Summer Adjournment

Chris Bryant Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Bosworth (David Tredinnick) on his speech. I disagreed with every word of it. I was intrigued to hear that he is the chair of what I think he called the Government herb committee. That conjured images from my childhood of the television programme, “The Herbs”. Parsley the Lion, Dill the Dog, Lady Rosemary and Bayleaf the Gardener all went flooding through my mind.

I was delighted by the contribution from my hon. Friend the Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley). I completely agree with her on the bedroom tax. I am determined that when Labour wins the general election next year, we will repeal the bedroom tax. If the Deputy Leader of the House, who will wind up for the Government, is still a Member of Parliament then, I look forward to him voting with us, even if he cannot bring himself to vote with us on this matter before that date.

I wish to raise two specific issues. The first is concussion in sport. Members may know that in the United States a legal action against the National Football League has led to a $1 billion class suit. It looks as if the money set aside by the sport will still not be enough to compensate those who have suffered from industrial injuries. That was due to the negligence shown by the sport, and the cover-up: the sport had conducted research, but was not prepared to make it public. I believe—as do some other Members; we have produced a joint report—that exactly the same thing is happening in the United Kingdom. The sporting bodies in this country need to take this matter far more seriously than they do.

On 19 January 2002, Jeff Astle died. He was perhaps one of the most iconic soccer players of the late 20th century. He played for West Bromwich Albion and was renowned as a great header of the ball. The coroner decided that he had died because of repeated minor traumas to his head caused by heading the ball. Some people say that football has changed in the intervening years. However, the research conducted in the US shows that the use of a lighter ball makes absolutely no difference to the chronic traumatic encephalopathy that can be suffered by players.

When Jeff died, the Football Association in this country promised—it swore blind to Jeff’s family, his lovely widow and his daughters—that it would conduct 10 years of thorough research, and that it would make that research public. To date, no research whatever seems to have been done. If any research has been done, it has been covered up and not made public. Not only is that a disgraceful way to treat the family of Jeff Astle, but the FA is verging on the criminally negligent in how it is treating other players who are in exactly the same position.

We only had to watch two of the last matches of the World cup to see examples. In the final, Christoph Kramer was playing for Germany when he received what was quite clearly a concussion, but he went back on to play. Afterwards, he said that he could not even remember most of the first half of the match because of the blow he had taken to his head. Javier Mascherano, one of the Argentine players, was also clearly concussed in a semi-final game, but went back on to the field of play. That sends the message to young boys and girls playing many different sports in which they might receive a blow to the head that it is better to go back on the pitch, even if they have received such a blow.

To appreciate the all-too-possible danger of a double impact, particularly to children, we need only consider the case of Ben Robinson, who a few years ago went back on the pitch, received a second concussion and died. Of course, I am not saying that every child should be wrapped in cotton wool—we want people to enjoy their sport—but the message coming from big sport, broadcasters, doctors and sporting bodies is that it is better to get back on your feet, go back on and play. Where there is good research proving that chronic traumatic encephalopathy is leading to long-term depression, mental illness, early onset dementia and possibly suicide, surely to God we need to take that seriously, and where there is no research, in sports with regular brain injuries, surely to God we need to ensure that research is done, and all the sporting bodies need to work together.

That is why the hon. Members for Salisbury (John Glen) and for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris), two peers, Lord Addington and Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson, and I have produced a joint report calling on the Health Committee or the Culture, Media and Sport Committee of this House to conduct a parliamentary inquiry, bringing together all the facts from sporting bodies, doctors, the NHS and schools, and coming up with a single message: concussion will not always kill, but we must take it seriously because on occasions it can be fatal. I commend those journalists at The Mail on Sunday—I do not often say that—and The Guardian who have taken this issue seriously. However, I hope the Minister—and other hon. Members, if they know anyone on either Select Committee—will encourage colleagues to produce such a report before the general election.

In this potpourri or smorgasbord debate, I want to move, seamlessly but briefly, to the issue of Russia, for one simple reason. I had responsibility for our relationship with Russia in the last Labour Government, and I worry that the Government, though they might now be making all the right noises, have not been doing so consistently, and therefore effectively, in relation to Russia. When they came to power, they understandably wanted to draw a line under the Litvinenko case, move on and establish better trading relations with Russia. I am delighted that they have now changed their mind and that today the Home Secretary announced a proper public inquiry into the death of Alexander Litvinenko, because we owe it to his widow, who simply has not had justice yet and is a courageous and independent-minded women.

We also have to be clear about the case of Sergei Magnitsky, who was murdered in a Russian jail because he unveiled corruption in Russia while working for a British company. If we already have travel bans on some Russians coming to the UK, we should surely be saying that everyone involved in that corruption and murder is not welcome in this country. This House passed that resolution unanimously on 7 March 2012, and instead of all the mealy-mouthed nonsense I have heard on the eight occasions I have asked this question, the Government should get on and announce such a ban. This is a cross-party issue. France and Germany are showing a dereliction of duty in their relationship with Russia, which will always want to pick off one country after another in Europe and end up with a free pass. We have to stand together and show that Russia is currently acting more like Hitler in the Sudetenland than a modern, 21st-century democracy.