Functioning of Government
Margaret Greenwood Excerpts(1 year, 10 months ago)
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Michael Ellis
I recommend that the hon. Gentleman awaits the statement that is due from the Prime Minister shortly.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
The Minister will be aware that our constituents contact us about extremely important matters when they have explored every other avenue to get a resolution to their problems, and we then write to Ministers on their behalf. I am concerned on their behalf about what this situation means, not only for the casework that we have already sent to Ministers, some of which is of extreme importance for people’s health and survival, but for future casework. It is untenable that the Prime Minister should stay on until the autumn, so will the Minister please explain how we can have a situation where there is no functioning Government but the Prime Minister thinks that he can stay on?
Michael Ellis
There is a functioning Government and a functioning civil service, which will continue to do its duty in supporting the operation and functionality of the state as it always has.
Oral Answers to Questions
Margaret Greenwood Excerpts(3 years, 5 months ago)
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Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
Julia Lopez
The National Audit Office set out a number of recommendations that we will be looking into, but the idea that we did not need to contract under emergency terms during the pandemic is inaccurate, and there are rules in place to allow us to do that. We have been slow to publish contracts because we experienced some problems, which I set out in the Westminster Hall debate last week, but we now have 100% of those contracts for the relevant bodies.
Margaret Greenwood [V]
The Good Law Project estimates that £1.6 billion-worth of contracts for covid-19 services have yet to be published, and details of contracts are consistently being published late. This is despite the fact that there is a legal requirement for those details to be published no more than 30 days after the contract is awarded. The Government are clearly failing in their duties. What is the Minister going to do to improve transparency in Government procurement?
Julia Lopez
We have now published in full all the contracts for personal protective equipment. There are some difficulties in doing that, which, as I say, I set out last week in the Westminster Hall debate. This week we have launched a Green Paper on public procurement, and we will be introducing a number of changes to our existing procurement regime when the transition period is over, which will improve the way we do things in future.
Covid-19: Winter Plan
Margaret Greenwood Excerpts(3 years, 5 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is right to say that that has been a problem; but in fact, more people have been self-isolating than is sometimes supposed or alleged, and they have done a great thing. We have instituted means-tested payments to help support those who are isolating, but what will now really change things are the lateral flow tests, which we hope will enable someone to have a shorter period of quarantine. They will not have to stick to the full 14 days, and they can get a rapid turnaround test—a lateral flow test—after a much shorter period. That is what we are aiming for.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab) [V]
The Government have failed to make provision for the delivery of remote education to pupils who live in a household where someone is clinically extremely vulnerable. A number of my constituents are suffering from extreme anxiety as a result, as they do their best to keep their family safe. Some are even considering home schooling, despite the fact that their children love their schools. Will the Prime Minister respond to their concerns and ensure that in his new guidance, no family is put under unnecessary stress in such a way?
The Prime Minister
I assure all the parents who are coping with exceptionally difficult circumstances and trying to do the best for their kids when it is very stressful and they have the difficulty of knowing whether to send them to school that it is much better to send them to school if they possibly can. We have distributed, I think, hundreds of thousands of laptops to help pupils to learn remotely throughout the summer. We continue to support catch-up and top-up learning for vulnerable kids, particularly via one-on-one tuition. I want to see every child supported, and that applies, as the hon. Lady rightly says, to the children of families who are facing particular difficulties.
Oral Answers to Questions
Margaret Greenwood Excerpts(3 years, 6 months ago)
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Simon Hart
It would be remiss of me not to give a substantial name-check to Rhyl, having given one to Wrexham—that would seem unfair. I agree with my hon. Friend’s position and the basis of his question. National league funding in England has come up with significant funds, which should be replicated in Wales. We will certainly do anything we can to get money channelled into the sport to see it through this difficult time.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Wales (Simon Hart)
On top of the £5 billion guarantee given to the Welsh Government, we have provided an additional £1.96 billion in direct support to businesses in Wales and protected over 400,000 Welsh jobs. We have also extended the £1 million annual investment allowance to stimulate investment in UK manufacturing.
Margaret Greenwood [V]
Several of my constituents work at the Airbus plant in Broughton in north Wales. In July, it was announced that more than 1,400 jobs would be cut there and earlier this month we heard that there could be more than 400 compulsory redundancies. This is a time of immense uncertainty for the aerospace sector, so what action is the Secretary of State taking to work with the Welsh Government and the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to ensure that my constituents’ jobs are secure?
Simon Hart
The hon. Lady appropriately points out the cross-border implication of the effect of coronavirus on Airbus, and I am very aware of that. That is why we are working together with the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the Welsh Government, other stakeholders and, in particular, with Airbus, which has been incredibly co-operative, forward-looking and—I would like to think—grateful for the support already given by the Chancellor to it in particular and to the industry. The plan is to ensure that there is a future for Airbus at Broughton not only for the next few months but for the next few years. All the planning is about having a sustainable business over a long period of time in addition to seeing people through this immediate period with the most limited amount of hardship that we can achieve.
Defence
Margaret Greenwood Excerpts(3 years, 10 months ago)
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Johnny Mercer
I launched the veterans’ gateway app on 1 May. We are going through a process of working with users and so on to make it more user-friendly. That is an ambition of mine: to put veterans’ care in the palm of every single veteran in this country. We will have a formal event and I would be delighted if the hon. Gentleman came with me to that event. We can then look at the figures together and perhaps work on getting the app into more people’s pockets as we go.
The following is an extract from Defence questions on Monday 6 July 2020.
Margaret Greenwood [V]
The Minister said that the veterans’ gateway app will put veterans’ care in the palm of every veteran in the country. Will he tell us what estimate his Department has made of the number of veterans who do not have a smartphone and what his Department is doing to reach them?
Johnny Mercer
It is a completely fair point that many of our veterans are of an age group who will not be digitally able to access this app. The app was never designed to be something that is all encompassing. It is simply another measure in the suite of options that we are offering to veterans in this country to make sure that this is the best country in the world in which to be an armed forces veteran. There is a whole host of other ways of looking after our veterans, such as breakfast clubs that we all get involved in. When this app does come out, I will be looking at ways to make it even more user-friendly, particularly to our older veterans, to whom we owe such a great debt.
[Official Report, 6 July 2020, Vol. 678, c. 651.]
Letter of correction from the Minister for Defence People and Veterans, the hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer):
An error has been identified in the response I gave to the hon. Member for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood).
The correct response should have been:
Oral Answers to Questions
Margaret Greenwood Excerpts(3 years, 10 months ago)
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Janet Daby (Lewisham East) (Lab)
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr Alister Jack)
I would like to take a few moments to pay tribute to Glasgow’s emergency services for the enormous courage they showed in dealing with last week’s shocking knife attack. Our thoughts are with all those who were caught up in that terrible incident. In particular, I know that the whole House will join me in wishing Constable David Whyte a speedy recovery from the injuries he sustained in trying to help others.
I have regular discussions with my Cabinet colleagues, including the Chancellor, on all aspects of the impact of the coronavirus pandemic in Scotland. As we emerge from tackling this global crisis, we are determined to get Britain’s economy back firing on all cylinders, and as we do, protecting people’s health remains our top priority. However, just as we entered lockdown together, the best way to ensure the recovery of our economy is by working together across the United Kingdom.
Margaret Greenwood [V]
Unemployment very often causes misery and can lead to a downward spiral of opportunity. With the unemployment rate in Scotland the highest in the UK, what steps will the Secretary of State take to protect and create jobs in Scotland?
Mr Jack
The unemployment rate is going up faster than anywhere else in the United Kingdom, and we are proving in Scotland to be slower at reopening our economy—something I regret. It is important that we get our economy reopened as quickly as possible, because that is the best way to save jobs. As I say, we are currently supporting almost 800,000 jobs through the self-employment support scheme and through the job retention scheme. It is important that once we get back to near-normal, our economy bounces back as quickly as possible. The best way to achieve that is to keep money in people’s pockets, and the 80% furlough has done just that.
Strengthening Families
Margaret Greenwood Excerpts(6 years, 3 months ago)
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Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Buck. I congratulate the hon. Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) on securing the debate. It is a great pleasure to speak for the Opposition in what has been an interesting discussion covering a wide range of important issues. I was particularly pleased to hear many speakers talk of the importance of the role of fathers and the value to families of supporting prisoners.
The hon. Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy) focused on child mental health provision, describing its inadequacy as a “burning injustice”. It was interesting to hear him talk about his childhood experiences and the phrase, “It takes a whole village to raise a child.” That very usefully broadened the discussion out, away from a focus purely on families and on to the broader range of support that is needed.
I was somewhat surprised by the claim made by the hon. Member for Congleton that family breakdown is the root cause of poverty. As the hon. Member for Glasgow North West (Carol Monaghan) explained, poverty is the root cause of family breakdown. It is important that we keep that in mind.
Fiona Bruce
The problem is that, for too long, successive Governments have ignored the fact that family breakdown is a root cause of poverty. We have given many examples of that today, and we cannot get away from that fact.
Margaret Greenwood
I notice the hon. Lady says it is “a” root cause, which is a helpful context, but we cannot get away from the power of poverty to damage family relationships. We all know that from our own lives and our surgeries, and it is important that we bear that in mind.
“A Manifesto to Strengthen Families” was published by a group of Conservative MPs and peers in September 2017. I agree with some of the recommendations of course—who would argue against the Government focusing on promoting healthy relationships as one way to tackle the country’s mental health crisis? Of course that is important, as is the proposal to create family hubs to co-locate superb early years health services and services that offer help for parents with children across various age ranges. That is exactly what the highly successful Sure Start programme, introduced by the previous Labour Government, does. Why, then, have more than 1,200 Sure Start centres been closed since 2010? That is a severe reduction in essential support for many parents. Do the Government recognise that the closure of Sure Starts was a mistake? Perhaps they are too embarrassed to say so and want to introduce them under another name. If they do, that will be fantastic. Please do.
The manifesto might have more credibility if it were not for the damage being done to families by the Government’s policies. For example, the manifesto calls on the Government to encourage every local authority to work with voluntary and private sector partners to deliver family hubs. However, local councils are being forced to cope with deep cuts to their budgets, and the cuts are having a detrimental effect on family life. Children’s services will face a £2 billion funding gap by 2020, yet in the recent draft local government finance settlement, no extra money was committed for children’s services, despite a 124% rise over the past 10 years in the number of inquiries where local authorities believe a child may be suffering, or is likely to suffer, significant harm. The number of children needing child protection plans has increased by more than 23,000 in the same period.
In my own area of Merseyside, local authorities in Liverpool, Wirral and Knowsley have worked with the Merseyside police service to establish early health hubs to support families with complex needs. However, the police service is concerned that the level of cuts it is coping with means that it is becoming increasingly reactive rather than proactive.
It is important that we think carefully about how we talk about families, when we consider the many types of families that exist: single parents, widows, widowers and kinship carers, for example.
Fiona Bruce
I want to be absolutely clear that when we talk about family hubs, we say that they should be open to all families. There is no exclusivity. It is really important to make that clear in this debate.
Margaret Greenwood
I thank the hon. Lady for her clarification.
The coalition Government introduced the marriage allowance in April 2015, supposedly to support families. Couples with an overall income of more than £55,000 can benefit from the marriage allowance, but is that a priority when there is so much need elsewhere? Child poverty is increasing, 4 million children are growing up in poverty and two thirds of those are in working households. In some parts of Birmingham and London, more than 50% of children are growing up in poverty. The Child Poverty Action Group estimates that the cuts to universal credit will push 1 million more children into poverty by 2020, along with an extra 900,000 adults.
The coalition Government abolished the statutory targets for reducing poverty set by the previous Labour Government, along with the child poverty unit that the Labour Government set up to co-ordinate policy across Government to meet those targets. Instead, the coalition substituted measures of life chances. The Work and Pensions Secretary at that time repeated in February last year his belief that
“family breakdown is a big driver of UK poverty as children in families that break apart are more than twice as likely to be living in long term poverty. When couples break up, children suffer and poverty in the family is often not far behind.”
That ignores the reality that, in many families, poverty places great strain on relationships. Research by Relate, Relationships Scotland and Marriage Care found that a significant number of people cited financial problems as a reason for the break-up of long-term relationships. Debt creates real problems for families.
A recent study by the Institute for Fiscal Studies showed that one in four of Britain’s poorest households is falling behind with debt payments or spending more than a quarter of its monthly income on repayments. That is why the Opposition strongly believe that families in debt should be given breathing space to sort out a debt problem once they contact an agency such as StepChange to ask for help. We will press that as an amendment to the Financial Guidance and Claims Bill.
It is hard to credit that after repeated cuts to social security since 2010 the Government could seriously claim to support families. Child benefit, like most working age benefits, is frozen until 2020, yet inflation is over 3%, and food prices in December were over 4% higher than a year earlier.
The families manifesto calls for the marriage allowance to be increased for lower-income couples with children. It calls for those claiming universal credit and entitled to marriage allowance to receive the allowance automatically, and for the remaining couple penalties in universal credit to be removed. Is that really a priority when a fifth of people claiming universal credit still do not receive payment in full on time, and when more than one in 10 do not receive even partial payment on time?
Parents who find their claim for childcare delayed because the universal credit online system cannot validate the notepaper used for receipts might wonder how serious the Government are about supporting families and children. Parents with two children claiming tax credits, or the equivalent in universal credit, who find that a new baby is on the way and who will not qualify, will similarly be surprised at the Government’s claims, as will families claiming universal credit and earning more than £7,400 a year, whose children will no longer qualify for free school meals. That £7,400 is hardly a high income.
Only last week new Government statistics on the benefit cap revealed that 72% of households capped were single parent families, and 77% of those families had a young child under five. So will the Minister explain how the Government will support those families, who will doubtless experience increased difficulties in paying their bills as a direct result of Government policy?
The High Court ruled in July that imposing the benefit cap on single parent families with children aged two or under was unlawful. The judge in that case said that the mothers are not workshy,
“but find it, because of the care difficulties, impossible to comply with the work requirement.”
He went on to say,
“Real misery is being caused to no good purpose.”
It is clear that that is not supporting families.
Single parent families have been hit especially hard by cuts to social security since 2010, delivering real hardship to parents and their children. An independent study for the Equality and Human Rights Commission on the long-term impact of tax and welfare changes between 2010 and 2017 found that lone parents are set to lose around 15% of their net income on average: almost £1 in every £6. It is important that the Government recognise and value all family types. One in four families in the UK is a single parent family, so it is important that they are valued as much as any other family. Stigmatising single parent families is unacceptable and highly damaging.
Social policy needs to take into account all the family types that I have mentioned. The Government have failed to do that in the case of the bedroom tax, for example. Where parents have separated or divorced, the parent who is not the main carer is not allowed to claim for an extra room for children. Fathers are particularly badly affected by that. Labour would abolish the bedroom tax. I know that that is not the Government’s position, but will the Minister look at addressing the impact of the bedroom tax on separated and divorced parents and their children as a matter of real urgency? Many Members have spoken about the importance of fathers, but if a father cannot spend quality time with his children at the weekend simply because somebody has to sleep on the settee, that is not good enough.
Where relationships unfortunately break down, it is clear that the changes to the child maintenance system have not succeeded in supporting parents caring for children or in enabling parents to reach agreement themselves.
The families manifesto calls for the Government to promote healthy relationships to tackle the country’s mental health crisis, yet we know that mental health services are under extreme pressure and that trusts are finding it difficult to recruit key mental health staff. According to a study by the King’s Fund published in January, approximately 10% of all posts in specialist mental health services in England are vacant. Its survey of trusts found a pattern of high vacancy rates, with difficulties recruiting child and adolescent psychiatrists in particular. High staff turnover is currently leaving 4% fewer mental health nurses employed each year. All MPs are aware of the strain that child and adolescent mental health services across the country are under and of the impact that that has in terms of our young people not being able to access the support that they need and being asked to wait for an exceptional length of time and, in some instances, to make unacceptable journeys to get help when it becomes available.
Fiona Bruce
The hon. Lady omits to mention the recent announcement made by the Government to invest substantially in mental health support, including for school-age children, through schools.
Margaret Greenwood
I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention.
The families manifesto also states that the drug strategy board should look at how parents can be supported to prevent addiction to drugs and alcohol from developing in young people. Obviously, we all want to support people going through such difficult experiences in their families, but the families listening to this debate who live in areas where drug crime is a real problem will be distraught at the Government’s failure to provide adequate funding for our police and will be acutely aware of the loss of the 21,000 police officers and 6,000 police community support officers since 2010.
Michael Tomlinson
It is very depressing to see the hon. Lady in splendid isolation reading out a party political rant. It is tempting to step up to intervene. She and her party voted but yesterday against a £450 million increase for our police officers and yet she continues to read that out.
Margaret Greenwood
Our position was that the money the Government are providing is not nearly enough. That was the point. [Interruption.] I am very unhappy that the hon. Gentleman is not even looking at me when I respond to his point. He says I am making a party political point, but I can tell him that I can think of areas in my constituency where people are really frightened about drug problems. They speak to me about the loss of police and police community support officers. It is a real issue. The lack of funding to police forces is devastating. We have lost 1,000 police officers since 2010 on Merseyside; that is 1,000 police officers no longer on the beat. I think I am entitled to make the point that the Government should fund the police properly if we are to support families in supporting people at risk of coming into touch with drugs and alcohol—and particularly with drugs and illegal substances. Families in the areas concerned desperately want the police to be properly funded so that they can feel safe in their own homes.
Reductions in local authority funding have also meant that youth services, for example, have been decimated. Parents in my constituency say to me, “Where are the youth services? We need them. Why are the Government cutting funding for those things?” It is important that there are activities for young people to do.
Fiona Bruce
The hon. Lady is looking through the wrong end of the telescope. The whole point of what we are talking about is prevention—strengthening family life to reduce the drug-related problems that the police would have to deal with. It is about encouraging families to relate to one another and their young people, so that young people do not always have to look outside the family for enjoyable activities—although I do not say they should not do that. The Labour party always talks about dealing with problems after the event, rather than getting to what I repeat is the root cause. Strengthening family life would prevent problems from occurring in the first place.
Margaret Greenwood
I understand the focus on family life, but it is acceptable to look at the effect of policing cuts. When constituents are going to their MP and pleading for support, saying they do not feel safe, we have a duty to reflect that. It is important.
The Labour Government took hundreds of thousands of children out of poverty, but research published late last year by the Institute for Fiscal Studies shows that the number of people living in poverty will soar to a record 5.2 million over the next five years because the Government’s social security cuts are biting deepest on households with young families. As the IFS said, the benefit freeze, the introduction of universal credit, and cuts to tax credits will mean a surge in child poverty, and the steepest increases will be in the most deprived parts of the country. That will have an impact on family cohesion and relationships.
Universal credit was introduced to smooth the transition into work and lift people out of poverty, but since 2010 work allowances and the taper rate have been cut. Today the Work and Pensions Committee report on universal credit has highlighted the Government’s inability to provide evidence that universal credit will enable more people to find work. I am talking about the full range of people: not just single unemployed people, but disabled people, single parents, carers and the self-employed, who are now claiming universal credit as the full service is rolled out. Ministers continually refer to statistics that cover only single unemployed claimants with no children; that is a strange focus if the Government are committed to supporting families.
It is important to consider the impact of the cuts to work allowances, because so many people on low incomes are in insecure work. Low pay and zero-hours contracts have an impact on the family life of hundreds of thousands of people. They make life extremely difficult for parents who have to pick up children from school or childcare, or arrange childcare in the first place. It is difficult to do that if someone is on a zero-hours contract. It is easy to highlight the importance of active fatherhood in a child’s life, as the manifesto does, but research by the TUC, published last summer, showed clearly that some employers seek to prevent fathers and mothers from taking time off for family emergencies.
I was surprised to hear the hon. Member for Congleton claim that family breakdown is the biggest social problem affecting the nation today. I would suggest that there are a number of contenders for that. My personal view is that the Government’s privatisation of the national health service will lead to the biggest social crisis in this country within memory. [Interruption.] Conservative Members may groan or laugh, but that is the case. There is so much evidence. I wish that they would look at what is happening in their constituencies, to verify it. The Government are also failing to tackle the housing crisis. Young people in their 20s and 30s are reluctant to start their own families, because they cannot find anywhere to live, and still live with their parents. In addition there is the Government’s failure to tackle the scourge of low pay and insecure work.
To conclude, there have been some sensible suggestions in the debate, which I welcome, but there is a danger, in focusing on couple relationships, of ignoring the reality that there are many different types of family—and Government policy must reflect that.
Margaret Greenwood
No. I have given way plenty, thank you.
The manifesto has some important threads to it, but in some places it reads like some sort of fairy tale, ignoring the impact of Government policy since 2010 and the way it has made life so much harder for many families, especially those on low incomes.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Oliver Dowden)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Buck, and it was a pleasure to have Mr Bone as our Chair prior to your arrival.
When we go to someone’s funeral, it is rare that people talk about that person’s educational or career successes. They certainly, as my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) said, do not talk about the money that person made during their lifetime. Almost always, the eulogy centres on the family. People want to be remembered for the family—for their contribution to family life and the stable family life that they built. Families are at the centre of all our individual lives. They provide us with a sense of stability, security and purpose, sustaining us through times of emotional, health and financial difficulty, and providing us with a sense of place and fulfilment. We all experience families in different ways throughout our lives, as children to our parents, as parents or indeed grandparents as we grow older, as partners or through our extended relationships. To answer a point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne), of course we all know that modern families are not all two parents with two children. It has been established during the debate that it is not helpful to stigmatise people who do not conform to that measure, and I do not think anyone suggests we should do so.
As a dad with two young children, I know the importance of strong families and the role that families play in children’s development—not only physical development but cognitive, emotional and social development. I completely agree with the attitude of my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy) towards television and social media for children. The decline in the practice of children sitting at the table to eat with the family has profound consequences. When children eat with the family they learn many soft skills such as conversational ability and table manners that put them at an advantage and help them succeed throughout life. I certainly agree about playing games: my family like Articulate! My six-year-old already beats me at Cluedo so I am giving up on that one. I shall resist the temptation to speculate on games that members of the Cabinet might choose to play.
For all the reasons I have given, it is, for me and certainly for my party and the Government, families and not the state that form the cornerstone of our society. That is why families are at the heart of Government policy and why I am so pleased to have the opportunity to respond to the debate on behalf of the Government. It is an important issue, and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) said, it is also a cross-cutting issue where responsibilities lie with a number of different Departments. As a Minister in the Cabinet Office, which has responsibility for co-ordinating cross-Government work and policy, I am responding to this wide-ranging debate on behalf of the Government. Within the Cabinet Office, we are continually looking at ways to measure the impact of policies in relation to the family. We currently analyse that impact through mechanisms such as the implementation unit, which falls within my brief. That is a central part of the initiative.
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for securing the debate. I know what a strong campaigner she is on the importance of families, and how much of her parliamentary career she has devoted to championing the cause. That was demonstrated once again by her passionate speech today. I also pay tribute to all hon. Members who were involved in drawing up the “Manifesto to Strengthen Families”. I know that she chaired a roundtable on Tuesday with our hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) and David Burrowes. I join my hon. Friends in paying tribute to Mr Burrowes. He was a neighbour when he served as Member of Parliament for Enfield, Southgate and he is completely and passionately committed to this cause.
I am very familiar with this cause from my time working for the former Prime Minister. My hon. Friend the Member for Congleton mentioned “Breakthrough Britain”. I well remember that report and its impact and the significant contributions, not just from David Burrowes, but people such as Dr Samantha Callan, who are very committed to this project. For me, the statistic that brought it home during the debate is that children are more likely to have a smartphone than a father at home. What does that say about our values as a society if that is the case?
Margaret Greenwood
When the Minister is talking about values as a society, will he set out for us what his Government are going to do to tackle child poverty, which is set to rise to 5 million?
Oliver Dowden
As the hon. Lady has raised the point now, I am happy to talk about it. It was certainly my experience growing up that my dad losing his job at a wire factory had the single biggest impact on our family finances and our family life. It put the greatest strain on our family. I am very proud to serve in a Government under which more than 2 million new jobs have been created—that is hundreds of thousands of households where children grow up seeing their parents going out to work and having the stability and security of a wage packet.
That achievement stands alongside a range of measures that we have taken—for example, we are the first Government to introduce a national living wage. We are also cutting people’s taxes so they keep more of what they earn. We have essentially doubled the tax-free allowance, meaning that anybody working 30 hours a week on the minimum wage pays no tax at all. In addition to that, universal credit reforms pioneered by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith), the former Work and Pensions Secretary, have had a tremendous impact. When I visit jobcentres in my own constituency, I see the enthusiasm that people working there have because they know that we finally have a policy that genuinely incentivises people from welfare into work. We have a record of which we can be proud.
I did not want to descend into party political points at this early stage, but I would note on the issue of the so-called privatisation of the health service that I do not see how that accords with the tremendous increase in funding we have provided for the NHS.
Ms Karen Buck (in the Chair)
Order. Before the hon. Lady intervenes, I would remind Members that this is not a debate about the health service.
Oliver Dowden
I will give way in just one moment. Record numbers of operations are being performed on the NHS, record numbers of people are seeing GPs, and record numbers of people are being seen in A&E. We have committed an extra £8 billion in this Parliament and another £6 billion was committed in the Budget to the NHS. I will give way, and then I must move on.
Margaret Greenwood
I thank the Minister for giving way and I take on board your comment, Ms Buck, but I would say that the debate is cross-departmental and the document does refer to health. Accountable care systems or integrated care systems are suggesting bundling together budgets for the hospitals, the GPs, community health, public health and local authority spending of one area—Wirral, for example—and potentially giving that to one private provider. We have seen what happened with Carillion, so there is clearly a huge risk in taking that kind of approach. I would say that if that leads to the privatisation of the national health service, it will have a devastating effect on families.
Ms Karen Buck (in the Chair)
I call the Minister, and I would stress my earlier point to him as well.
Oliver Dowden
I thank you for that warning, Ms Buck. I will deal with the comment in one sense and move on to the substance of the manifesto.
There is virtue in integrating services, The sort of thing that is being pioneered in Manchester, where we bring together different services—it is in fact being pioneered by a Labour Mayor, in conjunction with the former Chancellor’s measures—is, I think, a way of improving health outcomes.
I will now move on to the specific measures in the manifesto, which form part of broader Government policy. For example, there is the important matter of education. There are now 1.9 million children in good or outstanding schools, which is a record number. My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford raised some important points about mental health. As was recognised, we are investing £1.4 billion in mental health services for children and young people, and we have set up a scheme in schools to raise awareness and help them to know how to deal with individuals in schools suffering from mental health issues. We have published a Green Paper to set out our plans to transform mental health services in schools. My hon. Friend made an important point about the need for a holistic, family approach to mental health, and hopefully the Green Paper will be a starting point.
As I said, a route into meaningful work is very important for improving children’s life chances. We now know that nearly three quarters of children from workless households moved out of poverty when their parents entered full-time work. That means 608,000 fewer children are living in workless households.
Before moving on to the contents of the manifesto, I would like to try to address some of the points raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton. The importance of champions for the family in Government was raised by several Members. As a starting point, I know that the Prime Minister is personally committed to this—she is the principal champion of families. We have already discussed the other Ministers with family responsibilities, but I have certainly heard the point about a specific, designated family Cabinet Minister loud and clear, and I will relay that to my colleagues in Government.
My hon. Friend the Member for Congleton raised the DAD scheme. I understand from my officials that the Department for Education has funded a range of family advice and support services since 2008, including Family Matters, which runs the website called DAD. The service is well used and is valued by its users. Ministers at DFE are considering the future requirements for the next financial year, so it is under active consideration. I am sure the representations made by my hon. Friend will have been heard loud and clear. On children’s centres, an important point was raised about family hubs. Clearly, local authorities have responsibility for children’s centres and they are free to pioneer family hubs. As my hon. Friend said, a great number are already doing so. She highlighted Westminster and the Isle of Wight. I would urge other councils to consider doing so.
My hon. Friend made an excellent representation on a transformation fund. Sadly, it is entirely beyond my remit to make public spending commitments, but I am sure the Chancellor will take note, particularly regarding the £90 million in dormant bank accounts. On the statutory duty to have the father’s name on birth certificates, it is worth noting that 94% of birth certificates already have the father’s name there, so we are making progress.
On relationships education, which came up in a number of contributions, the call for evidence is out at the moment. Some passionate pleas were made. I would urge hon. Members to respond to that call for evidence—I believe it closes on Monday. That is the route for formulating policy in that area. Again, I think a valuable point was made about the need for an annual statement on strengthening families and that is again something I will relay to my right hon. Friends in Government.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford talked about Home-Start, which is very important. I have looked into it very briefly, and I believe that comes under the local transformation plans that we put in place in 2014-15. There is an opportunity, as part of those plans, to provide for such schemes, but I will write to him further on that point.
Let me turn to the substance of the debate: this excellent manifesto. The Government introduced the family test in 2014 to bring a family perspective into policy making. It helps to ensure that the impact on family relationships and functioning, both positive and negative, is recognised in the process of policy development, and it informs policy decisions made by Ministers. We introduced the test to ensure that, across Government, we think carefully about the potential for new policies to support or undermine family relationships. The Implementation Unit has a role in ensuring that the family test is implemented. The test means that families are considered at the start of any new policy development.
Margaret Greenwood
How would the two-child policy, under which families are disincentivised to have a third child, measure up to the family test?
Oliver Dowden
The whole point of the two-child policy is that people on benefits should be subject to the same restraints as people who go out to work. Anyone who goes out to work has to think carefully about whether they can afford to have more children, and many people choose not to have a third or fourth child. All the policy does is to replicate that in the benefits system by ensuring a cap at two children. It is a perfectly sensible policy with which many members of the public completely agree.
Oliver Dowden
I really need to make progress, and I do not want this to become a two-way, Conservative-versus-Labour debate.
On the point about spending on childcare, I have already talked about the role of parents in children’s development. Children from less advantaged backgrounds are already behind in their learning by the time they start school, and high-quality early learning from the age of two can help us to close that gap. Parents have a vital role to play in their child’s development. Evidence suggests that, aside from maternal education, the home-learning environment is the single biggest influence on a child’s vocabulary at the age of three. That is why we have committed £5 million to trial evidence-based home-learning environment support programmes in the north of England—my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton referred to them. They will focus on early language learning and literacy. We are currently running a procurement exercise to identify an external organisation to work with us in delivering that trial.
The primary purpose of providing free early learning places for two-year-olds is to improve outcomes for children. We want to make it as easy as possible for children to benefit from early education. One of the interesting initiatives in that area is community-based nurseries, at which parents volunteer in return for lower childcare fees. Disadvantaged families are helped through the lower cost of childcare, and they learn parental skills by working in the nurseries. A number of those trials have already happened with voluntary organisations, and they have had very positive outcomes.
The “Manifesto to Strengthen Families” also recommended that relationship education should be extended online, with a dedicated campaign and virtual platform. The Government want to help all schools to deliver high-quality relationships education and relationships and sex education to ensure that pupils are taught about healthy and respectful relationships, and that they stay safe and are equipped with the knowledge they need to prepare for adult life. I completely agree that it needs to cover concepts such as commitment, respect and safety. Of course, marriage is a perfect example of all those things. I urge hon. Members to make sure their views are heard as part of that consultation process, because that evidence will shape draft statutory guidance and regulations, which will be subject to further consultation later this year. There will be many opportunities for hon. Members to have an input into that process.
In December, the Government published our social mobility action plan, which set out our ambition to close the word gap in early years. It is a clear direction for all those that have a part to play, including children’s centres. Our focus is on delivering that ambition. We welcome the development of family hubs as one way to meet local needs. We believe that local councils are best placed to understand local needs, so if they believe there should be a family hub, they should be free to set one up.
This excellent manifesto also focused on health. The Government are already working to reduce health inequalities by addressing the social causes of ill-health, promoting healthier lifestyles and tackling differences in outcomes of NHS services. We are doing that in a number of ways. We are investing more than £16 billion over the current spending period to support local public health services. That action is being led locally to ensure that the solutions reflect the needs of individual communities. Local authorities can also commission a range of children’s public health programmes that support women in pregnancy through childbirth and support children from early years through to adolescence. Clinical commissioning groups and local authorities are responsible for commissioning services to meet the needs of their local populations. As part of that, we also need to look at mental health. The Government are committed to parity between mental and physical health, which has been one of the challenges in our health service for successive Governments.
The manifesto contains an excellent recommendation about maternity services and maximising the involvement of fathers. Perhaps I can call myself a new dad—I was certainly there at the birth of my two children. There really are some excellent maternity services now. I was at a midwife-led unit at Watford General Hospital, just outside my constituency, and I saw how helpful it is to have a dedicated room in which the birth takes place with en suite facilities. That helps the father to be involved. That is why the Government have provided more than £37 million of capital funding since 2013 to support maternity services and to create safe, family-friendly environments. That includes increased provision of facilities in labour and post natal units, such as double beds, reclining chairs—which can be converted to beds for partners to rest in, especially overnight, and remain with their partner and new-born children—en suite toilets, new birthing pools, and dedicated family rooms.
The manifesto also raised the important issue of couples therapy. When children arrive it is a time of great happiness, but it can put a tremendous amount of strain on relationships, so it is important that we focus resources at that stage. The NHS already offers couple-based therapy as part of its Improving Access to Psychological Therapies programme.
On drug addiction, many hon. Members eloquently made the point that families play an absolutely central part in helping people through that very challenging time in their lives. At a national level, we have extended the troubled families programme to help local areas to ensure that their services have an integrated, whole-family approach. The programme now specifically supports families with younger children and those with a broader range of problems, including substance misuse, mental health problems and domestic abuse.
On the point about police and crime commissioners working with schools in which domestic abuse issues are prevalent, the Government are fully committed to tackling domestic abuse, and we will shortly be launching a consultation on the landmark domestic abuse Bill to improve protection and support for victims, to strengthen the focus on perpetrators, and to recognise the lifelong damage that domestic abuse does to children. The evidence on that front is completely overwhelming.
My hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Michael Tomlinson) made a passionate speech about the prison system and the role of families. I was particularly struck by his statistic that reoffending rates are 35% lower if partners and families are allowed to visit. That is also borne out by other studies. The impact of imprisonment on a family is likely to be long term, especially if the main breadwinner of a family goes to prison—the problems back home build up, with rent or mortgage arrears going up, and social stigma and loneliness for the family left behind.
While offenders are in custody, therefore, we have an opportunity to support them in changing their values and perspectives on their roles and responsibilities. As a Government, we believe that prisoners who are in touch with their family are likely to be more settled while in jail. Multiply that improved mood among prisoners, and we see a transformation in prison conditions. As we have heard, on 10 August last year the Government published a review by Lord Farmer that made several recommendations to strengthen family or significant other ties. As has been recognised, we have welcomed all those measures and will be working to implement them.
On the military covenant, the case was well put by the hon. Member for Glasgow North West (Carol Monaghan) —sadly, she is no longer in her place. We all know, and I certainly do from my previous role as the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Defence Secretary, the huge sacrifice made not only by our armed forces, but by their families. That is often under-reported, with the families often the ones who take the strain of prolonged periods of absence and moving around, so it is important that we support those families under the military covenant, which is exactly what we have done.
The Ministry of Defence launched its first ever UK armed forces families’ strategy in 2016, which focuses and co-ordinates activity to support service families. The single service welfare organisations provide a flexible and inclusive network of welfare support to service personnel and their families. Defence also rightly works hand in glove with the principal service charities and organisations such as Relate to provide specialist support to families. In addition, we have launched a health and wellbeing strategy to improve mental health, and developed a memorandum of understanding with the Royal Foundation. As part of such efforts, I certainly take on board the suggestion of my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West about ensuring that we include training courses.
I thank hon. Members for allowing me to speak for some time. I wanted to cover all the points included in the manifesto, as well as the other matters raised. If Members feel I have left anything uncovered, I undertake to write back to them. I believe that as a Government we are working towards a shared goal of putting family at the heart of policy making. I hope that we will continue in that vein, because all the evidence shows the value of families to our national life.
Oral Answers to Questions
Margaret Greenwood Excerpts(6 years, 7 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that we want to ensure that the principle of one country and two systems is preserved and continues to operate. On the specific case and the specific issue that she has raised, my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary informs me that the Foreign Office has raised this issue at various levels in relation to Hong Kong and China, and we will continue to do so.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
Of course, we never want to see people in the position of losing their jobs, and if people do lose their jobs, support is available to them through the DWP to help them to get back into the labour market and to get back into work. We are in the process of a negotiation on Brexit. We will leave the European Union in March 2019, and we are negotiating for the best possible deal we can get for the United Kingdom. We have also indicated that we want an implementation period after that deal has been negotiated to ensure that businesses do not face a cliff edge but can have certainty about the rules under which they are going to operate in the future. If there is one thing that is certain it is that we will leave the EU in March 2019.
Grenfell Tower
Margaret Greenwood Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
If the hon. Gentleman looks at the housing White Paper produced by the Government earlier this year, he will see that we clearly expect there to be a diversity of ways in which people will be in their homes. Some wish to own their homes and some wish to rent. Some wish to have rent-to-buy schemes and others wish to have shared ownership schemes. I want there to be diversity to suit people and their circumstances.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
Both the fire stations in my constituency are closing as a direct result of Government cuts, so will the Government now take action and increase funding to Merseyside fire and rescue service?
The Prime Minister
Fire services across the country are ensuring that they have the appropriate response to the fires with which they are dealing. Importantly, urban search and rescue as well as the London Fire Brigade were available for the Grenfell Tower fire. The resources were there and they were able to take the action that they took.
UK's Nuclear Deterrent
Margaret Greenwood Excerpts(7 years, 10 months ago)
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Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
I believe we should oppose the maintenance of the continuous at-sea deterrent. For me, the arguments are both moral and practical. I will take the moral argument first. I believe it is important that we all give full consideration to the scale of destruction that modern nuclear weapons can deliver. I want to read out a message from the mayor of Hiroshima in a recent statement:
“On August 6, 1945, a single atomic bomb rendered Hiroshima a scorched plain and tens of thousands were burned in flames. By year’s end, 140,000…lives had been taken. Those who managed to survive, their lives grotesquely distorted, were left to suffer serious physical and emotional after effects compounded by discrimination and prejudice. Nuclear weapons are an absolute evil and ultimate inhumanity.”
Louise Haigh
In the same statement, the mayor of Hiroshima called on us all to share the sincere message of their hibakusha:
“No one else should ever suffer as we have”.
Does my hon. Friend not share my concern that this latest round of renewal makes it difficult to ignore the fact that we are moving against our international duty into an era of permanent armament?
Margaret Greenwood
My hon. Friend makes a good case, and I agree with her.
Contemporary nuclear weapons are capable of delivering much greater levels of devastation, and they are eight to 10 pounds heavier than those that hit Hiroshima and Nagasaki. One modern missile with 12 warheads could wipe out a city of 10 million people and leave it uninhabitable. As the International Court of Justice put it back in 1996:
“The destructive power of nuclear weapons cannot be contained in either space or time. They have the potential to destroy all civilization and the entire ecosystem of the planet.”
That is chilling, and it is important to keep hold of that vision of horror when considering Trident renewal.
I recently visited Woodchurch high school in my constituency, where I met the school council, which comprises pupils from each of the different year groups aged between 11 and 16. I asked them who felt that we should renew Trident. There was a slight sense of agitation in the room, and I wondered whether they were just a little shy on the topic. I then asked if anyone was definitely opposed to the renewal, and every hand shot up in the air without hesitation. The decisions that we make about nuclear deterrence today will have an impact on our children for decades, and it is important to remember that we are making a decision for the next generation.
The defence challenges that we now face are different from those in the post-1945 era when the world seemed divided into ideological blocs and the threat came primarily from other states, principally the Soviet Union. An attack was thought of in terms of a conventional military attack or a nuclear strike. Yes, there are concerns over the intentions of President Putin’s Russia. The annexation of Crimea and Russian involvement in the civil war in Ukraine has had a destabilising effect on security in central and eastern Europe, but we must also counter the threat from non-state actors such as terrorist groups. Nuclear weapons will not enable us to meet that threat, and money allocated to Trident could mean that the defence budget is not focused on the most serious challenges that we face. Trident’s replacement is projected to be operational for 30 years from the early 2030s. Is it possible to be sure that it will be an effective deterrent in 2060? There is plenty of evidence to suggest that it will not.
I recently attended a meeting addressed by Lord Browne, the Labour Defence Secretary in 2006-07. He made a compelling argument against the renewal of Trident, focusing particularly on two practical issues: cyber-security and the detection of submarines by enemy forces. He warned that NATO countries cannot be confident that their nuclear defence systems would be able to survive an attack from a sophisticated and well-resourced opponent that was utilising cyber-capabilities in combination with its military and intelligence capabilities.
The Prime Minister spoke about the value of nuclear submarines patrolling our seas unseen and undetected. That may well be the case today, but it is not a given for the future. There is a real threat that with the increase in under-sea detection technology, the location of submarines is more likely to be compromised, thus undermining the fundamental rationale of continuous at-sea deterrence, which relies on submarines remaining undetected. There is also a real risk that advancement in detection technology will outpace any advancement in counter-measures.
It is important to take into account all the jobs that are reliant on Trident, and that a credible industrial strategy is created and a cogent plan signed off before any action is taken to not renew it. Jobs, skills, and incomes should be protected. I believe, however, that there is a real risk that these expensive weapons may become obsolete over the period of their lives, and we would be better off investing in a defence strategy that addresses the real dangers that we face from current strategic threats.