Oral Answers to Questions

Justin Madders Excerpts

Wednesday 30th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Chloe Smith]

I assure the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) that I regularly meet many disabled people and disability organisations. I am aware of this issue and the natural anxiety about rising costs felt by many who live on a fixed income. That is why the Government are already acting in the way I set out.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

10. If she will undertake an equalities impact assessment of HM Prison and Probation Service’s equality assessment for fitness testing.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (James Cartlidge)]

The HMPPS staff fitness testing policy was reviewed, updated and published in 2021. An equality impact assessment was undertaken in 2021, and it remains a live document. It will be reviewed and updated regularly as work in this area progresses. HMPPS staff networks, diversity and inclusion experts and trade unions were fully consulted during the policy review, and they contributed to the equality analysis.

[Justin Madders]

The Minister will be aware of concerns, particularly from the Prison Officers Association, that far more female officers than male officers are failing this test. Will he meet the Prison Officers Association to discuss this issue?

[James Cartlidge]

The hon. Gentleman takes a consistent interest in this point, and I am happy to mention his question to the Minister of State, Ministry of Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins). I can confirm that, since prison officer fitness testing resumed last July, 90% of female officers passed on the first attempt, and none failed by the third attempt.

Living with Covid-19

Justin Madders Excerpts

Monday 21st February 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend for that extremely interesting idea, which my right hon. Friend the Health Secretary may wish to discuss with him.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

I am not sure that the Prime Minister understands that supporting people to self-isolate is not a restriction on their freedom; it is actually what a responsible Government do. He will know that millions of people do not qualify for SSP at the moment and that without financial support they cannot self-isolate. Does he understand the invidious position that he is putting some people in?

[The Prime Minister]

Of course I understand the difficult position that some people may find themselves in, but I hope that everybody will also understand that it is our job to be responsible towards others and to avoid spreading the disease.

Sue Gray Report

Justin Madders Excerpts

Monday 31st January 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

No. I refer to what I said earlier.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

On 8 December, the Prime Minister told this House:

“I have been repeatedly assured since these allegations emerged that there was no party and that no covid rules were broken.”—[Official Report, 8 December 2021; Vol. 705, c. 372.]

Well, just who gave him those assurances? Given that he was at some of the parties, and at least one of them was in his own flat, he should not need anyone else to tell him what happened, so it looks like when the Prime Minister spoke those words he was fooling himself—or was he just trying to fool everyone else?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman needs to wait and see what the inquiry concludes. That is what due process demands. I stick by what I said.

Covid-19 Update

Justin Madders Excerpts

Wednesday 5th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I have tried to be consensual across the House—[Interruption.] I have, and I have tried to build on those aspects of our handling of covid—[Interruption.] I was very consensual to the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford), and, frankly, I thought he was rather rude.

Let me put it this way. There is much, much more that unites all parts of the UK in our handling of covid than divides us. In comparison with any other European country, we are moving virtually in lockstep. There are some baroque eccentricities in various other parts—in Wales—and I will make no comment on those, but I will repeat what I have said: we will continue to provide support throughout the UK.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

Many of my constituents who were doing the right thing and self-isolating are becoming frustrated on days six and seven because they cannot gain access to the lateral flow tests that they need to be released early, although just three weeks ago the Health Secretary told the House that the country had tens of millions of tests. Can the Prime Minister tell us what has gone wrong, and will he apologise to my constituents for putting them in this position?

[The Prime Minister]

I certainly share the frustrations of everyone who has found it difficult to get a test during a time of unbelievable demand. We have taken responsibility by tripling supply and creating our own home-grown UK lateral flow testing manufacturing capability, of which the Labour Front Bench was in unbelievable ignorance when this debate began.

G20 and COP26 World Leaders Summit

Justin Madders Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd November 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

We talk all the time to the oil and gas industry, which has a great and proud history in this country. I believe that the future for the industry—for hydrocarbons—is moving beyond the old combustion approach and towards the extraction of clean power. That is the direction in which we should be going.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

It seems that we are in the last chance saloon if we are to make an impact on limiting the effect of climate change. Does the Prime Minister share my disappointment that China and India have failed to match many other countries’ commitments to reach net zero by 2050, placing their targets 10 and 20 years later? Does he agree that if the remainder of COP26 is to be a success, we need to get some movement from them on that as well?

[The Prime Minister]

We will continue to push on the net zero dates. Although I agree with the hon. Gentleman’s characterisation of those countries’ targets, I think we also need to look at what both of them are saying about what they will do pre-2030. As the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner) pointed out, that is the key issue on which we need to focus. The Indians have now made a big commitment to decarbonising their power system by 2030, and the hon. Gentleman has heard what we have already said in the House about the Chinese commitment to “peak” CO₂ output in 2030 or before. The question is, how long before? Both those countries have made substantial progress, but obviously it is not yet enough.

Emergency Covid Contracts

Justin Madders Excerpts

Tuesday 29th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Julia Lopez]

I thank the hon. Lady for her concerns, and I wish to assure her that a link to the Conservative party was not one of the criteria that needed to be fulfilled when those PPE contracts were being undertaken.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab) [V]]

The National Audit Office report on PPE procurement made it clear that there was a lack of transparency in the documentation relating to key procurement decisions. We now know about the routine use of private emails to conduct Government business, which raises the question of whether the NAO could not find all the documentation because it was hidden away in private email accounts. Can the Minister now give us an assurance that all relevant private emails were handed over to the NAO as part of its investigations? If she cannot give us that assurance, can she ensure that all those private emails will now be passed over to the NAO?

[Julia Lopez]

In relation to the challenges we faced in trying to transparently publish all the contracts, I have set out some of the reasons for them. It was partly because a team of 450 people had to be surged across Government, and they were all working on different IT systems. Going back and trying to look at all the documentation relating to PPE has been a real challenge, and those challenges have been acknowledged in the various court cases that have been brought. I wish to assure the hon. Gentleman with regard to the emails that, in so far as freedom of information requests are made, they will be looked at in the relevant way.

Security of Ministers’ Offices and Communications

Justin Madders Excerpts

Monday 28th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Julia Lopez]

My understanding is that the general policy is that cameras are not sited within Ministers’ offices. I think this situation was an outlier in that regard, and we will have a better understanding of why it occurred once the Department’s investigation is complete.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab) [V]]

The shadow Secretary of State asked the Minister directly whether any Minister or the Prime Minister used private emails to conduct Government business, and in response the Minister basically repeated the guidelines, which seem to suggest that, yes, Ministers can use a private email and it is up to them to police themselves. Given the stench of cronyism around this Government, can she not see how that answer is completely unacceptable? All this needs to be opened up, and transparency must be the order of the day immediately.

[Julia Lopez]

My point is that it is not Ministers who make the final decisions on contracts and that important processes are gone through. There may be questions about the direction of email traffic, but the point is that every decision is scrutinised under the same process when it comes to providing covid contracts—if that is the hon. Gentleman’s concern.

Ministerial Code

Justin Madders Excerpts

Monday 26th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend makes an important point—that we all have a responsibility to learn lessons, learn from the past, do our best to make sure that we collectively maintain high standards in public life, acknowledge that there are human frailties in individuals who represent all the parties in this House and do our very best to learn from the past.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

Does the Minister know the identity of the person who gave the Prime Minister the money to pay for the refurbishment of the Downing Street flat? Either he does not know, in which case he should not be at the Dispatch Box saying there is no problem at all, or he does know, in which case he should just tell us what their name is. Can he do that now, please?

[Michael Gove]

The person who paid for the renovations in the Downing Street flat was Boris Johnson.

Lobbying of Government Committee

Justin Madders Excerpts

Wednesday 14th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

Every day, things get a little murkier. Every day, some new revelation appears that adds to the general whiff of sleaze that emanates from the Government. Rather than seeking to uphold higher standards, it seems that the Government want to underplay the importance of probity, sideline the principle of transparency, and behave as if the law does not apply to them. It starts with a friendly drink, then a cosy chat, and before we know it millions of pounds of public money is being siphoned off without any kind of open process being undertaken. Never has the phrase, “It’s not what you know, but who you know,” rung so true. Never has the path to riches been so open to a select few, and never has our democracy been so warped by an erosion of basic standards.

These revelations diminish us all in the eyes of the public. That should concern us all, regardless of political persuasion. I urge Conservative MPs who intend to vote against our motion to think about what message they are sending to their constituents. If their constituents are like mine, many will have faced massive financial hardship over the last year. I have written to Ministers about the issues affecting businesses and individuals in my constituency in relation to the covid response, but on far too many occasions I have received a disinterested generic reply six months later.

My constituents and I are disappointed when their concerns are treated with such disdain, but that disappointment turns to outrage when my constituents see that those who have the Chancellor’s mobile number have no such difficulty in getting an audience. The 3 million excluded, the health and social care staff scrabbling around for personal protective equipment, and the millions of people who have given their time to help in the fight against covid have all given so much. When they see that this crisis has been used as an opportunity by some with the right connections to line their own pockets, they are disgusted.

Ministers should remember that they are not only custodians of the public purse; they are responsible for the reputations of the Departments they oversee. One of the schemes that that special access led to was essentially payday loans for NHS employees. More thought should have been given to the implications of that. It is clear that Greensill wanted the credibility that comes from working with the NHS, in the hope that that would enhance its reputation, but what about the reputation of the NHS after being associated with such a scheme? If it is thought that pay is so low that salary advances are needed, perhaps the Government should think again about the real-terms pay cut that they propose for NHS staff.

If we are to have lobbying, we should lobby for the Prime Minister to buy a dictionary, because his definition of “independent” is very different from mine and that of most other people. There is now a pattern whereby anything tricky involving the Government sees them marking their own homework. We know what happens then: reports on bullying never see the light of day, and the breaking of the ministerial code is no longer seen as a reason for resignation. For this Prime Minister, no transgression is too big to ignore, so I say to him, show some leadership, allow independent scrutiny and clean up this rotten mess.

Covid-19: NAO Report on Government Procurement

Justin Madders Excerpts

Wednesday 9th December 2020 Westminster Hall

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Ms Eagle. As one of the people who originally asked the NAO to look into the handling of PPE contracts, I was of course extremely interested in what its report had to say. I asked for that because throughout the summer, suppliers contacted me as they were angry about being overlooked, especially given that they had put in many hours of work to get some of the contracts. Their anger turned to rage when they saw that some of the companies to which contracts had been awarded had no background in PPE and sometimes no background as a company at all. In fact, their chief qualification was a connection to the Tory party.

How did we get into that position in the first place? Of course, there was unprecedented demand, but it seems that the Government failed to heed their own warnings about the readiness of this country to deal with a pandemic. They ignored the recommendations of Exercise Cygnus and allowed the PPE stockpile that we did have to go out of date and dwindle—a dwindling stockpile, by the way, that we were paying a private company £11 million a year to sit on.

The way in which warnings were ignored created the conditions for the get-rich-quick specialists to thrive and for the taxpayer to foot the bill for overpriced PPE from people who had never sold as much as a pair of gloves the previous year. At the same time, companies with the contacts, experience and even the stock were given the run-around, so we had the scandal of doctors and nurses bringing homemade PPE to protect themselves, while British companies were selling their stock abroad because they could not get their own Government to take an interest in it. We then saw the absurd spectacle of a Secretary of State proclaiming on national television that help was on the way with a shipment of PPE from Turkey, most of which never arrived or turned out to be unusable. That was an international embarrassment that we must never let happen again.

When the Minister responds, will she set out exactly how many millions of items of PPE that were purchased either never showed up or were found to be unusable? Will she tell us how much of that has already been paid for and whether we have received any refunds? So far, I have not heard any contrition from the Government about the way in which procurement has been handled, and we need to hear some today, because the public will not forget the arrogance until long after the last person has been vaccinated.