Ministers’ Severance Pay

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Monday 11th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Wheeler]

I recall that, during the Blair and Brown years, the Labour party decided it did not need to change the legislation. The legislation is as it is, there is a three-week period, and I think that is completely fair.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

First, I commit to responding directly to the hon. Member for North Devon (Selaine Saxby) and the Minister on what statements were put out.

This seems to be a situation entirely of the Conservatives’ making. We are potentially at risk of making a mockery of our system. Given that the Minister says it has been more than 30 years since this legislation was looked at, does she agree that now is the time to revisit it and that, at the very least, we should look at a minimum term of service before a Minister or Secretary of State is entitled either to waive or to receive a severance payment?

[Mrs Wheeler]

That is a fair question. The answer I would give the hon. Lady is that, obviously, the Liberal Democrat who resigned during the coalition did not think it was worth looking at either.

Standards in Public Life

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Tuesday 5th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Michael Ellis]

I do not accept the premise of my hon. Friend’s question. As I think he will note, when, after the exercise—the investigation that I referred to a few moments ago—the former Minister in question was appointed to the Department for Levelling Up, and then to the Whips Office, I am not aware that any further objection was made by the senior civil servant in question. That is something from which my hon. Friend can draw a note.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

As many in this House know, I am a former police officer, and something that is important for every single one of us as MPs is our responsibility for safeguarding, both on the estate and in our constituency. If I received an unsubstantiated allegation, I would do my best to find out as much as I could about it, not just from curiosity, but to ensure that people were safe. What has failed here? Is it a failure of process, integrity or both?

[Michael Ellis]

No. As I have articulated, there was an exercise in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office on the matter, which I believe went on for several weeks. I need to confirm the details, because I had insufficient time to do so this morning, but as I say, there was an exercise, and it concluded to the satisfaction of all involved. That was within the Department and, it appears to me, before the Prime Minister was made aware.

Independent Adviser on Ministers’ Interests Resignation

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Thursday 16th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Michael Ellis]

May I gently say to the Opposition parties that if they wish for a change of Prime Minister, they should do something different from attacking personalities? They should attack policies, but of course if they were to attack policies, they would find that they would lose.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

Government is accountable to Parliament. The independent adviser on Ministers’ interests is a crucial role that is appointed by the Prime Minister. Does the Minister accept that the only way to begin the process of restoring trust in standards of public life—standards undermined by the Prime Minister—is to give Parliament a role in the appointment of the new adviser? At minimum, we should be looking at a scrutiny session by the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee and a confirmatory vote in this House.

Sue Gray Report

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Wednesday 25th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I wish things could have been handled better and I wish we had got things right in No. 10 in the way we did not. I apologise again for things that we got wrong, but we have already changed the way we work and I really think it is time that the country moved on.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

The Prime Minister has previously stated that partygate investigations would be complied with fully, but today there are reports that senior staff simply did not answer the questionnaires and, as a result, have avoided being fined. Can he therefore confirm whether all senior staff at No. 10, including himself, met their obligations and replied to the Metropolitan police in full?

[The Prime Minister]

As the hon. Lady knows, those are matters for the Met.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Tuesday 24th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

It is very telling that the SNP spokesperson, the hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald), did not want to talk about those issues or Scotland’s record and asked us something totally outside the realm of Justice questions. My hon. Friend makes a compelling point, but we will not rest on our laurels south of the border. We will introduce a victims Bill that will place the victims code into law and send the clearest possible signal that the justice system must deliver for victims as a matter of moral correctness and to ensure the efficacy of the system.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

T5. In all nations of the UK, rape victims are being let down by criminal justice systems that make prosecuting rape extremely rare, lengthy and difficult. At present, charge rates for rape vary widely from 1.3% in Surrey, home to the Secretary of State’s constituency, to 8.2% in Durham. Some 63% of cases are closed because the victim gives up on the process and withdraws from it. Despite progress on disposals, what additional steps is he taking to address that horrific reality?

[Dominic Raab]

First, we have seen a step change increase in convictions by 67%—two thirds—over the last year. I think the hon. Lady is wrong, if I may say so, to use the statistic that she used. In fact, the conviction rate has increased from 68% in July to September 2021 to around 71% in the last quarter. Through Operation Soteria, section 28 and changes that are being made to disclosure, we will drive a step change in support for victims with the quadrupling of victims funding, which will help to support victims through the process and secure more convictions.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP)]

21. What recent discussions he has had with Cabinet colleagues on reforming the human rights framework.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

22. What assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the independent Human Rights Act review published in December 2021.

[The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Dominic Raab)]

The Government were elected on a manifesto commitment to replace the Human Rights Act 1998, and we have launched a consultation on a UK-wide Bill of Rights. We intend to bring forward legislation in the next Session.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dominic Raab]

Although I disagree with the hon. Gentleman, I pay respect to the way he has introduced this question. There is a school of thought—I have been up to Edinburgh and discussed this with the Scottish Government—that we should expand a wider range of policy issues, social and economic, and environmental goals, and turn them into judicially enforceable rights. Many of those areas involve collective issues that require finely balanced judgment calls and often require public finances to be allocated in a very sensitive way, and I think they should be decided by hon. Members in all parts of this House, accountable to the British people, not lawyers in a courtroom.

[Wendy Chamberlain]

It is agreed by legal experts in areas ranging from local government to the House of Lords that the HRA is a delicate and well-tuned piece of legislation, and the organisation Lawyers in Local Government said in its response to the independent HRA review that the Government’s proposals not only risk reducing the accountability of public authorities and undermining the rules but will concretely cause further delay in reaching decisions on social housing, which is worse for all our constituents and for councils. This is not about ideology but about real-world outcomes. The HRA is working well, so will the Government accept that plans to scrap it are counterproductive?

[Dominic Raab]

I am afraid that I will not, and I respectfully disagree. I will side with the local authorities of whatever political colour or composition who are trying to serve their constituents. They of course need to be held to the rule of law and be accountable, but I am not on the side of the lawyers suing local authorities.

Ukraine

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Thursday 24th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Yes, and not only is that true, but the opportunity and the reward for success and being strong are huge, because if this should end with the rejection of aggression and the rejection of the Putin regime’s view of the world, that will be a massive, massive benefit, including economically, to the whole world.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

Up until May 2021, Valentyna Yakovleva was my constituent. She resided in Scotland for 20 years with her daughter and her family, but due to an initial error in application, she eventually exhausted appeals and was deported with two covid jags last year. Now that 71-year-old is sheltering in a subway. In response to the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford), who is no longer in her place, I reiterate: does the Prime Minister agree that as we face a likely refugee crisis, the UK must be doing all it can to extract individuals who have immediate family relatives in the UK? I urge for support for this case.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Wednesday 19th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

The British Sign Language interpretation of proceedings is available to watch on parliamentlive.tv.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

Q1. If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 19 January.

[The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)]

I will shortly update the House on this country’s fantastic progress in tackling covid-19, including through our booster programme, which is enabling us to ease plan B measures and restore the ancient liberties of this country.

I know that the whole House will be delighted that Her Majesty the Queen has given permission for a special medal to be awarded to all those who were deployed to Kabul. Operation Pitting saw our servicemen and women deliver the largest British evacuation since the second world war. The whole country can be immensely proud of their service.

This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.

[Wendy Chamberlain]

Last year, we were told by the Prime Minister that there were no Downing Street parties. Then it turned out that there were parties, but we were assured that no rules were broken. Last week, we heard that rules may have been broken, but that he thought it was a work event. Yesterday, from the man who wrote the rules, we heard, “Well, nobody told me what those rules were.” Five weeks ago, the people of North Shropshire were clear, and the people of North East Fife are being clear to me now: no matter the excuse, there is no excuse for taking the British people for fools. Does the Prime Minister agree that it is now time for him to resign?

[The Prime Minister]

No, but as I said to the House last week, I apologise sincerely for any misjudgments that were made. The hon. Lady must contain her impatience and wait for the inquiry next week before drawing any of the conclusions she has just asserted.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Thursday 13th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Minister without Portfolio (Nigel Adams)]

May I first congratulate my right hon. Friend and Lady Goodwill on the fantastic news from Her Majesty’s new year honours list? The good people of Scarborough and Whitby will be rightly proud of their Member of Parliament. He is right to ask that question. The strategy that we are implementing supports multiple production technologies including both electrolytic green and carbon capture-enabled blue hydrogen production. We are not limiting ambition for any one technology by arbitrarily splitting our 5 GW ambition between green and blue hydrogen. Following the consultation, we will develop an approach to different production routes, including the less developed ones to which he refers, by early this year.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

T5. Given the damage that the self-styled Minister for the Union has done to public trust in recent days and the decision of some Cabinet colleagues to diminish the role of the Scottish Conservative leader, the hon. Member for Moray (Douglas Ross), will the Minister prove that the Government can at least try to do one thing right and commit to supporting my private Member’s Bill, which would at least ensure that the boards of public bodies include appropriate representation from the devolved nations?

[Steve Barclay]

As a former member of the Whips Office, I know that it is always a triumph how different issues can be used in support of a private Member’s Bill. I am sure that my colleague the Chief Whip will look at the Bill’s terms in detail.

As for the Union, the Prime Minister is the Minister for the Union, and its importance was reinforced by the recent machinery of Government change and the leading position taken by the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. We want to level up across the entire Union of the United Kingdom. I referenced the call that I had yesterday with other Ministers and colleagues in the devolved Administrations as part of the ongoing covid response on which we are working closely together. The Union is fundamental to the Government—it certainly informs much of my work as a Minister—and the Prime Minister and ministerial team are hugely committed to it.

Photographic Reconnaissance Unit: National Memorial

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Tuesday 9th November 2021 Westminster Hall

[Andrew Bowie]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention and I heartily agree. It was in speaking with George yesterday who, as my hon. Friend says, at 97 remains as sharp as a tack and very much on the ball, that this campaign was really brought home to me. George flew Mosquitoes over enemy lines to gather crucial intelligence for the allies, and he made clear to me just how important this campaign is. There will come a time, which is sadly fast approaching, when there will be no veterans of that great conflict left with us. Therefore it lies with us—we who are free to stand in this Parliament today, in this country, on this continent, because of the actions of men like George—to commemorate and remember them.

I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting this debate today, and in this week of all weeks, when the nation will fall silent as we remember all those who fought and did not return; those who did give their tomorrow for our today, 378 of whom flew with the PRU and 143 of whom lie with no grave. They really were the few.

Early in the morning of 5 March 1942, 22-year-old Alastair “Sandy” Gunn of Auchterarder in Perthshire climbed into his Spitfire AA810 at RAF Wick, taking off into the cool, blue dawn with one instruction: to get eyes on the Tirpitz. The Tirpitz was the sister ship of the Bismarck. She had escaped unscathed from an RAF bombing raid on Wilhelmshaven where she lay in build and, since evading the Royal Navy, local intelligence and RAF aerial searches for months, the pride of the German fleet had been seen in Trondheim harbour.

It was a beautiful late winter morning—one of those seen only over the North sea—giving Sandy no cloud cover whatsoever. Not that that mattered very much, because the Luftwaffe, from their listening station in Kristiansund, had scrambled two Messerschmitts. As with all photographic reconnaissance aircraft, Sandy’s Spitfire was stripped of guns and plating, which were replaced with cameras and enough fuel for long-range missions. Hon. Members will agree that that takes incredible bravery—to fly those most dangerous of missions, over enemy lines, with no armaments whatsoever with which to defend oneself. Diving down, the Messerschmitt found Sandy’s oil system but, as it closed in, blinded by spray, could not hold course and broke away. The second Messerschmitt, pressing home the attack, sprayed its 20 mm cannon into Sandy’s wing, bursting a fuel tank. The Spitfire was on fire, falling fast.

Sandy ejected, and parachuted into the snow-covered mountains. Two Norwegians climbed to meet Sandy with skis—and with all the daring resolve of their underground resistance. His Spitfire, the AA810, remained on the mountainside. Badly burned, Sandy was in no state to attempt a cross-country escape across occupied Norway. Instead, he handed himself in to the Germans. Interrogated for 21 days, Sandy held his resolve, and held his silence, before he was sent off to the infamous Stalag Luft III. Punished for a first, failed escape, he then set himself at the slow and steady work of tunnel Harry and, alongside his fellow inmates, made his great escape on 24 March 1944. Looking to find neutral Sweden, riding on the axles of freight trains, he and Flight Lieutenant Casey were one day’s walk away from the Baltic coast. Sadly, they were caught and, given up to the Gestapo, interrogated. Sandy was brought outside and shot, on Hitler’s direct orders.

Sandy was one of over 1,000 who flew with the PRU and one of over 378 who fell, giving the PRU the second-highest attrition rate of any unit in the entire second world war. However, in delivering over 20 million images of enemy operations and installations—from Norwegian fjords to the Burmese jungle; for D-day, Amiens and the Dambusters raid; first spotting the V1 and V2—the PRU opened up the terrific German war machine cog and piece apart, and gave a sight of victory. If that sounds familiar to the Minister, it is because the first camera systems were fitted into the Spitfires and Mosquitoes at RAF Farnborough, in his constituency, and the men who did so taught at the RAF School of Photography nearby.

The Photographic Reconnaissance Unit was formed on 24 September 1939. Throughout the second world war it operated, as I said, in highly dangerous, clandestine photographic reconnaissance operations in all theatres of operation.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for securing the debate and for his tenacity in bringing it back post 2019. He mentioned Sandy Gunn and his bravery. Sandy Gunn flew from Wick during that campaign, but he was briefly at Leuchars. Given that the hon. Member is describing the history of the Photographic Reconnaissance Unit, it would be remiss of me not to detail the fact that it was based at Leuchars airfield from late 1942 to early 1944. I hope that the hon. Member will join me in seeking to honour the memory of all those men and to ensure that all air bases are recognised in the memorial.

[Andrew Bowie]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. I completely agree: all the air bases from which the PRU flew should be commemorated, and all the men who flew, from whatever airfield, should be commemorated if we are able to succeed in getting a memorial erected in a prominent position in the country in the coming years.

In 2019, Mr Tony Hoskins recovered Spitfire AA810—Sandy Gunn’s Spitfire—from the Norwegian mountainside where Sandy had ejected all those years ago. Tony Hoskins established the Spitfire AA810 Project to restore the plane to flight, which it is hoped will be completed by 2023. The project also established the Sandy Gunn Aerospace Careers Programme, which was launched at Cranfield University on 27 September 2019—what would have been Sandy Gunn’s 100th birthday.

In 2019, the Spitfire AA810 Project began its campaign to establish a national memorial to the PRU and the brave men who flew for it from wherever they were based. This year, the project established an advisory board, with representatives from industry, academia and both Houses of Parliament, to drive forward the establishment of a national memorial to the PRU. The young pilots who flew for the PRU performed their duty in highly dangerous conditions, without armour and alone. The work of the PRU and the intelligence it gathered were crucial to allied planning and strategy throughout the war. They were critical to the success of countless operations, saving the lives of thousands of servicemen in the process.