Covid-19 Update

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Thursday 13th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

As I set out in my response to the noble Baroness, there are a number of factors in why we believe that spring 2022 is the right time to start this inquiry. I gave them earlier. Of course the noble Lord is absolutely right that we need to tackle the worrying backlog of people needing care from the NHS, which is why we have committed billions of pounds to doing so, including £1 billion to tackle waiting lists by providing up to 1 million extra checks, scans and additional operations. We will continue to prioritise urgent and cancer care, as well as the recovery of non-urgent diagnostics and treatment so that patients receive the best healthcare as quickly as possible. That is an absolute priority.

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

The noble Baroness the Leader of the House did not respond to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Newby, about the publication of interim reports from reviews and inquiries. The Hackitt review on the Grenfell fire and the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse also produced interim reports in order to save lives and protect people. The Leader of the House has admitted that we know that the pandemic is by no means over. Surely an inquiry into the pandemic should also publish interim lessons learned to save lives and protect people. Can she make sure that that happens?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

I am sure that, when a chair takes their place, views like that will certainly be put to them and it will be up to them to decide.

Covid-19: Road Map

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd February 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord McNicol of West Kilbride) (Lab)]

I apologise for missing the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, whom I now call.

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I return to my noble friend Lord Newby’s question about self-isolation. Australia and New Zealand give a straight- forward grant, set at minimum wage, for those self-isolating and quarantining, with no means testing. Their results have been outstanding, with a very high compliance level; people do not have to choose between putting food on their tables and isolating. Given our low levels of compliance, should not the Government move to a non-means-tested grant, as a tool to succeed in lifting lockdown, as a matter of urgency?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

As I said, the £500 support payment has been extended, so parents of children who are isolating are now eligible for it. In addition to that, we are increasing, to £20 million a month, the funding available to local authorities to make discretionary payments, and that money is intended to support those who fall outside the scope of the main payment but still face hardship. As I have said, obviously we have the Budget next week, where there will be further detail in the round about the economic support we will provide going forward.

Covid-19 Update

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Thursday 7th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

Yes, I can give the noble Lord that assurance. Work is already ongoing, but he is absolutely right: it is critical.

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, this morning, the Health Service Journal has said that our already overburdened hospitals are trying to release Covid patients into care homes but that a major problem is stopping this. The National Care Forum reports that insurance for designated Covid settings is now almost impossible to get and that, without indemnity cover, they cannot take Covid patients. NHS Providers is begging the Treasury to help, as hospital beds must be freed up, but the Treasury is refusing. Can the Lord Privy Seal take this up with the Treasury as a matter of extreme urgency and help resolve this problem, not of care homes’ making, which is blocking beds in hospitals at a time of national crisis? Please will she keep me informed of progress?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

I am very happy to raise those issues with both the Department of Health and the Treasury. I am sure that my noble friend Lord Bethell in particular will be able to keep the noble Baroness updated on discussions.

Palace of Westminster: Restoration and Renewal

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Tuesday 6th February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, in the wonderful elegance of parliamentary language, we have talked much already about “patch and mend”. The restoration and renewal of the buildings and the facilities in the Palace of Westminster are vital and urgent and I believe that we need to use much franker language given the neglect of the past. I support the Motion and oppose the amendment. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, that 20 years ago I was bursar of Selwyn College, Cambridge, when we needed to renew and restore our main court that had seen little—frankly, virtually no—maintenance and progress since it was built a century before. Student rooms still had gas and electric fires and the electric cabling was on its last legs, with much of the urgent work not visible or easily accessible. Does this sound familiar?

Since Selwyn was the poorest college and had very little resource to invest over the years in the buildings, the “patch and mend” approach was clearly failing us. We knew we had to do the work in one go, no matter how disruptive it was. We were also clear that we had to ensure it did not happen again, and that maintenance must be built into the future life of the buildings. This is also true for the Palace of Westminster after this major work. What steps are being taken to ensure that detailed maintenance costs of the building, and not just the ordinary life of the building, are being built into the baseline budget and then ring-fenced? The future of this historic and important building is just too important to get wrong.

When my noble friend Lady Thomas of Winchester, who cannot be in her place today but I hope will soon be able to rejoin us, gave evidence to the Joint Committee on the Palace of Westminster, she spoke for many of us who face accessibility issues in the Palace. I am grateful that the Joint Committee has taken the evidence on accessibility from a number of people, but I seek reassurance that there really will be a step change under the full decant option. It is not a “nice to have” option, and now is the best time to do the core work. So I am pleased to see in paragraph 7 of the Motion that there will be,

“full access for people with disabilities”.

That is better than the phrases used in the Deloitte’s pictogram on page 6 of its report, in which two of the bubbles refer to, “works carried out to improve access for all” and “all new lifts to provide improved access to the majority of the Palace of Westminster”. There is a lot of scope for moving around in the middle of that.

The clerks to Parliament and the Director of Facilities, Mr Woodall, as well as ParliAble are unfailingly helpful whenever issues occur. However, most of the problems are about a failure of building and a wider, unconscious cultural attitude that can make the Palace of Westminster extremely unwelcoming to disabled parliamentarians, staff and visitors.

Core to the current problems is the way in which parliamentarians in wheelchairs do not have the same rights and experience as our able-bodied colleagues. A parliamentarian in a wheelchair cannot sit with their party or group in either the Commons or the Lords. Our Lords’ mobility Bench behind the clerks in front of the Cross Benches, has three spaces, so when five or six of us want to speak we cannot stay in our place for the rest of the debate. Worse, if the Chamber is full, we cannot even manoeuvre around after speaking to let another colleague move in. Even worse, the Commons does not even have a mobility Bench.

The design of the space in your Lordships’ House means that people sitting on the Front Bench have to get up and move aside for us to leave or come into the Chamber. Too often, they are reluctant to move. I am afraid that on one occasion, one Peer not only refused to move but insisted that I ask the Opposition Front Bench to move. I could not do so because two Peers were moving amendments from that Front Bench. As a result, I had to wait 20 minutes before I could leave the Chamber and was consequently late for my next meeting.

Wheelchair users often have to travel double the distance as most routes round the Palace have steps. To get to the River Restaurant from Peers’ Entrance one has to go along a corridor, up in a lift, travel back down, past Central Lobby to the Commons, go down in a lift and then all the way back to the Lords. No wonder our batteries do not last long. Wheelchair users have missed votes when travelling from far-flung places in the Palace, especially when both Houses are dividing at the same time because there are so few lifts accessible—that is, large enough—for wheelchair users. Members understandably follow the “take priority for a Division” rule, but they forget that we are Members too, and do not even have the option of the occasional staircase.

It is not possible to get to parts of the Commons ministerial corridors in a wheelchair. The lift behind the Speaker’s Chair in the Commons has a stone arch in front of it that is just too narrow for a standard-size wheelchair, so to access a meeting with a Minister on that corridor, one has to use the stairs. The same is true of the stone archway in Central Lobby leading to the Justice Ministers corridor. Can the Leader of the House confirm that every archway and lift will be fully accessible to those in wheelchairs? I know that some of this is rhetorical, but I am making the point that we say, “accessible to all”. There are no self-opening or closing doors, meaning that at the beginning of the day, disabled people have to face heavy, closed doors which are a real barrier.

The brilliant Changing Places toilet just off Central Lobby is, sadly, one of a kind. Other disabled toilets are too small, cluttered with bins, and the red alarm cords are often in the wrong place and tied up, which makes their use impossible. Will they be upgraded to meet current public building standards? There are a number of ramps in the building already, but they are too steep for wheelchairs—oh, the irony of seeing a ramp painted with a “No Wheelchair” sign. I hope that that will no longer be a problem.

Finally, there is only one space in the whole of the Commons Public Gallery for a wheelchair. There are no wheelchair spaces available for Peers and, unlike in the Lords, it is not permitted for a wheelchair Peer to sit below Bar in the Commons. The final irony is that of MPs standing below Bar in the Lords, preventing a wheelchair user seeing what is going on in her own Chamber. It does not help the feeling that disabled Members just are not welcome.

I therefore look forward to “more accessible for all”, but it is a dangerous starting point. If the newly-restored Palace is not truly accessible for people with disabilities and special needs, it will have failed.

Care: Costs Cap

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Monday 14th September 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

My Lords,—

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords—

[The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Stowell of Beeston)]

My Lords, we have not heard from the Liberal Democrats. It is their turn.

[Baroness Brinton]

My Lords, as questioners have illustrated to your Lordships’ House, we face a perfect storm with health and social care. There was cross-party agreement in advance of the 2010 election that the cap was vital. We have delayed discharges and local authorities facing a real crisis. Will the Government take action in the next few weeks to remedy this problem, of which the cap is an important part?

[Baroness Chisholm of Owlpen]

As I said, means-tested financial support remains available for those who cannot afford to pay for care to meet their eligible needs, but the introduction of the cap on care costs system will be the biggest reform to how care is paid for since 1948 and we must ensure that the new system works from day one. Local authorities and partners have consistently warned us of the risks of implementing this too quickly. We will therefore not be complacent and will work hard to make sure that there is additional time to ensure that everyone is ready to introduce the new system and that people can understand what it will mean for them.

Care Sector: Apprenticeships

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Monday 6th July 2015 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Courtown]

My Lords, the noble Baroness asked a number of questions. She asked about a career pathway for young people going into the sector. If we look at the apprenticeship starts by sector, and particularly at the Trailblazer system of industry-designed apprenticeships for getting people into them, there is one for nursing, another for adult care, another for healthcare and another for early years. There have also been in excess of 250,000 new apprenticeship starts in the care sector between 2010-11 and 2013-14. Apprenticeships are one route for those who want to progress into a satisfying career within the care sector.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, the Christie report points out that 20% of nursing students drop out of their university courses, which is a waste of their careers and of public money. Can the Minister say what the Government are planning to do to reduce this dropout rate as a matter of urgency? To have a shortage is not good enough, but to waste 20% of those who enrol in university courses is a disgrace.

[The Earl of Courtown]

The noble Baroness is quite right about people leaving these courses after they have been accepted on them. Ministers in various departments are discussing this issue.

House of Lords: Reform

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd June 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton]

My Lords, yesterday my noble friend Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon made arguments for legitimacy through democratic elections. I believe his arguments are unanswerable and I wish to echo the sentiment. A noble Lord commented afterwards that all Liberal Democrat candidates would write down his speech and deliver it in hustings over the next few years. There have also been comments that nobody outside this House is interested in possible reform.

When the coalition document was published last year, I had not just telephone calls but an irate voter in Watford, where I had stood for Parliament, knocking on the door to say that the coalition document was not strong enough on reform of the House of Lords. I hasten to point out that this was not a Liberal Democrat member but a member of the public who had heard me espousing the reasons that this Chamber should become fully elected at various hustings; it also came up during questions at those hustings. For some people—more than we suspect, I think—reform is an important issue.

I wish to make clear that my personal view is that I support 100 per cent elected, and I agree with the sentiments expressed earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Stamford. However, I am more of a pragmatist than him and suspect that the draft Bill’s proposal of 80 per cent will move us in the right direction while retaining the expertise of the Cross-Benchers. I will come back to that in a minute.

The noble Lord, Lord Davies of Stamford, also referred to the issue of constituencies. It is important to recognise that with any list system on a regional basis, the constituency work of MEPs is very different from the constituency work of MPs in the other place. It is simply the nature of the geography: if you are a Member for a large region you will not have the close contact that you do with constituents in a smaller constituency.

[Lord Davies of Stamford]

Does the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, agree that the difference is that MEPs are elected to handle issues falling under the jurisdiction of the EU? In the case of the Lords and the Commons—or in the future, elected Lords and the Commons—the jurisdiction will be the same, and the issues will be the same. Therefore, there would be the conflict which I drew attention to.

[Baroness Brinton]

The point I am trying to make is that it is not purely about jurisdiction, it is about the practical application of having a constituency of 5 million people as opposed to 75,000.

I turn now to issues of diversity in a future House that is either partially or wholly elected. In an elected House, we need to ensure that recommendations from the Speaker’s Conference to improve the diversity of the other place are taken into account by the scrutiny committee over the next two years. In our present format we do not represent the country in all its diversity. Some of the appointments in recent years have attempted to deal with that, but, partly because there is no retirement, we still do not reflect the country that we represent.

There is also an issue about the geographical diversity that is needed. If we looked at where most Peers come from, I suspect that we would find a heavy southern bias. I was speaking with colleagues in the north-east the other day who feel that they do not have access to many Peers; they have some, but not the same as those who live among the large concentration in London and the south-east.

As for the conventions governing the relationship between the two Houses, we all agree that those are not absolute. I do not take the view that they will stand still, and my noble friend the Leader of the House must have been right yesterday when he said that the conventions will evolve and that the relationships between the two Houses may change. However, that is nothing new. Conventions have evolved over the years and the relationship between the Houses changes with time.

This House is much more muscular than it was a few decades ago. For example, in the decade up to 2000 the Government were defeated 155 times; in the decade up to 2010 the Government were defeated 422 times—nearly a threefold increase. Granted, cause and effect cannot be proved. It may be that the change in government in 1997 was influential and the reforms which saw the departure of the majority of the hereditary Peers should be noted.

However, we have not seen this House attempting to depart from any of the conventions since then. Furthermore, Clause 2(3) of the draft Bill makes it clear that the conventions governing the relationship between the two Houses are to remain unaffected, and there is no reason to suppose that that aim will not be achieved. However, if a future Parliament were of the view that the conventions needed to be explicitly codified to protect their efficacy, legislation could be brought forward to bring that about, as was proposed in the 2005 Labour manifesto.

I am concerned that a House of 300 could deal adequately with the workload of the House, particularly if there were to remain some who are not full-time politicians. I suspect that many in this House, and the public at large, regard the presence of some who are not full-time as one of the strengths of this House. The pride that is rightly taken in the House’s expertise derives largely from having here many who are active in other spheres, and I am not sure that it is intended that we should sit on many more days than we currently do.

Pride in the expertise of the Members of this House does not derive solely from the presence of Cross-Benchers, much as I respect their expertise. It is unfair to assert as a generality—and I have heard it said—that those who are unelected or without party affiliation hold a monopoly on expertise. A glance around this Chamber certainly proves that wrong.

As for the system of election, as a committed supporter of STV for parliamentary elections I nevertheless feel that—in the larger constituencies that will be appropriate for proportional elections to this House of, say, 80 to 120 new Members across the country at each election—an open list system has much to commend it. In particular, we would be far more likely to achieve a membership that is more diverse, as I mentioned earlier, and more representative of Britain as a whole with an open list system than we might with STV. That is why we should consider that system for elections. However, whatever the system of election, a democratically legitimate upper House, as part of a democratic Parliament of the United Kingdom, is a goal that we should pursue and achieve.