Emma Lewell
MP for South Shields · Labour · United Kingdom
“South Shields tourism is largely made up of families from neighbouring regions who have saved hard all year round to spend a few days at the seaside, and even if the increase from this measure is marginal, they will not come.”
“I echo Mr Speaker’s comments at the start of business questions and hope that everyone has a lovely summer. Reform-led South Tyneside council is planning to close down our publicly run, high-quality STANLEY’s—South Tyneside Accredited Network for Learning in the Early Years—nurseries and daycare, which will affect hundreds of children, th…”
“T10. Heugh Street bridge has been closed since November. The council only applied to the structures fund after I raised the matter here, and despite pleas, it has still not implemented proper diversions. The bridge is absolutely vital on Great North Run day in September. Can the Minister suggest what else we can do next?”
“The chairman of the public inquiry also found that MI5 missed a significant opportunity to take action that might have prevented the attack. Lisa, Mark and Caroline were signatories to the Hillsborough Law Now campaign letter to my right hon. and learned Friend the Prime Minister earlier this year.”
“Before I speak to the Government’s new clauses and amendments, which ensure that there is no carve-out from the duty of candour for the intelligence and security services, I put on record my utmost respect for my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool West Derby (Ian Byrne) and all my hon. and right hon.”
“This is so important for everyone who is fighting for justice—the nuclear veterans, Chinook, Grenfell, the Post Office scandal, the infected blood scandal, the covid-19 bereaved families, and many others.”
The complete record
Every one of 602 lines we hold for Emma Lewell, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 12 of 13.
“By October 2020, a further letter from the EU confirmed that new evidence showed that, both in terms of frequency and quantity, dumping levels continued to be breached, reaching almost 53 tonnes of sewage in the first six months of the year. As a result, it also confirmed that it was commencing infringement proceedings. And so it went on, with more meetings and more correspondence. The Environment Agency, Northumbrian Water and the Government all dispute the findings. It is a bureaucratic nightmare, where everyone has a different version of the levels of sewage being dumped, everyone continues to claim that it is not up to them to sort it out, and no one seems able to provide any update at all on the infringement proceedings. I, my team and my constituents are exhausted and angry. This obstinance has to stop.”
“It found that the UK was still in breach, and sewage continued to harm our beach at Whitburn and our sea life. It asked yet again that the United Kingdom fully comply with the 2012 ruling and explain what action it intended on taking within two months. It appears that the Government never bothered replying and never took steps to halt the sewage discharges. In early 2020, I raised the matter yet again with yet another Secretary of State, eight years after the initial request to rectify the problem. I was advised that DEFRA does not believe there are problems with the sewage system at Whitburn and that the beach was classified as “Excellent”. Now, everything in South Shields is excellent, but that definitely does not mean that sewage is not being dumped on that beach.”
“After the judgment in 2012, the UK was given five years to correct the situation. The correctional work was completed by the end of December 2017. In those years, I continued to correspond with various Secretaries of State regarding my constituents’ concerns and requests for information. I was advised that Mr Latimer’s requests, via me, had become repetitive and created an unreasonable burden on the resources of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Environment Agency. It was then decided that no further requests or queries would be responded to. Of course the requests have been repetitive; it is because answers and solutions have never been forthcoming. In January 2019, our hardworking and effective MEP, Jude Kirton-Darling, raised the matter again with the European Parliament. Guess what?”
“I would like to correct some of the Minister’s points. I was not aggressive; I was stating facts. I am very disappointed that people have had death threats, and of course I would not condone that. I was simply relaying facts and what happened in last week’s votes. If the Government were confident about last week’s votes, why on earth have they U-turned?”
“The Minister is being very generous. I am fully aware of what is in the Environment Bill. This debate this evening is about a particular issue that has been ongoing in my constituency for more than 20 years. I was hoping that the Minister would come here tonight to discuss that, not what the Government are going to do in the future. She is already aware of the problems at Whitburn; we have corresponded about it repeatedly. I would like to know what action will be taken for me and my constituents, because this problem is ruining our beach and has been for decades.”
“This is another in a long line of serious errors regarding the Government’s Afghan relocations that will cost lives. Can the Secretary of State please advise us how many of the 260 interpreters the Government have been unable to make direct contact with since the breach?”
“5. What progress the Government have made on supporting touring musicians to continue to work in Europe following the UK’s withdrawal from the EU.”
“The reality is that there has been limited progress on this matter. South Shields is home to many independent musicians, who used to be able to showcase their talents right across Europe. The cost and bureaucracy involved now prohibits them from doing so. Carry on Touring has written to the Minister with a solution: a pan-European EU visa and work permit waiver. Will she please ask the new Secretary of State to use her first day to implement it?”
“The Secretary of State has not delivered a concrete plan today, and there is no real clarity on thresholds for further lockdowns, or details of what draconian and unnecessary powers in the Coronavirus Act 2020 he wants to hold on to. Will he at least say when that soon-to-expire Act will be back before the House for a vote?”
“Even by this Government’s standards, it has not been a great first week back, has it? We have had chaos and misinformation regarding Afghanistan, attempts to impose vaccine passports, and the breaking of manifesto commitments, with the Government scrapping the triple lock and rushing through the biggest tax rise of 50 years, as well as pulling an Opposition day debate on the scrapping of the universal credit lifeline. May we please have an urgent debate on probity in public office?”
“Time and time again, when it comes to defence procurement, programmes are beset by delays, costs spiralling out of control and poor oversight—in short, the abysmal contract management of public money. Ajax has been no different. The Minister will recall dodging any responsibility in July’s Defence Committee sitting for the failings of this programme. A lessons learned review was then promised over the summer. Where is it?”
“Q3. A constituent of mine spent hours waiting to get through to someone on the Government-issued telephone number for non-British nationals in Afghanistan. Distressed and fearful for his family, he was relieved when he eventually spoke to someone. However, when the person he spoke to thought he had hung up, he overheard them laughing and saying to a colleague, “We are having to lie to people; we are giving them false hope; the whole thing is a complete scam.” Is it the Foreign Secretary, the Defence Secretary, the Home Secretary or the Prime Minister who is responsible for this scam?”
“The app forcing self-isolation is making our country grind to a halt. Delivery drivers, shops, transport, hospitality, factories, and essential public and blue-light services are at breaking point. The Minister has said that there will be no more exemptions to self-isolating. The Business Secretary said the same just this morning. Then, just over an hour ago, he told the press—not this House—that he had changed his mind. Who are we to believe—this Minister or the Business Secretary?”
“Our Port of Tyne secured us as the base for the biggest offshore wind farm in the world. Richmond and Westoe Taxis offered free taxi transport to elderly and vulnerable people to help them shop for essential supplies. Our pharmacists filled the gap left when GP surgeries were shut and they made sure that essential medication was delivered across the constituency. Communities across the country, including mine in South Shields, have shown the absolute best of our country. My constituents make me proud every single minute of every day, but I have never felt more proud of them than I have done throughout this pandemic. I have a simple message to the Government: do better, be more like South Shields.”
“If anyone is not deeply frightened or concerned about the trajectory in which the Government are taking our country, they have not been paying attention. In spite of the Government, we have seen communities like mine in South Shields do the exact opposite. In the pandemic, we have fundraised and delivered food and essentials to our friends, neighbours and wider community. Stuart Hatton provided online ballroom dancing lessons, Stevey Sullivan held “Storytime with Stevey” and Shah Lalon Amin delivered free curries every single night. South Shields Volunteer Life Brigade, Women’s Health in South Tyneside and North East Animal Rights kept on with the volunteering. South Tyneside council staff, my amazing team and other key workers went above and beyond every single day.”
“Throughout this pandemic, we have seen the Government award almost £1.5 billion to Tory friends and donors; send covid patients into care homes, leading to thousands of deaths; fail to equip our heroic health service with adequate PPE, then deny health workers a fair pay rise; row back on manifesto promises to pensioners, our armed forces and foreign aid; deny refuge to children fleeing conflict and persecution; repeatedly ignore the crisis in adult and children’s social care; exclude 3 million people from financial support; be shamed into feeding hungry children; silence any dissent and clamp down on freedom of speech, proposing to jail journalists who print the truth; and disfranchise millions from voting in future. Recently, we heard the Prime Minister tell us all that we need to simply accept that more people are going to die.”
“The children’s rights charity Article 39 has made an application to court for a judicial review of the proposals. Become, a national charity for children in care and young care leavers, has said that the Government have systematically “failed to listen to young care-experienced people who have spoken out about the lack of security, stability and support they have experienced living in unregulated accommodation.” I could never support any legislation that not only denies children the care they so desperately need, but actually makes them deeply unsafe. This is a shameful SI, and if given the chance, I would vote against it every single time.”
“I sincerely hope that it is none at all because if she has spoken to them, it makes what the Government are pushing through today even more shameful, because in those children’s own words they are literally just surviving, not living, and not being allowed to prepare for adulthood. They are not in education, they are not in employment, they are literally just surviving hour by hour. The SI is nothing more than another step in a long line of attempts by the Government to shamefully deregulate the care of our most vulnerable children, to make it profitable for providers and ripe for further privatisation, because removing care removes extra costs. The Association of Directors of Children’s Services has warned that the reforms could result in “a number of unintended consequences”.”
“It is legitimising, encouraging and increasing the shameful practice of placing thousands of children in unregulated, unsafe hostels, bed and breakfasts, shared homes and caravan parks. Some children have even been placed in tents on campsites. All those settings leave them without any support and vulnerable to criminal abusers, drug gangs and sexual exploitation. The SI creates a two-tier discriminatory system, because children in foster care can remain in that setting until they are 21-years-old, but those without a foster family are being told they their leaving age will not be 18, as it always has been, but now 16. How many children who have lived in unregulated accommodation has the Minister spoken to?”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies, and to follow my hon. Friend the Member Hove, who spoke from the Opposition Front Bench. However, I respectfully rise to speak against the regulations. The Government spin on the regulations has really been something else. The line they take is that they are ensuring children of 15 years of age and below must live in setting where they receive care, but that is wrong, because what the statutory instrument really does is legislate to deny children aged 16 and 17 years of age—children in the care of the state—any care at all. Our social care system does not even do that to vulnerable adults in supported accommodation, and I am aghast that it is proposed for children.”
“What the Minister is saying is all very nice, but the SI we are discussing places children who are 16 and 17-years-old in unregulated accommodation where they are not safe. There is no safety mechanism to protect them. How on earth does the Government think that provision will make them safe, protected and cared for?”
“I am little bit curious because the Minister claims that this type of accommodation can work for some children, but the SI actually removes the current level of responsibility that the local authority has for those children by removing the national standards that are a requirement under Ofsted. Can the Minister explain exactly what the Government think is different between a vulnerable child who is 15 and one who is 16 or 17? That is the distinction that is being made in the SI.”
“Throughout the pandemic, the Transport Secretary has treated the travel industry as an afterthought—delaying decisions, making vague promises, creating chaos and confusion. Nearly 200,000 jobs have been lost or are at risk, and countless well-established high street agencies are now boarded up. Over a year ago, the Government promised a sector-specific support package. He keeps referring to £7 billion, yet he knows that that was purely for the aviation industry, not for travel agencies. ABTA wrote to him just this week about the lack of support. Why has he failed to deliver for them?”
“The Minister’s responses today further confirm that social care and the millions who rely on it are simply not a priority for her or this Government. It was recently reported that the Minister leaned on Public Health England to alter its proposed advice to care homes in the pandemic, from ensuring that those discharged from hospital tested negative for covid to not requiring any testing of patients at all. That led to more than 30,000 deaths. Will she take this opportunity to apologise to those who lost loved ones?”
“I am. The Minister says that he is confident about the argument he is making, and that the Government believe they are on the right track. With these new clauses, all the Opposition are asking the Government to do is evaluate and assess the decisions that they have made. Why will the Minister not do that, if he is confident about what they are doing?”
““Our greatest national asset”; “Best of this country”; “Record increase in funding”; “Saved my life—no question”; “My No.1 priority”—all things that the Prime Minister said about our NHS. Yet award-winning South Tyneside District Hospital has lost vital services and been told by his Government to make further cuts to remaining services. Later today, I am presenting a petition on behalf of more than 40,000 of my constituents who are against these cuts. Like me, they want him to help us save our hospital and ensure, for once, that he is able to match his rhetoric with some action. Will he?”
“The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urge the Government to work with NHS England, South Tyneside NHS Foundation Trust, South Tyneside Clinical Commissioning Group and South Tyneside Health & Well-being Board to stop any plans to close acute services at South Tyneside District Hospital and to safeguard its Accident and Emergency Service. And the petitioners remain, etc. [P002667]”
“I rise to present a petition about South Tyneside Hospital on behalf of 44,000 of my constituents in South Shields. The petition states: The petition of residents of the constituency of South Shields, Declares that the downgrading of South Tyneside Hospital announced in the “alliance” between South Tyneside NHS Foundation Trust (STFT) and City Hospitals Sunderland (CHS) with loss of acute services will be a disaster for the people of South Tyneside and the people of Sunderland; further that the removal of all acute services to Sunderland will make the Sunderland A&E unsustainable and will mean that people from South Tyneside will have to travel to Sunderland or Newcastle; further that the immediate threat of this “alliance” is the loss of acute stroke and maternity services; further that the decision to downgrade South Tyneside Hospital demonstrates that the Government’s direction with the NHS is to reduce its funding and damage it through its fragmentation into purchasers and providers, closure of acute hospitals and A&E Departments, cut-backs and the takeover of the most profitable services by private health companies; further that the Government has a duty to provide a comprehensive health service across England to all communities; and further that access to healthcare is a right of all in a modern society and we demand that it be guaranteed.”
“In April last year, Government guidance in relation to hospital discharges clearly stated: “Negative tests are not required prior to transfers/admissions into the care home.” One month and many deaths later, the Secretary of State very clearly said on national television that “right from the start we have tried to throw a protective ring around our care homes.” Since then, the guidance seems to have disappeared from Government websites, and this weekend he has denied making those claims, yet again today he expects us to trust this Government’s judgment in deciding how we should continue to live our lives. Why on earth should we?”
“South Shields and North Tyneside are interconnected. Today, my community and businesses are incredibly anxious. We know that local lockdowns do not work and inevitably lead to national ones. We know that it is likely that there will be other variants of this virus, which may well be with us for ever. Lockdowns break our economy and society, cause mental distress, delay vital cancer treatments, lead to further unemployment and exacerbate inequalities. Can the Minister explain why the Government’s response—instead of fixing test, trace and isolate, for example—is always more restrictions and endless cycles of lockdown?”
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. On Monday at the Dispatch Box, the Secretary of State for Health stated: The truth is that when we put Pakistan and Bangladesh on the red list, positivity among those arriving from those countries was three times higher than it was among those arriving from India. —[ Official Report , 17 May 2021; Vol. 695, c. 430.] However, the data he referred to, which he directed me to in the same debate, states that India’s positivity rate was 5%, Bangladesh’s was 4% and Pakistan’s was 6%, from 25 March to 7 April. It is during that two-week period that Bangladesh and Pakistan were put on the red list, so it is clear from that data that the positivity rates were not three times higher, and that in fact India’s positivity rate was higher that Bangladesh’s when Bangladesh was put on the red list.”
“I am not at all surprised that the Minister’s answer bears little resemblance to the reality. Even pre-pandemic, 75% of children living in poverty lived in a household where at least one person worked. A recent NHS England-funded report found that around 700 child deaths could be avoided each year by reducing deprivation rates. Under this Government, work is no longer a route out of poverty. Why is that?”
“Thanks to the Prime Minister’s delaying travel restrictions, an estimated 20,000 people arrived in the UK from India before restrictions were put in place. Can the Secretary of State inform the House how many of those arrivals were covid positive and were subsequently quarantined, and if not, why not?”
“What steps he is taking with the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to ensure the equitable distribution of coronavirus business support schemes.”
“It is clear that equitable distribution of covid business schemes is not a priority. Only those on this Treasury Bench would have the gall to claim fairness when the Chancellor and his Ministers were consumed with pulling out all the stops to support their friend the former Prime Minister on behalf of Greensill, while 3 million people were excluded from support schemes, some so distraught that they took their own lives. So to clear this up once and for all, can the Minister explain what news did Treasury officials report at a meeting on 24 April that made Greensill representatives “very pleased”?”
“Convicted, jailed, persecuted, taken their own lives, made bankrupt, reputational damage and mental and physical anguish for years, yet still no one at all at the Post Office or Fujitsu has been held to account for this horrendous injustice. There are also those in Government who became acutely aware of this scandal, yet remained completely passive in their duties on the board of the Post Office. Is it the Post Office, Fujitsu, or some Government Members that the Minister is protecting by resisting a statutory public inquiry?”
“I remain of the view that this Bill is a hurried and inadequate piece of legislation that has never matched up to the rhetoric surrounding it. No one is in disagreement that greater legal protections for armed forces personnel and veterans serving overseas were needed, but the Government have drafted legislation that makes the problem worse, leaves our service personnel and veterans at a disadvantage and without crucial support, and fails on its promise to those who served in Northern Ireland. Our service personnel and veterans deserve the very best for risking their all for us; I echo the pleas made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) that, in today’s vote, Government Members show that they believe this too by joining us in the Lobby.”
“The Bill’s objective is to offer more protection and support to service personnel and veterans, so how can an amendment that offers just that protection and support be, as the Minister said last week, “contrary to the Bill’s objectives”? —[ Official Report , 21 April 2021; Vol. 692, c. 1058.] I would really appreciate it if, in summing up, the Minister could expand on and clarify why the Government’s stubborn objection to this duty of care has remained. There still remains nothing in the Bill that will solve the problem of repeated investigations. Without Lords amendment 5B, there is nothing in the Bill that will afford our forces personnel and veterans a duty of care when they are undergoing such awful investigations.”
“The Minister also claimed that the Lords amendment carries a risk of “unintended consequences, including a possible increase in litigation, which would be contrary to the Bill’s objectives.” As the noble Lord Dannatt said in the other place, that is simply an empty argument because, under the amendment, the Ministry of Defence has the opportunity to draw up its own statement of a duty of care standard and act within that. I reiterate my comments from last week—that to claim that the duty of care proposals would be better placed in the Armed Forces Bill is not acceptable. We are debating and voting today on this Bill; it is not right for MPs to accept gaps in legislation on the promise that it may or may not be rectified in future legislation.”
“I was not comforted by the Minister’s words last week—neither, indeed, was I just now—when he assured us that, “The Ministry of Defence takes very seriously its duty of care for service personnel and veterans, for whom there already exists a comprehensive range of legal, pastoral, welfare and mental health support”, bearing in mind the testimonies from those in my own constituency and those who gave evidence to the Bill Committee of how inaccessible and ineffective that support can be. I was even less assured after reading the media comments made by the hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer), who said that help is available, yet it is hard to understand it and “hard to understand where it is”, and that promoting where it is and how to get to it was simply not part of this Government’s agenda.”
“It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. and respected Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart). It is welcome that the Government have eventually accepted that war crimes should be excluded from the Bill. However, that it took this long for them to understand the grave implications of their proposals remains very worrying. What remains of concern is the stubborn refusal to introduce a duty of care to our service personnel. I am still at a total loss as to why the Government would reject and oppose care standards for service personnel and veterans involved in investigations or litigations arising from overseas operations.”
“Finally, as I did on Report, I urge all Government Members to look beyond the rhetoric and political spin, read the legislation and consider the noble Lords’ amendments and new clauses carefully, before they vote with their Whip and put our armed forces and our veterans at a gross disadvantage.”
“It is a dereliction of duty for MPs to accept glaring gaps in legislation on the promise that the issue may or may not be rectified in future legislation. As we have heard from other Members, there remains nothing in the Bill that will solve the problem of repeated investigations. Without the Lords amendment, there is nothing in the Bill that will afford our forces and veterans a duty of care when undergoing such investigations. I would appreciate it if the Minister fully explained why the Government feel that, after our forces personnel and veterans have put themselves in harm’s way for all our sakes, they do not deserve legal, pastoral or mental health support at a time of heightened stress and worry.”
“That is a clear conflict. The Government have shamefully created legislation that protects them from legitimate legal claims while preventing forces personnel from access to justice. The new clause under Lords amendment 5 would introduce a duty of care for service personnel. I am completely at a loss as to why the Government would reject and oppose care standards for service personnel involved in investigations or litigation arising from overseas operations. Anyone who has experience of being under prolonged or repeated investigation, especially when they are innocent, will know how utterly career-ruining, life-ruining and crushing it can be to be in that position. The defence that the Armed Forces Bill is the best place to address the issue simply does not cut it, because that legislation is not yet in place. This Bill will be soon.”
“The Government’s own impact assessment from last year shows that at a minimum, 19 injured or bereaved members of the forces community who made claims from operations in Afghanistan and Iraq would have been blocked from doing so had this legislation been in place. One member of our brave forces being blocked from a claim is completely out of order, never mind 19. Crucially, we do not know what will happen in the future, but it is likely that there will be drastic unintended consequences, and we do know that with this Bill, our forces will have less protection than civilians. There is simply no justification for introducing this time limit when such a measure currently does not exist. Unamended, this part of the Bill will only benefit the Ministry of Defence, yet the Ministry of Defence will be the defendant in all these claims.”
“As drafted, the Bill, whose central aim we are told is to provide greater legal protections to armed forces personnel, includes provisions to do the exact opposite and disadvantage our personnel and veterans by introducing a hard six-year cut-off for any compensation claims, including for personal injury and death, all by amending the Limitation Act 1980. The Government claim that this will stop any baseless claims, yet there are already provisions in the Limitation Act to strike out any such baseless claims. Worse still, the Bill allows the MOD to strike out not just baseless claims, but rightful ones, too. When it comes to dates of diagnosis and knowledge, such as with PTSD or hearing loss, or when it is difficult to establish facts in the context of armed conflict, claims cannot always be made within six years.”
“Like others, I sincerely hope for a change in approach, because our forces and veterans would have been better served by well considered and evidenced legislative changes, not this confused hash of a Bill. The Government have rightly identified that there is a problem and a need to provide greater legal protections to armed forces personnel and veterans serving overseas, but they have drafted legislation that makes the problem worse, all in a hurried effort to match the sweeping rhetoric of their 2019 general election campaign. Lords amendment 4 inserts a new clause that would ensure that our armed forces retain the same rights as civilians in bringing civil claims against the Ministry of Defence.”
“I refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. While it is an absolute honour to follow the right hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart), it is also a tough gig in defence debates, but I will do my absolute best in the time that I have. I will speak to Lords amendments 4 and 5 and the new clauses they would insert into part 2 of the Bill. Many of our witnesses in the Public Bill Committee called for this section of the Bill to be scrapped altogether. Before I turn to the amendments, I also want to add my welcome to the Minister, who is no longer in his place. He will know the frustrations felt by many of us who sat on the Public Bill Committee at his predecessor’s obstinance in the face of expert evidence and personal testimonies.”
“That is why we are asking Members on the Government Benches to show today that they share our unwavering respect for and value our forces personnel just as much as we on the Opposition Benches do.”
“Just yesterday in the Defence Committee, we heard that the integrated review’s promise of identifying, developing and deploying these new technologies and capabilities faster than our potential adversaries is unrealistic, because, as one of our witnesses stated, they “do not see” from this Government “the pace and level of investment to live that statement”. We have a Government who have not acted with sufficient pace regarding emerging technologies and cyber at the same time as they have depleted our existing capabilities, leaving us dangerously vulnerable. Cuts do not strengthen our defence capabilities. Unclear direction does not strengthen our defence capabilities. Acting in ways that increasingly distance us from our allies does not strengthen our defence capabilities. Our forces’ strength lies in their people.”