Business of the House

Joy Morrissey Excerpts

Thursday 19th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the acting shadow Leader of the House.

[Joy Morrissey (Beaconsfield) (Con)]

Will the Leader of the House give us the forthcoming business?

[The Leader of the House of Commons (Lucy Powell)]

The business for the week commencing 23 June includes:

Monday 23 June—General debate on Pride Month.

Tuesday 24 June—Estimates day (2nd allotted day). There will be debates on estimates relating to the Department for Education; the Department of Health and Social Care; and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.

Wednesday 25 June—Estimates day (3rd allotted day). There will be debates on estimates relating to the Ministry of Justice, in so far as it relates to criminal justice; the Ministry of Defence, in so far as it relates to the remit of the national armaments director; and the Department for Transport.

At 7 pm the House will be asked to agree all outstanding estimates.

Thursday 26 June—Proceedings on the Supply and Appropriation (Main Estimates) (No. 2) Bill, followed by a general debate on Armed Forces Day.

Friday 27 June—The House will not be sitting.

The provisional business for the week commencing 30 June will include:

Monday 30 June—Second Reading of the Deprivation of Citizenship Orders (Effect During Appeal) Bill.

Tuesday 1 July—Second Reading of the Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payment Bill.

Wednesday 2 July—Consideration of Lords message to the Armed Forces Commissioner Bill, followed by motion to approve the draft Armed Forces Act 2006 (Continuation) Order 2025.

Thursday 3 July—Business to be determined by the Backbench Business Committee.

Friday 4 July—Private Members’ Bills.

[Joy Morrissey]

I would like to start by congratulating the right hon. Lady. This is the third time I have had the pleasure of responding to her at business questions, and they have proved to be remarkably fruitful encounters. At our first encounter, I asked her to press the Chancellor to U-turn on winter fuel payments. The Leader of the House is clearly very influential, because the U-turn on that shameful attack on pensioners came just a few weeks later.

At our second encounter, I asked the right hon. Lady to get the Government to U-turn on a national inquiry for the victims of the rape gangs, and this week the Prime Minister finally did the right thing and delivered a U-turn on that as well. The Prime Minister may be getting dizzy from all his U-turning, but I congratulate the right hon. Lady on listening to the Opposition, using her influence and securing those U-turns.

Let me turn to one of the most important tasks of any Government: getting people into and keeping them in work. On the Conservative Benches, we know that economic growth comes from the success of businesses and risk-taking entrepreneurs. The Labour party has never understood that, and we are now seeing it have disastrous consequences for our country.

Unemployment reached record lows under the Conservative Government. Labour Governments are always incredibly successful at driving unemployment higher. This Government seem determined to be the best ever at putting more and more people out of work. Last week, we saw the devastating impact of the Chancellor’s reckless national insurance tax raid, which businesses warned her would cost jobs. They were right: the UK unemployment rate is now at its highest level since the pandemic. Job vacancies have collapsed. Last month, there were 109,000 fewer employees on payroll. These are the direct results of a Chancellor and a Government who do not understand business.

It is about to get a whole lot worse. Businesses are clear that the Employment Rights Bill will cost more jobs. The UK’s leading business groups have collectively told the Government that the Bill will damage economic growth and jobs. The Government are giving people rights in jobs that they simply will not have. The truth is that this Government are beholden to their union paymasters and cannot listen to businesses. They are a Government who have taken a time machine back to the employment nightmare of the 1970s, when union barons gave Labour Ministers their marching orders.

While the Government and the unions try to refight the battles of the 1970s, the world of work is changing at a rapid rate because of artificial intelligence. AI brings many benefits, but it is also a clear and present risk to the stability of our labour markets and the livelihood of millions of people in this country. Despite their love of regulation in all other aspects of our life, this Labour Government have yet again delayed their Artificial Intelligence (Regulation) Bill, so AI is developing unchecked and changing jobs in ways that will have a long-term impact.

While businesses and workers grapple with the new reality of a 21st-century AI economy, the Government are determined to burden them with taxes and regulations from the last century, so will the Leader of the House use her considerable and proven influence to deliver a U-turn on the Employment Rights Bill before it is too late? If not, will she grant us a debate in Government time on the impact of their union-inspired tax and regulation policies on businesses? Will she bring her party back to the 21st century and grant us a debate in Government time on how we address the role of AI in the future of work?

The story of this Labour Government and their economic policies is now clear. If it moves, they tax it; if it does not move, they still tax it. If they can find a way, they send unemployment higher. If businesses warn them that things will get worse, they do not listen. If the unions want something, they give it to them. This is a Government fighting the battles of the 1970s and behaving like they are still student politicians. It is a Government making the people of this country poorer as each day passes.

[Lucy Powell]

I know the whole House will be following the unfolding events in the middle east carefully and with a great deal of concern. I assure the House that the Government are working with our partners to urge de-escalation and diplomacy, as well as continuing to engage very closely on the situation in Gaza, for aid to get in and for a sustainable ceasefire.

This week was the ninth anniversary of the murder of my and many other Members’ dear friend Jo Cox. This week we remember everything that Jo stood for—her values, her passion, and her commitment to building bridges and resolving conflict, and to international development. I send my thoughts, and I am sure the thoughts of the whole House, to Brendan, Cuillin, Lejla, Jean and Gordon, and of course to Jo’s dear younger sister, my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater), who I know Jo would have been incredibly proud of, especially in recent weeks.

It is a pleasure to be joined once again by the hon. Member for Beaconsfield (Joy Morrissey), who I have a great deal of respect for and enjoy working with. I am sure that she and I are happy to take whatever plaudits we can for the exchanges that we have at business questions, because I know that the Prime Minister and many others follow them incredibly closely. Her contribution is certainly an improvement on the normal exchanges that I have with the shadow Leader of the House, the right hon. Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman), who is not in his place today.

I accept the hon. Lady’s invitation to say a little bit about child exploitation, but I do not accept her characterisation of there being any kind of U-turn. I thank her for her tone, which is really important in these debates, because in the midst of such unforgiveable injustices, it is essential that we come together across the House to lower the temperature, and to put victims and their experiences at the centre. As a Government, we have always said that we would leave no stone unturned to uncover the truth, get justice for victims and lock up the perpetrators, which is why the Prime Minister commissioned Baroness Casey’s review in the first place.

We never ruled out returning to the issue of a national inquiry; we have always been guided by what would be the most effective way of getting the action, truth, justice and accountability in the most effective way possible. Some of those measures, including implementing the recommendations in the Jay inquiry around mandatory reporting and the introduction of new aggravated offences for grooming offenders, were included in the Crime and Policing Bill that we voted on last night. I was surprised to see Conservative Members voting against the Bill, which strengthens those measures, so perhaps they can reflect on that next time they criticise the Government.

The hon. Lady raises job creation and the economy— I happy to debate that subject with her. She did not mention the three unprecedented trade deals that we have secured. The Conservatives were once the party of the trade deal and free trade, but they seem to have set themselves against the trade deals that are already securing jobs and investment. Since we came into government, economic activity has reached a record high; we have created half a million new jobs, moving people into employment; and real wages have grown more in the 10 months since last July than they did in the 10 years of the Conservative Government, so we are happy to stand by our record on job creation and the economy.

The hon. Lady talked about the Employment Rights Bill, which is absolutely not something that this Government will be U-turning on. We are incredibly proud of giving the biggest boost in a generation to workers in this country, and it is about time too. We are giving them rights on sick pay, abolishing exploitative zero-hours contracts for the first time, as called for by many Members for a long time, and introducing fair pay agreements and many other things. in a Bill that we are incredibly proud to be delivering for this country.

Finally, in this week of all weeks, Parliament has found itself at the centre of the national debate—a place where we should always find ourselves. There are big issues at stake, globally and here at home, which Members of Parliament from all parties have been grappling with and taking decisions on to the best of their abilities, whether about the conflict in the middle east, the publication of the Casey audit, or votes on abortion and assisted dying, among many other issues. I put on record my thanks to all those across the House who have approached those issues with the respectful, non-partisan tone that they deserve.

We are all elected to this place to make hard decisions, to represent our constituents with integrity and to work in their best interests. I know that every single Member of this House takes that job incredibly seriously. However, we also have a duty not to slide into personalised, over-politicised, clickbait attacks on each other which, if we are not careful, undermine us all and democracy as a whole, and threaten the safety of individuals. I was disappointed to see that members of the shadow Cabinet were doing just that this week, and I hope they will reflect and withdraw some of the dangerous attacks that they launched, particularly as we remember Jo Cox. We have a responsibility to take the heat out of the political debate—[Interruption.] Personalised political attack lines—exactly. We have a responsibility to approach these difficult challenges with the thought, respect and humility that they deserve, and I think the whole House will want to do its job without fear or favour.