Dame Diana Johnson
MP for Kingston upon Hull North and Cottingham · Labour · United Kingdom
“Longer-term funding is subject to future spending reviews. The Department and NHS England are committed to prioritising funding for sepsis in future spending bids. The framework is a 10-year plan. I do not pretend that we will deliver everything overnight, but it sets clear targets to reduce deaths by a quarter over the next 10 years.”
“It is not acceptable that when someone has been through the worst experience of their life, they are just left to get on with it. That is why we are committed to improving access to post-discharge support and rehabilitation, with priority actions set out in the framework.”
“I encourage everyone who has not yet come forward to do so, and to ensure that they obtain both doses of the vaccine for proper protection. The framework commits to improving vaccine access. The shadow Minister put a number of questions to me. I will respond in writing, as I am conscious of the time.”
“No one knows a child better than his or her parents or carers, which is why listening to patients, carers and families is vital to supporting sepsis recognition and escalation. Too many cases have shown the devastating consequences when deterioration concerns are not heard.”
“During Sepsis Awareness Month, I pay tribute to the charities, such as the UK Sepsis Trust and Sepsis Research FEAT, that do so much to support families, raise awareness and fund research.”
“That will include research calls that cover sepsis improvement priorities, whether it is vaccination and screening, faster and more accurate diagnosis or innovative treatments. It is true that the most recent data from the Office for National Statistics suggests that sepsis deaths went down in 2024.”
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“If levelling up is to mean anything, it must be a whole-north approach, and the funding, the city deals and the devolution must be instruments for economic regeneration in the national interest, not for political gerrymandering. In conclusion, I hope that I have shown why statements made by the Prime Minister about transport in the north matter to people who live in Hull and should matter to people across the whole United Kingdom. We need improvements to start happening visibly in the 2020s, rather than just hearing more about the Prime Minister’s latest fantasy project, such as a bridge or tunnel to Northern Ireland. When I am in London, I frequently pass the £500 million shiny new Crossrail station at Canary Wharf, built with private investment and complete with its own lush roof garden.”
“Meanwhile, Hull Trains, the open access rail operator that has provided Hull’s main direct rail link to London—a service built up successfully over the past 20 years to meet demand, amid all the franchise and infrastructure problems on the east coast main line—has not received any of the Government support that others in the rail industry have had during the covid crisis. Other levelling-up funding streams, from the new towns fund to the levelling-up fund and the community renewal fund, do not point to a scale of investment that will be transformational even for the most favoured areas, and certainly not on the scale that London docklands has enjoyed since the 1980s or that London and the south-east have seen—including, among many examples, the £19 billion spent on Crossrail over the last 12 years of construction.”
“In Hull, we have worked hard through the austerity decade to make our own luck, with Siemens and the energy estuary, a growing tech sector, city of culture status and exciting projects like the Hull lagoon and Maritime Hull. However, when it comes to transport investment, we are tired of being promised jam tomorrow, but having jams today. We have had advances such as cutting the Humber bridge tolls and the Mary Murdoch connection across the A63, and we are finally seeing Pacer trains gone, although we still have the polluting diesel rolling stock. But every step forward has been hard won, usually delayed for years and tiny in scale compared with the investment we see elsewhere in the country, especially in Greater London.”
“Funding for the Northern Powerhouse Rail project appears to remain at the level provided for 2020-21, but the fact that Transport for the North was told by Whitehall to delay submission of its business plan until after the Government’s integrated rail plan, itself delayed yet again, shows again that Transport for the North does not have the devolved powers and clout that, for example, Transport for London enjoys. The Department for Transport still controls funding for Northern Powerhouse Rail. Although a statutory body, Transport for the North is only an advisory body—Whitehall still decides. This is why we want straight talking from the Prime Minister, which we are famed for in Yorkshire.”
“The importance of boosting capacity for passengers and freight across the north is only underlined by the new freeport status of both the Humber and Liverpool. A few years ago, it was estimated that the north needed £100 billion-worth of investment to catch up with London and the south-east. Before the 2019 general election, that scale of investment was promised by the Prime Minister within a five-year Parliament. So far, that level of transport investment remains a promise.”
“East-west connectivity across the north is as important as the north-south link to London. Just a few spur links to HS2, especially the cut-down version that would be more distant from the Humber sub-region, do not amount to levelling up the north. Transport for the North research shows that Northern Powerhouse Rail, once delivered, would contribute £14.4 billion in annual gross value added to the UK economy and create up to 74,000 new jobs in the north by 2060. With the challenges of Brexit and “building back better” after covid, this economic boost is now perhaps even more important for the whole country, not just the north, than was the case a few years ago. As just one example, the boost it could give to the steel industry alone is vital for places like Scunthorpe.”
“In recent years, Hull has seen a downgrading of our rail services, even in relation to towns like Scarborough, which, unlike Hull, now enjoys a direct rail link to Manchester airport. The city of Hull currently faces a further downgrading of cross-Pennine rail services and even slower services. Certainly, it has been my suspicion that we will see commercial space travel before we get the high-speed electrified rail line between Hull and Liverpool that the Hull and Humber chamber of commerce and many others have long pressed for. Delivering on the previous promises of a high-speed northern rail powerhouse, Crossrail for the north or HS3—it has been called all those things in recent years—is a minimum requirement if Ministers are serious about levelling up: a fully electrified rail line between Hull and Liverpool.”
“We know that in the digital age, not so much economic activity needs to cluster in the south-east, a point proven again during the covid crisis. More employees can work from home than before, and not so many homes and workplaces need to be in or around the M25. However, levelling up is only meaningful when we start to see action on the ground—physical evidence that transport schemes are under way in this decade, far beyond just the moving of transport civil servants to Leeds, as announced in recent days. So what has been happening in Hull in terms of transport investment? The first significant development after the launch of the northern powerhouse was, sadly, Tory Ministers in November 2016 blocking Hull’s privately financed scheme to electrify the rail lines into Hull.”
“By the time the northern powerhouse was launched in 2014, there appeared to be a growing acceptance of the need to rebalance the economy in several ways, including investment in transport and other creaking infrastructure across northern England. “Rebalancing the economy” has now become “levelling up the north” in the everyday terminology used, but it means the same, and this broad political consensus is that levelling up the north is not just vital for the north, but would also be a win-win for the wider UK economy. It would boost the north’s productivity, general economic activity and the north’s contribution to GDP growth. It would also take pressure off the congested, overheated infrastructure of the south-east, with the economic inefficiency and constrained productivity and growth that that spawns.”
“In the case of Transport for the North, it is the road, bus and rail users in northern England to whom promises have been made who are most disadvantaged if and when there is no accountability for broken promises, moved goalposts or factual inaccuracies. Let me turn to why what the Prime Minister says about transport investment in the north matters so much to me as a Hull MP. My constituents in Hull North face the daily reality of poor transport links and infrastructure in the north, especially east of Leeds, and the long-standing disparity during the years of the northern powerhouse, as yet unaddressed, between levels of public and private investment in the south-east and the rest of the country. On transport especially, Hull people get a poor deal as fare payers and as taxpayers.”
“We saw it over Hillsborough, with what the Right Rev. James Jones called the “patronising disposition of unaccountable power”, and I have encountered the same problem in campaigning for an independent public inquiry into the NHS infected blood scandal. The Prime Minister’s cavalier attitude in inadvertently misleading the House and then not correcting the record reflects his strained relationship with his wide-ranging brief as Prime Minister and his attitude to accountability. This does not just disrespect Members of this House; I think it shows contempt for constituents, who send us here. It is a worrying shift to the “alternative facts” culture that we saw in the Trump White House, and is unhealthy for a modern democracy.”
“It is not dishonourable to make a mistake, but to seek to avoid admitting one is a different matter.” —[ Official Report , 11 March 2021; Vol. 690, c. 1001.] Further to the passage quoted by Mr Speaker, paragraph 1.3c of the ministerial code goes on to say: “Ministers who knowingly mislead Parliament will be expected to offer their resignation to the Prime Minister.” The fact that the Prime Minister is responsible for enforcement of the ministerial code raises the question of what happens when the Prime Minister may be in breach of the ministerial code and the issue of the accountability of that Prime Minister. We all know the culture of institutions that investigate themselves and usually conclude, “There’s nothing to see here”; it is one that we have seen many times in recent decades.”
“He said: “All Members should correct the record if they make an inaccurate statement to the House. They can do so by raising a point of order or in debate, or, in the case of Ministers, they can make a statement or issue a written ministerial statement. The Government’s own ministerial code could not be clearer about what is expected of Ministers. It says: ‘It is of paramount importance that Ministers give accurate and truthful information to Parliament, correcting any inadvertent error at the earliest opportunity’. The Speaker cannot be dragged into arguments about whether a statement is inaccurate or not. This is a matter of political debate. All Members of this House are honourable. They must take responsibility for correcting the record if a mistake has been made.”
“With the matter still unresolved, I was advised to apply for this Adjournment debate, which was kindly granted by Mr Speaker. This is the very first time in 16 years as a Member of Parliament—having been in the House with five different Prime Ministers—that I have needed to take such a prolonged course of action to try to correct the record. It now appears that the Prime Minister has on two other occasions in recent weeks made statements in the House that are inadvertently misleading and then failed, or refused, to correct the record. On 22 February, it was over personal protective equipment contracts being on the record. On 10 March, it was the incorrect claim that Labour had voted against a nurses’ pay rise. Mr Speaker made a clear statement to the House on 11 March.”
“My clear question to the Minister tonight is, has Transport for the North’s core funding been cut—yes or no? Since my exchange with the Prime Minister on 24 February, I have written to him twice, on 25 February and 11 March, to request that he corrects his statement. He has yet to do so, and I have received no substantive reply to my letters. I have also tabled written parliamentary questions asking when he will reply to my letters and have been told that it will be “in due course”. I tabled other written parliamentary questions just today, asking again when I will get the courtesy of a response. I also raised a point of order on 25 February; following the courtesies of the House, I informed the Prime Minister that I was doing so.”
“At the most recent Transport questions, the Minister—I am glad that he has joined us on the Treasury Bench—keenly pointed out that Transport for the North had been set up under a Conservative Government. Why are the Government now clipping its wings just as it is getting ready to fly? Aside from the cut to TfN’s core funding and the smart ticketing project, the lack of any Government commitment to work with the organisation on the development of its northern transport charter, which will determine the organisation’s future role, including its own allocated pot of funding, is worrying. Together with the cuts to funding, it raises serious doubt about this Government’s commitment to the north, to devolving real power and to genuinely levelling up.”
“Secondly, in that letter, £33 million of funding for integrated and smart travel, a London-style Oyster card for the north, was also cut by the Government, delaying the roll-out of contactless technology in the north. Why do these cuts to core funding matter? Throughout the early discussions about what Transport for the North was supposed to do, the point was made repeatedly that it would be a strategic body, responsible for setting priorities for the region. That is precisely what the core funding is meant to support. For an organisation at this stage of its life even to keep the same level of funding would be seen as a cut, but with a 40% cut to its core funding, the Government are undermining the original aspirations for TfN.”
“Its role was to provide strategic advice on road and rail investment, helping to shape projects, although decisions are still made ultimately in London; to co-manage the north’s rail franchises through the Rail North partnership; to co-client large-scale projects, such as Northern Powerhouse Rail, and to develop and implement an integrated and smart travel ticketing project across the north. On 4 January this year, Transport for the North received a funding letter from the Department for Transport. This letter was not good news. First, it stated that Transport for the North’s core funding allocation for 2021-22 would be £6 million, a £4 million reduction on the current allocation of £10 million. That was the basis of my question to the Prime Minister.”
“I thank Mr Speaker for granting this debate this evening. I sought it after the Prime Minister’s response to me in the House at Prime Minister’s Question Time on 24 February, when I asked him: “Is the 40% cut to Transport for the North’s budget part of the Prime Minister’s plans for levelling up the north?” He responded: “There has been no such cut, and we intend to invest massively in Northern Powerhouse Rail, and in railways in the north and across the entire country.” —[ Official Report , 24 February 2021; Vol. 689, c. 911.] That statement was simply incorrect, and I therefore welcome the opportunity this evening to set out the facts. As background, in April 2018, Transport for the North became England’s first statutory sub-national transport body.”
“I am surprised that the Minister did not pay the usual courtesies at the beginning of his speech, but I will leave that to one side. I want to ask again the question that I posed in my speech: can the Minister confirm whether the budget for Transport for the North, which was £10 million, has now been reduced to £6 million—yes or no?”
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am rather annoyed by that comment, as I was in the Chamber waiting to be called to speak, and the Minister did not even have the courtesy to be on the Front Bench when the debate started.”
“Will the Prime Minister explain how building national resilience will include the digital transformation of the security and intelligence agencies, where the resources will come from, and whether it will include industry and international partners?”
“Libby Squire was raped and murdered in Hull by a man who had, for 18 months prior to attacking Libby, wandered the streets committing sexual acts of indecent exposure, voyeurism and burglary of underwear and sex toys. Many offences were not reported, but even if they had been, the current law would not have dealt with the underlying problem. In conclusion, violence against women is endemic, but also preventable. In remembering Libby Squire, Sarah Everard and many others, we need deeds from this Government, not words.”
“Women are subjected to sexual exploitation by men, who face no criminal sanction. We must bust the business model of this modern slavery, cracking down on online pimping, deterring sex-buyers and supporting victims. I will be tabling cross-party amendments to introduce laws that support women and hold men accountable. Secondly, pornography websites currently profit from exposing children to misogynistic violent pornography, fostering attitudes that underpin violence against women. We need the Government to take action on that. Finally, we must join the dots. Individual incidents of violence against women are often not random, one-off or unconnected. Effective prevention of violence requires early intervention. We need a way to flag up where low-level sexual offences are often the gateway to potential serious escalation.”
“The Opposition’s reasoned amendment points out that the Bill fails to introduce a single new measure specifically designed to tackle the epidemic of violence against women. Indeed, anyone damaging a statue would receive a heavier sentence than many rapists. I want to raise three issues that the Bill should cover. First, if Ministers are serious about protecting women, they must recognise that exchanging money, food and accommodation for sex is a form of violence. Scotland’s Government, the Crown Prosecution Service and the London Mayor recognise prostitution as violence against women. Why not this Government? Our current laws on prostitution are unfit for purpose. The UK today is a low-risk, high-profit destination for sex traffickers and pimps. Pimping websites operate openly and legally.”
“This Bill has provisions that I support, including whole-life orders for premeditated child murder and ending automatic early release of dangerous prisoners and sex offenders. However, the Bill also attacks, on a permanent basis, the fundamental human right of peaceful assembly. Banning gatherings, or a single person protest, on the grounds of noise or annoyance is deeply troubling. Noting the disgraceful events at Clapham Common on Saturday, I will vote against the Bill tonight. The Bill also needs to do much more on tackling violence against all women and girls. The Government’s announcement on a council bidding process for lighting and CCTV funding does not cut the mustard.”
“The infrastructure bank in Leeds will only provide loans and finance on a scale two-thirds smaller than the £5 billion per year from the European Investment Bank that it replaces, and there is growing doubt about whether Transport for the North will have the finance and clout to deliver on its promises. There is just not enough pork in the barrel, and nothing like the sustained public and private investment that is needed for the real regeneration that we have seen over the last 40 years in places such as London docklands—all achieved without Whitehall insisting on permanent local government reorganisation. This was not a fair Budget for my constituents. Real investment in the Humber docklands seems no nearer.”
“However, the city of Wolverhampton was awarded £25 million after electing two Conservative MPs, and last Thursday the Leader of the House confirmed that Hull, with three Labour MPs, will not be considered by Whitehall decision-makers even if we make a bid. That is not fairness. However, the winners from this gerrymandering should not celebrate too much as the towns fund is worth less than half the £2.4 billion that the Government had cut since 2010 from the funding of the 45 local authorities receiving it. Even for the north’s favoured areas these pots of levelling-up funding will not be transformational.”
“Hull is the fourth most deprived local authority area in the UK, always high in social and economic indices measuring disadvantage, so how is it fair, consistent or logical that Hull is excluded from the list of 100 priority places for the community renewal fund while it achieves priority 1 status for the levelling-up fund? The Government say that they look at measuring unemployment, household income, productivity, skills and population density, but the criteria have not been published, and perhaps are still being cobbled together in Whitehall. This unfairness runs riot again with the towns fund. Of 45 towns and some cities chosen for funding, a disproportionate number—40—have a Tory MP. Hull was told that we are not eligible as we are a city.”
“Last week, the Chancellor spoke a lot about fairness and levelling with the British public, but does the Budget actually pass the fairness test? Even before the challenges of covid and Brexit, Hull had been hit hard by a decade of austerity after the global banking crisis, and that is why it was disappointing to see no real green industrial strategy, where the Humber could be central, and that the universal credit uplift was not made permanent to help hard-pressed families as council tax and other bills soar. There was also another real-terms pay cut for NHS staff, a £30 billion cut in day-to-day NHS spending from April, and still no sign of the Prime Minister’s talked-about clear plan for social care.”
“Last year, the all-party parliamentary group on sexual and reproductive health in the UK, which I chair, produced a report called “Women’s Lives, Women’s Rights” on women’s access to contraception. I hope the Minister will shortly meet me to discuss this report, which showed that, over the past 10 years, with cuts to public health budgets and the fragmentation of NHS services, women’s access to contraception has reduced, most strikingly in access to long-acting reversible contraceptives; that black, Asian and minority ethnic women, in particular, lose out; and that abortion rates have increased. What does the Minister say about how we can put this right and how the separate sexual and reproductive health and HIV strategy running alongside a woman’s health strategy will actually work and ensure that women are at the centre of NHS services?”
“Hull is the country’s fourth most deprived council area, but for some reason it is not in the 100 priority areas for the community renewal fund, which is supposedly based on social and economic factors. As my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mrs Lewell-Buck) has just highlighted, a disproportionate 40 of the 45 towns and cities receiving the £1 billion through the new towns deal have Conservative MPs. It seems that with three Labour MPs, Hull is excluded from even being considered. I am sure that the Leader of the House will want to avoid the impression of pork barrel politics and the sleaze that led to his party’s downfall in the 1990s, so can we please have a debate about the criteria for the allocation of these funds to maximise transparency?”
“How many of the 900 United Kingdom citizens to whom my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy) referred who left the country to fight for and support Daesh have been brought to justice either in the United Kingdom or abroad for any offences they have committed?”
“Councils have duties to the homeless but are underfunded by £2 billion by this Government. Hull City Council, which did an amazing job with rough sleepers during the pandemic, is today setting its council tax. Like many other councils, it will be forced to ask the just managing working families to pay more tax to fund these essential council services. Is this not again a case of going back to the days of the poor keeping the poor, because of deliberate political decisions taken by Government since 2010?”
“Iain Craven, finance director at Transport for the North, has said: “Transport for the North has clearly indicated its disappointment and concern that, at a time when the Government’s levelling up agenda is needed most, funding is being cut, putting northern investment and jobs at risk.’ There has been further extensive media coverage of the Government’s decision to cut 40% of the core central funding for Transport for the North in the Rail Technology Magazine , the Yorkshire Post , and on ITV and the BBC. Mayor Burnham has spoken about this cut, too. Madam Deputy Speaker, I seek your guidance as to what can be done to correct the record on an issue that many people in the north care deeply about.”
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Yesterday, I asked a question at Prime Minister’s Question Time. My question was: Is the 40% cut to Transport for the North’s budget part of the Prime Minister’s plans for levelling up the north? The Prime Minister replied: “There has been no such cut, and we intend to invest massively in Northern Powerhouse Rail, and in railways in the north and across the entire country.” —[ Official Report , 24 February 2021; Vol. 689, c. 911.] I raise this point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker, as I believe that the Prime Minister has misled the House by saying this. The papers for the Transport for the North board meeting in January 2021 set out the cut.”
“Having been in Parliament in 2010, I voted against the Tory-Lib Dem coalition’s flawed reorganisation, the failure of which has led us to today’s announcement. As well as sharing concerns about having another reorganisation during a pandemic, what guarantees can the Secretary of State give that these changes will improve the health of my constituents when, under his plans, Hull will be lumped into an artificial hotch-potch of the Humber Coast and Vale ICS: an area of 1,500 square miles with cities, market towns and remote rural and coastal communities, with little transparency and no clear lines of accountability to local people in Hull, with our stark health inequalities?”
“The Secretary of State has referred to fairness and the need for building companies to step up and I understand that he is introducing a levy on those companies, but what more is he doing to pursue those responsible for building unsafe homes, leaving the taxpayers and leaseholders to meet the clean-up costs?”
“In conclusion, it is worth reflecting once again, in this centenary year, on the events in Poplar in 1921, when Labour borough councillors rejected the idea that the poor should keep the poor and refused to impose austerity on the poorest families. They went to prison for it. Their victory secured equalisation of the rates—a fairer system of local government finance that lasted decades, apart from a few episodes such as the poll tax, until the Tories and the Lib Dems in the 2010 coalition Government started year by year to dismantle the idea of fairer funding for poorer areas. We now face the renewed need to battle for a fairer deal for areas such as Hull and other disadvantaged areas in our country, and for funding that works for working families in those communities.”
“A 1% council tax hike in Hull who would bring in around £883,000. In the East Riding, our wealthier neighbour, that same 1% would bring in £1.7 million. So a 5% council tax increase in Hull would generate £4.4 million, but that would not close the budget gap of £13 million that Hull City Council will face in 2022-23. Given the 80-seat Tory majority, this council tax bombshell will no doubt be forced through the House tonight. It will then fall to local councillors to make the unenviable choice of whether to pass on this austerity measure made in Downing Street to low-income working families to maintain services, or to reject this austerity made in Downing Street and make further cuts to services. This puts councils between a rock and a hard place.”
“Many of those families are currently having to choose between heating and eating, and they simply cannot afford the large increase in council tax made in Downing Street. The council tax is a regressive tax that hits hardest the low-income working families who are just outside the scope of benefit entitlement, so a 5% council tax hike would be a major act of austerity targeted at those families at the worst of times. In Hull, a 5%-plus council tax increase would raise little for local services such as adult social care and children’s services, which are already under huge pressure; it would instead cause disproportionate misery for families who simply cannot afford any extra tax burdens at this time. Council tax increases also raise less for services in disadvantaged and deprived areas than for those in wealthier areas.”
“Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts), said, there was a joint report from the Health Committee and the Local Government Committee a few years ago—I was a Member of the Health Committee at the time—that set out a way forward. It is unfortunate that we still have not had a response from the Government on those very sensible proposals. It is not just that local authorities in the poorest areas have had the deepest funding cuts since 2010. The areas that those councils represent also have the poorest families who have been hardest hit by the decade of austerity and then by the covid crisis over the past year, as unemployment, which is always higher in those areas, has risen sharply.”
“The Chancellor, who was previously so adept at locating the forest of magic money trees, has made the deliberate and calculated political decision to underfund local government by around £2 billion and to invite local councillors to make up that funding shortfall by levying a large council tax increase of up to 5%. That would be around 4% above the current rate of inflation even before the fire and police precepts were added. I find it disgraceful that the Chancellor is playing political games at a time of a national public health and economic crisis, devolving blame and not power, and yet again providing only a sticking plaster solution to the issue of social care, despite the Prime Minister’s promises. As the Chair of the Select Committee, my hon.”
“Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I am very pleased that both the Secretary of State and the shadow Secretary of State opened the debate by paying tribute to the vital role that local government has played in our national response on covid. I would like to personally thank all the local government officers in Hull for their amazing work over the past 12 months in supporting our community. In my view, local government must be central to any serious plan for levelling up that the Government bring forward, but sadly, in Hull over the past decade it has felt more like levelling down.”
“The Minister will know of the magnificent efforts of student doctors, nurses and many other healthcare students who are working in NHS covid wards as part of their studies. I am incredibly proud of the students from the University of Hull who have stepped up in this pandemic, often moving to the frontline early and putting themselves at risk. Along with the president of Hull University Students’ Union, Phoebe Bastiani, I have written to the Government asking for a reduction in healthcare students’ debt to recognise their contribution to the national effort against covid-19. Will the Minister look again at this proposal?”
“Staff at Hull Royal Infirmary and Castle Hill Hospital have been magnificent during this pandemic. They are used to making people better, however, and the number of deaths is taking its toll on staff, who are physically exhausted. What is the Prime Minister planning to do to support exhausted staff in dealing with the ever-growing waiting list that they will face once the covid threat has subsided?”
“Following the question from the Chair of the Education Committee, the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon), for many months the Children’s Commissioner, who leaves her post shortly and who is a terrific advocate for young people, has highlighted the effect of school closures on children’s mental health and wellbeing. Families in Kingston upon Hull North are struggling and as a nation we are storing up a time bomb of mental health issues for a generation. What discussions has the Minister had with the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care about real and additional support for schools, child and adolescent mental health services, and the voluntary sector groups helping children and families now?”
“As we have heard, by mid-October more than 600 health and social care staff had already died from covid. Professor Andrew Goddard, the president of the Royal College of Physicians, said today: “Frontline NHS and care staff must be vaccinated in the next couple of weeks as a priority, as the current pressures on the NHS will be impossible to withstand without a fit and protected workforce”. With today’s further good news on vaccines, will the Secretary of State give our NHS workforce the undertaking that they will be vaccinated in the next couple of weeks?”
“I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. I rise as a Commonwealth war graves commissioner to express the commissioners’ concern about and our respect for the workers she is talking about—those gardeners in Belgium and France. We must ensure that we do exactly the right thing by them, especially in the context of the rather challenging employment situation they are in and against the background of Brexit. I very much look forward to hearing what the Minister says on behalf of the Secretary of State, who is the chair of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.”
“As an analysis published by the European Commission points out, “Sex markets are reliant, by definition, on buyers finding spaces and places where it is possible to pay for sex.” The absolute necessity of deterring demand is why, at a recent international summit organised by UK Feminista to confront the rampant sexual exploitation of Romanian women by men in the UK, the president of the Romanian Women’s Lobby, Laura Albu, said: “The solution is simple: end demand in the UK. The UK can end demand and prosecute buyers of sex and close this so-called market.” We must heed her call. We have the power to bust the business model of sex trafficking. That is what my Bill would do, and the Government would do well to adopt it.”