Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Debate between Vicky Ford and Alex Sobel

Report stage
Wednesday 18th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Alex Sobel]

I look forward to repeating the words of the right hon. Gentleman and the Minister on the Treasury Bench in December this year, to see if that is true. Only time will tell. Maybe my poor level of trust might be wiped away or eroded, but I doubt it.

I will conclude, to give others more time. The Bill as it stands today gives us no protections and is a charter for a bonfire of rights and protections that the public not only hold dear but need in order to breathe clean air, drink clean water and ensure that our countryside is not ravaged by destruction and extraction. That is why I am supporting our Front-Bench Members and the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy).

[Vicky Ford]

I want to start by thanking the Minister for the “Dear colleague” letter that arrived last night. It went a long way to myth-busting some of the misinformation that has been put out about this Bill, particularly by clarifying that it will not weaken environmental protections and that the Government are committed to protecting workers’ rights. However, the letter did not mention consumer legislation. Consumer legislation is often dealt with by many different Government Departments, and that might be part of the reason why. I particularly want to focus on consumer legislation.

I worked for many years as a British MEP representing British constituents, and I also chaired the European Parliament’s Internal Market Committee, which is responsible for consumer legislation, so I am very aware of how important much EU consumer legislation is to protecting constituents—British consumers—and this covers many areas, including food safety, product safety and safety when we travel.

But I am also aware that EU legislation is not always perfect in all regards. Yes, the UK played a key part in negotiating much EU consumer law, but that does not mean that every single element of the law perfect fits the UK market or UK consumer needs. In some cases, the UK might have wanted to introduce different or even stronger protections, but to get consensus across all the EU member states, either a one-size-fits-all or a lowest-common-denominator approach was sometimes followed. For example, I sometimes saw larger companies lobbying on specific regulations or product specifications and making them so specific that smaller competitors would find themselves locked out of the market, thus stifling competition and reducing consumer choice. So I agree with the principle of the Bill that all of Whitehall needs to look again at all EU retained law and ensure that it fits UK needs.

Furthermore, where unnecessary regulation produces additional costs, these costs are too often passed on to consumers. In today’s economic environment, so many of our constituents have such pressures on their household budgets, and we need to reduce those unnecessary costs, so I understand why clause 15 has been drafted. However, this does not mean that removing all consumer regulation is in the consumer’s interests, because a well-regulated market can benefit consumers, especially when it comes to safety measures. There might be examples where it would be sensible for the UK actually to increase safety measures and therefore increase regulations in some places.

We also need to make sure that important protections do not inadvertently drop out of our legislation during this process. It is therefore important for Ministers to ensure that equivalent or improved legislation is put in place, so that consumer interests, especially regarding safety, can still be protected. I hope the Minister will be able to comment on that in the wind-ups.

We should also recognise that there are some areas, particularly in fast-moving sectors, where new or deeper regulation is needed. The consumer organisation Which? regularly reminds us that product safety regulations do not fully cover the way in which consumers spend their lives online, and there may be an opportunity to improve that in the forthcoming digital markets, competition and consumer Bill. Product safety regulations could be updated, given that the consultation is shortly to be launched by the Office for Product Safety and Standards. We need to make sure that the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill does not cut across those other initiatives.

Prime Minister’s Meeting with Alexander Lebedev

Debate between Vicky Ford and Alex Sobel

Thursday 7th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Vicky Ford]

The Prime Minister was questioned yesterday, and he answered the question yesterday. Today is today.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

As we know, the Prime Minister often goes into meetings, has conversations and then has a lapse of memory. He had a lapse of memory after the meeting with Alexander Lebedev. Has he now recalled it and informed the Minister of the conversation in that meeting? It is not just a national security matter; Alexander Lebedev owns businesses in illegally occupied Crimea, which is Ukrainian, not Russian territory. It is a matter not just for us, but for the country of Ukraine.

[Vicky Ford]

We must remember that at the time, there had been a devastating attack against a civilian on UK soil, involving chemical weapons. That led to a massive effort by the Foreign Office to co-ordinate the expulsion of Russian diplomats from embassies all across the world. At this time, the UK is also working with our allies across the world to counter Russian disinformation and help to remind people across the world about Russia’s brutal and illegal invasion of Ukraine. In terms of the information that the hon. Gentleman requests, I do not have any further information at this time.

Early Years Settings: Covid-19

Debate between Vicky Ford and Alex Sobel

Tuesday 12th January 2021 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Vicky Ford)]

It is of course a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I congratulate the hon. Member for Putney (Fleur Anderson) on securing the debate. I am grateful for the opportunity to discuss this important topic, and for the contributions of all Members who have taken part—but particularly to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), for mentioning the Northern Ireland situation. I enjoyed my childhood in Northern Ireland so much that I think I did P1 twice. He will get that.

As the hon. Member for Putney said, early years staff are, too often, unsung heroes. I should like to begin by offering my sincere and heartfelt thanks to the early years sector, which has been doing an outstanding job of supporting our youngest children throughout the covid-19 pandemic, in what I know are difficult circumstances. I spoke to people at the maintained nursery school in my constituency this morning. Our frontline early years staff are phenomenal, and they love and care for our children so much.

The early years experience is a vital part of a child’s education. It is when children develop the communication skills that set them up for life. Those skills cannot be taught online. Early years provision also, as we know, gives parents the ability to balance work and family life. The Government invest heavily to ensure that children can get access to that high-quality early education, which includes a universal 15 hours of childcare for three and four-year-olds, the additional 15 hours for three and four-year-olds with working parents introduced under the Conservative Government in 2017, and, of course, the 15 hours for disadvantaged two-year-olds.

The Prime Minister made the announcement last Monday, on 4 January, that early years would remain open for children during the national lockdown in England. That includes nurseries, childminders and maintained nursery schools, as well as nursery classes in schools and other pre-reception provision on school sites. It was with great reluctance that we restricted attendance at early years settings before the national lockdown in March. As I have said, early education enables very young children to develop the core building blocks of communication and social skills. They are the building blocks of life. We know that if a child’s vocabulary is underdeveloped by the time they start school, they are more at risk of falling behind and being unemployed in later life. They cannot catch up those years. It is hard to imagine how to teach those communication and development skills remotely in anything like the way that is possible for older children.

We also know much more about coronavirus and our understanding of the new variant is developing. Since the beginning of the pandemic, evidence has emerged that shows the very low risk of children becoming unwell from covid, even those with existing health conditions. There is no evidence that the new variant of coronavirus disproportionately affects children. Indeed, under-fives continue to have the lowest rates of confirmed coronavirus cases of all age groups. They are less susceptible. Evidence also suggests that pre-school children aged nought to five are not playing a significant role in driving transmission. That is partly because our youngest children tend to have the lowest levels of contact with others outside their household.

We took the difficult decision to restrict attendance in schools to all except vulnerable children and the children of key workers because additional measures were needed to contain the spread of the virus in the community. Doing that has enabled us to keep pre-reception provision open to all to support parents and to deliver that crucial care and education for our youngest children. We are planning to keep early years settings open unless the scientific or public health advice changes. We continue to monitor that very closely.

I know that there is a lot of worry about safety, so I want to be as clear as I can about the safety of early years settings for children and staff. Early years settings have been open to all children since 1 June. There is no evidence that the sector has contributed to a significant rise in cases in the community. The advice of Public Health England remains that the risk of transmission of infection is low, provided that early years settings follow the endorsed systems of control that have been in use throughout the pandemic. Those measures create an inherently safer environment for children, young people and staff where the risk of transmission of infection is substantially reduced.

I met representatives of the early years sector last Tuesday morning immediately after the Prime Minister’s announcement and again last Thursday. One of the things they asked for was better covid testing for EY staff. The Department worked closely with the Department of Health and Social Care and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to ensure rapid asymptomatic testing for all early years staff. The national roll-out of rapid testing, which was announced on Sunday, will support the Prime Minister’s announcement for early years settings to remain open.

Local authorities will be encouraged to target testing at people who are unable to work from home during the lockdown. On Thursday, I met the Association of Directors of Children’s Services to reinforce the importance of early years staff in the asymptomatic testing programme. An expansion of testing will help to identify more positive cases of covid and ensure that those affected can isolate to protect those who cannot work from home in our vital services.

My hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine) mentioned childminders. He is no longer in his place, but I wish his wife well. She does an important job. We are working with local authorities to put in place an appropriate route for childminders so that they can also access the asymptomatic tests.

Hon. Members have mentioned the vaccine. Those who are most vulnerable to the virus have to be prioritised for the vaccine. People working in early years who are over 50 or who are over 16 and in a higher-risk group will be eligible for the vaccine in the first phase of the programme. That includes all those over 50 or vulnerable and it will also include the early years staff who fall into those categories.

The hon. Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) is right to have written to me. I have to resay what I said just a couple of days ago in answer to his question. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, which makes the recommendations for who should get the vaccine and in what order, has asked the Department of Health and Social Care to consider occupational vaccination in the next phase of the vaccine roll-out. That will be a cross-Government piece of work; that Department will need to collaborate with other Departments. The Department for Education will have input into it and we will urge the need to prioritise our absolutely frontline staff.

[Alex Sobel]

I thank the Minister for her assurances. She gave a little more information just now than she did in her written answer, but there is no timescale or timeline for this. Does she have any more information about when it might happen?

[Vicky Ford]

My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has been very clear about the timeline that he has set for getting the first phase of the vaccines rolled out, and he went through the priority groups at the stage when he announced them—was it just before the 4 January start date? We have had the mid-February date from the Prime Minister to get through the first phase. Then we will move into the second phase and, as I said, we have been asked to look at occupational roles in relation to the vaccine. That will be in the second phase of the roll-out; that is my understanding.

Net Zero Carbon Emissions: UK’s Progress

Debate between Vicky Ford and Alex Sobel

Thursday 28th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Time is short for this debate and for the planet. I am going to speak up for the 3,000 young people who came out in Leeds two weeks ago on the youth climate strike and all the other thousands of young people who came out in every other town and city in the country. I spoke to those young people and said that I would come to the House and support their call for us to address the climate emergency. I call on the Minister today to say that the Government will declare a climate emergency as they would a civil emergency, because we are on the precipice of disaster.

NASA’s latest measurement of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is 411 parts per million. The historic high for this planet is 300 parts per million in 325,000 BC. In 2005, it was 380 parts per million. We are on a trajectory towards the global extinction of humanity. The insects are the canary in the coalmine of our planet. There has been a 75% reduction in flying insects in Europe in the past 25 years. Where the insects go, we will follow. How are we going to tackle this scale of emergency?

We need a rapid programme of decarbonisation. We need to become a leader in decarbonised technology in this country and in Europe. We need a world in 2030, not 2050, that looks radically different from the world we have today, a world where petrol stations are as common as coaching inns, if we are to avoid climate disaster. We need electric vehicle charge points in every parking bay. All new houses need to be made in factories from airtight and energy-efficient timber. We need to harness the internet and open and smart data, so that everybody knows everything about their lives, from the quality of the air to the amount of carbon in their clothes.

This is the brave new world we need to aspire to. We do not need gradual change; we need a paradigm shift in our system. I call on us not to have a green new deal; I call on us to have a Marshall Plan for the environment across Europe and across the planet.

[Vicky Ford]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Alex Sobel]

Time is very short, so I am going to continue.

After the second world war, we got together and we rebuilt this continent. We need to rebuild a planet free of emissions. That needs to be our single, unifying goal. We need to readdress the COP process to that point. We need to re-energise our relationship with our European Union partners—I say that in the strongest sense—to engage and to create this plan. That is where we need to be. If we do not get there we are failing not ourselves, but our grandchildren and great-grandchildren. At the end of the century, they will look back on the Governments of the early part of the century and say, “They failed us. They did not do what was needed.” They will be looking at their own extinction—the extinction of our race.