House of Commons
Business before Questions
Hon. Members
Object.
To be considered on Monday 4 May.
Malvern Hills Bill [Lords]
Motion made,
That so much of the Lords Message (23 April) as relates to the Malvern Hills Bill [Lords] be now considered.
That this House concurs with the Lords in their Resolution.—(The Chairman of Ways and Means.)
Hon. Members
Object.
To be considered on Monday 4 May.
Cheltenham Borough Council (Markets) Bill [Lords]
Ordered,
That so much of the Lords Message (23 April) as relates to the Cheltenham Borough Council (Markets) Bill be now considered.
That the promoters of the Cheltenham Borough Council (Markets) Bill, which was originally introduced in this House on 22 January 2026, should have leave to suspend proceedings on the Bill from the day on which the current Session ends in order to proceed with it, if they think fit, in the next Session of Parliament, according to the provisions of Standing Order 188A (Suspension of bills).—(The Chairman of Ways and Means.)
Speaker’s Statement
Mr Speaker
Before we come to questions, I wish to make a short statement. Numerous right hon. and hon. Members from across the House have written to ask me to give precedence to a matter as an issue of privilege. One of those letters is from the Leader of the Opposition. The matter concerns the Prime Minister’s answers to the House about the process for the appointment of Peter Mandelson and related issues.
I think it would be helpful to the House if I explained my role in deciding whether a complaint should be put to the House. Privilege issues should only be brought to the House sparingly, and it is my duty to act as a gatekeeper to ensure that frivolous applications are not taken forward. As a gatekeeper, my role is to decide whether an hon. Member has made a case that the House itself should be able to consider, not to decide whether someone is likely to have committed a contempt. If precedence is given, the Member tables a motion for debate. At the end of that debate, the House itself takes a decision on whether the matter should be taken further.
Some may be wondering why this issue is being looked at now. To be clear, I cannot determine when an application is made—I have to consider any application when it comes to me. In this case, having taken advice, I have decided to allow the House to come to a view on whether the Committee of Privileges should look at the matter. It is not for me to make any decision or come to any view. Therefore, the Leader of the Opposition will have the opportunity to put the matter to the House tomorrow. The debate will be taken after any urgent questions and statements and any ten-minute rule Bill.
Oral Answers to Questions
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
James MacCleary (Lewes) (LD)
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Seamus Logan (Aberdeenshire North and Moray East) (SNP)
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Torsten Bell)
The Government made their decision on this case on 29 January 2026, after giving the PHSO’s report careful consideration. The detailed reasons for our decision were set out in our response, which has been placed in the Library of the House.
James MacCleary
The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman has recommended compensation for millions of WASPI women. In 99% of cases, PHSO recommendations are complied with, so does the Minister accept that singling out this group by not complying amounts to discrimination on the basis of sex and age? If not, what possible justification can the Minister offer?
Torsten Bell
As I have previously said to this House, it is unusual but not unprecedented for the Government to take a different view from the PHSO. That does not mean that we have not taken its report incredibly seriously—I have also met its representatives—but as I have said, we set out the detailed reasons for the decision we came to in the response we laid in the House of Commons Library on 29 January.
Jim Shannon
I ask this question on behalf of the 6,000 WASPI women in Strangford. Given that the Department’s own 2007 evaluation raised serious doubts about the effectiveness of letters to pensioners, how can the Minister justify the decision that no direct financial loss occurred when thousands of women were deprived of the 28-month notice period required to adjust their life savings and retirement plans? In the light of the Scottish Parliament’s decision to again press this issue in February, will he please do the right thing, put actions before apologies, and deliver help and support? I say that respectfully, but I do want a good answer.
Torsten Bell
The hon. Member has raised this issue repeatedly over a number of years, and I recognise that. Specifically on the issues he raises, it was the ombudsman itself, rather than the Government, that initially set out that the women affected did not suffer direct financial loss. What is sitting behind the ombudsman’s judgment saying that is that the issue facing the ombudsman was not either the original decision in 1995 to increase the state pension age or the decision to accelerate the increase by the coalition Government in 2011. The ombudsman was looking narrowly at the question of how that increase in the state pension age was communicated, and I think it is really important to clarify that distinction with our constituents. It is the latter—the communication of the state pension age—that we have discussed in this House on numerous occasions.
The hon. Member specifically raises the 2007 evidence, which showed that a minority of people read and remembered such letters. However, it showed something else quite important, which was that those with good knowledge of their state pension entitlement were most likely to read the letters. It was therefore not a good metric for assuming that the majority of those who were sent letters would have learned something from that and changed what they knew.
Seamus Logan
These women were not properly informed about changes to their state pension. So said the PHSO on 21 March 2024, just in time for the election that year, when so many Labour Members of course promised to address the issue, if elected—another shameful, broken promise. First, can I ask the Minister to explain why the last ministerial meeting with the WASPI women took place in September 2024? Secondly, can he tell the House what work has been undertaken in his Department on a properly structured compensation scheme that could be implemented when the Government decide it is time for another U-turn?
Torsten Bell
The hon. Member raises a question about what Labour Members were promising in the 2024 election. As I am sure he is aware, our manifesto was clear that it did not make a commitment to bring forward compensation. What is the case is that Labour Members opposed the acceleration of the state pension age back in 2011, which in some cases gave women only five years’ notice. However, we of course lost that vote in Parliament and subsequent elections, and the courts unfortunately upheld that decision. As I have said, what we are debating in this case is the communications, not the decision itself. On those grounds, we have set out in detail the reasons for the decisions we have made and laid that document in the House of Commons Library.
Mr Speaker
We now come to a marathon runner—five hours and 20 minutes—Chris Vince.
Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)
I will not lie, Mr Speaker: bobbing is slightly more difficult than normal this morning.
Can the Minister detail what the ombudsman found about the financial loss women suffered as a result of the delay in sending out letters? On a more general point, can he say what this Government are doing to support women in retirement in my constituency of Harlow?
Torsten Bell
My hon. Friend makes a large effort not only when it comes to pounding the streets, but in raising his constituents’ cases and, in this case, those of female pensioners. He is absolutely right to say that there is a distinction between the communication of state pension age increases and the increase in the state pension age, and it is the latter that has had such an effect on millions of women, particularly the speed of the increase in 2011. I think there are lessons for this House and for all Governments about what would happen in future, and we certainly would not be bringing forward such short-notice changes.
My hon. Friend is also right to say that what matters more generally is what we are doing to support pensioners, and making sure they have dignity and support in retirement. On that front, just this month we are increasing the state pension, and we will be continuing to do that over the course of this Parliament via the triple lock, which is set to increase it by up to £2,100. We are also making sure that £26 billion of investment is going into our NHS, bringing down waiting lists month on month, because this Government came into office with one in five of those aged over 75 on NHS waiting lists, and we cannot allow that to continue.
Mark Garnier (Wyre Forest) (Con)
When his party was in opposition, the Prime Minister promised compensation for WASPI women, but when faced with the economic reality of the costs, he and the Secretary of State chose common sense over ideology. In the spirit of that pragmatism, may I ask the Pensions Minister also to take a sensible, thoughtful approach to mandation powers in the Pension Schemes Bill, and to remove clause 40 altogether?
Torsten Bell
We have debated this issue quite extensively in recent weeks, and the House will have another chance to do so later today. As I have set out during our debates, representatives of the industry itself have said that it is in the interests of savers to invest in a wider range of assets. That reflects lessons from across the industry—from open defined-benefit schemes, but also from those in the rest of the world, where the lack of exposure of the UK’s defined-contribution schemes to that wider range of assets makes it stand out. We have introduced a reserve measure to backstop the changes that the industry says are needed to solve a collective action problem. I will not try the patience of the House by repeating them now, but the aim is to ensure that savers do not lose out. We have also put in place significant protections relating to an affirmative vote, as well as the savers’ interest tests that enable pension schemes to spell out what is in the interests of their members.
Vikki Slade (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Andrew Western)
Our annual report and accounts 2024-25 states that, in that year, we answered some 43 million calls—up from 37 million in the previous year. Our call-answering rate increased to 86%, and the average answering time improved by one minute and 12 seconds. However, we do of course want to make further improvements where we can. We have continued to prioritise the service by focusing extra resources, and are currently making a systematic effort to clear agent work queues to free up capacity. We hope to see that progress lead to further improvements very soon.
Vikki Slade
I am glad that the call answering has speeded up, but, like those of many other Members, my office is constantly dealing with very long delays on the part of the DWP. Back in September 2024, my constituent Jackie appealed against a personal independence payment assessment for her husband, who died a couple of months later. In January, she received a letter saying that she had been overpaid by £7,000. I became involved in the middle of last year, when it was established that the figure was £75. The DWP confirmed that in January, but in April—so we are now nearly two years on—my constituent received a letter saying that she now owed £4,086. Given the radical plans to cut civil service numbers, what steps will the Secretary of State and his team take to deliver a better service in order to ensure that constituents such as Jackie do not suffer emotional or financial distress?
Andrew Western
I would be happy to look into that case if the hon. Lady writes to me. I am sorry if she feels that her constituent has been let down. We are taking additional steps—beyond those relating to call handling—to look at responsiveness more broadly. I apologise: it was not clear from the wording of her original question that she was referring to correspondence as well as telephony.
James Asser (West Ham and Beckton) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Pat McFadden)
The number of youth apprenticeship starts has fallen by 40% over the past decade. Because we want to give more young people the chance of apprenticeships, we are fully funding youth apprenticeships for small businesses, introducing a £2,000 hiring incentive for non-levy-paying employers, and expanding foundation apprenticeships in hospitality and retail. All that is aimed at more opportunity and more work for young people.
James Asser
I very much welcome the work being done to prioritise and expand apprenticeships, but all too often their image is dated and the modern situation is not fully understood. While my local university tells me that good work on promoting apprenticeships is being done in private and grammar schools, that is not always reflected across the wider state sector. Will the Government consider how we might tackle the issue, working with apprenticeship bodies, industry organisations and the unions, to ensure that modern apprenticeships are fully known about and the opportunities they provide are fully understood?
Pat McFadden
My hon. Friend is right to say that promoting apprenticeships must start in schools. Our brilliant apprenticeship ambassador network brings together about 3,000 employers and apprentices, who go into schools and colleges and share stories about how apprenticeships can transform young lives. Those ambassadors have now reached 97% of the state-funded secondary schools and colleges in England—nearly 3,500 in the past three years—but, for the reasons that my hon. Friend has given, we have got to do more work to make information about apprenticeships as clear and easy to use as possible.
Greg Smith (Mid Buckinghamshire) (Con)
I raised with the Prime Minister at PMQs a couple of weeks ago the case of Twentyfour Hair, a salon in Princes Risborough in my constituency, which for the first time in 21 years cannot afford to take on a new apprentice. That message is echoed by businesses across my constituency. In order to improve uptake in new apprenticeship starts, which I entirely support, what steps is the Secretary of State taking with the Chancellor to get rid of this punitive level of business taxation, which is preventing businesses from taking them on?
Pat McFadden
I referred in my previous answer to the step I am taking, which is to put in place a £2,000 hiring incentive for small businesses taking up a new apprentice. If it is someone who has been unemployed and on universal credit for six months, there is the potential for an additional £3,000 hiring incentive on top of the £2,000. We want to incentivise small businesses to take on apprentices, for reasons that I think are shared right across the House and because of the great opportunities that they entail.
Amanda Martin (Portsmouth North) (Lab)
This month I launched a space apprenticeship pilot in Portsmouth North, bringing together Airbus and the Solent Growth Partnership to ensure that candidates who narrowly miss out on an Airbus apprenticeship are matched directly with defence and space SMEs in the area. Following the failure of the last Government, does the Secretary of State agree that this Labour Government’s reforms are finally delivering high-value opportunities in aerospace and cyber, and will he work with me to look at how we can extend this initiative across other sectors, such as maritime and construction?
Pat McFadden
May I congratulate my hon. Friend on what sounds like a fantastic initiative? She puts her finger on something very important: sometimes people who narrowly lose out on a particular apprenticeship could benefit from one elsewhere. I did refer to the work that we are doing to try to improve the information, and the initiative she has taken is a great example of what can be done. Just because people do not get their first choice should not mean that they lose out on the opportunity of an apprenticeship entirely.
Caroline Voaden (South Devon) (LD)
Apprenticeships offer young people a great pathway into rewarding careers, so I very much welcome the Government’s ambition to create more of them, but a report published last week by the Social Security Advisory Committee highlighted the so-called apprenticeship penalty, whereby low-income families can lose up to £330 a week in child benefit and universal credit the moment a 16-year-old takes up an apprenticeship. What is the point of creating more apprenticeships if a cliff edge like this discourages young people from taking them up? Will the Minister commit to urgently fixing this penalty, so that no family are left worse off simply because their child chooses an apprenticeship over full-time education?
Pat McFadden
I am always grateful for the work of the Social Security Advisory Committee, and I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her question, but one thing that she missed out is that apprenticeships are paid, so a young person taking up an apprenticeship opportunity will be earning money that contributes to the family’s income. We have to take that into account, as well as all the other sources of the family’s income.
Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
I really welcome my right hon. Friend’s work in this area, given that so many young people are unemployed, but what is he doing to evaluate how many apprentices get proper, long-term, full-time jobs as a result? Clearly, that is the end goal that we all want to see.
Pat McFadden
My hon. Friend will know that when people complete an apprenticeship, their chances of employment are very high. I am pleased to report that apprenticeship achievement rates are up in the latest figures, as are the apprenticeship start numbers.
Shockat Adam (Leicester South) (Ind)
Leicester college, a further education college, is facing a funding crisis that is putting apprenticeships at risk. The Government have a noble commitment to building 1.5 million homes and training 60,000 construction workers, but young people wanting construction apprenticeships are being turned away. No bricklayers, no electricians and no plumbers means no homes. In Leicester, the rate of young people who are not in education, employment or training is nearly 6%—five times higher than the national average. We have the employers and we have the demand, but without proper funding, we cannot deliver the skilled workforce that this country desperately needs. What real-terms funding increase will the Secretary of State commit to in order to ensure that young people have the opportunity to access skills via the apprenticeship scheme?
Pat McFadden
We always listen to representations that ask for more funding for many good causes. On the issue of construction, a specific construction sector skills package was announced last year. It is aimed precisely at training the bricklayers, electricians and plumbers we need to meet our construction targets, not only in housing but in the many investment projects around the country that are being supported by this Government.
Mr Peter Bedford (Mid Leicestershire) (Con)
With the number of young people not in education, employment or training hovering at the 1 million mark, apprenticeships now more than ever are key to supporting opportunity and aspiration for so many of our young people. Conservative Members fundamentally believe that the best path out of poverty is being in work and contributing to society, with all the economic freedoms that a job brings. Given that the number of apprenticeships in the Secretary of State’s own Department dropped from 5,000 in 2024 to 3,500 in 2025, is it not the case that the Government’s message to business is, “Do as we say, but not as we do”?
Pat McFadden
I agree with the shadow Minister that work is the answer. As I said a moment ago, apprenticeship starts are up on the latest figures and apprenticeship achievement rates are up. The reforms that we are putting in place will mean more youth apprenticeship starts, and that is where the money should be directed, because that is where the need is greatest.
Steve Darling (Torbay) (LD)
A recent Guardian report highlighted how young people from more deprived communities are facing discrimination through the apprenticeship system. As my hon. Friend the Member for South Devon (Caroline Voaden) alluded to, there is a penalty if someone’s family also receives child benefit. How can the Minister intervene to support the most vulnerable families?
Pat McFadden
It is important to remember that apprenticeships are paid and that the people undergoing them get a wage. When we are considering the overall economic impact on a family’s income, we have to take that into account. Frankly, if the hon. Member pushes me and asks me whether it is better for that income to come from benefits or the constructive work of an apprenticeship, I know which one I would pick.
Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Andrew Western)
The CMS publishes several metrics regarding how quickly it responds to parents. In the quarter ending September 2025, on average, 96% of applications were cleared within 12 weeks and 83% of changes of circumstances were cleared within 28 days. Those are targets for the CMS set by the Department.
Iqbal Mohamed
I have constituents with court orders confirming genuinely shared care who are none the less required to pay full child maintenance for extended periods while disputes are resolved and/or system processes are completed. How does the Department ensure that evidence of shared care is applied consistently, fairly and speedily by the CMS? What support is available to constituents who face continued financial liability and hardship while they wait for delays in CMS decisions or tribunal outcomes to be resolved?
Andrew Western
Shared care can be incredibly contested, and questions about the suitability of evidence and which evidence takes precedent are often disputed. The hon. Member suggests that he has particular cases that he would like the Department to take a look into. If he writes to me with them, the responsible Minister, my noble Friend Baroness Sherlock, or I will provide a response.
Mr Luke Charters (York Outer) (Lab)
The Government’s planned major changes to CMS payments are welcome, but my casework inbox is inundated—absolutely chock-a-block—with complaints about the CMS’s poor customer service, which is damaging the lives of dozens of my constituents in the process. What steps can my hon. Friend take to rapidly improve the effectiveness of the CMS?
Andrew Western
My hon. Friend will be pleased to know that there is a significant improvement journey under way in the Child Maintenance Service. I am always keen to point out to Members that while we see a large number of CMS cases in our caseload due to the more adversarial nature of the cases it deals with, it is a fraction of the overall number of cases that the Department deals with. We continue to ensure prompt payments to more than a million children.
Liz Jarvis (Eastleigh) (LD)
My office deals with hundreds of Child Maintenance Service cases. In one case, a mum applied to the CMS in June last year and was initially awarded just over £100. She applied for a mandatory reconsideration and the figure was increased. However, the increased payments have still not been made, and she is experiencing significant financial hardship and stress as a result. Has the Minister considered how failings in the service facilitate post-separation abuse?
Andrew Western
My noble Friend Baroness Sherlock takes a very keen interest in this issue, in particular how we can look at the abolition of direct pay to subvert some of the instances of financial abuse and coercive control that we continue to see. If the hon. Lady would like to write to me about her specific case, I will ensure she receives a response.
Catherine Atkinson (Derby North) (Lab)
My constituent Rebecca and her now 13-year-old have not received child maintenance for over a decade. Arrears exceed £10,000, but because her son’s father has moved in and out of employment he has evaded enforcement, even where deduction from earnings orders have been made. I welcome that child maintenance systems are being reformed, but will the Minister tell us what action will be taken so that Rebecca and parents in similar situations across the country get the support they are entitled to?
Andrew Western
I thank my hon. Friend for her question. I know that she has been representing Rebecca for some time in seeking a resolution to that case. We seek to introduce a range of changes when parliamentary time allows, but clearly there is further work to do to ensure that enforcement processes are also strengthened. Baroness Sherlock would be happy to discuss that with my hon. Friend if she feels that would be appropriate, and I would be happy to facilitate such a meeting.
Rebecca Smith (South West Devon) (Con)
The Child Maintenance Service is not working for parents and it is not working for children. My own casework shows that the majority of those getting in touch about the CMS believe it to be ineffective, with systemic issues in communication, timeliness and case handling. My constituents are not alone. The independent case examiner received 1,827 complaints about the CMS in 2024-25, up from 1,519 in 2023-24. In November 2024, the charity Gingerbread published a report, “Fix the CMS”. In October 2025, a House of Lords Public Services Committee report recommended a range of changes to do the same. The Government have responded to both, but when will the Government enact the changes to bring forward the recommended and acknowledged improvements to the service?
Andrew Western
As I said in a previous response, we will do so when parliamentary time allows. My noble Friend Baroness Sherlock is also considering a calculation review. There is a range of issues with the CMS that need to be looked at and resolved to ensure that the children in the middle of this get the support to which they are entitled.
Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD)
The Minister for Social Security and Disability (Sir Stephen Timms)
In the six months up to March last year, we appointed an additional 111 case managers to help deal with increased demand for child DLA. The current target is to clear 90% of new child DLA claims in 45 days. Performance has steadily improved, and I am pleased to say that in March we did hit that target.
Sarah Olney
Over the past two years, only 3.5% of applications for disability living allowance for children have been approved by the Department for Work and Pensions within its own target timeframe. Parents of children with disabilities work tirelessly to ensure that their children can have the same opportunities as everyone else, and the disregard the DWP has shown towards supporting their claims is unacceptable. One of my constituents has experienced those lengthy delays first-hand and an administrative error meant she did not even receive her first payment award. Will the Minister commit to urgent action to ensure that the DWP’s pathetic processing time for children’s DLA applications does not continue?
Sir Stephen Timms
As I said to the hon. Member, we did hit the 90% target last month. That reflects a steady improvement over the last few months. We are also introducing a new online evidence portal to improve evidence gathering, in particular from schools and people in education professions. That will also reduce delays, and we plan to roll that out fully in autumn. We are on the case and making significant improvements.
Dr Kieran Mullan (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Andrew Western)
The Government are committed to reforming the Child Maintenance Service to get more money to children by removing direct pay to combat hidden non-compliance, streamlining enforcement by introducing administrative liability orders and improving our most serious enforcement measures. That said, there are currently no plans to introduce curfew measures; doing so would require amendments to primary legislation and raise significant safeguarding concerns for paying parents and those who live with them.
Dr Mullan
Every year, millions of pounds of child maintenance go unspent, not including deductions for money hidden away and parents who pretend they cannot work. As far as I am concerned, if someone has children and they can pay towards their maintenance, they absolutely should. Enforcement is not working, because the Government treat it like an unpaid utility bill rather than a moral obligation that people have towards their children. I would like the Minister to revisit his suggestion that the Government would need primary legislation to use curfew orders, as that is not my understanding. If all the other measures are not working, why should someone who does not pay for their own children be able to go out on the lash on a Friday and Saturday night when the Government can stop that happening?
Andrew Western
I will handle that question with care, Mr Speaker. [Laughter.] I know that the hon. Gentleman has been consistent on this matter for a very long time. A range of serious enforcement powers are already available to the Department, including disqualification from driving, removal of a passport, taking control of people’s goods and even, in some cases, commitment to prison, but very serious safeguarding concerns can arise as a result of the use of curfew orders; in one very tragic case recently, an individual subject to a curfew order murdered members of his family. On the hon. Gentleman’s specific question as to whether use of the orders requires primary legislation, I will follow up in writing to confirm that or otherwise.
Zöe Franklin (Guildford) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Andrew Western)
Redundancy payments are not taken into account in the standard maintenance calculation, which is based on gross taxable income from earnings, although the capital may be considered through an asset variation if the paying parent holds the income in a bank or savings account and the amount is at least £31,250. The Child Maintenance Service may also take the redundancy payment into account when considering any maintenance arrears.
Zöe Franklin
I thank the Minister for this and previous answers on the CMS. I hear the Government saying “when time allows”, but this really is important for the families who have suffered for too many years. My constituent, for example, has successfully appealed at tribunal, with both the judge and the Child Maintenance Service agreeing that the parent’s declared income did not reflect their true earnings, and arrears were awarded. Yet after receiving a substantial redundancy payment and despite holding significant assets, including property and substantial pension investments, no maintenance is being paid, and enforcement has not taken place. Does the Minister accept that this exposes a gap in how redundancy payments are treated by the CMS and the wider enforcement framework, and will he urgently review both to ensure that children are not left without support and no longer suffer?
Andrew Western
Part of the challenge here is that the legislation currently requires us to use earnings information and figures provided by His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, and, because redundancy payments of up to £80,000 are exempted from tax, they do not show up in that way. However, I hear what the hon. Lady is saying and the wider mood of the House with regard to the Child Maintenance Service, and I will share the concerns that she raises with my noble Friend Baroness Sherlock.
Yuan Yang (Earley and Woodley) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Pat McFadden)
I believe my hon. Friend will welcome the changes the Government have made to statutory sick pay, which came into force earlier this month. For the first time ever, we have removed the lower earnings limit for statutory sick pay, as well as the waiting period so that people can access sick pay as soon as they need it. These changes will mean that up to 1.3 million more people will be covered, helping the low paid and those who work for more than one employer in particular.
Yuan Yang
I am indeed very proud of this Labour Government’s historic Employment Rights Act 2025, which, from this month, means that workers will get statutory sick pay from the first day they are ill, rather than having to wait till the fourth. Too many people in Reading—even those working in health and care settings—are working through their illnesses; this measure will protect them, their clients and patients and improve the productivity of their workplaces.
While the ERA is an important step forward, does the Secretary of State accept that the current flat rate of statutory sick pay—at four fifths of average earnings—remains a barrier to those on low incomes, and thus remains a barrier to tackling illness in the workplace?
Pat McFadden
I believe that removing the three-day limit and giving access to statutory sick pay from day one, as well as making it available to those who work for multiple employers, should decrease the pressure on workers to have to work through illness.
My hon. Friend will be aware that the “Keep Britain Working” review led by Charlie Mayfield also aims to work with employers to help keep people in jobs while they cope with some of the long-term sickness issues that can develop as workers get older.
Ben Coleman (Chelsea and Fulham) (Lab)
Tom Rutland (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Lab)
The Minister for Social Security and Disability (Sir Stephen Timms)
We are determined that disabled people should have the confidence to try work. Our “right to try” legislation will come into force on Thursday. People claiming universal credit, new style employment support allowance and personal independence payment can take steps towards employment and be confident that doing so will not automatically trigger benefit reassessment.
Ben Coleman
I thank the Minister for that positive answer. Could he reassure my disabled constituents under the age of 22, many of whom are in education and low-paid work, that they will not lose their universal credit health payments? This financial support is vital to helping young disabled people, because they face the greatest barriers to work. Does he share my concern that removing it could push them further away from employment and deeper into poverty? Has an assessment been made of the impact on poverty of removing that support?
Sir Stephen Timms
There is an urgent need to address the big rise in the number of young people not in work, education or training that took place before the last general election. We think that better support might help young people more than extra cash. Alan Milburn’s review on the NEET problem more broadly will report in September; we will wait until then to decide whether to delay access to the universal credit health element until the age of 22. If we did do that, there would need to be exceptions.
Tom Rutland
Thanks to grant funding from DWP, my local Labour councils in Adur and Worthing are joining the Connect to Work programme, helping local people get into good local jobs. But for young people, including those with disabilities, being not in employment, education or training remains an issue. What more is being done to work with businesses and get more young people into the opportunities that they can thrive in?
Sir Stephen Timms
I very much welcome the fact that my hon. Friend’s local authority is joining up with Connect to Work, which will be available across the whole of England and Wales by this summer. These regulations are a very important step forward. More needs to be done to give people confidence that moving into work or embarking on volunteering will not trigger a benefit reassessment. I also point him to our Pathways to Work guarantee, giving tailored personalised support to young people in the position that he described, and to the “Keep Britain Working” review by Charlie Mayfield, making employer vacancies accessible to my hon. Friend’s constituents and others in the position that he described.
John Milne (Horsham) (LD)
My disabled constituent Joanne was holding down a good job, but delays in Access to Work resulted in her not receiving the necessary support to stay in it. The Government’s new “right to try” initiative is a positive move, but will the Minister commit to resourcing vital support services like Access to Work, and to eliminating its backlog of over 62,000 cases as a matter of urgency? If not, we will find ourselves in the same position a year from now.
Sir Stephen Timms
The support provided by Access to Work is absolutely vital. There has been a big surge in demand for the scheme over the last few years, which has led to some significant delay. I am very sorry to hear that the hon. Gentleman’s constituent has been affected in the way that he described. We said last year that we wanted to reform Access to Work, and that reform is much needed given the greatly increased demand. We are working on proposals and as soon as we are able to put them before the House, we will do so.
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)
It was a great joy to spend time last month in Kendal for the Disability Confident employer scheme. It is gaining more and more members in our community and is helping people with disabilities into work. Around 20% of working-age people live with a disability; many work, and many more wish to. What is the Minister doing to support Disability Confident employers, to make it easier for them to employ people with disabilities and to support those with disabilities into the workforce?
Sir Stephen Timms
I point the hon. Gentleman to the Keep Britain Working review, which Sir Charlie Mayfield is leading; it addresses exactly the issue that he rightly raises. We are also looking at reforming Disability Confident, which has huge potential—19,000 employers have signed up, I think. There is a lot of enthusiasm on the part of employers. We want to make sure that those who sign up to the scheme then progress up the levels so that Disability Confident makes a really significant difference. I am very hopeful that it will.
Mr Andrew Snowden (Fylde) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Pat McFadden)
The latest unemployment figures published last week show a fall to 4.9% in February, which I am sure the whole House will welcome. Along with growth figures of 0.5% earlier this year, that is more evidence that the economy was heading in the right direction at the beginning of the year. But I have to warn the House that external effects caused by the war in Iran and the rise in energy prices may affect jobs as well as prices in the coming months.
Mr Snowden
Fylde’s stunning coastline and countryside mean that the hospitality, tourism and leisure industry is at the heart of our local economy. But I have met many businesses that, following the changes to national insurance, have let go so many young people from that industry and are simply not taking on new seasonal staff. Could the Secretary of State update the House on the current trends of unemployment among 18 to 24-year-olds?
Pat McFadden
I recently joined a successful jobs fair close to the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, where the industries that he mentioned were hiring more people—it was one of the most successful such events that we have seen. I hope that he will welcome the fact that 330,000 more people are in work this year than at this time last year. When it comes to young people, he will of course know that there is a national insurance exemption for employees under 21.
Adam Thompson (Erewash) (Lab)
Because of the previous Government’s actions, the number of people not in employment, education or training rose by nearly 250,000 between 2021 and 2024, leaving many hundreds of my constituents among the almost 1 million young people in that situation today. I am glad to see, then, that the Secretary of State is taking action to support young people in Erewash through the youth guarantee. Further to that, will the Secretary of State please explain the measures that his Department is taking to address the decade-long trend of growing youth unemployment?
Pat McFadden
My hon. Friend will know that the number of young people not in education, employment or training rose by about a quarter of a million in the last three years of the Conservative party’s time in power, but that Government did nothing about it. We are putting in place a youth guarantee that offers training, work experience, subsidised employment and hiring incentives to small and medium-sized employers for both regular jobs and apprenticeships. That is all part of the effort to make sure that young people do not graduate from education to a life on benefits, and that they get the chance in life that a decent job brings.
Helen Whately (Faversham and Mid Kent) (Con)
I was disappointed that the Secretary of State did not answer the question put by my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde (Mr Snowden), so let me help him. Unemployment among 18 to 24-year-olds is at 14.3%—that means that one in seven young people is unemployed. There are thousands fewer jobs and thousands fewer vacancies under the right hon. Gentleman’s Government. I speak to young people across the country, who tell me that it is desperately difficult to get a job, and it is no wonder. His Government have made it much harder for businesses to employ people, especially young people.
I appreciate that the Secretary of State may be trying his best with his plethora of work schemes, but they are just a sticking plaster for the damage that the Chancellor has wreaked. Governments do not create jobs; businesses do. His Government need to change tack and back businesses to create opportunities for the next generation. I am on their side—isn’t he? Will he help the Chancellor understand before it is too late?
Pat McFadden
The hon. Lady neglected to mention that youth unemployment never recovered to levels enjoyed under the last Labour Government at any point during the Conservative party’s time in power; it was exacerbated during their last few years in particular. The difference is that we are responding with the initiatives that I have set before the House today. That is because we believe that work is the best answer and the best opportunity for young people. I will keep going, to give young people hope and opportunity because that is what this Labour Government stand for.
Mr Lee Dillon (Newbury) (LD)
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Pat McFadden)
Since our last DWP oral questions, I have updated the House on the expansion of our youth employment offer, I have been to an excellent job fair in Glasgow, I have said that the latest unemployment figures show a fall, and last week I went back to university—it was the McDonald’s Hamburger University. My Big Mac was not perfect, but I welcome McDonald’s as the latest employer to support our youth guarantee. My right hon. Friend the Minister for Social Security and Disability has said that the “right to try” regulations have come into force and, as we have mentioned, we also have the changes on statutory sick pay, which significantly expand coverage and make it available from the first day of employment.
Mr Dillon
I worked at McDonald’s throughout my GCSEs and A-levels and while at university—it is a good employer for those who are studying. Newbury Soup Kitchen is a local charity that is supporting a constituent of mine, spending many hours on the phone to universal credit staff. However, they do not consistently accept the authority to discuss, demanded an in-person meeting despite the resident being wheelchair dependent, and offered a Teams meeting only for the resident to find out that Berkshire does not offer Teams meetings. Will a Minister meet me to discuss the case and the process failures?
Pat McFadden
I am happy to ensure that the hon. Member gets a meeting with a Minister from the Department to discuss his constituent’s case.
Rachel Blake (Cities of London and Westminster) (Lab/Co-op)
Pat McFadden
My hon. Friend is right that we need everyone—not just central Government—to be involved. I would like local authorities, businesses—all of us—to see the youth opportunity challenge as a national endeavour worthy of all our support. I am happy to work with her local authority to try to make it as successful as possible.
Helen Whately (Faversham and Mid Kent) (Con)
Mr Speaker,
“We cannot defend Britain with an ever-expanding welfare budget”.
That is the view of the author of the Government’s strategic defence review, the Labour peer, former Labour Defence Secretary and former Secretary-General of NATO Lord Robertson. Which will the Secretary of State choose: defending the country or paying people not to work?
Pat McFadden
The Conservative party failed to reform welfare and failed to back our defence forces—it left the armed forces at their smallest size since Napoleonic times—and it says that there is a choice. The truth is, the Conservatives did neither of those things; we are doing both. We are increasing defence spending to 2.5% of GDP—something they never achieved, despite inheriting that level from us when they took office—and we are reforming welfare by putting work and opportunity at the heart of everything we do.
Helen Whately
Let us put some facts on the table, because it is time for the Government to confront the hard choices. We are spending less than 2.5% of GDP on defence, but 5.3% of GDP on welfare. Six million people of working age are living on benefits. Under the Secretary of State’s Government, over a million more people have gone on to universal credit and hundreds of thousands have gone on to sickness benefits—and the Government are choosing to spend even more by scrapping the two-child cap. We cannot go on like this. When will he and the current Prime Minister come forward with a plan to bring the welfare bill down? Or is it like with Sir Olly Robbins: another topic where his judgment and the Prime Minister’s differ?
Pat McFadden
The shadow Secretary of State said that she wanted some facts, so let me give her some facts. The Tories inherited spending on defence at 2.5% of GDP; they left office with it lower. They left the Army at its smallest in two centuries, and they cut the number of frigates and destroyers by 25%. It is the Labour Government who are increasing expenditure on defence. It is the Labour Government who are reforming welfare, including the changes in universal credit this month, and the youth employment initiatives that we have talked about throughout these questions.
Patrick Hurley (Southport) (Lab)
Pat McFadden
I thank my hon. Friend for a very good question. Here is another fact the shadow Secretary of State may not welcome: the truth is that before the pandemic, face-to-face interviews were the norm and after that, the numbers collapsed. Not only that, the previous Government signed off a new set of long-term contracts allowing most of the assessors to work from home, just a year before the general election. We are now increasing face-to-face interviews to provide a proper balance in the functional assessment process in the benefit system.
Steve Darling (Torbay) (LD)
The Department for Work and Pensions is currently reviewing over 200,000 cases of overpayments for carers, some of whom have accrued up to £20,000 through a situation not of their own making. In the light of this, will the Secretary of State stop applying carers penalties until the Department has completed this review?
The Minister for Social Security and Disability (Sir Stephen Timms)
As the hon. Gentleman has rightly said, we have now started reviewing those 200,000 cases. We anticipate that there will probably be 25,000 people among the 200,000 who could have debts cancelled, or could possibly be refunded. If carer’s allowance has been overpaid and should not have been, we will of course need to recover the money. The problem has been that the previous Government’s guidance in the Department was wrong. We have now corrected that, so I am hopeful that that particular kind of mistake will not occur again.
Charlie Dewhirst (Bridlington and The Wolds) (Con)
Pat McFadden
The policies that I am advocating are creating opportunity for young people, through offering employers hiring incentives, through promoting youth apprenticeship starts and through the other initiatives that we have set out. We do this because we agree that work is the best answer for young people, and I want to do everything I can to make sure that they have the maximum chance to get work.
Steve Yemm (Mansfield) (Lab)
Pat McFadden
Youth hubs are another part of the effort, and the advantage is that we can get the help that the jobcentre can give to where young people are in the community. This also means we can get help to people who are not necessarily signing on for benefits but who are looking for work, and it enables us to give a more flexible response across different services. We hope to expand these hubs to more than 360 locations, where they will be open to all 16 to 24-year-olds, whether or not they are on benefits.
Rupert Lowe (Great Yarmouth) (Restore Britain)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Andrew Western)
I fundamentally disagree with the perspective of the hon. Gentleman on people who have been here for years, made a contribution and paid their taxes, and then require some help back from a state that they have paid into, sometimes for decades. Not only that, the figure that he uses is a complete conflation and a significant overestimation. He shows his ignorance if he does not understand that it is impossible to suggest that that money has all been paid directly to foreign nationals because the figure that he uses is drawn from the total number of households with a foreign national in them, and many of the individual claimants could in fact be British or Irish citizens.
Kim Johnson (Liverpool Riverside) (Lab)
The Timms review is supposed to be shaped by disabled people and disabled groups, but I am hearing constantly that this is not the case, and that they are feeling sidelined. Can the Minister explain how we will ensure that there is true co-production, and that this is not just a tick-box exercise, and how the regions and diverse groups will be represented?
Sir Stephen Timms
I can certainly reassure my hon. Friend that we are ensuring genuine co-production. Two co-chairs, Sharon Brennan and Dr Clenton Farquharson, were appointed last October. The three of us have recruited a steering group of 12; they are almost entirely disabled people. Our fifth full-day steering group meeting was in Manchester last Thursday. We have issued a call for evidence, which is open until 28 May. We have had over 10,000 responses so far, and I hope we will receive many more. That is just step one in a programme of wider engagement. This is genuine co-production that will deliver.
Dr Roz Savage (South Cotswolds) (LD)
Pat McFadden
I have discussed this subject a lot with hon. Members from right across the House, and the issue that the hon. Member raises about transport is raised quite a lot with me. It is important, and I am willing to look at anything that I can do on that front to help people take up available opportunities. We need to bring everything together to give young people the maximum employment opportunities.
Sarah Edwards (Tamworth) (Lab)
As chair of the all-party parliamentary group for small and medium-sized enterprise house builders, I regularly hear about the growing skills shortage, and the urgent need to change perceptions about careers in construction, which is a highly skilled, rewarding industry that offers strong career progression, good wages and an opportunity to play a direct role in building the homes that our country needs. What steps is the Minister taking to invest in technical training for young people, so that SME house builders have the skilled workforce that they need to deliver the homes that this country urgently needs?
Pat McFadden
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to draw attention to the need for skills for house building. We support those skills through sector-based work academy programmes. Last year, the Government announced a £625 million construction skills package, in order to recruit 60,000 workers by 2029 to all the trades that we need for building and the other physical investment projects that the Government are supporting around the country.
Gregory Stafford (Farnham and Bordon) (Con)
As the Government’s reforms to special educational needs and disabilities provision focus on pushing children into mainstream education, they risk removing specialist support from many who need it and undermining successful work programmes, such as the Witherslack futures programme. Will the Secretary of State meet me and relevant groups to ensure that he does not allow SEND reforms to damage the chances of young people with special educational needs and disabilities to secure long-term, sustainable work?
Sir Stephen Timms
I welcome the hon. Member’s consistent interest in this important topic, and he will know that the SEND reforms that have been announced have been well received. Our youth guarantee will apply to young people with special educational needs and disabilities, and the trailblazers that we have set up are trying out new approaches, but I would be delighted to meet him and discuss how we can do this job.
Mr Bayo Alaba (Southend East and Rochford) (Lab)
I welcome the £2.5 million funding boost recently awarded to South Essex college; that will help equip even more residents from Southend and Rochford with the skills needed for fulfilling, lifelong careers. Following my conversations with Louisa Strachan, founder of Song School in Southend, on their desire for greater support for creative apprenticeships, can the Minister outline the steps that his Department is taking to support young people into the creative and music industries?
Pat McFadden
I thank my hon. Friend and sing a song of praise for the Song School in Southend. He is absolutely right to draw attention to the importance of the creative industries. Our creative industries sector plan provides £380 million of targeted investment, and, as part of the work on the youth guarantee, I was pleased to meet the film and TV industries at Pinewood Studios in January of this year to talk more about the opportunities that they offer young people in our fantastic creative industries sector.
Tom Gordon (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (LD)
Disabled people in England face a postcode lottery when it comes to the time in which they can use their bus passes. What conversations have been had with colleagues at the Department for Transport and the Treasury about removing those unfair time restrictions?
Sir Stephen Timms
I regularly meet the lead Ministers on disability from all Departments, including the Department for Transport; I know that my colleague there is particularly interested in transport accessibility for disabled people. I would be very happy to pick up with them the point that the hon. Gentleman raises.
Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)
Our declining healthy life expectancy, as underlined in today’s Health Foundation report, is a real worry, but as Professor Sir Michael Marmot has shown, that is no surprise after 14 years of austerity and its impact on our public services. There is the potential for a significant knock-on effect on Department for Work and Pensions spending. What conversations has my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State had with the Health Secretary on this issue, and is it being considered in the Timms review?
Pat McFadden
I know that the Chair of the Select Committee cares deeply about health inequalities in this country, which, to be honest with the House, are deep seated and long term. As in many areas of our work, I believe that constructive and productive employment is a big part of the answer in tackling inequality and prosperity issues right around the country.
Ben Obese-Jecty (Huntingdon) (Con)
I am dealing with a constituency case in which an individual has paid £23,000 during a dispute about being the parent of a child. He was not on the birth certificate, and the mother refused a DNA test. After three hearings in the family court, the court has ruled in his favour. I am sure the House will appreciate that £23,000 is an incredible amount of money for someone to pay for a child who is not theirs. Will the Minister meet me to discuss how my constituent can have it reimbursed?
Katrina Murray (Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch) (Lab)
BriggsAmasco in my constituency invests heavily in apprenticeships for the next generation of mastic asphalt tradespeople. According to BriggsAmasco, only 11 people in that part of Scotland are fully qualified in this work, and the only route to qualifying is through training programmes in England. The only training provider in Scotland stopped accepting apprentices last September. Will the Minister meet me to see if we can find a way to back employers that want to employ, and apprentices who want to train? There is a shortage of workers in that profession.
Pat McFadden
I thank my hon. Friend for being such a formidable champion for her constituency, and for opportunity within it. I would be very happy to talk with her further about this issue, but I point out that skills and apprenticeships are devolved in Scotland. The Scottish Government have received a record financial settlement—the greatest since devolution began—and I hope that opportunity for young people is part of their agenda.
Adam Dance (Yeovil) (LD)
My office has been waiting over six months for DWP replies to certain cases. Citizens Advice has reached out because it is not getting replies either. Will the Minister commit to getting us those responses this week, and will he commit to greater resourcing for responding to Members, particularly in relation to universal credit?
Pat McFadden
I know that responding to hon. Members’ inquiries—be they direct or on behalf of their constituents —is very important. I raise that with the Department constantly. If the hon. Gentleman sends me more details of the constituents in question, I will ensure that their cases are looked at right away.
Leigh Ingham (Stafford) (Lab)
We in Stafford welcome the announcement that Stafford college will become an advanced manufacturing technical hub, but we have a gap: more skilled jobs are needed than there are people to fill them. Will the Minister meet me to discuss the potential for Stafford to have a youth hub as soon as possible?
Pat McFadden
I know, because my constituency is not too far away, that advanced manufacturing is in the DNA of Staffordshire, so I warmly welcome what my hon. Friend said about her local college, and I will make sure that she gets a meeting with someone from the Department.
Mr Gagan Mohindra (South West Hertfordshire) (Con)
Earlier this year, I visited the High Speed 2 site in my constituency, where I had the privilege of speaking with several apprentices about the value of educational opportunities that offer a clear path into work. Given that there are nearly 1 million people not in education, employment or training, will the Minister outline what steps the Department is taking to promote such apprenticeship schemes?
Pat McFadden
We are promoting apprenticeships for young people in particular through the way that we prioritise the funding in the apprenticeship levy, and we are putting in place hiring incentives of £2,000 for small businesses that want to take on an apprentice. For small and medium-sized businesses, we will also fully fund the cost of apprenticeships for under-25s, because I agree with the hon. Gentleman that apprenticeships are a great opportunity for young people, and I want to do what I can to make sure that young people get more chances to avail themselves of those opportunities.
Lauren Edwards (Rochester and Strood) (Lab)
Can the Minister provide an update on the action plan to ensure that lessons are learned from the way that changes to the state pension age were communicated to women born in the 1950s?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Torsten Bell)
I thank my hon. Friend for her question. There absolutely are lessons for us to learn from this experience, both related to that particular case, and on the general point about giving adequate notice of any changes to the state pension age; that is the most important lesson, and we are absolutely committed to learning that. On the action plan, that will be focused on state pension age comms, and on complaint handling. We will work closely with the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman on that right away, and I hope to be able to publish that action plan in the coming months. More broadly, we are not waiting for that, but are getting on with action. I am sure that hon. Members will have seen over the last few months the “check your state pension age” campaign, encouraging people to be aware of their state pension age.
Clive Jones (Wokingham) (LD)
Twelve weeks ago, I raised four cases with the DWP, and I am still waiting for a response, despite chasing. These delays are upsetting for my Wokingham constituents. What is the Minister doing to address this backlog, and when can my constituents expect a response?
Andrew Western
We are increasing the resources available to handle Members’ correspondence, but given the delays that the hon. Gentleman has outlined, if he wants to write to me with those details, I will look into them urgently for him.
Callum Anderson (Buckingham and Bletchley) (Lab)
Around half of working-age people are under-saving for retirement, which is why I welcomed the relaunch of the Pensions Commission last year. Can the Minister update the House on how the commission’s forthcoming interim report will set out a credible path to raising contribution rates, in a sustainable way, for those who need that most?
Torsten Bell
I welcome my hon. Friend’s question, and he is absolutely right. We have seen progress in the last 15 years; 23 million employees now save into a pension, and that is restarting the business of workplace pension savings in the UK, but the job is not done. It is not done because of the issue that he raises about the adequacy of the amount saved by those who are saving, and because 45% of working-age adults are saving nothing at all. That is why there has been cross-party consensus that we should bring back the Pensions Commission to look at the question of adequacy, and I am pleased to say that its interim report will be published in the coming months.
Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP)
When a child is diagnosed with an illness such as cancer, their caring needs start immediately. Such a diagnosis upends any household; there are appointments, and often families are unable to work. Will the Minister review again the question of whether child disability living allowance should be paid immediately on diagnosis, as opposed to the family having to wait three months, and will he meet the Watson family from my constituency, who have, sadly, lived with this barrier to support?
Sir Stephen Timms
The hon. Member is right; there is a three-month period to wait after the onset of the incapacity or impairment. Sometimes I think there is a bit of confusion; people think it is three months after the application, but it is not: it is three months after the issue arises. That is to make sure that it is a long-term incapacity; that is what the benefit is there to support. I would be happy to have a conversation with the hon. Member about this. Of course, this matter is devolved in Northern Ireland, but Northern Ireland conventionally keeps in line with England.
David Baines (St Helens North) (Lab)
Last week was Multiple Sclerosis Awareness Week. I recently met my constituent Rob Denham to discuss the issues he has had with claiming the personal independence payment in the past—he compared the experience with being put on trial. Will the Minister assure me, Rob and all those suffering with MS that the review that the Government are now conducting will not just make the system more effective and efficient, but make it fairer and more humane?
Sir Stephen Timms
Yes. I was recently at a roundtable with someone who has multiple sclerosis who described to me the process of applying for PIP as “retraumatising”, rather like when she was initially diagnosed with MS. The steering group is determined to deliver a better system and when we report our recommendations to the Secretary of State in the autumn, I very much hope that that is what we will be able to do.
Ian Roome (North Devon) (LD)
One of my constituents in North Devon is a Royal Marines veteran who was just awarded over £2,700 in backdated universal credit, after the DWP failed to disregard his war pension from his monthly income. What can be done to ensure DWP staff understand armed forces pensions? Will the Minister assure hon. Members that this is not happening to other veterans across the country?
Sir Stephen Timms
I am very sorry to hear that the system was not properly understood in the case of the hon. Gentleman’s constituent. He is absolutely right that there is special treatment for compensation payments of this kind within the universal credit system. I will certainly talk to my officials about ensuring that those arrangements are properly understood in the Department.
Mike Reader (Northampton South) (Lab)
The potential rapid closure of St Andrew’s hospital in my constituency puts over 3,000 jobs at risk. Will the Secretary of State meet me to discuss what package of support we can put in place for those people to ensure they can find good quality work in my constituency?
Pat McFadden
As I have said a few times today, I will ensure that my hon. Friend gets a meeting with a Minister. I congratulate him on speaking up for his area and the workers within it.
Dunmurry Police Station Attack
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
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Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
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Mr Speaker
Before we come to the urgent question, I remind the House that there is an ongoing police investigation into the incident at Dunmurry. Members should avoid making any remarks that might prejudice future criminal proceedings.
Sorcha Eastwood (Lagan Valley) (Alliance)
(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the car bomb attack outside Dunmurry police station on 26 April 2026.
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Hilary Benn)
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sorcha Eastwood) for her question.
Shortly before 11 pm on Saturday 25 April, a vehicle was abandoned just outside the front gate of the Police Service of Northern Ireland station at Dunmurry. The vehicle had been hijacked in the Twinbrook area of west Belfast a short time before, where a gas cylinder was placed in the boot of the vehicle and the driver was ordered to drive to the police station. When he got there, the driver informed the police, who immediately and very bravely evacuated nearby homes. A number of residents, including two babies, were being taken to safety when the device exploded. I know that the thoughts of the whole House will be with all those affected—residents who had to leave their homes, the police officers who were helping with that evacuation when the device exploded, and the delivery driver, who has been through a traumatic experience. It is incredibly fortunate that nobody was killed or injured.
A similar attack on the police station in Lurgan was attempted on 30 March, when a fast food delivery driver was also hijacked by two masked men, who placed an object in the boot of the car and ordered him to drive it to Lurgan police station or be killed. Mercifully, on that occasion ammunition technical officers were able to carry out a controlled explosion. They confirmed that it was a crude but viable improvised explosive device, and the New IRA later claimed responsibility. This was a shameless and cowardly attack on the brave men and women who work so hard to keep our communities safe in Northern Ireland. Urgent investigations into both incidents are, of course, continuing and I urge anyone who has any information to contact the PSNI.
Over the decades, Northern Ireland has been transformed into a much more peaceful society. However, a very small number of people who represent no one but themselves remain determined to try to cause harm to our communities. I join with the Prime Minister and all those from across the political spectrum in Northern Ireland who have condemned what happened on Saturday, and I know the House will join me in paying tribute to the extraordinary efforts of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, led by Jon Boutcher, and to our security partners. It is their tireless work that keeps our communities safe, and this Government will continue to support those efforts as together we seek to bring to account those responsible for terrorism.
Sorcha Eastwood
I am sure the whole House will join me in sending a message that terrorism never succeeds—neither in the past nor in 2026. I too wish to put on record my thanks to the Police Service of Northern Ireland for the work that it does every day, keeping communities safe in the face of ongoing threats. In particular, I pay tribute to those police officers who were in Dunmurry police station on Saturday evening and who were helping to evacuate babies as the device detonated.
I also pay tribute to the officers at Lurgan police station who were there on 30 March when a viable device was driven through the front gates of the station. My thoughts are also with the two delivery drivers, one of whom was held at gunpoint as their vehicle was hijacked. It is only by the grace of God that we are not dealing with fatalities. The people who commit these acts of terrorism have no support from the decent people of Northern Ireland—they do not now, and they did not in the past. This is not representative of who we are.
National security is a reserved matter, so will the Secretary of State commit to ensuring that the PSNI is adequately resourced to deal with tackling Northern Ireland-related terrorism, along with the other categories of extreme right-wing terrorism, extreme left-wing terrorism, Islamic terrorism and those acting without ideology? Those are stated national security priorities. It is clear that the PSNI is already operating within a challenging budget, and I am sure the Government will want to ensure that it is adequately resourced to tackle this threat.
Hilary Benn
I join the hon. Member in her expression of thanks to the police and in her expressions of concern for all those who have been affected. As she well knows, PSNI resources are determined by the Northern Ireland Executive, but it is our job as a Government to play our part. We have given a record settlement to the Executive in the spending review last summer, and we have implemented the first increase in the additional security funding in more than a decade; it will be £130 million over three years.
I also draw attention to the fact that there is a Home Office counter-terrorism policing grant. The level of funding per head is the same as that given by the additional security funding. Northern Ireland received Barnett consequentials on top of that as a result of the announcement of the Home Office counter-terrorism policing grant. It is for the Executive to determine how much it chooses to devote to policing out of the record settlement that we give.
Tonia Antoniazzi (Gower) (Lab)
The two incidents in Lurgan and Dunmurry are of deep concern to us and to my Committee. I give my sincere thanks to the PSNI officers who have kept their communities safe. Does the Secretary of State agree that those responsible should face the full force of the law?
Hilary Benn
I certainly do. That is why anyone with any information has a responsibility to provide it to the PSNI so that people may be called to account.
The police and our security partners work hard every single day of the year to try to identify those responsible. For reasons that the House will well understand, a great deal of that work is unseen by the general public, but I assure my hon. Friend and the House that it is taking place, and we have seen that in recent times. In December, two men were sentenced to lengthy jail terms for preparatory acts of terrorism. PSNI investigations into drug criminality linked to the New IRA led to a man being sentenced last month in relation to the supply of drugs.
We have also acted against the New IRA and two individuals associated with the group through the Treasury’s counter-terrorism financial sanctions regime, which in effect takes control of the finances of those individuals. It is a very powerful tool to use, and, as my hon. Friend will see, we have already applied it on two occasions.
Alex Burghart (Brentwood and Ongar) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sorcha Eastwood) on having secured this urgent question. I associate myself with her remarks and those of the Secretary of State, although I gently say that it would have been better if this had been a Government statement. I cannot help but feel that had that car bomb been placed outside a police station in Westminster or Birmingham, Government Ministers would have come to the House with a statement.
It is, of course, profoundly depressing that we should be discussing this issue at all. However, it is an enormous relief that we are not today talking about casualties. As the hon. Member for Lagan Valley said, but for the grace of God, we would have been; but for the bravery of local people, we would have been. I pay very deep tribute to all those brave men and women in the Police Service of Northern Ireland who serve and keep our country safe. They were the target of this despicable operation, and it will be their hard work that brings its perpetrators to justice.
The people who have attempted to break the peace in Northern Ireland have no mandate and no public support—they represent only themselves, and are seeking to serve only their macho egos. The silver lining is, of course, that we are watching people in Northern Ireland from all communities come together this morning, united against them. We have come an incredibly long way, but as the Secretary of State referenced, this does appear to be the start of a pattern of new and deeply concerning behaviour. That is reflected in what happened in Lurgan last month, but also in the marching of masked paramilitaries in Easter parades. Will the Secretary of State confirm to the House that the PSNI is going after those people who broke the laws that were laid down during the peace process, just as I know they will be going after those who tried to blow up the police station in Dunmurry?
The attack on Sunday raises a number of questions to which I hope the Secretary of State can provide answers, because he has responsibility for national security in Northern Ireland. Can the Secretary of State assure the House that the Chief Constable has the resources he needs? I say that because, notwithstanding his remarks about funding, the Northern Ireland Troubles Bill is going to put a huge additional financial burden on the PSNI. Even if the Chief Constable believes he has the resources he needs today, he will not have them tomorrow.
Hilary Benn
I join the hon. Member in his tribute to the Police Service of Northern Ireland, and agree with him that the response from all communities in Northern Ireland to this terrible attack is a sign of the new Northern Ireland and shows that those responsible have no support at all. Sadly, though, they do have some capacity. As he knows, the enforcement of the law is a job for the police service, and if criminal offences have been identified, it is for prosecutors to take decisions. I hope the hon. Member will agree that my answer to the question from the Chair of the Select Committee about recent convictions and steps taken, shows that there certainly is capacity within the PSNI to go after people and—if the evidence can be found—to enable a prosecution to take place.
On the question of legacy, under the previous Government’s Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023, which established the commission, every request for disclosure and information falls to the police service and other partners. That was already the case, regardless of anything contained in the legislation that we are currently taking through the House.
Colum Eastwood (Foyle) (SDLP)
The people who planted this bomb in Dunmurry have set their faces against the people of Ireland, who made the decision long ago that the only route to constitutional change is a democratic one. They have attacked and tried to kill Irish police officers, they have murdered a young journalist in Derry, and just last weekend they have put children and babies in harm’s way. Will the Secretary of State confirm to the House today that the only route to achieving the united Ireland that some of us want to see is the democratic route laid out in the Good Friday agreement, and that it is up to those of us who want to see that happen to make the argument for it? These people are only an impediment to that change.
Hilary Benn
I say to my hon. Friend that the huge significance of the Good Friday agreement is that it charted a way forward and made clear the peaceful means by which those who wish to seek constitutional change in Northern Ireland can pursue it, but I also make the point that there never was any justification for the violence. There was always an alternative to the violence, and that was shown in the negotiation of the Good Friday agreement.
Mr Paul Kohler (Wimbledon) (LD)
I begin by praising the bravery of the police, the fire and ambulance services, and the delivery driver, all of whom put themselves in danger to prevent a tragedy.
I am sure the Secretary of State recognises that, as an act of terrorism, this is a matter of national security, which is the responsibility of the central Government. Unfortunately, whenever asked about funding to combat dissident republican terrorism, the Northern Ireland Office repeatedly points to general funding allocated to the Executive, as though the responsibility to combat such terrorism lies with them. Admittedly, some extra funding, as we have heard, is given for additional security funding, but that is intended to cover all forms of terrorist activity. It ignores the special circumstances in Northern Ireland, and has been described by the Police Federation for Northern Ireland as “minuscule”.
I want to press the Secretary of State on the same two questions. What additionally is he doing to ensure that the PSNI has adequate funding and resources to respond to the threat posed by dissident republican groups, and what discussions has he had with the Chief Constable, Jon Boutcher, and the Northern Ireland Executive to address their repeated concerns about PSNI funding?
Hilary Benn
Yes, it is a reserved matter, but there is a shared responsibility across Northern Ireland to defeat terrorism. That is a political responsibility and it is a policing and security responsibility. As I have set out to the House, the budget of the PSNI is determined by the Executive. We as a Government are playing our part by making sure there has been a record settlement. As I said, we have increased additional security funding for the first time in a decade, and the Home Office counter-terrorism grant was Barnetted across to the Northern Ireland Executive. It is for the Northern Ireland Executive to take the decisions about how they choose to spend the significant resources we are making available.
Katrina Murray (Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch) (Lab)
I associate myself with the comments made by the hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sorcha Eastwood) and the Secretary of State about the bravery of the PSNI and the delivery driver. This attack serves as a timely reminder that, for a handful of individuals in Northern Ireland, a return to violence is never that far away. Given the unique challenges to their own safety that members of staff and police officers in the PSNI have to face on a daily basis—and tomorrow is International Workers’ Memorial Day—would the Secretary of State work with the Northern Ireland Executive to ensure that nobody should be going to work and not coming home?
Hilary Benn
I very much agree with my hon. Friend’s last point. I meet the Justice Minister, the police and security partners on a very regular basis, and we discuss all of these matters and review what has been happening. All I would say is that the reduction in the number of bombings and shootings in the past decade is very marked, and that is testament to the efforts of the police and security partners. In fairness, I should also remind the House that the threat assessment at the moment remains substantial. It was previously severe in the wake of the attempted murder of John Caldwell, but it is currently substantial, which means that an attack is likely.
Jim Allister (North Antrim) (TUV)
Following two car bomb attacks in one month, what my constituents want to know is what will be done to snuff out this terrorist threat before it develops further—and that must include dealing with the underfunding and the understaffing of the PSNI. Today the Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland called out some Northern Ireland political parties for their failure to give unconditional support to the PSNI, which means that many young PSNI officers cannot live in nationalist areas. Does the Secretary of State agree that those parties need to do more, and that, in particular, Sinn Féin must match its pious words with actions of unconditional support for the PSNI and cease lauding its former car bombers, which only gives support to the current generation of car bombers?
Hilary Benn
I agree with the hon. Gentleman that it is the responsibility of all political leaders—indeed, of all in society in Northern Ireland—to give their full-hearted support to the Police Service of Northern Ireland, which is there to protect everyone from all communities and stands against those who would do the people of Northern Ireland harm. I think that that is a fundamental part of the responsibility that all of us have as political leaders.
Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)
Jon Boutcher has been fairly critical of a number of political parties, including, it must be said, the party of government. He is clear about the fact that his force, the PSNI, is not funded like other forces across the United Kingdom, and he believes that that is partly due to legacy issues—a position that will be made far more acute by the Northern Ireland Troubles Bill. Does the Secretary of State agree with the Chief Constable or not?
Hilary Benn
I have had many conversations with the Chief Constable about funding and other matters. I would just point out, as I did a moment ago, that as a result of the provisions of the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023, which is the existing law under which everyone is operating at the moment, and the establishment of the legacy commission, the more cases the commission takes on—the number of cases is now over 100—the more there will be a requirement for disclosure anyway. What the Bill seeks to do is win the confidence of all communities in Northern Ireland so that this body, reformed, can hopefully enable all the families who are still looking for answers about how their loved ones died to find them.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
Let me say on behalf of my party that we condemn the bombing at the weekend and we thank the police for their actions, which ensured that there were not the casualties that we would otherwise be lamenting here today.
It is significant that the bomb was set off at the same time as Sinn Féin was holding its party conference, at which bombers of the past were being praised. That glorification of terrorism only stimulates terrorism again today. The logic is clear: if we can praise the bombers of the past, why can we not bomb in the present? While the First Minister has condemned the bombing, does the Secretary of State agree that the schizophrenic attitude that Sinn Féin has developed towards past terrorism and present terrorism is only perpetuating terrorism in our society, and continues to pump the poison of violence into our society? Will he call on the First Minister and her party to stop being ambivalent towards policing and stop being ambivalent towards past terrorism, and make it clear that terrorism has no place in society?
Hilary Benn
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his opening remarks. I have already said that I think that all politicians, in Northern Ireland and throughout the United Kingdom, have a responsibility to encourage support for the work of the PSNI. I also welcome the condemnation that has been heard from those across the political spectrum in Northern Ireland—including Sinn Féin, which has made it very clear, as has everyone else, that those who were responsible for the attack on Saturday and the previous attack in Lurgan have no support and no place in the new Northern Ireland.
Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Given what the Secretary of State said about the nature of the Lurgan bomb, it sounds as if these weapons are unsophisticated and presumably not detonated remotely. This must mean that the delivery drivers were in exceptional peril, because such crude devices could have gone off at any time. Will the Secretary of State confirm that he is liaising closely with people in the Republic of Ireland, and that their attitude is nowadays one of complete support for the discovery and prevention of a new version of the terrorism of the troubles?
Hilary Benn
For reasons that I hope the House will understand, I am not going to speculate about the nature of the devices, but the right hon. Gentleman is right: given that the device on Saturday did explode, the lives of the two delivery drivers were self-evidently in great peril at the time they were forced to convey the devices to the respective police stations. The condemnation of terrorism is seen right across Ireland—in Northern Ireland, as we have just been discussing, and in the Republic of Ireland. These people have no support whatsoever, and it is important that we find out who did it and hold them to account.
Josh Babarinde (Eastbourne) (LD)
I pay tribute to the courage of the delivery driver and to PSNI officers, whose bravery saved lives in this deplorable attack. I also want to use this opportunity to pay tribute to one of my predecessors, Ian Gow, who was murdered by the IRA in a car bomb attack outside his Eastbourne home in 1990. His memory is enshrined in this Chamber via a shield above the door.
As well as ensuring that the PSNI is resourced to ensure that terrorists face the full force of the law, can the Secretary of State tell us what assessment has been made of the threat that dissident republicans pose to the British mainland, with a view to ensuring that no community anywhere in the United Kingdom suffers what has scarred the people of Northern Ireland and the people of Eastbourne?
Hilary Benn
I join the hon. Member in remembering the late Ian Gow, who gave such distinguished service to this House and was killed in that terrible attack—one of a number of Members who suffered at the hands of terrorist violence in the past. The assessment of the nature of the threat—which is currently substantial and has previously been severe, as I am sure the hon. Member will know—is carried out by the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre and is formally reviewed twice a year. I can assure him that JTAC’s staff take their job extremely seriously, and any information about any threats is circulated to all those who need to know.
Katie Lam (Weald of Kent) (Con)
We can all agree that the public should be protected from anybody who is willing to use violence against innocents and the police to get what they want, but I wonder how the right hon. Gentleman intends to enforce that. What message does he think it sends to those who have had the courage to protect the public, including British soldiers during the troubles, when this Government are making it easier for them to be dragged through the courts decades later?
Hilary Benn
I do not accept the hon. Member’s characterisation of what is in the troubles Bill that we will be discussing later, because the threshold consideration for prosecutions remains absolutely unchanged in the legislation currently before the House. However, I recognise that veterans are concerned about the impact that any changes may have on them. That is why the Government have put protections in the Bill and will bring forward further such proposals in Committee.
Robin Swann (South Antrim) (UUP)
What price does the Secretary of State put on a Northern Ireland life? What price does he put on the lives of PSNI officers, whom we have praised in this House today for saving so many lives at the weekend? The majority of his answers at the start of this session referred to Barnett consequentials and budgets, not the people who went out of their way to save lives. Why do he and this Government believe that if terrorists in Northern Ireland are attacking Northern Ireland people, it is only a Northern Ireland problem?
Hilary Benn
Well, I do not accept that I said that it is only a Northern Ireland problem. The reason I answered questions relating to the funding is because I was asked by hon. and right hon. Members about the funding that the Government make available to the Executive in Northern Ireland, out of which the Executive take decisions about the funding of the PSNI. That is their responsibility. I simply say to the hon. Member that the lives of everyone in Northern Ireland—be they police officer or ordinary citizen—are beyond price.
Lincoln Jopp (Spelthorne) (Con)
It is hard to believe that it was 34 years ago that one of these proxy bombs was driven into my checkpoint in west Belfast. I remember it like it was yesterday. I agree with the Secretary of State that we must find the perpetrators of this evil act, and I, too, encourage the community to come forward, because that is where the answer lies. Will the Secretary of State ask the Chief Constable how many Police Service of Northern Ireland detectives are allocated to investigating legacy issues, versus those allocated to finding the perpetrators of the Dunmurry police station attack?
Hilary Benn
I will take the hon. Member’s question away. The allocation of resources is a matter for the Chief Constable. This is a very urgent investigation. I point out to him that one of the consequences of the legacy Act that the last Government passed was that responsibility for investigating troubles-related cases departed from the PSNI; it does not rest with the PSNI today, but with the legacy commission. It is the commission that does investigations in respect of the cases that have been referred to it, not the PSNI.
Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP)
I, like every right-minded person, utterly condemn the abhorrent attack on Dunmurry PSNI station and the one on Lurgan in my constituency. I commend PSNI officers for their bravery in dealing with these attempts on their lives. Does the Secretary of State agree that Sinn Féin’s response drips with rank hypocrisy, condemning the bombers of today while glorifying, lauding and even erecting illegal statues to the bombers and terrorists of yesterday? Does he agree that the decision to put forward Órlaithí Flynn MLA—daughter of Patrick Flynn, convicted of an IRA bomb in Dunmurry—to condemn this attack was a calculated insult to victims and a grotesque reminder that Sinn Féin’s words condemn terrorism, but their politics still romanticise it? Surely the Government should reflect on their decision not to strengthen the legislation on glorification of terrorism and act to legislate against it immediately.
Hilary Benn
The hon. Member, quite rightly, speaks with great sincerity and anger about what has happened. On the very last point that she raised, she will be familiar with the provisions of the Terrorism Act 2006. As she will be aware, the Government have recently agreed to ask Jonathan Hall KC, the independent reviewer of terrorist legislation, to undertake a review of section 1 and report back.
Alex Easton (North Down) (Ind)
In the last year, there have been nine bomb attacks aimed at the PSNI from the men of darkness, who hide behind dark doors, in the dark and behind balaclavas. What action can the Secretary of State take to ensure that the PSNI has adequate funding? It is 700 police officers down, and the funding is still not in place. Will he agree to meet me and the Chief Constable to listen to those concerns about funding, so that we can beat the men of evil and not return to the past?
Hilary Benn
I know that the Police Service of Northern Ireland is treating this particular investigation with the urgency that it requires. Referring to the question from the hon. Member for Spelthorne (Lincoln Jopp)—I thank him once again for his service in Northern Ireland—what would help the police to bring the men of darkness to the light of justice is information that somebody probably knows. That information would enable people to be arrested and, if there is sufficient evidence, prosecuted for what they have done. That is the single most important contribution that can be made to assist the PSNI in trying to find out who was responsible.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Secretary of State for his answers. Police numbers, intelligence, CCTV, IRA infiltration, people sending information—those are all issues. It is beyond disappointing that this same New IRA was able to plan to hijack and deploy a second device in west Belfast without any prior interception. The Chief Constable of the PSNI and the Police Federation for Northern Ireland have continually highlighted a lack of resources for policing. Will the Secretary of State please explain whether the lack of ability to combat this group of murderous, terrorist thugs is due to failures in intelligence sharing—MI5, MI6, special branch—or to a lack of police service on the ground that affects patrolling in high-risk areas? More importantly, what steps will the Secretary of State undertake to address those issues?
Hilary Benn
There is a huge amount of effort going in, as I indicated earlier, and most of it is unseen by the general public for reasons that everyone in the House will understand. As much information as can be gathered on what these people are seeking to do, we seek to acquire, but we either have to catch people in the act or get information from those who know who was responsible in order to see them prosecuted. It cannot be just left to the PSNI and our security partners, who once again I pay tribute to; they do a truly extraordinary job on behalf of us all, but they need some help from others who have information that they can bring to bear, so that people are held to account for what they have done.
Lord Mandelson Humble Address: Government Response Update
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Darren Jones)
Given the upcoming Prorogation and state opening of Parliament, I thought it would be helpful to return to the House to provide an update on the progress the Government have made to respond to the Humble Address of 4 February as quickly and thoroughly as possible.
As Members will know, the Government published the first tranche of material on 11 March. That first tranche primarily related to the aspects of the motion regarding Peter Mandelson’s appointment and his subsequent dismissal as ambassador, in addition to the details of his severance payment provided to him by the Foreign Office. Following the publication of the first tranche of material, we have been working at pace to lay a second tranche before the House. The House will recognise, given the breadth of the motion, that a very significant number of documents have been found to be in scope and that it is taking time to process them accordingly.
The Cabinet Office team responsible for the Government’s response to the Humble Address has been working through a large quantity of material, working closely with many officials across Whitehall, particularly in the Foreign Office. The team has been seeking to take an approach to sifting and publishing information that allows it to respond to the will of this House thoroughly but expeditiously, and in line with the approach taken by previous Governments in responding to Humble Addresses. This includes co-ordinating a number of requests to Government Departments to identify documents potentially in scope of the Humble Address, particularly electronic communications and the minutes of meetings between individuals and Peter Mandelson. This is the section of the motion that has the broadest scope.
As Members will have seen from the first tranche, the Government cannot publish certain details, such as the names of junior officials, personal information or legally privileged information. Separately, in line with the process agreed by the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament, the Government will not publish information that undermines or threatens our country’s national security or international relations. As colleagues will appreciate, both those processes require detailed consideration. The Government are very grateful to the ISC for its constructive engagement in that process, which we recognise has constituted significant additional work on top of its existing responsibilities. As I have set out previously, the Cabinet Office has also been working with the Metropolitan police to avoid prejudicing a live police investigation.
I can confirm that by the end of today, the Cabinet Office will have passed to the ISC all the material it has processed as part of the Humble Address and judged to be prejudicial to national security or international relations. This has amounted to over 300 individual documents. It includes a number that are relevant to the processes of Peter Mandelson’s security vetting, too. As I mentioned earlier, I am very grateful to the ISC for the important role it continues to play in the Humble Address process, and for the speed with which it is processing the documents.
I would like to reassure colleagues that Parliament will receive the second tranche of material as soon as possible following the state opening and the conclusion of the work of the ISC, and I will return to the House at that point. I commend this statement to the House.
Alex Burghart (Brentwood and Ongar) (Con)
I thank the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister for advance sight of his statement and for taking this statement himself; it is good of him not to delegate. This was not his mess—that was the 2024 Budget—but I am afraid it is now his mess to clear up.
I have to ask: where are the documents? The Humble Address was nearly 12 weeks ago. I remind the right hon. Gentleman that on that occasion the House asked for a huge range of things: the due diligence document that was passed to No. 10; the conflict of interest form; the material that the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and the Cabinet Office provided to UK Security Vetting about Peter Mandelson; papers for and minutes of meetings relating to the decision to appoint Lord Mandelson; electronic communications; and so on. Where are they? Since February, the Government have asserted that they are working with urgency and that everything will be available very shortly, that they are working, in that least reassuring of Government phrases, “at pace”, and—today’s favourite—that the information will be available as soon as possible. That is, no doubt, as soon as possible after the local elections.
In the documents that have been released, what we appear to see is either an enormous cover-up or a very significant breakdown in the expected process of government. We have seen nothing from the Prime Minister, nothing from his chief of staff and nothing from Peter Mandelson himself; we have seen no minutes of meetings, no billets-doux, no annotations and no box returns. The official civil service guidance on this matter says explicitly:
“Keep submissions with ministers’ comments. If ministers write on a hard copy, keep the minister’s handwritten comments. Keep correspondence reporting ministers’ responses along with background provided to ministers in the medium in which they were created”.
We have seen none of this. This is either a cover-up or a terrible return to the days of sofa government under Tony Blair.
Simon Case told the Prime Minister that in order to complete due process, there had to be security clearance before he made the appointment, and a conflict of interest declaration had to be made by Peter Mandelson. To date, we have seen none of that information. I am pleased to hear the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister say that material associated with Mandelson’s vetting is now being handed to the ISC, but where is the conflict of interest form? I hope it is not the case that this is being disguised as personal information of the sort that the right hon. Gentleman said would not be disclosed, and I would be grateful if he could confirm that it is not.
I would also like the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister to confirm that that declaration of interest form exists. There is no good reason why he cannot tell us whether it does. Indeed, the former Attorney General wrote the other day in the papers that there is no legal reason why the Government cannot tell us which documents are being retained by the Metropolitan police. There should be a catalogue of all documents that exist; even if the House cannot look at them, we should be allowed to know what is out there and what will come to us in due course. The titles of documents will themselves not prejudice a trial.
The Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister has today talked about the non-disclosure of personal information. I ask him again to tell us about the conflict of interest form and whether Peter Mandelson’s personal information is considered to be in scope of that ruling. Will he set out the Government’s precise approach to redactions vis-à-vis the documents that will be given to this House, rather than the ISC? It will be useful to understand his thinking.
On electronic communications, despite this being in the Humble Address on 4 February, I understand from the Cabinet Secretary, who wrote to me over the weekend, that there was no instruction to hand over non-corporate comms until 13 March—about five weeks after the Humble Address. Why this delay? Is the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister confident that no material was deleted in that five-week period? How can he be sure?
I again ask the right hon. Gentleman to confirm or deny whether the ISC release contains the information about Lord Mandelson’s interests. This is of specific concern to the House, given how Peter Mandelson may have behaved when he was ambassador in Washington and given the meetings that he may have taken the Prime Minister to.
It is time the Government come clean—not on their own terms or to their own timetable, but on the terms set down by the House. Will the right hon. Gentleman finally tell us a hard deadline for when these documents will be handed over?
Darren Jones
The hon. Gentleman asked me a number of questions, which I will take in turn. To the question of where the documents are, those in scope of the Humble Address are currently in one of three locations: first, with the Government waiting for the publication of the second tranche; secondly, with the Intelligence and Security Committee; and thirdly, with the Metropolitan police. We have sought to publish all those documents—those that the Government hold and those that the Intelligence and Security Committee are considering—in a combined bundle, in order to aid the House to see the documents in a chronological order. Otherwise, I suspect there would be questions about what documents were missing, subject to the conclusion of the Committee’s work.
I can confirm that documents that relate to Peter Mandelson’s security vetting have been passed to the Intelligence and Security Committee today, and that we intend to publish those as part of the second tranche, subject to discussions with the Intelligence and Security Committee.
I was asked specifically about the documents that have been given to the Metropolitan police. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will appreciate that I have been advised by the Metropolitan police that I am unable to list those documents, and so I will not seek to do so. He asked me about redactions policy; obviously the key redactions policy is in relation to information that the Government consider to be prejudicial to national security or international relations. That goes through the Intelligence and Security Committee for consideration. If there is a disagreement between the Government and the Committee, there is a process of redactions hearings between them to resolve that.
As I mentioned in my statement, other redactions relate merely to information such as the names and contact details of junior officials, in line with established freedom of information policy as it relates to the publication of Humble Addresses.
Clive Efford (Eltham and Chislehurst) (Lab)
The whole House came together around the Humble Address on the basis that Parliament had found its way forward to deal with the evidence around the appointment of Peter Mandelson. Will my right hon. Friend guarantee the House that no documents are being withheld? Around the time that it was reported that the Prime Minister had not been told that Peter Mandelson had failed his security vetting, there were civil servants who were seeking to withhold documents. Can he give an assurance that that is no longer the case?
Darren Jones
As has been alluded to at the Dispatch Box, there were documents that the Humble Address warranted to be published as part of that process. The Cabinet Office was very clear about that. It took some time to get access to some of those documents, specifically in relation to UKSV recommendations. That has now concluded and the documents are going through the Intelligence and Security Committee, as I set out in my statement.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.
Lisa Smart (Hazel Grove) (LD)
I thank the Chief Secretary for advance sight of his statement. The women and girls who spoke out against Jeffrey Epstein and those connected to him did so at enormous personal cost. We must never lose sight of the fact that their bravery is the reason we are having this conversation at all.
The Prime Minister promised honesty, integrity and accountability. Instead, we have a tawdry saga of a political ally waved through despite serious security concerns, a senior civil servant forced out, and a Government who have descended into recrimination and infighting rather than dealing with the very serious issues the country faces. Parliament asked for transparency, and the public deserves answers. Every day this drags on, trust in our institutions erodes further.
Even though Lord Mandelson has stepped away from the House of Lords, will the Government bring in formal legislation to revoke his peerage? Will the Chief Secretary confirm whether the Government plan to bring in further legislation for much-needed reform of the other place? The deputy Chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee, the right hon. and learned Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright), asked in business questions on Thursday about potential further redactions made on grounds other than national security or international relations. Will the Chief Secretary confirm that there have been no redactions in what he said will be sent to the Committee by the end of today?
It has been reported that the Prime Minister is set to whip Labour MPs to oppose his referral to the Privileges Committee. Even Boris Johnson did not block his MPs from voting for scrutiny. Labour MPs must surely be given a free vote and not be forced into feeling like accomplices to a cover up. Will the Chief Secretary confirm whether Labour MPs will be whipped on tomorrow’s vote or not?
Darren Jones
It is not for the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister to speak about whipping arrangements at the Dispatch Box. I will leave that to the Chief Whip and the usual channels. The hon. Lady asked me two questions about reform to the other place, in particular the removal of peerages. I can confirm that legislation will be introduced shortly to bring forward the proposals that I have talked about at the Dispatch Box. She asked me further questions about redactions policy; I refer to my previous answer on that question.
Ms Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)
The pain of the Epstein victims sits heavy with all of us in this House because we expect the highest standards of all of us. The challenge with this incident is that it involves a convoluted process that raises difficult questions about Government vetting and appointments. Given that, can my right hon. Friend tell us when he expects the Adrian Fulford review, which is to identify whether any other cases of concern have come to light about how appointments have been made, to be completed?
Darren Jones
My hon. Friend is exactly right to raise that question. The terms of reference have been confirmed with Adrian Fulford. That work has been started, and I expect it to complete in three to four weeks’ time.
Sir Jeremy Wright (Kenilworth and Southam) (Con)
I thank the Minister for his kind words about the hard work of the Intelligence and Security Committee. He will recognise and want to reflect with the House that we cannot work any faster than the speed at which the documents are given to us by the Government; the last of them, as he said, is being given to us today. The process will not be complete by Prorogation, as perhaps it should have been.
I would like to raise two points of concern in what the Minister has said to us this afternoon. The first is about redaction. He has made it clear that the Government intend to redact for reasons beyond the Humble Address exemption related to international relations and national security; he has described that as the names of junior officials, personal information or legally privileged information. On Thursday, I put it to the Leader of the House that the Government document describing their approach to redactions is substantially wider than that. It says:
“It may also be necessary for the government to make further redactions in future publications based on other public interest principles, including”—
but of course not limited to—
“commercially sensitive information.”
Will the Minister please, either today or in writing, explain clearly on what grounds the Government intend to redact these documents? If, as I suspect, some of the grounds on which the Government propose to redact are beyond the scope of the Humble Address, will he confirm that the Government must return to this House and seek consent so to do?
With your indulgence, Madam Deputy Speaker, my final point is also about redaction. The Minister has said in his statement that the Government will not publish information that undermines or threatens our country’s national security or international relations. As he knows, in accordance with the process agreed, it will be for the Intelligence and Security Committee to determine those questions, not the Government—won’t it?
Darren Jones
I thank the right hon. and learned Gentleman for his question and confirm that the Government share the view that it is not the fault of the Intelligence and Security Committee that documents are not yet ready to be published; we hope that they will be ready shortly after the state opening of Parliament.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman asked me about redactions policy. I refer him to my earlier answer, but he did ask me some specific questions; I commit to seeking further advice on those and returning to the Dispatch Box. I hope that he and the House know that my intention, from the beginning of when I was asked to do this process, has been to ensure proper transparency with Parliament, which I and the Government take very seriously. If there is any suggestion otherwise, I will answer questions about that here at the Dispatch Box.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman’s second question has fallen out of my mind.
Sir Jeremy Wright
Forgive me, Madam Deputy Speaker. It was about whether the Minister would confirm that it will be the ISC that determines redactions on the basis of international relations and national security.
Darren Jones
I can confirm that the Government’s agreed process with the Committee stands.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
I thank the Chief Secretary for his statement. I am interested in the costs. We know about the £75,000 payout, and obviously a police inquiry is incredibly costly. There are the costs to his Department in complying with the Humble Address. Will he publish the costs? Will he also publish the costs in relation to Global Counsel? Its clients included Palantir, with which the Government have £800 million-worth of contracts. Will he publish how much money Global Counsel had been able to procure from the Government for being able to advance Palantir’s business interests at the time of Peter Mandelson’s appointment?
Darren Jones
My best answer is to refer my hon. Friend to the contracts finder tool, which publishes all public procurement contracts and their value. In relation to questions of the internal cost of processing the Humble Address, I cannot commit to give a round number; essentially it involves lots of hours of civil servants’ time across Government. They are working very hard to be able to publish these documents as quickly as possible.
Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)
May I, through the right hon. Gentleman, thank the officials in the Cabinet Office who have assisted me in the work that I have been doing in this area as Chairman of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee? He will know that not all Government communications are carried on Government devices. Will he, for the benefit of the House, explain what is being done and what can be done to secure and get into the right domain correspondence between the principal players who have used their personal devices, rather than their Government devices? Will he also assure the House that when he and his colleagues do the sift as to who sees what and when, parliamentary privilege and all that that means is still absolutely at the heart of the decisions that he and his officials take?
Darren Jones
The tranche of documents will be published in the normal way to ensure that parliamentary privilege is attached to those documents and any debate that we subsequently have in relation to them. The hon. Gentleman asked me questions about personal devices and personal communications channels, which we refer to as “non-corporate communications channels” or “NCCCs” in the documents that we have published. I confirm that all relevant stakeholders who had to consider submissions to the Humble Address process have been told that that includes their personal devices and personal channels as well as any Government-owned devices and Government channels. I thank him again for his work and confirm to the House that he, as Chair of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, kindly agreed to look at documents given to the Metropolitan police in relation to the police investigation so that we had a way—albeit a closed way—of showing due process and transparency to the House in relation to the Humble Address.
Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Lab)
Further to the security vetting issue in relation to Peter Mandelson, last week in the Chamber I asked questions—including to the Minister and through a point of order to the Speaker —three times, but I have not had an answer, so I would really appreciate an answer. At the point at which the Prime Minister’s former chief of staff Morgan McSweeney was involved in the appointment of Mandelson, did he himself have security vetting? On what date was Morgan McSweeney granted developed vetting clearance? Prior to that date, did Morgan McSweeney ever handle documents for which he would have required developed vetting clearance? I asked that three times in the Chamber but have not had an answer. I would be really grateful if the Minister could answer.
Darren Jones
The House will appreciate that I cannot comment on individual applications of policy in relation to private individuals who are no longer employed by the Government, but I reassure my hon. Friend and the House that all appropriate processes were followed.
Stephen Flynn (Aberdeen South) (SNP)
In respect of the Humble Address, perhaps contrary to what was suggested earlier, the House agreed to it only on the basis that Labour MPs were about to rebel against the position that the Government had adopted. Tomorrow, something similar may arise in respect of a potential referral of the Prime Minister to the Privileges Committee. Surely the Chief Secretary has an opinion as to whether his Members behind him would want to have a free vote in respect of whether the Prime Minister has misled the House.
Darren Jones
I always enjoy the right hon. Gentleman’s interventions, but that did not pertain to the statement before us. [Interruption.]
Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. [Interruption.]. Are we all finished? I thank the Chief Secretary for returning to the House again on this issue. Will he reiterate how due process for the conducting of security vetting before appointments are announced will change as a result of this affair?
Darren Jones
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. As has been said at the Dispatch Box before, it was previously due process that for the appointments of ambassadors and direct ministerial appointments, vetting took place after the announcement and before the commencement of the contract for employment. Given the problems that have been shown to be applicable to these processes, that has now changed.
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
A referral to the Privileges Committee has always been considered a House matter—a matter for the individual judgment of Members of Parliament. It would be an abomination if it were to be whipped by either side, wouldn’t it?
Sarah Russell (Congleton) (Lab)
Could my right hon. Friend the Minister please confirm whether any documents that were previously in the scope of the Humble Address have been deemed no longer to be within its scope due to the application of litigation privilege in respect of the dismissal of Olly Robbins?
Darren Jones
I am afraid I do not know the answer to that question, but I commit myself to taking it away.
Joy Morrissey (Beaconsfield) (Con)
I am just a humble Member of this House, and it is our job to hold the Government to account. It was unclear from the Minister’s first response what the process will be, so could he clarify again whether, if the ISC members disagree with the Government, that matter will be brought back to the House for a decision? I do not believe it is right for the Government to judge and mark their own homework.
Darren Jones
I refer to my previous answer about standing by the commitment made between the Government and the Committee. There is an established process for any disagreement through a redactions hearing.
Perran Moon (Camborne and Redruth) (Lab)
The worst outcome from this process is that a police investigation is compromised by materials making their way into the public domain before time. While Opposition MPs seek to rush this process through, can the Chief Secretary confirm that no documents of interest will be put in the public domain until they have been cleared by the Met police? [Interruption.] If Opposition Members want to know how Labour voters are going to vote tomorrow, they just need to join the Labour party.
Darren Jones
My hon. Friend asks an important question. As has been said before, at the heart of this entire scandal are the victims of the most heinous crimes who have yet to see any justice whatsoever, apart from this becoming part of big political debates here in the UK and in other countries. That is why the Government have been absolutely committed to supporting the Metropolitan police in its criminal investigation. We continue to do so, and we would not do anything to undermine that process because the victims have to come first.
Richard Foord (Honiton and Sidmouth) (LD)
I am grateful to the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister for his statement. He said that,
“in line with the process agreed by the Intelligence and Security Committee, the Government will not publish information that undermines or threatens our country’s national security or international relations.”
That sentence is correct, but it implies that this is a Government process that the ISC has acceded to, and that is not quite right. Rather, the Government propose redactions and the ISC directs that redactions be made on the basis that full publication would be prejudicial to national security or international relations. This matters because we want to maintain trust in the Intelligence and Security Committee, of which I am a member. Does the Chief Secretary accept that the Government propose redactions and that the ISC considers them and directs which ones should be made?
Darren Jones
The hon. Gentleman sets out the process that has been agreed between the Committee and the Government and, as I have said to other members of the Committee, that process stands.
Sean Woodcock (Banbury) (Lab)
This has been a very damaging issue. Peter Mandelson should clearly never have been made ambassador, and I am pleased that the Prime Minister has rightly apologised. There are, however, lessons to be learned already before the end of this Humble Address process. Can the Minister confirm that his Department has already started learning and implementing those lessons?
Darren Jones
My hon. Friend is right. There is a whole series of processes that this Government inherited as the status quo, including the due process from the previous Administration that was used in the past for other political appointments and direct ministerial appointments. This episode has shown that those processes needed to be updated, and the Government are working on modernising those rules and will bring those reforms to the House in due course.
Esther McVey (Tatton) (Con)
Is there any truth in the claims that the delay in the Government adhering to the Humble Address motion is because Cabinet Ministers are refusing to hand over their mobile phones because of the messages between them and Mandelson that they contain, and the embarrassment that that will cause them?
Darren Jones
Cabinet Ministers have received instructions from the Cabinet Office about the declaration of the information that they hold on either corporate or personal communications channels, and they have all complied with that direction.
Richard Tice (Boston and Skegness) (Reform)
With regard to the release of these Mandelson documents, there is genuine concern about what may be redacted and what may not. Given the ongoing dispute as to the pressure brought to bear between No. 10 and the Foreign Office, can the Minister confirm that nothing will be redacted with regard to pressure brought to bear on the Foreign Office about the vetting process?
Darren Jones
Redactions are done in line with the policy I set out previously.
Dr Kieran Mullan (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)
I politely say that the Minister’s overly sincere, butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-his-mouth act is beginning to wear thin—the way he suggests that the process he is going through has not put a foot wrong. He has repeatedly failed to answer questions that I put to him with candour around Mandelson, despite the fact that this evening we will pass a Bill that makes it law for Ministers to answer questions.
Can I follow up on the questions around mobile phones? Ministers will be asked whether they have any communications left on their personal phones. Are they also being asked to tell you, and will we be told, if those messages have disappeared because they have disappearing messages on their phones?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
Order. Let us keep our questions short and omit the word “you” because I am not responding.
Darren Jones
I am sorry that the hon. Member is not happy with my performance—I will try harder in future. In relation to his question, I refer him to my previous answer.
Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
What is the Department’s internal deadline for concluding the release of the Mandelson files? If there is an internal deadline, who will be held accountable if the Department fails to meet it?
Darren Jones
The Department has now handed over all the final documents that it needs to hand over to the Intelligence and Security Committee. Once that process is able to conclude, we will publish the second tranche shortly after that.
Sir Alec Shelbrooke (Wetherby and Easingwold) (Con)
The truth of the matter is when the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister says that process was followed to appoint a diplomat, a professional diplomat would not have been appointed if they had taken dodgy loans, tried to flog passports and leaked to the Chinese and the Russians, so that was not the case. The motion on the Humble Address got through this House because it said that all documents would be handed to the ISC, because that is the most secure place for them to go. It is not in the gift of the Government not to hand this over—that was the view of the House. This is not being done in good faith. When will all these documents be given to the ISC, which was exactly what this House said should be done?
Darren Jones
I answered that question in my opening statement. All final documents relevant to the ISC process are being handed over today.
Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)
Today’s statement is interesting, but we need to remember how we got here in the first place: the Prime Minister is facing allegations that he misled the House about the process by which an individual was appointed who had well-documented associations with a convicted paedophile and human trafficker. The Chief Secretary said yesterday that the Committee of Privileges is reserved for the most serious allegations. Does he recognise how that belittles what has been suffered by the victims and survivors?
Darren Jones
I am not quite clear what the question was in relation to the Humble Address. In relation to the Committee of Privileges motion before the House tomorrow, I refer to my previous answer.
Paul Holmes (Hamble Valley) (Con)
Last week, I asked the Prime Minister if he would publish his decision note on the box note given to him on 11 November from Simon Case. The Prime Minister said he could not remember the answer in that box note, and in the debate last week, the Minister himself said that redactions are only in black. The decision response on the box note has been left blank. Was there a decision, why has it not been published and will the Minister now undertake to publish the decision on that request from Simon Case, because this House and I believe that it will be fundamental to see whether the Prime Minister is actually telling the truth?
Darren Jones
I am happy to reconfirm that all redactions are in black in the documents that are being published in the Humble Address tranches. All documents that the Government hold in relation to that period of time have been published in the first tranche. Of course, decisions are communicated sometimes orally and sometimes in writing. The hon. Gentleman also asked me specifically about Simon Case’s advice and the process that was followed subsequently. I refer him to the letter published this afternoon from the previous Cabinet Secretary, who confirmed to the Prime Minister that due process had been followed.
Mr Lee Dillon (Newbury) (LD)
How does the Prime Minister’s promise of delivering honesty, integrity and accountability reconcile with the potential blocking of a motion to the Committee of Privileges? If the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister is not willing to comment on the Government’s voting intentions tomorrow, will he commit to accountability by ensuring that he votes in favour for it being referred to the Committee?
Darren Jones
I am not sure that I should declare my voting intention from the Dispatch Box, but I refer the hon. Gentleman to my previous answer.
Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
The Government are keen to emphasise their transparency in the course of dealing with the Humble Address requests and demands, so here is an opportunity to put that to the test. Last Tuesday, I put down a question for written answer by the Prime Minister:
“To ask the Prime Minister who first suggested to him that Peter Mandelson should be appointed as Ambassador to the United States.”
It was accepted and published as such by the Table Office. Subsequently, it has been transferred to the Cabinet Office, for which he has responsibility. It is due to be answered tomorrow. Will the Minister give the answer to that question tomorrow, on time and substantively?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
The Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister’s responsibilities are just growing and growing!
Darren Jones
I am deeply grateful, Madam Deputy Speaker. I always ensure that I honour parliamentary questions in a timely fashion.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Minister for his statement— he is a decent and honourable man. In phone calls to my office only this morning, Strangford constituents have expressed their dismay about Government cover-ups. Even my constituents’ bank account comings and goings are questioned, and when they make withdrawals, they are asked where their money is from and what it is for. There is a perception out there that there is one rule for the Government of the day and another for everyone else. How can the Minister begin to show people that we are all accountable to scrutiny?
Darren Jones
The Humble Address is an example of Parliament holding the Government to account, and of the Government being accountable to Parliament.
Dame Karen Bradley (Staffordshire Moorlands) (Con)
Could the Chief Secretary confirm that responses to submissions are written on the paper of the submissions, and not on Post-it notes?
Lincoln Jopp (Spelthorne) (Con)
I thank the Minister for his statement, in which he said that
“the Government will not publish information that undermines or threatens our country’s national security or international relations.”
My question is: in whose judgment? Ultimately, is that the judgment of an official or of a Minister? If it is that of a Minister, which one?
Darren Jones
In the first instance, officials make those judgments and refer those requests to the Intelligence and Security Committee, where parliamentarians take a view.
Jerome Mayhew (Broadland and Fakenham) (Con)
One of the glaring omissions in the first release of documentation was the Prime Minister’s response to his box notes about the proposed appointment of Peter Mandelson. The Government have now had three months to think about it. Will the Minister set out whether there is any reason why those documents will not be part of the next release?
Darren Jones
All the documents that the Government hold in relation to the initial appointment and subsequent dismissal have been published in the first tranche, and all subsequent relevant documents will be published in the second.
Mr Louie French (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)
When he was asked on 20 April why there is no record of his and Peter Mandelson’s meeting with Palantir in Washington, the Prime Minister said:
“That was a routine meeting in the course of a visit I was on in the US.”—[Official Report, 20 April 2026; Vol. 784, c. 62.]
Does the Minister agree that that was a routine meeting, and if so, where is the record of it, as required by the ministerial code?
Darren Jones
As the Prime Minister said, that was part of a series of visits that he was undertaking. It is of course proper that closed-door meetings between Ministers and stakeholders are attended by officials, minuted and reported in the normal way, but when visits are undertaken, they are managed differently. This was no secret to anyone; photos were taken and published on the Government’s social media account.
Harriet Cross (Gordon and Buchan) (Con)
The shadow Chancellor for the Duchy of Lancaster has asked today and previously, as have other Conservative Members, about the existence or not of a declaration of interests form for Mandelson. Does that form exist?
David Reed (Exmouth and Exeter East) (Con)
The Minister says that 300 documents have now been shared with the ISC, but how many are left to be processed? More importantly, what has the process been in ascertaining a document’s relevance, and who decides whether a document is important?
Darren Jones
The Cabinet Office has now processed all the documents ready for the second tranche. In relation to the Intelligence and Security Committee, those final documents have been sent or will be sent today. In relation to who decides whether a document is referred to the Committee, that is based on officials screening each document to see whether they engage international relations or national security, and whether they warrant a redaction request.
Points of Order
Stephen Flynn (Aberdeen South) (SNP)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. When I asked how the Government intend to vote tomorrow, the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister said that he would not answer, because the question did not pertain to the motion before us. He then used that as a justification for not answering the questions of numerous Opposition Members. How are we supposed to get an answer from a Minister when they believe themselves to be not only a member of the Cabinet, but the Speaker, or perhaps a Deputy Speaker, of the House of Commons?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
The right hon. Member has got his point on the record. Unfortunately, I am not responsible for the content of Ministers’ speeches, let alone the answers—if only we were. We do not want to continue this debate, but that point is, no doubt, now on the record.
Alex Burghart (Brentwood and Ongar) (Con)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. On this afternoon’s carry-over motion on the Government’s Northern Ireland Troubles Bill, over the weekend, the Government briefed journalists that they would bring forward amendments to the Bill in order to give Members reassurance that adequate protection would be given to veterans. However, this morning, no Government amendments appeared on the amendment paper. Is there anything that His Majesty’s Opposition can do to require the Government to publish those amendments in advance of this afternoon’s debate?
Madam Deputy Speaker
The Chair has no power to compel the Government to produce amendments earlier than the tabling deadline set out in the Standing Orders. However, those on the Treasury Bench will have heard the hon. Member’s comments. When we consider the carry-over motion later—there is some time for that—he will have a chance to raise the matter with the Secretary of State, who will no doubt be back in the Chamber.
Paul Holmes (Hamble Valley) (Con)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I have to admit that I am confused, which is not unusual. I seek your guidance. The Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister said that documents have been published in the first tranche relating to the box note issued to the Prime Minister on 11 November by Simon Case. I asked the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister whether that had been redacted, and he said to me that redactions are in black. The Prime Minister’s decision box is blank. I have asked three times now; why is there no response, and why has that not been published? No Minister has answered that for me. My question to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, is: where can I go to get an answer?
Madam Deputy Speaker
The hon. Member is a very professional Member of Parliament, and will no doubt know which other avenues he can take to get the answer. Unfortunately, I am not responsible for the answers that Ministers give here in the Chamber, but he will no doubt use every opportunity to hold the Minister to account.
John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Over a number of weeks, I have been raising the issue of Labour Together and its link with the agency APCO Worldwide. APCO prepared a report for Labour Together that smeared journalists. I called for an inquiry into Labour Together. A number of hon. Members then submitted subject access requests to both Labour Together and APCO. Labour Together has gone for an extension, and the three-month period should be up shortly, but a number of us received responses from APCO. I raised this in the House; the responses were heavily redacted, but they demonstrated that APCO was collecting information on hon. Members of Parliament. Last week, a whistleblower—this is before the London Court of International Arbitration at the moment—confirmed that APCO had instructed one of the freelance employees involved in the investigations to destroy materials related to the investigation, and evidence. May I request again that Members on the Treasury Bench take back to the Prime Minister that we need a full, independent inquiry on the role that Labour Together, and APCO in particular, has played?
Madam Deputy Speaker
I thank the right hon. Member for his point of order. The Government’s decision on whether to undertake an inquiry on the subject is not a matter for the Chair. However, his comments will have been heard by the Front-Bench team, and they will take action, if they wish to.
David Davis (Goole and Pocklington) (Con)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. This is a rather more mundane point of order. Last Thursday, my website, provided by the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority, was compromised. Malicious links were inserted, redirecting users to south-east Asian gambling websites. I guess it could be worse. We took the site down immediately. It was restored, but then came under a sustained distributed denial of service attack traceable to China. In just 24 hours, the site was hit with 142 million requests, consuming nearly 800 gigabytes of data. This is not a minor nuisance; it is direct interference with a Member of Parliament carrying out his duties. What are the House and the House authorities doing to prevent these kinds of attacks on Members’ websites, and to help MPs protect themselves against interference by a foreign state?
Madam Deputy Speaker
I thank the right hon. Member for his point of order, and for raising this very serious matter. It would not be appropriate to discuss publicly the details of preventive action, and of how Members are supported to protect themselves against these kinds of cyber-threats. If Members would like security advice on how to make personal accounts and devices more resilient, they should contact the Parliamentary Security Department. For matters relating to parliamentary accounts or equipment, Members should contact the Parliamentary Digital Service through the PDS service desk.
Bills Presented
English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
I confirm that nothing in the Lords message engages Commons financial privilege.
Clause 2
Areas of competence
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Miatta Fahnbulleh)
I beg to move,
That this House does not insist on its disagreement to Lords Amendment 2 but proposes Amendment (a) to the Lords Amendment.
Madam Deputy Speaker
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following Government motions:
That this House disagrees with the Lords in their Amendments 89B and 89C.
That this House insists on its disagreement with the Lords in their Amendments 36, 90 and 155, insists on its amendments 155A to 155F to the words restored to the Bill by that disagreement with Amendment 155, and proposes further Amendment (a) to the words so restored to the Bill by that disagreement.
That this House insists on its disagreement with the Lords in their Amendments 37 and 91, does not insist on its amendment 37A in lieu, and proposes Amendments (a) to (c) to the Bill in lieu of those amendments.
That this House disagrees with the Lords in their Amendments 94B and 94C.
That this House insists on its disagreement with the Lords in their Amendments 85 and 86, 97 to 116, 120, 121 and 123 but proposes Amendments (a) to (h) to the Bill in lieu of those amendments.
Miatta Fahnbulleh
I am grateful for the opportunity to speak once again on the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill. I am pleased that we have worked constructively throughout the Bill’s passage to ensure that the Bill is as strong as possible. We have engaged in good faith with Members from across the House and incorporated their feedback. With that, I turn to the amendments that remain in scope for ping-pong.
Lords amendment 2 seeks to add “rural affairs” as a distinct area of competence in clause 2 of the Bill. As I have said before, there is no difference in policy intent here; the Government’s position remains that those matters are captured in the existing areas of competence. Nevertheless, we recognise the strength of feeling that has been expressed by noble Lords in the other place. As we extend devolution beyond the predominately urban centres of England, it is right that strategic authorities look to use the powers and funding at their disposal to support communities across a wide range of geographies, whether urban, rural or coastal. The Government are therefore prepared to accept the addition of “rural affairs” and “coastal communities” to the list of subjects included in the areas of competence.
Hon. Members will know that the Government’s objective is for every part of England to benefit from devolution, and that we want this to be fundamentally a bottom-up process. For the benefit of the House, I will repeat the Government’s commitment not to commence the ministerial powers of direction to establish non-mayoral strategic authorities or expand existing strategic authorities without local consent for a period of two years following Royal Assent. This is the approach that we have taken in conversation and engagement with local authorities in order to form foundation strategic authorities, and this is the approach that we continue to take. At the same time, we have listened carefully to concerns raised by some in this House and in the other place about the backstop powers set out in schedule 1. We therefore propose removing the power for the Secretary of State to establish a mayor in an area without local consent.
On brownfield land, the Government fully agree on the importance of prioritising the development of brownfield land. As previous stated, planning policies and decisions are, and should be made, under the national planning policy framework. It remains the right place to set clear expectations on how and where developments should come forward. I have previously set out that imposing a legal requirement in the Bill would risk undermining effective plan-making and local flexibility in supporting sustainable development. The Government consider the amendment passed by the other place to be impractical, as it would undermine effective plan-making, limit consideration of local circumstances, and create inconsistency between the requirements for spatial development strategies prepared by mayors and strategic authorities, and those prepared by upper-tier county councils and unitary authorities. I therefore invite hon. Members to reject the amendment in lieu on brownfield land.
Let me turn to the issue of local authority governance arrangements. We remain firmly of the view that executive models of governance—in particular, the leader and cabinet model—provide the clearest and most transparent decision-making in local government. We continue to believe that our approach strikes the right balance between encouraging a more consistent model of governance across England’s local authorities and respecting local democratic mandates and decisions where a committee-run council has adopted its governance model more recently. We have got the balance right; we have listened and adapted, and we do not intend to go further. I invite hon. Members to reject the Lords amendment.
I recognise the strength of feeling about the role of town and parish councils in neighbourhood governance. The Government have considered Lords amendments 37 and 91 carefully, and we cannot accept an amendment that would undermine the principles of autonomy and localism. The creation of new parish councils is for local authorities to decide on, based on their community’s needs. Central Government should not intervene and direct that any particular model of neighbourhood governance is right for a place.
However, we have proposed a further amendment, building on our previous commitments. The new change requires local authorities to engage with town and parish councils where appropriate regarding parish representation under neighbourhood governance arrangements. That makes it clear that parish councils, where they exist, have an important role to play in neighbourhood governance. Again, we absolutely recognise the role of town and parish councils—I have made that point consistently throughout the passage of the Bill. We believe that our amendment strikes the right balance, alongside our commitments to reviewing and updating the guidance on community governance reviews, and to publishing a neighbourhood governance framework.
While I thank my noble colleagues for their insightful comments on the “agent of change” principle, I continue to hold that the most effective way to ensure the proper consideration of that principle is by strengthening existing mechanisms. National planning policy is not wishy-washy, as some have suggested. The framework carries significant weight in the planning system, and we are already in the most ambitious period of planning reform for a decade. I recognise the concerns that have been raised with me throughout this debate, and it is clear that the principle is not being effectively implemented. We already propose updating policy to address these issues, and I have committed to reviewing the guidance, in order to help disseminate best practice. Again, there is no fundamental difference in the policy intent; we are talking about the mechanism for taking it forward. We believe that the changes that we have in train will ensure that important businesses are protected from the effects of new development. With that, I urge the House to reject the Lords amendments.
The Bill has undoubtedly been improved as a result of the scrutiny in ping-pong so far, and we are incredibly grateful. We are pleased to be able to offer concessions on rural affairs, coastal communities, the power to direct a mayor, and town and parish councils. However, the Government are not prepared to accept any of the other Lords amendments that we have discussed today—not because there is fundamentally a difference in policy, but because we are thinking about the most effective mechanism for ensuring that these policies bite. I therefore urge the House to support the Government’s position and accept the Government’s concessions.
David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)
Despite the Minister’s centralising zeal, I detect a slight weariness on her part as we once again go toe to toe on Lords amendments. It remains the position of the Opposition that the Government are bringing forward in this Bill overall a set of centralising measures that are fundamentally about extending control from Whitehall into our town halls. Those measures come from a Government who have a record of imposing additional cost and responsibilities on our local authorities, as we hear continually from local government leaders.
It is welcome to hear from the Minister that there has been additional recognition from the Government of the differences that exist in our rural and coastal communities—I do have some coastline in my constituency, but I do not think Ruislip lido was what we had in mind when making the argument. It is clear that the needs of our rural and coastal communities, and the potential that they offer, are often different from what we see in urban and suburban areas, so we will not be pushing for a further vote on the matter of extending the recognition of rural affairs.
Mr Louie French (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)
The point that my hon. Friend is making is a very accurate description of what is happening in my local area of Bexley, where developers are trying to argue that greenfield sites are now ripe for development because of the Government’s planning changes. Does he share my concern that the Government are continuing to try to barge those changes through this House, and that both Reform and Labour support the Government’s position on the grey belt, which will have a detrimental effect on our local community and our natural environment?
David Simmonds
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. People in Old Bexley and Sidcup—just like those in Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner and, indeed, in many of the constituencies that are represented by Conservative Members—are concerned about a Reform party that is championing tearing up the green belt across our capital in pursuit of housing targets, and about the ambiguity that has been created by the Government’s position on grey-belt land. That description seems to be applied to any site on which a developer can argue that housing could be delivered because it has had some previous use. That level of ambiguity is another one of the reasons why we are keen to make the very strong case for brownfield being enshrined as the priority, and for the Government to accept that case.
I will now turn briefly to the Lords amendments dealing with the leader and cabinet model of local government. To be clear, as an Opposition, we do not have a strong view about what governance arrangements town halls should choose. Many of us will have had experience under the committee system or under the leader and cabinet model, some with executive mayors. However, the reason why we intend to push the Government on this issue is that it once again represents their centralising tendency—a view in Whitehall that the Government know best what structures should be used. I happen to agree with Ministers that the leader and cabinet model is the most effective and efficient model, but it is not for us to tell locally elected officials and councillors what arrangements they should make.
Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)
I thank the shadow Minister for giving way, and congratulate him on his efforts yesterday. I am sure we are both struggling to bob in the Chamber this afternoon.
I agree with the shadow Minister about the cabinet model for local councils. I am sure he agrees that one of the advantages of that model is that there are fewer meetings, which makes being a councillor more accessible for those who have jobs and childcare commitments and means that we do not just rely on councillors who are perhaps retired. On his point about the Government’s approach to local authorities, does he agree that one good thing that this Government have done is ensure multi-year funding for local councils? When I was a councillor in Harlow—I got my mention of Harlow in—it was a real challenge for the opposition to do its shadow budgets and for the administration to do its budgets.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
It would be interesting to know the timings of the shadow Minister’s marathon.
David Simmonds
Suffice it to say that I was significantly slower than the hon. Member for Harlow (Chris Vince), whose outstanding efforts will, I am sure, leave him a little bit sore when bobbing today.
The hon. Member will know the benefits of an effective leader and cabinet model, because he has a good Conservative local authority led by Councillor Dan Swords, and the work of Councillor Dan Swords and his team has driven forward the improvements Harlow has been able to enjoy over many years.
David Simmonds
I am going to make a little progress, if I may.
The key point is to ensure that our local authorities can set out their governance arrangements in a way that reflects the needs of their community. The Government have already accepted the argument that we need to ensure a degree of nuance in the Bill for rural and coastal communities, and this is another example of exactly that argument.
On parish governance, I know we do not all have parish councils in our local areas, but they are a significant feature of civic life across the country and many of them run important local facilities such as leisure centres and car parks. It is clearly important to ensure that their role is enshrined, especially at a time when this Government’s wider agenda of local government reorganisation is leading to a significant transfer of services to parish councils from districts due to be abolished, so it is welcome that the Government are moving forward on that.
On the final two groups of amendments we are debating this afternoon, the so-called agent of change principle is the idea that a new arrival in a community should bear the cost of consequent changes on its gaining planning consent: if somebody opens a new music venue or builds a new residential development, that should not be at the expense of existing and long-established uses. Many of us as constituency MPs have had experience of when, for example, a property developer creates a new residential development and seeks to close down an existing venue such as a local pub—I had an example to do with a bus garage—because they are concerned about the impact it would have. Clearly those established uses with prior consent need to have a degree of priority, and that has already found its way into law in Scotland. We believe that it is reasonable to recommend that the Government take this forward and ensure that those existing uses have sufficient protection in the Bill that they are not subject to the unfair impact of new and subsequent arrivals seeking to pass the costs of mitigating the consequences of their activity on to them.
Finally, Lords amendment 98 is about the Secretary of State’s powers on changes to strategic authorities. It was hotly contested as the Bill made its way through Committee that it contains chapters and chapters of new powers for the Secretary of State to direct mayors or combined authorities, which very much speaks to the point that this is centralising legislation. While it introduces a new layer of local government, it none the less results in central Government having significantly more powers to levy a precept, to create a new housing development, to create zoning to ensure development takes place, and to bring together groups of local authorities and assume some of their responsibilities. All of those now fall much more strongly within the purview of the Secretary of State issuing directions from Whitehall about how things should happen locally.
It remains the Opposition’s position that, as supporters of and believers in devolution, we should not simply pay lip service to it in the title of the Bill, but ensure that those measures have the consent and support of the locally elected politicians whose mandate gives them the power to make those decisions on behalf of their community. We remain determined to push ahead in favour of that principle of consent and ensure that local communities continue to have champions who speak up for them in this Chamber.
Alex Sobel (Leeds Central and Headingley) (Lab/Co-op)
In my comments, I will address the agent of change principle. I am the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on music, and this has long been on our agenda. The shadow Minister got the gist of this right when saying that it is about existing or long-standing venues—music venues and nightclubs, in particular—having to bat back legal challenges from residents of any new build residential property, but primarily apartments. We have had examples of cases, such as Alphabet and the Moth club, where there have been legal costs of £50,000 or more from having to take on new developments that are challenging their ongoing operations.
I encountered a case of this kind in my constituency, which we had to fight in the planning committee. An organisation called Music and Arts Production provides music and arts education in its building for young people who have been excluded from school and who would otherwise become NEET—not in education, employment or training—but who are thus kept within the education system. One of its main sources of funding is Cosmic Slop, an event that raises a significant amount on Saturday nights.
There was to be heavy residential development in the area in the form of a new block of flats in Mabgate, opposite the MAP building. The problem was that there would be no sound protection or mitigation; in its local plan, Leeds had not mapped music venues or nightclubs. I received thousands of emails about the planning application from as far away as New York. We had to have significant discussions with the planning department and councillors to ensure that the necessary stipulations were made for noise reduction, and to ensure that the new residents could not, in effect, close down the club night, because if that happened MAP would have to close as well, and all those young people would become NEET.
I sympathise with the Ministers dealing with this matter, because throughout the process the national planning policy framework, on a non-statutory basis, has forced local authorities to take such action. I think we should consider ways of addressing this issue through secondary legislation and the local planning process, because at present neither the Bill nor the NPPF protects venues adequately. I know that, like mine, the Minister’s constituency contains many music venues and nightclubs, and she obviously cares deeply about such venues. I hope she will reassure me that the Government will look at the agent of change principle and ensure that, both locally and nationally, the relevant protections are available so that further pressures are not put on those venues. Nightclubs in particular are already suffering as a result of the business rates increases and other recent cost pressures, and the additional costs of having to fight developers will eventually push them out of existence.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.
Zöe Franklin (Guildford) (LD)
The Liberal Democrats welcome the Government’s decision not to insist on their disagreement with Lords amendment 2, which proposes the inclusion of rural affairs in the list of competences for strategic authorities.
Sarah Gibson (Chippenham) (LD)
Too often, rural communities such as mine in Wiltshire have been overlooked by successive Governments and treated as an afterthought rather than as places with distinct needs, challenges and enormous potential. Decisions are far too often made on urban assumptions, leaving rural areas struggling with weak transport and fewer services. Does my hon. Friend agree that by embedding rural affairs at the heart of strategic authorities, the Lords amendment will ensure that rural communities are no longer overlooked or left behind?
Zöe Franklin
My hon. Friend is right. We have fought for the amendment consistently because rural communities are indeed overlooked too often, and it would put them at the heart of the Bill.
As I was saying, we support Government amendment (a) to Lords amendment 2, which adds coastal communities to the list of strategic competences, so I am grateful to the Secretary of State for tabling it. Together, the changes ensure that rural and coastal areas are explicitly recognised in the framework of strategic authorities and will be taken into account when powers, funding and responsibilities are devolved. The changes ensure that such areas are explicitly recognised in all decision making.
As my hon. Friend says, rural and coastal communities have too often felt overlooked, and their needs really need to be considered properly in the devolution process. We Liberal Democrats have long championed these communities, and many of my hon. Friends in this Chamber represent rural and coastal areas. We really welcome the constructive approach that the Government have taken in working with us, and I will continue to press for that spirit of collaboration as this Bill is implemented and, indeed, when further legislation on local government is introduced after the King’s Speech.