Business of the House (Thursday)
Alison Seabeck Excerpts(13 years, 5 months ago)
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Hilary Benn
They could indeed have done so, but responsibility for that rests with the Leader of the House.
Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that, given that students from Plymouth and the south-west have a 10-hour round trip to come up to London tomorrow, they deserve more than five hours for an explanation from the Liberal Democrats of why a pledge to the electorate is worth less than a pledge to the Conservative party in the coalition agreement?
Hilary Benn
They do indeed, and—given the inclement weather conditions—those students will probably spend more time travelling than they will having the chance to listen to the House of Commons debating the motion.
There are three principal reasons—to do with time—why the House should vote down this motion. The first is the importance and the consequence of the decision on tuition fees. When one compares the time allocated to the House when previous changes were proposed—and they were much less extensive changes to student support and the funding of higher education than those that will be before us tomorrow—we can see just how inadequate the time that is being offered is. The second reason is the fact, referred to in a point of order earlier, that this debate and vote are being arranged before the promised White Paper on higher education is published and when a whole series of fundamental questions remain about how the new world that the Minister for Universities and Science and the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills propose will actually work. I shall come to some of those questions later.
Summer Adjournment
Alison Seabeck Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Diana R. Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
I shall discuss three issues that are causing concern and anxiety in my constituency, but first I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (David Morris), who talked about the beauty of, and gave us a tour around, his constituency. I was lucky enough to be in Morecambe last weekend, and I certainly agree that Morecambe bay is a very beautiful setting. I also visited the Midland hotel, which has gone through a major refurbishment to restore it to its 1930s art deco beauty, partly funded, as I understand it, through the regional development agency in the north-west. I just wanted to put on the record the fact that government can do good things.
The first issue in my constituency that I want to raise is about education. Although Hull was fortunate enough to be in one of the early waves of Building Schools for the Future, so is not part of the coalition Government’s slash-and-burn approach to BSF investment, there remains a concern about the primary capital programme in the city. Indeed, I am still awaiting a response to a question that I put to the Secretary of State. It was due for answer on 14 July, so I wonder whether the Deputy Leader of the House could chase that up for me.
Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)
I share my hon. Friend’s concern about a failure to receive a response from the Department for Education. I asked a question, which was due for answer on 12 July, about the lists, and I still have not received a reply. I assume that she shares my concern.
Diana R. Johnson
Absolutely. I do share that concern, and I hope that the Deputy Leader of the House will be able to help us.
I want to talk about McMillan nursery in my constituency, which Ofsted recently rated as outstanding. The head teacher, Andrew Shimmin, and his staff do a fantastic job in a part of Hull that faces many challenges. However, the recent weeks and months have been a difficult time for McMillan. We had the very sad death of Kerry Mackinder, who had worked at the school for some time, and the staff’s future is now threatened by Hull’s Liberal Democrat council, which seems intent on making deep cuts without proper consultation and without considering other options for the school.
The coalition Government have talked at length about early intervention, and I know that many Members believe that it is important to put money into children’s lives early, so that we do not have to spend it later when things go wrong. Unfortunately, Hull city council does not seem to take that approach, and there are particular concerns about the new funding formula that Madam Deputy Speaker introduced when she was the Minister with responsibility for children in the previous Government. She made it clear that the new funding formula for early years could take into account the important role that nursery schools play, as they have professionally trained teachers, often work in deprived areas, and often need to keep places vacant in case social services need to place a child urgently in a nursery school.
I was very disappointed to hear not only that staff at McMillan nursery are to be made redundant, but that the nurture group—a positive way of dealing with children’s problems early—is also to be abandoned. Local parents are organising a petition to try to keep the group open, and I pay tribute to the trade unionists who, on behalf of members who work at McMillan, are fighting hard, trying to get other plans for the nursery put forward and challenging the tight timetable for consultation with staff about their jobs.
The second constituency issue that I want to raise is housing. The previous Government agreed to a regeneration scheme in Orchard Park based on private finance initiative credits, and the local authority is consulting the community on that. However, owing to the coalition Government’s stance on decisions made before the election, I am worried that the scheme might not come to fruition, and it is badly needed. I understand that Hull city council has already spent up to £1 million on the consultation and on the preparatory work for the scheme.
In another part of my constituency, Bransholme North, the first housing stock transfer will take place. There was a ballot earlier this year, and the Housing Minister will have to agree to the transfer later in the year, but the uncertainty about the coalition Government’s approach to social housing is causing concern in Kingston upon Hull North, so, as tenants want the stock transfer to happen, I again seek a reassurance that it will.
My final point about housing is that at the beginning of July I received a petition from residents of Auckland avenue in Hull. Led by Mrs Walker and Mrs Lambert, it was about the deterioration in the neighbourhood resulting from the conversion of small family homes into houses in multiple occupancy. I had a look for myself, and there was indeed a deterioration in the area. I have written to Hull city council to ask it how it is planning to use its powers to deal with the problem in that area. Now I understand that the coalition Government have suspended the Labour Government’s legislation on houses in multiple occupancy, which was intended to help communities and residents such as those now suffering in Auckland avenue.
Finally, I turn to transport. Under the Labour Government, approval had been given to upgrade schemes on local roads such as the A63. We were also moving closer to reducing or abolishing tolls on the Humber bridge. Now we are told by the Secretary of State for Transport that we must choose between the road schemes and progress on the Humber bridge tolls. Studies have clearly shown that cutting the tolls would boost the local economy on both sides of the River Humber. Surely the £98 million cost of building the Humber bridge has now been paid back by Humber people. Those are the issues—education, housing and transport —that really matter to my constituents in Hull, far more than the rushed referendum on the voting system.
In a passionate contribution to the debate, my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) talked about the gerrymandering over the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill. On the first day back, we are to be forced to have a Second Reading debate on that Bill without any pre-legislative scrutiny. That is an absolute disgrace.
Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)
It is a shame that, on only the second day on which the Backbench Business Committee has chosen the business, Back Benchers such as my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger) are being cut off in their prime and others have not been able to raise all the issues that they wished to raise.
More than 9 million people in the UK are deaf or hard of hearing. That is about one in every seven people, or approximately 14,000 per constituency. I wish to explore issues of accessibility for people who are deaf or hard of hearing to telephone services as well as shops and businesses. Deafness is the invisible disability and many elderly people tell me that hearing aids are automatically seen as a sign of decrepitude. That could explain why only some 2 million people use hearing aids when it is estimated that between 5 million and 6 million could benefit from them. Those who have difficulty hearing find that when speaking on the telephone or face to face people are impatient with them, and even sometimes seem to find it acceptable to be rude to them.
Many hon. Members will associate deafness and hearing loss with the use of British sign language—or BSL. It is important to our understanding of the issue that we acknowledge the fact that only 50,000 people in the UK use BSL as a first or preferred language. In fact, the Royal National Institute for Deaf People, the UK’s largest deaf and hearing loss charity, estimates that more than 8.2 million people have mild to moderate deafness. I declare an interest, as that figure includes me. I lost all hearing in one ear at the age of 16 after contracting mumps.
I wish to highlight action that businesses can take to better help their customers who are deaf or hard of hearing access them over the telephone. This is an especially important area as more businesses adopt automated answering software and call centre staff as the public’s primary means for contacting them. I am sure that we can all recall frustrating experiences when trying to contact a business by that method. Let us imagine how much more frustrating it would be with a hearing loss. Often one is asked to press a number to ensure that the call can be directed appropriately, but if one does not properly hear these instructions immediately it can be very difficult to seek clarification and often calls go round in circles or are prematurely terminated. It is also deeply frustrating when a person asks the call centre operator to give a yes or no answer, but the operator reverts to the fixed script they have to use and gabbles or mumbles, despite being asked to speak slowly. Some people who have speech difficulties, perhaps after a stroke, also have problems using voice recognition telephone systems, which can be a nightmare.
If a business wishes to have that kind of system, it is essential that there is an early and clear option for people with a hearing loss to be put through to an operator who has received deaf awareness training. There are some very simple steps that businesses can take. These include ensuring that their operators speak clearly and at a slow speed and that they repeat themselves when asked to do so. Businesses must recognise that calls involving customers who are deaf or hard of hearing will be of a longer length. I hope that the Deputy Leader of the House will ask the Minister responsible to consider introducing a set number on all systems that people who are deaf or hard of hearing could press to be put through to somebody who understands their needs.
I also wish to raise the problems with text relay, which is a national relay service that allows text phone users to communicate with users of normal telephones through a relay assistant. It is a complex system and it does take time, but unfortunately call centre staff and others are reluctant to use it, simply because it does take time. However, some large and high-profile businesses are doing the right thing, including Western Power, Lloyds TSB, Barclays Bank and even Government agencies such as HMRC.
There are some simple steps that can be taken to ensure that people who are deaf or hard of hearing can communicate, and even I was surprised, as someone who is hard of hearing, at just how simple those steps are. People can ensure that they talk in a place with good lighting so that they can be lip-read; they talk in a place away from noisy distractions; they face the person, again so they can be lip-read; they speak clearly, but not too slowly, and do not exaggerate their lip movements; and they do not shout, because that is uncomfortable for a hearing aid user and it looks aggressive.
Better use of a loop induction system would help as well. In a mystery shopping expedition by the Royal National Institute for Deaf People, only 22% of shops had an operational loop. It would seem that regional managers of stores are fully aware of the importance, but do not switch them on.
I have many more issues to raise, and perhaps I need to return to the House to discuss them further.
Business of the House
Alison Seabeck Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Sir George Young
I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman has had time to look at the document “The Coalition: our programme for government”. He will see in it a clear commitment in the social action chapter to set up the national citizen service. There has been no fresh announcement of Government policy outside the House.
Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)
A constituent of mine who was the victim of a serious child abuse episode, and her family, came face to face at their local hospital with the paedophile responsible; he was sat grinning in reception. Will it be possible during this Session, perhaps after the summer recess, to have a debate on how the rights of victims are being subordinated to those of perpetrators of crime?
Sir George Young
I understand how distressing that encounter must have been. We must see whether there are better ways of protecting victims of paedophilia from those who have perpetrated it. I have taken note of the hon. Lady’s bid for a debate. There could be a debate in Westminster Hall, or the Backbench Business Committee might like to take it on board.
Information for Backbenchers on Statements
Alison Seabeck Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone), who is and always has been a very assiduous Back Bencher. I am sure he can confirm to the House that he did not pre-brief the press on his speech.
We are debating an issue that is of real importance to the way in which the House, and thence our parliamentary democracy, functions. It is imperative for the debate not to be seen through the petty prism of party politics. This is not a partisan issue, and while attempts to portray it as such are understandable enough, given the general atmosphere in this place and the anger that can be generated among both MPs and our constituents when the ministerial code is broken, it would be wrong to do so.
Let me take up the theme initiated by the hon. Gentleman. A hallmark of your tenure thus far, Mr Speaker, is that you have acted to strengthen the role of the Back Bencher and have sought to reinforce the principles of the ministerial code, one of which is that important statements should be made here before they are made to the media. All too often, however, that convention is still flouted, and it is only through the granting of urgent questions that Members are able to represent their constituents’ interests in the face of an Executive who continue the age-old tradition of occasionally treating the House, and the Speaker, with discourtesy.
This is not a new problem, and I do not wish the debate to descend into a tit-for-tat event during which each side decries the other for having “started it first”. The issue has plagued the House under Governments of all colours—although I am pleased that the Liberals, who of course have not been in government until very recently, for once cannot play the “whiter than white” card. I am afraid that we are all implicated.
Announcements on the “Today” programme, to GMTV or to the newspapers are nothing new. Quite apart from the leaking of this year’s Budget, the Queen’s Speech and a raft of subsequent policies, our parliamentary history is littered with examples. In 1936—well before the 1947 leak—the Budget was leaked by Jimmy Thomas to another Conservative Member. He subsequently resigned not only his seat in the Cabinet, but his seat in the House.
Mr Bone
The hon. Lady is making a powerful speech. However, in that instance the Budget may not have been leaked. It is possible that there was an inadvertent interpretation of something that had been said. Even the suggestion that there had been a leak was enough for the Minister concerned to resign.
Alison Seabeck
Yes, indeed. It was a question of honour, and I think that we have lost a little of that.
As was mentioned by the hon. Member for Kettering, the 1947 Budget was famously leaked to the Star by the then Labour Chancellor, and the 1996 Budget somehow ended up in the hands of the Daily Mirror. As I have said, it is not a new problem; but it is a problem whose resolution is long overdue. We must take it upon ourselves, in this new Parliament, to ensure that the House is returned to the heart of substantive political life in this country.
I am not interested in the question of who has the worst track record, although it is useful to be able to draw on historical examples. I am interested in how we can bring the practice to an end. This was supposed to be the “clean slate” Parliament. A new Parliament with a large influx of new Members should have been able to start afresh. We have made many advances in the way in which we do things—I am thinking not least of the advent of a Committee devoted to Back-Bench business—but the continuation of the old way of doing things must be nipped in the bud.
The fact that Governments, Labour, Liberal and Tory, have leaked and pre-announced policy to the media in the past—advertently or inadvertently—does not give licence to the current incumbents to carry on in the same way. We are in the process of changing the balance of Parliament, so that it ceases to be a Parliament in which Back Benchers are here simply to cheer on their respective Front Benchers, and becomes one in which ministerial promotion is not seen as the sole career path, and in which Back Benchers can bring their experience to bear and ensure that their constituents’ interests are fully represented. We cannot do that if the House is not treated as the right and proper place for ministerial announcements and statements.
We all know that Ministers have a hard job to do. Working on red boxes at 2 am, as Ministers do in some of the busier Departments, is not fun, and mistakes do occur. Working in haste also leads to mistakes and poor scrutiny by Ministers of vital papers, as has happened in the last week or two. We must not mention the word “lists” too often. However, it is within the power of Ministers to prevent some of those mistakes from happening, and it is a shame—a real shame—that the Education Department’s Ministers did not check the detail of those lists more carefully. As has been pointed out, however, the Secretary of State had the good grace to apologise in person.
Back Benchers really should not have to sit by their radios every morning listening with bated breath to the “Today” programme while simultaneously channel-hopping across the various breakfast television media, simply to make certain that they know what is going on. Back Benchers ought to know that this House, and this House alone, is where statements are made, where policy will first be debated, and where their views will be heard before the media circus kicks off. The comments of the hon. Member for Kettering about the empty Press Gallery reinforce that point. If Ministers had to come to this House, those in the Press Gallery would be able to see the reaction of Back-Bench MPs and hear our constituents’ concerns being voiced directly. An empty Press Gallery is not a good sign.
Alison Seabeck
My hon. Friend is absolutely right and, if the motion is agreed to, it will be interesting to see how the Procedure Committee takes matters forward. I shall have some suggestions later in my comments as to exactly what some of the penalties might be.
Stephen Pound
My hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) talked about sanctions, and my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Alison Seabeck) mentioned the case of J. H. Thomas. If I remember rightly, he was playing golf on the morning in question and made a joke about “Tee up”, which was interpreted to mean that there was going to be an additional duty on tea, which was correct. He was sued by the Thomas Lipton company because of the consequences for its shares. Does my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Moor View agree that this is all about Ministers trying to control situations, and it is the control rather than the inadvertence that is the key to the issue? Does she also have sympathy for the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda that this issue should, in fact, be referred to the Standards and Privileges Committee?
Alison Seabeck
I thank my hon. Friend for his, as always, incredibly well-informed comments.
Alison Seabeck
You don’t look a day over 21!
I agree that the precise nature of the sanction is an issue—and I have a proposal that may be thought of as somewhat flippant. My hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda is something of an expert, however, and I therefore think we should listen very carefully to what he has to say and to his proposals.
Sir Peter Soulsby (Leicester South) (Lab)
On the need to take this issue forward speedily and robustly, does my hon. Friend agree that it is a matter of considerable regret that the Procedure Committee has not yet been appointed, and will she join me in encouraging Members, particularly on the Opposition Benches, to make up the numbers so as to ensure that this can be dealt with properly? Perhaps my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) might join us as a member of that Committee in order to ensure that it does, indeed, produce an early and robust response.
Alison Seabeck
I thank my hon. Friend for his remarks, and I am sure colleagues on both sides of the House will have heard what he had to say. It is to be hoped that a volunteer or two will come forward. The Committee should be set up as soon as possible, and he is right to say that it will be very difficult to proceed otherwise.
Back Benchers and the whole House ought to be the first to hear ministerial statements and policy announcements, and they should know that the only place for that will be either this place or the other place. That is a matter not only of constitutional convention and courtesy but of practicality. Members of this House should not have to be faced with phone calls from the media telling them what is going on in the outside world and asking for their views on events about which they have no knowledge. We have all experienced that and, apart from anything else, having to say, “I haven’t heard about that” is very embarrassing—nor does it give people confidence in our ability to do our job properly. That is certainly not a way to run a democracy, and I look to the Leader of the House to ensure that, in so far as his remit stretches, our democracy runs as well as it possibly can. I therefore hope he will commit to redoubling his efforts to bring Ministers to the Dispatch Box before they reach for the radio mike.
An excuse that has often been given is that the majority of the White Paper or statement was in fact revealed to the House and that only one or two of the main items have been released to the public—that is of relevance to a point made earlier about the precise wording of paragraph 9.1 of the ministerial code. That excuse is not good enough, because often the juicy bits of the White Paper or statement are leaked to the press and the House is left with the odds and sods—if I am allowed to use that term. [Interruption.] Yes, the bare bones might be a better phrase. My point is, however, that all of the contents should be saved for the Floor of the House.
Alison Seabeck
I am sure the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, and I concur with that view. I do not imagine that any member of the Treasury-Bench team will be willing to defend the practice of pre-announcing policies or leaks to the media. If any of them are, however, then I am ready to give way and hear the rationale, but if they cannot defend the practice then they should not practise it.
Under a Labour Government, we had the release of difficult news under cover of a smokescreen of even worse news—“A good day to bury bad news” was a term used. However, that term was used by a special adviser, and although what she did was not technically out of order, she at least left her job as a consequence. Ministers need to learn some lessons from that.
John Mann
My hon. Friend has brought up a critical change that has taken place with complicity on both sides of the House, which is that the majority of special advisers appear, in fact, to be media advisers and press officers who advise on nothing special other than how to manage news. Is this not a problem that has now become deeply embedded in our politics, and which we could look at addressing?
Alison Seabeck
Yes, it is a problem, and strangely enough it is at its worst at the beginning of a new Government. When our party was elected to government in 1997, we had a lot of very good advisers who had been extraordinarily good in opposition at spinning stories out and making sure that shadow Ministers got their stories in the press. However, working with the civil service and Parliament in government involves a completely different mindset. We have to treat the two phases quite differently. A special adviser just chatting away to a media person and trying to get the nub of a story out—or spinning it out—from a Government position can have the sort of effect that we have seen, and which we are all here in the Chamber now objecting about, when a story appears in the press in advance of being announced in the House.
John Mann
Taking the Department for Transport, or whatever it might be called these days, as an example, is not the point that the concept of a special adviser suggests someone who is highly specialist and gives advice on transport, not somebody who is highly specialist and gives advice on news management? Even if Ministers are held to greater account by the House, it is that feature of special advisers that is so embedded in our system, as is the concept of their spinning to the media. After all, that is precisely what these people are paid to do.
Alison Seabeck
I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. To be fair to special advisers and to Ministers who employ them, they are not all of that ilk; there are within government, as there certainly were within our Government, very specialist people in the particular spheres in which they work.
Unfortunately, despite the risk of being chastised by you, Mr Speaker, and your predecessors, it has been difficult to bring both the current Government and the previous one to heel on some of these issues. Although apologies have been made, sanctions should be considered. I hope that the Chairman of the Procedure Committee is listening to these comments, which I am sure will be reinforced later in the debate. What is an appropriate punishment for Ministers? Perhaps we should make them deliver the apology on their knees at the Bar of the House.
I shall stop being frivolous, because this is a serious issue and one on which the Government were elected. All parties stood for cleaning up Parliament, modernising this House and listening to Back-Bench MPs, and the Government were elected on that. It might therefore be appropriate for the Procedure Committee to consider insisting that the Prime Minister come to the House to apologise in person every time one of his Ministers pre-announces something. The thought of a Prime Minister having to come to the Dispatch Box on a regular basis to apologise for the actions of members of his team would help to focus minds. Such an approach would make him force his Front Benchers to behave, because that would not be good for his business or for his image.
Barry Gardiner
Does my hon. Friend agree that, given the extent of leaks from both parties when they have been in government, the fact that the leaks have continued signals either that the Prime Minister does not have authority over his Cabinet or that he refuses to implement that authority?
Alison Seabeck
I agree with my hon. Friend.
The motion states that we need a “protocol” that Ministers will abide by and, as Back Benchers, we should expect that to happen. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) says, it has to have teeth. There will be an expectation that the Procedure Committee will take this forward and we will expect serious proposals to be made. If they are not, we should revisit this issue because it is incredibly serious. We have heard all the talk about new politics, but I think we should have some action. Let us see Ministers acknowledge the respect with which this House ought to be treated and see an end to policy announcements in the breakfast media.
Business of the House
Alison Seabeck Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Heath
Concerns about the integrity of the postal vote process have been expressed for a long time. Postal votes form a useful part of our electoral arrangements, but nevertheless we must make sure that our electoral system has the highest possible integrity. The Government are committed to introducing the individual registration of voters, and that will go a long way towards dealing with some of the potential abuses of the current system. I hope that legislation will be introduced in due course that will enable the hon. Gentleman to make his points very forcefully.
Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)
The deadline for the payment to pleural plaques victims of compensation worth £5,000 has come and gone. On at least two occasions in this House, Ministers have said that the payment would be made by the end of June. Will the Deputy Leader of the House please ensure that the appropriate Minister makes a statement to the House to explain to victims of this dreadful disease in my constituency exactly why they are still having to wait for the much promised and expected £5,000 payment?
Mr Heath
I am grateful to the hon. Lady, and also congratulate her on her election to the Backbench Business Committee. She raises an issue that I know is very important to a large number of Members and constituents. I will pass her comments on to the relevant Ministers. Hopefully, there will be statement in the near future, but I cannot promise it.