Mr Toby Perkins
MP for Chesterfield · Labour · United Kingdom
“The hon. Member for Bicester and Woodstock (Calum Miller) is absolutely right to say that what is behind this is the deep unpopularity of President Milei; it is not anything actually that the UK has done.”
“In Chesterfield, there will be unmitigated despair at the statement we have heard today from my right hon. Friend. For the authorities for which she is doing a review—the 14 that thought they had got their decision in July—could she clarify the basis of that review?”
“It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Desmond. I congratulate the hon. Member for Waveney Valley (Adrian Ramsay) on securing this debate.”
“The report spells out the link between degradation overseas and the impact here. The assessment lays out the consequences: food insecurity, economic insecurity, increased migration and refugees, increased interstate competition, conflict and geopolitical instability, all of which will threaten us here at home.”
“The Government are right to take their time and make sure that they get this right—we saw what happened when the previous Government did not do the work that was needed. This is a delicately balanced decision.”
“Thirdly, will the Minister consider bringing forward the fourth national adaptation programme? NAP3, published by the previous Government in 2023, was deemed ineffective by the Climate Change Committee. NAP4 is not due until 2028, but can we afford to wait two more years before we have an adequate plan?”
The complete record
Every one of 3,898 lines we hold for Mr Toby Perkins, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 32 of 78.
“It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I, too, thank my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood) for securing the debate and for her contribution. The sheer number of speakers in the debate says a lot. The Minister should be concerned not just about the number of Labour and Scottish National party Members who came; she should hear loud and clear that not a single Conservative MP was willing to come to the debate to speak up for the decision. The fact that the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) is not here to speak up for the decision should say more to the Minister than every single eloquent speech that we have heard from my hon. Friends and colleagues.”
“There was a time when the Conservative party was proud of the fact that it was the party of business, but those days seem to be long gone: now business is telling the Government about the problems that these arrangements will cause. Businesses need certainty and time to put in place measures to make such fundamental changes. We have a Government who seem to be passionate about the fact of Brexit, but ignorant of the facts around it. Will the Minister just come to the Dispatch Box, take seriously the concerns that have been put in front of him by a whole array of business bodies, and try to sort this out?”
“The Minister seems keen to tell us how hard he and his team are working; meanwhile, crucial trade partners such as Canada seem to feel that the Government just have not got their act together and are not giving this the attention it deserves. Does he not realise that what is really important here is that British businesses, which need certainty about what their trading arrangements will be in January, are sat here in the middle of November still no clearer about whether we are going to be able to trade tariff-free with Canada?”
“We are here for a debate about funding for further education, which my hon. Friend is coming to, and many of us are concerned about the overall amount of funding. However, alongside that, we are seeing things such as the Government sending £330 million allocated for skills back to the Treasury because it has not been able to be spent under the apprenticeship levy. There are other examples, which I will come on to, where the issue is not just the overall amount being spent, but the fact that how it is being spent means that it ends up not being used.”
“It is clear that Ministers’ rhetoric about FE funding is a long way from the reality of the policies we have seen over the last decade. This Government are constantly keen to distance themselves from the last 10 years of their own record. However, whether they have really made a Damascene conversion to FE remains very much to be seen.”
“Friend the Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) once again demonstrated what a great advocate she is for her local college, and spoke about the state of the college estate. The FE colleges that have been hit hardest by the pandemic are those that took the Government’s advice, developed training in association with large employers locally, focused on apprenticeships and built up commercial partnerships. It is a tragedy that those are the ones most badly affected. As the Secretary of State focuses his aims in the White Paper on creating a German-style education system, it is important that the Government should have cognisance of the difference between the kind of economy we have and that of Germany. I would love to see more of a skills-based approach, but it will not stand in isolation from a proper industrial strategy.”
“Member for Totnes (Anthony Mangnall) talked about the importance of his college in Devon. He made a powerful case for the importance of the FE sector, focused on local needs, in small towns and rural communities. The hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) spoke about adult education, as I have, and she referred to the decision to scrap the union learning fund. I see that decision as entirely vindictive. The fund is a tiny proportion of the money being spent on skills, and it is being scrapped at a time when we know that the Government cannot even spend the money that they have. The decision does not seem to be based on any evidence that shows that the programme does not work—it does work—but on the Secretary of State’s antipathy towards the trade union sector. In a wide-ranging speech, my hon.”
“On the subject of money being sent back, in a debate a couple of weeks ago I asked the Minister about the “Get Help to Retrain” scheme, which was being wound up after its pilot. She said that it had not been scrapped, but was being incorporated into the national retraining scheme. FE Week recently published evidence that the leftover cash from the £100 million, earmarked for the retraining scheme, would not be added to the new skills fund and Ministers have confirmed that the money will be sent back to the Treasury. Once again, we have a situation where money has been allocated and it ends up not being spent on our young people, when it should be. That is becoming something of a pattern. The tweaking of the apprenticeship levy to enable large employers to pass levy funds down to companies in their supply chains is welcomed. The hon.”
“Friend the Member for Luton South (Rachel Hopkins) reflected. A powerful point was made by the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier), who brought her experience to bear, as well as her passion for the sector. In her contribution she talked about the frustration that we all feel when money that has been allocated by the Treasury and is finally in the skills sector is then subject to systems that mean we cannot use that money, and it is sent back to the Government. It is infuriating. My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough spoke powerfully about the digital divide. In this crisis, we have seen the importance of young people being able to access broadband and devices. The case she made about the lack of laptops was powerful.”
“In the five years that followed, the Government reduced that spending in actual terms by a shocking 64%. When we hear the Government now proudly boasting about a £200 million increase in capital funding, we need to place that in the context of the cuts we have already had. Even with the additional money that has been spent, Government are spending less now than they were 10 years ago—purely in cash terms, not even taking into account inflation. When colleges urgently need funds to make structural changes to cope with the demands of coronavirus, it is staggering inaction on the Government’s part to say that there will be a plan coming along in April. The Association of Colleges has exposed that the average college has spent between £200,000 and £300,000 on covid-related improvements to keep their college safe, as my hon.”
“This debate is timely, Mr Hosie. In the last decade the further education sector has seen its funding slashed by a third, but adult education, which is so crucial at this time, has taken an even bigger hit, with a 50% reduction. By the end of this year, an estimated 1 million young people will be neither in employment nor in education or training, and will be facing the toughest jobs market in a generation. Even when faced with the urgent need to act this spring, Ministers ignored calls from the Association of Colleges to have that education and training offer in place for September, at the start of this academic year. On capital funding, £2.61 billion was invested in further education capital expenditure in the final five years of the previous Labour Government.”
“The colleges that focused most on apprenticeships and commercial partnerships are the very ones with the biggest financial challenge. Many apprentices’ college courses were suspended, and they were either furloughed or made redundant, and a generation of workers of all ages who need retraining find that the careers and adult education offers that would help them right now have been obliterated. On finances, the Ney report exposed the fact that the Government’s destruction of the civil service and its capacity means that the Department for Education has been ill equipped to work with colleges that hit financial trouble. On capital funding, which other Members have referred to, the Minister’s written response to my recent question exposed the unprecedented capital funding cuts we have seen over the last 10 years.”
“We already had an apprenticeship levy where there was a huge reduction in apprenticeships at small and medium-sized enterprises and in the number of 16 to 19-year-olds obtaining access to one of them. We already had an underfunded further education college sector. We already had a huge flight of experienced college lecturers, after years of real-term pay cuts. They left the profession and left colleges less able to provide the support that is needed. We already had a Government who were making further education the enemy of higher education, rather than seeing them as complementary providers whose success depends, in part, on each other. Coronavirus has only exacerbated those challenges, with a huge reduction in apprenticeship starts.”
“Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough said about the extent to which the skills and productivity crisis that we face existed prior to coronavirus. It has been much exacerbated by the virus, but many of the issues existed long before, and it is important for us to focus on that. As we think about the value of adult education, and learning at all stages of our lives, I am sure I am not the only one who has today learned, in far more detail than they knew it before, the geography of Wisconsin and what the obscure states around America are all about. It just shows that every day is a school day. It is important to make the point that we already had a skills and productivity crisis before coronavirus.”
“They are the institutes of second chance for many people who have had their lives turned around by the further education sector—even in my own family. My son went to an FE college and subsequently went to university, which would not have been predicted when he left school. I know that his experience is commonplace. People who go to our colleges can study vocational or academic subjects, and foundation and life skills. Colleges are incredibly important for adult education. People who go to colleges are more likely to be younger, and more likely to be black or from an ethnic minority, than the average population. Colleges are an incredibly important cog in a functioning education system. I think that the passion for that has come across today. I was particularly struck by what my hon.”
“It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hosie. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss) for securing this timely debate and for the passion and determination with which she continues to speak up for the further education sector. It is hugely welcome that for the second time in two weeks we are here to debate the sector. I know how important it is to many Members. Our colleges are incredibly important. They are at the heart of all our communities. They are an education and skills hub relied on by employers and learners. They are crucial providers of skills and play an incredibly important role in bringing employers and learners together.”
“The Minister has previously spoken about the five colleges that have had direct financial support, and 40 colleges she has identified that might need that support. Can she update us a bit more on what progress is being made, and how many more she thinks are likely to need further support?”
“The report has exposed the failures in the system so I hope that this debate and the Minister’s response can be a step towards getting greater fairness and security for many of the 3.9 million children who will look to us to act.”
“Does the Minister think that the Government do enough to support separated fathers to continue to be there for their children? Will he explain why it is not appropriate for benefit payments to be shared as a matter of course when parents are sharing responsibilities rather than relying on parents coming to some mutual arrangement? I do not underestimate the difficulty in finding arrangements that work fairly and equitably for all sides but will the Minister tell us whether there are any specific concerns about an assumption towards shared payment? Protecting children who have suffered the trauma of a divorce is something that we should all feel passionately about. Supporting their parents when they are suffering ill health is one of the most tangible ways that we can deliver on that.”
“In summary, it cannot be right that the benefits system forces parents already in dispute to fight it out between themselves as to who receives the money needed to support their children. Nor can it be right that parents who do the right thing and want to care for their children are hit with the bedroom tax for having their child’s bedroom empty for half the week. In addition to the Minister telling us what the Government have done in response to the Social Security Advisory Committee report, will he tell us what steps they are planning or can take to ensure the equity of payments in these situations? Is the gender of the parent a factor that the state considers when deciding who should be regarded as the main carer?”
“I do not underestimate the challenge, given that it is difficult to design a system that takes into account every personal circumstance, but I do say that there should be safeguards in place to ensure that any social security system is not open to abuse and does not work against the interests of separated parents when one parent has decided not to support a collective approach. We also need to make sure that children are protected in the eventuality that one parent is negligent in carrying out their responsibilities, and I recognise that striking a balance is a difficult matter, but it is incredibly important. It is clear that the social security system is currently not fit for purpose to reflect the complexities of modern family life and that reform is necessary.”
“The committee also suggested that the social security system and interactions with the child maintenance system affect the hardship of both parents, including those not classified as having main caring responsibility, while also affecting and creating hardship for children. When examining the housing element of universal credit, the committee recommended that the system should be reformed to enable young parents under 35, who share custody of their children, to have them to stay overnight without imposing a financial penalty. Another key recommendation of the committee was that the Department for Work and Pensions should consider options for the system to support all non-residential parents with more than one child to stay with them overnight.”
“The committee went on to say that the group should also consider how to ensure that the benefits system and interactions with the child maintenance formula do not unduly result in poor work incentives or push one parent into hardship, with all the impact that that would have on the children, and it should consider how to ensure separated parents can easily access the right information and support from the social security system. The Government’s sorting out separation website was a welcome step, but much more needs to be done to help both parents effectively navigate the complexity of the system.”
“It suggested that such a working group should consider the impact of policy on the living standards of both parents and the net impact of that policy on children’s welfare. It should consider how the social security system could better reflect modern shared care relationships that are not detrimental to the parent without main caring responsibility. What actions have the Government taken as a result of the Social Security Advisory Committee report and has the cross-departmental working group been set up to instigate urgent action on the issues that the committee raised?”
“He is often forced to go without to prevent his children going hungry. It is difficult to quantify the scale of the situation as there is currently poor quality data available in relation to parents without main caring responsibility. The family resources survey in 2017-18 estimated that as many as 30,000 young non-resident parents were likely to be affected by the housing benefit shared accommodation rate policy. I understand that the situation is a difficult one, particularly in circumstances where parents are in a dispute over custody or child maintenance payments. In the Social Security Advisory Committee report that I referred to earlier, the committee believed that a cross-departmental working group should be set up to instigate urgent action on these issues.”
“In addition to having the bedroom tax imposed upon him, Mr Waterhouse is unable to receive the housing portion of child benefit, given that his children live with him on what is seen as a part-time basis, albeit 50% of the time. Given that my constituent is unable to work owing to a long-term mental health condition, he is now struggling to make ends meet. That is without the additional stresses placed on him by the current benefits system. He does not qualify for any child benefit entitlement. Again, as he has his children on a half-time basis, despite the lack of funds, my constituent is expected to care for his children when they stay with him. From what he has put on social media and from reading the evidence from many other parents in a similar situation, it is clear that his situation is not unique.”
“Chesterfield Borough Council has enabled Mr Waterhouse to have a discretionary housing benefit allowance payment that can be used in cases where the Government’s unfair bedroom tax applies. However, the Government are specific that it is a transitional payment to allow claimants to make arrangements to move into more appropriately sized housing. In this case, Mr Waterhouse’s property is exactly the right size when his children are with him. Although we have managed to get Chesterfield to extend the discretionary housing benefit, relying on that means that the Government have outsourced responsibility for the fairness of welfare policy on to Chesterfield Borough Council rather than the Department for Work and Pensions taking the responsibility, which is where it should reside.”
“The report stated that, as a result, some parents without main caring responsibilities are being pushed into hardship, may face poor work incentives and are unable to share care of their child, which may not be in the best interests of the child’s welfare. I have to ask the Minister, what is the merit of the state deciding who is the main carer in situations where children are shared equally between two parents? The committee pointed to Scotland as an example of best practice, given that the Scottish Parliament has established a cross-party working group looking at separated parents. It was recommended that the Department for Work and Pensions should join up with that group to ensure a joined-up approach and to learn lessons from the progress made so far.”
“The committee outlined that it felt the welfare system needed to be updated, given that a key principle is that it should centre on the welfare of the child, in line with the United Nations convention on the rights of the child, but that in doing so it should consider the impact on the child’s welfare of the living standards of both parents—not just the parent with the main responsibility—and their ability to share care. The report went on to highlight that the current system does not meet those principles, pointing to the presumption that there is one main carer, despite the range of shared care arrangements in place within separated families.”
“The Social Security Advisory Committee, which examined this subject in October 2019, acknowledged that one of the most difficult issues for successive Governments has been to design and operate an effective financial regime for separated parents. The committee’s report went on to recognise that it is difficult for the social security system to reflect complexities, especially of shared care arrangements. One recommendation was that there was a strong case for the Government to take a more strategic approach to separated parents and social security.”
“One of my constituents, Lee Waterhouse, has two such issues. He and his former wife were in dispute over some matters. I do not propose to go into the detail of their case, but while the Government will allow parents who share care for two children to agree to receive child benefit for one child each, when there is not agreement, as in this case, it means that one parent is considered to be the parent with care and the other parent neither receives child benefit nor is eligible to be housed as a parent with caring responsibilities—that parent therefore becomes eligible to be charged the bedroom tax. That issue affects Lee, as he is classed as having a spare room, though he needs somewhere for his children to be when they stay with him for about half the week.”
“It is also an incredibly financially stressful time for parents. It can lead to mental health issues, depression, homelessness and many other difficult consequences. It is therefore incumbent on all of us in this place to do all we can to protect children in such circumstances and to support them to have as stable and successful a relationship with both parents as possible. The process of separation can often lead to considerable hostility between the parents, and that can spill over into financial disputes. Through the Child Maintenance Service, the Government already involve themselves in supporting the process of one parent providing money to the other, but that still leaves the thorny issue of who is eligible to receive child benefit. That issue also has consequences for the housing allocation and as a gateway to other benefits.”
“I beg to move, That this House has considered the effect of child element of universal credit on separated parents. It is a tremendous pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Mrs Murray. There is a lot of evidence that children who have positive relationships with both parents are happier, healthier and more successful. When families choose to have children, in the vast majority of cases they hope and expect to stay together as a couple for the foreseeable future and the rest of their child’s childhood, but alas, it does not always work that way. A sad fact of life is that parental separation is commonplace: there are 2.5 million separated families with almost 4 million children across Great Britain. Separation is in itself a traumatic experience for everyone involved, in particular for the children.”
“I seek clarity on that point. It is the understanding of Chesterfield Borough Council that discretionary housing payments are a transitional payment for local authorities to work with vulnerable people so that they can get themselves out of the position of having a spare bedroom. In this particular case, and many others like it, however, it is not a transitional arrangement. The man will have a long-term need to accommodate the children. The council is under the impression that the Government do not want it to use discretionary housing payments as a long-term support. Has the council misunderstood the guidance? If it has not, what does the Minister suggest for this case?”
“The Minister talked about the Government wanting parents to work together and leaving it to parents to decide, but clearly, this is not a unique situation. After a separation, there is often contention and disagreement between former partners. When both are looking after the children 50:50, how is it fair for the Government to decide that one of those parents is the main carer and therefore gets the support with housing, child benefit and the gateway that that opens, and the other parent gets nothing? It seems patently unfair. To dismiss that by saying that is how the system is and it would be difficult for the Department to work on it in a different way is not really good enough, not just for Mr Waterhouse but for many others in that situation.”
“I remind the Minister of the question I asked and invite him to respond. Is the gender of each party a deciding factor in who ends up getting the original payment? Certainly, the view of Mr Waterhouse and many others is that there is a sort of natural bias in the system, so that where both parties share the care, the woman is treated as the main carer. Is that how the system works, and what more can he tell us about that aspect of it?”
“We recognise that we have a safety net to support parents and families and their children, so investigating whether there is more that can be done to allow for the reality of the situation, which is often that responsibility for children is shared and that therefore benefits need to be shared, is something to work towards. I will take the Minister up on his offer to meet further. Question put and agreed to.”
“I am never knowingly quiet, Mrs Murray. [ Laughter. ] I appreciate the Minister’s response and his offer to continue our dialogue after this debate. I recognise that creating a system that works in individual cases is difficult, but there is inherent unfairness at the heart of this system, and a real danger that it will make it more difficult for fathers who are on benefits and who may suffer with mental health or physical health problems, or who are for whatever reason reliant on the benefit system, to be the parent that they would like to be.”
“Many small business owners have been forced to raid their personal savings to keep their businesses afloat over the past eight months, but that is not a bottomless pit. Many small business owners are not wealthy people, and the Chief Secretary to the Treasury must understand that if they go under, the whole company goes with them. The Treasury has now had eight months to get this scheme working. Why is it still excluding 3 million people? Does he not recognise how perilous the situation is for many of those businesses?”
“We all recognise that the Prime Minister has got a difficult job, but by God he is doing it badly. He said a few moments ago that he is having to balance lives and livelihoods, but does he not realise that his delay is costing lives and livelihoods? Businesses will fold, people will lose their jobs and the strain on our NHS will be greater because he failed to take the advice of SAGE and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer). Will the Prime Minister at least now acknowledge the failure of his policy and start getting in front of this business, rather than always playing catch-up and costing lives and livelihoods?”
“I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way and thank her for the case that she is making. Is she interested, as I am, that not a single one of the interventions that she has faced from the Conservative side has been relevant to the motion that we are debating? They all seem to be dragging us back on to Labour party policy, rather than standing up for the financial settlement that they are offering to Manchester, and that we know will be going to so many other areas. So can she help me in inviting them to actually speak about the 80% that we are trying to ensure gets into some of the most impoverished people’s—some of the most impoverished workers’—pockets, rather than trying to change the debate into the one they want to have?”
“The Minister suggested a moment ago that the Mayor of Manchester had not been constructive; he praised how constructive the Mayors who had come to an agreement with him were. The Mayor of Manchester made a request for £90 million and was willing to be negotiated all the way down to £65 million, which sounds incredibly constructive to me. In the spirit of trying to bring everyone back together, would it not be better for him to recognise that the Mayor of Manchester is doing what he thinks is right—as are other Mayors and council leaders in other areas, whether or not they agree with the position that the Prime Minister and the Government come up with—and to say that everyone in this is attempting to be constructive?”
“They are the Government who conspired to deny a cash-strapped council £50 million from Richard Desmond, and who pay consultants £7,000 a day to screw up track and trace, but when it comes to laying people off—because all the Government’s measures so far have failed—the people of Manchester are not even worth £20. What a shabby disgrace!”
“If the Government had a formula all along, why was Manchester getting only £22 million at 3 o’clock and £60 million again by 7 o’clock? Why is Sheffield city region getting £6 million less in business support than the formula says? Why was the initial offer to Manchester, of £55 million, £3 million less than what the Government now say that formula is? If there is actually a formula, it does not add up. They do not even lie well. The Government are so inept that they cannot even get their story straight when they are screwing people over. The whole charade would not be so bad if the Government had the slightest compunction about wasting billions of pounds of public money.”
“The Government are now claiming that they had a formula all along, but that has so transparently been done after the event to justify what they offered to Greater Manchester. Surely a sensible business support formula would work on the basis of the number of workers that an area has, not the number of citizens. The deal that the Greater Manchester Mayor asked for would replace 80% of the income of those workers on low wages put out of work by the Government’s incompetence. It is an area, remember, that has been in tier 2 for months. In Chesterfield, we are just going into tier 2 and we see the appalling consequences it has for our hospitality sector, which is getting no support whatever. All the way through, the Government’s eyes have been on the political win rather than on the best interests of the people they are here to serve.”
“It is a huge misfortune that, at the moment the entire world is grappling with this pandemic, the United Kingdom should be stuck with this Government—probably the most incompetent Government that there has ever been—at a moment when never more has there been a need for a strong and reliable Government. When the whole country is looking to the Government for leadership, for them to instead be involved in the dreadful spectacle of politicising and trying to split up areas such as Greater Manchester—trying to get people to work against each other, rather than working together—at a moment like this says everything not only about their competence, but about what motivates them.”
“We need a properly resourced Department for Education that sees FE colleges working collaboratively with employers, universities, trade unions and Government schemes, and we need a Government who recognise that not all people can get careers advice from their father’s friends at the golf club. We need a skills system that works around real people’s lives and supports them to retrain without their families going hungry while they are doing so. Colleges are capable of playing the role we need them to, but not unless the Government show the humility and resolve to recognise where those colleges are starting from and what is required to help them back to the place they should be in: at the heart of a skills system relied on by employers, valued by learners and every bit as good as the very best in the world.”
“There is so much more to say about our further education sector, but unfortunately there is not the time in which to do it, so I will close with this: we need a Government that recognise that colleges are a fundamental part of our skills and economic ecosystem and that do not pit them against universities or even see them as opponents of the independent provider sector, but that see them working collaboratively across the piece. We need a Government that introduce policy based on evidence and then give policies a chance to work. We need a Government that are honest about the fact that the scale of funding cuts means that the current investment is a tiny step back up the mountain.”
“At the same time, we know that, just a few months ago, the Government sent £300 million of apprenticeship levy funds back to the Treasury. There is far more generous funding for the commitment-free kickstart programme than for apprenticeships, and the hon. Member for Mansfield (Ben Bradley) was absolutely right to say that SMEs are shut out of our apprenticeships far too often. The Association of Colleges has stated that colleges face a shortfall of £2 billion this academic year.”
“What is more, we have seen adult education funding slashed by 50% in real terms and appalling failure on careers guidance, and the Government announcement just this week that they were scrapping their “Get Help to Retrain” initiative—the centrepiece of the national retraining scheme—less than three years after it was announced should give us all pause for thought. As we enter this period in which we are asked to believe that the Government have finally accepted the need for a skills-based economy, we do so in the shadow of the vindictive and destructive announcement that they are scrapping funding for the Unionlearn programme that their own assessment was so complimentary about. That is perhaps more revealing than 1,000 press releases.”