Dame Siobhain McDonagh
MP for Mitcham and Morden · Labour · United Kingdom
“Q5. In a capital city still scarred by the loss of 72 lives in the Grenfell fire, we have a second equally flammable and deadly risk. In bedrooms and corridors across London, low-paid deliverers for Deliveroo, Just Eat and Uber Eats are charging the tools of their trade: lethal lithium e-bike batteries.”
“I am therefore delighted that NHS London announced up to £57 million to expand and modernise St Helier’s emergency department. However, that cannot be the end. St Helier needs renewal. Only days later, there was an announcement that disrepair in the women’s services block meant that it would have to close.”
“The walk-in centre at the Wilson hospital in Mitcham, which once treated patients every day until midnight, even on Christmas day, has gone. Out-of-hours GP services have been reduced. Those patients have not disappeared; they now go to St Helier.”
“A number of constituents who work as nurses in the A&E department at St Helier hospital asked me to come to see for myself what they were dealing with. They asked me to come late on a Monday morning, rather than a Saturday or Sunday night as I had anticipated. What I saw was deeply troubling.”
“St Helier hospital has the fourth best maternity unit in the country, the only exclusively NHS-run assisted conception unit in south-west London, and a specialist gynaecology ward where nurses are highly trained in counselling. Yet all that is set to close next May because of the need for emergency repairs.”
“I thank the Petitions Committee and my friends from Brain Cancer Justice, who I affectionately think of as the provisional wing of the all-party parliamentary group on brain tumours. In July last year, we launched Margaret’s trial at University College London hospital.”
The complete record
Every one of 600 lines we hold for Dame Siobhain McDonagh, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 5 of 12.
“Joanna was placed in a shared house when she was four months pregnant, along with four men she did not know. She had been living there for 14 months, and by the time she came to see me she had a nine-month-old daughter. Like countless other pregnant women and parents with small children, she worried endlessly for her safety. The biggest worry for people like Joanna is that they have no safe sleeping arrangements for their babies. That is important, because we know that between April 2019 and March 2023, 55 children died as a result of the temporary accommodation they were housed in—42 of them were under one. The most likely cause of death is sudden infant death syndrome because of the lack of safe sleeping provision, such as cots. I would like to think that I speak for the whole House when I say that that is unacceptable.”
“I agree; indeed, it is the only solution. The only way we are going to bring an end to use of expensive and appalling temporary accommodation is through building more social housing units. After I have spoken about the consequences of temporary accommodation, I will look at its cost to the taxpayer, and the billions of pounds that we are spending on it, which frankly I could think of such better uses for. Finally, I will speak of the solution to this mess. Stories of dislocation and crisis alone could fill the debate. I have managed to get two or three such cases resolved in the last week. These are a selection; I could have doubled, tripled or quadrupled the examples of the conditions that people are being kept in, but I will start with just one.”
“London boroughs spend £90 million every month on it, which is 40% more than they spent last year. Councils in England alone spent £1.74 billion on temporary accommodation in 2022/23—that is 10% more than the year before and a 62% increase over five years. Some councils seriously risk bankruptcy because of the cost of temporary accommodation.”
“I agree. Those families are being failed, and they are being failed by us all unless we get action to build more social housing. The shocking thing is that the weaker someone is, and the less fight they have, the worse they get treated. A child with special needs will often find themselves in the ridiculous situation whereby the social services department—in the same council as the housing department that placed the child outside their borough—scraps the transport to their special school because their council has moved them out of their area. It is extraordinary that we make victims of those people, who just cannot stand up for themselves. Members would not believe the fortune that taxpayers spend on such unacceptable accommodation—accommodation that you wouldn’t put your pet in.”
“There is one party in this House refusing to build on the grey belt, removing housing targets and delaying the ban on section 21 evictions, and its Members are not sat on the Opposition Benches. I issue a plea to the Government: build the homes my constituents deserve, so that we can end the vicious cycle of temporary accommodation. The situation is desperate, and I hope that the Government give it the political will it deserves.”
“There are 19,334 hectares of unbuilt green belt within a 10-minute walk of London train stations where there is enough space for 1 million new homes—that would be a very sensible start. Then, we could look at dealing with land bankers: in 2019, the FTSE 100 house-building companies were sitting on land banks of more than 300,000 plots between them. That is even more land that could be used for some of the families I have mentioned today. Finally, it feels like stating the obvious, but we could bring back mandatory house-building targets for local authorities. It is incredibly important to bring back those targets, and I am glad that Labour Front Benchers have committed to do just that.”
“I try not to take things personally in politics, but when a Government treat housing as a political game—another hotseat for the latest Minister, only for them to be turfed out months later—it is difficult not to be angry. Never has this country needed a cross-party, long-term consensus about tackling our housing crisis more than it does now, and never have a Government seemed so ill equipped for that challenge. I appreciate that I may be biased, but the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities must be desperate for a Labour Government, just to give it some stability. I bet that a fair few of the 112,660 families living in temporary accommodation would like to see that, too. Here is what we can do.”
“However, we can solve this crisis; it just needs the political will, which is, I would argue, something that we have been missing over the past 14 years. I do not know how anyone can say that building more social housing has been at the top of the Government’s priority list, given that we have had 15 housing Ministers in 10 years, with an average tenure of nine months each. I am sure that the Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, the hon. Member for Kensington (Felicity Buchan) is very talented, and I know that she is sympathetic to our arguments and has helped the APPG on temporary accommodation greatly, but I think even she would find it difficult to struggle around this generational crisis in less than a year.”
“I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. Providing more social housing, and giving more support to families in temporary accommodation, needs to be a mission of the next Labour Government. It strikes me as extraordinary that we, as a nation, are spending £1.74 billion on temporary accommodation, knowing that the figure will not go down any time soon. In Merton, we have one of the lowest numbers of families in temporary accommodation. The figure stands at between 400 and 500 families, but that is 400% higher than it ever used to be. With the ban on section 21 evictions again kicked into the long grass, I have no doubt that I will continue to see more and more families turn up at my weekly advice surgeries having been evicted from their homes and forced into temporary accommodation.”
“Last year, Merton Council had 72 two-bedroom properties and 34 three-bedroom properties to offer the 10,000 families on its housing register. The situation is so dire that it will not be long before a local authority goes bankrupt just on the back of temporary accommodation costs. Surely the Government have to intervene and do something.”
“I will call Jim Shannon next. If he would not mind, I ask him to voluntarily restrict his comments so that at 5.08 pm I can call the Opposition spokesperson for five minutes and the Minister for 10 minutes, because I think people want to hear what the Minister has to say.”
“Back in the UK, I had hoped that at the last Cabinet reshuffle we might have got a Foreign Secretary who would take some action on Sri Lankan human rights—a Foreign Secretary who had more than warm words for British Tamils calling for justice. What did we get? We got Baron Cameron of Chipping Norton, who has spent his time out of office being paid by a Chinese state enterprise to promote a commercial court in Sri Lanka, promoting a Rajapaksa-era mega-infrastructure project.”
“Anyone convicted of violating the sixth amendment faces losing their passport and will not be able to sit for public exams or even qualify for a trade that requires a licence. It prevents Tamils at home and abroad from coming together freely to express their political aspirations. It is not just about the sixth amendment—we need to go further than that. The 13th amendment stops elected members of provincial councils from using their powers and instead gives them to unelected governors controlled by the Sri Lankan President. That leaves Tamils powerless when the state takes ancient Tamil places of worship and converts them into Sinhala Buddhist temples. Tamils have nowhere to go.”
“In the 14 years since the end of the Sri Lankan civil war, I have stood alongside Tamils in my constituency of Mitcham and Morden on the road to justice, peace and accountability. Those 14 years have presented so many challenges and such little progress, but so much pain. Not only have we called for accountability for the terrible war crimes committed 14 years ago, but we are calling for an end to the human rights abuses that are still being experienced by the Tamil community in Sri Lanka today. That starts with repealing the sixth amendment, which continues to be a barrier to Tamil self-determination. The sixth amendment criminalises support, in Sri Lanka or abroad, for the establishment of a separate state within the territory of Sri Lanka.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dame Maria. I congratulate the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Elliot Colburn) on securing the debate, and it is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), who has so frequently spoken in support of the Tamil people. I hope that I am a friend of the Tamil community: a community that is hard-working and entrepreneurial, and that has given so much to our country and our capital city. It has an almost obsessive desire to educate its children to ensure that they are the future doctors, lawyers, engineers and accountants who will make such a great contribution. I am well aware of the tenacity of the Tamil community.”
“Hundreds of thousands of people who disappeared during the civil war have still not been found, and not one person has been prosecuted for committing a war crime. There are more questions than there have ever been. On occasion, it seems to me to be just ticking a box and some mealy-mouthed diplomacy. Tamils deserve a UK Government that will take the lead in calling for Sri Lanka to repeal the sixth amendment, which would give Tamils in Sri Lanka and abroad the ability to come together and call for the political solution they hope for. Then we would have a Government with a principled position on Sri Lanka.”
“I will then make a statement of fact: David Cameron worked on behalf of a Chinese state enterprise to promote a commercial port in Sri Lanka, promoting a Rajapaksa-era mega-infrastructure project. I do not believe that that was in the interests of the Tamil people in Sri Lanka, and I do not think it was in the interests of this country, either. My Tamil constituents deserve better. There seems to be an attitude in the Foreign Office, which I have witnessed during Labour Governments and Conservative Governments, of there always being a need for discussion and encouragement. Nothing that I have seen in Sri Lanka over the years since the civil war suggests that the Sri Lankan Government will ever react to anything but force and determination, rather than encouragement or negotiation.”
“He was treated by an “amazing team” at St George’s. His dad, Shaun, said: “If we had to transfer to Evelina it would be added stress and worry and take away what we can give to Jackson. When we come here there’s a network and protocols in place and it takes the weight off us knowing that we have that here. If he has a temperature the protocol is to get Jackson to St George’s or the…Marsden within an hour so being forced to go further into central London means there’ll be traffic and nowhere to park and we might not make it in an hour.” Shaun summed up my thoughts when he said: “Why change something that’s not broken?” The services are excellent. They provide a service more cheaply than the proposed changes would. Leave things alone. Let children’s cancer care stay at St George’s.”
“Angela has been staunchly opposed to plans to move the services. She said: “I can’t imagine travelling to Central London for cancer care with a vulnerable child is in anyone’s…interest. Luckily we were able to drive to St George’s when Meg was here, and for our family it was invaluable. We were able to keep some semblance of normality.” This is not just about Megan and Angela. Philip has a 10-year-old son, Daniel, who has just finished cancer treatment and spent countless days and nights at St George’s. Philip said: “You can’t use public transport when your child is immuno-suppressed, and I can’t imagine having to drive into central London every time Daniel needed urgent care.” Little Jackson Hall was diagnosed with leukaemia in February 2020 after a rash appeared on his skin and would not go away.”
“I do not want to take up too much time—I know that lots of people want to say things in this debate—but I would like to speak on behalf of some of the parents and children who have been involved in the consultation. They have made it clear that they want the cancer services to remain at St George’s Hospital—as we would imagine—for practical reasons and particularly transport and parking. It is St George’s that offers dedicated parking spaces and a drop-off zone directly outside the entrance of the proposed new state-of-the-art children’s cancer centre. We can just look at Angela’s case to see how critical that is. A children’s nurse at St George’s, she has cared for hundreds of kids during her decades-long career, but her worst fears were realised when her own teenage daughter was diagnosed with cancer.”
“Does my hon. Friend agree that we have to have measures to improve and boost our economy? Was it not disappointing that there was nothing about commercial trials for pharmaceutical companies in the Budget? On trials, we have fallen from fourth to 10th in the world, losing 44% between 2007 and 2017-18, and 50,000 a year between 2021 and 2022. Without those trials we will not only see a lack of money, but a lack of improvement in cancer outcomes.”
“That is a real failure of government. The MHRA should be shouting loud and proud about how much money is available for investment in brain tumour treatments, but it does not and I cannot understand why. For as long as there is no progress and I am a Member, I will come back to the House at every opportunity. I came into politics to fight for people who are not heard, and there are few people heard less than those who suffer from glioblastoma. Question put and agreed to. Ordered, That Dame Siobhain McDonagh, Will Quince, George Freeman, Tracey Crouch, Steve Brine, Helen Hayes, Paul Blomfield, Sarah Owen, Dame Meg Hillier, Daisy Cooper and Wes Streeting present the Bill. Dame Siobhain McDonagh accordingly presented the Bill. Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 19 April, and to be printed (Bill 169).”
“The NHS should make it easier for optometrists to directly refer patients straight to A&E for a scan without going through their GP. On Monday I met the Anticancer Fund, which is based in Brussels, and I think I have discovered the one benefit of Brexit. Brexit means that the NHS medicines repurposing programme has been able to identify drugs that were initially purposed to cure another cancer, and that is exactly what we need to tackle brain tumours. The NHS should require that every doctor training to be a medical oncologist goes through a mandatory course on brain tumours, which takes me to my final recommendation. In 2018, after Tessa Jowell sadly passed away from glioblastoma, £40 million of Government funding was promised to fund research into brain tumours. As of January 2024, just £15 million of that £40 million had been awarded.”
“We can solve this issue if NICE funds each drug used in the treatment of glioblastoma separately. We will make progress if we make those changes, but we should not stop there. We need a whole host of policy changes if we want to make a change. If we carry on with the same old processes, we will get the same old results, which in the case of brain tumour research is failure. We also need a target of getting 200 glioblastoma patients each year into clinical trials on drugs that have the potential to change the course of the disease. We need the NHS to ensure that every neuro-oncology multidisciplinary team has a medical oncologist as a core member, so that brain tumour patients are not left in a corner of the ward because there is nobody to fight for them.”
“The second difference is about regulation. We need to ensure that our regulators incentivise the pharmaceutical industry and clinicians to do as many clinical trials as possible. Right now, the pharmaceutical industry sees the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency and the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence as a barrier, as a reason not to do clinical trials in the UK. That needs to change. For starters, when a pharmaceutical company is trialling a drug for glioblastoma and another disease such as melanoma, the MHRA should allow it to submit its data separately, so that glioblastoma patients’ results do not adversely affect the application. Funding treatments as a package has been a major impediment to the industry.”
“The House will be interested to hear that Moderna has published an environmental, social and governance statement on its website that says it has “a responsibility to the multitude of patients our technology could help, regardless of whether they have a disease shared by millions, or one that is unique to them alone.” The statement says that Moderna “understand what our stakeholders expect from us as a sustainable responsible business and leader in mRNA medicines.” Those words are clearly meaningless. I do not mean to sound pessimistic, because some companies have been very supportive—I have had wonderful conversations with Roche—but where companies such as Moderna have the funds and the medicines but lack the will to find a cure for brain tumours, I think it is the Government’s duty to step in and legislate to ensure that they do.”
“That is why, as policymakers, it is our job either to encourage or to force the pharmaceutical companies to provide the drugs for these trials. I will give just one example. In October, I met Moderna to ask if it could donate medicines for a clinical trial of 10 patients. I had hoped that it would give clinical access to its mRNA pipeline to help find a cure, but it refused. This company with annual sales of $4 billion refused to donate drugs for 10 people at a maximum cost of half a million pounds. These drugs could save thousands of lives each year, so Moderna’s refusal is shameful.”
“Having cared for someone with a brain tumour, I know how bad things are, and I know that if we try something different, we can give people diagnosed with this deadly disease some hope. This is my something different. No. 1 is the pharmaceutical industry. Dr Paul Mulholland is Europe’s leading medical oncologist in glioblastoma. He believes that we are on the cusp of a cure and he would like to run clinical trials so that he can turn that belief into a reality, but the pharmaceutical industry has refused to donate the drugs he needs for those trials to take place. That is because glioblastoma is a very small market for those companies. With only 3,200 people diagnosed each year, the investment is just not profitable —there is not much money in it, and the companies are not interested.”
“When Margaret passed away on 24 June, it was left to me to take on that battle. Her mission is now my mission. The Government have left the disease in the “too difficult” pile for too long, and I am here to put finding a cure back on the Government’s agenda. The second reason I am making this speech is above us in the viewing Gallery: I am incredibly grateful that a number of patients’ families have come to the House to hear the speech, and their support is a reminder that 3,200 people are diagnosed with a glioblastoma brain tumour every year. It is not just Margaret who was forced to fly thousands of miles to access the treatment that should have been provided on the NHS, but families up and down the country who are being failed and who deserve better.”
“The reason I am speaking again about this terrible disease is a personal one. It is why this campaign will always feel different from the other campaigns I take on. On 24 June 2023, I lost my wonderful sister Margaret to a glioblastoma brain tumour. As soon as Margaret received her diagnosis, we found out just how bad the treatment was, how the life expectancy was nine months and how there had not been a new treatment on the NHS for 30 years. We found out that families in the UK were left to crowdfund and sell their houses to fund private treatment, and that they would have to take their very sick family member on to a plane and fly thousands of miles to access healthcare in Germany or the United States. That is why Margaret started her final campaign: to find a cure for glioblastoma brain tumours.”
“I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to set a target for the number of glioblastoma patients who take part in clinical trials each year; to require training for medical oncologists to include training relating to brain cancers; to provide that any drug that has been licensed for use on tumours must be trialled on people with brain tumours; to make provision in relation to neuro-oncology multidisciplinary teams in the NHS, including a requirement that each such team must include a medical oncologist; to require manufacturers of drugs licensed to treat tumours to make those drugs available in specified circumstances for clinical trials relating to brain tumours; to make provision about the application of funding caps on funding for multi-drug treatments for glioblastoma brain tumours; to make provision about the processes for funding of drugs intended for the treatment of glioblastoma; to make provision about the management of drug trial data, for the purpose of increasing the quality of data relating to glioblastoma patients; to make provision about reviewing the allocation of existing funding for brain tumour research by the National Institute for Health and Care Research; to make provision about the direct referral of patients by optometrists to accident and emergency departments for the purpose of diagnosing brain tumours; and for connected purposes.”
“Journalists have revealed that the family of Asif Aziz, a landlord to my constituents in Britannia Point, Colliers Wood, manages a large property portfolio registered under dozens of companies on the Isle of Man. There is no beneficial owner listed, so complaints can never reach the landlord. We already have legislation that requires offshore companies that own properties to declare their owners on a register. Does my right hon. Friend agree that properly resourced enforcement is essential, and that having public registers of beneficial owners would make it much easier to identify and scrutinise the beneficial owners of offshore shell companies?”
“Hundreds of thousands of people have still not been found and not one person has been prosecuted for committing a war crime; there are no more answers than there were before. Now is the time for the Foreign Office to decide whether it will carry on with its mealy-mouthed diplomacy, or whether it will use the laws Parliament has given it to take action against those who perpetrated war crimes. Our Foreign Secretary needs to come forward and be honest about his role in promoting the Chinese Government’s plan for a new port in Colombo. It does not bode well. Let us show Sri Lankans and Tamils something different. Let us take a different path and make some progress.”
“I congratulate the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Martyn Day) on securing this debate. In Easter 2009, I spent my time out on Parliament Square watching London’s Tamil community beside itself with grief as it received news of relatives, friends, communities and hospitals being bombed. We heard of people lying on the beach, unable to be removed by family or community members because the democratically elected Sri Lankan Government were dropping cluster bombs on their own people. I spent my time taking London Tamil students to see the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, to prevent some of them from taking drastic action and committing suicide. In the 13 years since then, how much has changed? There is an attitude of always negotiating, always talking, always being calm—and doing nothing. Negotiating for what?”
“I am sure that the Minister genuinely believes the speech that he is making, but the Foreign Office has for the last 13 years been beseeching the Sri Lankan Government for an independent truth and reconciliation process. To date, that has not happened. At what point will the Minister try something else?”
“5. Whether he has had discussions with the independent adviser on Ministers’ interests on declarations of interest by the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs.”
“Since the Foreign Secretary was last in office, he has been working for a Chinese state enterprise that was sanctioned by the US Government and blacklisted for bribery by the World Bank. The Foreign Secretary was paid by the Chinese company to promote the building of a port in Sri Lanka, a country which has itself been accused of war crimes and where, since the end of the civil war in 2009, tens of thousands of disappeared people have still not been found. Does the Minister agree that the British people have the right to know when their Foreign Secretary has been employed by the Chinese Government?”
“Does my hon. Friend agree that this issue is putting huge strains on local authorities, which are being forced to pick up so many homeless families at a time when social housing unit availability is at its lowest and it is difficult to find any form of temporary accommodation that is half-decent?”
“Has my hon. Friend had the same experience that I have had? I see an ever-growing number of constituents over 60 who face section 21 eviction. In the 26 years that I have been the MP for Mitcham and Morden and in the previous 18 years that I was a councillor, or when I worked for Wandsworth local authority or the Battersea Churches Housing Trust, I have never seen that. It is a very new development.”
“The guidance code on dealing with homeless families suggests that priority for local temporary accommodation should be given to children in their exam years. That is a great aspiration, but it is not being realised on the ground because local authorities cannot find accommodation, particularly for larger families.”
“The rush for the door is distressing for the people involved, but has the knock-on effect of causing huge problems for local authorities attempting to assist people who are in priority need in terms of homelessness. We are all seeing many more people than usual being evicted via section 21. That has enormous consequences in so many ways.”
“I ask the Minister to consider the law of unintended consequences. If the Government delay implementation of the clauses that end section 21 evictions, they could find that landlords who are worried about their ability to evict tenants or have choices will rush for a clause 21 eviction, because they know that at some point section 21 evictions will be ended. The longer it takes the courts to be reformed, in whatever undisclosed way we are considering, the greater that concern will be. As I said, I see a lot of older long-term assured shorthold tenants being evicted, their landlord rushing them toward the door because they do not want a tenant who has limited means of paying increased rent in the future, and because they are concerned about the news that it will be difficult to evict anyone.”
“Does my hon. Friend agree that it causes another problem for those families, because hard-pressed councils might find them intentionally homeless? Generally, if someone is evicted for rent arrears, they are found intentionally homeless. Although reference has to be made to particular circumstances, I imagine that a court order with that result would lead to no landlord taking them on and to the council not helping them. There are then families floating around the system, with social services ultimately taking children into care.”
“Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the groups of people for whom it is most difficult to get housing benefit or universal credit correct is self-employed minicab drivers, because of the difficulties in assessing the costs involved in being self-employed? They regularly get a decision on their benefit claim only to have it change and have money taken back, while they remain on exactly the same income.”
“That is even before we get on to housing disrepair, where there is an impact on people’s health and the stress that is caused, which has an impact on the health service as well. There are substantial savings for the health budget in getting these things right early as well. It is penny wise and pound foolish to think we save the money here and to not look at the broader costs that we incur as a result of those tiny savings.”
“Richard Miller: This is one of the ultimate challenges. If we are being asked how you can improve the situation without quite a bit of significant investment, my answer would be that you cannot. The point—this is so often overlooked—is that if you take that step back, you are still spending the money. You made the point that local authorities have to pick up the burden of homeless families. A bit of early advice to sort out the housing benefit might have meant that the family was never homeless in the first place, with huge savings to the public purse and in relation to pressures on the system. Early advice can stop cases getting to court at all and make sure that cases are better dealt with when they do go to court. All that investment saves substantial sums.”
“The Government are right not to create a separate one. In effect, we have a housing court that works—when resourced—fairly well in the county court. This is something that I have heard Richard talk about before, and certainly we are very strong about that. Our understanding of where justice begins for people needs to go well beyond the court doors. That is why we keep mentioning the advice sector, legal aid and other measures. I would also include in that public legal education and helping people understand their rights as tenants, which we are not doing nearly enough. Those kinds of support would not necessarily, in themselves, create a more efficient justice system, but they would create the kind of solutions that many people seek in it, rightly or wrongly, and which they could reach elsewhere. I am sure Richard has more on that.”
“I can only imagine the amount of time-wasting going on because people are desperately in search of help. Currently, at Croydon county court, it takes 16 weeks on average to get a bailiff’s warrant after a possession order is secured. On the other end, we have the local authorities that are desperate to delay for as long as they can, because they do not have anywhere to put people. What is the resolution to that? Nimrod Ben-Cnaan: It is a tough one, for two reasons. First—this has been mentioned in previous sessions—a separate housing court should probably not be set up. That is partly because if you already have a system that is starved of relevant—mainly judicial—staff and has had its budget starved, creating a separate jurisdiction that would need to have its own of everything makes no sense.”
“Q Can I just say to Nimrod that I am greatly helped by South West London Law Centres in my constituency? I am very grateful for the work they do, particularly at the emergency and routine desk at Croydon county court. I can only imagine what that is like on a daily basis. Lots of very vulnerable tenants turn up with absolutely no advice, and the best advice I give to them is to get there really early and get to the front of the queue. I imagine all sorts of things happen to tenants and landlords in those courts that are not fair or reasonable, but because nobody is represented, or it is very difficult to get representation, it is difficult to avoid that. On reforming the whole county court system, what can be done other than to resource it better and provide better advice to people?”
“My frustration here is not about parks, hills or areas of environmental protection, but the scrappy plots of land in towns and cities, surrounding railway stations, that no one in their right mind would see as attractive. I am talking about the car wash in Tottenham Hale, the scrubland in Ealing, the waste plant in Hillingdon and the concrete airfield in Wisley—sites that no one in their right mind would recognise as green belt if it were not for their designation. I issue a plea to the Government: build on the grey belt to give my constituents the homes they deserve and give children a cot, because they desperately need one.”