Functioning of Government

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Thursday 7th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Michael Ellis]

I am not answering any questions along those lines.

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

Today, it appears that a number of Bill Committees on issues of the utmost importance will be cancelled—from national security to levelling up, as my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) has raised, and tackling fraud—because there are no Ministers to attend them. The Minister says that the business of the House will continue, but it will not. It obviously is not doing so if Committees are being cancelled. In no other workplace would such crucial work go undone. Can the Minister explain why his Prime Minister and why his party think this is acceptable?

[Michael Ellis]

I say to the hon. Lady, as I have said before, that the legislative business of this House is a matter for the Leader of the House of Commons, who holds a Cabinet position and is in place. He is shortly to have his weekly question-and-answer session in this House, and she will be able to take advantage of that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Wednesday 8th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend for her fantastic work on this, and I know the personal circumstances that give her an understanding of that campaign. I can tell her that the National Institute for Health Research is looking at what more we can do to support research on aortic dissection, and I know that she is meeting my right hon. Friend the Health Secretary shortly.

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

Q12. The Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra and the Kyiv Symphony Orchestra are due to visit the UK this summer to perform at the BBC Proms, the Edinburgh Festival and other venues. Other European countries are waiving their visas, but to get to the UK, the musicians are facing visa delays and prohibitive visa costs of £18,000 and £10,000 respectively. We should be doing all we can to support these Ukrainian musicians, so will the Prime Minister match our European neighbours and enable these Ukrainian artists to tour to the UK this year by expediting their visa applications and waiving their visa fees?

[The Prime Minister]

I think the hon. Lady needs to bring this particular case to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, but I can tell the House—[Interruption.] I know, by the way, that many hon. Members are showing a lead by having Ukrainians to stay in their own homes, and I thank all hon. Members who are doing that, thanks to the scheme that the UK Government have put in place. I think we should be very proud of what we are doing.

Sue Gray Report

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Wednesday 25th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I direct the hon. Gentleman to what I have already said.

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

I want to quote the following to the Prime Minister and all those on his side—we have just heard one of them—who suggest that the covid rules did not matter. It is from palliative care doctor, Dr Rachel Clarke:

“To NHS staff, it was always abundantly clear that the way you survive a pandemic is together.”

She goes on to say that, in 2020,

“Collective compliance…was really all our patients had”

to protect them, and “basic, selfless, public decency” mattered. Rules were

“Hated yet obeyed, because we care about each other... And that glass of wine in the prime minister’s hand? It’s been thrown into the faces of us all.”

How does he reply to that?

[The Prime Minister]

I wish things could have been handled better and I wish we had got things right in No. 10 in the way we did not. I apologise again for things that we got wrong, but we have already changed the way we work and I really think it is time that the country moved on.

Referral of Prime Minister to Committee of Privileges

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Thursday 21st April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

Several hon. Members have referred to the collateral damage that the Prime Minister leaves in his wake, as he has done throughout his career. For example, the Paymaster General, who is on the Front Bench today, said on 9 December during a statement on the Christmas party at No. 10 Downing Street:

“The Prime Minister has been repeatedly assured since these allegations emerged that there was no party and that no covid rules were broken.”—[Official Report, 9 December 2021; Vol. 705, c. 561.]

We now know that there were several parties, not just one, and that the rules were broken, because fines have been issued, one of which the Prime Minister has received. Part of the collateral damage, therefore, is that the Paymaster General came here to make a statement, based on the same information that allegedly was given to the Prime Minister, and misled the House. I accept that the Paymaster General did so inadvertently, but what has he done about that? The record needs correcting. Surely he should be investigating how he came to be misinformed and to misinform the House.

This has happened on too many occasions for ignorance to be the defence. There is this idea that, throughout lockdown and all the occasions on which these parties took place and the rules were broken, none of the bright young things who had been invited ever thought that any one of those events might break covid rules. Is it conceivable that no one raised a single question about whether they might be breaking the rules? Some of those events were drinks events for people who were leaving. In our constituencies, people missed funerals and cancelled weddings and birthday parties. However, the people in No. 10 thought that it was okay to have leaving drinks. Where are they? What were they thinking? How out of touch with our constituents can they be to think that they can have a leaving drinks party and are more important than our constituents?

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

My hon. Friend is making a good speech, and that is a good point. I want to make a point about the impact of breaking the law, and how it hurt people and continues to do so. My constituent told me:

“Boris Johnson broke the law partying with his colleagues while I watched my father die through a care home window. My father gave up on life because he could not have any proper connection with much-needed family during recovery from a stroke. I think he could still be alive today if I was able to break the law by having a close connection with him”,

but, they say, they were not in the privileged position of the Prime Minister.

[Clive Efford]

What my hon. Friend read out speaks for itself. She has demonstrated, as have many others, through the cases they mentioned, that the problem starts at the top. The workers who organised the parties would not have done so if they thought that their bosses would be upset, would come down on them and say, “You are breaking the rules. Stop it.” We now know that on at least six occasions, the Prime Minister was present at these parties, so this problem comes right from the top.

The Prime Minister’s defence has been different on many occasions. He started by saying that no rules were broken. He then said that there was a party, but that he was not present—but then he was. Then he said, “I wasn’t warned that it wasn’t a work do.” I did not see anything about a work do in the rules, but perhaps I missed that. The person who writes the rules cannot misunderstand them so fundamentally.

Setting that aside, if the Prime Minister’s defence is, “I didn’t understand the rules; I needed them explained to me” and “I was misled at the outset about there having been a party, because people told me that there wasn’t one,” who misled him? What has happened to them? Are they still in their posts? Have they moved on? Have they signed non-disclosure agreements? Where are those people who misled the Prime Minister, which led him to him inadvertently misleading the House? We cannot have this both ways: either the Prime Minister knowingly came to this House and lied, or other people lied to him, which led to him misleading the House. Either way, we need to identify those people.

The worst crime of all, however, is failing to feel the pain that our constituents felt throughout lockdown. No one who felt the agony and understood the pain that people were going through, as in the example that my hon. Friend read out, could have attended the events that happened in No. 10 Downing Street and other places. The question for Tory MPs today is this: do you stand by the people who felt that pain and vote today for—

Easter Recess: Government Update

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Tuesday 19th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend, who is a valiant campaigner for the armed forces in all their guises, and quite rightly. It is partly thanks to the lobbying of himself and others like him that we have increased defence spending by record sums—£24 billion—and that has enabled us and helped us greatly in helping our Ukrainian friends.

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

A constituent wrote to me about his feelings about the Downing Street parties. Good Friday was the second anniversary of the death of his wife, a healthcare assistant at Bolton Hospital, who died from covid. Over the 10 days she was ill, he was not able to go with her to hospital or visit her until just before she died. After she died, he had to plan her funeral alone, there was no wake, and after the funeral he had to go back to an empty home with no support from family and friends. It is clear that the Conservative party wants to move on, but since his wife died, my constituent tells me he has been unable to work, to move on or to grieve. I want to ask my constituent’s question to the Prime Minister directly:

“I followed the law to the letter, so why does the government think that the laws don’t apply to them?”

[The Prime Minister]

I want to say again how sorry I am for the loss of the hon. Member’s constituent, and I apologise to him personally and to his family—all those who lost loved ones—and it is a measure of the seriousness with which I take this today. Of course, we think the law applies to us: of course it does.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Yes. I thank the House for what we have done to accelerate the economic crime measures. We will be able to whip aside the veil of anonymity. Ownership of the luxurious dwellings to which my hon. Friend refers will be exposed and, yes, we will be able to take away the ability to remain in this country.

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

Q4. As energy costs spiral, I want to raise the issue of people who use extra electricity to charge their electric wheelchairs, or to run ventilators or a stairlift. It is not right that people with a disability or serious medical condition should face unmanageable debt, or go without food, to pay the costs of electricity on which they absolutely rely. They need a real cut to their bills right now. Why is the Prime Minister not looking at drawing on the profits of the North sea oil and gas companies to help the most vulnerable families with those costs?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank the hon. Lady very much and she raises an important issue. Clearly, the spike in energy prices is going to fall most heavily on vulnerable people such as the ones she mentioned, and we will certainly be looking at ways to abate their costs.

Oral Answers to Questions

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd February 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend for everything she does to champion steel. She is right that it is of strategic importance for our country; we must look at ways we can help the steel industry to have access to cheaper, low-carbon energy, and this Government will do everything we can to ensure that that happens. So far we have provided over £600 million since 2013 to help with the cost of energy and put in a £350 million industrial energy transformation fund, but I stress to the House that that alone will not be enough. As we transition to a low-carbon future, hydrocarbons must also have their place.

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

11. Unpaid family carers are treated appallingly by this Government. I am not talking about paid care staff in care homes, but about people who provide care, unpaid, for family members. While food and energy costs skyrocket, carer’s allowance is increasing in April by only £2 to a miserly £69 a week. That insulting amount will be more than swallowed up by the £2.50 cost of a single lateral flow test so that carers can keep the person they care for safe. How can the Prime Minister justify this tax on caring?

[The Prime Minister]

I think that the whole House understands the pressures on carers and the immense amount that they contribute to our society. We are doing our best to support people throughout our country. I think the House also understands that we cannot indefinitely support universal free testing. We are uprating the carers allowance, and of course carers are also entitled to the increases that we are putting through in universal credit.

Living with Covid-19

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Monday 21st February 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We have to set all these things—the cost of lockdowns, and the cost in terms of people’s mental health and wellbeing—against the difficult decisions we have to make about opening up our society, and I think the House understands that this is a balanced decision that is entirely right.

I should just clarify to the right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) that those who are vulnerable who are symptomatic will of course continue to have access to testing. I should have said that in my answer to his question.

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

In a recent survey, a majority of NHS leaders agreed that it was not the right time to end free testing for the public. Why does the Prime Minister disagree with them, and what scientific advice has he considered to come to this decision, which could have a real impact on the NHS elective recovery plan?

[The Prime Minister]

I hear the anxieties of people, but I have to say that I think this is the balanced and the right decision. On testing, I just remind the hon. Lady of what those on the Opposition Benches have previously said about the cost of testing. We now think that the best thing, given the severity of omicron, is to focus on surveillance and to use the huge funds that we are currently dedicating to mass testing on electives and all the other things that we need to do.

Sue Gray Report

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Monday 31st January 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

There is a process, and we have to wait for it to conclude.

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

Among those who were the most isolated during the pandemic were people with learning disabilities, cut off from visits by their families and not even allowed an advocate if they were admitted to hospital. For too many, restrictions to services and the awful isolation without visitors that the Prime Minister’s rules expected them to follow were a matter of life and death. The mortality rate for people with learning disabilities from covid was eight times that of the general population. When he thinks about the damage done to all those groups who were so isolated and their families, and the serious failings of leadership and judgment in No. 10 found by this independent investigation, how can he think his position is tenable?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Member is entirely right about the suffering of people with learning disabilities, and indeed all vulnerable groups who were exposed to lockdowns for long periods. That is why, actually, we worked so hard to make sure that we could get this country out of lockdown and keep it out of lockdown, and that was our objective.

Covid-19 Update

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Wednesday 19th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an extremely important point about young people and vaccinations. I do think that people need to appreciate the value of vaccinations for ease of travel, particularly boosters, but it should be as simple as possible for young people; I totally agree with him about that. I know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care will make a statement in the next few days about what we propose to do.

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

I want to quote the words of my constituent Steven Booth:

“I wish to add my name to the angry voices regarding the conduct of politicians who broke the rules during lockdown, but especially that of the Prime Minister, who demanded we follow the rules, which we did to the letter, while completely disregarding the rules themselves…This is one scandal too many.”

Mr Booth and other constituents will now have no confidence in the rules or the public health messaging from this Prime Minister, and that is a serious failing. What is the Prime Minister’s response to my constituent?

[The Prime Minister]

I am very grateful to the hon. Lady’s constituent for his point of view and I understand where he is coming from, but if you look at the evidence, the UK population have been amazing in the way we have followed the guidance and followed the rules, and the results are there to be seen in what I have been able to announce today.