Business of the House

Valerie Vaz Excerpts

Thursday 22nd October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)]

Will the Leader of the House please give us the forthcoming business?

[The Leader of the House of Commons (Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg)]

The business for the week commencing 2 November will include:

Monday 2 November—General debate on covid-19.

Tuesday 3 November—Remaining stages of the Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill.

Wednesday 4 November—Consideration of Lords amendments to the Agriculture Bill, followed by consideration of Lords amendments to the Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill, followed by motion to approve the draft Blood Safety and Quality (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, the draft Human Fertilisation and Embryology (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, the draft Human Tissue (Quality and Safety for Human Application) (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020 and the draft Quality and Safety of Organs Intended for Transplantation (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020.

Thursday 5 November—Debate on a motion on coronavirus business interruption loan schemes, followed by general debate on the UK Government’s role in ensuring innovation and equitable access within the covid-19 response. The subjects for these debates were determined by the Backbench Business Committee.

Friday 6 November—Private Members’ Bills.

The provisional business for the week commencing 9 November will include:

Monday 9 November—Second Reading of the Financial Services Bill.

[Valerie Vaz]

I thank the Leader of the House for the business next week and for the motion extending proxy voting until 21 March. I do not know whether he has heard the outcome of the Public Health England visit, but I say again that the voting queues are not safe. On Monday, as we were walking round and round, it felt like something out of the book “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich”. We want remote voting because it is safest for Members and, most importantly, for staff, and it is quickest for staff behind the scenes.

The Leader of the House continually talks about democracy and “Erskine May”, but he is excluding Members from taking part in debate at this really difficult time, because some of them are in tier 3 areas that are in lockdown. Will he please reconsider remote voting? It is just for the pandemic, not for life. He will know that proxy votes do not count as a quorum for private Members’ Bills on Friday. We know that more than 25% of Members have proxy votes. I wonder whether he could consider, perhaps through the usual channels, a fairer way of enabling Members to take part via a proxy, so that those votes are not wasted.

Again, there is no update from the Foreign Secretary on Nazanin, Anousheh and Luke Symons, even though Iran is now in its third lockdown and other countries are having some success.

They came for our public money and wasted it. The Government have already spent £12 billion on Test and Trace, and yet they have accounted for only £4 billion, with the private sector consultants being paid £7,000 a day and everyone saying that this is a failed Test and Trace programme. The worst thing is that the Care Quality Commission has been told that its inspectors cannot have weekly testing when they go into care homes. That is one of the most important jobs that needs to be done at this time. Could we have a debate on the whole Test and Trace programme? Who is getting the money? Let it be laid bare. It is difficult to get answers from the Government. Even if we table written questions, the responses are taking a long time to come back. The Government need to be accountable for public money during this pandemic.

Then they came for the Labour Mayors. The Government are now dictatorially moving areas from one tier into another. The Mayor of Greater Manchester has brought everybody together. The Conservative leader of Bolton Council, the hon. Member for Bolton West (Chris Green), who has resigned as a Parliamentary Private Secretary, and the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale West (Sir Graham Brady)—a really serious person who has been in the House for a long time and is chair of the 1922 committee—have all said that they want to do the best for their community in Greater Manchester. On Tuesday, in response to the hon. Member for Hazel Grove (Mr Wragg), the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care said:

“the cases were shooting up before we took action and then levelled off.”—[Official Report, 20 October 2020; Vol. 682, c. 1032.]

It would be nice to know what figures he is using. If cases are levelling off, why are the Government taking this action?

Let us look at the facts. Liverpool city region has received £44 million; that is £29 per person. Lancashire has received £42 million; that is £28 per person. After three months of restrictions, Greater Manchester was offered—by text—£22 million; that is £8 per head. Will the Government publish the funding formula behind those decisions? The shadow Chancellor, my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds), has called it a “phantom” formula.

Then they came for the trade unions. The union learning fund is about to be abolished, at such an important time. It was established in 1988, in the time of Margaret Thatcher. It is one of the most successful learning, training and reskilling projects currently running in British industry. It is value for money. For every £1 invested, there is a return of £12.30, with £7.60 going to the worker taking part and £4.70 going to the employer. The Trades Union Congress said that it contributes £1.4 billion to the economy at a cost of £12 million. Can we have an urgent statement on that decision or a reversal of it?

Yesterday marked the 54th anniversary of the Aberfan disaster when 116 children and 28 adults lost their lives. There was a one-minute silence on Wednesday at 9.15. We must remember them.

Our thoughts are also with my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi), who is in hospital after testing positive for covid-19. We wish her well, as we do my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson), who is an assiduous attender in the Chamber, and all other Members who may not have said that they have got covid.

Yesterday, the deputy leader of the Labour party, despite grieving for her aunt, Anne Irwin, who died of coronavirus last week, came to the Chamber and said:

“I come here wanting the Government…to succeed, because lives literally depend on it.”—[Official Report, 21 October 2020; Vol. 682, c. 1081.]

We say that there is another way: Labour in Wales’s two-week circuit break and £300 million package, just as was done in New Zealand. The Prime Minister of New Zealand memorably said that the tooth fairy was an essential worker, and we congratulate Jacinda Ardern and Labour party on their historic landslide victory. As they in New Zealand, “Mihi.”

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I hope the right hon. Lady will provide a translation for the benefit of Hansard.

[Valerie Vaz]

Congratulations.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The right hon. Lady kindly translated not only for the benefit of Hansard but for me. I believe the Prime Minister has also congratulated the Prime Minister of New Zealand.

I absolutely align myself with the right hon. Lady’s remarks on the anniversary of Aberfan. I am sure it will be remembered. It was a great tragedy, and it was acted on, with most coal tips removed for safety reasons. I also very much join her in sending best wishes to the hon. Members for City of Chester (Christian Matheson) and for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi). The hon. Lady is an assiduous campaigner, and the work she has done on Primodos is of fundamental importance. I supported her strongly from the Back Benches, and I hope that she will soon be back to resume her effective campaigning and holding Government to account.

On the union learning fund—£1.4 billion on £12 million? That sounds a little bit exaggerated. One can always find experts to come up with some figures if they are asked. With that sort of return, they ought to be in my former profession of investment management rather than in a union learning fund.

As regards the Manchester issue, the Government have provided £60 million of taxpayers’ money, not £22 million. In Lancashire, Liverpool and South Yorkshire, agreement was reached with the Mayors, whereas in Manchester we had this ridiculous fandango with the Mayor pretending he did not know when he had been told by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government hours earlier. It was as if he was trying to go on the stage. It was the most ridiculous prancing performance that one could imagine when he should have been seriously trying to help the people of Manchester, which is what Her Majesty’s Government were doing. I am afraid he was playing party politics of the cheapest and most disagreeable kind, whereas people such as the Mayor of the Liverpool city region, who was clear in his political opinions when he was in this House, were able to work with the Government and put aside party political differences. He has shown himself to be a model of how to behave.

As regards Test and Trace in care homes, 120,000 test kits are made available to care homes on a daily basis, so the Government are doing everything they can to ensure testing in care homes. Of course, it is expensive to set up a system from scratch—that is not something people should be surprised about—but the system is now testing up to 300,000 people a day from zero earlier in the year, because nobody knew that Test and Trace would be needed. One should recognise that significant achievements have been made. Of course, I accept that it is expensive.

I will, once again, take up the issue of Nazanin, Anousheh and Luke Symons with the Foreign Secretary. I do so every week on the right hon. Lady’s behalf. She is right to carry on raising it. The Government are doing what they can, but obviously there are limits to what the Government can do when dealing with foreign regimes that are undemocratic.

As regards remote voting—we have discussed this on a number of occasions—it is important that MPs are here. MPs have a right to be here. They are essential workers, and all the advice that the Government have given, whether it be in tier 1, 2 or 3, states that people who have essential work to do must carry on doing it. We are in that category. We expect people to teach schoolchildren, and we expect other people in other categories to go to work, so we should do the same. We have, as yet, received no formal response from PHE on Divisions, but they seem to me to be working well and efficiently. We are getting through them in about 15 minutes, which is in line with the time that a Division takes ordinarily. The system is one that I think you came up with, Mr Speaker, and it is working extremely well.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I quite like petrol engines, I must confess, with some old cars. However, the Government have consulted on bringing forward an end to the sale of new petrol and—

[Valerie Vaz]

Mr Toad!

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I think that is a jolly good heckle, don’t you, Mr Speaker, though for the record, I deny that I model myself on Mr Toad. The policy on petrol and diesel cars will be beneficial, and a consultation is taking place on bringing it forward earlier. My hon. Friend is absolutely right: the key to making this happen will be changes in behaviour driven by the ease with which people are able to charge their cars, and that means having more charging points. There is £500 million over the next five years to support the roll-out of infrastructure for electric vehicles, so taxpayers’ money is being spent in this direction.