Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Clarke Excerpts

Wednesday 11th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. Of course we still have more work to do to get young people into work. Overall, however, 1.4 million more people are now employed in the private sector and we have a historic, record level of women in employment, and the number of people in work is almost up by 1 million since the election, with unemployment lower than at the election and long-term unemployment down on a year ago. We still have more work to do, but we are heading in the right direction. We have to keep on track and keep working to help business to take people on.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

Q8. Will the Prime Minister tell us why people with mental illnesses are being kept in police cells?

[The Prime Minister]

We are making efforts to try to bring that to an end through better working between the NHS and the police. This has been a long-standing problem under Governments of all colours for a very long time, but we are having those discussions to try to make good progress.

Syria and the Use of Chemical Weapons

Tom Clarke Excerpts

Thursday 29th August 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I will take one more intervention.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

Will the Prime Minister reflect on the question from my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) on the humanitarian situation, not just as it might appear in the future, but as it happens now, with thousands of refugees going to neighbouring countries? Given that aid agencies such as CAFOD have said that this is the worst situation of the 21st century, how can we be absolutely sure that we will not add in the neighbouring countries, including those in north Africa, to the problems that we are facing?

[The Prime Minister]

The right hon. Gentleman makes an extremely important point, and we should be proud in the House and this country of the massive role that aid agencies and British aid money are playing in relieving this disastrous humanitarian situation. We are one of the largest donors, and we will go on making that investment because we are saving lives and helping people every day. But we have to ask ourselves whether the unfettered use of chemical weapons by the regime will make the humanitarian situation worse, and I believe that it will. If we believed that there was a way to deter and degrade future chemical weapons action, it would be irresponsible not to do it.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Clarke Excerpts

Wednesday 27th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I will look very carefully at what my hon. Friend has said. It is certainly true that the levels of conditions such as spina bifida have come down and that folic acid has an important role to play. I shall look at the specific points he makes and the bureaucratic problem he identifies and perhaps get the Department of Health to write to him about it.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

Q11. With respect, I make no apology for returning to an issue that my colleagues have raised. A letter from my constituent reads:“I am disabled, wheelchair dependent; suffer from brittle bones, require day and night assistance from Social Services and therefore I need a spare room on health grounds. I feel suicidal about this bedroom tax.” Will the Prime Minister, in consultation with the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, agree to put the needs of disabled people first and revisit what is turning out to be a disastrous policy for hundreds of thousands of disabled people and their families?

[The Prime Minister]

This Government always put disabled people first; that is why we have protected disabled people’s benefits. On the specific issue the right hon. Gentleman raises, there is a £50 million fund to support people who are affected by the under-occupancy measure. Disabled adults will have access—[Interruption.] The Opposition do not want hear it, but this directly answers the point. Disabled adults will have access to the discretionary housing payment scheme and it will remain for local authorities, including the right hon. Gentleman’s, to assess the individual circumstances. It is worth making the point again that there is a £23 billion budget, which has increased by 50% over the past decade. We have to do something about the growth in the housing benefit bill, but all we hear is irresponsibility from the Opposition.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Clarke Excerpts

Wednesday 19th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Last but not least, I call Tom Clarke.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

Many people watching our proceedings will be interested in the issue of fuel poverty, but they might be a little confused by the Prime Minister’s reply a few moments ago to my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley). Will he confirm—let us be transparent—that, as one body has advised, approaching 9 million households suffer from fuel poverty, which is the highest since records began? Will he explain to the House and our constituents, as we approach Christmas, what the Government are prepared to do about the horrible scandal of fuel poverty?

[The Prime Minister]

The right hon. Gentleman is entirely right that fuel poverty is a scandal and that it needs to be dealt with, but I do not believe the figures he gives are correct. The figures I have show that, in 2012, it is expected that 3.9 million households will be in fuel poverty. However, as I have said, we are committed to tackling fuel poverty. That is why we have maintained the winter fuel payments; why we have increased the cold weather payments and kept the increase permanent; and why we are investing in the Warm Front scheme and the warm home discount. The green deal will make a real difference—[Interruption.] I hear chuntering from Opposition Front Benchers. They promised to abolish fuel poverty, but they put it up.

House of Lords Reform Bill

Tom Clarke Excerpts

Monday 9th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I will make a little more progress and then give way again.

First, let me take the myths in turn. I have heard the accusation that the reforms will be too quick and too abrupt and that the Bill amounts to some frantic act of constitutional violence. The truth? These reforms would be implemented over about 15 years. New Members would be appointed or elected in three tranches over three elections. The political parties and groups would have maximum discretion over how to reduce their existing numbers.

I have heard it said that the modernised Lords will cost the earth. The truth? Taken as a whole, and once completed, the Government’s reforms of Parliament will be broadly cost-neutral.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

rose—

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I will give way later.

The additional costs attached to running a reformed House of Lords—which, incidentally, are much more modest than some of the estimates doing the rounds—will be offset by the saving from reducing the number of MPs. Once all this is implemented, the real-terms cost of running Parliament is expected to be roughly the same as it is now; the only additional cost will be conducting the elections themselves.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

If I may, I will make progress on the issue of primacy.

To ensure that there is a rock-solid legal backstop, the Parliament Acts will remain. We have reaffirmed those Acts in the Bill to make that point crystal clear. The Government will still be based in the Commons, the appointed element of the new Chamber means that it will never be able to claim greater electoral legitimacy, and the Commons will, of course, continue to have sole responsibility for money Bills.

[Mr Tom Clarke]

The Deputy Prime Minister has referred on a number of occasions to the Joint Committee on which I and other colleagues served. Does he think that it best served the purposes of reform when the Government declined, despite our encouragement, to give us any information about funding and refused us legal advice in the form of the Attorney-General?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I pay tribute to the right hon. Gentleman for his work on the Joint Committee. As I hope he knows, we have published the costings of our proposals in full and in detail. Everyone can scrutinise them line by line. Of course, we were not in a position to provide him with a line-by-line analysis of the costings at that stage because we were waiting to change the Bill in view of the conclusions of the Joint Committee. Without finalising the Bill, we could not finalise the analysis of the costs.

Debate on the Address

Tom Clarke Excerpts

Wednesday 9th May 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I very much respect the work—often painstaking, careful and difficult—that the right hon. Gentleman did in a range of different roles to try to move House of Lords reform on. He is absolutely right that all parties are divided on this matter—we should be frank about that—so we will only achieve reform if people work together. I do not believe that a pre-legislative referendum is a good move. On the whole, that is a weapon that has been used by slightly unsavoury regimes over the years. On the question of a referendum more generally, I will merely say that every political party went into the election with a pledge to reform the House of Lords so I do not personally see a referendum as having much to recommend it. The House of Commons can discuss this matter and the House of Commons must decide. If we are going to achieve reform, we will have to work together across the parties to try to deliver what I think will be progress for our constitution—a reformed and smaller House of Lords.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

The Prime Minister might be aware that I was one of those who, since last July, served on the Joint Committee that considered the future of the House of Lords. We were not given any indication of the Government’s thinking on funding or costing. Can he tell us today what costing has taken place on the proposal in the Queen’s Speech and will he share that with the House?

[The Prime Minister]

Certainly, the cost of a stand-alone referendum would be significant and it is worth taking that into account.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Clarke Excerpts

Tuesday 24th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Attorney-General]

The hon. Gentleman makes a very important point, perhaps missed by other questioners —that there are different kinds of economic crimes, some of which move into serious organised crime as well. That is why it is so important for the Government to give this matter a high priority. As I said to the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell), that is precisely why my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and others, as well as me, have been focusing on how to deliver the best outcome to cover the sort of thing that the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) has spoken about, while also ensuring that the financial end of serious crime is tackled correctly. I am very confident that we are going to come up with the right solutions.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

Will the Attorney-General assure us that the Serious Fraud Office will not be swallowed up by the national crime agency, relegating fraud and corruption to third place after terrorism and organised crime?

[The Attorney-General]

I am absolutely confident—because of my own commitment and that of my fellow Ministers to this matter—that the area of crime the right hon. Gentleman identifies is of the highest priority to the Government. That is precisely why it is being discussed. I can reassure him—and I will stand by it when the time comes for announcements—that the outcome will commend itself, I hope, widely across the House.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Clarke Excerpts

Tuesday 1st March 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

This is a very important issue. As it happens, since April last year the Information Commissioner has had the power to impose a penalty of up to half a million pounds for serious breaches of the Data Protection Act, and that applies to internet companies who misuse personal data. The commissioner can also serve information notices and enforcement notices, apply for warrants, pursue prosecutions and accept undertakings. As my hon. Friend may know, the commissioner has issued a code of practice for collecting personal information online. Finally, he might be interested to know that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills are working on updating the relevant regulations and are considering extending the powers of the Information Commissioner and the sanctions available when privacy is breached.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

T2. Will the Deputy Prime Minister give the House his definition of front-line policing? If he cannot, does he understand that the House will have great difficulty in believing that he can protect essential services?

--- Later in debate ---

[The Solicitor-General]

I understand the point of frustration that my hon. Friend raises. The Law Officers are not here to direct judges on what to do in any given case, but the CPS and the police need to co-operate to make sure that relevant evidence is put before the court so that it can make a decision based on its application of the facts to the law and the sort of cases to which my hon. Friend refers happen on fewer occasions.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

9. What steps he plans to take to ensure that the outcome of the comprehensive spending review will not have an adverse effect on the provision of services by witness care units.

[The Attorney-General (Mr Dominic Grieve)]

The Crown Prosecution Service is committed to ensuring that the provision of services by witness care units is protected. Future funding for witness care units will still be made from the CPS baseline budget along with the commitment that also comes from the Ministry of Justice. Consequently, the outcome of the comprehensive spending review will not have an adverse effect on the provision of those services.

[Mr Clarke]

I thank the Attorney-General for his reply. Has he made representations to the Home Secretary to ensure that the police input into funding, which is extremely important, continues in respect of witness care units?

[The Attorney-General]

It is my experience, from the importance that the Home Secretary attaches to ensuring that witnesses and victims are properly cared for, that she gives this matter considerable priority. I have not been made aware of anything that suggests that my Department’s work will be adversely affected in this area by anything being done by the police, but I will certainly raise the matter with my right hon. Friend. If she or I can provide the right hon. Gentleman with some reassurance, I am sure we will be happy to do so.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Clarke Excerpts

Wednesday 19th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I can give my hon. Friend that assurance. The failure of top-down housing targets was that they not only created huge unease around the country but did not result in the building of very many houses, as house building fell to such a low level. Our more local version will make sure that where councils go ahead and build houses, they will benefit from doing so.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

While we all welcome the comparative calm during the referendum in southern Sudan, does the right hon. Gentleman accept that hundreds of thousands of southerners are seeking to move back home from the north? Will he ensure that they have the maximum protection as well as the maximum of humanitarian aid?

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Clarke Excerpts

Wednesday 24th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I call Secretary Michael Gove to make a statement.

[Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. [Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. First, I say to the right hon. Gentleman that points of order come after the statement, and secondly, I appeal to right hon. and hon. Members who are leaving the Chamber to do so quickly and quietly, so that we can hear the statement from Mr Secretary Gove.