Oral Answers to Questions

Nick Smith Excerpts

Monday 20th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

I am very conscious of the great support in my hon. Friend’s constituency—in fact, I have visited it a couple of times now and seen not only the police officers on the front line, but the way the community is coming together on safer streets. I have absolutely heard his request for this particular bid.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

The school holidays in Wales and England start on 22 July. There are nearly 30 million visits abroad by air in quarter 3, which includes those school holidays. To help families get away, will the Passport Office backlog be cleared by 22 July?

[Kevin Foster]

We have already made clear the actions we are taking. Since April last year we have been advising people to allow up to 10 weeks for an application, although 91% of people get their passport back within six weeks of applying. The hon. Member will also be aware that in some instances, such as school trips, collective passports can be used, subject to those being accepted by the country they are travelling to.

HM Passport Office Backlog

Nick Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 14th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Foster]

I join the hon. Member in paying tribute to the staff at the Belfast passport office, who are working hard and delivering a strong service. I am pleased to hear about the engagement that he and his colleagues have had, which reflects some of the comments of other Northern Ireland Members about support in a previous exchange on passports. There is incentivised overtime, but obviously there has to be a balance in terms of wider pay policies. As I touched on, we need to ensure that people are working sensible amounts of overtime, because working seven days a week for months on end is not healthy or appropriate.

We are certainly looking at the future and what the capacity is in particular locations. We looked to see how we could maximise that, particularly as social distancing regulations ended. We dealt with something like 60,000 people at the counters in March and 74,000 last month. Although that is not the majority of our applications, it is certainly a service that we have looked to expand, as I will come on to in a moment.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Kevin Foster]

I will give way one final time and then make some progress.

[Nick Smith]

I thank the Minister for giving way. Will he please tell us how big the backlog at the Passport Office is at the moment?

--- Later in debate ---

[Kevin Foster]

I think it is safe to say that the vast majority of Passport Office staff have been back in the office for some time; indeed, as I have touched on, some of them have been in the office for seven days a week working overtime. There is a very small cohort employed specifically to handle digital work that is wholly online and can be dealt with purely online. Mostly that will be what we call simple renewals, where it is not necessary to look at documents—to prove citizenship, for instance. We have done pretty much all we can in getting people back into the office, although we did not exactly get a great deal of support for that approach from the Opposition. I am satisfied that the vast majority are now working in the office; anyone who needs to be in the office to do their work has been in the office now for some time.

[Nick Smith]

Will the Minister give way?

[Kevin Foster]

The hon. Gentleman has already intervened once so I will continue.

HM Passport Office endeavours to process all applications as quickly as possible. The simplest of applications submitted online can be processed with fewer manual interventions, as I have just said, meaning a passport can be issued much more quickly. To help customers submit a simpler application, HM Passport Office is currently delivering a digital marketing campaign across social media with some basic tips such as applying online if possible and using a photo code from a photo booth or shop, including the photo booth we have here in Parliament.

It is worth noting, however, that the standard service does not have a guaranteed timeframe as a British passport cannot and will not be issued until all checks are satisfactorily completed. If further information is needed or an application is complex, the application will take longer, especially if there is doubt about whether the applicant is a British citizen.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kevin Foster]

The failure of the telephone line means that constituents have waited longer than they should have done. There have also been difficulties in receiving prompt updates to inquiries made by right hon. and hon. Members on their behalf. The number of HM Passport Office staff supporting the Home Office’s MP hotline and offering input and surgeries at Portcullis House has steadily increased. That will be monitored to ensure that those services to colleagues continue to improve. I am advised that people are now waiting much less time.

[Nick Smith]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I hope that it is a point of order and not just disturbing the debate.

[Nick Smith]

Could you give some advice, Madam Deputy Speaker, on whether there is a difficulty with sightlines to this corner of the Chamber, as the Minister seems unable to see requests to give way from Labour Members?

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

First, that is not a point of order. Secondly, I am sure that the Minister is well aware of the calls for him to give way, but it is entirely for him to decide whether to do so.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

The Government are letting down thousands of families across our country. The Passport Office is in chaos because record applications are not being processed in good time. The Home Office was warned about this last year but has failed to take sufficient action. Indeed, its own key indicators last autumn showed that a storm was brewing. I have been frustrated by Ministers ducking and diving and not admitting the scale of the problem. I have submitted a dozen parliamentary written questions about this, but I have had poor responses on the size of the backlog, on the metrics that are being used and on when the service will return to normal. The only figure available was a leak to the press suggesting a 500,000 backlog.

This problem is causing havoc to people’s plans. My office is hearing from worried constituents every day. One case is a seven-year-old constituent who has a family holiday to Australia next week. Their application was submitted on 16 March. It took six weeks for the Passport Office to request information, which was sent back straight away, and tomorrow marks 13 weeks since they first applied. The family needs the passport in order to apply for a visa, so these delays are risking their family holiday.

This is being made worse by the clunky system that the Passport Office is still using. An upgrade was planned three years ago, but it still has not happened. A new digital system would reduce processing time and cost less, so this needs to be done urgently. In the Minister’s closing remarks, can he please tell us when this will happen? Yes, more staff have been hired and more applications are being processed, but still the applications pour in and the delays continue. Families are having to resort to fast-track applications just to get their passports back in time, but at double the cost.

We must have a realistic action plan to get the service back to normal by the middle of July, ahead of the summer holidays. I think the Passport Office needs to tag-team with the National Audit Office to better understand the problem. It must improve its process management and we must have much, much better reporting to Parliament. We are all afraid that the problem will get even worse as the summer holidays approach. Ministers must grip this now, before family holiday plans are turned to sand.

HM Passport Office Backlogs

Nick Smith Excerpts

Thursday 12th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Home Secretary if she will make a statement on backlogs at Her Majesty’s Passport Office.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Tom Pursglove)]

Due to covid-19, more than 5 million people delayed their passport applications in 2020 and 2021. With demand for international travel having returned, Her Majesty’s Passport Office is currently receiving a higher number of passport applications than ever before; 9.5 million applications are expected in 2022 compared with approximately 7 million in a normal year.

Since April 2021, 500 new staff have joined and a further 700 will join by the summer. As a result, the vast majority of passport applications are being processed within the 10-week timeframe and more than 90% within six weeks. Less than 1.4% of the passports printed last week for UK applications had been in the system for longer than 10 weeks.

With a record number of applications in the system, customer inquiries have increased accordingly. However, the passport advice line, which is run by Teleperformance, is not currently meeting the needs of passport customers. Clearly, that is not acceptable. The Home Office has clear standards for the level of service that suppliers are expected to provide.

Her Majesty’s Passport Office has engaged with Teleperformance at its most senior levels to emphasise the need to significantly improve performance as soon as possible. Alongside steps to bring the operation of the passport advice line, email and call-back functions within the required standard, Teleperformance is urgently bolstering staff numbers in response to the recent surge in customer contact, with 500 additional staff due to be added by mid-June.

We recognise that hon. Members will wish to raise cases and queries on behalf of their constituents, as is, of course, right and proper. Her Majesty’s Passport Office staff have therefore been deployed to answer passport-related inquiries to the Home Office’s dedicated MPs hotline and, for the most urgent cases, they will also be available to conduct in-person passport surgeries in Portcullis House.

Although we acknowledge that there have been issues with customer contact that must and will be resolved, I take the opportunity to recognise the work of Her Majesty’s Passport Office staff who continue to ensure that the vast majority of passport applications are processed in under 10 weeks. Their efforts, alongside the extensive work that went into preparing for record demand, have ensured that passport applications continue to be processed in higher numbers than ever before.

Across March and April 2022, Her Majesty’s Passport Office completed the processing of nearly 2 million applications. As that output demonstrates, HMPO staff are firmly focused on maintaining a high level of service and are fully committed to ensuring that people receive their passports in good time for their summer holidays.

[Nick Smith]

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question.

I thank the staff working on the passport backlog, but many people across our country will not be satisfied with the Minister’s response today. A constituent told me yesterday:

“It’s terrible. We’re due to fly out on Sunday but are still unable to get our youngest son’s passport. Every time I phone I get passed to a different department, then hold, then the phone line goes dead.”

Another told me:

“I’ve called 40 times in the past week, they cut me off every time. I don’t know what to do and am breaking down at this point.”

The facts are that there are long queues outside passport offices; that hours and hours are being spent on phone lines; and that families are afraid of holidays getting cancelled. This situation was avoidable. It was obvious that, when restrictions ended, people would need passports to get away.

The Prime Minister blames a mañana culture at the Passport Office. We need a strategy that improves performance and helps families now, not those flippant comments. During a cost of living crisis, telling people to spend an extra £100 per person to fast-track their application rubs salt into their wounds.

Yesterday, the Home Secretary told us of record passport delivery, which is good, but we need the facts today. How big is the actual backlog? By when will the Passport Office’s too-long 10-week timeframe be down to the normal three weeks?

Deliveries are also delayed and other companies are having to help TNT. Its £77 million contract cannot be value for money, so will the Government be renewing that contract in July?

After years of covid, families finally want to get away this spring and summer. Instead, they face losing thousands of pounds if they cannot keep their holiday after the grief of chasing their passport. The Government need to do much, much better than this.

[Tom Pursglove]

I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for putting in for this urgent question today and for the way that he approached his contribution.

I again thank HMPO staff for the tireless work that they are doing to issue passports as quickly as possible for people who have made those applications; in saying that, I am sure the whole House joins me. I can also confirm for the House’s benefit that the service I referred to in Portcullis House is now live and available for colleagues to access to get help with these matters. Of course, it is also worth pointing out that the Minister for safe and legal migration—the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Torbay (Kevin Foster)—issued a “Dear colleague” letter yesterday that provided further detail on this issue.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned specifics in relation to contracts. Of course, what I must not do is get into contract-related deliberations on the Floor of the House today, but it is of course right to say that, where performance issues arise, candid conversations are had about performance and what interventions are required to improve performance, where necessary. I again reiterate for the House’s benefit that the key reality is that, between March and April 2022, Her Majesty’s Passport Office completed the processing of nearly 2 million applications. The vast majority of passport applications continue to be processed well within 10 weeks, with over 90% of applications issued within six weeks between January and March 2022. Less than 1.4% of the passports printed last week for UK applications had been in the system for longer than 10 weeks. Those are the facts. He asked for the facts. Those facts have been provided.

There is of course an expedited service available for individuals where passports have been in the system for more than 10 weeks, and I would certainly encourage people to avail themselves of that service if that is the situation they find themselves in. Of course, if there are Members of this House who have specific cases they wish to share with Ministers, we will happily take those away and look at them if colleagues make contact.

Preventing Crime and Delivering Justice

Nick Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 11th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

The right hon. Lady is absolutely right, and she will be aware of Operation Soteria, which does that. I will come on to wider support through the courts system and independent gender violence advocates, but the system is working now in a much more joined-up way, which I am sure the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford will also welcome. These measures have to be integrated not only with policing, but with the CPS, so that we have an end-to-end approach on prosecution.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

The Home Secretary talked about passports. Constituents are telling me that the long delays at the Passport Office could both badly affect the travel industry and ruin family holidays. We need action now. Will she ensure the backlog is dealt with in the coming weeks?

[Priti Patel]

If the hon. Gentleman has a particular case, I have been speaking to other hon. Members—[Interruption.] No, please send it to me. There has been a problem with Teleperformance, the company that runs the helpline on this, but I would be happy to address his points. There is a great deal of work taking place operationally with Her Majesty’s Passport Office in dealing with passports and applications, and we are about to have yet another record month of passport delivery.

The fourth round of the proven safer streets fund is worth £50 million and will help to reclaim spaces so that people across our communities and streets are safe. Alongside that initiative, the Government have worked assiduously to combat issues such as drugs and county lines. While we know that Opposition Members are weak on combating drugs, this Government have overseen the arrest of 7,400 people as part of the county lines drug programme, and 1,500 lines have been closed. Drug seizures by police officers and Border Force in England and Wales in 2020-21 increased by 21% on the previous year. The 10-year drugs strategy is underpinned by £30 million of new investment to tackle that scourge.

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 backs the police with improved powers and more support for officers and their families in recognition of the unique and enormous sacrifices they make. It means tougher sentences for the worst offenders and modernises the criminal justice system with an overhaul of court and tribunal processes.

Public Services

Nick Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 16th October 2019 Commons Chamber

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

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman). Opposition Members will agree with a lot of what he said, particularly on housing.

We are here to debate a legislative programme, set out by a minority Government, that we are all under the impression has little hope of being delivered. Whether we see it more as a pre-election broadcast by the Conservative party, or as a serious proposition, the question for me remains the same: what does it do to help my constituents with the everyday struggles they face? On that basis, the Queen’s Speech is, in my opinion, a failure. It does nothing to undo the damage caused by a decade of cuts to council funding and other public services. It does nothing to help the most vulnerable or those struggling to make ends meet because of a callous and inhumane benefits system. It does nothing to help our struggling schools, our GP surgeries, the local transport network or the failing housing market.

On the subject of housing, I am very much more concerned with what is not in the Queen’s Speech than what is in it. My constituents, whether those who are hoping to become first-time buyers, renters who want stronger rights, families who are stuck on the council waiting list or those at risk of being homeless, are getting the message loud and clear from this Queen’s Speech that housing and their concerns about it are not a priority for this Government. Where is the plan to tackle the chronic shortage of affordable and council housing in this country?

Let us not forget about the leasehold scandal. Although the Government said a lot in the build-up about what they would do on leasehold reform, with heavy social media plugging, the heavily trailed policies of peppercorn ground rents and a ban on leasehold houses did not feature in the Queen’s Speech. I say this just about every time I speak on leasehold and I make no apologies for saying it again: there are thousands of people who are stuck with leasehold houses that were sold to them with a paucity of information at best or, at worst, as part of a systematic deception. Those people need legislation now. The Westminster Hall debate last month revealed a great deal of support across the House to do something. I would have hoped that the governing party, which does not have a majority, wanted to show that it is on the side of ordinary people and that it can make a difference to people’s lives. There is a high degree of consensus on the way forward, and legislation is needed to help existing leaseholds out of the vice they are in.

Only this week, some of my constituents have had a reminder about the pitfalls of leasehold. They have received notification that they are beholden to a new freeholder called Landmark—the new owner of their property. A nice letter came through informing them that their ground rent was going up, of course, but there was also a schedule of fees that they had not seen before that included, outrageously, a £100 charge to obtain consent to have a pet in their own home. How can we allow these rip-off charges to continue? Legislation is needed desperately.

The Government consider law and order to be a priority, with about half a dozen Bills in the Queen’s Speech that fall roughly within that area. What is the point of having so many new laws to deal with criminal behaviour when the police do not have the numbers to deal with existing laws?

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his powerful speech. Does he agree that we would have been much better off on policing if the Government had not cut 20,000 police officers over recent years?

[Justin Madders]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I will go on to explain why the Government have a damn cheek, frankly, to argue that what they are presenting is something new and exciting.

In recent times, I have come across situations in various forces around the country that show just how starkly the cuts have affected frontline policing, such as when the police said they would not investigate a fraud complaint because the amount at stake was less than £15 million; when the police said they would not look at CCTV footage in relation to a theft because it was longer than 20 minutes; or when recently in my constituency the police said they might not have the officers available to close the road for a Remembrance Sunday parade. I think that tells us we have hit rock bottom. Fortunately, we have managed to get agreement from the police that they will support the parade this year, but the fact that they were even having to consider that should surely send the clearest message to Government Members that austerity has gone too far and that 10 years of cuts have led us to the edge of the abyss. I am glad that this message does now appear to be getting through, with the great fanfare on 20,000 new police officers, but of course, as we have said, it does not replace those we have lost in the decade of austerity we have just had. In Cheshire, we will go back to two thirds of those we have lost since 2010, so I do not believe that the fanfare is warranted. Only the Conservative party under its current leadership could have the audacity to present having fewer police officers serving than when it came into office as some sort of triumph. You couldn’t make it up, Mr Deputy Speaker.

Let me briefly talk about schools. Again, when we get past the headlines, the detail is not quite as impressive. Every school in my constituency has faced cuts since 2015. New data shows that, over the five years from 2015 to 2020, £78.9 million will be lost from west Cheshire schools—an average loss of £403 per pupil. I should make it clear that my wife is the cabinet member for children and young people at our local authority, so I hear first hand on regular occasions how damaging this all is, but I also know from talking to parents, pupils and teachers just how far these cuts have impacted on education. We hear time and again from parents coming to our surgeries how they have to battle to get their child’s special educational needs recognised. Education is a fundamental right for every child, and parents should not have to fight the system just to get the education support that their child deserves.

I want to talk about a few things not in the Queen’s Speech that we should be looking at. There is nothing on low pay, insecure work, child poverty or pensioner poverty. There is nothing on scrapping the benefits freeze, the benefits cap, the bedroom tax, the two-child limit, the rape clause or punitive sanctions. There is nothing on universal credit. Week after week in my surgery, I hear from people who are living in poverty and struggling to survive because they face a continual battle with the benefits system, which is actually supposed to be there to support them. I hear about overpayments, underpayments, long initial waiting periods, inaccessible and complex online forms, lack of support for put-in claims, cruel disability tests, and unfair and unreasonable fines. Universal credit is not working and, worse, it is driving people into poverty, debt and rent arrears. It is forcing many more people to turn to food banks just to survive. There are no plans in this Queen’s Speech to scrap this failed, cruel policy, and that just shows us where the priorities of this Government lie.

Finally, I want to express my disappointment that once again the WASPI women have not been mentioned. It is a source of shame that the Government continue to ignore that campaign in the face of overwhelming evidence of the injustice that has been served on them. In fact, I have just come from a drop-in session where there were probably more Members than there are in here. That shows that across the House there is genuine support for doing something for the WASPI campaigners.

Oral Answers to Questions

Nick Smith Excerpts

Monday 15th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

Absolutely. Building “failure to prevent” offences such as bribery and tax evasion into statute makes a real difference. It is important for us to give our law enforcement agencies powers to deal with, for instance, corporations that engage in conspiracies, because in the past that has been very hard to prove.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

Poor pension transfer advice can amount to fraud, but in my experience local police officers often refer such cases to the Financial Conduct Authority, which often focuses on administrative penalties rather than criminal prosecutions. Will the Minister agree to meet me, and to review economic crimes against pensioners, so that justice can be done?

[Mr Wallace]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. While large sectors are regulated under the FCA, we have seen fraudsters exploiting marketing as a guise to escape that regulation. When we identify them, there are criminal investigations, but I should be delighted to meet the hon. Gentleman and hear more about his views.

Oral Answers to Questions

Nick Smith Excerpts

Monday 10th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

The hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Nick Smith) is welcome to shoehorn his inquiry, Question 16, conveniently into Question 14, if he so wishes, but it is not obligatory.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

16. I have been working with Gwent police and local residents regarding alleged criminality in the village of Cwm. The local police have been great, but clearer 101 call information would ease victims’ concerns. May I ask the Home Secretary to encourage the police to provide more detailed call centre data, including out-of-hours response times and geographic information, for better public involvement and support for our police services?

[Victoria Atkins]

I am very happy to look into that. The hon. Gentleman will know that, through the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014, there are six powers available to the police and to local authorities and agencies to tackle, in a flexible way, the terrible crimes that can be occasioned by antisocial behaviour.

Oral Answers to Questions

Nick Smith Excerpts

Monday 25th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Atkins]

I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend, who brings with him his experience of working with his local women’s centre, the Sutton women’s centre, to help the victims of domestic abuse. He is correct in identifying the early signals of an abusive relationship, and this is precisely why the draft Bill includes proposals for a statutory definition that ensures that all forms of domestic abuse are recognised, understood and challenged, both by those who can help the victims and by those who can tackle the perpetrators of these crimes.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

17. Domestic violence protection orders give essential support to the victims of domestic abuse. Effective training for police officers on these orders is key, so will the Minister review the funding of the “Domestic Abuse Matters” training course, which is unclear for next year, in order to support the victims of domestic abuse in the future?

[Victoria Atkins]

I am so pleased that the hon. Gentleman has raised the very good “Domestic Abuse Matters” project, which is run by SafeLives, the domestic abuse charity. This is being rolled out by the College of Policing, and some 14 police forces have already signed up to it, but there are a number of other training and change programmes available to the police. Part of the important message of the non-legislative measures in the draft Bill is that we need to train police officers and a whole range of other frontline workers, which could include that one person who can reach the person who needs help.

Police Pension Liabilities

Nick Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 6th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

The House will have noticed that the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Nick Smith) has perambulated. He was over there!

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

I am trying to get your attention, Mr Speaker. What does the Minister suggest Gwent police do: cut 100 police officer jobs or make local precept payers make up the difference?

[Mr Hurd]

Gwent was the first police force I visited, and I am well aware of some of the pressures on the force and some of the excellent work it is doing, not least in pursuing exploiters of children. I say gently to the hon. Gentleman that Gwent is absolutely the outlier in the reserves it holds; it sits on £56 million-worth of public money as reserves, which is a stunning 46.3% of its funding. I think the people of Gwent deserve a clear explanation of how that public money is going to be used to support their local police service.

Civil Partnerships, Marriages and Deaths (Registration Etc.) Bill

Nick Smith Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Friday 26th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)]

In fairness, the hon. Lady has corrected the record by what she has just said, so I think that part has been dealt with. On her point about having a meeting, I know that the Prime Minister meets many hon. Members and I am sure Government Whips will pass on the hon. Lady’s request for a meeting.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. Is it in order to ask for a Government statement on this matter? According to Chief Constable Dave Thompson:

“It is an extraordinary amount of money policing has been asked to pay with no notice and with no proper consultation. A serious rethink is needed.”

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

The Chair has not been given notice of any forthcoming statement, but I think the request will have been noticed. It is certainly on the record that that request is pursued and, knowing the hon. Gentleman, I am sure he will do just that.