Protection from Sex-based Harassment in Public Bill

Debate between Stella Creasy and Chris Philp

Report stage
Friday 24th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

It is occasionally possible for the Government to come up with something perfect straight away, but I accept that that does not always occur. The process that my hon. Friend just set out, where the Government might publish a draft and invite comments on it, either informally or via a formal consultation, seems to me a sensible way of arranging matters.

[Stella Creasy]

One of the concerns behind much of this is about consistency in the law. With other forms of harassment legislation, how reasonableness is defined is already written in. I invite the Minister to consider whether the important thing is not to come up with a whole new set of guidelines, but simply to clarify and be consistent in how we expect courts and juries to consider that concept when somebody claims, “I thought my behaviour was reasonable,” and the law says, “Well, you ought to have known,” in other forms of harassment legislation. This is not about a new piece of guidance; it is about clarifying matters so that we do not inadvertently damage the ways in which our courts can work. For example, the CPS guidance on the Serious Crime Act 2015 talks about how defendants “ought to know” about the course of conduct—again, with oblique directions that judges can give. There is plenty of guidance out there; we really just need to compile it into one document, do we not?

Public Order Bill

Debate between Stella Creasy and Chris Philp

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 7th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

My right hon. Friend is putting me on the spot a little bit. I would like to reiterate that the Government are neutral on this position. It is a free vote and there is no Government position, and in my capacity as a Government Minister I do not have a view. Obviously, as a Member of Parliament, I will be voting as an individual on this question. I do think, speaking personally, that women should be free to use these services without intimidation or harassment, which is why I voted for the amendment from the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) when it was first tabled, but I do not think the amendment moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South undermines that, particularly given the words in proposed subsection (3B), which say that prayer

“shall not, without more, be taken to”

influence a person’s decision. So, personally, I will vote for that, but I emphasise again that the Government do not have a position and this is a free vote. We have heard some extremely thoughtful, well-considered, well-argued and sincerely held views on both sides, and Members will no doubt make up their own minds. up.

[Stella Creasy]

I respect the fact that the Minister has his own personal opinion. For the avoidance of doubt, can he confirm to the Chamber that this legislation, as amended in the Lords, is compliant with the European convention on human rights and that it does not criminalise praying but sets out boundaries for where it should occur?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Stella Creasy and Chris Philp

Monday 28th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

If she will relocate a number of unaccompanied refugee children affected by the recent fire at Moria refugee camp on Lesvos from Greece to the UK.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Chris Philp)]

As another Croydon MP, I would like to add my words to those of my constituency neighbour, the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones), and pay tribute to Sergeant Ratana and his long track record of service to our local community. Everybody in the borough, from north to south, feels it deeply. Our sympathy and condolences go to his family at what must be an agonising and heartbreaking time.

On the question of resettlement, we are continuing to welcome family reunion cases, as we are obliged to do under the Dublin regulations, including from Greece—in fact, particularly from Greece. Already this summer, three flights have brought in refugees to reunite them with family members in the United Kingdom, so we are continuing to discharge our obligations.

[Chris Philp]

We are investigating ways that the United Kingdom Government can help our colleagues in Greece. That includes the possibility of using overseas aid money to assist them, as well as looking at people who are entitled to be relocated to the UK under the Dublin regulations, and at what we can do to assist and expedite that process.

[Stella Creasy [V]]

I have some numbers to put this issue in context. Some 13,000 refugees are without any shelter as a result of the recent fires in Greece, 3,800 of whom are children. There are 21 confirmed cases of covid in the camp, which has a quarantine capacity of just 30. Ten countries, including France, Germany, Croatia and Portugal, have already agreed to take some of the hundreds of unaccompanied young minors in the camp. At present, we have taken just 16, but this place promised to take 3,000 under the Dubs scheme. Will the Minister give me and others who are concerned about this issue just one meeting to discuss what more we can do on our obligations to those vulnerable young children?

[Chris Philp]

We have fulfilled our Dubs obligation in full: 380 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children have been brought to the UK from European countries, in addition to 3,500 who came here last year. That is higher than any other country in Europe. In addition to that, we are honouring our Dublin obligations to Greece. It is not 16; well over 100 people have been taken from Greece directly back here. Where we have further obligations, we will do everything we can to make sure we meet them. In addition to that, as I said in response to an earlier question, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office is looking at ways that we can help to provide the kind of shelter that the hon. Lady referred to. There is a lot that the Government have done and will continue to do. If she would like to meet me to discuss that, I would be delighted to do so.

Finance (No. 2) Bill

Debate between Stella Creasy and Chris Philp

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Wednesday 21st February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

My hon. Friend makes a very important point. The fact that the tax gap is 6% rather than the 8% bequested to us by Gordon Brown sounds like a theoretical point, but that two percentage point difference, as she rightly says, amounts to billions of pounds funding the NHS and schools. In debating these avoidance measures, we are not talking about something theoretical and of academic interest: it is precisely these measures that fund our public services, and that is why they are so important.

Turning to the Opposition’s amendments and new clauses, I was rather surprised, on looking at the amendment paper earlier today, to see that new clause 6 once again calls for a review and analysis—analysis which, I am sure, is already conducted by the Treasury, as the Financial Secretary will no doubt point out. But there was an absence—a silence and a desert; tumbleweed was rolling across the amendment paper—where I would have expected to see an abundance of ideas that we might have adopted from the fertile mind of the shadow Chief Secretary. If he could not have proposed ideas in an amendment for some arcane parliamentary procedural reason, he might at least have done so in his speech.

The Financial Secretary to the Treasury is an extremely attentive and receptive Minister. Had the shadow Chief Secretary proposed some constructive ideas, I am sure that the Financial Secretary would have listened carefully. I am very disappointed that after all the noise and, I dare say, bluster—I hope that is not unparliamentary—that we heard in the shadow Chief Secretary’s speech, we did not hear any concrete ideas. We cry out for and are open to new ideas, yet we did not hear any in what was otherwise an amusing and entertaining speech. I am disappointed.

If the Financial Secretary is in the market for new ideas on avoidance, as I am sure he is, one idea is that we could give some thought to ensuring that the Land Registry records the ultimate beneficial ownership of property and land. We discussed that yesterday in our debate on sanctions, and it was suggested by David Cameron a couple of years ago. When the ultimate beneficial ownership of those properties changed, we might then levy stamp duty on that change as though the physical property had been transferred. A lot of high-end residential property is held in non-UK corporate wrappers, and when the property is transferred, rather than selling it, as we would sell our properties, ownership of the company is transferred. There is no record of that in the UK and therefore no stamp duty is paid. That idea might well raise some more stamp duty. I could hardly criticise the shadow Chief Secretary for his lack of ideas without proposing at least one myself. I hope that Ministers will give some thought to that idea in due course.

In conclusion—[Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] I am glad I have said something that finds favour among Opposition Members. I must have set a record for the number of interventions taken, though there was only one from my own side. The action on the bank levy contemplated in the Bill is the right one. We are taxing banks more heavily than non-banks. We are raising more money than ever before, but we must be mindful of the risk of driving these companies or part of them overseas at a time when they contribute 9% of our total income.

On avoidance and evasion, I am proud that this Government have delivered the lowest tax gap in the world and improved by a quarter the position that they inherited. That pays for public services, as pointed out by my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean). It is a good record, and I am proud of it. I look forward to supporting the Bill.

[Stella Creasy]

I rise to support the amendments tabled by the Opposition and to speak to my amendments 1 to 4.

I was into PFI before all the cool kids were. These amendments speak to a long-held concern of mine, which is that it is not enough for us as politicians to identify when something has gone wrong and to shrug our shoulders and say, “It’s complicated.” The consequences for the communities we represent and for this country’s public finances are so toxic that it is vital we act.

George Bernard Shaw said:

“Political necessities sometimes turn out to be political mistakes.”

Let me be clear that I am not seeking to blame anyone. Governments of all colours used PFI. It started in 1992 and has gone on to the present day. Absolutely, the last Labour Government used PFI to fund things, and it was not an ideological decision; it was a very simple one about keeping borrowing off the books.

However, we know now just how costly these decisions have been for this country. Every single school, hospital, street lighting system and motorway built was needed, but we know now that the consequence of these costs is that we may not be able to build such things in the future. I am in the Chamber today to propose a way in which Parliament can now act to get money back for our public services, because everyone of us has one of these projects in our constituencies.

We can talk about the numbers involved: £60 billion of capital building, on which we will pay back £200 billion. These companies are truly the legal loan sharks of the public sector, charging an excessive rate of interest in comparison with public sector borrowing for building and running services for us. Conservative Members may say that the cost I am talking about includes services, so it is worth breaking down the charges. Last year alone, this country paid out £10 billion in PFI repayments, over half of which was for interest and charges. The money we are paying for PFI is not paying for schools and hospitals to be run; it is paying the profits of the companies we borrowed from to be able to build them in the first place.

The National Audit Office has done absolutely sterling work uncovering just how bad a value-for-money calculation it was to go for PFI. On average, these projects are 2% to 4% more expensive than Government borrowing at the time. In total, with charges and fees included, they are now, on average, 40% more expensive than having worked with the public sector.

The interest rate matters because the costs are not necessarily about the management of a project; they are about the profits being made. Every single MP who is being lobbied about their schools and hospitals needs to recognise that 20% of the extra money the Government say they are giving to schools and hospitals will not touch the sides of emergency wards or go into the budgets of teachers to pay for the books and classes our schoolchildren need. It will go straight out of our public sector into pure profit for these companies.

The Centre for Health and the Public Interest has gone through the accounts of the few hundred companies running schools and hospitals to identify just how much money is involved. It found that they will get £1 billion in the form of pre-tax profit from NHS deals alone, which total just 125 of the 700 PFI projects. For example, the company holding the contract for University College London has, alone, made £190 million in the past decade out of the £725 million the NHS has paid out. In short, it has made enough in profits to build and run an entire hospital.

We have to talk about the human cost. I became interested in PFI when I saw the damage it was doing to my local hospital, Whipps Cross in Walthamstow, and to schools such as Frederick Bremer School in Walthamstow. Its headteacher is now desperately struggling to balance her budget in the face of this Government’s swingeing cuts to the schools budget, but the one repayment she cannot cut is the PFI one. Barts, the biggest PFI in our NHS—with a £1 billion capital build, and £7 billion repaid—is paying £150 million a year, of which £74 million is interest alone. It is no wonder that the hospital is in such persistent financial difficulty.