Sir Christopher Chope
MP for Christchurch · Conservative · United Kingdom
“When was the last time that an allotted Opposition day was withdrawn in the way that the Leader of the House is withdrawing this one? I was looking at my calendar of business, otherwise known as the Order Paper, and it says that “The selection of the matters to be debated will be made by the Leader of the Opposition (Standing Order No.”
“The Climate Change Committee has condemned the Government for failing and falling short of adapting to climate change and accepting the reality as it is, which is that by the end of this century, global temperatures will have increased to between 3.5° and 4.5° above pre-industrial levels.”
“The Minister has referred to the grooming gangs inquiry carried out by our friend, the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth (Rupert Lowe), and early-day motion 380 makes a number of recommendations. Will the Minister engage with the hon.”
“The landmark 250th anniversary of the declaration of independence by the United States takes place in the week commencing 29 June. I have applied for an Adjournment debate, but will the Leader of the House enable more Members to be able to participate in marking that historic event?”
“That is exactly what I did on behalf of my constituent Paul Kenchington: I wrote to the Secretary of State about the specialist steel that he uses, and I have not had a reply.”
“Next week, can the Leader of the House produce a Government statement in response to the Hallett review on covid-19 vaccines? Lady Hallett recommended major reform of the vaccine damage payment scheme.”
The complete record
Every one of 5,444 lines we hold for Sir Christopher Chope, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 50 of 109.
“This is an extraordinary occasion. We are discussing a Bill, the long title of which—as put down on 29 June last year—was: “To require the United Kingdom to ratify the…Istanbul Convention.” We have just heard the promoter of the Bill explaining why she now wishes that long title effectively not to require the United Kingdom to ratify the Istanbul convention. I congratulate the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Dr Whiteford) on the charming way in which she has been able to explain a complete volte-face in her approach to this important subject. The Minister has spelt out all the wonderfully effective and good measures that the Government have introduced to address the really serious issues of violence against women and domestic violence. I commend her and the Government for the work they have already done and the work they will do.”
“With the greatest respect to my hon. Friend, that is not an answer to the question. The question is: when the Government ratify the convention, will they do so with or without reservations?”
“Under the rules of the convention, reservations are not put in at the time of signature, but at the time of ratification. I will take the Minister’s remarks as a commitment that there will be no reservations when it comes to ratification.”
“That seems to show an acceptance by the Government that they will not be in a position to ratify the convention for some considerable time. The strong feeling on both sides of the House is that people want the convention ratified, but the Government seem to be wriggling about when and how they will achieve that. I have tabled a number of amendments and new clauses. I think I have a commitment from the Minister, in so far as one can tell, that when the convention is ratified, it will not be ratified with any reservations, and I am grateful to her for that. However, I still fear that the impression being given to the world outside is that we are passing today a Bill that will require the United Kingdom to ratify the Council of Europe convention, when, in fact, it does no such thing, and that needs to be made absolutely clear.”
“Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), in her short contribution from the Opposition Front Bench, asked the Minister whether the forthcoming legislation on domestic violence, to which the Minister referred, would incorporate the necessary legislative requirements to enable the ratification of the Istanbul convention, but my hon. Friend—I do not think she is listening, which is a pity—was not even able to respond. That must surely cast doubt on how long it will be before the convention is actually ratified. One of the Government amendments says that the Government do not want clause 2 implemented before clause 3. Therefore, no report may well have been made under clause 2 by the time we reach 1 November 2017 and the report on progress under clause 3.”
“Everybody who is suspicious about the length of time it is taking for the Government to get their act together on the issue needs to bear in mind that background—that in 2011, on the basis of a convention that had been negotiated by the previous Labour Government, the Government were concerned about the issue of extraterritorial application. We have not heard, even at this very late stage, anything from the Government precisely about what measures need to be brought in to satisfy those requirements before the convention can be ratified. It seems to me that we are owed something from the Government on that because the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan and others have been pressing them to come up with a list of what is required. Even the hon.”
“The Foreign Office representative who lobbied us in Paris on that occasion— unfortunately, only half an hour before the decisions were to be taken—expected us to persuade everybody to accept an amendment from the United Kingdom Government at very short notice. The Government, through their Foreign Office representative, were very concerned then about the extraterritorial application of the convention, which is why they wanted to allow a participant party to have a reservation. In the end, the convention went through without that power being granted.”
“I am glad that my hon. Friend has been satisfied by the Minister’s response. One reason that I have been interested in the subject for a long time is that I was present at the Standing Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe when this convention was first discussed. I remember vividly the representations that were made to me and my hon. Friend, the then Member for North Dorset, explaining that the United Kingdom Government really wanted the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe to pass an amendment to the draft convention—as it then was—to enable a signatory party to the convention to have a reservation in respect of extraterritorial jurisdiction.”
“I hear what my hon. Friend says, and I am grateful to her for that intervention. I am sure that others will be able to check out the issue to see whether it will need further discussion when the Bill gets to the other place. However, having said that, and in light of her intervention, I am not going to speak to the new clauses and amendments that I have tabled, because I get the feeling that the House would like to move on to debate other issues.”
“My hon. Friend has obviously done a lot of work on defining what he means by a family member for these purposes. Did I hear him correctly when he said that this was based on housing legislation?”
“Under the Fraud Act 2006 it is still an offence to make, or to attempt to make, a financial gain by fraudulently wearing uniforms or medals. Does my hon. Friend have any information on how many times that provision has been applied in law?”
“The policy background to the Bill was set out in the explanatory notes, which state: “Since 2009 it has not been an offence for an individual to wear medals or decorations that they were never awarded.” It does not seem as though the law before 2009 covered the wearing of false medals. I cannot understand—I wonder whether my hon. Friend can—why we are seeking to extend the law beyond even what applied prior to 2009.”
“It is disappointing that anyone should wish to try to use emotional blackmail against my hon. Friend and what he is proposing. In his last intervention, my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson) referred to people who were wearing medals that they had not been awarded. He did not deal with the issue of them wearing things that had the appearance of being an award. I cannot understand why some of the amendments of my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) are not acceptable to the Bill’s promoter.”
“I might therefore be able to give him the excuse of not having fully comprehended that matter. New clause 5 is well worth considering, as is the issue of post-traumatic stress disorder. One issue the whole debate raises is how we deal with private Members’ Bills in Committee, because if they are completely changed in Committee—”
“Friend the Member for Shipley have a lot to commend them. It is sensible that the offence of wearing awards with intent to deceive should be triable summarily, bearing in mind that under the Fraud Act, as I said, there is a maximum of 10 years’ imprisonment, and no summary trial, for much more serious offences. We do not want people to be criminalised for what is, in effect, frivolous conduct on their part. That is why the suggestion in new clause 3 that this should apply only to wearing awards in a public place is very sensible. My hon. Friend referred to what goes on in public houses, but I am not so sure that I am necessarily persuaded on that point. Nor am I sure that he is necessarily very knowledgeable about what goes on in public houses, because he is teetotal.”
“In particular, why do we need a Bill that goes unnecessarily wide in its sanctions and its interpretation of what would be the criminal behaviour? That is why the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley are well worth considering. Of all his amendments, I cannot understand why anybody would be against amendment 1, because it would mean that clause 1 would read, “A person commits an offence if, with intent to deceive, the person wears…an award specified in the Schedule”, and would no longer include a reference to “something which has the appearance of being an award specified in the Schedule.” I cannot see why my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford is not prepared to accept that amendment. I hope that given a bit more time for reflection, he may be willing so to do. Some of the other amendments tabled by my hon.”
“I suspect that the provisions that were previously in place on the wearing of medals or decorations that were not awarded were repealed in 2009 because it was thought that the offence was covered by the Fraud Act. Under that Act, it is an offence to make, or attempt to make, a financial gain by fraudulently wearing uniforms or medals or by pretending to be, or to have been, in the armed forces, with a maximum penalty of 10 years imprisonment. It is a very serious offence, and so it should be. My hon. Friend the Member for Dartford is trying, in a sense, to replicate part of that, and using emotional arguments in support of it, while not drawing the public’s attention to the fact that these are already serious offences subject to a maximum penalty of 10 years’ imprisonment. So why do we need this Bill?”
“I still hope that that will be so, because we all feel very strongly—certainly I do—that, as the promoter of the Bill says, we must protect our veterans and ensure that there is confidence that people wearing medals on parade on Remembrance Day have in fact been duly awarded those medals. In my constituency, where we have some of the finest remembrance parades anywhere in the country, I do not think there has ever been an incident where somebody who was not entitled to a medal was wearing one. We have to think about the proportionality of the issue when working out how we are going to address it, particularly if we are to do so through the criminal law going beyond what is already contained in the Fraud Act 2006.”
“I am sure everybody thinks it is despicable for anybody to wear medals or decorations to which they are not entitled, and we condemn that behaviour without equivocation, but that is a very different proposition from bringing in a Bill with a whole lot of other technical measures designed to widen the offence far beyond what it was originally. I cannot understand why my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson), who is promoting the Bill, has not been able to reach an accommodation with my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) in the spirit of consensus. If we do not finish the debate on this group of amendments today, it may still be possible for an accommodation to be reached before the Bill comes back to be considered further.”
“I want to speak briefly to some of the amendments. It is sad that there is a falling-out among people on the detail of the Bill. I do not think anybody is against making it an offence for an individual to wear medals or decorations that were never awarded to them. The problem is that the way in which the Bill has been drafted goes much wider, and is in danger of having a whole lot of unintended consequences. If the law prior to 2009 was as simple and straightforward as I have said, why do we have to make it so much more complicated in reintroducing one of its provisions?”
“This week, three of the six district councils in Dorset voted to keep their own sovereignty and independence. Despite that, last night the chief executive of Dorset County Council announced that other councils in Dorset would apply for a hostile takeover. May we have an early debate on how to prevent ineffective and wasteful councils from seeking to seize by compulsion the assets and powers of their financially sound neighbours?”
“When, if ever, does my right hon. Friend think the EU will issue an equivalent White Paper, setting out with equal clarity the agreed negotiating objectives of the 27 other members?”
“There have been a couple of references to paragraph 122 of the Supreme Court judgment. It says: “There is no equivalence between the constitutional importance of a statute…and its length or complexity.” It adds: “A notice under article 50…could…be very short”. Does my right hon. Friend agree that that is a very important message for Opposition Members?”
“Some councils are now thinking outside the box and saying, “Why can’t we enter into joint arrangements so that public buildings can be made available for the provision of public conveniences?” [Interruption.] My hon. Friend the Minister is acknowledging that. On reading clause 9, it seems that there will be no relief from council tax or business rates for a building that partially consists of a public lavatory but that offers other facilities as well. It is difficult to speak to clause 9 without puns, but I hope that the gist of my point has come across. Why would we wish artificially to restrict a relief such as this and say that it will be available only on a free-standing, dedicated public lavatory?”
“When it was set up, there was concern among some businesses that they might end up paying extra for things that were of no use to them. Can my hon. Friend spell out the safeguards that will be in place to ensure that significant increases in supplements or additional business rates are not imposed on hard-pressed businesses? I turn now to clause 9 on public conveniences. Christchurch Borough Council has been privileged to win the Loo of the Year award on many occasions, and it has a really good selection of public conveniences, as befits its age profile and its reputation as a very important tourist destination. Meanwhile, much to the consternation of the local people in Poole, Poole Borough Council has decided to close half its public conveniences.”
“Why are the Government taking the power to introduce mandatory pooling arrangements, and how will they work? Can all nine local authorities in Dorset be regarded as a pool for the purposes of business rate income and distribution? I do not see any problem with that. In fact, it might be quite desirable, but why must it be imposed by the Government, rather than agreed to locally? My next point came out in the response of the shadow Minister. I am concerned that, as a result of the powers being given in this Bill, some businesses may find they are in a minority in an area and subject to significant extra supplements on their business rates. How will we ensure that a minority of businesses are not oppressed by the majority? In east Dorset, there is a business improvement district centred on a Ferndown industrial estate.”
“The essence of the provision in the Bill is that if councils impose excessive levels of council tax on their citizens, there should be the safeguard of a referendum, but what is proposed in the name of local government reform in Christchurch, Poole and Bournemouth is that people in Christchurch should be expected to pay extra council tax but will not have the chance of a local referendum to decide whether or not they wish their council to be abolished and absorbed into a new one. If we can have referendums on the levels of council tax, why can we not have referendums on whether a council is to be abolished? It seems that something is rather out of sync. In responding to this debate, will my hon. Friend the Minister be a little bit clearer about the pooling arrangements?”
“I ask because later this week, in both Poole and Bournemouth, councillors are going to be invited to support the proposal for a unitary authority in the mistaken belief that they will continue to be subsidised by the residents of Christchurch for 20 years, under an equalisation/harmonisation regime. If they were disabused of that and told that from day one they would be liable for an increase of up to £200, I think minds would be concentrated and there would not be quite so much enthusiasm on the part of councillors in Poole and Bournemouth for what is being proposed, which is hotly contested by councillors not only in Christchurch but in other parts of rural Dorset. I hope I can get some clear answers to those questions.”
“The idea of excessive levels of council tax has often been interpreted as being about excessive levels of increase, but, as the explanatory notes on clause 4 make clear, the clause will allow “the Secretary of State to make a statement of principles for determining whether council tax is excessive covering a number of years, rather than just one.” Am I correct in my assumption that were there to be a new unitary authority for Poole, Bournemouth and Christchurch, the Secretary of State could use the powers in clause 4 to say that there should be one set level of council tax for the authority, starting from day one?”
“I hope that my interpretation of clause 4 is correct when I emphasise that were there to be a unitary authority covering Poole, Bournemouth and Christchurch, from day one the people of Poole, Bournemouth and Christchurch would all pay exactly the same level of council tax.”
“Two of those councils, Poole and Bournemouth, seem to be supporting the idea of creating a new unitary authority with Christchurch, in the belief that were the Secretary of State unwise enough to approve such a proposal and the unitary authority was set up, on day one the residents of Christchurch would be paying £200 more in council tax at band D than the people resident in Poole or Bournemouth. Last week, my hon. Friend the Minister responded to my written question to confirm that it is not possible for an individual principal authority to levy council tax in one part of its area at a level different from that in another. That is an important principle.”
“For example, we have heard from the Government that councils can increase their adult social care precept by an extra amount in the next financial year and the year after, but in the third of those years, 2019-20, they will not be able to. How are those arrangements going to interact with my hon. Friend’s laudable objective of introducing all these reforms in 2019-20? Clause 4 is very relevant to matters of local government reorganisation. The nine councils in Dorset are meeting this week and next to decide whether they wish to go down the road of a local government reorganisation.”
“Friend has retained the principles of the uniform business rate, which was introduced to prevent Labour councils at the time—for example, in Liverpool—from so attacking their own businesses that they drove them out of town and, in so doing, drove the jobs away as well. I am glad we are not going to be allowing councils the freedom to destroy jobs which they had prior to introduction of the 1988 legislation. I welcome the emphasis on certainty and predictability, in which context I ask my hon. Friend the Minister to set out a bit more clearly how the reforms that he says are going to be brought into effect in 2019, including the new funding formula, are going to interact with the four-year settlement, which, as I understand it, will still be there in 2019-20.”
“I am sorry that the shadow Minister’s glass is half empty. He said that the Bill had the potential to create a much better situation, as I think it has, but also seemed to be emphasising that he thinks things are going to be far worse. I am glad he is at least not going to be voting against the Bill’s Second Reading. My hon. Friend the Minister referred to a once in a generation reform; I can recall my involvement as a Minister during the passage of the Local Government Finance Act 1988, when I took forward the uniform business rate, among other matters. I am delighted that my hon.”
“I agree with my hon. Friend. One reason why I am a great supporter of small local district councils is that they are accountable to the local town and the local people. It means that those local people can decide whether more money should be spent on public conveniences or on public parks. It is much better to leave those discretions to the local councils, which is why I am so strongly against the imposition of unitary authorities in Dorset.”
“I do not resile from my enthusiasm for the community charge as it was introduced, because it delivered a ready reckoner for local people. Our council system would be a lot more accountable if we still had the community charge.”
“Last summer, the nine Dorset councils submitted a proposal to my right hon. Friend to establish a combined authority. Will he ensure that the order establishing that authority is brought forward in sufficient time to enable the authorities to be set up on 1 April this year?”
“T6. The most sustainable aid is aid through trade. Will the Secretary of State therefore ensure that, when we leave the European Union and the customs union, we give top priority and free access to our markets to exports from the poorest countries?”
“We do not have to look as far as Sudan for examples of countries that have not ratified, and do not intend to ratify, the convention. One example is Germany. Last new year’s eve, there was the most appalling violence against women, but Germany has not even signed, let alone ratified, the convention.”
“In the preamble to the convention there is a reference to the Geneva convention of 1949, which is gender-neutral despite the fact that most of the victims of breaches of the Geneva convention are men.”
“May I suggest one answer to the hon. Lady’s intervention? Our legislation in this country has a much broader definition of domestic violence than the one in the convention.”
“My hon. Friend has been referring to statistics from the United Kingdom. He may be aware of the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, which issued a very big report on violence against women—an EU-wide survey—in which it found that 11% of non-heterosexual women in Europe have experienced physical or sexual violence at the hands of other women.”
“Will my hon. Friend expand on the link between article 44 and article 77, under which a party ratifying the convention can specify the territories to which it applies?”
“Does my hon. Friend share my view that such a threat of interference is one reason why the German Government do not wish to ratify the convention? If that was the case, a lot of searching questions would be asked about their attitude to what happened in Cologne on new year’s eve last year.”
“My hon. Friend says that he is against the Bill, but at least we have a Bill. If it had not been for the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Dr Whiteford) bringing forward the Bill, the House might never have been able to discuss this issue before the Government went ahead and ratified the convention.”
“He thereby showed that his mind had been made up all along against keeping Christchurch independent and that the public consultation was effectively a charade.”
“Although he was immediately contradicted by the leader of East Dorset District Council, the Christchurch leader went on to say that if he did not receive a mandate from his councillors for the council’s abolition, he would be ready to defy that decision when discussing with other council leaders the preferred option for Dorset. In throwing aside the caution that he had been seeking to impose on all other councillors around the issue of predetermination, he said: “What is expected cannot be achieved with the status quo”, and he gave the Minister a paper setting out his expectation of Government that it should give “support for the principle of changing to a two unitary model in Dorset”.”
“Indeed, it was only at the insistence of a minority of council leaders—including, I think, the leader of East Dorset—that a no-change option was included at all. Last Friday, the Housing Minister visited Christchurch to discuss the issue with the leader of Christchurch Council. At the Minister’s request I was present at the meeting, which was also attended by the leader of East Dorset District Council. Despite the fact that Christchurch councillors have at no stage given approval to any suggestion that their council should be abolished, the leader of the council told my hon Friend the Minister: “We don’t think option 1”— no change— “is really an option”.”
“If included with similar services from the two other upper-tier authorities in the combined authority, Poole and Bournemouth, significant savings would be achievable without undermining local democratic accountability. At the end of August this year, the nine Dorset councils launched a separate consultation on what they described as “reshaping your councils”. The consultation was meant to be presenting four options. The first was no change to existing structures, and the other three were for variations on the theme of abolishing the nine existing councils and creating in their place two unitaries. The options presented for consultation and the terms of the consultation paper were never approved by councillors in Christchurch or East Dorset.”
“It also reassured consultees that “combined authorities combine specific functions of two or more local authorities. The councils remain separate but they pool decision making over what services they want to combine, acting as one strong and accountable body representing and responsible for the area.” That application was unanimously approved and is now on the Secretary of State’s desk. Contrary to some black propaganda, the proposal does not involve the creation of an elected mayor for Dorset. It was disappointing that council leaders could not agree that key issues such as public transport, adult social care and children’s services should also be included within the remit of the combined authority, despite the obvious financial benefits. Adult social care and children’s services consume some 75% of the Dorset County Council budget.”