Tonia Antoniazzi
MP for Gower · Labour · United Kingdom
“Linked to this are concerns about the Executive’s overspending and budget sustainability. At the end of the last financial year, the Government provided the Executive with a £400 million reserve claim loan to cover departmental overspends in health and education.”
“The increase we have seen over the current spending review period may be to cover the broadened remit, but no information is publicly available about how the level of funding is determined by the Government.”
“I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting time for this timely debate on the spending of the Northern Ireland Office. As I stand here today, it remains the case that Northern Ireland has no agreed budget, despite it being a quarter of the way through the financial year.”
“However, Peter May’s recent review of the ICRIR raises some serious concerns about its capacity and governance. According to the review, cases are being paused due to a lack of resource which, in a recent Committee session, the ICRIR disputes.”
“I thank the hon. Member for his intervention about the local growth fund. In our Committee session today, we grilled the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, who is sitting on the Front Bench, about this funding.”
“Could the Secretary of State provide more detail on, and has he had any correspondence about, the funding that I have heard has been provided by the Irish Government for community cohesion following the riots.”
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“Although we have the biggest tax burden since the second world war, public services are crumbling. Never before have a British Government asked their people to pay so much for so little. Schools with reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete—RAAC—are literally falling down, and a headteachers’ union warned just last week that parents are taking their children out of those schools as a result. The RAAC failure is just one issue affecting schools in England. According to a National Audit Office report last year, 700,000 children are being taught in unsafe or ageing buildings. The NHS is in crisis after more than a decade of Government mismanagement. With waiting lists totalling over 7.6 million, one in seven people in England are on NHS waiting lists—more than ever before.”
“This Parliament is on track to be the first in modern history in which living standards in this country have contracted. Household income growth is down by 3.1%. A report published just last week by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that 14.4 million people were in poverty in 2021-22. That is 22% of people in the United Kingdom—let that number sink in. That included 8.1 million working-age adults, 4.2 million children and 2.1 million pensioners. That is completely unacceptable. The economic damage caused by this Government is leaving British people worse off, and it is most acutely felt by the most vulnerable in our society. Increasing numbers of children and pensioners reside in poverty, as this Government preside with no public mandate or democratic accountability for the policies they seek to pursue.”
“Under the Conservative Government, GDP growth has averaged 1.5% per year. This year we are forecast to be the slowest growing economy in the whole of the G7. National debt is at the highest level since the 1960s and has more than doubled since 2010. Experts predict this will be the biggest tax-raising Parliament on record. There have been 25 Tory tax rises since the last election. Even after this month’s tax changes, the average household is still set to be up to £1,200 worse off. Fourteen years of economic failure is having a devastating impact on the people of this country. With taxes eating into wages, mortgages rising, interest rates and inflation high, and prices in shops still going up, too many families are struggling to make ends meet.”
“At the time, the National Institute of Economic and Social Research said that the uncertainty caused by the fiscal event was directly pushing up longer-term borrowing costs, and it was right. Interest rates soared and families were forced to cope with higher mortgages, with the average mortgage up £240 a month. That is on top of the cost of living crisis, which continues to exert enormous pressure on families as they face higher food and energy bills. The mini Budget shows the catastrophic consequences of behaving recklessly with the economy, but the extent of the Conservative Government’s economic damage goes beyond that one disastrous event. The Government have presided over a period of national decline. We have had 11 growth plans from seven Chancellors, yet economic growth is stagnant.”
“Fast forward to now and the only thing that has changed is the Government’s figurehead. Despite there being a new Prime Minister and promises of a new direction, chaos persists and continues to govern as matters get even worse for the country. That fact is glaringly obvious to just about everyone other than the Prime Minister, who is so out of touch that he continues to tell the public how good they have got it as they feel the country burning around them everywhere they turn. British people continue to pay the price of the Conservatives’ catastrophic mini Budget, delivered with absolutely no mandate from the British people. It triggered an economic meltdown and saw the pound plummet to its lowest level against the dollar in 37 years.”
“The fact that this is the second debate on an immediate general election in less than 18 months is about as strong an indicator as one can get of how much the governing party have lost the respect of the British people. Let us remind ourselves of the situation surrounding the previous debate. Inflation had reached a 41% high; families were confronting a cost of living crisis and unaffordable energy bills; and there were record backlogs in our NHS. After becoming the fourth Conservative Prime Minister in six years, solely on votes from Conservative party members whose backing represented just 0.17% of all voters, the right hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss) delivered a mini Budget that caused complete market turmoil and led to further havoc with U-turns, reversals and the sacking of the then Chancellor.”
“The NHS is in crisis, the asylum system is broken, there are delays at the ports, and institutions are failing. The British people should be given a say on what to do next.” I pay tribute to David Nash, who started the petition. More than 286,000 people have signed it—383 of them my constituents in Gower—and the number is climbing as we speak. That demonstrates the strength of feeling of dissatisfaction and dismay at the Government and the turmoil that we find ourselves in in this country. That dismay is not new. Members will be aware that this is not the first petition or debate of its kind. In October 2022, my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) opened a discussion in this hall on a similar petition, which received almost 1 million signatures.”
“I beg to move, That this House has considered e-petition 641904 relating to the next general election. It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Mr Dowd. I am pleased to introduce the petition and give voice to its hundreds of thousands of petitioners, as well as pretty much everybody I have spoken to recently regarding the current state of this country. The petition calls for an immediate general election in the light of the chaos of the current Government. It is clear in its demand: “The Prime Minister should call an immediate general election to allow the British public to have their say on how we are governed, we should not be made to wait until January 2025”. It goes on: “Consistent opinion polling has shown the British public have lost confidence in the current government.”
“I thank hon. Members who have participated in the debate. I was quite surprised that we did not have a higher turnout, because the demand for a general election is so great. I understand that the Minister is not the Prime Minister, which is a great shame, because we need answers now. As a member of the Opposition party, I look forward to the next general election, as I am sure many others do. Question put and agreed to. Resolved , That this House has considered e-petition 641904 relating to the next general election.”
“Rural connectivity remains a huge problem in my constituency. As the Secretary of State said, the charter has been introduced. However, it was introduced over a year into the process, when things had already gone wrong. What is she going to do to rectify that?”
“The Government left the role of Victims’ Commissioner unfilled for over a year and to this day have refused to place any duty on public bodies to co-operate with the postholder. Will the Government and the Secretary of State explain why they have not supported Labour’s proposals to give the role the same powers as the Domestic Abuse Commissioner has over public authorities such as the police?”
“In May, the MOD admitted that just 4% of the steel used to construct Type 31 frigates was sourced from UK steelyards. What steps is the Minister taking to ensure that British warships are built in British shipyards by British workers using British steel?”
“In communities across the country—particularly in Wales through Port Talbot—steel has created high-paying, productive jobs for generations, but we are the only G7 country with a steel industry in decline. Thousands of jobs are being lost. What we need is a long-term plan that supports steelworkers and their communities to maintain those good jobs into the future and transition to net zero, so why is the Minister making short-term decisions instead of delivering on the long-term industrial strategy that communities such as mine, and our steel industry and workers, desperately need?”
“T2. At their busiest time of year, British cheese exporters are warning of damaging losses as the Government continue to fail to reach a deal that ensures access to the Canadian market. Every day that the Government fail, companies such as the Snowdonia Cheese Company in north Wales lose contracts, and they cannot make plans with the looming deadline of 31 December a matter of weeks away. Can the Minister update the House on the negotiations to extend the deadline for cheese tariff quotas between the UK and Canada?”
“We need one and I urge the Leader of the House to make that intervention on my behalf and on behalf of everybody who is supporting Teagan.”
“Last week, I raised with the Leader of the House the case of Teagan Appleby, as did her Member of Parliament, the hon. Member for Dover (Mrs Elphicke). We did, as a result, have a meeting with the Minister, so I thank the Leader of the House for that. However, both the hon. Lady and I asked for an emergency intervention by the Department. This is day 37 of seizures and, last night at 7.30, Teagan’s mum, Emma, was told that there is nothing else that can be done. A brain operation would not address Teagan’s seizures. She currently has access to an oil, which her parents must pay for while she is in an NHS hospital. She needs another oil. I passed Emma’s number to the officials on Monday. I have seen the Minister in these corridors, but nothing has happened. I have asked for an emergency intervention. It is now Thursday.”
“We have heard in this House today how disappointed Northern Ireland is at no successful levelling-up bids. I visited Coleraine football club, which was disappointed to be unsuccessful in round 2. Is the Secretary of State confident that the restoration of power sharing is close? Northern Ireland simply cannot afford to lose out on even more money.”
“As the Leader of the House may be aware, I am co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group for access to medical cannabis under prescription. Currently, young Teagan Appleby, who is a constituent of the hon. Member for Dover (Mrs Elphicke), is in hospital in London and very poorly. The former Minister made every effort in his role to break down the barriers for medicinal cannabis under prescription to children with epilepsy. Will the Leader of the House please urge the new Minister to call a roundtable of all the stakeholders, so that those children can get the medicine they deserve?”
“One of the crowning achievements of the previous Labour Government was to lift 1 million children out of poverty. How does the Secretary of State think that that compares with the Conservatives’ record given that new figures show that children are experiencing destitution, and that that has actually tripled since 2017?”
“I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way. In Llanmadoc—in my constituency—the post office is located in a community shop that also serves as a meeting space for local groups. After the closure of the old shop 20 years ago, the community and volunteers got together to make that happen. The post office benefits hugely from being in this hub now, and it also benefits the tourists that come to Gower. Will the hon. Gentleman agree that post offices such as the one in Llanmadoc are vital to our rural communities, and will he join me in thanking the volunteers and people in these rural communities determined to make those services work for everybody?”
“The Government did not listen to the renewable energy sector, which repeatedly warned them that the budget set for this year’s offshore wind auction was too low to attract bidders to develop offshore wind in the Celtic sea. Can the Minister tell the House why that advice was ignored, leading to not a single bid being made?”
“I used to live in Wigan in the north-west of England, and I am very disappointed for my family and friends who are still there that this project is not going ahead—disappointed, like the people in Swansea are disappointed that the electrification never got to Swansea. HS2 is an England-only project, so will the Minister stop talking down the Welsh Labour Government and give us what we are due?”
“To conclude, in light of the consultation on renewable liquid fuels, the Government must review their oil boiler ban. The Minister must ensure that the consultation is expedited so that all our off-grid constituents can benefit before he leaves Government.”
“However, renewable liquid fuels are more expensive than their high-carbon competitor, kerosene. In order to aid swift uptake, the Energy Bill must enable the use of renewable liquid fuels, as well as introducing measures to explore reducing their cost and making them more accessible, such as a renewable liquid heating fuel obligation, mirroring what already exists in transport and aviation. That would help my constituents transition to lower-carbon alternatives and incentivise faster and wider transition, more broadly, among off-grid households. There is some consensus across the House on those measures. An effective transition to cleaner energy must ensure that rural off-grid communities, such as mine in Gower, are not left with an expensive cost burden as we transition to net zero.”
“However, for some, those increased grants will not go far enough in making the cost of heat pump installation workable. My constituents in Gower, many of whom are off-grid homeowners, want to play their part in reducing emissions. In fact, the majority of people who came to my summer surgeries, while concerned about the cost, wanted to do their bit to reduce carbon emissions. As has been said in the Chamber today, renewable liquid fuels, such as renewable diesel made from hydrotreated vegetable oil, offer a cheaper alternative. They can reduce net carbon dioxide greenhouse gas emissions from source to end user by up to 90%. At a small cost, existing off-grid boilers can be modified to run renewable liquid fuels, such as HVO, saving the homeowner the extortionate cost of a heat pump replacement.”
“Some 11 million people live in rural areas across the UK, with 15% in off-grid homes. The cost of installing a low-carbon heat pump is around four times more expensive than a replacement boiler. What is more, while a heat pump can technically be installed in all homes across the UK, and it should be in new build housing, in certain property types, such as those in rural and coastal communities like Gower, they will not run efficiently and risk increasing energy bills to unnecessarily high levels for homeowners, above those they currently pay. In some cases, that could increase the overall cost of installation to £25,000, according to the Government’s own calculator. I welcome the fact that the Government are consulting on increasing the grants available for heat pumps in certain homes, as announced last week.”
“We all want to cut emissions and tackle climate change, but people continue to suffer from the cost of living crisis. It is important that the cost of transitioning to lower carbon alternatives is not left to individuals to shoulder on their own. The Government propose phasing out the use of high-carbon fossil fuel heating from the gas grid by banning the installation of new gas-fuelled boilers from 2026, and they advocate the alternative of heat pumps. While heat pumps have an important role to play in the decarbonisation of home heating, a heat pump only approach risks unfairly burdening off-grid rural homeowners with expensive installation costs. My constituents are rightly concerned at the prospect of being made to install very costly alternative heating systems that are not fit for purpose.”
“This is a critical state of affairs, and the full impact may not yet be realised, as any overspends will inevitably lead to further cuts the next year. The only viable way forward for Northern Ireland is the restoration of the Executive, and I implore the Secretary of State, the Minister and the main parties in Northern Ireland to ensure that happens sooner rather than later.”
“A real-terms funding fall of 3.3% means that existing services simply cannot continue to function as normal. The people of Northern Ireland have been left facing cuts to support and increases in charges for everyday necessities during the cost of living crisis. While we appreciate the need to explore avenues to raise revenue, the measures put forward so far may cause more societal damage than the monetary gain is worth. As I have mentioned, we are missing a vital level of scrutiny and accountability for these measures. We, the Labour party, agree with the principle that local decisions should be made by local politicians, but the situation is now extreme. While there continues to be no functioning Executive, I ask the Secretary of State to consider what he can do within his power to help the people of Northern Ireland.”
“To quote today’s report from Pivotal, “managing this situation has been extremely challenging, if not impossible, thanks to two interlocked problems: no political leadership for decision-making and impossibly tight budgets.” On the first problem, sadly I have seen no sign over the recess that indicates the restoration of the Northern Ireland Executive is any nearer. I would welcome hearing from the Secretary of State what discussions he has had over the summer with parties in Northern Ireland, as the situation is now beyond breaking point. On the second problem—the budget—we do not oppose the Bill, as services are in desperate need of funding, but the fact is that this budget is not enough to address the problems facing public services in Northern Ireland.”
“It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Dame Rosie, in this Committee. I will keep my remarks brief to allow us to hear from the Northern Ireland parties on Third Reading. Once again we come together to debate legislation that should be dealt with in Stormont. We still have civil servants running Departments with restricted powers, trying to plug a gap of £800 million and unable to consult with Cabinet Ministers. Stormont is the right and proper place for scrutiny to take place. In this place, we cannot simply provide the level of consideration and scrutiny that this budget deserves.”
“In June this year, the borders inspectorate said that not every arrival into the UK at Manston was having security checks done as part of their interview or having their property checked. Can the Home Secretary guarantee now that every arrival is being fully checked, and if not, why not?”
“Will the Minister explain why Fujitsu, whose IT software is at the heart of this scandal, continues to win Government contracts, including a recent extension to a Post Office contract worth £42 million?”
“Our forces families are made to live in damp, mouldy service accommodation, with broken boilers. In his statement, the Secretary of State spoke about rent freezes, but well over 4,300 troops already do not pay rent because their accommodation is so bad. He said that there would be no unfunded gimmicks, so is the £400 million in two years for service accommodation new money or is it from existing budgets and commitments?”
“I close my remarks with a quote from a teacher in response to the Committee’s survey: “[Teaching assistants] are all too often the only reason a student will stay in school. Their nurturing nature and patience is priceless, their ability to break down work so a student can understand is phenomenal. Pay them what they deserve!””
“According to the Department for Education’s own review of academic evidence, 91% of primary school teachers and 75% of secondary school teachers were very or fairly confident about the positive impact of support staff on pupils’ learning, and other studies have found that teaching assistants can have a positive effect on children in their care. Our schooling system is severely underfunded, with real-terms pay cuts, the closing of services and crumbling buildings; this is what we have to show for a decade of under-investment in the future of our children. In the long term, our education system needs a radical new approach to funding, but as a first step towards that much-needed reform I can think of no better place to start than improving the salary and recognition of teaching assistants.”
“Teaching assistants are proven to improve classroom behaviour, which is especially true for children who are all too often let down by mainstream education. Teaching assistants are reported to be effective at lowering exclusion rates for particular groups where they are often deployed to provide personal learning support, including pupils identified with special educational needs and disabilities, those with poor mental health, and Gypsy, Roma and Traveller children. Despite that, teaching assistants are not eligible for the SEN allowance afforded to teachers.”
“Numerous other employers, from supermarkets to warehouses, are now offering variations on term-time only contracts in a direct attempt to recruit school support staff on more competitive terms than schools can offer. It should not be a competition. In addition to low pay, school support staff are cut off from career development opportunities as they are ineligible for careers programmes, scholarships and the new national professional qualifications, which currently apply only to teachers, school leaders and special educational needs co-ordinators. The decisions we make about our education system should be driven by what is best for pupils, and teaching assistants have an enormous positive impact on their attainment and experience.”
“In 2020, it was reported that vacancy rates were higher for teaching assistants than for any other occupation, and 90% of teaching assistants who responded to the Committee’s survey said that they had considered leaving the role. One respondent, who is a headteacher, said: “Teaching assistants are one of the most important resources in my school. I am losing highly skilled, trained, experienced TAs who are leaving to take up posts in supermarkets and other work which is paid better.” That is not to undermine the value of retail work, but it does highlight the impact of low wages on retaining—as another respondent said—“amazing teaching assistants”. Recent research by SchoolDash found that support staff vacancies are up by 85% compared with before the pandemic.”
“We often stay late and arrive early also unpaid. I would like our pay to reflect the role we do. I am a mother of three. Myself and my husband work full time... I eat less to feed my children, I go without clothes, haircuts and non-essentials to make sure my children have all they need.” Low wages do not only impact current teaching assistants. The disparity between these wages and other comparable work means that schools are struggling to attract and retain new teaching assistants. The Education Research, Innovation and Consultancy Unit has warned that there is a “new emergency over TA recruitment and retention”, which the Minister will be aware of.”
“We now wear extra layers and use hot water bottles as we are extremely worried about finding the money to pay the bills and not get into debt.” Members of the GMB report that they regularly pay for essential items such as food and toilet paper for their schools and pupils out of their own pockets. I saw that happening in all my teaching jobs—before covid and before I was in this place. Only 4% of respondents to the survey agreed with the statement “my pay is keeping up with the cost of living,” because it is not. Sixty-six per cent said that they could not afford necessities for themselves each month, and 73% said they could not afford necessities for their families. This response from one teaching assistant really sums up the issue: “We work at home unpaid to prepare resources, do research and training.”
“As I said, 92% of teaching assistants are women, and the chronic undervaluing of what is perceived as women’s work has created a situation where key workers find themselves below the poverty line. Is it any wonder that, along with nearly half of teaching assistants looking for new roles with better pay, 28% are having to take on second or third jobs to make ends meet, and 43% have had to borrow money from family? The impact of low pay is amplified by the cost of living crisis, particularly where we find ourselves today. In response to a 2022 survey by the GMB, one teaching assistant said: “It is very stressful trying to manage bills and food costs.”
“One respondent to the Committee’s survey highlighted the reality of the pay for teaching assistants: “Poor pay is now a real concern. Due to my hours being term time only and this is pro rata over the year. I actually only bring home around £14k which is a very poor salary in today’s situation.” The average take-home salary for a teaching assistant is £14,211. It is an issue that depends on the person’s sex. Many women who are mothers find that working as a teaching assistant will fit in with their children and be convenient. But we do not want it to be a job of convenience; it has to be a job with pay progression that also offers the right work environment.”
“It’s unfair on staff and children as there is no support for us.” Working in such conditions, it cannot be surprising that nearly 50% of those surveyed by Unison are actively looking for better paid work. I know from my own experience that many of the women I worked with who were teaching assistants moved on to other work or had numerous jobs. Teaching assistants are some of the lowest paid public sector workers, sitting at the bottom of local government pay scales. The majority of local authorities use the National Joint Council pay spine, and although academy trusts are not obligated to use that scale, some do. The bottom end of the NJC pay spine is lower than the living wage. The mean salary of full-time and part-time teaching assistants in state-funded schools in England from 2020 to 2021 was only £19,000.”
“Some teaching assistants reported that violent students were given lesser sanctions for attacking them than they would receive for attacking teachers or senior managers. The prevalence of physical violence against teaching assistants, many of whom are women, risks normalising violence against women to children who are present, as well as being entirely unacceptable to classroom staff. One teaching assistant responding to the Committee’s survey said: “The amount of children coming into mainstream schools with behavioural problems is increasing and some are very violent which is hard to cope with physically and mentally. It also has an impact on the rest of the children in the class as it disrupts their learning, and they also get very distressed. It falls on TAs to work with these children without any training.”
“Twenty seven per cent reported providing physical therapy, 65% reported supporting pupils with toileting and soiling incidents—and that was not just in primary schools—and 7% were providing assistance with both catheters and colostomy bags. While they provide that essential support, the survey found that 48% of teaching assistants do not feel valued as a member of staff by their school. There is a real concern about the experiences of teaching assistants that we cannot ignore. A study by the University of Roehampton found that teaching assistants were kicked, punched and spat at by pupils, with one interviewee experiencing a spinal injury and forced to take early retirement; that is not the first such case that I have heard of throughout my career.”
“The role has become even more varied, intense and emotionally demanding, with more support being given to parents and carers, and more backfilling for specialist staff; add to that the fact that there is a desperate lack of places in specialist schools, and the role of a teaching assistant has become more and more complex. There are also many parents who wish for their child to have mainstream education and not be put in a specialist educational environment. Therefore, the role of a teaching assistant, as I have seen at first hand, is key for inclusivity in all classrooms and schools across the United Kingdom. A Unison survey found that many teaching assistants were expected to provide medical as well as educational support.”
“The impact of the pandemic is still being felt strongly in schools and across communities, with the crisis in children’s mental health and wellbeing being one of the starkest reminders to us all. There has been a 77% rise in the number of children needing specialist treatment for a severe mental health crisis from April to October 2021, compared with April to October 2019; in that context, the care and attention provided by teaching assistants is more vital than ever before. Research by the University of Portsmouth, commissioned by Unison, found that the covid period “remade” the teaching assistant role, and that the changes are likely to be long lasting.”
“Research by the Education Endowment Foundation found that teaching assistants who provide one-to-one or small, group-targeted interventions can result in pupils achieving between four and six additional months’ progress on average. A 2019 research project for the Department for Education found that senior leaders placed a high value on the capacity of teaching assistants to improve classroom management and other staff workload pressures. Those same senior managers reported that budget restraints saw teaching assistants being forced to do more and more without corresponding increases in pay. Teaching assistants are doing that work in an increasingly challenging environment.”
“In fact, the Government’s own “Opportunity for all: strong schools with great teachers for your child” White Paper published in March 2022 used the phrase “teaching assistant” only twice, and it failed to mention their pay or progression. Teaching assistants take on a variety of roles, from ensuring that students have nutritious meals in school to delivering structured interventions to help pupils to progress, working and planning closely with classroom teachers and senior leaders. They play a key role in tackling inequalities and improving attainment, especially for those pupils who are falling behind, or who have additional special learning or mental health needs or behavioural issues.”