Hate Crime Against the LGBT+ Community

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Wednesday 18th October 2023 Westminster Hall

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) for securing this important debate and for his passionate speech, which I associate myself with very much.

The statistics that my hon. Friend set out were absolutely shocking, but they are only the reported crimes. As we know, only one in 10 LGBTQ+ people report hate crimes or incidents. It is even more worrying and upsetting that over recent months we have seen Government spokespeople specifically using trans people—who already struggle against prejudice day in, day out—as a political football, for no reason other than stoking a culture war.

The Government’s words matter. I met a group of parents of trans young people in Salford on Sunday. The Government’s words mattered to them, and they mattered to the young people. I heard stories about how horrified those young people were when the Prime Minister made certain statements during his conference speech, and how in some cases those young people felt they had no place in the world. Some had even considered suicide. The Government must understand that their words have an impact, not just on increases in hate crime but on the mental health of the people they affect.

We have a moral duty in this place to speak up for those we feel are disenfranchised, and we have a moral duty to choose our words carefully. I am proud that Britain is a tolerant, respectful and inclusive country but, as the charity Stonewall states,

“a lack of positive action and threats to existing rights are taking the UK off course.”

We cannot allow that to happen. I urge the Minister to really take action today and listen to the words of my colleagues.

Oral Answers to Questions

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Monday 20th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

13. What steps her Department is taking to tackle knife crime.

[The Minister for Crime, Policing and Fire (Chris Philp)]

Tackling knife crime is a priority. That is why, since 2019, we have not only spent £340 million on diverting young people into alternative activity via the violence reduction units, but had targeted Grip hotspot policing in areas where knife crime is particularly prevalent. That has led to a 19% reduction over the last three years in hospital admissions with a bladed weapon injury, and since 2010, according to the crime survey for England and Wales, violence is down by 38%.

[Rebecca Long Bailey]

Last year knife crime in Salford fell, thanks to the extensive work with young people by the Salford community safety partnership and Greater Manchester police operations to remove weapons from circulation. Sadly, since January this year there has been a spate of serious knife crime incidents that have destroyed lives and distressed the community. We need urgent Government support to implement a wider proactive reduction strategy. Will the Minister commit to ringfencing dedicated funding today for knife crime reduction initiatives and for lifesaving bleed kit roll-outs across Salford?

[Chris Philp]

That is a very fair question. We are already directing ringfenced money towards Greater Manchester and other areas via the Grip hotspot funding, which we are going to at least maintain and possibly increase next year, and the violence reduction units, which try to get young people on to a better path. I am visiting Greater Manchester a week today and look forward to discussing those initiatives and more with Chief Constable Stephen Watson, who I must say is doing a very good job, and others in Manchester.

Public Order Bill

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 7th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I am not going to give way to my hon. Friend, who has intervened many times already. I have been asked to speak very briefly.

It is worth looking at what this amendment is, and it is worth considering the question put by the police officer to the lady. The police officer asked her, “Are you praying?” In other words, there was nothing she was obviously doing that was harassment or in any way objectionable. The police officer had to actually go into her mind—she was just standing there; I do not think it is even clear that she was kneeling—and that is surely what is dangerous about the measure.

In speaking to this Chamber, I am going far beyond what that lady was doing. Of course I am not indulging in any objectionable behaviour by expressing my thoughts. I am not harassing anybody, but everybody in this Chamber in a sense is being forced to listen to me, and I have spent 39 years no doubt irritating people and even boring them. They cannot shut their ears, but this lady was not actually saying anything, and the policeman had to go up to her and ask what she was doing. If we are going to have a law—a criminal law—it has to be capable of being effective.

The reason George Orwell’s novel “1984” resonates so much with all of us is that the state was trying to regulate not just people’s actions but what goes on in their minds. That is why, ever since that novel was written, people have felt that probably the most advanced form of totalitarianism is one where the state is trying to regulate not simply people’s behaviour, but their minds. What the debate is about is that those who oppose my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South (Andrew Lewer) are determined to stop anybody indulging in any kind of protest, if it could be deemed to be some sort of protest, even if it is entirely silent.

The whole point of the Public Order Bill, as I understand it—this is why I support it—is that it does not outlaw peaceful protest. What the Government are addressing is people making that protest who are deliberately trying to obstruct the rights of other citizens by blocking roads or whatever. That is the point of the Bill. It has now been hijacked by people who want to stop completely silent peaceful protest.

The case of Livia Tossici-Bolt has not yet been mentioned. In the past few days she was told by council officers in Bournemouth that she would be fined simply for holding up a sign saying, “Here to talk if you want” inside a buffer zone. She was not holding up a sign with any graphic images, and she was not trying to intimidate anybody; she was simply saying, “Please, if you want to talk, I am here if you want any advice. This is a very difficult day for you.” For that she was stopped by the police. In other words, that lady was told that she could not offer other women who might, in some circumstances, be coerced into attending an abortion clinic, or who felt that they lacked the resources to complete a pregnancy, the opportunity to talk if they wanted to do so.

We must not criminalise such peaceful activity. Where are we going? Where will this stop? I believe—this is how I will conclude; I think that this is the shortest speech—that this is an entirely worthwhile, harmless, moderate amendment, and I hope that Members will support it.

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

I remain of the view that the Bill is draconian and anti-democratic, and represents a frightening lurch towards authoritarianism. Whether or not Members agree with me, most of us will accept that the concept of what constitutes serious disruption is central to the sweeping liberty-curtailing powers and offences that it contains.

The matter of protest banning orders rests on that definition, and the peaceful and often innocent conduct that the police would seemingly be able to criminalise as a result is breath-taking in its range. The Bill says that those orders can apply to people without a conviction—the Minister explained the Government amendment earlier—if someone has carried out activities or contributed to the carrying-out of activities by any other person related to a protest

“that resulted in, or were likely to result in, serious disruption”,

among a range of other scenarios, on two or more occasions. Justice has stated:

“Given the extent of the powers contained within the Bill, it is essential that any definition should be placed at such a threshold as to minimise the possibility for abuse.”

I agree. The term “serious disruption” should be defined. Despite requests even from senior police officers for clarity in the Bill’s early stages, the Government had to be dragged to this point today. Looking at the Government’s vast and vague amendment on this issue, the reasons for not defining the term in the first place are clear. It would appear that their intention was always to set the bar at a frighteningly low level—and the bar could not be lower.

Serious disruption is “more than a minor” hindrance. That is a paradox if ever there was one. Apart from being dangerously vague, “more than a minor” hindrance is not serious disruption by any stretch of the imagination. More than a minor hindrance, as suggested by the Government, is having to cross to the other side of the road because someone is protesting on the pavement. It is a Deliveroo takeaway arriving 15 minutes later than someone would like. Those things might be annoying, but they are not serious disruption and they certainly do not warrant arrest.

I want to set this in context, as the Lords have attempted to do. The comparison in English common law is the definition of civil nuisance, which involves “substantial interference”. That is a very high bar, which has been defined by decades of case law on the matter. It is a world away from the low threshold that the Government propose in this measure.

I should make it clear that on the issue of blocking emergency vehicles—the Minister might try to cite that as a reason for the Government’s vague and dangerous amendment—of course that should be an offence, but it already is. The Emergency Workers (Obstruction) Act 2006 contains two offences. First, the Act makes it an offence to obstruct or hinder certain emergency workers who are responding to emergency circumstances. Secondly, it makes it an offence to hinder or obstruct those who are assisting emergency workers responding to emergency circumstances. The Lords amendment provides a much more sensible definition of serious disruption. It states that serious disruption

“means causing significant harm to persons, organisations or the life of the community, in particular, where…it may result in significant delay to the delivery of a time-sensitive product…or…it may result in a prolonged disruption of access to any essential goods or any essential services”.

That complements “significant delay” in the delivery of goods and “prolonged disruption” of access to services, as set out in the Public Order Act 1986, as well as measures in the Emergency Workers (Obstruction) Act.

On stop and search, which colleagues have already mentioned, of course the police must have the ability, sometimes, to stop and search when people are reasonably suspected of various crimes. However, the danger of abuse lies in the threshold of “reasonable suspicion” being low or, worse, as in the case of this Bill, non-existent.

Public Order Bill

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 23rd May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

Many of the rights that we take for granted today were largely not born of the spontaneous goodwill of some trail-blazing politician. They came about because people stood together, they demanded change, they protested and they made those with power listen. For example, I would not be standing here today as an MP, and many of my constituents would not even have the right to vote, had it not been for the Peterloo protest, also known as the Peterloo massacre due to the horrific atrocities inflicted upon those protesting. That protest movement called for reforms to parliamentary representation. Ultimately, it resulted in the Great Reform Act 1832, which went some way to addressing the injustices in the political system.

We have heard today how women would not have the right to vote had it not been for the suffragettes. They are hailed as heroines now, but back in their day they were demonised and viewed as trouble-making anarchists. They were the so-called “lefties” Conservative Members have been talking about today.

Equal pay legislation was largely born of the actions of brave striking workers at Ford Dagenham and the large scale protests that followed. The establishment of the National Parks and, ultimately, the principle of the right to roam would not have happened without the Kinder Scout trespass. The list is endless, but, sadly, it is clear that such era-changing moments in our history will be a fairy tale that we simply tell our children if this House allows the Public Order Bill as drafted to become law.

Human rights organisation Big Brother Watch says this of the Bill:

“It is without doubt that it includes some of the most undemocratic, anti-protest measures seen in the UK for decades.”

Law reform and human rights organisation JUSTICE considers that the Bill

“would pose a significant threat to the UK’s adherence to its domestic and international human rights obligations.”

Further, Amnesty’s analysis is that many of the provisions that have re-emerged in this Bill after being roundly rejected by the House of Lords in February

“would seriously curtail human rights in this country and damage the UK’s international standing, potentially irreparably.”

On protest banning orders, the vast range of peaceful and innocent conduct that the police would seemingly be able to criminalise is breathtaking. The Bill says that these orders can apply to people without conviction if someone has carried out activities

“or contributed to the carrying out by any other person of activities related to a protest that resulted in, or were likely to result in, serious disruption”

among a range of other scenarios, on two or more occasions. Let me explain that. If a law-abiding person attends two marches, for example, where hundreds of thousands are in attendance and some people completely unrelated to them cause a “serious disruption”, which is undefined and could mean literally anything, could that law-abiding person be subject to a protest banning order? The Bill as drafted certainly seems to suggest that they could.

The offence of locking on is also veiled in ambiguity. As JUSTICE says, it is so vague that it would appear to capture a couple walking arm in arm down a busy street where they may be being reckless as to cause “serious disruption” to another couple walking in the opposite direction. Again, “serious disruption” is undefined and could mean literally anything.

The widening of already extensive stop and search powers also appears wholly disproportionate and hugely damaging to racialised communities. Indeed, clause 7(2) is one troubling example. That allows for the police to search an individual when they have reasonable grounds for finding an object that is

“made or adapted for use in the course of or in connection”

with one of the relevant offences. “Object” is not defined; it could be anything from a mobile phone used to agree meeting points with friends to a leaflet about the event. Those are just three staggeringly pernicious examples from a frightening selection box of draconian and anti-democratic measures in this Bill.

[Kit Malthouse]

I just thought I would take the opportunity to deal with the “serious disruption” issue. My hon. Friend the Member for North East Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller) also mentioned it. I believe the hon. Lady is a lawyer by training, so she will know that the phrase “serious disruption to the community” has been in use in the law since 1986 and is therefore a well-defined term in the courts, which of course is where the test would be applied under the legislation.

[Rebecca Long Bailey]

I welcome the Minister’s contribution but, as he well knows, case law differentiates and changes from time to time without adequate explanation in the text of a piece of legislation. That is what causes significant ambiguity here; there is no doubt in my mind that what would be deemed a serious disruption would change over time and could ultimately result, given the other provisions in the Bill, in an inference that serious disruption is of a lesser nature than it currently is in present case law.

To be frank, those provisions have no place in a democratic country with a long, proud history of upholding the fundamental right to lawful and peaceful protest. There has been a lot of talk in this debate about the Bill cutting crime; if that were the case, I think we would all welcome it. However, as the Government well know, the first step to cutting crime would be to properly fund our police services, which have suffered 12 years of dramatic cuts to their funding and resources. This Bill will not cut crime. Indeed, Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary and fire and rescue services said in relation to protest banning orders that they

“would neither be compatible with human rights legislation nor create an effective deterrent.”

There has also been an illusion created that new offences are being brought in to deal with some of the issues that have been referred to. I want to set the record straight on that. We talked earlier about the terrible issue of emergency vehicles being stopped. That should certainly not be happening, but there is already legislation for that; the Emergency Workers (Obstruction) Act 2006 makes it a criminal offence to obstruct an emergency vehicle. Similarly, the Criminal Damage Act 1971 imposes a fine or prison service of up to 10 years for an act of criminal damage. Highway obstruction is also a criminal offence.

To suggest that the Public Order Bill is in some way a panacea for actions that many within our communities would deem irresponsible, unlawful and incorrect is way off the mark. Therefore, I hope that colleagues across this House will recognise before it is too late the chilling effect that the Bill will have on our democracy and vote it down on Second Reading.

Nationality and Borders Bill

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 19th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab) [V]]

The Government state that this Bill is necessary to deter irregular journeys and increase the fairness of the system in order to support those in need of asylum. I think that most of us in this House agree that the system needs to be fairer. Lengthy waits for asylum applications to be processed are the norm, immigration detention is often indefinite, and modern slavery and trafficking survivors are routinely detained. As the Red Cross states, removing support and raising the penalties for those who arrive irregularly does not address the underlying reasons why people seek safety in the UK.

This Bill is brutal. It in effect punishes those desperate souls who often genuinely flee persecution, famine and war in the hope of safety. The Refugee Council has stated that

“the actual effects of the bill in its current form will be to punish refugees who have been recognised as such under international law, and actually reduce safe and regular routes to the UK as refugee family reunion rights become more limited.”

One of the most dangerous parts of the proposals is that someone’s means of arrival will determine how worthy they are of protection in the UK. Asylum seekers arriving through anything other than resettlement will receive a lesser form of protection, including temporary status, no access to financial support and limited rights to family reunion. In fact, the new proposals plan to criminalise anyone arriving irregularly, not through official channels. But as we all know, people fleeing atrocities are rarely afforded the luxury of arriving through official channels. As the UN Refugee Agency has confirmed, this principle is in breach of the refugee convention.

These are cruel and unworkable plans. I agree with Amnesty International:

“Instead of introducing this piece of utter legislative vandalism, what the Home Office should be doing is establishing safe routes for the relatively few people escaping persecution who wish to seek asylum here…This reckless and deeply-unjust bill is set to bring shame on Britain’s international reputation.”

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I call Liz Saville Roberts.

Delays in the Asylum System

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Wednesday 7th July 2021 Westminster Hall

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab) [V]]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stockport (Navendu Mishra) for securing this important debate.

Only this morning I received an email from a constituent who has been waiting for more than four and a half years for a decision on her asylum claim. That is four and a half years she has been unable to work, four and a half years of mental anguish, and four and a half years excluded from the fabric of the country to which she desperately wants to contribute because it offered her a place of safety. This is no way to treat a fellow human being who fled unimaginable horrors in search of a safe, secure life.

We are lucky in Salford to have the brilliant Salford Forum for Refugees and People Seeking Asylum, which is led by Councillors Wilson Nkurunziza, Irfan Syed, Alexis Shama and a team of brilliant people who have established a support network for people such as my constituent. Sadly, her case is one of thousands and most areas do not have a support network like ours. The Select Committee on Home Affairs, the independent chief inspector of borders and immigration, the National Audit Office and the all-party parliamentary group on refugees have all raised concerns over the rise in the backlog of cases over recent years and the failure of the Home Office so far to address the issue.

As we have heard, the Government’s “New Plan for Immigration” sadly appears to contain no proposals to address this backlog, and I fear it will make the problem much worse. The most dangerous part of the proposals is that someone’s means of arrival will determine how worthy they are of protection in the UK. Asylum seekers arriving through anything other than resettlement will receive a lesser form of protection, including temporary status, with no access to financial support and limited rights to family reunion. In fact, the new proposals go as far as criminalising anyone arriving “irregularly”, not through official channels. As we know, people fleeing war and persecution are rarely afforded the luxury of arriving through official channels.

I would argue that those proposals are in breach of the refugee convention, which protects people seeking asylum from persecution on the grounds of their method of entry, and guarantees them access to claim asylum, for the very reason that there is no viable way to seek permission to enter a country in order to apply for asylum. To conclude, those are cruel and unworkable new immigration plans. As Refugee Action has said:

“Compassion, evidence, and 193 refugee and voluntary organisations tell us to fight against the principle of these plans, not help to thrash out the details.”

I hope that the Minister has listened to my concerns and will not just address the backlog at the Home Office, but throw out the unworkable and callous new immigration proposals.

Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

3rd reading
Monday 5th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab) [V]]

This Bill is so pernicious in parts that it chillingly removes some of our most precious freedoms. Indeed, on press freedom, the Investigatory Powers Act 2016 already allows for the identification of journalistic source information via a judicial process when that is required by the police. The Bill appears not only to relax, but to ride a coach and horses through the legal process, with no clear protection or processes for journalistic whistleblowers, and by extending the people who can access the information not only to police officers and constables, but to employees of the Court of Common Council of the City of London, and immigration officers.

The Bill is littered with instances of racial and other forms of discrimination, from the biased operation of serious violence reduction orders, to attacks on Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities through the criminalisation of their way of life. Then there are the Bill’s provisions on our right to protest. The Home Secretary will have unfettered powers to define what constitutes “serious disruption”, and protesters who simply cause a “serious annoyance”, which is not defined, can be subject to jail sentences of up to 10 years. Worryingly, Amnesty International has said:

“The Bill also gives Ministers further enhanced powers to issue further legally binding regulations around these highly subjective and vague thresholds, which raises the prospect that the current or any future government may misuse these powers to stifle criticism and views that it might find uncomfortable.”

I will finish with a warning. History is littered with examples of democracies sliding blindly into authoritarianism. It usually happens by stealth: undermining the judiciary one day, threatening the existence of public broadcasters the next, rigging electoral rules to make it much more difficult for Opposition parties to win elections and, of course, silencing dissent by restricting the right to protest. It all sounds chillingly familiar, does it not? If the Government believe in democracy, and I truly hope they do, let them prove it tonight. Drop the Bill, otherwise I will have no option but to determine that tonight, whether intentionally or accidentally, the Government begin their stealthy descent into authoritarianism.

Oral Answers to Questions

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Atkins]

Indeed. Of course the Home Office has been working with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, at both official and ministerial level, in developing the draft Bill. We remain fully committed to making the UK the safest place to be online while defending freedom of expression, and we believe that the Bill achieves that. The strongest protections in the Bill are reserved for children, and I can confirm that Ofcom, the independent regulator, will have a range of tough enforcement powers to use against companies that fail to fulfil their duties. Those include fines of up to £18 million or 10% of qualifying annual global turnover, whichever is greatest.

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab)]

What steps her Department is taking to ensure effective investigations by the police of allegations of rape to help improve the number of cases that result in charges being made.

[The Minister for Crime and Policing (Kit Malthouse)]

Supporting victims of sexual violence and abuse is an important priority for this Government. In the past five years, we have seen a significant decline in the number of charges, prosecutions and convictions for rape. That is why we have carried out a robust end-to-end review of the criminal justice response. The review will be published shortly and will set out clear action to reverse this trend and to ensure that victims receive the support they deserve and that perpetrators face justice.

[Rebecca Long Bailey [V]]

There is currently a backlog of 57,000 cases in the Crown court, with victims of rape and serious sexual violence often left to wait years to go to trial. Sadly, they are the minority who received sufficient support to bring a case forward in the first place. Will the Minister commit to bringing forward urgently proposals for the fast-tracking of rape and serious sexual assault cases? Will he also confirm the creation of specialist rape and serious sexual violence units in every police force to ensure that cases are brought against alleged perpetrators?

[Kit Malthouse]

Two of the key planks of the work that we will be undertaking in this area—indeed, we have started already—are, first, yes, to shorten the timeframe between a report and a case getting to court, and secondly, to develop expertise throughout the system to ensure that victims get the justice they need, but in particular that investigations focus on perpetrators.

Fire Safety Bill

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments & Ping Pong & Ping Pong: House of Commons
Wednesday 24th February 2021 Commons Chamber

I am particularly concerned about the 18-metre distinction, especially because of the Cube fire in Bolton about 16 months ago. As it was 16 cm below the threshold, there were lower safety expectations for the cube, including regarding the requirement to have fire-resistant cladding. The Cube turned into an inferno in a matter of minutes, and if the carelessly discarded cigarette had been thrown at four o’clock in the morning rather than eight o’clock in the evening, we can only imagine the toll on the 217 residents. I urge the Minister to change the focus from 18 metres-plus, as with Grenfell, or 18 yards-plus, which would apply to the Cube, and to move towards taking a fully risk-based approach to dealing with this crisis, because ultimately this is about protecting lease- holders, who have done no wrong.

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab) [V]]

I too send my best wishes to the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire). I have told the Government repeatedly that many residents in Salford face exorbitant fire and safety remediation costs—up to £100,000 per flat in some cases. I told them that even buildings under 18 metres were failing EWS1, and that many residents were being forced to pay thousands for measures such as waking watch, and increased insurance premiums.

On 10 February, I hoped against hope that the Government had listened—that they had heeded the recommendations of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee, the all-party parliamentary group on leasehold and commonhold reform, a range of sector bodies and MPs from across the political spectrum, and had decided finally to address this great moral injustice, to ensure an urgent national effort to make buildings safe, and to guarantee that no resident or leaseholder would ever have to pay for a crisis that they did not cause. Sadly, the Government did not listen. The extra £3.5 billion of funding announced was only for cladding removal, not for remediating fire safety defects, which usually accounts for the majority of remediation costs. Only buildings over 18 metres are eligible. Residents in all other buildings, including those even one metre under, will need to apply for a loan, and buildings under 11 metres will receive nothing at all.

My constituents are devastated. Every day, bills for interim fire safety measures and increased insurance premiums rack up. They cannot move or sell; they struggle to get credit; and, worse, some may face bankruptcy or homelessness. It is so bad that the UK Cladding Action Group reports suicides nationally, and 23% of those surveyed by the group had considered suicide or self-harm. My constituents are victims of systemic regulatory failure or, worse, corporate malfeasance, but the Government are making the victims take responsibility. This has to end today. I say to the Minister that his Government have a moral duty to agree to legislate for the principle that residents and leaseholders should not pay for historical fire safety defects. I urge him to support amendments to that effect today; to ensure that the Government lead an urgent national effort to carry out fire safety remediation by June 2022; to forward-fund that work; and to reclaim the costs from those responsible and via a levy on new development.

[Joy Morrissey (Beaconsfield) (Con) [V]]

I, too, thank the Government for the £5 billion that they have committed to targeting and helping to make safe these high-risk buildings. May we remember the lives lost in the Grenfell Tower tragedy. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Felicity Buchan) for all she has done to fight for justice for the Grenfell Tower survivors. I volunteered to help; I first went there two days after the fire. The tales of the fires that consumed the outward escape mechanisms because of the cladding, and of the way the building was encased with flames, are not something I have wanted to speak about, but I feel that it is appropriate to do so today, because I see that the Government are trying to bring some justice to the victims and to future-proof the safety of social tenants in tower blocks, and I thank them for that.

My concern is the long-term unintended consequences of the high levels of fire safety regulations for private leaseholders. They are often young men and women who have saved their whole life to buy their first home. Oftentimes the flat is in London, and as leaseholders, they are now unable to leave that flat. Many of my constituents have written to me about their children in London who have purchased a flat and are now trapped. They can no longer afford the soaring costs of their debts, and some have even moved home to their parents in Beaconsfield because they cannot afford the financial burdens they are now under as leaseholders. I hope that we can continue to address this issue long term, but I want to see this legislation passed and this first stage accomplished. I appreciate and sympathise with many of the amendments, but I would ask that we just move forward and support the Government to ensure that this first level of safety is on offer for residents across the UK.