International Women’s Day
Baroness Thornton Excerpts(1 month, 3 weeks ago)
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Baroness Thornton (Lab)
My Lords, like other noble Lords, I always find it slightly strange starting my International Women’s Day speech each year with those words. Perhaps one day we will find a gender-neutral expression with which to address each other, perhaps after we stop being a House of Lords and become something else—but that is a discussion for another day.
We have had a comprehensive and varied debate, as ever, with some outstanding contributions. I loved the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, because she was one of my feminist heroes—and still is—and has lost none of her passion. It was absolutely wonderful. I also loved the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Casey. I welcomed her maiden speech and, even though I had warning of what she intended to do in addressing the grave matter of female homicide, like others I was indeed moved to tears, as I was by the reading out of that sad list by my noble friend Lady Anderson.
I thank the Library and many organisations that have sent briefings to our deliberations. I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Vere, for her opening remarks, which were her usual very optimistic ones on the state of the world. It was a very good way to start the debate, even if we may not always agree about the accuracy of some of those things.
I particularly thank my noble friend Lady Gale for opening the debate from these Benches. I believe that she has spoken in pretty much every single debate in your Lordships’ House on International Women’s Day, and her speeches are always very practical—about practical action that needs to be taken for women’s equality, and about what is happening in Wales. It is also worth noting that, as the first woman to be general secretary of the Welsh Labour Party, she is responsible partly for the equality of representation of women in public life in Wales.
I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Amos, Lady Anderson, Lady Armstrong, Lady Chakrabarti, Lady Donaghy, Lady Goudie, Lady Merron and Lady O’Grady, and two Lady Taylors—the noble Baronesses, Lady Taylor of Bolton and Lady Taylor of Stevenage—for their contributions: a formidable set of Labour women if ever there was, whose presence and sisterly support always fills me with joy. Of course, I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Davies, and the noble Viscount, Lord Stansgate, and other noble Lords and men who have made contributions to International Women’s Day because, as the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, said, without the support of men in our lives, the struggle is that much harder.
The timing of this debate coincides with the publication overnight of Sexism in the City, the latest report of a House of Commons Select Committee. It is worth telling one of the stories that was given to it. It is of a City executive, called Selena for these purposes. When she
“logged on for a Teams call with five senior male colleagues in spring 2021, she was gobsmacked.
She had spent weeks warning bosses that the London-based investment firm risked falling foul of European regulations. She had gathered data and presented supporting evidence, but was repeatedly brushed off. ‘Nobody wanted to listen,’ she said.
So her jaw dropped that afternoon when a male colleague raised the issue and immediately gained support from the same boss who had ignored her. ‘I had to stop the meeting,’ she recalls. ‘I said: “Why does it take a white, middle-aged man to deliver the exact same message that I’ve been delivering over the last few weeks?’”
Noble Lords will not be surprised to learn that:
“When her comments were dismissed, and described as ‘over the top’, it was the final straw. ‘The realisation was it doesn’t matter how hard I work, how talented, how committed I am. They will never ever recognise me’.
Prompted in part by the sexual harassment allegations against hedge fund boss Crispin Odey, the inquiry is meant to determine whether meaningful progress had been made since the committee’s last review in 2018. But the shocking stories recently shared with MPs for its investigation—which ranged from office bullying to allegations as serious as rape—suggest the post-#MeToo focus on diversity and inclusion has failed to eradicate widespread misogyny”
in the City of London.
The report was particularly concerned to hear of the widespread misuse of non-disclosure agreements—NDAs—which have the effect of silencing the victim of harassment and forcing them out of an organisation, while protecting perpetrators and leaving them free to continue their careers and go on to abuse others.
I would welcome the Minister’s comments on that report because it is very reasoned but this is, of course, a first-world problem—although it is as potent a discrimination as any that we have heard about today. From the City of London to the fields of Cambodia, the mountains of Tasmania, the streets of Cape Town and the studios of Hollywood and Bollywood, women face misogyny and violence. As many noble Lords have said today, violence against women and girls is an equalities issue. It prevents women being free and living their lives as they wish to live them.
Over the years, we have all worked hard—and are still doing so—to ensure equal educational opportunities for girls and in taking extra steps to encourage women to go into sectors such as STEM, wherever their talents fit them and whatever they may want to do. We are still fighting for equal pay; there are still 41 years to go, it looks like, but much has improved in terms of pay and prospects for women. Career things are on the up. However, whoever the woman and whatever her career, if she is raped or becomes a victim of domestic abuse, she will be seriously affected, damaged and unable to thrive fully—sometimes for a very long time. Sometimes, these male crimes against women are life-changing and women are just stopped from thriving, full stop. Violence against women and girls is a barrier to women’s drive for equality. No matter how hard one has worked to make good use of one’s opportunities, being a victim of male violence will be a crippling setback.
Some 910,000 domestic abuse cases were recorded by police in 2022—that is probably a quarter or a fifth of the women who suffered it—and 68,000 rapes were recorded; again, that is perhaps one-fifth or less of the women who suffer it and report it. This is a wide-ranging, far-reaching block on women living a life of equality with men. Labour’s mission is to cut violence against women and girls by half, which we think will be a powerful boost to women’s economic equality by freeing more of them from the pain, anguish and trauma of having been a victim of these horribly intimate and undermining crimes. Rape and violence against women are also used often in the conduct of warfare, a most recent example being 7 October and Hamas, which puts the debate about economic inclusion into a very different perspective.
Across the world, women hold less economic power than men, whether it is wages, assets or the disproportionate amount of unpaid care that they take responsibility for; of course, as my noble friend Lord Davies explained to us, that has a clear impact on women’s ability to take on paid, good-quality work and have a sustainable pension later on in life. Clearly, without reproductive work, cooking, cleaning and taking care of children and others, the economy would stall. According to the TUC, more than 1.46 million women are unable to work alongside their family commitments, compared with around 230,000 men; of course, as many noble Lords have said, that has an impact on the type and quality of employment available to women.
Then there are those women whose economic exclusion oftens form an inseparable part of a wider system of denial of human rights. I mention the report from Amnesty International that we received as part of our preparation for this debate. Its recent investigation into the frightening realities of daily life for women and girls in Iran was particularly marked; the same could be said for women and girls in Afghanistan. In Iran, the investigation gathered the testimonies of women and girls who are targeted solely for exercising their rights to bodily autonomy and freedom of expression. Many of them have been targeted economically through, for example, arbitrary car confiscations, fines and denial of access to employment.
We on these Benches are proud of Labour’s record on equality, both nationally and internationally, with the Equal Pay Act, maternity rights and the Equality Act 2010—to name just one or two. Labour has provided a legal and moral foundation for the equality and human rights of this generation and the generations to come.
We, of course, have a plan for if we are fortunate enough to be in government. We will support women at work. We will introduce the right to flexible working from day one. We will modernise equal pay laws to give women the right to know what their male counterparts earn. We will make it illegal to make a new mother redundant, from the notification of their pregnancy until six months after their return to work. We will review the failing system of shared parental leave. We will require large employers to publish menopause action plans. We will ensure that outsourced workers are included in the gender pay gap and pay ratio reporting. We will require employers to create and maintain workplaces free from harassment, including by third parties.
As has been mentioned, on the “Today” programme this morning “Thought for the Day” asked the question: why is there an International Women’s Day and why would we embrace that here in this country? Of course, it is because the discrimination that women have endured over millennia, everywhere in the world, the oppression of various forms of state and organised religion used to suppress women, and the need to create a better world for all of our daughters and granddaughters are common to all women everywhere.
That is why this is a powerful day; a moment to celebrate ourselves and our achievements and to support those women everywhere who need our solidarity and support. I thank all noble Lords for what I thought was a fantastic range of contributions. I believe that we have done honour to this International Women’s Day in a debate filled with passion and determination.
Budget Statement
Baroness Thornton Excerpts(9 years, 1 month ago)
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Baroness Thornton (Lab)
My Lords, to justify his spending priorities, the Chancellor quipped:
“The sun is starting to shine and we are fixing the roof”.—[Official Report, Commons, 18/3/15; col. 769.]
This blinkered perspective deliberately ignores the growing crisis of underinvestment in the social infrastructure on which the economy rests. The 60-minute Statement made no mention of vital areas such as childcare, social care, education, the disabled and health. Even if one accepts that a bit of roof repair is going on, can it make sense to fixate on the roof while causing the social foundation to crumble?
What has life been like for the last five years under this coalition Government if you are a woman with children on a low or modest income or you are disabled? As my noble friend Lord McFall said, quite rightly, the success of any economic strategy is measured in its effect on people and their lives. So how have disabled people fared?
After many years of progress under both Tory and Labour Governments, with the DDA, Making Rights a Reality for Disabled People and the signing of the United Nations convention under a Labour Government, now, under this Tory-led coalition it feels as though we have gone back to the dark ages. Disabled people have been—I do not think it is an exaggeration to say this—vilified, while the support that they rely on has been slashed without a care for the long-term or human consequences. According to campaigners, disabled people have been hit nine times harder than non-disabled people by austerity cuts. Such support as has remained in place is increasingly confined to the most severely disabled. Surely, such an approach is simply counterproductive.
Those seeking work have faced reduced employment support. Thousands of disabled people have been affected by welfare changes. Councils have experienced significant budget reductions and have had to reduce access to social care for disabled people and their families as a result. Two-thirds of those hit by the hated bedroom tax are disabled. That is 440,000 people. There is no automatic exemption for disabled people, except for those with an overnight carer. We are proud that when Rachel Reeves gets to the DWP she will scrap the bedroom tax, before she goes on maternity leave. Noble Lords know that Labour is a modern party.
This Government’s policies have led to greater isolation, reduced social participation, worse health outcomes and less chance of disabled people being able to participate economically. Yet even as disabled people are taking the hit, every day there is a drip-drip story in the media, which repeatedly portrays them as scroungers, skivers and frauds. On these Benches, we have said clearly that it is wrong, cruel and shameful. It underlies unacceptable levels of hate crime against disabled people and we need to call time on it. The result of this general election will do just that.
Turning to how women have fared over the last three years of George Osborne and his Lib Dem cohorts, everyone is aware that David Cameron and this Government have a problem with women. Even so, it is amazing that they have hit women and their families hardest with their austerity programme. Research from the House of Commons has found that £22 billion out of the £26 billion—85%—raised over this Parliament from tax and benefit changes has come from women’s pockets. According to the IFS, families with children have been hit hardest by all of David Cameron’s choices, which is a clear betrayal of his promise to lead the most family-friendly Government ever.
Forty-four years after the Equal Pay Act was passed, women still earn just 81p for every £1 earned by a man. The Chancellor said that the gender pay gap is falling, but this is mostly due to a greater fall in men’s wages than women’s. Self-employed wage statistics are not included in this figure, so there is still cause for great concern. Progress on closing the gender pay gap slowed under this Government. While I welcome the recent turnabout on equal pay transparency, we have to ask why we have waited so long. Let us look at actions and not words: even David Cameron thinks that it is acceptable to pay one of his own Cabinet Ministers less than her male predecessor—namely, our Leader in your Lordships’ House being paid over £22,000 a year less than her predecessor.
I agree with my noble friend Lady Smith that the story of this recovery has been one of low-waged, insecure, temporary work, which has hit women particularly hard. More than one-quarter of all working women are now on low pay and make up the majority of workers on zero hours contracts. Yet the Government have refused to back our plans to ban exploitative zero hours contracts, to provide incentives to employers to pay living wages and to raise the minimum wage to £8 an hour. A Labour Government will do those things. More women are moving into part-time work than ever before and more young women are being left behind under this Government. Half a million young women aged between 18 and 24 are not in education, work or training, which is higher than when Labour left office.
While this Government boast about the apprenticeships they have created, they are prepared to tolerate a stark gender divide within apprenticeships, with women overwhelmingly in the lowest paid occupations. For example, 58,000 women took up apprenticeships in health and social care, and 25,000 went into children’s care, but only 400 took a position in engineering. A truly woman-friendly Government would recognise this gender segregation as a problem and would tackle it.
Key to a woman being able to work, if she is a mother, is childcare. Childcare costs have soared under this Government, with the price of a nursery place up 30% since 2010. There are 720 fewer Sure Start centres than in 2010 and the number of registered childcare places has fallen by more than 40,000. What will Labour do when it is in government? We will support families to better balance work and childcare. We will extend free childcare for the three and four year-old children of working parents to 25 hours to support more parents back to work. That will be on top of tax-free childcare. We will fund that by increasing the bank levy. We will guarantee access to wraparound childcare, such as breakfast clubs and after-school clubs. We will support both parents to share in those important first weeks with their newborn baby by doubling paternity leave to four weeks paid at the minimum wage. We will pay for this in the savings we will make from more women returning to work because of the 10-hour extra free childcare to which they will be entitled.
The Chancellor claimed in his Budget speech that the Government had been a success for women, with the smallest pay gap and the largest number of women at work in our history. These are incidental successes. There are more women at work than in our history because there are more women, not because the Government have created more jobs. The Government have shown little sign of giving any specific attention to women in the economy even though they have been under particular strain over the past five years.
For one of the most potent examples of how this Government’s lack of awareness of the impact of their policy on women you only have to look at what has happened to women’s refuges. Services and networks protecting women against domestic violence are under terrible strain and the most vulnerable women are being set back probably about 40 years. I have already mentioned the impact of cuts on women seeking refuge from domestic violence in places such as Chester and Gloucester. It is a disgrace and it is serious.
The current austerity agenda and programme of deep spending cuts has left women facing a triple jeopardy—cuts to jobs, benefits and essential services—locking them into poverty. Women have fared extremely badly under the Government’s austerity programme. This is absolutely not a price worth paying.
Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill
Baroness Thornton Excerpts(9 years, 1 month ago)
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Baroness Thornton
“Equal pay: transparency
(1) The Secretary of State must, as soon as possible, and no later than 12 months after the passing of this Act, make regulations under section 78 of the Equality Act 2010 (gender pay gap information) for the purpose of requiring companies to publish information showing whether there are differences in the pay of male and female employees.
(2) The Secretary of State may consult such persons as the Secretary of State thinks appropriate on the details of such regulations prior to publication.”
Baroness Thornton (Lab)
My Lords, I start by thanking all supporters who have put their names to the amendment—the noble Lord, Lord Low, and my noble friends Lady Prosser and Lord Young—and also those who failed to put their names to it, because there were many others who wished to offer their support and were keen to support the purpose of the amendment.
I thank the Minister for the two meetings that we had to discuss the amendment and the issues it raises. I welcome the amendments that she has put to my amendment and congratulate her on doing so. I inform the House from the outset that as long as the Minister intends to accept my amendment, as amended by her, the proposers of the amendment are happy to accept her amendments.
I thank my colleague Gloria De Piero MP for her leadership in this recent campaign. I also thank the TUC and Unite the union for their briefing and continuous commitment over many years and pay tribute to Frances O’Grady and many women trade unionists who have worked without cease and done a huge amount to support women in the workplace against discrimination. I also thank Grazia magazine for its inspiring campaign and petition, reflecting always what its readers have had to say about equal pay and the injustices that they have experienced. Finally, I thank the unsung heroine Nicola Jayawickreme in our Labour Party office here who had the idea that the Bill might lend itself to bringing forward this amendment. She has done a great job.
One of the strengths of this House is that we can and do seize the moment on issues. I suggest that this is one of those times. We were wise to put the powers on transparency in Section 78 of the Equality Act 2010 and I hope that we will now be wise to enact those powers. It is 46 years since the machinists walked out of Dagenham’s Ford plant in protest over the pay divide which prompted the Equal Pay Act. Overall, women in the UK are still earning just 81p to every pound that men earn. According to the new figures based on the Office for National Statistics annual survey of hours and incomes, the pay gap between men and women in their twenties has almost doubled since 2010, from 2.6% to 5%, and it has also increased for women over 50.
We are falling down the international scales on equal pay. Women across the world still earn only 77% of the amount that men earn, a figure that has improved by only three percentage points in the past 20 years, according to the United Nations International Labour Organization report this week. Frankly, I do not think we can wait another 40 years to get equal pay.
The most exciting moment for me in the recent equal pay campaign was meeting the Dagenham women last December. They were right to be astonished and dismayed that we still do not have equal pay. At the time, I wished we had better news for them. Perhaps after today’s business we can say that we are absolutely on our way to delivering the equal pay that they fought for all those years ago.
It is without doubt true that under this Government some progress has been made by exhortation and encouragement, but the truth is that it is not nearly enough when one considers that, despite this effort, a mere five companies actually publish their gender pay scales: PricewaterhouseCoopers, for example, is one of them. The company says that it has had only a positive impact, because it is tangible proof that it is a fair employer. Why would our large employers not wish to embrace such a programme and have such a reputation with their employees?
Amendment 58 calls for the enactment of Section 78 of the Equality Act within a year. Last week, my noble friend Lady King mentioned some of the examples that Grazia has so usefully collected from its readers. Shannon, aged 25, works in advertising and felt too insecure in her job to ask for a pay rise, despite knowing that her male counterpart was earning more than she was. To make matters worse, for an end-of-year bonus he was given £2,000 in cash while she received a £100 Liberty voucher. Erin, 30, is a lawyer who was asked to take a pay cut to avoid redundancy, only to find that none of her male colleagues had been asked to do the same. Amanda, who works in the media, was stunned when two of her male colleagues drunkenly boasted about their salaries as she realised both were being paid an average of £10,000 a year more, despite having the same experience as her.
Last autumn, an overwhelming majority of 258 MPs voted yes to the implementation of Section 78 of the 2010 Equality Act, so we know that there is support for this in the Commons.
We do not believe that this new clause will place a disproportionate burden on British business. Of the 4.9 million private sector employers in 2013, 7,000 employ more than 250 staff and will be affected by this legislation. These are data that these companies already routinely collect and which they would publish with their annual reports. That will make a difference to women, because close to 50% of the employees in the private sector in Britain work in these large firms.
What of the EHRC? During the passage of the Equality Act 2010, it said in relation to Section 78 that if a voluntary regime,
“is achievable, then there would be no need for the clause to be brought into play”.
It made it clear that over time it would,
“be looking for an increase in the proportion of employers measuring and sharing information on the differences between men’s and women’s pay”.
Indeed, during that time the EHRC has supported the Government’s Think, Act, Report initiative to encourage companies to improve gender equality on a voluntary basis. However, can the Minister confirm that only 270 employers are involved in the Think, Act, Report initiative, compared with 7,000 companies with more than 250 employees in the United Kingdom? Indeed, of those, only five have signed up to publish their gender pay gaps. This suggests that a voluntary approach on its own will not deliver the transparency needed to achieve a change in companies’ behaviour. This is what the EHRC says:
“The persistence and extent of the pay differences between women and men suggest that considerably more needs to be done to reduce the gender pay gap. In light of the low impact of voluntary gender pay reporting and the recent increase in the size of the gender pay gap, the Commission believes that the time is right for implementing section 78 of the Equality Act through this New Clause. By having to publish information about their gender pay gaps, companies will be encouraged to address those gaps in order to demonstrate that they are complying with equal pay legislation and to attract and retain talented women in their workforces”.
Closing the gender pay gap is a priority for all political parties—possibly with the exception of UKIP, but who knows—so I think we need to get on with it. I beg to move.
Amendment 58ZZA (to Amendment 58)
Autumn Statement
Baroness Thornton Excerpts(10 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Davies of Oldham (Lab)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to address the issues raised in the Autumn Statement in our usual atmosphere of calmness and courtesy—a rather sharp contrast with the wall of noise that greeted my counterpart, the shadow Chancellor, in the other place. This is an occasion for asking questions so I am sure that I am not going to be able to generate such excitement on the government Benches, but I hope that the Minister will answer my questions.
The Chancellor did not mention the concept of productivity, made no acknowledgment of the weakness of our balance of payments position in recent years despite the significant devaluation of the currency that we have experienced, and showed no real appreciation of the fact that real wages are still falling, among those who are employed. It is therefore proper to ask the Minister whether he is assured that the much vaunted growth figures quoted in the Statement are not based upon a somewhat insubstantial platform. Do these figures also not reflect a bounce back from a very low base indeed? The House will appreciate that even if growth reaches the figures that the Chancellor quoted, with his customary optimism, after three years of this economy flatlining, growth by 2015 will be only half the growth that in 2010 the Chancellor indicated to the nation that he hoped to achieve by the time that this Parliament had concluded.
The Minister who will respond to this Statement speaks and acts significantly on the issues of infrastructure in the economy. Will he comment on the fact that infrastructure output has fallen by 15% since 2010, and that so much which is promised remains unfulfilled? In 2010 the Chancellor also said that he was setting out to balance the books by 2015. It is clear that in 2015 we shall still have a deficit of £80 billion. That reflects the amount of borrowing that he had to do in the lean, flatlining years when no growth occurred. Will the Government persist in seeking to deny that we are in the middle of an acute cost of living crisis?
The Government are of course so wedded to the free market that they are quite unable to recognise the challenge presented by the Opposition on energy prices. After all, their belief in the market means that they cannot even recognise a standard textbook analysis of the creation of cartels, which is what the six main energy companies represent, and how that leads to excess profits. It is noticeable that the Government’s gesture in attempting to moderate the level of energy prices during this winter does not cost the cartel anything at all. It is the taxpayer who is going to meet the deficit that will occur due to the companies charging quite so much, and prices will still rise, going up by £70 in this period. For an awful lot of people in the country, £70 is a very significant sum for fuel. After all, we pay £100 to pensioners in the winter fuel allowance because we recognise the acute need that pensioners have to keep their homes warm. However, we expect all the rest of the population, whatever their incomes, to withstand an increased charge of £70.
The Government shy away from any interference with the market. However, I am a fair man and therefore the House would expect me to acknowledge those occasions when the Government do interfere—for example, the gesture with regard to payday loans, but that is a straight reflection of the pressure that had been generated from my party and in this House on the issue, and of course the Government’s response has been woefully inadequate.
The crucial thing I want the Minister to address is the constant failure of wages to match prices, which is making working people poorer. It may be that the Minister is not that familiar with those people who find themselves poor at present. He is likely to meet an awful lot of people—his friends certainly have many associates among the banks—in the banking fraternity, at the highest levels, who are of course not feeling the pinch at all. Hedge funds, too, are not noticeably short of returns. That is to say nothing of the growth of high salaries right throughout British commerce and industry, while wage levels stay stagnant. It is only accidental that some of those groups have a profound interest in sustaining and supporting the Conservative Party both between elections and at election time. We are not seeking to be too controversial today so the Government need not comment on that particular point, but I want the Minister to respond on the issue of falling wages.
It is quite clear that the Government are committed to a position. The Chancellor waxed with some strength over the fact that there will be a cap on welfare and very severe constraints on public expenditure, and gave the briefest outline of what that would mean. We all know what it means: five more long and hard years. We also know who is going to bear the costs of those five long and hard years—those who have done it since the coalition came into office in 2010.
The other obvious question is: if the Government are so wedded to free markets, do they consider that the free market worked well in the banking crisis of 2007-08? That was not a failure of anything except the free market. I notice some excitement on the government Bench, because they have worked out that in 2007-08 Labour was in power. That is certainly so, but we were not in power when the Big Bang freed up the City to create the successive market mechanism, and whenever there were suggestions of anything to do with regulation we know on which side the Conservative Opposition were. Of course, they have shown themselves to be exactly the same in the energy debate.
Will the Minister confirm that the Chancellor envisages—if, by some mischance, this Government, or a Conservative version of them, were retained in office—aiming for the size of the state in public expenditure to go back to the levels of 1948? To contemplate that in a modern society merely demonstrates that ideology dictates this Government’s economic policies, not the welfare of the nation.
Economy: Women’s Incomes
Baroness Thornton Excerpts(10 years, 5 months ago)
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Baroness Thornton
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they have carried out an economic impact assessment of the effects on women’s incomes and standard of living of their economic policy since May 2010.
Lord Newby (LD)
My Lords, departments take full account of the impact of their policies on women. In spending round 2013, the Government published an analysis of how their decisions impacted on different groups, including by gender. This was a first for any UK Government. The economy is growing, the deficit is falling and jobs are being created. The only sustainable way to raise living standards for both men and women is to stick to our current economic plans.
Baroness Thornton (Lab)
I thank the noble Lord for that Answer. I have to say that it does not coincide with the information that I have, which was produced by the House of Commons Library. Its analysis tells us that, of the £14.4 billion George Osborne has raised through additional net direct tax and benefit changes, about £11.4 billion—79%—is coming from women. This includes low-paid new mums, who have lost nearly £3,000 in support during their pregnancy and their baby’s first year; couples with children, who have lost 9.7% of their disposable income; and single mothers, who have lost the most—15.6%? Does the noble Lord think that that is fair, and how does it reflect, “We are all in this together”?
Lord Newby
My Lords, I think that those figures are in some respects significantly misleading. For example, 98% of all child benefit goes to women, but it is the whole household that benefits. The single biggest improvement in the position of women under this Government has come from the fact that there are 450,000 women now in work who were not in work in 2010. This is as a result of the Government’s economic policies, which have kept interest rates down so that we have not seen the high unemployment peak that we had in the previous recession.
Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill
Baroness Thornton Excerpts(10 years, 5 months ago)
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Baroness Thornton
“( ) Where a court makes a sexual harm prevention order in relation to a “child” as defined in section 103B(1), the court must have regard to safeguards in place to ensure the child receives the support he or she needs, including an assessment of their emotional, welfare and behavioural needs, therapeutic or educational support.”
Baroness Thornton (Lab)
My Lords, the first thing I need to say is happy birthday to the Minister. I am sure noble Lords will agree with me in wishing him all the very best. I am not sure that this is the best way I would choose to spend my birthday.
As I said at Second Reading, we on these Benches generally support the sexual harm prevention orders and the sexual risk orders as set out in Part 9 of the Bill. The two new orders will replace existing powers, and the threshold for risk will be lowered to cover any case of sexual harm, not just cases of serious sexual harm. These orders seek to improve the protection of vulnerable children at risk of sexual harm. On Report in the Commons, the Minister, Damian Green, provided details of the two new orders. He explained:
“The sexual harm prevention order may prohibit the person from doing anything described in it, including preventing travel overseas. Any prohibition must be necessary for protecting the public in the UK from sexual harm or, in relation to foreign travel, protecting children or vulnerable adults from sexual harm. It lasts a minimum of five years and has no maximum duration, with the exception of any foreign travel restrictions which, if applicable, lasts for a maximum of five years but can be renewed”.
The sexual risk order,
“will be available for those who have not been convicted of an offence but who none the less pose a risk of sexual harm to the public. It may be made by the magistrates court on application by the police or the new National Crime Agency where an individual has done an act of a sexual nature and poses a risk of harm to the public in the UK or adults or vulnerable children overseas”.
Of course, any prohibition in the sexual risk order must be necessary for protecting the public in the UK from sexual harm or for protecting vulnerable adults abroad. Such an order, as I have described it, will last for a minimum of two years. The police are very keen on these orders as their view is that they do not have the right measures at their disposal to intervene to prevent harm to children. We agree with them.
It is also welcome that these orders simplify the current system. In relation to non-conviction behaviour, they reduce the number of acts of harm required for an order to be used from two to one, which means that they can be obtained more easily. Extending the scope of sexual behaviour covered by the orders and lowering the threshold from serious sexual harm will also increase their use. This will help tackle behaviour that poses a risk of sexual abuse to children but which has not yet translated into a criminal offence.
In the Commons, my honourable friend Ann Coffey MP noted:
“The risk of sexual harm orders, which the new sexual risk orders would replace, can be given only to offenders aged 18 and over”.
She asked the Minister:
“Will the new sexual harm prevention orders also only apply to offenders over 18? If they will apply to offenders under 18, what consideration has he given to introducing accompanying rehabilitative provisions for child sex offenders?”.
That is at the heart of what this probing amendment is about. At the time, the Minister, Mr Green, said:
“The two new orders will apply to both over-18s and under-18s”.
He also clarified the situation in relation to the sex offenders register:
“In line with the old order, the new sexual harm prevention order will make the offender subject to the notification requirements for registered sex offenders—it will put them on the sex offenders register. For both new orders, in line with the existing position, breach is a criminal offence punishable by a maximum of five years’ imprisonment. Conviction for a breach of a sexual risk order would also make that individual subject to the sex offender notification requirements”.—[Official Report, Commons, 14/10/13; cols. 472-75.]
Extending the ability to use these orders to protect children under 18, including 16 and 17 year-olds, recognises that older children are still vulnerable and can be subject to child sexual exploitation and abuse. The inclusion of vulnerable adults to the SHPO and SRO is welcome. We know that young adults with learning difficulties or special educational needs are targeted by individuals looking to exploit them.
The amendment seeks to probe how the orders will work for young people under 18 subject to the orders and how they are supported. Some young people who are subject to the orders may also have been victims of sexual exploitation, or become involved as a means of self-preservation, as was the case for a young person quoted in one of the briefs that I received. We are seeking safeguards from the Government for young people under 18 who are subject to the orders, to ensure that they receive the support that they need,
“including an assessment of their emotional, welfare and behavioural needs, therapeutic or educational support”.
We are concerned that a breach of the child SHPO without conviction or the SRO can result in five years’ imprisonment when a child has not actually committed a criminal offence. We know that custody may not be the most effective way to tackle children’s criminal behaviour, and I am sure that we all agree that custody for under-18s should only be used as a very last resort in the most serious and violent offences, so we must question whether this is appropriate where children have not been convicted of an offence. We are very concerned about the use of custodial sentences for under-18s subject to SROs or SHPOs obtained without conviction. That is why we have put forward this amendment.
What measures do the Government propose for under-18s subject to these orders? Will the Government consider prescribing the use of therapeutic support and/or education and an assessment of needs in guidance when the orders are applied to under-18s? Will the Government review and evaluate the effectiveness of the orders, such as through rates of reoffending and the effectiveness of any assessment of needs, when they are applied to under-18s? It is important that we question the detail of how this will work for under-18s.
The Minister very kindly wrote to me on this matter and in his letter he mentioned that the Government will be,
“working closely with the Ministry of Justice on applications for orders relating to under-18s and will ensure that guidance is available to the courts and others to ensure that such cases are heard in the youth court as appropriate”.
Will that draft guidance be available before the Bill has completed its passage through your Lordships’ House? I beg to move.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
My Lords, the Government have moved forward a great deal, as have the police and the CPS, in understanding that in some cases, particularly in cases of trafficked people, those who may at first be seen as a perpetrator—often of relatively small crimes, but sometimes of bigger ones—are in fact victims and have done what they have done as a result of the way that they have been treated. It seems to me that what the noble Baroness proposes is absolutely in line with that thinking.
Baroness Thornton
I thank the Minister for that detailed reply. I will read it in more detail but the Government seem to be taking this issue extremely seriously. I would just like to be reassured that when these orders are being considered, therapeutic and educational support can also be prescribed, as it were, as part of the order. The noble Lord is nodding—I thank him.
Finally, I suggest that the others that are consulted in the process of producing this guidance will include the children’s organisations that are expert in dealing with abused children. Their expertise has certainly been very useful to me in bringing this amendment to the Committee and I hope that the Government will draw on those resources. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Hamwee
My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendment 4. This is a very low-key group of amendments as we start the part of the Bill on forced marriages. Many noble Lords will have far more to say on this issue than is appropriate to this little group. I will confine my remarks very narrowly to the points of which I have given the Government notice.
These are two probing amendments. Amendment 3 would take out new subsection (2). The intention is to probe the meaning of “aware” in it, where it says that,
“a person can be guilty of an offence … in respect of conduct engaged in at a time when the person was aware of the existence of the”,
forced marriage protection order. What is the burden of proof as to whether an individual is aware of an order? I assumed on first reading that this meant actually aware as distinct from having been served with an order, which is rather more particular. Is there scope for judicial discretion in dealing with this? As I said, this is just intended to understand what is meant by “aware” in this context. My noble friend Lord McNally accuses me of being too curious about this sort of terminology.
Amendment 4 probes the relationship between criminal proceedings following a forced marriage protection order and contempt of court if an order is not complied with. I agree with what I understand the Bill to provide—that it should be one or the other—but I hope that my noble friend can explain to the Committee how decisions will be taken about which enforcement route will be followed. What criteria will be used? I am not challenging the content; I simply wish to understand how the matter will be approached. I beg to move.
Baroness Thornton
I was not completely clear what these amendments concerned when I read them and I assumed they were probing. They are both legitimate questions and I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say about them.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
My Lords, first, I reassure my noble friend that her curiosity is always welcome on these Benches. That is well acknowledged by my noble friend Lord McNally.
Turning to her specific amendments, as she rightly said, we are moving on to the subject of forced marriages. This is an important subject to address. It is unfortunate that we have to address it but it is a reality that exists. As my noble friend said, we will move on to other elements of this. I say from the outset that the Government take this particular issue very seriously. It tragically impacts on people in this country and it needs to be tackled and dealt with. I hope that through our discussions this afternoon we will be able to throw further light on what is a very important matter.
The new offence of the breach of a forced marriage protection order mirrors closely the existing offence of the breach of a non-molestation order in Part 4 of the Family Law Act 1996. This approach of closely following the non-molestation order precedent is the proposal on which the Government consulted in 2012, as noble Lords will know, and with which a large majority of respondents—71%—agreed.
Consistent with the existing offence, new Section 63CA of the Family Law Act provides that, first, a person can be guilty of an offence under Section 63CA only in respect of conduct engaged in at a time when the person was aware of the existence of the order and, secondly, where a person is convicted of a breach of a forced marriage protection order, they cannot be punished subsequently for contempt in relation to subsections (3) and (4).
Baroness Thornton
“( ) It shall be a duty on the Secretary of State to prepare and publish guidance about the effect of this section before it comes into force to such descriptions of persons as the Secretary of State considers appropriate.
( ) A person exercising public functions to whom guidance is given under this section must have regard to it in the exercise of those functions.”
Baroness Thornton
My Lords, in moving Amendment 5 I also speak to Amendment 10; both are in my name and that of the noble Baroness, Lady Hussein-Ece. Amendment 5 would place a duty on the Secretary of State to prepare and publish guidance about the consequences of forced marriage and breaching a forced marriage protection order. We all agree that criminalisation, whether through criminalisation of a breach of a forced marriage protection order or through direct criminalisation, is not enough to tackle forced marriage alone. The previous Government recognised this and that all the authorities which come into contact with victims of forced marriage—schools, colleges, the police, doctors and health services, social services, local authorities, airport staff, FCO staff and the courts—must be aware of forced marriage, how it manifests itself, what to look for and, most importantly, the appropriate action that needs to be taken.
For example, in August this year, the Government issued a warning to teachers, doctors and airport staff to be alert to forced marriages over the summer holidays. Between June and August, the Forced Marriage Unit—a joint operation between the Home Office and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office—received over 400 reports. This year the unit handed out leaflet cards called Marriage: It’s Your Choice, to provide help and information to potential victims, signposting them to confidential advice. The cards reminded young people to speak to police or airline staff if they found themselves at an airport with nowhere to turn. That is an important initiative. Of course, it referred them to the Forced Marriage Unit, which was set up in January 2005 as the Government’s one-stop shop for dealing with forced marriage policy, outreach and casework. It does an excellent job, operating both inside the UK, where support is provided to any individual, and overseas, where consular assistance is to be provided to British nationals, including dual nationals. I pay tribute to my noble and learned friend Lady Scotland and other noble Lords who set up this important initiative.
However, we need to look at what has happened since that time. We must recognise that, if we look at the evidence, the action we want to be taken throughout all those authorities and public bodies is certainly not uniform or adequate. We can look, for example, at the evidence that Karma Nirvana and the Southall Black Sisters gave during Committee in the Commons. Karma Nirvana’s evidence showed that little had changed in schools since 2008, and that schools were often reluctant to participate in the charity’s work on forced marriage, for example. Other evidence confirms that schools do very little to ensure that pupils are informed about forced marriage and to offer them the necessary support if they need it. There was even evidence that some schools were putting students at risk by contacting family members when children had consulted teachers in confidence.
Southall Black Sisters said in its evidence:
“Our experience shows that the education system has been the slowest to respond to the need to address forced marriage. There needs to be considerable attention on increasing awareness and creating monitoring mechanisms for all forms of gender-related violence and equality issues in schools … We are of the view that heads of secondary schools and further education colleges have an obligation to provide clear and well publicised information on a range of gender-related violence issues”,
which includes forced marriage,
“and Ofsted has an important role to play in monitoring how these issues are addressed”.
I hope that the Minister will be able to give us some information that will help to reassure us that this will happen and that it will have teeth. However, in addition to that evidence, in 2011 the Home Affairs Select Committee wrote to the Secretary of State for Education to express its concerns about this matter. I am sorry to say that the Secretary of State rejected its views and said that he did not believe that his department should be directive or prescriptive to schools on this matter. Does the Minister think that that is satisfactory, on a matter of child protection that lies at the heart of forced marriage for young people?
There have now been two Select Committee inquiries and the Forced Marriage Unit report, and still the Department of Education does not treat forced marriage as a child protection issue in many schools—a reason why this amendment is so important. We have to recognise that the voluntary sector is doing an excellent job in trying to remedy this situation. I know that were he here, my noble friend Lord Harris would tell us about the organisation he chairs, the Freedom Charity, which first and foremost wants to protect the lives of children and young people by raising awareness of forced marriage in the UK and the associated problems of dishonour-based violence, giving young people the tools and confidence to deal with the problem. The charity plays a vital role in spreading the word and helping to prevent forced marriage, and runs the country’s first 24-hour, seven-days-a-week helpline to raise awareness and prevent abuse. It should be commended for the work it does. However, we have to accept that it is almost certainly not enough.
My second point, which I will raise very briefly with the Minister on this matter, is on whether and how legal aid will be available to victims of forced marriage when they come forward. Again, many of the organisations that deal with forced marriage have raised that as a concern. Statutory agencies have a legal duty to ensure that safeguarding policies and practices are implemented, and that is what lies at the heart of this amendment. I beg to move.
Baroness Thornton
I am grateful to the Minister for giving this detail, but can he clarify whether the Department for Education regards forced marriage as a safeguarding issue?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
Safeguarding and the protection of people in schools or elsewhere are central to every department of government. The Department for Education takes that responsibility very seriously. As I have already said, schools work very closely with the Forced Marriage Unit and children’s services at a local level. It is right that decisions are taken with the full consultation and engagement of schools, and intervention will be available to them if they require it.
Perhaps I may address the other points that were raised. The noble Baroness mentioned legal aid, a subject that has occupied your Lordships’ House at various levels over the past few years, but there was a reality to address. I am conscious that my noble friend Lord McNally is sitting to my left but I will not ask him to take over the Dispatch Box; he has answered many a question on this issue. However, there was a reality and a challenge that needed to be faced. However, I assure the noble Baroness that we have retained legal aid in key areas impacting on women—in particular, in relation to injunctions to protect victims from domestic abuse and in private family law cases in which domestic violence is a feature. Legal aid is also available for victims of forced marriage, who can seek a forced marriage protection order.
Finally, as my noble friend Lady Hamwee pointed out, given that we will come on to discuss elements of a later amendment that relate to forced marriage—a subject raised by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss—I hope that, given my explanation, the Committee is assured that there is appropriate provision for guidance and that the Government are fully committed to addressing and tackling this issue. We are looking to update existing guidance to support professionals in the field. This is not just about passing laws but about applying them too. I therefore hope that the noble Baroness will agree to withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Thornton
I thank the Minister for that detailed and comprehensive answer. I also thank my noble and learned friend Lady Scotland, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and other noble Lords who have taken part in this debate, as well as the noble Baroness, Lady Hussein-Ece, for her support.
This has been a useful discussion because this issue is important. I had a look at the guidance, which, as my noble and learned friend Lady Scotland pointed out, is comprehensive and impressive. Were it to be implemented in the way that is intended, it would be extremely effective. It is detailed and tells all public officials how they should deal with this issue and what they should say. The guidance is very impressive but implementation is the point. I also agreed with the noble Lord when he told the House that this is also about cultural change, changes in community and so on.
I might say to the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, that I come from a community in Bradford, have links across West Yorkshire and have spoken about this issue to many different groups of women in those areas. I have to say that the enthusiasm for criminalisation, which we will come on to talk about, is not by any means uniform among the groups, including, for example, a group of Somali women in Halifax with whom I had conversations only in the past year. Criminalisation of breaches of the Forced Marriage Act is important, as I think everyone would agree. However, the discussion that we are going to come on to is slightly more nuanced.
I should be grateful if the Minister could answer the question mentioned by his noble friend Lady Hussein-Ece about free schools. He does not need to answer now; a letter would be sufficient. Do the rules relating to this issue apply also to the new free schools? I should like to read what the noble Lord has said about the Department for Education’s role in this and about the safeguarding issue. We may need to have discussions and return to it at a later stage. However, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Faulks
My Lords, I am a member of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, which looked at this issue, as with other issues in the Bill, and realised that there was a great deal of knowledge and experience in your Lordships’ House, some of which we have heard today. We came to the conclusion that we cautiously accepted the Government’s reasoning for the criminalisation of forced marriage, but we recommended, among other things, that the Crown Prosecution Service should develop a strategy on prosecutions over forced marriage and that, in developing such a strategy, there should be consultation with the relevant stakeholders. It was very much a cautious acceptance of the Government’s reasoning.
I appreciate that the noble and learned Baroness has put this down as a probing amendment rather than anything more and I accept it in that spirit. I counsel some caution, however, about having an offence which one commits if there is an aggravating feature in relation to another offence. It causes difficulties in sentencing in other cases in which this form of offence has been introduced. It seems to me, as I suggested in a brief intervention on the noble and learned Baroness, that it would be perfectly possible to have an offence of forced marriage and to have an offence if the context required it—a further offence, perhaps, in Section 20 or Section 18—of whatever other offence had been committed. However, I understand the spirit of the amendment and I look forward with interest to what the Minister has to say.
Baroness Thornton
Did the human rights committee consider the proposal that has been put forward by my noble and learned friend? If it did not, does it think it would be a good idea if it did now do so, if there is time?
Lord Faulks
I do not, of course, speak for the committee, as I am only one member. This particular amendment was not considered; I can certainly take it back to the committee and ask that we consider it.
Baroness Hamwee
My Lords, I am at the cautious end of the spectrum as well. Being cautious, I noticed in the fact sheet on this issue published by the Home Office the lines:
“Victims of forced marriage, their families, and society may feel better served by a specific criminal offence. There may also be a deterrent effect”.
I read into the second sentence that that might also cover a reluctance to approach the health and other authorities simply because they are authorities.
I share the concern that has been expressed about stigmatising one’s own family and the ostracism of not just the family, but of the whole community. However, as I have said already today, I am not yet convinced that this would be answered by there being a choice between civil and criminal proceedings. Indeed, the fact sheet also makes it clear that choice is a key message of engagement. That is because there is still the dilemma of how one’s family and community will react to either type of proceedings. I then asked myself whether, conversely, it could produce the reaction of, “Well, they are civil proceedings, not pursuing the criminal route, so it is not that serious”. That worries me as well. I have said to my noble friend that I am concerned about training in this issue for the police and prosecution authorities, although that probably goes to the guidance: how will they put to those who are victims in this situation the choice they have and yet not put pressure on them?
Finally—at this point at any rate—my noble friend said that female genital mutilation is not a good example. I think that it is a good example because the criminal route has not been chosen. I am not sure what we have learnt from that; I have not picked up that we have learnt anything.
Baroness Thornton
My Lords, this has been a remarkable debate and I thank my noble and learned friend Lady Scotland for introducing what is a very serious and important issue to our discussions. I want to make a point about the legislation on female genital mutilation. The reason we had to create an offence was because our law was silent on the matter of female genital mutilation at the time. We created an offence because it was the only thing we could do.
We should not be in any doubt at all that forced marriage is an offence. We need to be clear about that, and I do not think that my noble and learned friend’s—
Baroness Hussein-Ece
My Lords, I want just to clarify a point. Perhaps I did not make myself clear, but what I meant was that in the debates around FGM at the time, it was argued that criminalisation would force the practice underground. There is an area of comparison because the point about this issue is that it is underground already.
Baroness Thornton
The noble Baroness makes a very fair point. What we are being presented with here, as the result of the proposal of my noble and learned friend, is a choice about how to deal with the crime of forced marriage: which is the best way to deal with it? At Second Reading I think I indicated to the Minister that the Government would have to make a good case for going down the road they are proposing. They need to have a robust justification for criminalisation. As yet, the Government have not produced the evidence that would be the justification for doing so.
My noble and learned friend has done the Committee a great favour here, because she has said that there are two ways of achieving this. This side of the House is very keen to strengthen the law on forced marriage; indeed, my right honourable friend Yvette Cooper and my honourable friend Gloria De Piero—my new boss, the shadow Equalities Minister—have both said that we are keen to do so.
I would like to ask a couple of questions, because I know that some of us are quite keen to have our lunch. In what way did the Government examine this as an alternative route to the criminalisation that is on the face of the Bill? What was the discussion? Where did it take place? In particular, was this discussed with the CPS and police and what were their views on the most effective route to take? If the Minister thinks it is appropriate, we may need to have further discussion about this.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
My Lords, first, I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in a very detailed and expert debate on this issue, as the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, has already said. On a lighter note, I will address a point made by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Scotland, who knows I have a deep respect for her professionally and personally. She talked about how parents would react to children who said no to them. I can assure noble Lords that as a father of two myself, that is a regular occurrence in the Ahmad household. A firm line—more from mother than father—normally does the trick. However, we are on a serious subject and it is important that we have had this detailed debate.
I join other noble Lords in thanking the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Scotland, for all the work that she has undertaken both in and out of government to end forced marriage. We have different perspectives on this. Let me also assure the noble Baroness, Lady Hussein-Ece, and the noble Baroness, Lady Uddin, who is not in her place at the moment, that this Government are building on what has been done already. I am sure that I speak for all in the Committee and in your Lordships’ House when I say that we are at one in trying to get the best solution on this most important issue. I am therefore very grateful to the noble and learned Baroness for raising her important points and I welcome the opportunity to explain to the Committee how we have considered these points fully in the development of the Bill and will continue to take them into account as we move forward on the issue of forced marriage.
Let us be absolutely clear: we all agree that forced marriage is a fundamental abuse of human rights and needs to be tackled. We are as one on that. In criminalising forced marriage it is the Government’s intention to prevent this appalling abuse, to protect victims and prosecute perpetrators. By criminalising forced marriage, we are sending a very strong message that this abuse will simply not be tolerated and we are empowering the victims, who are at the centre of what we are proposing, to come forward in the knowledge that this issue is being and will be taken seriously, and perpetrators will be punished.
The proposal is to replace the new offences of forced marriage in England, Wales and Scotland with provisions that would make the same conduct an aggravating factor when sentencing a person found guilty of another offence. I would like to reassure the noble Baroness that the Government have considered making false marriage an aggravating factor for sentencing. However, in England and Wales, the courts already have an overarching guideline on the principles of seriousness which they are required by law to follow. Within this guideline, abuse of power, position, trust and the deliberate targeting of vulnerable victims already apply, as supplemented by a guideline on domestic violence issued by the Sentencing Guidelines Council, which courts are required by law to follow. The guideline uses the current definition of domestic violence which covers forced marriage. It is therefore difficult to see how the amendments of the noble and learned Baroness would make any difference to the way in which the courts currently sentence forced marriage—the behaviours often associated with it are already aggravating factors.
Savings Accounts and Health in Pregnancy Grant Bill
Baroness Thornton Excerpts(13 years, 4 months ago)
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Baroness Thornton
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introduction to this somewhat pick and mix abolition Bill, containing as it does future plans for three quite separate pieces of primary legislation. The Bill, like so much of the cuts programme of this Government, will hit children, women and the poorest families hardest. It is almost as if Nick Clegg and David Cameron, like a pair of playground bullies, said, “Let's push around those least able to defend themselves”. This Bill will hit the poorest in society hardest and it will undo positive measures introduced by the Labour Government; wholesale and without any consideration of mitigation.
As the Minister said, the Bill removes eligibility for child trust funds, abandons the saving gateway and abolishes the health in pregnancy grant—a measure that I was responsible for steering through your Lordships' House at the time we enacted it. All of those acts were progressive measures and we need to be clear that their abolition is in fact a matter of dogma. That this is dogma is borne out by the fact that the Government could not even be bothered to undertake a proper impact assessment on their proposals, from which I take the lesson that they do not really care what the effects will be.
I know that we are becoming more and more familiar with broken promises from both parties in this Government, but it is worth noting that the Conservatives are breaking their manifesto commitment, which said:
“We will … cut government contributions to Child trust funds for all but the poorest third of families and families with disabled children”.
Another commitment bites the dust. It is true that the Liberal Democrats had in their manifesto an end to the child trust funds. I am not sure why, because there was no explanation. I looked in vain to see whether the funding might be redirected to some other support for the most impoverished and for anything at all about looked-after children. It may be there, but if so it is very well hidden. I looked in vain for anything that suggested that the Liberal Democrats had thought about how to create and nurture the savings habit.
The child trust fund is a savings and investment account for children born on or after 1 September 2002. The Bill ends new child trust funds from January 2011, worth £500 to all children over their lifetimes and £1,000 to the poorest children. Children who were due to receive the £250 top-up—£500 for the poorest—on their seventh birthday will not now do so. I hope that the Government intend to write to them all.
Last year, the Labour Government announced that they would contribute an extra £100 each year into the accounts of all disabled children, with severely disabled children getting £200 a year. I am bound to remind the House and perhaps the Minister, who was not about during that time, that David Cameron's Conservative Party did not oppose the measure when it was passed earlier this year before the general election. Perhaps that timing has something to do with this particular decision. I do not think that a respite scheme, welcome though it might be, is a substitute for those disabled children.
The child trust fund is a hugely successful scheme. In a recent survey by Mum’s Views, polling more than 1,000 current or expectant mothers, a staggering 91 per cent of expectant mothers interviewed had no idea that the Government were planning to replace the much loved child trust fund, and nearly half said that the Government should work harder to keep parents informed. Perhaps more worryingly, 18 per cent of those surveyed claimed that the changes meant that they were less likely to save for their children's future. That is a considerable proportion of the very people that the scheme was designed to reach.
Wherever you may sit on the political spectrum, everyone can agree that fostering a long-term savings culture is something that the UK badly needs. I am aware that the Government want to bring forward a junior ISA. However, it will not be ready until the autumn of next year. In the mean time, did the Government consider leaving the child trust fund in place so that families do not fall through the gap in the first half of 2011? Why did they not do so? For children born between January and the introduction of a new scheme, there will be no government-endorsed, universal tax-free scheme into which their parents will be able to save. Contrary to the Government's assurances that the retrospective nature of a replacement scheme will address the issue of a savings black hole, I remain profoundly concerned that, at this incredibly busy and emotional time, when new parents’ minds are far from focused on savings products, the lack of a government-endorsed product will result in a lost generation of children with no savings provision.
I turn to the case for looked-after children. As it currently stands, the new junior ISA would rely on voluntary contributions from parents and family members and there would be no provision at all for contributions to an account for looked-after children. The House is not permitted to discuss amendments to this Bill, but I am certain that this issue in particular is one that many noble Lords would have wished to address. I am now, with respect, addressing the Minister on behalf of looked-after children and their champions, notably Action for Children and Barnardo's. Will the Government consider picking up the amendment in the interests of looked-after children, or something like it, that my honourable friend Paul Goggins put down in another place? If not, why not? The Government have had time to reflect on this issue since 22 November, which was the Third Reading in another place, and I hope that they will have taken on board the powerful and compassionate arguments in favour of either maintaining the child trust fund for looked-after children or coming forward with a suitable replacement.
My understanding is that Action for Children, Barnardo's and Paul Goggins MP met the Financial Secretary Mark Hoban MP at the Treasury to discuss the proposal during the Report stage of the Bill in another place, and the Minister agreed that the proposal was worthy of proper consideration. He said:
“I have a lot of sympathy with what he”—
Paul Goggins—
“is trying to achieve, and I want to consider the matter more closely”.—[Official Report, Commons, 22/11/10; col. 78.]
Have the Minister and his colleagues done so? Have they looked at the impact that the abolition of the child trust fund will have on looked-after children? What is the conclusion of their deliberations?
Some 6,000 children go into care each year. Over previous years, the Government have opened 33,158 child trust funds for children in foster care, residential care or children who are being looked after by the state. If the Government refuse to allow the child trust fund to continue, what exactly are they, as the corporate parent, going to say to the children who will not have that nest egg at 18? What about the situation of siblings, one of whom may qualify because they went into care last year, and a brother or sister who will not qualify because they go into care in the coming year? What responsibility does the Minister believe the state has in these circumstances, as the corporate parent of some of the most disadvantaged children in society?
At the moment we have no details for the implementation of the child ISA, and we do not know what will happen to the most disadvantaged children. We know that there will be a gap, and I invite the Minister to address these important issues before the Bill passes from your Lordships' House.
This Bill repeals the legislation providing for the establishment of a saving gateway scheme. As noble Lords will be aware, in 2009 the Saving Gateway Accounts Bill was introduced to pave the way for a national scheme. The purpose of the scheme was to promote a saving habit among working people on lower incomes by providing an incentive to save through a government contribution for each pound saved. We would all agree that savings are important in providing people with independence throughout their lives and security if things go wrong. While we on these Benches disagree with the decision not to establish the saving gateway next year, I would put in a plea to mitigate this decision, in the knowledge that the Conservative Opposition supported this scheme only last year. Would it not make sense to delay the implementation rather than repealing the Act? Will the Minister explain this change in policy to the House? Do this Government now not want to encourage low-income people to save, or was this yet another casualty of the coalition agreement—and, if so, which part of it exactly?
The last part of the Bill removes the entitlement to the health in pregnancy grant when a woman reaches the 25th week of her pregnancy. I regard this as a health issue, not a money matter, and I would have much preferred the kind of well informed debate that the House had when we established that grant. The health in pregnancy grant is a one-off tax repayment of £190 from HMRC for mothers-to-be who are at least 25 weeks pregnant to help them prepare for the birth of their baby. The payment is not means-tested and does not depend on national insurance contributions. It is estimated that there are around 750,000 qualifying pregnancies each year, based on the national statistics projections for birth. I am very sad that the Government have decided to remove this grant. It can make a crucial difference at a time when family finances become tight. It may not be a significant amount to the Minister but £190 is a substantial amount to a low-income family and, whatever the grant’s imperfections, it must be a matter of enormous regret that the Government propose to reduce the investment in women as they conceive, bear and give birth to children. I invite the House to join me and these Benches in regretting anything that has a detrimental impact on maternal health and well-being.
We know that women need to approach giving birth in a calm and confident frame of mind. We also know that very low-income families can and do run out of money for food from time to time, so this grant can be, could be and is of enormous importance. The Royal College of Midwives said that it was,
“disappointed at the decision to abolish the Health in Pregnancy Grant, which, apart from providing pregnant women with much needed financial support, provided an opportunity for midwives to communicate health advice to women and their families”.
As we are quoting the National Childbirth Trust, its chief executive said:
“At a time when families are trying to make ends meet, the Coalition Government has hit parents particularly hard. Cutting pregnancy and maternity grants, as well as child benefit and tax credits, will make it even more difficult for new parents or those wanting to start a family. We’re worried that parents, and parents-to-be, have been singled out unfairly, and that the Government should stick to its commitment to making the UK more family friendly”.
When this legislation was introduced in your Lordships’ House, many noble Lords who come from a medical background and are knowledgeable about pregnancy and childbirth were very much in support of this grant. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Patel, and my noble friend Lord Winston have spoken to me about this and I am very grateful for their wise counsel on this matter. My noble friend Lord Winston is unable to be here today, so I shall reflect his views, as they were expressed to me, to the House. He pointed out to me that there is growing evidence that health and the feeling of well-being are not only important for pregnant women but for their offspring. The modern field of epigenetics suggests that environmental influences on the pregnant mother may alter the way that the DNA of her child functions and that this may have long-term consequences for the health of the baby, even as an adult.
The epigenetic effects are likely to be heritable: that is to say, not only the baby to be born but his or her offspring may suffer from the inherited deleterious effects from the circumstances of their grandmother’s, or even their great grandmother’s, pregnancy. My noble friend Lord Winston provided me with five examples of research from Australia, New York, Canada, Southampton and Imperial College in the UK, which I am more than happy to make available to the Minister.
I am not claiming more for this grant than that it is a contributing factor to the well-being of the pregnant mother and that the Government should have a better justification for its abolition than simply money-saving. I thought that one of the most powerful arguments for this grant was the fact that it is not given unless the mother has attended an interview with a medical professional, a health visitor or a midwife, and discussed her pregnancy, care and diet. There are some women—I am thinking particularly of very young, vulnerable or teenage women—for whom this visit may be their first contact with a health professional. The grant has two benefits: first, it provides a lump sum to assist a pregnant woman with either diet or something else that she might need towards the end of her pregnancy; and, secondly, it helps to ensure that she is in the system and stands a better chance of receiving care and support throughout the rest of her pregnancy and the birth of her baby.
Would the Minister care to address the issues of the benefit that pregnant women receive from this grant and how the Government intend to replace it—if not, why not?—and of how the Government intend to address the issue of women who receive extra support as a result of this grant? I very much look forward to this Second Reading debate and to the Minister’s response to the questions that I have raised and that other noble Lords will raise during the course of the debate.