Covid-19 Update
Kerry McCarthy Excerpts(4 years, 4 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
That is right. We will encourage people to do so, but it will not be compulsory.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
In response to my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts), who talked about the severe shortages of lateral flow tests in pharmacies, the Prime Minister was incredibly dismissive and seemed to suggest that my hon. Friend was making it all up. The Prime Minister might like to speak to my constituent who both phoned and emailed me on Monday desperate to go to work the next day as a crucial frontline NHS worker but who could not get his hands on a test. I ended up popping round myself with some spare tests. Can the Prime Minister assure me that from now on my constituent will be able to get the tests that he needs when he needs them, so that he can go to work and do his job in the NHS?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady really must not misrepresent what I said. I began by saying that I shared the frustrations of people up and down the country who had been unable to get the tests that they wanted. I also pointed out that we had huge demand for tests that we were doing our level best to meet, that we tripled supply, that we were making tests in this country on a scale never seen before, and that we were doing more testing than any other country in Europe. Those are positives. I fully accept that it has been difficult for people to get tests, but we are stepping up supply the whole time.
Oral Answers to Questions
Kerry McCarthy Excerpts(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Dominic Raab
I thank my hon. Friend for that, as he is absolutely right: those are two core drivers of reoffending. So in the White Paper we set out plans to deliver a prisoner education service that will focus not only on the big challenges we see with inmates on numeracy and literacy, but on encouraging vocational qualifications—a step up during their course in prison. We will be driving better outcomes on work by implementing dedicated employment advisers in prisons and a digital tool to match prisoners to jobs on release.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
One way of preventing reoffending would be to make sure that appropriate sentences are imposed in the first place, so what is the Minister doing to ensure that pre-sentence reports are available before prisoners are jailed or given alternative community sentences?
Dominic Raab
I do not see these things as binary opposites; we need to see robust punishment and robust deterrence. I am disappointed that Opposition Members voted against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, which would end automatic release at the halfway point. [Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) wants to vote against stronger sentences for dangerous criminals, he can stand on that record. But in answer to the hon. Lady’s question, let me say that we are looking at all the other drivers: drugs rehabilitation and, in particular, drugs recovery wings in prisons; vocational educational training; and, crucially, providing hope and the chance to get inmates into work, be it during their time in prison or while they are on licence.
Oral Answers to Questions
Kerry McCarthy Excerpts(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Elizabeth Truss
What is important is that we ensure that people are not coerced into conversion therapy, but it is also important to protect freedom of speech, the ability of adults to consent and the freedom to express the teachings of—[Interruption.] I hear Opposition Members asking whether freedom of speech is a good thing. Yes, it is.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Will Quince)
Education settings are required to make reasonable adjustments for disabled children, including those with autism, under the Equality Act 2010. The “SEND code of practice” sets out detailed guidance on meeting children’s needs. Through the new autism strategy, published in July, the Government set out our vision to make life fundamentally better for autistic people by 2026, including in education.
Kerry McCarthy
A recent report from the National Autistic Society said that a quarter of autistic children can wait more than three years to receive the extra support they need. Does the Minister agree that that is an equalities issue? What conversations will he have in the Department for Education to ensure that schools and councils get the funding that they need to carry out special educational needs and disabilities assessments and make the right provision?
Will Quince
As an Education Minister, of course I want every child to fulfil their potential. I am committed to speaking to and working with children, families, parents, carers and SEND experts, including the National Autistic Society, which I met this week as part of a stakeholder roundtable. I am always happy to listen to the voices of sector leaders and I would be happy to meet the hon. Lady.
G20 and COP26 World Leaders Summit
Kerry McCarthy Excerpts(4 years, 6 months ago)
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Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
As chair of the all-party group on small island developing states, I welcome the fact that the Prime Minister acknowledged the imminent threat to them in his statement. Two things would really help them: one is to have access to the finance that hopefully is now on the table—because, as countries with very limited resources, it is very difficult, they tell me, to get their hands on the money and to do the bids—and the other is to develop blue finance. We know that the City of London leads on green finance. Blue finance for the blue economy and marine conservation would really help them, and we could take a lead on that.
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady is completely right about the imperative to help the small island states. I must say that, at COP and in the last few months, they have been incredibly valuable in getting the world to focus—the Maldives, the Seychelles, Bangladesh, where people face catastrophic flooding, Mauritius and Barbados, which was brilliant the other day. They are helping to focus minds on the issue and attract massive sums of investment.
Oral Answers to Questions
Kerry McCarthy Excerpts(4 years, 6 months ago)
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Iain Stewart
I would be happy to meet my hon. Friend. I can tell him that an application has been submitted to the EU to lift the restrictions, based on recognising GB seed potato requirements as equivalent, and is being pursued at both a political and a technical level. We remain committed to finding a solution to allow exports to resume and will continue to press our case with the Commission. In the meantime, the temporary authorisation that allowed imports of seed potatoes from the EU expired on 30 June.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
This is just another example of the botched Brexit deal failing to take into account the needs of a small but very important industry. The industry has now completely collapsed; 30,000 tonnes of seed have not been exported and £13.5 million of trade is no longer in place. What is the Minister doing to ensure that an equivalence deal is reached with the EU as soon as possible so that trade can resume?
Iain Stewart
In addition to the points that I made in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker), I point out to the hon. Lady that there is enormous export potential around the world, particularly in China and elsewhere in Asia, for Scottish seed potatoes. I discussed the matter with the industry in Glasgow on Monday evening. There is huge potential, and we will do everything we can to help the industry to realise it.
Oral Answers to Questions
Kerry McCarthy Excerpts(4 years, 6 months ago)
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Alok Sharma
I congratulate my hon. Friend and Climate Action Wendover on all their work in encouraging climate action from local residents and businesses. Local communities across the country are playing their part in tackling climate change, and the cities, regions and built environment day at COP26 will provide a focus on local community action.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
The Minister will know that there is widespread concern about a lack of clarity, as we get so close to COP26, as to what will actually be happening at the summit and what the priorities will be. What discussions has he had with the small island developing states to make sure that their concerns are fully represented, that they have a voice at COP26 and that we come away from it with something that really helps them to meet the challenges they face?
Alok Sharma
The hon. Lady raises an incredibly important point. I have a regular dialogue with representatives of the small island developing states. I have been clear that one thing we want to do through this presidency is champion them and the developing countries that are at the frontline of climate change.
Tributes to Sir David Amess
Kerry McCarthy Excerpts(4 years, 6 months ago)
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Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
If David had been here to hear the words spoken today, he would have loved the fact that there was so much humour in people’s contributions, as well as the obvious warmth and respect for his decency. It is just so obvious how genuine the tributes are.
I knew David fairly well through working with him on animal welfare issues. All I wish to do is to quote from some of the animal welfare groups that have paid tribute to him on social media. World Animal Protection talked about his support for calls for an end to the global wildlife trade. The Dogs Trust, with which he worked to support the end to the cruel puppy-smuggling trade, said it was “devastated to hear” of his death. Animal Aid posted a picture of David calling for a ban on game-bird battery cages, saying that it was “shocked and saddened” and describing him as a “friend to animals everywhere”.
I feel particularly for the Blue Fox campaigners—the Conservative campaigners against foxhunting. When the campaign was first established, only a very few MPs on the Conservative Benches supported it, but David was so integral to it. We are now at a place where whether there could ever be a successful attempt to overturn the foxhunting ban is a bit of a moot point, because we have managed to win the debate on both sides of the House rather than just on the Opposition Benches. David was so much a part of that.
The animal welfare campaign PETA—People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals—has said it is going to add a leaf with David’s name on it to its Tree of Life memorial, which
“celebrates individuals who made a difference”.
PETA said that he “did that in spades.”
Finally, Nick Palmer wrote a lovely tribute to David. Nick was a Labour MP whose time in the House overlapped with David’s for quite some time, but he is now at Compassion in World Farming. He wrote a lovely article in which he said:
“I was especially struck by Alastair Campbell’s comment that the first thing you noticed when David entered the room was his beaming smile, and that not many of us”—
in politics—
“are remembered especially for our smiles.”
I think that is fair to say. He concluded his article by saying:
“When animal sentience is officially on the statute book, when live exports end, when cages on farms are banished to history, all of us in the animal welfare movement will celebrate—and we shall remember the quiet idealism that made Sir David help bring it all about.”
Oral Answers to Questions
Kerry McCarthy Excerpts(5 years, 1 month ago)
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Michael Gove
I thank my hon. Friend for reminding us that Yorkshire is the home of ingenuity, enterprise and creativity when it comes to responding to all sorts of crises and challenges. In Keighley, the success of the business that he identifies is one that we should all seek to emulate. He points out that sometimes companies that have been strong in one area can adjust over time to produce other products such as PPE. Some people on the Opposition side of the House have sometimes said, “This company doesn’t have a track record, so there must be something sniffy about its producing PPE.” They seem not to understand that savvy, smart Yorkshire business people can actually adapt their business models to help this country at particular times. It is called the free market, and it exemplifies the best of British and the best of Yorkshire.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab) [V]
Michael Gove
It is the case that the new Office for Environmental Protection will be in Worcester, which is to my mind an equally attractive location for civil servants and for those who will be working in that critical role. The most important thing is that we have good people, making sure that we maintain the highest environmental standards. That is what the OEP will do, but our commitment to making sure that there are high-quality civil service jobs in Bristol remains. Bristol is one of the principal locations outside London at the moment for civil service jobs, but it is only right that other areas, not least in the west midlands and Teesside, as well as Worcester, benefit, because let’s face it, when we have brilliant Mayors such as Ben Houchen in Tees Valley and Andy Street in the west midlands, making a superb case for locations such as Darlington and, indeed, for Wolverhampton, it would be foolish not to pay attention to their brilliant advocacy and to hope—who knows—that they might be re-elected in forthcoming polls.
Covid-19: Road Map
Kerry McCarthy Excerpts(5 years, 2 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
I think my right hon. Friend speaks for many people in the country when he says that. We do have a very tough regime on international travel—one of the toughest in the world—and we will certainly be making sure we learn all the lessons we need to about the early handling of the pandemic.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab) [V]
Events and exhibitions companies in my constituency are still struggling to get any support for lost business. The fact that they are not customer facing means that they do not get the retail, hospitality and leisure grant. The fact that they have not actually been forced to close, although they service businesses that have, means that they have lost out on the council’s now closed local restrictions support grant. They are not arts organisations as such, so they do not get the Arts Council funding, and the advice and guidance that is being given to local councils about what grants they should be giving to the events and exhibitions sector is incredibly vague and inconsistent. What reassurance can the Prime Minister give me that, in the Chancellor’s Budget next week, there will finally be help for those companies, like the ones in my constituency, that are absolutely on their last legs?
The Prime Minister
I am acutely conscious of the businesses that have fallen through the cracks, as it were—wholesalers, for instance, that have found it difficult to qualify under one scheme or another—and we are doing absolutely everything we can to make sure that we give the support that people want. There is extra discretionary funding available for councils to support such businesses, and the hon. Member will be hearing more, certainty from the Chancellor next week.
Oral Answers to Questions
Kerry McCarthy Excerpts(5 years, 3 months ago)
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Will Quince
The female employment rate is at 72% and the female unemployment rate is at 4.7%. This is an issue we take incredibly seriously, not least the Minister for Employment, my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Sussex (Mims Davies), who leads on this important work. I will, of course, study the report carefully, as will the Minister for Employment.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
The Minister for Women and Equalities (Elizabeth Truss)
Tomorrow is the International Day of Women and Girls in Science and, as we build back better, we want to see a new generation of female tech and science entrepreneurs. Promoting science, technology, engineering and maths among girls is vital to this. Since 2010, 31% more girls and 34% more women are studying these subjects at A-level and university respectively. We are building on that programme with STEM ambassadors to encourage even more girls and women to come forward.
Kerry McCarthy [V]
Many disabled people, and their carers too, are still in receipt of legacy benefits, which means they are not getting the £20 uplift that universal credit claimants have been getting. Does the Minister agree that that is discriminatory and needs to be addressed?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Will Quince)
I thank the hon. Lady for her question. I appreciate that many people are facing financial disruption due to the pandemic, which is why the Government have put an unprecedented package of support in place. Legacy benefits were increased by 1.7% last year and will increase by 0.5% from April, in line with prices.