Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Theresa May and Lisa Nandy

Wednesday 20th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

Q12. After four weeks of Northern Rail chaos, passengers in the north of England have had enough. The Government have said that Network Rail did not deliver and that Northern was not prepared, but I have been handed emails from within the Department for Transport that show Ministers and officials were warned of impending chaos as long as two years ago. These emails are a disgrace. In them, officials describe key Northern routes as valueless, discuss “a classic handling strategy” for Members of Parliament, discuss whether to throw “a sop” to Northern passenger groups and debate whether to propagate myths in order to divert public attention from agreed planned route closures.Will the Prime Minister explain to the House why she has withheld this key information from us and from the public? Or is she so incompetent that she literally does not have a clue what is going on in her own Government?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady refers to documents that she describes as having been leaked from the Department for Transport. No Government respond from the Dispatch Box to leaked documents they have not seen. In advance of the timetable changes for both Northern and Govia in May, a separate independent panel was set up by the DFT to reassure the Department about the nature of those plans.

[Lisa Nandy]

indicated dissent.

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady may shake her head, but that independent panel was set up, and that independent panel advised the Department for Transport.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Theresa May and Lisa Nandy

Wednesday 28th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I say to my right hon. and learned Friend that we are indeed committed. We have given that commitment—we gave it in the December joint report and we have given it in the negotiating stage that was completed last week—to ensure that there is no hard border between Northern Ireland and Ireland, and also to ensure that businesses in Northern Ireland can continue to trade freely with the rest of the United Kingdom and vice versa. We are working to ensure that we have tariff-free trade and trade that is as frictionless as possible. As I am sure he will know, trade between the UK and the EU is not completely frictionless today, but we will ensure that trade is as frictionless as possible in the future. We have put forward proposals and we have started discussing them in detail with the European Commission, and I assure my right hon. and learned Friend that the Home Secretary and others are taking the steps necessary to ensure that we have the arrangements in place for when we come to the end of the implementation period.

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

It has been four weeks since the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse published a damning report about the treatment of British children sent overseas by their Government. They were physically, sexually and emotionally abused, separated from siblings and wrongly told that their families were dead. Successive Governments supressed information, ignored warnings and continued to send children to harm for decades. The report is unequivocal that compensation is owed and that this is now urgent. Many have died and others are dying, but in the last four weeks the Government have failed to issue a response, to set out any timetable for a response or even to agree which Department is responsible for formulating a response. The Prime Minister commissioned this report. Will she now get a grip on her Government, stand by its verdict and ensure that no more have to die waiting for justice?

[The Prime Minister]

I did indeed commission the work that is being done in looking at the treatment of children and the abuse of children in the past. I think that that was important. I said at the time that I thought that many people would be shocked by some of the results, including, obviously, the issue of former child migrants to which the hon. Lady has referred.

I can confirm that the Department of Health and Social Care is responsible for policy on former child migrants. As the hon. Lady will know, we have funded the Child Migrants Trust since 1990 so that it can expand its work in seeking resolution for former child migrants and their families. It has received more than £7 million, and in the 1990s we provided £1 million for travel to help former child migrants to be reunited with their families. At the time of the Government’s formal national apology to former child migrants in 2010, an £8 million family restoration fund was established.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Theresa May and Lisa Nandy

Wednesday 1st November 2017 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend stands up well for his county and constituency on this matter. I am very happy to confirm that we will maintain that commitment in our forthcoming industrial strategy White Paper. We do want to see a fairer distribution of infrastructure spending across the country because we know that infrastructure investment is important to unlocking economic opportunities, economic growth and productivity in our towns, villages and cities. We have backed that with ambitious commitments to increase our spending on infrastructure by 50% over the next four years, but I can assure him that we will be looking at that infrastructure spending across the whole country.

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

Q12. I thank the Prime Minister for her opening words on the horrific revelations this week, but can I say to her that, three years ago, I brought evidence to her in this House that Whips had used information about sexual abuse to demand loyalty from MPs. I brought that information to her in this House and I warned her at the time that, unless real action was taken, we risked repeating those injustices again today. On three occasions, I asked her to act and on three occasions she did not, so can I ask her: in this of all weeks, for the fourth time, will she finally take concrete action to tackle this?

[The Prime Minister]

I will, of course, look back at the questions that the hon. Lady said that she raised with me in this House. I assume that she raised those with me when I was Home Secretary. I am very clear that the Whips Office—I hope that this goes for all Whips Offices across the House—should make it clear to people that, where there are any sexual abuse allegations that could be of a criminal nature, people should go to the police. It is not appropriate for those to be dealt with by Whips Offices; they should go to the police. That continues to be the case.

As I say, I will look at the questions that the hon. Lady raised with me, but I am very clear that we will take action against those where there are allegations that we see and the evidence is there that there has been misconduct. I say to her that I hope that we will all send a message from this House today that we want people in this place to be able to feel confident to bring forward cases, and we need to ensure that those cases are dealt with in a way that people can have confidence on both sides that they will be properly investigated. That means I want to see a good process in this Parliament, so that people do not feel that they have to go through a party political process to have their allegations considered.