Rail Strikes

Zarah Sultana Excerpts

Wednesday 15th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Zarah Sultana (Coventry South) (Lab)]

This House has just discussed the Government’s disgusting Rwanda deportation policy. On Monday I attended a demonstration against that policy, coming directly from a debate in Parliament on the Government’s similarly disgraceful refusal to ban trans conversion therapy. That debate, the debate on the Rwanda deportations and this afternoon’s motion on the rail strike are connected: they are all about this Tory Government’s attempt to divide our communities and distract from their failure to serve the British people.

That is clear with the Rwanda policy, which has nothing to do with tackling people-smuggling and everything to do with whipping up hate, demonising marginalised groups and pitting people who were born here against people who seek asylum here. That is what the refusal to ban trans conversion therapy—letting abusive practices against trans people go unpunished in order to pit cis women against trans women—is about: division and distraction.

That is also what the demonisation of railway workers and the RMT Union is all about: threatening anti-democratic and anti-worker legislation; vilifying workers who are standing up for jobs, pay and conditions; and pitting those railway workers against other workers. It is all an attempt to distract and divide, at a time when this Government are overseeing a cost of living emergency and a growing poverty crisis across the country.

Railway workers are clear: this strike is a last resort, no matter what Conservative Members say. The union and the workers have been calling for the dispute to be resolved for two years, but Ministers have refused to do so. Ministers have refused to get employers to withdraw the threat of compulsory redundancies against thousands of railway workers or to end the pay freeze for workers, which is really a pay cut, worth thousands of pounds per worker, when inflation rises to 10% and beyond. This dispute is not about modernising the railways or whatever else people say; it is about attacking workers, declining standards and worsening services for passengers.

These workers—we should applaud them for it—are standing up for their jobs and pay, but are being scapegoated by a Tory Government who would rather distract and divide.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

My hon. Friend must be aware of the anger that many people who work in the rail industry feel—those who clean and repair the carriages, those who repair the track and those who provide the catering that many Members of this House enjoy—at being told basically to take a pay cut and face compulsory redundancies at a time when billions has been poured into the train operating companies, which have done very nicely out of their cosy arrangement with this Government.

[Zarah Sultana]

I absolutely agree. These tactics from the Government are to stop us talking about the fact that private rail companies take more than £500 million out of the railway system every year in private profits. It is the richest in the country who are truly raking it in, from the Chancellor, who is one of the wealthiest people in the country, to the record number of UK billionaires, one third of whom donate to the Conservative Party—[Interruption.] Tory Members can make all the sounds they like, but the facts are the facts.

That is all while working people are experiencing the biggest squeeze on living standards since the 1950s. Tory Members want us to believe that railway workers are the problem. They want us to blame refugees, not Tory cuts, for the crisis in public services and why they are at breaking point. They want us to think trans women are a threat to cis women. This House should be clear: the problem is not railway workers, it is not refugees and it is not trans women. The problem is this Tory Government and the billionaires who back them.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Right. We have just over 20 minutes and there are 11 people standing to speak. If there is discipline, they will all get in; no discipline, and some people will not get in.

HS2

Zarah Sultana Excerpts

Monday 13th September 2021 Westminster Hall

[Taiwo Owatemi]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising such an important point. HS2 has caused financial restraints for many people whose life it has impacted—

[Zarah Sultana (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Taiwo Owatemi]

I will, but I will have to continue my speech very shortly.

[Zarah Sultana]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way. I share many of the concerns about HS2 that she has raised. These concerns were made very clear to me when I joined constituents affected by the project earlier this year and saw the impact of HS2 on them and their local area. In addition to the environmental issues that my hon. Friend has raised, what keeps coming up time and again from constituents is noise pollution. Does she agree that it is long overdue for HS2 to put up noise-cancelling barriers to stop the disruption that is plaguing so many constituents?

[David Mundell (in the Chair)]

I will just say at this stage that because the debate is heavily over-subscribed, those people making interventions, particularly lengthy ones, are unlikely to catch my eye for the debate itself.

Covid-19: Aviation

Zarah Sultana Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kelly Tolhurst]

I understand the impact that any reduction in jobs or stress on organisations in the hon. Lady’s constituency will have on her constituency. The Chancellor did announce an unprecedented level of support, and use has been made of that. The option to come to talk to us about bespoke support has been there and is still there. I am continuing to talk to airports and airlines about the ability to tap into that. We will continue to work with those in the sector to mitigate some of the issues and impacts they are understandably feeling at this moment in time.

[Zarah Sultana (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Constituents of mine have told me that BA’s plan means that they face redundancy, significantly reduced wages and worse working conditions. The company should step back from the brink, and instead work with trade unions and the Government to develop a strategy that protects jobs and the environment. Will the Minister commit to using the Government’s powers to prevent this betrayal of staff, such as withdrawing slots at airports and exploring the option to bring the company back under public control?

[Kelly Tolhurst]

I think I have outlined the point quite clearly, and I have answered a number of questions in the same vein. I will continue to do what I can to make organisations in the sector aware that we would rather they used the unprecedented Government support available to them before making redundancies. I absolutely understand the concerns of the workers affected, and we will continue to look at all the options we as a Government have to make use of.

Oral Answers to Questions

Zarah Sultana Excerpts

Thursday 12th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)]

2. What steps he is taking to reduce the cost of rail fares.

[Zarah Sultana (Coventry South) (Lab)]

5. What steps he is taking to reduce the cost of rail fares.

[Kate Osborne (Jarrow) (Lab)]

8. What steps he is taking to reduce the cost of rail fares.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

The hon. Gentleman would probably like to know that 98p of every £1 paid in fares goes back into the railways, which allows investment in all the areas where he would like to see it, including accessibility for his constituents.

[Zarah Sultana]

Under the Conservatives, rail fares have rocketed by 40%. An annual season ticket from Coventry to London is now £5,760, to Birmingham it is £1,400 and to Nuneaton it is £1,200. That unfairly puts rail travel beyond the reach of many of my constituents and it discourages green travel. Privatisation has failed, so will the Government bring our railways into public ownership to slash fares and combat the climate emergency?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I am sure the hon. Lady will look forward, as I do, to the issuing of the Williams review, which answers some of the questions she raised, but she should be careful what she wishes for because, today, using a single fare—£7, I believe it is—to go from London to Coventry, a host of Conservative Members are going to campaign in her hyper-marginal seat, at very good value for money.