The Government's Plan for Brexit

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Wednesday 7th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

I suggest to the hon. Gentleman that he speaks to the public and listens to what they had to say during the referendum campaign. If he is saying that they were not voting for change on free movement and immigration, I am afraid that he simply was not listening to them.

I have long argued for a change in the system of free movement to reflect people’s concerns. As it stands, it is not working for the more deprived parts of our country, particularly those where traditional industry has been replaced by lower-skill, lower-wage employment. My preference was to work within the EU to fix those problems, but the country, understandably, lost patience with that approach.

Free movement does not affect all places in the same way; it affects cities differently from former industrial areas. It has also made life more difficult in places where it is already hardest. These are areas that got no real hope from the Government when traditional industry left and that saw house prices collapse and whole streets bought up by absent private landlords. They are places that, alongside taking new arrivals from the EU, continue to take in the vast majority of this country’s asylum seekers and refugees. Largely they do so without any real strife or difficulty, so I do not want to hear anyone claim that people in places such as Leigh who voted to leave are in any way xenophobic or racist. They are welcoming, generous people, but they also want fairness, and they do not think that it is fair that the country’s least well-off communities should expect pressure on wages, housing, public services, primary schools and GP services without any help to manage it.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

I agree with my right hon. Friend that it is certainly not xenophobic or racist to call out unscrupulous employers who are causing some of the problems in our working-class areas by allowing the undercutting of wages, which is causing resentment from people who work in traditional industries such as the construction sector. Is not that what we really need to understand? We hear it constantly on the doorstep.

[Andy Burnham]

That is precisely the issue that neither Europe nor, let us be honest, this Parliament was addressing. Free movement was being used to undermine skilled wages and we did not do enough about it. We have to be honest about that.

People in my constituency want to continue to welcome people here who contribute to our society, but they want an immigration system that affords greater control and reduces the numbers. I believe that that is what we must work towards. The left across Europe has got to break out of its paralysis on this issue. The fear of being labelled as “pandering” stops people entering the debate, but it also stops progressive ideas that meet the public’s concerns and leaves the pitch clear for those with right-wing solutions.

I want to set out two principal reasons why there is a legitimate left-wing case for reform. First, in an era of increasing globalisation, free movement has arguably been providing greater benefit to large companies than it has to the most deprived communities. There is nothing socialist about a system of open borders that allows multinationals to treat people as commodities and to move them around Europe to drive down labour costs and create a race to the bottom.

Secondly, there is a strong case for saying that the immigration system that has developed over time in this country is inherently discriminatory—it does not treat all migrants equally. Instead, it accords a preferential status to migrants from our nearest neighbours in the context of a policy that seeks to cap numbers. That, therefore, discriminates against those non-EU migrants who seek to come here and who have families here.

My call to this side of the House is to put forward a plan that treats all people equally and that applies progressive principles to migration. We need to make the argument for an immigration system that allows greater control and that reduces the numbers coming here, but that does so in a fair way. This would be a system that treats all migrants equally, that does not allow people’s wages to be undercut, as my hon. Friend said, and, crucially, that continues to welcome people from Europe and around the world to work here. Those are progressive principles that can form the basis of a new immigration policy for the left.

It is time for many of us on this side of the House to confront a hard truth: our reluctance in confronting this debate is undermining the cohesion of our communities and the safety of our streets. I am no longer prepared to be complicit in that. We need answers to the public’s concerns, but answers that are based on hope, not hate.

Policing and Crime Bill

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Monday 13th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

That is a good offer and I thank the Minister for it. I think we can move forward on that basis. I hope we all know what we are trying to achieve—that is, if serious wrongdoing comes to light about an individual who is beyond 12 months retired, it must be possible for misconduct or disciplinary proceedings to be initiated against them. Our amendment says that there should then also be sanctions that are able to be applied against that individual. I say to the Minister that we will want to insist on that point as well.

If we can agree to move forward on that basis, that is a considerable example of progress that matters greatly to the Hillsborough families, who, as they were continuing their 27-year struggle, felt very aggrieved when they saw individuals who had retired on a full pension and who they felt were beyond reach and could not be held to account. I believe that this should apply retrospectively. Misconduct is misconduct whenever it occurred, and people should be held to account for their actions.

[Steve Rotheram]

I thank the Minister for coming partly towards the position that we believe should be taken, but can we clarify one point? We are talking about serious wrongdoing—malfeasance and gross misconduct —by police officers. We have mentioned Hillsborough, so many people will spin that with regard to the conduct of officers—ordinary officers—at that disaster in 1989. There are no accusations against many of the ordinary officers, who performed heroically: it was the senior officers who let people down, and then, in some cases, took the opportunity to get away scot free through the cop-out of using ill health—

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[Steve Rotheram]

In March 2013, the Prime Minister said that Leveson 2 should go ahead without further delay. The Secretary of State told the Select Committee that he was awaiting a further Government statement. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the three years that have passed since the Prime Minister’s promise have been far too long for many of the victims of press intrusion?

[Andy Burnham]

I would certainly say so. I cannot understand why there is any doubt about this, given the clarity of the Prime Minister’s statements, which I have read out, and given that the Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), has just said that the promise was made not only to the victims but to senior parliamentarians. I do not see how this commitment can be negotiable.

Investigatory Powers Bill

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Report: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Monday 6th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

I do not know whether that was a compliment, but I will take it as such. The right hon. Gentleman raises an important point. To be fair to the Government, there has been movement on thematic warrants: if an MP or a journalist was to be added to a thematic warrant, there would be a judicial oversight process. The right hon. Gentleman mentions taking that principle even further and relating it to bulk data. I think that David Anderson would need to consider how practically possible that would be, but the right hon. Gentleman’s point needs to be considered.

Labour amendment 262 relates to trade unions and would amend clause 18 to ensure, in statute, that undertaking legitimate trade union activities is never in future a reason for the security services or police using investigatory powers. In recent times, we have been shining a light on this country’s past and learning more about how we have been governed and policed. Revelations about Bloody Sunday, Hillsborough, phone hacking, child sexual exploitation and other matters have all in different ways shaken people’s faith in the institutions that are there to protect us. They raise profound questions about the relationship between the state and the individual. Confronted with those uncomfortable truths about abuses of power, this House needs to provide a proper response and legislate to prevent them in the future. We need to redress the balance in favour of ordinary people and away from the Executive.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

Will my right hon. Friend join me in paying tribute to Unite, the Union of Construction, Allied Trades and Technicians and the GMB, which fought a long campaign to raise the scandal of the illegal blacklisting and secret vetting of construction workers? Can he assure the House that such a gross injustice could not be perpetrated against innocent workers again, and that his amendment would provide an absolute guarantee that legitimate trade union activities would be excluded from monitoring by the security services and the police?

[Andy Burnham]

I will indeed pay tribute to Unite, GMB and UCATT, which, in the past couple of months, have reached out-of-court settlements on blacklisting—a major and historic victory on their part. I will come on to explain the prime concern behind the Opposition’s amendment, and the case that most justifies our bringing it forward.

In the past, the actions of some in senior positions in politics and in the police have unfairly tarnished the reputation of today’s services and today’s policemen and women. That is precisely why it is crucial that we continue to open up on the past. Transparency is the best way of preventing lingering suspicions about past conduct from contaminating trust in today’s services, and it will help us to create a modern legal framework that better protects our essential freedoms, human rights and privacy.

One such freedom essential to the health of our democracy is trade union activity. Historically, trade unions have played a crucial role in protecting ordinary people from the abuses of Governments and mighty corporations. It is that crucial role, and the freedom of every citizen in this land to benefit from that protection, that amendment 262 seeks to enshrine in law. There will be those who claim that it is unnecessary and the product of conspiracy theorists, but I have received confirmation from the security services that, in the past—under Governments of both colours, it has to be said—trade unions have indeed been monitored. In the cold war, there may well have been grounds for fears that British trade unions were being infiltrated by foreign powers trying to subvert our democracy. That helps to explain the wariness of many Labour Members about legislation of this kind. Outside the security services, it seems that some activity went way beyond that. There is clear evidence that such monitoring was used for unjustified political and commercial reasons, breaching privacy and basic human rights. I mentioned the case of the Shrewsbury 24 on Second Reading, and I remain of the view that that is an outstanding injustice that needs to be settled.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) anticipated, however, I want tonight to focus on the blacklisting of construction workers, which clearly illustrates the necessity of the amendment we have tabled. We have seen the settlement of claims, as I have mentioned, against companies such as Carillion, Balfour Beatty, Costain, Keir, Laing O’Rourke, Sir Robert McAlpine, Skanska UK and Vinci. It has now been proven that those companies subscribed to central lists of workers that contained information on their political views and trade union activities. Those lists were used to vet people and deny them work. That affected the livelihoods of hundreds of people, and it was an outrageous denial of their basic human rights.

By seeking an out-of-court settlement, it would seem that the companies concerned are trying to limit reputational damage, but I do not think that the matter can be allowed to rest there. We need to understand how covertly gained police information came into the hands of a shady organisation called the Consulting Association, which compiled and managed the blacklist.

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[Steve Rotheram]

May I expand on the point that my right hon. Friend is making? Perhaps some people outside the Chamber will not understand what subversive activities were. In those days, subversive activities included complaining about health and safety because a person was dying on a building site every single day. Does my right hon. Friend agree that that is hardly subversive activity?

[Andy Burnham]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Those were people who were trying to protect their workmates and colleagues. An individual who protested outside Fiddler’s Ferry power station near us in the north-west was trying to safeguard people’s safety at work, but they were subjected to this outrageous abuse of their rights.

Investigatory Powers Bill

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Tuesday 15th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

I will let the hon. Gentleman form his own view on the right parliamentary tactics for the Opposition, but I will be deciding that position, and I do not think I would be serving the public simply by giving the Government a blank cheque this evening. It is my job—[Interruption.] Wait a second!—to hold them to account on behalf of the public and to get the most I can to protect the public as best we can through the Bill. I am approaching that job, as part of Her Majesty’s Opposition, with the utmost seriousness.

Alongside bereaved families, there have been cases of journalists claiming that material was inappropriately seized from them, most recently in connection with the “plebgate” affair. Last year, a former senior police officer-turned-whistleblower came to an event in Parliament and said that he and a colleague had been involved in supplying information that led to the blacklisting of construction workers. I would refer those who claim that these fears are exaggerated to the biggest unresolved case of this kind—the 1972 national building workers’ strike and the convictions of 24 pickets, known as the Shrewsbury 24. It is widely believed that their prosecution was politically orchestrated, with the help of the police and security services.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

rose—

[Andy Burnham]

I give way to my hon. Friend, who knows a great deal about this matter and has championed those still fighting for justice.

[Steve Rotheram]

My right hon. Friend mentions the case of the Shrewsbury pickets, which is a stark example of the misuse and abuse of state power. Does he agree, therefore, that it is essential that the Bill contains the strongest possible safeguards specifically to ensure that great, historic injustices, such as the politically motivated incarceration of pickets in 1972, can never happen again?

[Andy Burnham]

My hon. Friend puts it very well, which is why fears about such legislation run deep on the Labour Benches. We know the truth about what happened, even though it is not widely known yet by the public, because we have seen the documents. I have here a memo from the security services sent at the time to a senior Foreign Office official—I am glad that the Foreign Secretary is winding up tonight, because this concerns his Department. It is headed “Secret” and talks about the preparation of a television programme that went out and the trial of the Shrewsbury pickets, and it says, at the top:

“We had a discreet but considerable hand in this programme”.

That is from the security services, so why would people on the Labour Benches not fear handing over more power to the police and security services without there being adequate safeguards?

Police Funding, Crime and Community Safety

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Wednesday 24th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

No, I will not, because, as my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington said, the figures were accurately reported. The challenge today is for the Home Secretary to explain her claim that crime is falling, because I am afraid the recorded crime figures do not show that, and some experts say that the British crime survey is about to show that crime has in fact doubled. That is the issue that she has to explain, and she will have to work hard to do so.

Tackling online crime is one of the biggest challenges we face, but as I have said, forces do not have the capability. The question is, how are they going to do that with these further cuts? To be fair, the Home Secretary has floated one idea, which I have just mentioned. She told the BBC website in January that she was planning to recruit a new army of volunteers to help solve cybercrimes. She said that

“volunteers who specialise in accountancy or computing”,

as well as IT professionals,

“could work alongside police officers to investigate cyber or financial crime”.

I ask in all honesty, is that really the best the Government can come up with to crack the complex crime challenges of the future—Theresa’s temps, a Dad’s Army of retired accountants to take on and defeat the sophisticated international organised crime and fraud networks?

The week after next, we will debate the Home Secretary’s Bill, which will propose that powers be given to volunteers without their becoming special constables. Is that really the answer—a part-time police force? It does not equate to a vision for policing in England and Wales that is up to the challenges of the future. A part-time police force is no answer to the growing threats we face from cybercrime and terrorism. When it is the only answer that the Government can come up with, it is a sure sign that their cuts have gone way too far.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

It was suggested by the former deputy Mayor that these things can be done by sophisticated algorithms that can filter out such crimes. Actually, the victims of such crimes still feel that they need a police officer to come round and speak to them. That is the problem, especially when 1,000 front-line police officers in Merseyside are being cut.

[Andy Burnham]

We have seen this cost cutting and privatisation elsewhere, haven’t we? Take NHS 111, which was going to solve everything because of the algorithms that the call handlers would use. Has the service to the public been better than under NHS Direct? In no way. My hon. Friend has got it absolutely right. The Government suggest that it can all be done on the cheap, but people know it cannot.

In conclusion, the official line from the Government has been, “We’re protecting the police and crime is falling,” but that claim is something that should be added to the growing fraud statistics. The truth is the opposite: the police are being cut while crime is rising. They are cutting the fire service and the Border Force even more deeply—Tory cuts that are putting people’s safety at risk. That is the message that we will take into the PCC elections. Our police do a difficult job in a dangerous world. They deserve our thanks and respect, particularly those of the Government of the day. If promises are made to them, they should be kept. As we have shown, Labour is prepared to stand up for the police and protect community safety. That is what we are asking the House to do tonight by making this arrogant Government honour their commitment to the police. Real-terms protection should mean just that. What better way is there for Members on both sides of the House to show their appreciation for their local police forces than by voting for the Opposition motion tonight?

Immigration Bill

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Tuesday 1st December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham (Leigh) (Lab)]

As the Home Secretary said, we have had a lively and thorough debate, if not a genuine dialogue, as the movement from the Government has been minimal. We have not won many amendments but we have certainly won the argument. For that, I thank my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) for the assured and expert way he led for the Opposition on the Bill. He was, of course, our star summer signing and, like one of Mr Wenger’s best from the old days, he has managed to outshine his considerable reputation already, with more to come.

I would also like to thank my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), who brought an invaluable insight from her outstanding work on tackling the exploitation of children, and my hon. Friends the Members for South Shields (Mrs Lewell-Buck), for Workington (Sue Hayman), for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) and for Blackburn (Kate Hollern) who served on the Committee. Our thanks go too to the co-Chairs of the Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) and the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone), and to the third-party organisations that the Home Secretary referred to, which made a very important contribution.

Figures were published last week that I believe set the context for this Third Reading debate. The ONS reports that net migration has reached a record high of 336,000—up 82,000 from last year and 101,000 higher than the level it was when the Prime Minister came to office. I heard the Home Secretary’s comments about the record of the previous Government. She needs to have a look at her own record before she comes to this House and points the finger in this direction. That is the record of her Government. Let us set it against what they promised.

The Conservatives’ 2010 manifesto made a solemn pledge to reduce net migration to “tens of thousands”. “If we don’t meet it, boot us out,” said the Prime Minister. The 2015 manifesto made the same pledge—and we now know that, rather than reducing net migration, the Government are increasing it by tens of thousands. That is the Home Secretary’s record, and it is lamentable even by the standards of the Government. The Home Secretary likes to go to the Conservative party conference and talk a tough game, but the truth is that she cannot escape her own record. The very scale of the gap between her rhetoric and the reality continues to erode public trust on this most important and sensitive of issues.

As I made clear on Second Reading, I will always support practical measures to deal with the public’s legitimate concerns about immigration, and there are some measures in the Bill that we support—particularly the emphasis on labour market enforcement and English language requirements in public services. What I will not do, however, is lend our name to desperate attempts to legislate in haste and to half-baked measures that owe more to a PR exercise to camouflage a record of failure than a considered attempt to create the firm but fair immigration system of which the Home Secretary spoke.

We will refuse to give the Bill a Third Reading tonight because the Government have failed to listen in Committee and failed to produce any meaningful evidence that the measures in the Bill will have any more success than the steps that they took in the last Parliament. Worse, by legislating in this ill-conceived way, they have produced a Bill that could have a number of unintended and pernicious consequences, as my hon. and learned Friend the shadow Immigration Minister so skilfully exposed in Committee.

First, the Bill could undermine all the progress made on tackling modern slavery and human trafficking—for which, actually, the Government deserve some credit. Secondly, the Bill could leave desperate children utterly destitute. Thirdly, it could lead to discrimination in the workplace and the housing market and erode important civil liberties and human rights. I shall take each issue quickly in turn.

I have real concerns that the creation of a new offence of illegal working could deter vulnerable people, such as trafficked women and children, from having the courage to come forward to report rogue employers and criminal gangs. Those unscrupulous individuals already hold the whip hand; the tragedy is that the Bill will strengthen their grip over these most vulnerable of people. The House should reject the Bill. Working to put food in your kids’ mouths should never be a criminal offence. More broadly, if employees fear losing wages or even imprisonment by coming forward to report employers, might not the effect of the Bill be the reverse of what the Home Secretary wants? Might it not actually increase the size of the black market?

Those are genuine concerns and I have not seen any convincing evidence from the Government to suggest that they are misplaced. Although the Government have remained unmoved during the Bill’s passage through this House, I feel sure that their lordships will wish to push them hard on this issue in another place.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Government are focusing on the wrong party in the Bill? They should be concentrating—[Interruption.] They should be concentrating, as the Home Secretary should while I am speaking, on clamping down on unscrupulous employers who prey on the misery of people forced into terrible conditions, such as those exploited on Britain’s building sites. I have actually seen that with my own eyes.

[Andy Burnham]

My hon. Friend has more experience than anybody in the House of the workplaces that might be most affected by the Bill. He is absolutely right to say that unscrupulous employers—sadly, they do exist in the construction industry—will feel emboldened by the Bill. They will know that exploited people on building sites will no longer have the courage to report them to the authorities. [Interruption.] The Home Secretary says that is “desperate”, but those people are desperate and she is putting them in a worse position. She needs to think about that before she puts the Bill into law.

Another concern is about clause 34, which removes support from families—a power that the Home Office has long sought; the proposal was put to me as a Minister and piloted under the last Labour Government. The official evaluation of that pilot found no evidence of increased removals but plenty of families going underground and losing touch with the authorities. As my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central said in the debate, there is also the shunting of costs from the Home Office to local authorities.

In the end, however, the question we need to ask ourselves is much more fundamental: should any child—whoever they are, wherever they come from—be denied food and clothes while they are on British soil? I do not think so and I would venture to say that most Members on both sides would, in their heart of hearts, think the same. The great irony is that it was the then Conservative Opposition—specifically, the shadow Home Office team—in the last but one Parliament who led the charge against what was then known as clause 9. They were right to force the then Government to pilot this change, and we were right to drop the whole idea once the results of the pilot were clear. If what they said was right then, why is it not right now?

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) on raising widely held concerns about the need for immigration rules that allow for the reunification of refugee families. She spoke powerfully about that. I hope that the Government will continue to look at this, particularly at new clause 11, which calls for a review of the rules.

Finally, I turn to the concern about the potential of the Bill to increase discrimination and erode basic rights and liberties. We live in the most challenging of times when there is no shortage of people with extreme views who seek to set race against race and religion against religion. We are legislating in a febrile climate in which discrimination can easily flourish, and this House must take great care that nothing we do adds to that. The right response to these challenges is not to erode important rights and liberties but to do the exact opposite—to protect and champion them. Given the huge backlog in the Home Office and its consistently poor record on initial decisions, the deport first, appeal later approach could undermine Britain’s position in the world as a bastion of fair play and higher ideals. Despite the evidence published by the Government, I remain concerned that the threat of imprisonment to landlords who rent flats or houses to people without immigration status could lead to discrimination in the housing market, and a greater sense among black and Asian young people that they are being victimised.

Let me end on a more positive note that gives us a glimmer of hope for the Bill’s onward passage to another place. I am pleased that the Minister, whom Labour Members have time for, has conceded significant ground on immigration detention. That has had strong support from Members on both sides, including the hon. Member for Bedford (Richard Fuller), who has Yarl’s Wood detention centre in his constituency and has long called for a more humane system.

NHS Services (Access)

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Wednesday 15th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

May I remind the hon. Gentleman, for whom I have a lot of respect, that I, as Health Secretary in 2009, introduced to the national health service a policy of NHS preferred provider? That is because I am not neutral about the NHS. I believe in the public NHS and what it represents, which is people before profits. Any policy that I develop will always be based on that principle. I was attacked at the time by the Conservative party for introducing such a policy, but I make no apology for it. We used the private sector in a supporting role, but the Government want to use it in a replacement role, and there is a very big difference between the two things. If they were continuing what we had done, why did they need a 300-page Bill to rewrite the whole legal basis of the national health service?

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

Is my right hon. Friend aware that even the Chancellor agrees that the disastrous top-down reorganisation of the NHS was a huge strategic error? Does he agree that those on the Government Benches, including the hon. Member for St Ives (Andrew George), should apologise—I include in that the newly elected hon. Member for Clacton (Douglas Carswell) who has somehow found his way on to the front Bench on the Opposition side, but hopefully not for long—and support the private Member’s Bill of my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) when it comes before the House on 21 November?

[Andy Burnham]

I am interested to see this new friendship that my hon. Friend has struck up with the hon. Member for Clacton (Douglas Carswell) on the Front Bench. My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The promise was that there would be no top-down reorganisation. We told the Government that it would be a major mistake to break that promise. They broke that promise and now they are admitting it in private to newspapers. I will come to that point a bit later.

Francis Report

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Wednesday 5th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

I am pleased that the hon. Gentleman has acknowledged that it was I who appointed Robert Francis to begin the process of an independent inquiry into what went wrong. I shall say more in a moment about what I did, why I did it, and why I stand by what I did, because in my view what I did was help to get to the truth while also helping Stafford hospital to recover.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

As my right hon. Friend knows, my wife is a community psychiatric nurse who sees mental health services at the sharp end. Does he agree that the coalition seems to view mental health as a Cinderella service rather than an integral part of the NHS?

[Andy Burnham]

My hon. Friend is right: it is the poor relation that has always been on the fringes of the system, and is always the first service to be targeted for cuts. That has happened again in these difficult times. The Government are cutting mental health services more deeply than the rest of the NHS, and that has led to all the problems that I have been describing.

I went to Stafford recently to meet campaigners who are working to support the hospital. One of them told me that because of the lack of available mental health beds, beds had had to be found in the hospital for people who were experiencing serious mental health crises. That is what begins to happen when we do not have adequate capacity on the ground. Government Members say that this is not relevant, but it is directly relevant to all the matters that we are discussing today.

NHS

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Wednesday 5th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

I acknowledged that there is always pressure in A and E, but the fact is that it performed better in every month when I was Health Secretary than it has under the current Health Secretary. The hon. Gentleman mentions Norfolk again. We have been looking at the Minister’s website, which makes us wonder whether he considers himself a Minister or an observer of events in the NHS. Under the headline “Norman Lamb’s North Norfolk Ambulance Survey” he states:

“I have been campaigning over the last year to improve unacceptable ambulance response times in rural Norfolk.”

My God, this is the Minister! He is campaigning against his own Government.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

I wonder whether the Minister will write to the Minister about that problem. The spin from those on the Government Front Bench may kid some of their Back Benchers, and it has certainly kidded some Liberal Democrats who I have been speaking to across the Chamber, but it will not kid patients who go to A and E and see people on trolleys, camp beds or blocked in ambulances.

[Andy Burnham]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I would love the Government to explain that everything is fine and that there is no problem at all to more than 100,000 people who have waited more than four hours on a trolley this year, or almost 1 million people who have waited more than four hours in A and E. The complacency is not justified, and if those people were to read the Government’s motion, I am afraid, quite frankly, they would be astonished.

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[Andy Burnham]

The beard is certainly helping. I suggest that the hon. Member for Taunton Deane (Mr Browne) visit Liverpool Walton, because he will see more food banks there than anywhere else in the country. He will meet families who cannot afford to put enough food on the table to give their kids a decent diet. He will see the direct effects of some of his Government’s policies on some of the most deprived communities in the country.

[Steve Rotheram]

If people who turn up to A and E have malnutrition, it plays havoc with their medication. If they are not eating properly, they can be violently ill from their medication. Does my right hon. Friend agree that that is a growing problem?

[Andy Burnham]

I agree, and the last time we had a debate on this issue I quoted a well-known GP who said that she has taken to asking her patients whether they are eating properly, because many are presenting with unexplained symptoms that she cannot identify. People on several prescription medicines who are not eating properly are putting themselves at risk—

Accident and Emergency

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Wednesday 18th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

I agree. The Government have made grave mistakes. I warned them—they misquote me every week—that it would be irresponsible to give increases to the NHS, which is what they were promising, if they had to ransack local government, particularly social care budgets, to pay for them. That is a false economy. It means that older people have support withdrawn from the home, and they drift towards A and E in ever greater numbers. That is what is happening today on this Secretary of State’s watch.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

Given that we have just heard that Liverpool will face 62% reductions in local government settlements, does my right hon. Friend agree that the obvious consequence will be to put additional pressures on A and E in Liverpool hospitals?

[Andy Burnham]

The Government are tearing up the social fabric of England’s most deprived city. This is a city in which people struggle to feed their kids and to make ends meet. Council services are utterly crucial in helping people to cope. The Government do not understand, or they do not care, and they just rip up the fabric of an entire city. It is disgraceful.

Sudden Adult Death Syndrome

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Monday 25th March 2013 Westminster Hall

[Steve Rotheram]

I just wanted to put that on the record.

Many excellent points have been raised in the debate. What we have seen demonstrated during the past three hours is the clear and absolute desire for Parliament to act. I understand that the Minister has a difficult job. There are obstacles and challenges to overcome in relation to cardiac arrest and SADS, including raising awareness and overcoming people’s initial fear of helping someone who has sustained a cardiac arrest. The hope is that this debate will have teased out some of those things.

We have also heard about a number of issues that are not directly relevant to the Minister’s remit, so she may well have to have conversations not just with the relevant Education Minister, but with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and certainly with the Department for Communities and Local Government in relation to the planning issues. However, that does not mean that she or the Government can abrogate their responsibilities. As has been highlighted, some of these things are cost-neutral; they just need action. We are not asking for money or, at worst, they cost very little. They simply require political will.

A few weeks ago, after the debate was announced, I received numerous phone calls and e-mails from organisations and charities that have been campaigning for years on this issue, so it is only right that they receive recognition for their efforts. Therefore, in praising again the efforts of the OK Foundation, I would also like to pay tribute to SADS UK, the British Heart Foundation, Cardiac Risk in the Young, the London Ambulance Service, Hearts and Goals, the Arrhythmia Alliance, the North West Ambulance Service, AED Locator, the Community HeartBeat Trust, Kays Medical and Liverpool football club and the great Steven Gerrard, the England captain, who has also recently come on board and lent his support—my right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) is shaking his head.

There is growing momentum for action, and campaigners will not give up on this issue until progress is made. Including first aid training in the school curriculum would take up 0.2% of the timetable, but have an incalculable value.

[Andy Burnham]

Can I add my own tribute to the organisations—most of them—that my hon. Friend has just listed? Obviously, we do not doubt the Minister’s good will, but I think that we will have been disappointed by the response, particularly on the issue of legislation. With that in mind, may I encourage my hon. Friend to return to the Backbench Business Committee and make a request to bring this issue to the Floor of House? It seems to me that Parliament might take a different view from the Government on the need for legislation. I think that we should try to test the mind of Parliament on this issue. I hope that my hon. Friend will not be put off and will pursue his campaign in that direction.

[Steve Rotheram]

I am happy to confirm to my right hon. Friend that I think that, following the discussion that I will have immediately after this debate, the next step will be for us to push the Backbench Business Committee for a further debate in the main Chamber so that we push this issue to a vote, because I genuinely believe that defibs will save thousands of lives every year. No one in their right mind doubts that, so it is for the Government to show their resolve and to back the campaigners. A national lead is needed on this issue. We have not been given that today, so we will push in the future for that lead.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the e-petition relating to preventable cardiac deaths arising from Sudden Adult Death Syndrome.

Education Bill

Debate between Steve Rotheram and Andy Burnham

Tuesday 8th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

On the Minister’s first point, my mum reliably informs me that in 1950s Liverpool the mass was said in Latin, but I can tell him that it is not today. On his second point, he needs to tell the shadow schools Minister in Committee why he is removing the apprenticeships guarantee. What is the reason? If we are convinced that this can be done without restricting opportunities to young people who are not planning to go to university, perhaps we will be satisfied, but he does not fill me with encouragement.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that Governments do not create apprenticeships, they fund apprenticeships? Employers create apprenticeships and under the previous Labour Government the number of apprenticeships trebled. Does he agree that it is simply laughable that the Secretary of State is trying to position himself as the champion of the working classes, and that we should invite him to Goodison Park to meet some ordinary working people, so that he can learn from them about what these policies will do to ordinary working-class families?

[Andy Burnham]

My hon. Friend is right that the Government have nothing to say to young people who want to plan to get a good skill so that they can get on in life. He rightly said that employers create apprenticeships, but the Government are a huge employer. When I was Health Secretary we increased the number of apprenticeships from 1,000 to 5,000, but that was not enough in the country’s biggest employer and the third biggest employer in the world. It was the existence of that guarantee that meant that public services had to work hard to increase the number of apprenticeship places they were making available. My worry is that by dropping this commitment the Government are going to throw that progress into reverse. The Government have figures for funding apprenticeships, but I am not certain that they are going to turn into a real increase in the number of apprenticeships, and the Minister for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning will need to have some good answers on that point in Committee.