House of Commons

Monday 18th November 2013 Commons Chamber

Monday 18 November 2013

The House met at half-past Two o’clock

Prayers

Monday 18th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions

Monday 18th November 2013 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

1. What plans he has for the future of the independent living fund.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mike Penning)]

We will consider the Court of Appeal judgment carefully and will announce plans in due course.

[Hywel Williams]

I declare an interest, in that my brother is enabled to live independently in his own community by the ILF, and I am extremely grateful that that opportunity is afforded to him. Will the Minister assure the House that when the Government come to consider their future plans, there will be full consultation this time with disabled people and disability groups in Wales, the regions of England, and Scotland, and specifically with the Welsh Government?

[Mike Penning]

I greatly respect the hon. Gentleman, but the conclusions of the Court of Appeal were nothing to do with consultation. It was a process issue, in that the Court felt that the Minister had not been given enough information, based on the information that was put in writing. The Court went on to say that there was evidence that the Minister

“consulted personally with many affected groups”

and it had

“no doubt that evidence of hard cases would have been forcefully drawn to her attention.”

That is what the Court ruled. It had nothing to do with consultation.

[Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)]

The Department for Work and Pensions annual report was due to be published in April this year. When will we finally see it?

[Mike Penning]

With due respect, the Court ruling did not have an awful lot to do with that so I cannot answer the question. The annual report will come out in due course.

[Mr Speaker]

The Minister of State has the advantage in this case of being right. It was rather a cheeky inquiry by the hon. Member for Ealing North (Stephen Pound), even by his own standards.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

2. How many people in Kettering constituency claim ESA; how many such claimants have had their claim turned down in the last year; and how many are appealing that decision to the first tier tribunal.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mike Penning)]

In Kettering 4,400 claims started between October 2008 and February 2013. Of those assessed, 49% were deemed fit for work. Appeals data, I fully accept, are running very slow, especially in my hon. Friend’s constituency, which he has been campaigning hard for. We will be looking to recruit more judges as we go forward.

[Mr Hollobone]

Benefit appellants in the Kettering constituency are being told that they now have to wait up to 40 weeks for a first-tier tribunal hearing. This is more than twice the national average and is completely unacceptable. Will my hon. Friend speak with his counterpart in the Ministry of Justice and get the situation sorted out?

[Mike Penning]

My hon. Friend has been campaigning hard on behalf of his constituents and we have been working closely with the Ministry of Justice, which is why I can announce that there were six sessions per month in June 2012 and there are now 18 sessions per month, a 300% increase, and we intend to do better.

[Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab)]

People in Kettering and claimants elsewhere might be able to get a quicker resolution of their cases if the testing of the new descriptors for mental health and fluctuating conditions were brought to an end. It is more than two years since Professor Harrington suggested action. When will we see the results?

[Mike Penning]

I am sure that in the hon. Lady’s constituency as well as in Kettering, we are working very hard to bring down the time it takes, particularly in the tribunals. We have been working closely on the area of mental health, and we will continue to work to make sure that everybody gets a fair deal from the process.

[Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)]

3. What comparative assessment he has made of the number of people in full-time and part-time employment.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

Three in every four people work full-time, and full-time work accounts for all of the significant rise in employment over the last year.

[Simon Hughes]

The Minister has done exactly what I hoped she would do, which is to deal with the fact that whereas the Leader of the Opposition in 2010 said that the Government’s policy would lose a million jobs, my understanding is that since the election there have been more than a million new jobs, and this year more than a quarter of a million new jobs. Will the Minister put it clearly on the record that these new jobs are not all part-time jobs, that there has been a significant growth in full-time employment and that that is predicted to continue?

[Esther McVey]

My right hon. Friend is correct. It is good news that UK business is creating so many new jobs. Since the 2010 election we have seen a rise of nearly 800,000 in the number of full-time jobs and of more than 300,000 in the number of part-time jobs.

[Julie Elliott (Sunderland Central) (Lab)]

With many people in my constituency, particularly women, doing a number of part-time jobs to make up an income, the knock-on consequence is that many of them do not pay national insurance and are therefore not building contributions to their pension. What is the Minister doing about this long-term consequence of too much part-time employment?

[Esther McVey]

The family will accrue credit if they have family responsibilities. That is a very positive step that the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my hon. Friend the Member for Thornbury and Yate (Steve Webb), has taken. We can all welcome the fact that more than a million people are now in work, and more than 210,000 more women are in work this year alone.

[Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)]

Will the Minister join me in congratulating New College Telford, Telford college of arts and technology and Harper Adams university on providing the skills and training throughout Shropshire to ensure that unemployment continues to fall as it has done month on month for the last seven months?

[Esther McVey]

I will indeed join my hon. Friend in celebrating this positive news. What is happening in his constituency is also happening in every constituency throughout the country. This is positive news that we can all celebrate.

[Mr Frank Roy (Motherwell and Wishaw) (Lab)]

Has a comparative assessment been made of former Remploy employees who find themselves in part-time or full-time work, and if so, will the Minister publish those findings?

[Esther McVey]

I and the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning), will be publishing those findings. We have had significant success with Remploy employees. They have gained jobs at a faster rate than others who have been made redundant, and the work of the local Jobcentre Plus has been exceptional.

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

4. What assessment he has made of the effect of the benefit cap on employment outcomes

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

Recent poll findings show that of those notified or aware that they would be affected by the cap, three in 10 took action to find work. To date, almost 36,000 have accepted help to move into work from Jobcentre Plus and around 18,000 potentially capped claimants have moved into work.

[Mr Syms]

Jobcentre Plus in Dorset worked extremely hard to identify those affected and to get them into employment. What assessment has my right hon. Friend made of the impact of that on the recent encouraging employment figures?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I give credit to Jobcentre Plus for the action that it took, which sometimes goes unnoticed, when it knew that this policy was coming in. From April 2012, it wrote to potentially affected people with advance warning. It set up a helpline on the benefit cap and an online calculator so that they could work out some of the figures themselves. It then telephoned some of the most vulnerable, and visited them as well. It set up funding for intensive employment support and worked with local authorities to support claimants in budgeting, housing and child care, and big employment events. This is one of major reasons why about 61% of those who moved into work did so after they were notified.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on this, and I assure him that in an area such as mine, which includes the ward with the highest level of child poverty in the south-east region, my constituents welcome the fact that we really are trying to encourage people who have been far too long on benefits to look for options to work. The news that he has just announced is what is needed.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I agree with my hon. Friend. The reality is that of more than 19,000 householders capped in mid-September 2013, 60% were lone parents and 78% were capped by £100 or less a week. This is a system that is returning fairness to the whole programme. The Opposition opposed the cap, and it is worth remembering that even though the trade union leaders opposed it, 80% of Unite members support our policy on welfare reform, as I discovered from a poll the other day.

[Mr Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab)]

6. What progress he has made on delivering his target of 160,000 Youth Contract wage incentives by April 2015; and if he will make a statement.

[Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)]

13. What progress he has made on delivering his target of 160,000 Youth Contract wage incentives by April 2015; and if he will make a statement.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

There were more than 21,000 wage incentive job starts up to May 2013. The next wage incentive statistics are due to be released early in the new year.

[Mr Reed]

As the Secretary of State is well aware, in the first 14 months of this programme his Department delivered less than 3% of what he promised. Together with the appalling underperformance of the Work programme, and with Ministers and civil servants at each other’s throats over the chaotic introduction of universal credit, is this not yet another example of how this Secretary of State promises much but delivers little?

[Esther McVey]

I am quite sure that what the hon. Gentleman was reading out was a piece of fiction and I would like to give him the correct figures. The Youth Contract is made up of many component parts. One is wage incentives, and there is a wage incentive for apprenticeships, and another is for work experience. Of the 113,000 people who went on work experience, 50% have a job, and 21,000 have wage incentives, and that figure is rising by 4,000 a month. Youth unemployment has fallen for 17 consecutive months. In the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, it has fallen 35% in the last year. Perhaps he wants to congratulate us on that.

[Barbara Keeley]

I do not congratulate the Government on the level of youth unemployment in my constituency; there are 900 unemployed young people in my constituency and almost 1 million nationally. The system of wage incentives is clearly not working, because the numbers are appallingly low for constituencies such as mine. Is not it time that Ministers stopped being in denial and started doing something radical to help young people back to work?

[Esther McVey]

I would just like to mention Labour’s record: a 40% increase in youth unemployment. What we have done, as I have said, has seen youth unemployment fall for 17 consecutive months. It is now lower than it was at the general election.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend confirm that since the Youth Contract was launched in April 2012 youth unemployment has fallen by more than 59,000 and that the number of people claiming jobseeker’s allowance has been dropping for 17 consecutive months?

[Esther McVey]

I totally agree with my hon. Friend. Just so that we can hear it again, even though I have said it twice and he has said it once, youth unemployment has fallen for 17 consecutive months.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Will the Minister tell the House how the Youth Contract performs in terms of value for money and effectiveness compared with the future jobs fund?

[Esther McVey]

The future jobs fund cost £6,500 per outcome, whereas our work experience outcomes cost £325, which is a 20th of the price for exactly the same outcomes. As always, the coalition Government are delivering value for money.

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

After more than two years of the Work programme and 18 months of the embarrassing flop of Youth Contract wage incentives, youth unemployment is still nearly 1 million, higher than it was at the general election and higher than when the Work programme began. That is terrible not only for young people, but for the future of the economy. When will Ministers finally get serious about that and back a proper youth jobs guarantee?

[Esther McVey]

Obviously the Opposition like to rewrite history. The 40% increase in youth unemployment that we saw over their years in office was shocking, particularly given that it was during a boom period. We are dealing with the issue most practically. The Youth Contract has been, is and will be a huge success, with wage contracts increasing from a slow start of 1,000 a month to 4,000-plus a month.

[David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)]

7. What costs will be included in his proposed cap on pension charges.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

As my hon. Friend knows, we are consulting on whether there should be cap on charges in workplace pensions and, if so, what costs it should cover. Without pre-empting the consultation, he can be assured that our presumption would be in favour of a broad definition of charges for those purposes.

[David Mowat]

I thank the pensions Minister for that answer and congratulate him on his consultation on introducing a cap that is 50% of the level of the cap for stakeholder pensions introduced when the Opposition were in government. That is a step forward. A further step forward across the whole industry would be to have better comparability and transparency of charges generally. We have acted to do that for energy companies by simplifying charge structures. Will we consider doing that for pensions?

[Steve Webb]

I thank my hon. Friend for being the only Member who managed to get a pensions question on today’s Order Paper. [Interruption.] I will make the most of it. He is quite right that the Office of Fair Trading identified 18 different sorts of charges, which are often baffling and hidden. One of its recommendations was that the committees that oversee pensions should be given transparent information about charges, and that is a recommendation we will be looking to take forward.

[Andrew Miller (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

Over the last generation the net size of employment units has shrunk as a function of technology and changes in society. That has meant smaller pension schemes that in net terms require a greater management effort to run them. What will the Minister do to try to bring together some of the smaller schemes to get better value for money overall?

[Steve Webb]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. In fact, consolidation is happening; the number of medium-sized schemes has declined quite significantly in the past few years. The quality standards that we will be putting in place will mean that running a small, substandard, sub-scale scheme will not be an option, so we anticipate that there will be much more consolidation. Together with the National Employment Savings Trust, the Government’s own scheme which already has over 500,000 members, we are moving towards better value for money.

[Gregg McClymont (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (Lab)]

Tonight on Channel 4, the Minister will accuse big pension companies of making excess profits at the expense of those who have worked hard and saved all their lives. “Dispatches” will claim that many savers are losing up to £10,000 per year every year in their retirement as the companies make excess profits, yet the Pensions Bill that the Minister has just taken through the Commons does precisely nothing to tackle rip-offs in annuities. When will he get a grip on the annuities market and end these rip-offs?

[Steve Webb]

I make no apology for defending consumers against an abuse that has gone on for far too long, with people buying annuities where they will get their money back only if they live until they are 90 or beyond. The Financial Conduct Authority, which was created only about six months ago, has already reported on annuities and will bring forward further proposals. We are working with our colleagues at the Treasury who lead on these matters to make sure that this issue, which has gone long unaddressed by successive Governments, is finally tackled.

[Mr William Bain (Glasgow North East) (Lab)]

8. What assessment he has made of the effect of universal credit on work incentives for lone parents.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

Universal credit fundamentally simplifies support for working lone parents and our analysis shows that UC will create positive work incentives for lone parents.

[Mr Bain]

But does the Minister not accept that research for Gingerbread shows that two in every five lone parents will lose out in cash terms under universal credit, with lone parents in work fighting an uphill battle to make work pay beyond 20 hours a week? Are not this Government not only botching the introduction of universal credit but breaching the Secretary of State’s pledge that UC would make sure that work paid for each and every hour that people work?

[Steve Webb]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for referring to the Gingerbread report, which I have here. It says:

“Universal credit increases the financial pay off from working of single parents”.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

Does the Minister agree that regardless of any particular problems that might be thrown up by the introduction of universal credit, one of the biggest problems with the welfare system is that it is far too complex, which leads to all sorts of mistakes being made, and that regardless of the teething problems we must press ahead with universal credit?

[Steve Webb]

My hon. Friend is quite right. At the moment, people have to go to Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs for their tax credits, to the local authority for their housing benefit, and to the Department for Work and Pensions for their jobseeker’s allowance. Having all this in a single system will improve take-up, and that is one of the things that the Gingerbread report did not factor in.

[Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)]

The Gingerbread report does, though, warn that working single parents are likely to lose a higher proportion of their income than other household types. Why does the Minister think that the children of lone parents should lose out?

[Steve Webb]

As I say, the report makes some assumptions that it accepts are not true. One of its assumptions is that there is no impact on take-up; it assumes 100% take-up before and after. We know that that is not true—that take-up is partial—and rolling all three benefits into one will improve take-up for the benefit of the children of lone parents.

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

The introduction of new IT systems can be challenging for business as well as for Government Departments. What lessons have been learned from the mistakes of others as regards the introduction of the new universal credit and its new IT system?

[Steve Webb]

As my hon. Friend knows, the litany of failed IT systems under the Labour Government would fill the remainder of this Question Time. One of the key things that is often forgotten is that every day this Department pays pensions and benefits seamlessly to millions of people. All the IT projects that are developed without delay and without hiccup never make it on to the front page of the newspapers.

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

Free school meals offer vital support to many lone parents in my constituency. When does the Minister plan to set out the eligibility criteria for free school meals under universal credit?

[Steve Webb]

The broad intent is to mirror, as far as possible, the current rules. I am grateful to the hon. Lady for stressing the importance of free school meals. She will therefore welcome the coalition’s decision to extend access to free school meals to all infant school children.

[Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab)]

9. When he estimates the Work programme will provide the same number of job outcomes as the flexible new deal.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

The flexible new deal ran for two years from October 2009 to the end of September 2011, by which time 50,000 people achieved a six-month job outcome. By August 2012, after only one year and two months, 47,000 people achieved a six-month job outcome through the Work programme. Only one month later —in September 2012, after one year and three months—63,000 people were in a job. Simply put, the Work programme is outperforming the flexible new deal.

[Chris Ruane]

It is not so much a work programme, as a Government do not work programme. Whatever the Minister says, the figures she commissioned from a private company state that the flexible new deal created more jobs over a limited period than the Work programme.

[Esther McVey]

I think I set out plainly how many jobs the flexible new deal did not create. To date, 117,000 people have achieved six-month outcomes through the Work programme, so it is working. I am pleased to note that in the Vale of Clwyd the level of jobseekers is at 3.6%, the lowest it has been since November 2008. We must be getting something right.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

The Work programme is failing disabled people badly, with only 5.8% getting into work—worse than if there was no programme at all. Meanwhile, specialist disability charities are complaining that they are getting only a handful of referrals. The employment and support allowance is costing the public purse £1.4 billion per year. When will the Minister get a grip on this failing programme, so that disabled people can receive the expert support they need to get them into work?

[Esther McVey]

I have just had a successful meeting with the Shaw Trust. Its latest report calls for the Work programme to be refined, not redone. The Work programme is working, but we need to make it better. The Opposition left 1.4 million people without support or help, and those people are being helped for the first time. Although it is tough, we have got significant numbers into work.

[Mr Stephen Hepburn (Jarrow) (Lab)]

10. What recent representations he has received on compensation for people with mesothelioma.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mike Penning)]

In the short time I have been the Minister of State with responsibility for this matter, I have had the pleasure of meeting the all-party group and victim support group representatives to discuss the Mesothelioma Bill currently before Parliament.

[Mr Hepburn]

I thank the Minister for bringing forward this much-needed Bill. Does he agree that thousands of working-class people have been killed through being negligently exposed to asbestos in the workplace and that their families have been denied financial security, while the insurance industry has got off with almost £1 billion in unpaid compensation payments? I urge him to reject the proposals from the House of Lords for the insurance industry to be responsible for 75% of compensations payments only, and to make them pay the full 100%. Let the vultures in the insurance industry pay.

[Mike Penning]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on campaigning on behalf of his constituents and others. People have been suffering from this abhorrent disease for many years. The issue was discussed extensively in the House of Lords and will be discussed extensively in this place. Our discussions will not be quite as extensive, so that we can pass the Bill and the people who need it may receive compensation. Governments—I stress Governments—have turned their back on these people. We are not going to do that.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

11. When he expects all new claimants to be on universal credit across the UK.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

16. When he expects all new claimants to be on universal credit across the UK.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

Within the time scales set out, our priority is to deliver universal credit safely and securely, and we will set out our plans in more detail in a couple of weeks.

[Emily Thornberry]

Why did the Secretary of State tell the House last month that his plans for universal credit were on track?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

As I said in my earlier answer, I ordered a reset so that we do not have difficulties when we start to roll out the scheme. We have rolled out the pathfinder already. It is important to note that there have been at least six sites from October, and there will be many more around the country when we expand that. As I said, I will make clear to the House the plan and programme for the full roll-out, all the way through to complete delivery, in detail in the next couple of weeks.

[Nick Smith]

The Public Accounts Committee found that leadership of the universal credit programme was hapless. Will the Secretary of State tell us who is responsible for that blunder?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I already take full responsibility for everything that goes on in my Department. I have to say that I take responsibility for making sure that universal credit as originally planned was stopped and reset. Before anybody was affected, we made absolutely sure that when we roll it out, as we have begun and will continue to do, it will deliver maximum benefits of more than £38 billion to the public.

I take no lessons from the Opposition, who spent years rolling out programmes regardless of how they affected people—a disaster on IT for tax credits and a disaster on the health service. A little bit of humble pie on their part might not be a bad thing.

[Dame Anne Begg (Aberdeen South) (Lab)]

The pathfinder mentioned by the Secretary of State was meant to include 10 separate Jobcentre Plus areas by October this year, but only one has come on line, in addition to those already in place, so there has been a further slowing down of the roll-out of universal credit. Indeed, the ones assessed have been the very simplest cases. When will the Department deliver on its original timetable, far less on any speeded-up timetable?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

As I said to the hon. Lady when I appeared in front of her Committee in July, we have been very clear that we would roll out universal credit on the plan and programme already set out. The pathfinders are on track. Those before Christmas and those after Christmas are on track—[Interruption.] Yes they are. It is not just the pathfinder centres; we already have a huge amount of change. We are putting 6,000 new computers into jobcentres to be ready for universal credit, and we are training 25,000 jobcentre staff to ensure that they are ready for its delivery. We are on track to make sure that universal credit—the bit that follows next—can use those pathfinders to deliver a universal credit programme that works, unlike so many of the programmes that the previous Government used.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

Dear, dear, dear. [Interruption.] No, the report does not say that; I can tell you what it does say. It says that, precisely in the Government’s timetable, from October 2013

“All new claims for out-of-work support are treated as claims to Universal Credit.”

That has not happened, has it? The Secretary of State is not on time, he is not on budget, and it looks as if he is going to lose £140 million. The first step to recovery is owning up that you are sick. You are not on time, you are not on budget—are you?

[Mr Speaker]

I am always on time. Let us hear from the Secretary of State.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Mr Speaker, you are not only on time, but you are always on budget.

That was a lot of sound and fury from the hon. Gentleman, signifying absolutely nothing. The reality is, as I have said quite categorically and publicly, the report could be written because of the actions I took over a year ago to ensure that universal credit will roll out and deliver exactly as we said it would. The hon. Gentleman served for I do not know how many years in a Government who allowed all these other programmes to fail, but not one person will be adversely affected by the change we have made. Universal credit will deliver maximum benefits to the British public, and the Opposition will remain out of government, because they have not a single clue.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

12. What plans he has to introduce the payment of pensions and benefits and begin accepting applications for universal credit through the Post Office.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

I assure my hon. Friend that all Department for Work and Pensions benefits and entitlements, including universal credit, are normally paid by direct payment into a mainstream bank account, the vast majority of which can now be accessed over the counter at post office branches.

[Mr Reid]

Millions of people have chosen to collect their pensions and benefits at a post office through a Post Office card account, but the contract is due to expire in 16 months’ time. Will the Government end the uncertainty and announce that POCA will continue after April 2015 with, I hope, improved banking facilities?

[Steve Webb]

We are in active discussions with Post Office Ltd and our colleagues at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. Indeed, I am meeting ministerial colleagues later this afternoon to discuss that issue. I can assure my hon. Friend that I share his commitment to the post office network.

[Mrs Anne McGuire (Stirling) (Lab)]

How long does the Minister anticipate that post offices will have to wait before they are in a position to take applications for universal credit?

[Steve Webb]

Just to be clear, people can receive universal credit into an account accessible at a post office already. Universal credit obviously has an online application process, so if there is access to the internet at local post offices, that can be done already.

[Stephen McPartland (Stevenage) (Con)]

14. What steps he is taking to create more employment opportunities for young people.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

The Government are not only creating job opportunities. In the last quarter, youth employment was up by 50,000. That shows that our approach is working. We are providing young people with the support that is needed, including work experience and apprenticeships.

[Stephen McPartland]

North Hertfordshire college in Stevenage has developed a range of learning companies in which students work while they gain their qualifications. We have seen an increase in the number of job offers for students who are learning in that way. Does the Minister agree that learning companies offer opportunities for young people, in partnership with local employers?

[Esther McVey]

I do agree with my hon. Friend. If people come together to create opportunities that turn into jobs, that is welcomed by the Department. We are leading the way and have put down a strategy that enables people to work in partnership.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Minister recognise that her response to that question sounded a bit complacent? Will she consider how we can build a better relationship among employers and further education colleges, schools and universities? Is it not time that she spoke to her colleagues in the Department for Education and brought a careers service back into our schools?

[Esther McVey]

If I gave the impression of being complacent, I am sorry, but I am certainly not. I know the size of the job that the Government have to do to help all the youth out there. We are doing that job and will continue to do it as best we can. We do talk to other Departments. There is a duty on head teachers to provide careers guidance in their schools. We have a National Careers Service at Jobcentre Plus. We can work with schools to ensure that children have the best careers advice.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

17. In my constituency, youth unemployment has fallen to its lowest level since before the last election. Will the Minister join me in paying tribute to the excellent partnership in my constituency between MidKent college and ActivKids, which improves the job prospects of young people?

[Esther McVey]

I join my hon. Friend in celebrating that success. I know that it is something in which he takes much interest and that he has helped greatly. I hope to hear many more stories like that from across the UK.

[Paul Maynard (Blackpool North and Cleveleys) (Con)]

15. What steps he is taking to offer more intensive support for new jobseekers.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

Conditionality measures were announced in the spending review to increase the support for jobseeker’s allowance claimants. Claimants will be asked to write a CV and register with universal jobmatch. Longer initial interviews, weekly signing and quarterly reviews with our advisers will provide more intensive support for claimants.

[Paul Maynard]

I thank the Minister for that reply. Will she reassure me that that conditionality will involve remedying deficiencies in what is often called work readiness, as well as focusing on the overall number of jobs for which a claimant applies each week?

[Esther McVey]

My hon. Friend is quite right that work readiness skills are key and that it is not only the number of jobs for which somebody applies that matters. Through the claimant conditionality and the longer intensive interview when a claim is made, the people at Jobcentre Plus will find out what skills the claimant needs and support them.

[Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)]

The Minister will know that Deloitte is selling its interest in the Work programme. Why does she think investors are pulling out of the scheme?

[Esther McVey]

Investors are not pulling out of the scheme. The hon. Gentleman is quite right that Deloitte is not working with Ingeus any more. Ingeus is one of the top performing Work programme primes. We expected to see movement in the industry. Deloitte came in and supported Ingeus as best it could, and now it is exiting, as happens when any businesses come together. As I said, the Work programme is working. The figures are going up, which is something that the Labour party could not achieve.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

Not only is the number of jobseekers falling, but the number of economically inactive people of working age has fallen by more than 400,000 under this Government to a level that has not been seen for more than two decades. Does the Minister agree that when people are returning to the labour market after a long period outside it, new jobseekers need support to prevent them from becoming long-term unemployed themselves?

[Esther McVey]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Let us look again at Labour’s record. It left 5 million people unemployed and claiming. We have taken the number of people who are claiming the three main benefits down by more than 500,000 since coming to power. Instead of criticising what we are doing, all Members should take pride in the fact that 1 million more people have jobs.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

21. What assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the Work programme for people already claiming employment and support allowance.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

Work programme provider performance is helping people on ESA move towards work, and to continue that improvement we are setting up a best practice group to help other primes share best practice.

[Chi Onwurah]

Last Wednesday, I spoke at a conference entitled, “Newcastle: a good city in tough times”, where faith, volunteer groups, charities and business all emphasised the importance of volunteering and the voluntary sector in helping claimants into work, yet the Department for Work and Pensions is making it harder to volunteer, through sanctioning, and squeezing the voluntary sector out of Work programme contracts. That is one reason that Newcastle’s success rate for ESA claimants is only 2%. What is the Department doing to encourage volunteers and the voluntary sector to help build the community skills we need to get people back into work?

[Esther McVey]

Of course, we fully support people doing voluntary work, so long as they can commit to their job signing and the work they have to do to get a full-time job. We see voluntary work as an important step to getting a job, and nearly 50% of Work programme providers are from the voluntary sector. Also, I am sure the hon. Lady will join us in celebrating the fact that the claimant count in her constituency has fallen by 13% in the past year.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Is my hon. Friend aware that the Work programme and other measures have seen the number of people unemployed in Harlow fall by 100 over the past year and that other Government measures have seen the number of apprenticeships increase by 86%? Does this not show that the Government are helping working people?

[Esther McVey]

Absolutely. Not only are we helping people through the Work programme, wage incentives and record numbers of apprenticeships—half a million in the last year—but the Government are doing everything to support people, young and old, back into the workplace.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

22. How many people in (a) Stafford and (b) England were receiving the major working-age benefits in April (i) 2010 and (ii) 2013.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

In May 2013, the number of people claiming working-age benefits in England was down to 4,645,040 from 4,807,940 in 2010—a fall of 162,900. In Stafford, the number was down to 8,070 from 8,690 in 2010—a fall of 620.

[Jeremy Lefroy]

The figures suggest that the number of people on major out-of-work benefits has fallen substantially since May 2010. In addition to the great benefit to former claimants of being back in work, will the Minister estimate the saving to the taxpayer?

[Esther McVey]

My hon. Friend is right. The figures suggest that out-of-work welfare dependency has been reduced by nearly 10%, which of course is very encouraging. Furthermore, in the past 12 months, the change in the number of JSA claimants has saved £1 billion.

[Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)]

23. What recent steps his Department has taken to support care leavers.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend’s work on the all-party group on financial education for young people. Last month, we launched the cross-departmental care leavers strategy, brokered through the Cabinet Committee on Social Justice, to ensure that for the first time pooled resources from education, employment, health, housing and justice will be tailored to the challenge facing a group of young people for too long left to struggle alone.

[Fiona Bruce]

Does the Secretary of State agree that equipping young people in general and care leavers in particular to manage their own finances well is a vital tool? What are the Government doing to address this matter, as recommended by the report of the all-party group on financial education for young people?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Again, I congratulate my hon. Friend, because we will definitely be considering this next recommendation of hers. I have listened and read her suggestions, and we have actually managed to alter the new curriculum. The final version will now state that

“the functions and uses of money, the importance and practice of budgeting, and managing risk…income and expenditure, credit and debt, insurance, savings and pensions, financial products and services”

will be taught as part of the curriculum for the first time.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

25. What steps he is taking to improve the quality of medical services reports on claimants of benefits.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mike Penning)]

This Government take the quality of assessments very seriously. That is why, before I became the Minister, when the Government saw a drop in the quality of work capability assessments, Atos was instructed to implement an improvement plan to ensure that assessment reports meet the high standards that the Department needs. That plan is now complete.

[Kevin Brennan]

My constituent Mr Robert Shafer suffered an injustice as a result of a rogue medical services report from many years ago. Will the Minister undertake to take further steps to improve the quality of medical services reports, and arrange a reply to my latest letter to the Secretary of State, to which a response is overdue, on behalf of my constituent?

[Mike Penning]

On the latter point, not only will I ensure that the hon. Gentleman receives the letter he requires, but if he wants to meet me, I will be more than happy to do that. The Department has commissioned four independent reviews. We know we need to get there; we know we need to do more. We have made changes to help cancer patients and are carrying out an evidence-based review of criteria, which is being overseen by Professor Harrington. I expect to see that report quite soon.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

My constituent Matthew Moore, who has a severe mental health condition, was told that he no longer qualified for employment and support allowance. He appealed and months later saw the decision in his case overturned in a few minutes. The tribunal chair said that he was shocked that ESA had been withdrawn in the first place and had no hesitation in awarding 30 points. Is that not yet another example of the incompetence of the many people paid to carry out assessments of some of our most vulnerable people, and of why the Government need to get their act together, have some compassion and ensure that such people are treated fairly?

[Mike Penning]

Individual cases are understandably quite emotional for individual MPs and their constituents. If the decision in that case was overturned, we will look carefully at what the tribunal said. We need to do that to ensure we get it right. However, this process was started by the previous Administration—it is nothing new for this Government—but we will get it right where, I am afraid, they got it wrong.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

Today I welcome the latest labour market statistics. We have seen the largest annual drop in the claimant count for 15 years. Almost every area in Britain has seen the number of people claiming jobseeker’s allowance fall over the last year, contributing to a total fall in worklessness of more than 500,000 since 2010, while there are now more than 1 million more in work. All this is a testament, I believe, to this Government’s success in getting Britain working again.

[Andrew Bridgen]

Few would disagree that careers advice in schools needs improvement. Given that unemployment is now down to 2.6% in my constituency, does my right hon. Friend agree that Jobcentre Plus is well placed—it has the resources and the local knowledge —to deliver part of that improvement, preferably in conjunction with local employers?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I congratulate my hon. Friend and his area on having an unemployment rate of 2.6%, which is testimony to the efforts this Government are making. Schools obviously have a legal duty to secure independent careers guidance for their pupils, and employers have to work with them, but it is also a fact that Jobcentre Plus has a careers guidance programme. We are now in talks with the schools to ensure that somehow we can connect would-be school leavers, long before they leave school, with companies and businesses, to tell them exactly what they need to have and what skills they will need to obtain.

[Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab)]

This weekend it was reported that Atos had pulled out of a DWP contract providing specialist disability advice. What was the Department’s response? An internal memo instructing staff deciding whether people are disabled enough to receive disability living allowance to “google it”. Is this not the biggest indication yet of the sheer contempt in which the Department for Work and Pensions holds disabled people?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The hon. Lady is completely wrong. First of all, it was not an internal memo; it was guidance that goes out to the Department in the normal way. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) needs to keep quiet for a while and listen a bit more. This man has travelled so far in his political career that we never know what he is talking about. He has gone from being a Tory to being a Blairite and then a Brownite, and now he is a socialist on his website, so I wonder whether he needs to keep quiet and listen a little more.

The answer to the hon. Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves) is that Atos Healthcare has not withdrawn from the contract. Normal procedures to update guidance in the process of DLA reform are going through. Under DLA, only 6% had face-to-face assessments; the majority have face-to-face assessments now, under the personal independence payment. Therefore, decision makers have much more objective information than they ever had before, so there is no change to the quality of the service. This is a simple contract adjustment to reflect and meet the corresponding business needs. The hon. Lady should really not listen to jobbing journalists who come to her to tell her they have an issue.

[Rachel Reeves]

I am not sure whether the Secretary of State has even bothered to read the memo from his own Department. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, because of the failure of his Department to deliver the reform, the personal independence payment is going out only to a third of country. After the chaos of the universal credit, the work capability assessment, the PIP, the Work programme and the Youth Contract, DLA is now in chaos as well. Is there any part of the Department for Work and Pensions that is actually working?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The thing that is wonderful about the hon. Lady is that she never listens; she just reads what is on her script that she prepared before, and it does not matter what question was answered. I have already told her—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda should keep quiet; otherwise he will jump out of his underpants if he carries on like that—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. These occasions are becoming deeply disorderly. A question has been put, and the Secretary of State is answering it. The House must hear the answer with all due courtesy and orderliness.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The first answer is that the hon. Member for Rhondda should keep quiet for longer. The real answer to the question on PIP is that the hon. Lady is completely wrong. As with every other programme, we are controlling the roll-out to ensure that it meets all our needs. There is nothing for the hon. Lady to concern herself about. This is working and it will work all the way through next year, exactly as planned. The truth is that the hon. Lady raises these questions because she does not want to come back to last week’s failed Opposition day debate, when her argument was so powerful that 47 Labour Members—including the shadow Chancellor, who I gather is a “nightmare”—decided to abstain.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

T4. Will the Government use the Post Office to allow people without internet access to submit applications for universal credit and to give help with the application? Post offices are in the heart of communities, and for many of my constituents, this would avoid a long journey to the nearest jobcentre.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

May I say to my hon. Friend that that is exactly what we want to do? We want to make sure that those claiming universal credit can claim it in a number of different places—for example, we are setting up the facility to claim in libraries, in local government offices and also in jobcentres. We will work and are working with post offices to ensure that if people need to make claims from them, particularly in very rural constituencies such as my hon. Friend’s, that facility will be made available as well.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

T2. Last month, the Secretary of State tried to tell me that lots of people were using food banks simply because they were available and it made sense to do so—adding insult to injury for the many thousands of people who are being forced to use food banks and have been referred to them by agencies because they are recognised as being in desperate need. Has the Secretary of State seen the research commissioned by Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs into the rise of emergency food aid? Why has this been shelved? Is it because it reveals that the Government are at fault for people not being able to feed themselves and their families?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

We have not shelved anything, and I have to tell the hon. Lady that she needs a few facts to be put on the table. First, during a time of growth under the Labour Government—[Interruption.] Labour Members really hate to be reminded that they were in government once and that the reason why they are no longer in government is that their incompetence was so phenomenal that even at a time of growth, people ended up claiming food parcels. If we look back, we see that under the last Government the number claiming rose by 10 times. More importantly, let me inform the House of an international comparison. In the UK at the moment, some 60,000 or so are food bank users. In Germany, which has a much higher level of welfare payment, 6 million people use food banks—one in 12, which is many more, and it is the same in Canada. The hon. Lady should not always read everything she reads, particularly when it is her lot that write it.

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

T5. A recent report by the Office of Fair Trading identified no fewer than 18 different points at which charges can be levied on a pension. Does the Minister share my view that there should be radical simplification and disclosure on pension fees and charges—however and wherever they are levied?

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

My hon. Friend is right to raise this important issue. Over the last few years, we have taken expanded powers to cap charges and to require disclosure along the lines he describes. We will shortly act on our charges consultation and will publish quality standards, which will include requirements to disclose relevant information, including charges.

[Graham Jones (Hyndburn) (Lab)]

T3. Eleven parishes in Oswaldtwistle have come together to open Hyndburn’s four food banks, which often serve people who are in employment. Is the Secretary of State not concerned about these levels of poverty, particularly in constituencies such as mine?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am. That is why we are doing all that we can to reduce the levels of poverty, and are succeeding. Child poverty, for example, has fallen by more than 300,000 under this Government. [Interruption.] I accept that the hon. Gentleman may well find that there are issues and problems in his constituency, and I am ready and willing to discuss them with him at any stage. The fact is, however, that child poverty rose under the last Government. They spent more than £170 billion on tax credits in an attempt to end the situation, and one of the hon. Gentleman’s own colleagues has said that they would no longer be able to afford them. They were more than 10 times more expensive than anything that they replaced.

[Sir John Randall (Uxbridge and South Ruislip) (Con)]

T6. We have heard about the excessive amounts being charged on pensions and annuities. Does my hon. Friend the pensions Minister agree that it is important for us to re-establish a real savings culture, and will he tell us what else he can do?

[Steve Webb]

I do agree with my right hon. Friend. We are establishing an economy that is based on savings rather than debt, and one of the most important measures that we are implementing is automatic enrolment in workplace pensions. By Christmas, about 2 million workers will have been enrolled. Nine out of 10 people are choosing to stay in workplace pensions, and it is encouraging to note that—notwithstanding what sceptics have said—young people are particularly likely to do so, thus establishing a culture of saving from an early age.

[Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

Since January, the coalition has no longer been producing the statistics showing the number of people chasing every job vacancy in each constituency. Will the Secretary of State bring those statistics back, so that we can have information about what is happening in our own constituencies?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I shall consider the hon. Lady’s request, and get back to her.

[Tessa Munt (Wells) (LD)]

Does the Secretary of State agree that a non-resident parent who has no declared income, but chooses not to claim benefits and is living on a loan, should be required by the Child Support Agency to contribute the flat rate of £5 rather than being party to a “nil” arrangement and not having to pay anything? Should not such people contribute to the considerable costs of raising their child or children?

[Steve Webb]

My hon. Friend will be pleased to know that when we bring all new claims into the 2012 child maintenance system, we will use information from Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs relating not just to earned income, but to income from all sources. Provided that income is coming into the household and HMRC is aware of it, we shall be able to use that information in assessments.

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

Can the Minister tell us how many people have died as a result of illness or suicide between their being declared fit for work and the hearing of their appeals? If he does not know, does he not think that he has a duty to collect those figures?

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mike Penning)]

I think that we should be very careful about scaremongering. There will be people to whom that applies, but such figures are not collected centrally. I know the hon. Lady very well, and I do not think that the House expects scaremongering of that kind from her.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

I congratulate the Secretary of State on introducing a benefit cap. The feedback that I receive from my constituents suggests that they thoroughly support the principle of the cap, but feel that its level is too high. Will the Secretary of State encourage them by announcing that he will consider lowering the level, perhaps to a figure beginning with 1?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I shall take my hon. Friend’s plaudits and congratulations in the spirit in which they were meant. The benefit cap is intended to be fair to those who pay tax to support people who are out of work by ensuring that people cannot earn more through being out of work than they can through being in work. Of course we keep the whole issue under review, but the cap is working very well at its present level.

How interesting it is that not one Opposition Member wants to talk about issues such as getting people back to work and being fair to the taxpayer. The only policy that the Opposition have come up with so far is reversal of the spare room subsidy. That is a pathetic indictment of the lack of welfare policies in the “welfare party”.

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

I welcome today’s figures showing a reduction in unemployment, but what are the implications for the targets relating to inappropriate sanctions on jobseeker’s allowance claimants? This is a real issue, and it needs to be addressed. It is distorting the JSA figures.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

I can give a very short answer: there are no such targets.

[Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con)]

With regard to discretionary housing payment, under a recent freedom of information request it has been established that Calderdale’s budget is almost £384,000 and under the same FOI we learned that in the first six months of the spare room subsidy Labour-run Calderdale has struggled to spend around £24,000. Does my right hon. Friend agree that this massive differential between budget and actual spend could indicate that the spare room subsidy in Calderdale is not an issue, or does he think Labour-run Calderdale is not doing enough to help the most vulnerable?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

We will, of course, be releasing figures on this later, but what I say to councils up and down the country is, “That is what the money is there for—to help alleviate issues and problems, at their discretion.” I remind my hon. Friend that last year, after having complained that they did not have enough money, they returned £10 million to the Exchequer, so my urging to them is, “Either do what you’re meant to do or stop complaining.”

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

What advice does the Secretary of State have for the 4,963 people in Sefton chasing the 10 available one-bedroom properties? Where does he expect them to go, especially given that many of them are disabled and are unable to pay the bedroom tax?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

As my hon. Friends made clear in the debate last week, there is actually an awful lot of available property in HomeSwap, with over 300,000 available in the last week alone. I simply say to the hon. Gentleman, and, through him to the councils, local authorities and housing associations, that the purpose of this programme is to get them to manage their housing better, and not to be building bigger houses when they need one-bedroom properties, and to start managing better for the people who need their property.

Rural Fair Share Campaign

Monday 18th November 2013 Commons Chamber

George Freeman (Mid Norfolk) (Con)

- Hansard - - Excerpts

I would like to hand in a Rural Fair Share campaign petition for my constituency of Mid Norfolk.

The petition states:

The Petition of residents of Mid Norfolk,

Declares that the Petitioners believe that the Local Government Finance Settlement is unfair to rural communities; notes that the Rural Penalty sees urban areas receive 50% more support per head than rural areas despite higher costs in rural service delivery; and opposes the planned freezing of this inequity in the 2013–14 settlement for six years until 2020.

The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to reduce the Rural Penalty in staged steps by at least 10% by 2020.

And the Petitioners remain, etc.

[P001267]

Rory Stewart (Penrith and The Border) (Con)

- Hansard - - Excerpts

I have the honour to present the petition of the residents of Penrith and the Border on the local government finance settlement.

Following is the full text of the petition:

[The Petition of residents of Penrith and the Border,

Declares that the Petitioners believe that the Local Government Finance Settlement is unfair to rural communities; notes that the Rural Penalty sees urban areas receive 50% more support per head than rural areas despite higher costs in rural service delivery; and opposes the planned freezing of this inequity in the 2013–14 settlement for six years until 2020.

The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to reduce the Rural Penalty in staged steps by at least 10% by 2020.

And the Petitioners remain, etc.]

[P001269]

Commonwealth Meeting and the Philippines

Monday 18th November 2013 Commons Chamber

15:31

[The Prime Minister (Mr David Cameron)]

With permission, Mr Speaker, I would like to make a statement on the disaster in the Philippines and the Commonwealth meeting in Sri Lanka.

Ten days ago a category 5 super-typhoon brought massive destruction across the Philippines, where the city of Tacloban was devastated by a tidal wave almost 2.5 metres high. The scale of what happened is still becoming clear, with many of the country’s 7,000 islands not yet reached or assessed, but already we know that more than 12 million people have been affected, with over 4,400 dead and more than 1,500 missing, including a number of Britons. This disaster follows other deadly storms there and an earthquake that killed 200 people in Bohol last month. I am sure the thoughts of the whole House will be with all those affected, their friends and families.

Britain has been at the forefront of the international relief effort. The British public have once again shown incredible generosity and compassion, donating £35 million so far, and the Government have contributed more than £50 million to the humanitarian response. In the last week HMS Daring and her onboard helicopter, an RAF C-17 and eight different relief flights have brought essential supplies from the UK and helped get aid to those who need it most. An RAF C-130—a Hercules—will arrive tomorrow and HMS Illustrious will also be there by the end of this week, equipped with seven helicopters, and water desalination and command and control capabilities.

Beyond the immediate task of life-saving aid, the people of the Philippines will face a long task of rebuilding and reducing their vulnerability to these kinds of events. Britain will continue to support them every step of the way.

Let me turn to the Commonwealth, and then to the issues in Sri Lanka itself. The Commonwealth is a unique organisation representing 53 countries, a third of the world’s population and a fifth of the global economy. It is united by history, by relationships and by the values of the new Commonwealth charter which we agreed two years ago in Perth. Britain is a leading member. Her Majesty the Queen is the head of the Commonwealth and His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales did our country proud acting on her behalf and attending last week.

As with all the international organisations to which we belong, the Commonwealth allows us to champion the values and economic growth that are so vital to our national interest. At this summit we reached important conclusions on poverty, human rights and trade.

On poverty, this was the last Commonwealth meeting before the millennium development goals expire. We wanted our Commonwealth partners to unite behind the ambitious programme set by the UN high-level panel which I co-chaired with the Presidents of Indonesia and Liberia. For the first time this programme prioritises not just aid, but the vital place of anti-corruption efforts, open institutions, access to justice, the rule of law and good governance in tackling poverty.

On human rights, the Commonwealth reiterated its support for the core values set out in the Commonwealth charter. Commonwealth leaders condemned in the strongest terms the use of sexual violence in conflict—an issue that has been championed globally by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs. We also called for an end to early and forced marriage, and for greater freedom of religion and belief. We committed to taking urgent and decisive action against the illegal wildlife trade ahead of the conference in London next year. And Britain successfully resisted an attempt to usher Zimbabwe back into the Commonwealth without first addressing the deep concerns that remain about human rights and political freedoms.

The Foreign Secretary and I also used the meeting to build the case for more open trade and for developing our links with the fastest-growing parts of the world. The Commonwealth backed a deal at next month’s World Trade Organisation meeting in Bali that could cut bureaucracy at borders and generate $100 billion for the global economy. Before and after the summit in Sri Lanka, I continued to bang the drum for British trade and investment. I went to New Delhi and Calcutta in India before heading to Sri Lanka—the third time I have visited India as Prime Minister. And I went from the summit to Abu Dhabi and Dubai, where Airbus agreed new orders from Emirates and Etihad airlines that will add £5.4 billion to the British economy. These orders will sustain and secure 6,500 British jobs, including at the plants in north Wales and Bristol, and open up new opportunities for the Rolls-Royce factory in Derby.

The last Government agreed, late in 2009, to hold the 2013 Commonwealth meeting in Sri Lanka. That was not my decision, but I was determined to use the presence of the Commonwealth and my own visit to shine a global spotlight on the situation there, and that is exactly what I did. I became the first foreign leader to visit the north of the country since independence in 1948 and, by taking the media with me, I gave the local population the chance to be heard by an international audience.

I met the new provincial Chief Minister from the Tamil National Alliance, who was elected in a vote that happened only because of the spotlight of the Commonwealth meeting. I took our journalists to meet the incredibly brave Tamil journalists at the Uthayan newspaper in Jaffna, many of whom have seen their colleagues killed and who have themselves been beaten and intimidated. I met and heard from displaced people desperately wanting to return to their homes and their livelihoods. And as part of our support for reconciliation efforts across the country, I announced an additional £2.1 million to support de-mining work in parts of the north, including the locations of some of the most chilling scenes from Channel 4’s “No Fire Zone” documentary.

When I met President Rajapaksa, I pressed for credible, transparent and independent investigations into alleged war crimes, and I made it clear to him that if those investigations were not begun properly by March, I would use our position on the United Nations Human Rights Council to work with the UN human rights commissioner and call for an international inquiry. No one wants to return to the days of the Tamil Tigers and the disgusting and brutal things that they did. We should also show proper respect for the fact that Sri Lanka suffered almost three decades of bloody civil conflict and that recovery and reconciliation take time. But I made it clear to President Rajapaksa that he now has a real opportunity, through magnanimity and reform, to build a successful, inclusive and prosperous future for his country, working in partnership with the newly elected Chief Minister of the Northern Province. I very much hope that he seizes that opportunity.

Sri Lanka has suffered an appalling civil war—and then of course suffered all over again from the 2004 tsunami; but it is an extraordinary and beautiful country with enormous potential. Achieving that potential is all about reconciliation. It is about bringing justice, closure and healing to the country, which now has the chance, if it takes it, of a much brighter future. That will happen only by dealing with these issues and not ignoring them.

I had a choice at this summit: to stay away and allow President Rajapaksa to set the agenda he wanted, or to go and shape the agenda by advancing our interests with our Commonwealth partners and shining a spotlight on the international concerns about Sri Lanka. I chose to go and stand up for our values and to do all I could to advance them. I believe that that was the right decision for Sri Lanka, for the Commonwealth and for Britain. I commend this statement to the House.

15:39

[Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)]

I thank the Prime Minister for his statement. Let me start by saying that all our thoughts are with the people of the Philippines as they struggle to deal with the devastation of Typhoon Haiyan. Thirteen million people have been affected by the typhoon, over 4 million of them children; nearly 3 million have lost their homes and, as the Prime Minister said, thousands are believed to have lost their lives, including a number of British citizens. The pictures we have seen are of terrible devastation. As so often happens when disaster strikes anywhere in the world, the British people have reacted by reaching deep into their pockets: so far, £35 million has been donated by the British public through the Disasters Emergency Committee. I also want to thank our forces on HMS Daring and HMS Illustrious for the work they are doing to help with disaster relief, and to commend the leadership of the Prime Minister and the International Development Secretary in providing £50 million in aid. We need to see the same from other countries, as the UN appeal has only a quarter of the funds it needs. Therefore, may I ask the Prime Minister what actions the Government are taking to encourage other countries to commit and free up resources as quickly as possible to the Philippines, so that this UN aid target is met? Serious damage sustained to airports, seaports and roads continues to present major logistical challenges for the emergency response, so may I ask the Prime Minister what steps are being taken to ensure that humanitarian relief is reaching those in very remote and isolated areas who have been worst affected by the typhoon?

On the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting —CHOGM—we welcome the communiqué’s conclusions on global threats and challenges, on programmes promoting Commonwealth collaboration and, of course, on development. At its best, the Commonwealth summit gathers together 53 countries seeking to promote common values, including democracy, accountability, the rule of law and human rights. I believe that this House is united in our abhorrence of terrorism and in recognising that what happened in Sri Lanka, particularly towards the end of the conflict in 2009, when tens of thousands of innocent civilians were murdered, totally fails the test of those values.

It was for that reason that, at the 2009 Commonwealth summit, the last Labour Government blocked the plan for Sri Lanka to host the summit in 2011. As the current Foreign Secretary told the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs:

“The UK made clear…during the 2009 CHOGM...that we would be unable to support Sri Lanka’s bid to host in 2011.”

Those are the words of the Foreign Secretary. Delaying the hosting of the summit until 2013 was to allow time for the Sri Lankan Government to show progress on human rights. This has not been the case; indeed, things have got worse, not better. I say to the Prime Minister that when he attended the summit in 2011, he could have acted precisely as the Labour Government of 2009 had done and brought together a coalition to block Sri Lanka’s hosting the Commonwealth summit in 2013.

Let me ask the Prime Minister a series of questions. First, the Deputy Prime Minister said in May to this House that

“if the Sri Lankan Government continue to ignore their international commitments in the lead up to the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting, of course there will be consequences.”—[Official Report, 15 May 2013; Vol. 563, c. 634.]

Can the Prime Minister tell us: what were those consequences for the Sri Lankan Government? Secondly, at the summit on Friday, the Prime Minister called for the Sri Lankan Government, as he said, to initiate an independent inquiry by March into allegations of war crimes. But by Sunday, President Rajapaksa had already appeared to reject this. The UN human rights commissioner called two years ago for an internationally led inquiry, and we have supported that call. Is not the right thing to do now to build international support for that internationally led process?

Thirdly, after this summit the Sri Lankan President will be chair of the Commonwealth for the next two years—that includes attending the Commonwealth games. Did the Prime Minister have any discussions at the summit with other countries about whether President Rajapaksa was an appropriate person to play that role? Finally, the Prime Minister of Canada and the Prime Minister of India decided not to attend this summit. In explaining his decision, Prime Minister Harper said:

“In the past two years we have...seen...a considerable worsening of the situation.”

Accepting the good intentions of the Prime Minister, were not Prime Ministers Harper and Singh right to believe that the attendance of Heads of Government at CHOGM would not achieve any improvement or prospects for improvement in human rights within Sri Lanka? Indeed, the summit communiqué failed even to reference the issue of human rights in Sri Lanka.

The legacy of human rights abuses in Sri Lanka is in contradiction to the good traditions of the Commonwealth. We believe we cannot let the matter rest. Britain must do what it can to ensure that the truth emerges about the crimes that were committed, so that there can be justice for those who have suffered so much. When the Government act to make that happen, we will support them.

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for what he said about the response on the Philippines. I agree with him: other countries need to do more, and we will continue to work with them, through both the Department for International Development and the Foreign Office, to make sure everyone lives up to their responsibilities. He asked specifically how we will ensure that relief gets through. That is why HMS Illustrious, with seven helicopters, joining the American carrier there can make a difference—because of the lift capacity.

I am also grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his response on Sri Lanka and the Commonwealth, but it is worth recalling that, had we listened to his advice, we would not be having this statement now in the House and discussing this issue. Given that Labour agreed to this conference taking place in Sri Lanka, criticising my attendance breaks new records for opportunism and double-speak. Let me respond very directly. In 2009, some time after the end of war, the last Government agreed that the conference should take place in 2013 in Sri Lanka. If he knows anything about foreign affairs—I doubt it, because he barely gets out of Islington—he would know that this is a consensus organisation: once something has been agreed, it is very difficult to unblock it. So it was in 2009 that the pass was sold. I have to say to him that, more than that, this shows very poor judgment. This is a multilateral organisation of which we are a leading member and our Queen is the head. How do we advance free trade if we are not there? How do we stand up for issues such as tax, transparency, tackling poverty, and preventing sexual violence in conflict? How do we do all that from 4,000 miles away?

On Sri Lanka, the right hon. Gentleman specifically asked whether we pressed for our agenda. Yes, we did, very directly, on the importance of land reform, on the importance of human rights, on the importance of an independent inquiry. Of course, some other leaders decided to stay away, and everyone must take their own decision, but frankly, no country on earth has a more direct relationship with the Commonwealth than this one, and that is why it was right to go. If he is concerned about the rights of Tamils, as I am, and reconciliation, the right thing to do is to go and shine a spotlight on their plight. You cannot do that sitting at home. I remember when his brother said that we needed Foreign Secretaries and Prime Ministers who could stop the traffic in Beijing. He will not even get out of Primrose Hill. This whole area of judgment by the right hon. Gentleman is a sign of weakness. He was given a choice: an easy political path or a tough, right path, and he cops out every time—too weak to stand up to Len McCluskey, too weak to stand up for Britain abroad.

[Sir Menzies Campbell (North East Fife) (LD)]

May I associate myself with the Prime Minister’s observations about the Philippines and congratulate him and the Government on ensuring such a remarkable response on behalf of the United Kingdom?

I am not one of those who believes that the Prime Minister should not have attended. Unlike other Prime Ministers, he had a constitutional obligation to be present to provide support and, if necessary, advice for the Prince of Wales who was representing Her Majesty the Queen. Is not the rightness of the Prime Minister’s decision demonstrated eloquently by the quality and volume of the coverage he was able to achieve? Of course, the test will be the extent to which there is a proper follow-through. In that respect, will my right hon. Friend assure us that everything will be done to try to achieve unanimity of purpose at the United Nations for an inquiry of the kind he has outlined?

[The Prime Minister]

I am very grateful for what my right hon. and learned Friend says about the importance of attending. This point about media organisations is important, because they have been unable to travel freely in the north of the country. By taking respected organisations such as the BBC, ITV, Sky and Channel 4 directly to the areas affected in Jaffna, they were able literally to shine a spotlight on the things that have happened. He is entirely right to say that what matters now is follow-through, but what is important is that this is now an established part of Britain’s foreign policy—to raise at every international forum, in every way we can, the importance of a strong, united, prosperous and reconciled future for Sri Lanka, and that is exactly what we will do.

[Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

The report from the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs on the FCO’s human rights work stated:

“We recommend that the Prime Minister should obtain assurances from the Sri Lankan Government that people who approach him to talk about human rights while he is in Sri Lanka to attend the CHOGM do not face reprisals or harassment by security forces.”

Was he able to obtain those assurances from the Sri Lankan Government, or not?

[The Prime Minister]

I made very clear to all the authorities I spoke to how important it was to be able to visit the north of the country, to meet refugees and displaced people and to raise their cases. That was exactly what I was able to do with the President. The world will now be watching what happens to those people, and I was given assurances that people were being re-housed and given new livelihoods. We will watch very carefully to see what happens to the people I met.

[Mr Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)]

I congratulate the Prime Minister on going to Jaffna and raising those difficult questions with President Rajapaksa. Does the Prime Minister agree with me that as Sri Lanka will be in the chair of the Commonwealth running up to the Mauritius CHOGM, it is incredibly important that it focus relentlessly on the agenda he encapsulated of good governance, the rule of law, free trade and wealth creation?

[The Prime Minister]

That is absolutely the agenda we should be addressing and pushing for. I would make the point that the role of the Commonwealth chair can be overstated, as it is the Secretary-General who sets the agenda for the Commonwealth. Again, however, the Commonwealth is a consensus organisation. Once the previous Government had signed up to CHOGM’s being in Sri Lanka, the natural consequence was that Sri Lanka would be the de facto chair for two years. That flows from a Labour Government’s decision, not our decision.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

May I press the Prime Minister on the question from my right hon. Friend the Member for Cynon Valley (Ann Clwyd)? She asked him whether undertakings were given that there would be no harassment of those he met and had dealings with in the north. Re-housing is one thing, and it is important, but I would be very grateful if he expanded on that.

[The Prime Minister]

The point I was trying to make was that although undertakings that those people should not be harmed were vital, their cases should also be taken up by the Sri Lankan Government. The response of the Sri Lankan Government to such issues is not to say that such people do not exist or that there is nothing that can be done. They are saying, “Please give us time. We are dealing with this.” It is right for the international community to press them on these issues. Yes, there were many more internally displaced people four years ago, but there are still too many today and they need to be properly looked after.

[Mr Lee Scott (Ilford North) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the real issue at stake is the approximately 40,000 women, children and men—innocent people—who were slaughtered at the end of the conflict, and that the robust approach he showed on the visit to Sri Lanka and CHOGM should be carried through, as their memories deserve justice as well as the work that he has done? I have had many e-mails over the past few days thanking the Prime Minister for his robust approach, while also asking him to ensure that we take things forward in March if President Rajapaksa does not take his stance.

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his comments. I challenge almost anyone in the House to watch even part of the Channel 4 documentary about the events at the end of the war—when there were appalling levels of casualties among civilians in the north of the country who were, it seems, targeted—and not to believe that there should be a proper independent inquiry. Of course, dreadful things happened throughout the war and it is for the Sri Lankan Government to decide how they should be investigated. It is clear, however, that those particular events at the end of the war need an independent inquiry so that the issue can be properly settled.

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)]

Will the Prime Minister explain how exactly he proposes to follow up his demand for an inquiry? What monitoring and reporting will there be, and what action will the Commonwealth take if and when Sri Lanka does not follow up on the assurances he was apparently given? Many people are dead, and many people are very angry about the abuses of human rights by the Sri Lankan Government.

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for what he says. The key thing is that the UN high commissioner for human rights, Navi Pillay, has made the point that there should be an independent inquiry and has set the deadline for when it should at least begin. If it is not begun, there needs to be, as she has said, an international independent inquiry. We are saying that we support that view and will put behind it Britain’s international diplomatic standing in all the organisations of which we are a member, including, of course, the United Nations.

[Sir Alan Haselhurst (Saffron Walden) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend accept that the fierce reaction in the Government-influenced press in Sri Lanka throughout his visit ensured that human rights in that country was the stand-out issue? Would he agree that in future CHOGMs, a stronger presence on the part of Commonwealth parliamentarians would help the whole matter of the promotion of human rights?

[The Prime Minister]

I certainly agree with my right hon. Friend that links between Commonwealth parliamentarians are very helpful for raising these issues. His first point is absolutely spot-on: because of visiting the north and raising these issues, human rights, and questions about land reform, reconciliation, and investigations, were top of mind for the press, the media, and everyone in Sri Lanka in a way that they simply would not have been.

[Mike Gapes (Ilford South) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Prime Minister says that the Government will press the issue in March next year at the United Nations Human Rights Council. In the light of that council’s woeful record—at one point, it actually praised the Government of Sri Lanka for their internal policies—how confident can he be, given the authoritarian states and friends of Rajapaksa who are on the council, that we will get anywhere on this in the UN?

[The Prime Minister]

I think this is going to be very hard pounding for a very long period of time, but what the Sri Lankan Government need to understand, and I think understand more today than perhaps they did a week ago, is that the issue is not going to go away, and if they do not hold an independent inquiry, the pressure for an international inquiry will grow and grow. Using the UN human rights machinery is the right way to do that.

[Sir Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)]

The UN Special Court for Sierra Leone has been sitting in The Hague for some time now. It demonstrates that there is plenty of precedent showing that if the United Nations Security Council has the will, it is perfectly possible to devise mechanisms for independent judicial inquiries into crimes against humanity by UN member states.

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend brings considerable expertise and experience to this area. I would argue that the Commonwealth, like the United Nations, is of course an imperfect organisation, but even with the Commonwealth, it is possible to point to examples where it has stood up for human rights and for democracy —perhaps particularly recently in the case of Fiji. We have to use these organisations to get the results that are right, in terms of human rights and these sorts of issues.

[Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)]

I thank the Prime Minister for what the Government are doing on the Philippines disaster, and pay tribute to the many communities up and down the land who are contributing massively to the public appeal, not least in my constituency, where there is a community sit-out on the Shankill road to raise funds; I pay tribute to those involved.

On the Commonwealth summit, may I press the Prime Minister on the issue of combating poverty? Will he tell us in more detail what has been done to combat corruption and promote good governance?

[The Prime Minister]

First of all, let me join the right hon. Gentleman in praising all those who are raising money for the Philippines Disasters Emergency Committee appeal. I think it is incredibly striking, in all our communities, how many people come straight out on to the streets and are rattling those tins and raising that money; at the weekend in my constituency, I saw rotary clubs doing precisely that.

On the issue of tackling poverty and the link between corruption and poverty, in the report from the high-level panel, which I co-chaired, if we look at the 12 targets that we thought should be set, a lot of those concern things like access to justice, freedom from corruption, absence of press censorship, proper democracy and the rule of law, because those issues are vital in helping countries to move sustainably from poverty to wealth. That, I think, is the great thing about this high-level panel report: yes, it is about aid, and yes, it is about economic growth, but it recognises the golden thread of vital issues to do with democracy and institutions as well.

[Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

Regarding the Philippines, may I congratulate my right hon. Friend, the Government and the British public for their very generous response? In addition, may I say that the Secretary of State for International Development has done the most amazingly sterling work? We owe her and her team enormous thanks for everything that she has done.

[The Prime Minister]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. The Department for International Development and the Secretary of State have done a superb job—in marshalling resources in response to the crisis, in working with the Ministry of Defence to get HMS Daring and then HMS Illustrious alongside, in generating income and money to go directly to the appeal, and in making sure that we work with our partners to do that. There are now two teams out there to assist with the Foreign Office effort, and my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has just told me that some of our experts on victim identification will be part of an Interpol team that will be there soon as well.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

The Prime Minister’s call for an inquiry into the terrible events in Sri Lanka would carry a great deal more weight if he had not obstructed the report on the Iraq war. The Chilcot inquiry demanded papers to reach a conclusion on why, 10 years ago, the House made a decision to join Bush’s war in Iraq, with the loss of 179 British lives.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The hon. Gentleman is on a different ski slope altogether today.

[The Prime Minister]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

It is ingenious and imaginative—the hon. Gentleman is always that—but the Prime Minister is already on his feet.

[The Prime Minister]

I am responsible for many things, but holding up the Iraq inquiry is not one of them. Conservative Members and, indeed, my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Liberal Democrat Benches called for an inquiry, we voted for an inquiry and we worked for an inquiry year after year before one was finally set up. I very much hope that its conclusions will shortly be available for all to see.

[Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Commonwealth is in many ways uniquely placed to take advantage of the global world in which we all live? Will he say a little more about the opportunities for commercial development between Commonwealth countries, particularly this country and the Commonwealth?

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. Friend makes a very important point. The Commonwealth brings quite different and disparate countries together—some of the largest on earth, such as India, but also some of the smallest and most fragile island states in the world. It is a forum in which we can discuss issues, share values and perspectives, but also, yes, talk about business and trade, which is why there is a business angle to the events in which we took part. We should use all those forums to push for our agenda of free trade and trade facilitation, and there is an important meeting coming up in Bali very soon.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

I welcome the Prime Minister’s third visit to India, and his first to Calcutta. In Jaffna, he saw the devastation and grief inflicted on the Tamil people by President Rajapaksa. Is he aware that we continue to deport Tamil people from this country to Sri Lanka, where they are tortured? Will he speak to the Home Secretary about updating the advice given on the Home Office website so that we can protect those people, who are genuinely seeking asylum in our country?

[The Prime Minister]

The asylum system should work on the basis of the best and latest information about whether someone genuinely faces a risk of torture and persecution if they return. Of course, I shone a light on some of the human rights abuses that are taking place, but it is also right to point out that in Sri Lanka today warfare, civil war, terrorism and violence of that kind are not taking place, so we should be clear and welcome that.

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for what he said about my third visit to India and my first to Calcutta. This is part of building the special relationship that I believe should exist between Britain and India, and which spans diplomacy, politics, trade and other international relations.

[Mr Stephen O'Brien (Eddisbury) (Con)]

I congratulate the Prime Minister on the high impact that he and the British Government have had in relation to the Philippines. That includes not just the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Department for International Development but the extension resourced through the armed forces, which is most welcome.

In relation to CHOGM, the Sri Lankan President proposes a truth and reconciliation process, but that is not adequate to meet the concerns and anxieties about alleged war crimes. We therefore need to follow the process proposed by the Prime Minister, however good the truth and reconciliation processes have been in South Africa and Mali.

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. Friend makes an important point. I accept that the Sri Lankan Government have set up some processes, including the ones to which he referred, but too many of them have been military-led inquiries—basically, private inquiries into events at the end of the war—rather than a proper, independent inquiry, which is what needs to be held.

[Mr Elfyn Llwyd (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

I have to confess that I thought it unwise to go to Sri Lanka, but having heard the Prime Minister’s statement and what he now plans to do I am changing my mind—not a bad thing, possibly. As someone who has raised the Tamil question many times in the past 20 years or so, may I urge him and the Foreign Secretary to give due priority to the issue to ensure that at an early stage we will have a just peace and reconciliation on this worried island?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his kind and very generous remarks, and for the way in which he put them. I completely agree. Having made this visit, having taking this important stand and having given the issue the attention it deserves, we must now make sure that we follow through, but we should do so on a basis of huge optimism about the potential future of the country. If proper efforts at reconciliation are made, there is no reason why that country, which is now essentially at peace and is not suffering warfare and terrorism, cannot be an immense success story in the future.

[Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)]

As somebody who was very uncomfortable about the meeting happening in Sri Lanka in the first place and very troubled by our participation endorsing President Rajapaksa, may I, too, commend the Prime Minister for being extremely robust and effective on the war crimes issue, and encourage him down that road? Was he able to ask any questions about disappeared people and about assassinations, and is there a chance that the Commonwealth, under its next Secretary-General, will stand up for human rights better than it has been doing?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his very kind remarks and for what he said about my attendance at the summit. I did raise the issue of the disappeared, and at the refugee centre in the displaced persons village I met some people who told me about relatives who had disappeared. The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, my right hon. Friend the Member for East Devon (Mr Swire), held a meeting with families of the disappeared, so the issue was raised at every level in our engagement with the Sri Lankan authorities. We must continue to raise these issues in the months and years ahead. There is much to commend in the Commonwealth, but it is an imperfect organisation. At its best it does stand up for values that we all share and believe in, and the more it does so the better an organisation it will be.

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

In answer to a question, the Prime Minister suggested that he had made a tough and brave decision to go to CHOGM. May I tell him through you, Mr Speaker, that the tough and brave decision was that of those family members of the disappeared who were willing to approach him? They are now at serious risk for their lives, the lives of their families and the future of relatives they have not seen for years. What are the Government going to do, and principally what is the British high commission in Colombo going to do, to ensure the safety of those families?

[The Prime Minister]

I agree entirely with the hon. Lady. The bravery that was shown was by the displaced people who were prepared to meet me and to speak out about their concerns. Bravery was shown by all those who have lost relatives and who do not know where they are. Also, it was incredible to meet journalists who have stood up for freedom of the press and risked assassination, torture and persecution. In the offices of the Uthayan newspaper are pictures around the walls of journalists who died reporting facts and truth in Sri Lanka. We should do everything we can, including through the high commission, to make sure that nobody who spoke out or met me suffers in any way at all. It is now very public who I met and where I went, and our engagement with the Sri Lankan Government could not be clearer about the importance not only of their safety, but of making sure that they are properly housed and have access to a livelihood as part of reconciliation.

[Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)]

At this time of national crisis for the Philippines, will the Prime Minister join me in calling on the splinter groups of the MNLF and MILF in the southern Philippines to lay down their arms in order that the Philippines army can help the needy throughout the whole of the country, rather than take up arms against rebel groups?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an important point about the Philippines. The overwhelming priority now must be getting aid to people who need it and trying to put that country back together again.

[Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)]

In the wake of the disaster in the Philippines, our leading aid agencies have said that the increased frequency and intensity of extreme weather events should act as a wake-up call for the international community to do a lot more on climate change. Does the Prime Minister agree, and what does he intend to do?

[The Prime Minister]

I do agree that climate change presents huge dangers for our planet. There is a strong case for saying that there are connections between unusual weather events and the climate change that is taking place. That is why it is important to keep the issue high up the international agenda. At the Commonwealth conference I was able to raise the fact of the international climate fund, to which Britain has made a significant contribution, and how it should be helping these countries. The Commonwealth is a good place to make the point because many members are very vulnerable small island states for whom climate change is literally an existential challenge.

[Margot James (Stourbridge) (Con)]

Manufacturers in the black country will be reassured to hear that the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary used the Commonwealth meeting to promote our trading links with the fastest-growing parts of the world. Will my right hon. Friend update the House on the prospects for more open trade with India following his very successful meeting with Mr Tata?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question. We continue to push with India the case for a free trade agreement. With India being effectively in an election year, I am not sure that we will make huge progress now, but we continue to make the arguments and demonstrate the figures for how beneficial it would be for both our countries, and for the EU, to have this agreement go ahead.

[Sandra Osborne (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (Lab)]

What progress can the Prime Minister point to in relation to human rights in the Commonwealth? Is he, for example, aware of the excellent report of the Kaleidoscope Trust, chaired by the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr Blunt), on the state of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people’s rights in the Commonwealth? An incredible 41 countries still criminalise same sex activity by adults. Is not that a disgrace?

[The Prime Minister]

We have a very clear view that there should be proper rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, and we do raise these issues, including at the Commonwealth meeting, as the Minister of State and the Foreign Secretary did. The report that the hon. Lady mentions is an excellent report. It is still depressing that so many countries persecute gay people, but there has in some countries been some progress in terms of greater rights and, as we have done in this country, celebrating gay marriage.

[Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con)]

Despite the fact that 53 countries signed up to the communiqué to uphold the Commonwealth’s core values, does my right hon. Friend not think that the Commonwealth has a long way to go to uphold those core values, particularly if some countries thought that Zimbabwe could creep back in?

[The Prime Minister]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. At its best, the Commonwealth comes together and signs up to important declarations, such as the Perth declaration on human rights, but sadly, at its worst, those values are not always stood up for in every case. We can point to the good places, such as Fiji, excluded from the Commonwealth, given a path back to the Commonwealth if the right things happen, but we can all point to examples where these values have not been properly upheld. But it is an organisation that we should be proud to belong to and want to make it deliver to its best.

[Mr Pat McFadden (Wolverhampton South East) (Lab)]

Given what happened at the end of the war in Sri Lanka and what has happened since, why does the Prime Minister think that the Sri Lankan Government can be trusted to set up a proper independent inquiry? Why is it not right for us to press now for what he said he might press for in March, which is an international inquiry in which the world can have trust?

[The Prime Minister]

Just to be clear, I have not said we might support it; I have said we will support it. What is required is an independent inquiry, and if there is not a proper independent inquiry, we will—will, not might—push for an independent international inquiry in March. That is the right approach. The Sri Lankan Government need to be put to the test. The war is over. The terrorism is finished. They have this incredible opportunity. It is no good the shadow Foreign Secretary just sitting there. He was the first one who said there was no point going; there was nothing to talk about; nothing Britain could do. It is the sort of stick-your-head-in-the-sand approach to diplomacy that does absolutely no good for this country or for human rights.

[Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

Does the Prime Minister agree that the excellent work of the Royal Navy in the Philippines crisis well illustrates its unique capability not only to project power but to provide assistance around the world, and will not that capability be massively increased when we have two fleet carriers providing that sort of potential for the future?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is entirely right that our Royal Navy does have these multiple purposes. One of the strengths of HMS Illustrious is that it has the ability to desalinate water, and it also carries seven helicopters, and the two new carriers will be even more capable of such a role in the future.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Prime Minister looks a little like someone sticking their head in the sand when it comes to the environment. All the world’s scientists are looking at what is happening to our planet’s climate, but I read all the news reports of the conference and saw nothing on the environment, and there was nothing on the environment in his statement today. Global warming is going to destroy our planet. Why did he not take a lead on that at the conference?

[The Prime Minister]

It is obviously quite difficult to take a lead at a conference if one does not attend, which of course is what Members on the hon. Gentleman’s Front Bench were suggesting. In my contribution I talked about the importance of integrating our goals on climate change into our general approach to tackling poverty. I made the point that, with so many small island states in the Commonwealth that are so vulnerable, this is an existential issue for them and we should support them, including through the international climate fund, which is exactly what we are doing.

[Dr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con)]

For some time now many Government Members have been privately pressing the Sri Lankan Government to undertake an independent inquiry in order to allay the fears of our constituents, including my constituent, Mr Jana Mahalingam, who regularly corresponds with me on the issue. Does the Prime Minister agree that although peace has come through the ending of violence, the battle is now for reconciliation, which could be achieved through an independent inquiry?

[The Prime Minister]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. An independent inquiry is essential, but we should be clear that reconciliation is so much more than that. There were issues put to me about restoring land to people who have been moved from their homes, about the army needing to play a reduced role in the north of the country, and about real change being needed with regard to respecting the elected chief Minister in the north of the country. That is both frustrating and yet quite exciting: the country is, at one level, at peace, because there is no more war or terrorism, so the Government there can afford to be generous and magnanimous, and that is exactly what they should do.

[Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

Further to the question from the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), does the Prime Minister accept that over the past few years the British Government have forcibly returned Tamil asylum seekers to Sri Lanka, only for them to be bundled into white vans at Colombo airport and subjected to horrific torture? Is he proud of his asylum policies?

[The Prime Minister]

Our asylum polices should be based on the latest information and on proper judgments about whether people are likely to be tortured or persecuted on their return. That is not a decision that is made by Prime Ministers, or even by Ministers, but it is right that those decisions are properly taken account of in each case, and that is the way it should happen.

[Richard Benyon (Newbury) (Con)]

Many people will be really pleased to see something in the communiqué about the illegal trade in wildlife. The Prime Minister and his fellow Commonwealth leaders have grasped that that is about not only the tragic loss of iconic species, but the funding of organisations such as al-Shabaab and the Lord’s Resistance Army. What can he and his Commonwealth colleagues do now to try to influence the demand for those items of trade, which is fuelling the high prices that poachers can get in African countries, for example?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. There needs to be a process of education to try to reduce demand for those products, because that, of course, is what drives the trade in the first place. I am excited that next year we will be having that very important conference in the United Kingdom, bringing all the experts together, when we can really give as big a boost as possible.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Is it the Prime Minister’s position that the Governments of Canada, India and Mauritius, by deciding not to attend the summit, exercised a serious misjudgment and are sticking their heads in the sand?

[The Prime Minister]

My point is simply this: this country has a unique relationship with the Commonwealth and it would therefore have been completely wrong, opportunistic and irresponsible not to go. I think that has been demonstrated amply this afternoon.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I thank the Prime Minister for his statement, which I warmly welcome. I think that he was absolutely right to go to Sri Lanka and demonstrate this country’s commitment to the Commonwealth. Does he agree that one concrete way of demonstrating our continued commitment to the Commonwealth would be to establish dedicated channels of entry at UK airports for Commonwealth citizens, on the grounds that if it is good enough for the European Union it is good enough for the Commonwealth?

[The Prime Minister]

I hear what my hon. Friend says, but I think that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary might have a few things to say about new, simpler routes for people to come to this country. What we have tried to do is improve our visa system. For instance, in India we have introduced a one-day visa system. Of course, we should look at all countries on the basis of how we can have an improved visa system and encourage people who genuinely want to come here to visit, but we should also ensure that there are not abuses, and I am afraid that we have to apply those rules to Commonwealth countries as well.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

The war may be over, as the Prime Minister says, but there are still many Sri Lankans here in this country, particularly Tamils, who are seeking asylum and are being given first decisions that are so dubious that they have been overturned at appeal. Will the Prime Minister, with the new information that he has personally gained, look again at the way we treat people who are seeking asylum from Sri Lanka in this country?

[The Prime Minister]

As I have said, our work should be based on the latest evidence. It is not the case that every single Tamil who comes here or to another country would be persecuted on their return. We would be making a great mistake if we took a blanket view like that; it should be done on the evidence.

[Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con)]

Like other colleagues, I thank my right hon. Friend for the tremendous effort that the Secretary of State for DFID and her Department are undertaking in relation to the truly shocking humanitarian disaster in the Philippines. This is of course Britain showing, as always, where we morally belong and should be. I know that it is very early days, but can the Prime Minister update us on whether any longer-term help has been requested or, indeed, offered for when the initial crisis is over?

[The Prime Minister]

We are working on the issue of longer-term assistance. The real need now is to help with the disaster in its recovery phase. That is why the heavy-lift equipment, the planes, the helicopters and the work of the RAF are so vital. That is what needs to be done now, and then we need longer-term planning about the needs of the Philippines and how we can help.

[John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)]

Is the Prime Minister aware of any lobbying activities undertaken by the Sri Lankan Government within Westminster, either directly or through third-party lobbying companies?

[The Prime Minister]

I am frequently lobbied by the high commissioner for Sri Lanka who is here in the UK, and obviously he wants to put the best gloss on everything that is happening in his country, but one of the most important things is going to see some of these things for yourself rather than simply reading about them.

[Mr David Burrowes (Enfield, Southgate) (Con)]

Some hon. Members may recall David Miliband, the chief executive of the International Rescue Committee, saying when Foreign Secretary that the Sri Lankan Government have engaged in a war without witness. Can the Prime Minister assure me that following his visit Sri Lankans can all benefit from a peace with witnesses?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is entirely right. What is required is peace and reconciliation and proper rights for everyone who lives in Sri Lanka. As I said, the fact that the world is going to be watching how this reconciliation takes place is very important.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

Given the defiant tone of President Rajapaksa after the summit, does the Prime Minister really believe that progress on human rights by March next year is possible?

[The Prime Minister]

That decision rests with the Sri Lankan Government. I do not think it is fair to say that they have done nothing in response to the need for action or, indeed, international pressure. As I said, the fact that an election has taken place in the Northern Province and a new Chief Minister has been elected who is part of the Tamil National Alliance is a very positive step forward. We will not get anywhere if we do not point to the positive things that are happening as well as being very tough and firm about where further action is needed.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

Yesterday in church I heard the moving testimony of some Filipino members of our congregation about the effects of the disaster on their families and relatives. Further to the question by my hon. Friend the Member for Calder Valley (Craig Whittaker), does the Prime Minister agree that we should be working very closely with the large Filipino community in the United Kingdom on how we can continue to help in the future development and rescue of the country?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend has lots of expertise in the area of aid and development, and I am sure that he will want to work on this issue with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International Development, who has recently met the Philippine ambassador here in the UK. We want to bring all these brains to bear to make sure we get the right development and reconstruction effort together.

[Mr Andrew Love (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op)]

While recognising the good intentions of the Prime Minister in going to the north of Sri Lanka, that action has failed to drag any concessions out of President Rajapaksa or to convince his Commonwealth colleagues to sign a communiqué criticising human rights in Sri Lanka. What confidence does the Prime Minister have that in five months’ time or so action can be taken on its chairmanship of the Commonwealth and on setting up a United Nations investigation?

[The Prime Minister]

As I said, the decision will rest with the Sri Lankan President, but I do not think that anyone can be in any doubt that they are under more pressure today than they were a week ago, or a month ago, because of the international attention that has been shone on these issues—they know that the world will be watching. One only has to watch President Rajapaksa’s press conference, which was dominated by questions about human rights and inquiries into what happened at the end of the war, to see that there is pressure today that there was not a week ago.

[Michael Ellis (Northampton North) (Con)]

Does the Prime Minister know that he was described recently in the Australian press as a

“defender of democratic ideals and confident international statesman”?

Is it not the case that he was right to go to Sri Lanka because of the constitutional obligation of supporting the head of the Commonwealth and her representative the Prince of Wales, and because the concomitant publicity, both in the UK and around the world, has highlighted the issue front and centre?

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. It was right to take that stand and attend, and to stand up for the Commonwealth. Above all, it was an important meeting of a multilateral organisation in which we play an important part. I have been called quite a lot of things in recent days, but let me put it this way: those views are not always necessarily shared widely in the Cameron household.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

The Prime Minister has made much of the spotlight his visit has shone on human rights abuses in Sri Lanka. What do we make of the fact that not only was there no communiqué, but that in the final statement there was no mention of those human rights abuses, let alone an inquiry into them?

[The Prime Minister]

As the hon. Gentleman will know, one of the strengths of the Commonwealth, but also the source of some of its trouble, is that it is an organisation based on consensus. If someone disagrees with a potential conclusion it is effectively struck out. It was not, therefore, possible to have everything in the communiqué that we wanted. Is there, however, pressure on the Sri Lankan Government to act, to reconcile and to sort these problems out? As I said, there is more pressure today than there has been for a while.

[Rory Stewart (Penrith and The Border) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International Development on the work in the Philippines. I encourage the Government to make a clearer commitment over five years to ensure that the assistance in the Philippines does not cease when the headlines cease.

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes the important point that we must be helpful in the long term. I do not think it is possible now to predict exactly what the needs and priorities will be—we are still in the recovery phase—but proper work should be done to see what we can do to help. With our 0.7% of gross national income aid commitment, Britain is in the forefront of doing the right thing internationally. I am sure we can bring some of that to bear in the Philippines.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

The British people, seeing the television pictures from Sri Lanka of the Prime Minister smashing Muralitharan for six, will think that the Prime Minister is auditioning for a role in the England Ashes team. Afterwards, Muralitharan said that the situation in the north was improving. Would the Prime Minister like to comment on that?

[The Prime Minister]

First, I did not hit Muralitharan for six. Secondly, I think he was being quite gentle with me. I certainly could not read which way the ball was going to go and I was fairly lucky to hit it at all. He made a good point that a huge amount of progress has been made in terms of peace, stability and economic prosperity. His organisation is bringing together Tamils, Sinhalese and others to help forge the country together. He is doing amazing work and we should back that work. He also thought I was right to attend and to raise these issues. What he wants, as a proud Sri Lankan, is to ensure that a fair picture is painted of his country, and he is right to say that.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

The Prime Minister clearly succeeded in raising concerns about human rights in Sri Lanka. At the Commonwealth summit, did he or his officials get the chance to raise, with the Government of Bangladesh, our Government’s wish for them to address concerns about the International Crimes Tribunal in Bangladesh, the upholding of fair trial standards and the use of the death penalty for those convicted?

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary raised those specific issues with the Foreign Minister of Bangladesh. We have a good engagement with that country, and no issues are off limits.

[Dr Phillip Lee (Bracknell) (Con)]

The typhoon in the Philippines is just the latest natural disaster to afflict the globe. In the light of such dreadful events, is the Prime Minister interested in hearing more about my idea for the Government to build a mobile army surgical hospital capability that Britain could deploy swiftly into the field. The deployment of naval forces, although very welcome, can take days, but a MASH unit can be deployed within 24 hours of his decision.

[The Prime Minister]

I would be interested to hear about that idea. As my hon. Friend knows, we have emergency capabilities that can be sent out of the country very rapidly, but there is always room to see whether we can improve such an issue, either at a British level or by doing things with partners.

[Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)]

Amnesty International has welcomed the Prime Minister’s call for

“genuine freedom of expression and…an end to the intimidation of journalists”.

Does my right hon. Friend think that it would have been as easy to speak up for the freedom of the Sri Lankan press had he stayed in London?

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for what he says. Being able to take journalists to the north of the country, particularly to the Uthayan newspaper, so many of whose journalists have been injured or killed in the course of their work, was a very powerful way of drawing attention to the importance of a free press and of freedom from intimidation.

[Neil Carmichael (Stroud) (Con)]

I warmly welcome the Prime Minister’s statement, not least because it rams home the importance of Britain’s involvement in the international community. On trade, does he agree that the welcome news about the Airbus order, worth £5.4 billion, is excellent for the south-west and for Stroud, which supplies parts of the aircraft?

[The Prime Minister]

It is very good news that both Etihad Airways and Emirates airline have effectively ordered 50 aircraft each. Of course, the wings are made in Wales, the landing gear in Bristol and, indeed, many of the engines will be made by Rolls-Royce in Derby. It is really good news. This is the high-end, high-skilled jobs that we need, and it has very much been backed by the Government, because we have put a lot of money into the Aerospace Technology Institute and the Aerospace Growth Partnership that we are building with the industry.

[James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)]

The Department for International Development’s work in the Philippines has been innovative, successful and very popular. Has my right hon. Friend considered supporting disaster resilience programmes similar to the one mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell (Dr Lee) more broadly, and looking at resilience planning for potential disasters, rather than simply waiting for disasters to happen?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. We are looking specifically at whether we can do even better in the rapid response element. I remember, particularly from what happened in Haiti, that British firefighters and experts can play a vital job in rescuing people in the early stages of a disaster, but only if they get there quickly. There is always room to try to do better, and I know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International Development will listen to those suggestions.

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

The Commonwealth can be a powerful force for good in the world, as demonstrated by the centrality of human rights and shared prosperity to its charter, but does the Prime Minister agree that it is only as good as the commitment of its members? I congratulate him on showing a real commitment to both the Commonwealth and human rights, rather than taking the easy political option of running away.

[The Prime Minister]

Any institution works only as well as the political will of its members. We can sometimes obsess too much about the precise make-up of the institution, but we need to look at the political will that goes into defending the values to which we have signed up.

[Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)]

The Prime Minister rightly highlighted the extensive work done by the Foreign Secretary to end the abhorrent practice of sexual violence in conflict. Given the evidence of that having occurred in Sri Lanka, what can our Government do to assist the victims?

[The Prime Minister]

The first thing we must do is to continue the Foreign Secretary’s excellent work to drive the issue to the top of the international agenda. Some really important steps in relation to commitments from other countries and through the UN have now been made. The specific allegations are one reason why the independent inquiry that we have talked about this afternoon is so important.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

With personal experience of being affected by a natural disaster—I lost 30 relatives, as well as my grandfather, in the Kashmir earthquake in 2005—may I thank the then Secretary of State for International Development and the current Secretary of State for the work done by the UK and the public then and now to help rescue people and save lives? I urge the Government to provide long-term support and assistance to hard-to-reach rural areas whose whole livelihoods have been thrown away. Such people need our help, as I know from experience. Will the Prime Minister make them a top priority?

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for what he has said. He speaks movingly about how his family were affected by the situation in Kashmir. The key thing is to consider what long-term help and development assistance we can provide for rebuilding and to look at resilience against future natural disasters. That is something for which the international climate fund can be used.

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

Does the Prime Minister agree that the Leader of the Opposition’s cynical approach to his excellent trip to Sri Lanka contrasts starkly with the incredible—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I have tried to be generous. We have heard the point. The Prime Minister has made his point of view very clear. We do not need to rehearse the position of the Leader of the Opposition. The hon. Gentleman needs to be a bit more delphic and perhaps a little less clumsy.

[Mr Tobias Ellwood (Bournemouth East) (Con)]

May I welcome the statement and the taskings of HMS Daring and HMS Illustrious, which are joining the USS George Washington? This situation underlines why we need both new aircraft carriers and to ensure that one is always available. Does the Prime Minister agree that the new aircraft carriers and the new Type 26s must have the ability to assist in upstream engagement, stabilisation and humanitarian tasks, as well as having the high-end war-fighting capabilities?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is right to raise the importance of the aircraft carriers and the capabilities that they will bring. In particular, they will be used as a platform for helicopters, for desalination and for command and control. They will bring a huge amount of capability to tasks like this one.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

Given the generous response of the great British public to the disaster in the Philippines, it is clear that this is international aid that everyone can support. All of us applaud the efforts of our servicemen and women and British charity workers on the ground. Given that we meet our target of 0.7% of gross national income, that we are one of the most generous charitable donors of international aid in the world and that the defence budget is one of the tightest in Whitehall, how is our military spending on such occasions offset against our international aid target?

[The Prime Minister]

I think that we have the right balance. As a country, we spend almost £35 billion on our defence budget. It is the fourth largest defence budget in the world and it still will be at the end of this Parliament. Under this Government, there is much better co-ordination between international development and defence. That is why we have the conflict pool, which brings Whitehall Ministers and money together to work out how the money can best be spent. Sometimes that involves using our defence assets to help countries that are in need.

[Stephen Mosley (City of Chester) (Con)]

If you will bear with me for a second, Mr Speaker, I was disappointed that the Leader of the Opposition did not welcome the £5.4 billion order that Airbus gained over the weekend. Will my right hon. Friend join me in welcoming the deal and in congratulating the workers of Broughton, who manufacture the wings? It is their expertise and skills that make Airbus such a world-beater.

[The Prime Minister]

That was extraordinarily skilfully done. My hon. Friend is right to stand up for the workers in Broughton, whom I have visited several times. They have incredible skills and produce incredible technology. We should be proud of our contribution to Airbus’s international success and must do everything we can to back it. That is why I went to the Dubai air show, where far more British companies were holding stands and putting forward their wares. We should be full-hearted in supporting such industries.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

Did the Prime Minister detect any signs, even small ones, from the Sri Lankan Government that crimes against humanity might have been carried out by their security forces when operating in the north of the island?

[The Prime Minister]

I obviously discussed that issue with President Rajapaksa, as well as the need for an independent inquiry. The Sri Lankan Government’s current position is that they do not believe such an inquiry to be necessary and that they have their own processes and procedures. However, it is fair to say that they recognise that questions are being asked internationally and that they will have to provide some answers. The answer is that we must keep up the pressure.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Many people in our country will be proud of our Government for standing up against mass murder and genocide in Syria and Sri Lanka. The Tamils will be comforted by the Prime Minister’s strong visit to the north of Sri Lanka. Will he continue to ensure that the Sri Lankan regime is held accountable? If there is evidence that any member of the Sri Lankan regime has committed war crimes, whether from a Sri Lankan inquiry or a United Nations inquiry, will he look at bringing them to the International Criminal Court for justice?

[The Prime Minister]

Of course, that remains an option, but the most important thing is to get the independent inquiry under way. I would urge colleagues who have not seen some of the evidence in the recent Channel 4 documentary to look at that, because one really can see the need for rapid answers to the allegations made.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friends the Secretaries of State for International Development and for Defence for a model example of a joined-up government response to the horrors in the Philippines. Did my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister have time, in the margins of the conference, to discuss with President Hussain the dialogue that he has managed—singlehandedly more or less—to get going between himself and President Karzai over the vital future of Afghanistan?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend for what he says about the joined-up nature of government between the Ministry of Defence, the Foreign Office and the Department for International Development. That joined-up government is now working well, through the National Security Council and things such as the conflict pool, which brings money together for states, particularly those facing instability. We have massively increased the amount of money going into that pool.

I was fortunate to sit next to the Pakistani Prime Minister during one of the sessions and so had a good conversation about the progress we were making with the trilateral approach and the better relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Both countries recognise their mutual interests in peace and prosperity as democratic states living side by side.

[David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con)]

I welcome today’s statement and the leadership the Prime Minister is showing in the Philippines, as well as the comments from my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy). Will the Prime Minister join us in highlighting the important work that Filipino community groups, such as MaccPinoy in Macclesfield, are doing across the country in raising the important funds, clothing and food required by families and friends back in the Philippines?

[The Prime Minister]

It is important to recognise that there will be many people from the Philippines here in the UK desperately worried about their relatives back home. We should be with them at this time and praising their efforts to raise money and resources for the disaster recovery appeal.

[Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend confirm that he will continue to stand up for British values abroad and not play opportunist politics while important human rights issues are being discussed? Many of the people affected by those issues are currently living through a nightmare.

[The Prime Minister]

That is important on two counts. First, this is the Commonwealth, a multilateral organisation, and we should be there making our arguments, because if we do not, we will lose important battles over the issues we care about. Secondly, it provided an opportunity to talk about human rights specifically in Sri Lanka and to raise their profile in a way that would not have been possible sitting at home.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Human Rights Watch has praised my right hon. Friend for honouring his promise and delivering a strong message on human rights abuses and allegations of war crimes while in Sri Lanka. Does he agree that had he listened to the advice of some political leaders and not attended in Sri Lanka, that message would have gone completely unheard and unreported?

[The Prime Minister]

It is notable that Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, which might have had some doubts about my attending, have made it clear that we put forward human rights in a way that Britain can be very proud of.

[Mr Speaker]

I thank the Prime Minister and all 61 Back Benchers who questioned him.

Commission on Devolution in Wales

Monday 18th November 2013 Commons Chamber

16:43

[The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr David Jones)]

Since the general election, the Wales Office has made investment in infrastructure its No. 1 priority to deliver growth in the Welsh economy. This Government have already committed over £2.25 billion to new infrastructure that will benefit Wales, directly or indirectly. We are spending almost £2 billion to modernise the rail network, including electrifying the Great Western main line to Swansea and the railways serving the south Wales valleys. We are investing £250 million to build a new prison in north Wales that will create up to 1,000 new jobs and require a supply chain that will bring an estimated £28 million a year more into the local economy. We have also committed £57 million to bring superfast broadband to Wales, a key element of a modern infrastructure network. Alongside that, Hitachi’s investment in new nuclear at Wylfa Newydd is a great opportunity to create jobs and drive economic growth across north Wales.

Earlier this month, I confirmed in a written statement to the House that we would enable the Welsh Government to use their existing borrowing powers to start work as soon as possible on the sorely needed upgrade to the M4 around Newport, tackling the congestion that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has described as

“a foot on the windpipe of the Welsh economy”.

Today, in making our full response to the Silk commission’s recommendations, the Government are unveiling a new and extensive package of financial powers that will be devolved to the National Assembly for Wales and the Welsh Government. I would like to commend my right hon. Friends the Chancellor and the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, and Jane Hutt, the Welsh Minister for Finance, for the positive and collaborative approach taken in agreeing this package of powers, which demonstrates the strength of the United Kingdom, and the flexibility and adaptability of devolution within our Union.

The Silk commission made 33 recommendations, 31 of which were for the Government to consider. Today we are accepting, in full or in part, all but one. We are devolving many new financial powers to the National Assembly and the Welsh Government, potentially giving the Welsh Government control over more than £3 billion of tax revenue, with commensurate levels of borrowing. We are providing the Welsh Government with additional tools to invest in the areas they are responsible for, to enable them to upgrade Wales’s infrastructure and help to quicken the pace of economic growth. This will facilitate the improvement of Wales’s deteriorating road network—not only the M4, which I have mentioned, but the other key Welsh trans-European route, the north Wales expressway.

The devolution of tax and borrowing powers will also make the Assembly and the Welsh Government more accountable to the people of Wales who elect them. Since devolution, the Assembly and the Welsh Government have been accountable only for how they spend taxpayers’ money; they will now become more accountable for how they raise it. The Government’s response to the Silk commission’s first report builds on the announcement made by the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister earlier this month, and sets out in detail the devolved financial powers we are giving to the National Assembly for Wales. We will give Welsh Ministers borrowing powers, so they can invest in the capital infrastructure I have described. We will devolve landfill tax and stamp duty land tax in Wales, ensuring that the Welsh Government have an independent funding stream to pay back the money they borrow.

We will also provide for a referendum to take place, so that people in Wales can decide whether some of their income tax should be devolved to the Welsh Government. Subject to the approval of the people of Wales in a referendum, we will deduct 10p from each of the main UK income tax rates in Wales, with the Welsh Government able to set an unrestricted Welsh rate of income tax for all Welsh taxpayers. This is consistent with the system being introduced in Scotland and will increase the accountability of the Welsh Government, while avoiding significant risks to UK revenues that would result from different Welsh rates for each band.

We will also fully devolve non-domestic business rates raised in Wales, so that the Welsh Government budget benefits more directly from growth in Wales; enable the National Assembly for Wales to create new taxes, with the UK Government’s consent; and devolve the tools to manage these new powers. A cash reserve will be created that the Welsh Government can add to when revenues are high and utilise when they are below forecast. We will also provide the Welsh Government with limited current borrowing powers to deal with shortfalls if their cash reserve is insufficient.

I was pleased that Carwyn Jones, the First Minister of Wales, welcomed the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister’s announcement earlier this month. This package of powers gives the Welsh Government additional tools to invest in Wales to rejuvenate the Welsh economy, which has languished behind the rest of the United Kingdom for far too long. This package will make the Assembly and the Welsh Government more accountable to the people they serve and place important taxation levers in the hands of the Welsh Government, which, if used wisely, can help to make Wales a more prosperous place. This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity for Wales. I hope that the Welsh Government will rise to the challenge and look beyond the M4 to invest wisely and strategically across the whole of Wales. I will place a copy of the response in the Libraries of both Houses, and I commend this statement to the House.

16:49

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement on this historic occasion. It is almost a year since the Silk Commission produced its report and 16 years since the last time a Conservative Secretary of State for Wales made a statement in this House—better late than never. Labour Members certainly welcome the acceptance of the Silk recommendations, especially coming from a Secretary of State who once described devolution as constitutional damage.

I would like to thank Paul Silk and his team for their work in producing the report. That report and the Government’s response to it are of enormous significance to the people of Wales—a part of the UK that has been harder hit by this Tory Government than anywhere else. Welsh wages have fallen faster and further than anywhere else in the UK, the Welsh budget has been cut by £1.7 billion by the current Tory Government, and we have seen energy and other bills rise higher and faster than elsewhere. That is the reality of the context of today’s announcement.

Because of those cuts, the Welsh Government have sought borrowing powers and agreed with the Silk recommendations that Wales should be able to exercise those powers, as Scotland and Northern Ireland do at present. We welcome the confirmation that Wales will in future have the capacity to borrow in order to invest in infrastructure, but will the Secretary of State clarify some of the many details that are left outstanding after today’s announcement?

First, will he clarify exactly when he expects that package of borrowing to be in place for the initial tranche of investment in the M4 and other roads? More importantly, will he tell us about the process by which that level of borrowing will be agreed? The Government previously indicated that the devolution of the minor taxes such as stamp duty and landfill tax, which are being devolved today, would be sufficient to trigger significant borrowing powers for the Welsh Government. Today’s statement, however, seems to suggest that that borrowing would now be contingent on income tax-varying powers being taken up in Wales. Will the Secretary of State confirm whether that is the case and say how much borrowing will be released once the minor taxes are devolved? Will he further confirm whether a mechanism, a set of methods and a formula similar to that used in Scotland under the Scotland Act 2012, which affords about £230 million of borrowing to Scotland, would be the method employed in Wales?

We welcome the devolution of the minor taxes—stamp duty and landfill tax—as this gives the Welsh Government the capacity to make some changes to the Welsh economy and to invest in order to grow and create jobs. Prior to the introduction of these new Welsh taxes, we would need to be very clear about whether the Welsh people would be better or worse off. That is our primary concern, so will the Secretary of State explain exactly how the process and methods will be agreed and set for offsetting the block grant by the amount devolved to Wales under the minor taxes?

The most significant aspect of today’s announcement relates to income tax and the proposal that the Government will legislate for a referendum in which the Welsh people may be asked if they want a proportion of income tax to be devolved to Wales. Our position on income tax is that we support the proposal as laid out by Silk on the basis of a “triple lock”, whereby we will judge whether the people of Wales will be worse off, we will see through the referendum whether the people of Wales want to take that responsibility and we will see whether fair funding is agreed for Wales. That remains our position today.

It is a significant that, in making today’s announcement, the Government have rejected Silk’s proposal to devolve the income tax bands independently of one another. Can the Secretary of State confirm why he has rejected that recommendation? The Government’s written statement suggests the reason is that the UK Government have discovered an interest in the progressivity of the UK tax system and are concerned that devolving those bands independently of one another might reduce that progressivity. That is ironic from a Government who have cut taxes for the wealthiest people in Wales. Will the right hon. Gentleman further confirm that the leader of the Welsh Conservatives in Cardiff Bay has said that he would use the tax powers only for the wealthiest by cutting only the 40% band, thus continuing the anti-progressive policies being pursued in Westminster?

I noted from the media today that the Secretary of State, in contrast, would cut all the bands by 1%. He will know that that would result in a £200 million shortfall in the Welsh Assembly’s budget. Will he tell us exactly how he would fill that shortfall, or, alternatively, tell us which services he suggests that the Welsh Government should cut to make the tax cut affordable?

May I ask the Secretary of State about fair funding? Last year the Government said that there was evidence of convergence in funding between Wales and England. Today’s statement commits them to

“review relative levels of funding for Wales and England in advance of each spending review and, if convergence is forecast to resume, to discuss options to address the issue in a fair and affordable manner.”

Will the Secretary of State tell us exactly what the result of those reviews will be? If there is evidence of convergence, will action be taken? Will we see what Paul Silk wanted, namely a review of the Barnett formula?

Without a hint of irony, the statement provides for the Government to give Wales a facility to save any “surplus revenues” that it might have lying around. Given that the Welsh budget has been cut by £1.7 billion over the last three years, can the Secretary of State tell us when that surplus is expected to materialise? Or have we just been given another set of false promises by a Government who do not believe in the Welsh people, and will not deliver for them? Is today another day on which we should beware Tories bearing gifts?

[Mr Jones]

I am grateful to the shadow Secretary of State for what I think was a welcome for my announcement. However, we heard the predictable preamble about Wales having been hit harder by the Government than any other part of the United Kingdom. In fact, the grant to the Welsh Government has been reduced proportionately less than that of any other Whitehall spending Department. Given that we are living in times of extreme difficulty—caused to no small extent by the last Labour Government—I should have thought that the hon. Gentleman would welcome the support that this Government have given the Welsh Government and the Welsh Assembly.

The hon. Gentleman asked a number of specific questions, the first few of which related to when the borrowing powers would be made available. I am pleased to be able to tell him that, as was announced in my written ministerial statement, the Welsh Government have already been given assurances that they can negotiate with the Treasury for borrowing powers in respect of the M4 and the north Wales expressway to take effect immediately. We will fund that by allowing the Welsh Government’s current borrowing powers to be used without any adverse impact on the departmental expenditure limit.

The hon. Gentleman welcomed the devolution of taxes. The two larger taxes that are being devolved are landfill tax and stamp duty land tax. That will of itself provide a funding stream against which the Welsh Assembly Government can borrow, but we want income tax to be devolved as well. The hon. Gentleman is right: I do support the devolution of income tax. I urge the Welsh Assembly Government to trigger the referendum as soon as they can, because the Conservative party will be campaigning vociferously for a yes vote in that referendum, and, furthermore, for a cut in income tax.

The hon. Gentleman made a point that revealed the poverty of the Labour party’s ambition. We believe that devolution should be used to give a competitive edge to Wales, and that the powers that are devolved should be used to make Wales a more prosperous place. Very far from wanting the tax cuts to apply to the wealthiest people in Wales, we would like them to apply across the board, to everybody in Wales, so that the brightest and best want to come to Wales to set up business, to make their livings and to look forward to a brighter future. That is what differentiates the Labour party from the Conservative party. Interestingly, the Welsh Finance Minister, Jane Hutt, hailed today’s announcement as

“a good deal for Wales, and a big step forward for devolution.”

However, the Eeyore-like shadow Secretary of State prefers to look for a cloud in every silver lining. He is out of step with everybody except himself.

[Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

May I congratulate Paul Silk and the Silk commission on the excellent work they have done on part I? May I also heartily congratulate my right hon. Friend on his excellent response to this thoughtful piece of work? I am pleased that he has taken time in responding, because it is the right response. I am particularly delighted with the extension of borrowing powers. He will be familiar with the fact that the Welsh Assembly Government have always made excuses about why they could not improve the M4 and the A55. Does he agree with me that we should have a start-date for those improvements this week from the Labour Government down in Wales?

[Mr Jones]

May I, in turn, commend my right hon. Friend on the hard work she carried out in setting up the Silk commission in the first place? I would also like to repeat the thanks I gave in my response to the Silk commission’s recommendations for the hard work carried out by Paul Silk and his commission. The truth is, indeed, that responsibility for the maintenance and upgrade of those major routes always lay with the Welsh Assembly Government. They have in the past acknowledged that the cost of that was difficult to meet within their budget. We could not allow the deterioration of those major routes to continue indefinitely, and I therefore hope they will proceed swiftly with the upgrade of both those routes. I am pleased to see, however, that they are already consulting on the upgrade to the M4.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

Timeo Tories et dona ferentes, as we say in Newport. Are the people of Newport and Wales right to be cautious about Tory promises, particularly in the light of the very small share Wales has had of the Olympic legacy? Although it was promised a larger share, it is on protozoan level. Can we have a guarantee from the Government that if the Welsh Assembly Government implement these measures, it will mean fair funding, not a continuation of underfunding?

[Mr Jones]

Well, we clearly have another representative of the Eeyore tendency in the hon. Gentleman. All I would say is that his concern is not shared by the Welsh Government who, I repeat, have said very strongly that the announcement

“represents a good deal for Wales, and a big step forward for devolution.”