we will not make any inroads into the 13,500 beds that are currently occupied by people who should not be in hospital—who need to be in homely settings in the community—ambulances will continue to queue around the block, and frail elderly people will not get the care they are entitled to.
Dr Coffey
My right hon. Friend is right to consider the issue on a broader scale, but of course, we will be focusing on that with the local NHS. There are certainly some parts of the country where there is not the same provision and discharges are not happening to capacity, while in other parts of the country there are extraordinary amounts. That is what we need to focus on locally.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)
Yesterday, the County Councils Network produced a statement saying that there is a crisis in social care, which echoed the findings of the Select Committee on Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. The Secretary of State’s announcement of £500 million is welcome, but all it does is replace the funding stream that was cut in April, and will do exactly the same job. When is she going to recognise the enormous financial gap that councils are facing and the poverty pay that is not attracting care workers into the sector, and actually come forward with a real policy? If she wants the money, why not cancel the cut in corporation tax and use that funding to create real benefits for people in social care?
Ruth Edwards (Rushcliffe) (Con)
I strongly welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement. It has been great to see how elective surgery hubs around the country are helping to tackle the backlog; however, we are yet to have one in Nottinghamshire. I ask my right hon. Friend to look kindly on Nottinghamshire’s bid for a new elective surgery hub. Will she meet me to hear the many merits of its case?
Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)
I welcome the Secretary of State to her new role. With nine out of 10 dental practices in England not accepting new NHS patients and over 2,000 dentists having left the NHS in the past year alone, NHS dentistry is in crisis. While today’s small changes are welcome, as were the minor tweaks announced back in July, they are underwhelming given the scale of the crisis. When will the Secretary of State complete a full reform of the contract, with prevention at its heart, so that my constituents can access an NHS dentist when they need one?
Dr Coffey
The hon. Lady is absolutely right, and I completely agree with her: it is a real problem. We have started making some changes already, but we need to do so in more detail right across the country. My hon. Friend the Minister responsible for dentistry will be looking into that more intensively.
Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
In Gloucestershire, the inability to discharge people from hospital because of inadequate social care is the primary reason why we have ambulances queuing, so I welcome the adult social care discharge fund that the Secretary of State has announced. Can she set out how that £500 million is going to be allocated, so that Gloucestershire’s local NHS will know how much it can expect and can work with Gloucestershire County Council to improve matters for my constituents?
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)
Some 41% of my constituents with a cancer diagnosis are now waiting more than two months for their first treatment. We know that every four weeks that people with a cancer diagnosis wait for treatment means a 10% reduction in their chance of surviving it—this is killing my constituents every single day. There are quick, sustainable fixes that could make a difference, one of which is an up-front investment in radiotherapy now. Will the Secretary of State agree to meet me, the all-party parliamentary group for radiotherapy and key clinicians, so that we can help her get to grips with this problem and save my constituents’ lives?
James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)
I warmly welcome my constituency neighbour to her new dual role. I am grateful for her statement and, in particular, her commitment to work closely with the independent sector. She will be aware that figures show that as many as one in 10 adults in England have used the private sector in the past 12 months. Does she agree that without that waiting lists would be even higher? Will she therefore consider the reintroduction of tax relief on private medical insurance, which was first introduced by Ken Clarke in 1989 and was scrapped by the Labour party?
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
The Secretary of State spoke about the importance of prevention and the impact of the cost of living crisis on health and wellbeing. Will she therefore work with colleagues across government, including those from the Department for Work and Pensions and from local authorities, to maximise the take-up of the Healthy Start scheme, which can address both maternal and child health and wellbeing, and help families with living costs?
Helen Whately (Faversham and Mid Kent) (Con)
I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement, particularly her focus on access to GPs and on tackling ambulance waits, and her recognition of the importance of social care, including with the £500 million discharge fund. Will she also assure me that she will be taking forward our reforms to social care, not only the cap on social care costs, but increasing the scrutiny of care locally, to drive up quality and make sure that care workers are paid fairly?
Imran Hussain (Bradford East) (Lab)
Two weeks to see your GP—is that a target or joke? I know how many of my constituents will see it. Surely the Health Secretary will understand that we must first address the underlying rampant health inequalities in many of our cities. In that regard, will she lend her support to Bradford’s levelling-up bid for £20 million for grassroots, transformational, community-led health centres, which will make sure that we make a real difference to tackling health inequalities in our district?
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)
Will the Secretary of State meet me and other Members, no doubt including my hon. Friend the Member for South Derbyshire (Mrs Wheeler), whose areas face particular difficulties over access to general practice as a result of tens of thousands of new houses having been built, with more coming, without the commensurate increase in general practice capacity?
Dr Coffey
I know that my hon. Friend has been concerned about this issue for some time. As I have set out, GPs are, in effect, independent and we cannot force people to be in a particular part of the country. However, I know that the NHS has been working to target and bring doctors into places where there are not that many other doctors. I know that the primary care Minister will be happy to meet him.
Paula Barker (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab)
Anyone marking the Secretary of State’s A, B, C, D homework would give her an F—an F for failing—as nothing we have heard today addresses the biggest threat to our NHS: the workforce crisis. The shortage of doctors, nurses and care workers is compromising patient safety and driving morale through the floor. So will she explain why the Government are yet again failing to address that and why she has talked today about volunteers and medics coming out of retirement, as surely the Government should be investing in a proper workforce strategy and also increasing the amount of people going through training?
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
I strongly welcome the statement and congratulate the Secretary of State. She will be aware that Princess Alexandra Hospital has among the highest A&E levels per head in England and that we are in the first wave of the new hospital programme. Will she set out the timing of that programme? Will she meet me and my neighbouring MPs, one of whom is the Deputy Speaker in the Chair at the moment, to discuss the hospital programme and set out the timetable, so that the residents of Harlow can be assured about it?
Dr Coffey
I am sure that the Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care, my right hon. Friend the Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick) would be happy to have a meeting on this occasion and to investigate that. It is important that Ministers get on with the creation of both new diagnostic centres and hospitals. I intend to work on Project Speed to make sure we get these hospitals right across the country under way.
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
In the past year, I have witnessed a seven-year-old having to be locked in a classroom because they were a danger to other pupils and heard from the mother of a nine-year-old who hospitalised their sister. They, along with thousands of other children across the country struggling with their mental health, are languishing on waiting lists for months, if not years. So when the Secretary of State says,
“this Government will be on your side when you need care the most”,
those words are meaningless to the parents who come to my constituency surgery week in, week out. Will she give them hope, and make the mental health of children and young people a priority for this Government?
Bob Seely (Isle of Wight) (Con)
I welcome the Minister’s priorities on GP appointments, pharmacies and dentistry, which are important for Islanders. May I make her aware of the specific needs of what her Department calls “unavoidably small hospitals”? We have 12 in England and Wales, covering 20 mainly Conservative constituencies, of which St Mary’s is the most isolated. We have done good work on improving funding, but there is more to be done to ensure fairness and equality. So will she or her Ministers meet me and other right hon. and hon. Members to discuss what more can be done to ensure support for these small hospitals, which are so important for our communities?
Dr Coffey
I believe it is in the Isle of Wight where we have a particularly difficult challenge as many patients are still in hospital who do not need to be there. I know we have asked the local NHS to start working with the council on how we can get that discharge going, and I know how important it is to make sure that the hospital can function readily.
Jon Trickett (Hemsworth) (Lab)
This year, I have been in acute care, as have two members of my family; we were in four great Yorkshire acute hospitals. In many encounters with staff, whom I thank deeply for the work they have done, it was clear that they are universally wonderful but that the system is under stress. They were emphasising to me two basic principles of the NHS. The first was that nobody should make a profit from another person’s illness. The second was that the speed of treatment should be directly related to the gravity of the illness and not to the size of someone’s wallet. Will the Secretary of State confirm that she stands by those two principles? Finally, when will those staff get a rise?
Dr Coffey
GPs, dentists and pharmacists are all independent contractors, and it is up to them how they best manage and help patients. I am setting clear expectations on that. Furthermore, on pay uplift for people in the NHS, the Government have accepted the independent pay review body recommendation, and that is what we will be doing.
Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend for her excellent statement and her focus on the A, B, C, D. But none of that will be delivered without E—effort. I refer to the effort our vital nurses put in to keeping the NHS rolling, which will be vital in delivering on her plan. Will she join me in thanking them and encouraging them to get behind this plan as soon as possible?
Dr Coffey
I thank my hon. Friend, and I agree. We recognise and accept that, after the pandemic, there are still significant issues to address, and that is why this national endeavour is really important and why we want people to help. That is also why we have extended some of the measures we had during covid for a further two years, so that people can come back more readily to help the NHS. It is important that we strain every sinew to make that happen.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
I note the Secretary of State’s comments about hospital discharge. As she will know, the Government legislated through the Health and Care Act 2022 for a process known as discharge to assess, whereby people’s social care needs assessments can take place after they have been discharged from hospital, rather than before, and that model was already being used under the Coronavirus Act 2020. However, when I asked the Government last May what assessment they had made of the number of patients who had been readmitted within 30 days, I was told that they did not hold the data centrally. It is vital that the Government understand the clinical outcome of this policy, so will the Secretary of State please commit to gathering and publishing that data?
Dr Ben Spencer (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con)
I welcome my right hon. Friend’s announcement today. Healthcare providers in Runnymede and Weybridge tell me that the biggest challenge they face is recruitment and retention. Driving that is the fact that staff are being poached by London. London can offer London weighting, but we face equal, if not sometimes higher, living costs. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the NHS needs more flexibility when setting staff remuneration, and will that form part of the measures she will announce in the upcoming plan on expanding the workforce?
Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)
Under the last Labour Government, patients were guaranteed a GP appointment within 48 hours, but when the Conservatives came to power they scrapped that standard. This is all part of the managed decline of our NHS. After 12 years, GP numbers are down, and more than 300 GP practices have closed since 2019 alone, with many of my constituents unable to get a GP appointment when they want one. Does the Secretary of State agree that the 2019 Tory manifesto promise to deliver an extra 50 million GP appointments and over 6,000 more GPs is not worth the paper it is written on?
Laura Trott (Sevenoaks) (Con)
I welcome the statement today. The majority of GPs—75%—now work part time. That is an understandable choice for them, but we need to be honest about the impact it is having on the availability of appointments and the cost of training. Will my right hon. Friend look at what she can do to address the barriers to more GPs working full time?
Dr Coffey
It is a choice for GPs whether they work part time or full time. I am conscious that some of the different things we are doing, including on pension flexibilities, should help, as should diverting people so that they do not have to go to GP appointments but can use pharmacies and other approaches.
Charlotte Nichols (Warrington North) (Lab)
This morning I met the Warrington and Halton Hospitals NHS Trust regarding its bid for a new hospital in Warrington, which is desperately overdue. Our bid is through to the final stages of the Government’s tendering process, but there is concern that timetables are increasingly slipping, putting the bid at risk and driving delays in treatment because the current facilities are not fit to meet the need we have locally, despite the best efforts of our NHS staff. Will the Secretary of State therefore please confirm that the Government still intend to honour the previous Government’s plans for new hospitals and that these decisions will be made without further delay?
Steve Double (St Austell and Newquay) (Con)
I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement. The NHS in Cornwall faces a unique set of circumstances, because we are a rural peninsula with an ageing population. However, the impact of tourism also means that, in terms of pressure on the NHS, it is always winter in Cornwall. Does the Secretary of State recognise the unique challenges we face in Cornwall? Will she or one of her Ministers meet me and other Cornish MPs at the earliest opportunity to discuss what support we can give the NHS, not just to get through this winter but to get ahead of the summer season next year?
Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)
Last month, my constituent Alan Suthers phoned 999 at 7 in the evening. His wife had suffered a stroke. He knew the signs—face, arm, speech, time—and the urgency of medical care. That care arrived five hours later, at 1 o’clock in the morning. The Health Secretary can have all the ambitions, expectations and targets she likes, but does she agree that she will not have the human resource to achieve them unless she addresses the workforce strategy and the 132,000 vacancies that currently exist in the NHS?
Dr James Davies (Vale of Clwyd) (Con)
I welcome this plan for patients, which recognises the importance of data in the NHS in England. My right hon. Friend will be aware of extreme concern over the state of the NHS in north Wales. Will she therefore affirm her commitment to UK-wide compatible and interoperable data in the NHS and the potential for the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill to bring that about?
Dr Coffey
I thank my hon. Friend, who is a practising GP and who is very committed to his constituents as their MP as well. He will recognise that the NHS in Wales is run by the Labour Government there. However, he is right to point out that it is important that we work across the United Kingdom by sharing information and putting patients first, and we will continue to work to try to make sure that happens.
Several hon. Members rose—
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
As one exasperated constituent put it, having not been able to get a GP appointment,
“It seems there are too many patients and not enough doctors and this has gotten worse over the last few years.”
My constituents can grasp the workforce issue, but it seems that the Secretary of State cannot. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern) that it is deeply worrying that the new Secretary of State did not mention the pay of care staff, when that is the crucial issue if we are to tackle the 160,000 vacancies in the care sector. Will the Secretary of State tell me why the Government are choosing not to tackle the shortage of doctors, nurses and care staff, which is leading to such long wait times for my constituents?
Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)
I welcome the greater use of pharmacies to ease pressure on GPs. However, with ongoing treatment, it is essential for patient safety that GPs can see what has been prescribed through the pharmacy module on the GP system. At present, community pharmacists do not have access to it. Will the Secretary of State unlock it?
Dr Lisa Cameron (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) (SNP)
I welcome the Health and Social Care Secretary to her place. As chair of the all-party parliamentary health group, I have been hearing from people right across the United Kingdom that it is face-to-face appointments with GPs that are really required. Communication by telephone or Zoom is difficult especially in relation to clinically sensitive issues and mental health issues and also for people with autism who find it very difficult to speak through those modes of communication. Can she reassure the House that face-to-face appointments will be a priority going forward?
Dr Coffey
I thank the hon. Lady for her question, but I trust doctors to have that relationship with their patients directly, rather than my prescribing or mandating a particular approach. With greater transparency and the publication of a lot of this data, we will gradually see that happening more and more, but it is important that I do not directly say that x, y or z have to be seen by a doctor. Clinical need should be what matters.
Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)
It is welcome to hear that D is for dentists. As a constituency neighbour, my right hon. Friend is very much aware that there is a crisis in NHS dentistry in Suffolk. There have been some improvements, and it is welcome, as she has said, that work has started on a new NHS dental contract. Can she confirm that she is committed to root and branch reform, which also includes fair funding, a strategic long-term approach to recruitment and retention, a proper prevention policy and transparent and full local accountability?
Dr Coffey
My hon. Friend is right. In his constituency —in Lowestoft in particular—there has been increasing provision. Meanwhile, in Leiston, not a single dental practice will take up the opportunity to provide NHS dental care at the moment. I entirely accept that the matter needs sorting. That is why we will be putting the priority on the local NHS to make sure that we avoid these dental deserts. In terms of other aspects of the contract, they will continue to evolve.
Several hon. Members rose—
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)
Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker. When someone has cancer, every day is an emergency. Weston Park Cancer Centre in Sheffield does outstanding work, treating patients not just from my region, but from right around the country. I have been grateful to previous Secretaries of State and other Ministers for their engagement on securing the investment needed for the urgent refurbishment of Weston Park. Will the Secretary of State give me an undertaking that, along with her Ministers, she will continue to work with me to do everything that we can to support Weston Park in its important work?
Dr Coffey
I do not have specific details about that matter, but I know that my right hon. Friend the Minister of State would be happy to follow up on that with the hon. Gentleman. I am very conscious about the impact of cancer. That is why, instead of having a 48-hour target, which would predominantly be predicted by emergency diagnosis from GPs, I want that to be a broader target, so that people who are showing symptoms and are concerned about seeing their doctor have that assurance that they will be seeing their GP, so that diagnosis can start as quickly as possible, particularly on issues such as cancer.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Thank you. That concludes the statement.
Tributes to Her Late Majesty the Queen
Thérèse Coffey Excerpts(2 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Speaker
I now invite the House to resume its tributes to Her late Majesty. I expect to conclude tributes at 10 o’clock, when I shall invite Ministers to move the motion for a Humble Address to His Majesty. A hundred and eighty-two Members contributed yesterday, and many want to contribute today. I hope Members will therefore keep to the informal time limit of three minutes. I invite the Deputy Prime Minister, Dr Thérèse Coffey, to speak.
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for allowing Ministers to participate in this debate. I really appreciate it, and I know that my constituents from Suffolk Coastal will, too.
Her late Majesty the Queen was a constant across the decades. As a child, I remember the silver jubilee; there were also celebrations for the golden, diamond and platinum jubilees, and commemorations of VE Day. The Queen brought the nation together at sad times, including for events at the Cenotaph, but there was also celebration of what makes our country great. The very first time my mother watched television was the coronation. Somebody nearby in her town of Wrexham bought a TV, and people came from the surrounding streets to watch the Queen being crowned.
The Queen’s impact was felt right around the world. I saw that when I was Minister of State at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. In Kenya, in Uganda, and wherever I went, the Queen was held in the highest regard, and there were always representations made to her. Her impact was felt in world war two as well; I think of the broadcasts by the princesses. As a youth, in 1995—a long time ago—I went as a representative of the United Kingdom to the Anne Frank house, where there were pictures of the princesses. In her diary, on 21 April 1944, Anne Frank wished a happy 18th birthday to Her Royal Highness Princess Elizabeth of York, and wondered to which prince they would marry off this beauty. I am confident that our new King will also have that constancy, and that impact around the world, not only because of his work on the environment, but because he will sincerely continue the traditions of his mother.
Turning to Suffolk Coastal, I pay tribute to Rendlesham’s savvy parish council, which always puts on its parish fête on the same day as the trooping of the colour so we get the line-up of all the flypasts, whereas many other places pay for it. The Queen seemed to have a particular affection for Benjamin Britten and opera; she opened the 20th Snape Maltings festival in 1967, and when it burned down a couple of years later she came back to, in effect, reopen it. That affection carried on. Her love of music may not always have been evident, but people in this Chamber and elsewhere will know the special arrangement of the national anthem written by Benjamin Britten. Her love of music was further attested to by the fact that she authorised the name of only one other person on the coinage of the realm: Benjamin Britten.
I want to say on behalf of the people of Suffolk Coastal how much they will miss Queen Elizabeth II, and to pledge their loyalty and support to King Charles III.
European Union (Withdrawal) Act
Thérèse Coffey Excerpts(6 years ago)
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Mary Creagh (Wakefield) (Lab)
As we pass the witching hour, we are all still present and correct. I have never spoken in the Chamber after midnight. I feel that a pumpkin may appear, and some small mice may come out. Perhaps they come out later; I do not know how the pest control is doing. [Laughter.] That woke everyone up.
Let me begin with a French phrase. Qui sème le vent récolte la tempête: who sows the wind reaps the whirlwind. We are in this debate, in this position, in this Parliament, with no good options before us. We have only bad options and less bad options, after two years of negotiating what I believe has always been a fantasy Brexit. I think that David Cameron has a huge amount to answer for. He opened the Pandora’s box of English nationalism with his promise of a referendum, and the genie cannot easily be put back in the bottle. The Europe issue has defeated every Tory Prime Minister since Edward Heath. Thatcher, Major and Cameron all left because of Europe, and I fear that this Prime Minister may well be undone by it as well.
Let me be clear: I will not be voting for the Government’s draft agreement. I did not vote for a referendum; I voted to remain; and I was one of only three Labour MPs with leave seats who voted against triggering article 50. I feared that the Government had no idea what they were doing. I feared that they would call a general election and waste valuable negotiating time, and so it came to pass.
Let us not forget that that election was intended to crush the saboteurs. Members were called Luddites and people who wanted to disrupt democracy. However, the election did not crush the saboteurs. The election was tough, but it was not tough on those who, like me, opposed the Government’s approach to Brexit. It was tough on the causes of Brexit: the years of austerity, the grinding poverty, the creaking public services, the endless belt-tightening for families, the explosion of food banks, the public squalor that we see with homeless people sleeping on our streets and the shrinking of the state. The electorate were tough on the Conservative party. The Prime Minister, as I had feared, wasted six months and lost her majority. Then she came back to this place and, in the Lancaster House speech, showed that she had learnt nothing, setting out red lines on leaving the customs union and the single market.
And so, one by one, like layers of onion peel, the promises of the leave campaign have fallen away, leaving the people with tears, broken promises, and less trust in politicians than ever before. We have a political declaration with 585 pages, which is full of hope, exploration and best endeavours—full of warm words—but which signifies very little and which places the UK firmly as the weaker negotiating partner after we leave. We will be removed from all EU databases, and we face the prospect of a backstop border in the Irish sea.
Minutes were issued after the European Council’s approval of the withdrawal agreement—the so-called interpretative declaration. Rather like the Prime Minister, who has to come and translate everything for the House of Commons, the European Council has had to translate what that really means for Spain and Cyprus. According to the declaration, article 184 of the withdrawal agreement states only that we should use our best endeavours to cover the territories named in article 3. What are those territories? They are Gibraltar, the Cyprus sovereign bases and Britain’s overseas territories. We will use our best endeavours, but there are absolutely no guarantees in law that those territories will be covered in the withdrawal agreement, and, effectively, Spain has a veto over Gibraltar.
I am concerned that our environmental obligations are at risk of being breached, and the Government now have an unprecedented constitutional and administrative task before them. They have passed just five of the 13 Acts of Parliament they need to enact before Brexit. They have 700 statutory instruments, just 45 of which have gone through Parliament, and goodness knows what faces us when we come back in the new year.
This morning at 10 o’clock, I chaired the Environmental Audit Committee and we heard from the chemicals industry about the fact that it has spent half a billion pounds registering some 6,000 chemicals with the EU’s chemical database, and the Government are now expecting it to spend a similar amount re-registering the same registrations all over again with the Health and Safety Executive, which has no experience with public health or the environment. I am delighted to see the environment Minister in her place.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dr Thérèse Coffey)
The HSE is already very experienced. It is the competent authority on behalf of the European Chemicals Agency, or ECHA, in this country, but would the hon. Lady prefer that the future UK chemical regulation system did not have the information on which the ECHA is currently reliant?
Mary Creagh
Perhaps the Minister should take the time to meet the chemicals industry and listen to its concerns. It described Ministers’ approach to this problem not so much as strategic, but as being a view from the moon as it is so far away from the reality it is facing. I exhort the Minister to read the Hansard transcript. The intellectual property of the ECHA database is the subject of a great deal of argument and legal concern. I exhort her to read the details of what we heard this morning.
We have been calling for a new environmental Bill. We do not want to go back to being the dirty man of Europe, and we know that 80% of the UK’s environmental laws originate from the EU. They mean we bathe on cleaner beaches, drive more fuel-efficient cars and can hold the Government to account on things like air pollution. We are still waiting for the draft environment Bill; it is a bit like waiting for Godot—we never know quite when it is going to turn up, a bit like with the waste and resources strategy, which we are also waiting for.
These EU environmental laws such as the chemicals database cannot simply be cut and pasted into UK law. The Minister’s Department is setting up this new chemicals database. This is the foundation industry on which British manufacturing, aerospace motoring and electronics are based and it is at risk because of what is happening.
Mary Creagh
The Minister shakes her head: she is wrong; read the Hansard. These regulations are brought to life when they are held by regulators, the Commission and the ECJ and backed up by sanctions, and the Minister’s proposals do not allow stakeholders and the public to have a say in which chemicals are approved and which are not.
The cakeism, the cherry-picking and fudge before the summer will not work as we head into winter. We are promised this brave new world of free trade areas, but what the Prime Minister does not tell people is that it means less free trade with our nearest neighbour, it means shrinking our economy, and it means a backstop down the Irish sea.
For the past 40 years, we have worked together with our partners and allies to develop great social and environmental standards, and the EU has been the longest and most successful peace process the world has ever seen. There is no deal the Prime Minister can do that is as good as what we have now, and we are living in strange days when we have three votes—[Interruption.] I have listened to the Under-Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, the hon. Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris) and others on the Government Front Bench—[Interruption.] Calm down. We have had three defeats for the Government today, and we are going through the motions. We know this deal is going down. My constituents in Wakefield were promised something totally different. The Government are unable to deliver on their promise. That is why we need to put this decision back to the people before they pay the price.
Conflict Decisions and Constitutional Reform
Thérèse Coffey Excerpts(10 years, 6 months ago)
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Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Mr Graham Allen (Nottingham North) (Lab)
It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Weir. Thank you for opening our proceedings. There could barely be two more fundamental issues for our country than thinking about or actually being at war, and the state of the Union. Where the Union goes is probably more relevant now than at any other time in my lifetime in politics, and we will watch anxiously and with great interest for the result of the referendum in Scotland. We are trying to pre-empt that. If people want to be taken seriously in their views on the Union, they cannot wait for circumstance; they must build their position on principle. The Select Committee on Political and Constitutional Reform was keen to put into the field the concept of a constitutional convention in order to give people that opportunity.
These two issues are important, but before I go into them, I should say that I am willing to take interventions throughout my speech, as I know that several colleagues have to get away and might choose to intervene rather than make a speech.
Mr Allen
First, I want to pay tribute to my Select Committee and its members. For the last four years, we have worked diligently on these issues, and I hope that we have a reputation for working sensibly, crafting answers and working in partnership with Government. Although we are occasionally disappointed by the fruits of that partnership, we are none the less ever hopeful of making progress on numerous issues by working with Parliament and Government constructively, rather than grandstanding and getting nowhere. I pay tribute to the members of my Select Committee, a couple of whom—very distinguished Members—are with us here.
Mr Allen
For the convenience of Members, I asked the powers that be whether it would be possible to take the two together, which will allow people such as the hon. Lady to catch their trains back to their constituencies if they intervene early, rather than having to wait for the second debate. I thank the Chair for assistance in that.
If I may, I will introduce the first of the two topics: Parliament’s role when the country goes to war. It is an onerous responsibility, and in many ways we have been relieved of it over the years, because the Executive, exercising their control over the legislature, have often not bothered to involve Parliament. In a modern democracy, that is no longer a tenable way to run our affairs and govern ourselves. For me, the most obvious abuse of the system—one that demonstrated that a new, clear, honest and open relationship between Government and Parliament was necessary—came with the events around the Iraq war.
As our troops were gathering in the desert, it was pretty evident—every news channel was certainly briefed—that something was going to happen and that serious engagement was going to take place, but Parliament had gone into recess. I and numerous others were keen for Parliament to return and have a debate and discussion. Our Prime Minister was popping off to Camp David for regular discussions with President George W. Bush, who was keen to go into Iraq, yet our own Parliament had not been convened. Members of this House from all political perspectives and with all views on Iraq were not allowed to vocalise those views in the forum of the people.
It got to such a point that I and others organised petitions to the then Speaker to reconvene the House. They fell on deaf ears, and it became evident that in fact it was not within the power of the Speaker to recall Parliament; he could only do so at the behest of the Government. Perhaps my Committee needs to have another look at how Parliament is recalled. The power vested in Government was obviously not being used to request that the Speaker recall the House. I remember that it got to the point where I asked whether it would be possible for a Member or many Members to get together and hire, rent or be given permission to use a place to have our own debate, without having to recall the full panoply of the House. Of course, that was dismissed without a thought. We were getting ever closer to war—to a decision that some of us felt would make millions of terrorists, rather than reduce the chances of global terrorism. It was a very important question—not a little bush fire war, but a regional war that would have consequences for decades, possibly centuries—but no, the House could not come back.
I started to organise a way for my colleagues in all parts of the House to create their own parliament, to give Members of Parliament a chance to get together and voice the concerns that were clearly out there among the British people. We hired Church House over the road. I asked Members if they wanted to come to our parliament—a Members’ parliament, rather than an official Parliament—and we got to critical mass when a majority of the non-payroll vote replied “Yes” to the invitation to Church House. The former Speaker, Jack Weatherill, agreed to put down his name as speaker, with the proviso, which he and I discussed, that every Member who attended had at least 10 minutes on their hind legs to say what they felt about the impending war, even if that meant—this is the first time you will hear me say this, Mr Weir—an all-night sitting, something I opposed when we, thankfully, won the battle on that issue many years ago. Everybody would stay there, and Lord Weatherill would sit there, until everybody had had their say.
Even that did not get Government to reconvene Parliament. What did was that I communicated with the BBC, which agreed to cover the parliament in Church House gavel to gavel, as the BBC called it—from the opening moments until the close. Within a matter of hours, I received a phone call from the then Leader of the House, Robin Cook, who told me that the Government were going to reconvene Parliament.
We should not have to do that. Members of Parliament should not need to organise their own parliament to consider such issues. It is an abuse of our democracy that that takes place. Although in the end there was a vote, despite the biggest rebellion in a governing party in British political history, people on the payroll vote sided with the Prime Minister of the day, and people were threatened, intimidated and cajoled into supporting the Prime Minister. Sadly, my soon-to-be good friend, the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith), who was then the leader of the Conservative party, led most of his troops through the Prime Minister’s Lobby, although the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) and many others, including Liberal Democrat Members, sided with the incredibly large number of Members of Parliament who said that now was not the time, and that the case, importantly, was not proven.
Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)
This is a matter of the gravest importance, in that the decision that we took in March 2003 resulted in the deaths of 179 British soldiers. Even now, 11 years later, we do not know the full truth of how Parliament was bribed, bullied, and bamboozled into voting—
Paul Flynn
Yes, all those words I would be happy to defend. Does my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) think that the fact that, even now, we are being denied the—
Mr Mike Weir (in the Chair)
I think that the hon. Gentleman was making a debating point. I do not think that he was suggesting that Parliament as a whole was bribed in any way, and I do not think that that is a point of order.
Mr Allen
I will have to put the hon. Gentleman on the naughty step if he carries on.
I would like to move on to the report issued by my Select Committee on the need for a constitutional convention for the United Kingdom, on which I will be happy to take interventions from colleagues.
Dr Thérèse Coffey
I apologise to the hon. Gentleman and other Members: I mistakenly thought that a meeting with the Serjeant at Arms and the superintendant at 2 o’clock had been cancelled, so came to the debate. Before I go, I wanted to check on a point of correction. Page 6 of the report refers to the vote rejecting the motion by 332 to 220. My recollection—and I have just checked Hansard—is that that was the vote on the manuscript amendment tabled by the Leader of the Opposition, and that the main motion was defeated by 285 votes to 272. I remember that so vividly because it was probably the most extraordinary moment I have experienced in the Chamber in my four years as a Member of Parliament.
Mr Allen
I am happy to accept that as a statement of fact. It certainly was an interesting moment. The Prime Minister gave an incredibly statesmanlike response. In a short statement, he gave those of us who believe in democracy a great boost, because although some may say that there was technically a little confusion or muddle, the House had very clearly spoken, and he dealt with that excellently. Of course, that had repercussions, which thankfully mean that now, as the leader of Syria is undergoing a steady rehabilitation in the eyes of many people—it is all relative, of course—we are not enmeshed in a situation with great difficulties on all sides. Instead, we are adopting a position that is not going to replicate the awful consequences we see in Iraq on a daily basis.
There are no easy decisions in this field. Any people who pretend that everything would have been wonderful had we gone to war are people whose judgment is not of great value. Such decisions are incredibly difficult, but through the Syria vote the House indicated a way forward that the Prime Minister accepted. He made absolutely the right decision.
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
I shall make a short contribution. As I mentioned earlier, I had anticipated not being able to participate. This is such an important debate, and I am slightly disappointed that more Members are not here, but we all know that people like to go back to their constituencies.
I take a different view from some of the hon. Members who have spoken today. What happened on 29 August 2013 is a matter of regret. More people have been killed since then than in the years running up to it. Nevertheless, as has been articulated, the House spoke and the Prime Minister responded graciously by recognising the voice of Parliament.
The reason why I have already drawn hon. Members’ attention to page 6 of the report, and why I am speaking, is that I do not agree with the Committee’s central premise, on the grounds that we have imperfect information, and in those circumstances, any decision becomes a judgment call. Furthermore, when I wrote to or contacted by e-mail many of my constituents to get a view, a lot of the issues in the responses that said “Don’t vote for this” related to the Iraq war. People felt that Parliament had been misled—I am not suggesting that it had—and we know that apologies were subsequently made about the 45-minute claim. I was not then a Member of the House, but I have a strong political memory of the seriousness of the potential situation. The claim was later retracted, although the retraction did not feel very public, if that makes sense. Those who were Members at the time say that if they had known that what was claimed was not the case, they might have voted differently. If my hon. Friend the Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray) was still present, it would be interesting to have a semantics debate on that point.
Members of Parliament have to make a judgment on what is presented to them at the time. To be fair, although I cannot remember which witness—Lord Wallace of Saltaire, perhaps—restated the point that as a rule the Attorney-General’s advice is not disclosed to Parliament, last year the Attorney-General did disclose parts of the advice in order to help some Members come to a judgment. However, there was seen to be so much double questioning of the intelligence services, that I thought it was a sad day, in a way. In effect, Parliament and a lot of our constituents who contacted us—principally through the 38 Degrees campaign website—seemed to lose faith in our intelligence services; if they did, that is a worrying sign for Parliament.
I believe that to declare war on others is the prerogative of the Queen—the sovereign—advised by the Prime Minister. Going back to what happened last August, that was not the motion we voted on; indeed, the Prime Minister did not seem to be setting that out. Even on the day of the debate, however, he was limited in what he was able to share with the House and, to some extent, people again had to make a judgment call.
I do not endorse the comments in the report, although it was thoroughly done and I respect the views in it, because I am concerned about the stage towards which we are moving. I am starting to hear regular comments such as, “Why aren’t we spending more on defence?” but there is a greater reluctance to see our armed forces engaged in action at all. There is an interesting judgment to be made there, too: do we need such a large defence budget if that is the expressed will—rather than the actual will—of all our constituents?
I will leave that point there, except to say that we do not have perfect information. I still think that we should try to trust our intelligence services and the good people in the Government. We are all Members of the House, but at the end of the day they have had access to more information than the rest of us. Perhaps more Privy Counsellors should be made aware of the knowledge available at the time—that might be a way forward—but if the Committee’s proposal is ever put to Parliament, my instinct will be to vote against.
Mr Allen
The hon. Lady is making a rational and sensible contribution, which echoes many of the debates that we had in Committee before we came to our position. I need to reassure her immediately that there is no blanket need for some sort of armchair guesswork in Parliament before anyone is deployed in a zone of activity. On many occasions, the Executive—the Government—will have to respond quickly. When the hon. Lady was at her previous appointment, I mentioned that if bombs were falling on London as we were speaking, we would not check the time and say, “See you next Tuesday. Let’s have a chat about it.” We would want our people up in the air and responding. I put on the record again, for her benefit, that our recommendation is not clear-cut and black and white. That is why, through engagement with the Government and Parliament, we could find a form of words that satisfied not only me but, perhaps more importantly, the hon. Lady if she came to vote on a motion of that sort.
Dr Coffey
I respect what the Chair of the Select Committee says. I will leave that point about conflict and speak briefly on the convention.
My last memory of a constitutional convention is the one pertaining to the European Union. Under the leadership of Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, the great and the good met, including hon. Members on behalf of the House—I am trying to remember which ones; it was perhaps the hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart) and the former Member for Wells. We all know what resulted: a constitution, in a huge, thick book, including a huge transfer of powers, with no popular endorsement in most countries. Even when certain countries had a vote, they were invited to vote again when they got the wrong answer. In this country we expected a referendum on that constitution, which, but for a few niceties of minor detail, suddenly became the Lisbon treaty. There was no popular vote to endorse it.
I am glad that the Government introduced the European Union Act 2011, so that we will have a vote on any major transfer of powers. I am pleased that the Opposition now have policy proposals to go even further, with an in/out referendum on every single potential transfer of powers. I prefer the solution favoured by the Conservative party—I will not say by our Government—which is to have a decisive referendum in a few years’ time. That is why I am anxious about the idea of another European Convention.
I recognise the work in the report on how we should engage people more. Members of Parliament continuously try to engage their constituents in issues of the day. Let us be clear, however, that even on the most contentious issues, when we have had votes in the House, less than 1% of my electorate have contacted me. The challenge will be interesting.
I recognise that there is growing anger about the so-called English question. I question, though, whether regional devolution is what matters. Regional assemblies have already been rejected resoundingly up in the north-east; proposals for a mayor have been rejected in most of our cities, when put to the vote; and in consequence, we almost have a happy medium on most things involving local government in England, with the exception, I would argue, of the imbalance in the size of constituencies. It still amazes me that when I ran for election against the hon. Member for Wrexham (Ian Lucas) in 2005, there were fewer than 50,000 electors, in a constituency where all those powers have been devolved; I now represent 77,000 electors in a place where all the powers are essentially within the English Parliament. That issue needs looking at, but whether it needs a constitutional convention I am not sure.
Ged Fitzgerald, the chief executive of Liverpool city council, made the following point when he was interviewed in 2012—I mention Liverpool a lot, because I grew up there. In essence, 91% of Liverpool’s revenue is based on Government money, so the local population feel a lack of empowerment. Contrast that with many other councils whose Government-sourced income is less than half of their total income, meaning that they have to levy a lot of often unpopular charges. Councillors feel those things more, which is why they are so adept at lobbying MPs and the Government to get a fairer funding settlement for local government. I suggest that one of the ways we should go about that is to work towards a situation in which no council relies on the Government for more than—I am plucking a figure out of the air—60% of its budget. We have made a step in the right direction by reducing the grant, and substituting it with the proportion of business rates retained. I may be wrong about this, but I think that the budget in Liverpool, with the business rates, was higher this year than it was last year, although not in real terms.
Dr Coffey
The hon. Gentleman is shaking his head, so I will accept that. I will do some more work. It is, however, right that we put power back more locally. I simply sound a note of caution. I grew up in Liverpool in the 1980s. That is why I became a Conservative: it is thanks to Derek Hatton. When the council had control of all the different levers, dare I say it, a lot of tax rates went up and a lot of people and businesses left. It is one reason why the population dropped suddenly, as those people went to other areas around Liverpool to escape the high-tax regime.
I apologise to hon. Members: I said I would speak for a short time, but this is probably one of the longest speeches I have made in Parliament. The topics are interesting, and having two debates in one is a novel and wonderful idea.
Debate on the Address
Thérèse Coffey Excerpts(10 years, 6 months ago)
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Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)
This Friday we will mark 70 years since the Normandy landings, when wave upon wave of allied forces poured on to the beaches of northern France. They marked the beginning of the final chapter of the second world war, which preserved the freedoms that we enjoy today, so I want to start by honouring the service of those veterans and the memory of their fallen comrades—a feeling that I am sure is shared across the whole House.
I am sure that across the House today Members will also want to remember and pay tribute to the work of our armed forces over the past decade in Afghanistan. At the end of this year, British combat operations will come to an end. We should be incredibly proud of the service of our armed forces in that country. They have fought to make Afghanistan a more stable country, a country with democracy and the rule of law, and a country that cannot be used as a safe haven to plan acts of terrorism here in Britain. We grieve for the 453 members of our armed forces who have been lost, and our thoughts are with their families and friends. All of them and all the people who have served have demonstrated, as did our Normandy veterans all those years ago, that they represent the best of our country.
By tradition, at the beginning of each parliamentary Session we remember the Members of the House we have lost in the last year. In January, we lost Paul Goggins. He was one of the kindest, most honourable people in the House and someone of the deepest principle. At a time when people are very sceptical about politics, Paul Goggins is a reminder of what public servants and public service can achieve.
Let me turn to the proposer of the motion. The hon. Member for Portsmouth North (Penny Mordaunt) gave an excellent speech—so far, so good. It had a sense of history, a sense of place and a sense of humour. From reading about her background, she can only be described, as we saw from her speech, as one of life’s enthusiasts. Before coming to this House, she had a varied career. She was a magician’s assistant when a teenager and then had a job that was nearly as dangerous—running the foreign press operation for President George W. Bush.
The hon. Lady made headlines for her recent appearance on “Splash!”, to which she made reference. If she will allow me, I will quote her admirable line in self-deprecation about her performance:
“I have the elegance and drive of a paving slab”.
I say unequivocally today that that is wrong. As she got to the quarter finals, I am not sure what that says about the contestants who were knocked out before her. It certainly takes guts to get in a swimming costume and dive off the high board. If she is looking for a new challenge, she should try wrestling a bacon sandwich live on national television. In any case, it is clear that she deserved her place on the podium today.
The seconder of the motion made an eloquent speech. The hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke) came to this House with more than 20 years’ teaching in further education and the Open university behind her. Since being elected in 2001, she has campaigned with distinction on children’s issues and has been an assiduous local Member of Parliament. She voted against tuition fees, has described being in the coalition as terrible and says that the Lib Dem record on women MPs is dreadful. By current Lib Dem standards, that apparently makes her a staunch loyalist. On gender representation, she can take consolation from the fact that she can now boast that 100% of Liberal Democrat MEPs are women. As she said, she will be standing down at the next election. For her outside experiences, her wisdom and her all-round good humour and kindness, which I remember from when I was first elected to this House, she will be much missed.
Before I turn to the Loyal Address, let me say something about one of the most important decisions for generations, which will be made in just a few months’ time—the decision about the future of our United Kingdom. The history of the UK, from workers rights to the defeat of fascism to the NHS to the minimum wage, is the story of a country stronger together—a country in which representation from Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and England has helped us to advance the cause of social justice. It is a decision for the people of Scotland, but I believe passionately that this kingdom should remain united.
The ritual of the debate on the Loyal Address has existed for centuries. Today we do not just debate the Queen’s Speech; we assert the importance of this House and the battle it has fought over hundreds of years to exercise power on behalf of the British people. But what the recent elections show is that more than at any time for generations this House faces a contemporary battle of its own—a battle for relevance, legitimacy and standing in the eyes of the public. The custom of these debates is to address our opponents across the Dispatch Box, but today that on its own would be inadequate to the challenge we face. There is an even bigger opponent to address in this Queen’s Speech debate—the belief among many members of the public that this House and any party in it cannot achieve anything at all.
About 10% of those entitled to vote at the recent elections voted for UKIP, but as significant is the fact that over 60% did not vote at all. Whatever side we sit on in this House, we will all have heard it on the doorstep—“You’re all the same. You’re in it for yourself. It doesn’t matter who I vote for.” Of course that is not new, but there is a depth and scale of disenchantment that we ignore at our peril—disenchantment that goes beyond one party and one Government. There is no bigger issue for our country and our democracy, so the test for this legislative programme, the last before the general election, is to show that it responds to the scale of discontent and the need for answers.
In this election we heard concerns about the way the EU works and the need for reform. We heard deep-rooted concerns about immigration and the need to make changes, but I believe there is an even deeper reason for this discontent. Fundamentally, too many people in our country feel that Britain does not work for them and has not done so for a long time—in the jobs they do and whether hard work is rewarded; in the prospects for their children and whether they will lead a better life than their parents, including whether they will be able to afford a home of their own; in the pressures that communities face. and above all whether the work and effort that people put in are reflected in their sharing fairly in the wealth of the country.
The Governor of the Bank of England gave a remarkable speech last week, saying that inequality was now one of the biggest challenges in our country. We should all be judged on how we respond to this question, right as well as left. There are measures that we support in this Queen’s Speech, including tackling modern slavery, an ombudsman for our armed forces, and recall, but the big question for this Queen’s Speech is whether it just offers more of the same or whether it offers a new direction so that we can genuinely say that we can build a country that works for all and not just for a few at the top.
For me, this task starts with the nature of work in Britain today. It is a basic belief of the British people that if you work all the hours God sends, you should at least be able to make ends meet. We all, on all sides of the House, say in our slogans that those who work hard and play by the rules should be rewarded for what they do, but we should listen to the voices of all those people who say that their reality today is that hard work is not rewarded and has not been for some time. All of us on all sides will have heard that during the recent election campaign, such as from the person I met in Nottingham who was struggling with agency work and total uncertainty about how many hours’ work he would get. This was his working life: every morning at 5 am he would ring up to find out if there was work for him. More often than not, there was none. He had a family to bring up.
The fact that this is happening in 21st-century Britain, the fourth richest country in the world, should shame us all. This is not the Britain that that man believes in, it is not the Britain we believe in, and it should not be the Britain this House is prepared to tolerate. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] We have seen the number of zero-hours contracts go well above 1 million. We need to debate as a country whether this insecurity is good for individuals, families and the country as a whole. It is not.
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that we need to continue to create more and more jobs, but one of the things we have to make sure of is this: we have just reduced national insurance by £2,000 for employers, so will he now rule out any increase in employers’ or employees’ national insurance?
Edward Miliband
I believe we actually called for that proposal first, but I say to the hon. Lady that there are two schools of thought on the recent experience of the election, one of which says that this country is fine and the economy is fixed. I do not believe that that is the message of the recent elections.
Oral Answers to Questions
Thérèse Coffey Excerpts(10 years, 8 months ago)
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Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
1. What discussions he has had with the New Anglia local enterprise partnership on devolving powers and responsibilities to that partnership.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Greg Clark)
In the last 10 weeks, I have travelled across England to meet with all 39 local enterprise partnerships. As part of those visits, I had a very productive discussion with the New Anglia local enterprise partnership in Ipswich on 25 February, where we discussed its strategic economic plan.
Dr Thérèse Coffey
I welcome the positive discussions that my right hon. Friend the Minister had with the New Anglia LEP. May I urge him to make sure that we get the full responsibilities and powers that the New Anglia LEP board is seeking in order to accelerate the economy in East Anglia? Will he also pay tribute to Andy Wood, who is giving up as chairman of the LEP this coming Monday?
Greg Clark
I will certainly pay tribute to Andy Wood. He is the chief executive of Adnams, one of the biggest and most prestigious businesses in East Anglia, and he has done a fantastic job, not only in negotiating two city deals but in laying the foundations for what is—having discussed it with him—a very ambitious local growth deal that will build on the success that the economy is experiencing in East Anglia and create many more jobs and apprenticeships.