Mr James Frith
MP for Bury North · Labour · United Kingdom
“Our AI skills boost programme is already delivering results. In an answer given to the House last week, I referred to the early careers funding and work on curriculum reforms to come, such as an AI-inclusive GCSE in computing.”
“The Government are committed to supporting the worker experience through the AI transition, and have a proud record of advancing workers’ rights.”
“We are doing so with the data and AI ethics framework, the AI playbook, and transparency standards that ensure the public can understand how systems are used. We are also supporting UK firms that provide third-party AI-assurance ecosystems, demonstrating that AI systems are safe and reliable as well as creating new jobs.”
“We see the potential of AI in everything from scientific discovery to better public services and stronger economic growth. The Government have a clear responsibility to make sure that the change at the heart of this debate reinforces rather than weakens the fabric of our society.”
“Programmes such as TechLocal are creating new jobs, traineeships and professional training, while scholarships and fellowships are supporting the next generation of researchers and innovators. Nobody is waiting 25 years to tackle the threats, however. AI harms are very real, and we do not sit idly by when it comes to tackling them.”
“The Government’s principle is to regulate at the time of deployment or at use. I understand the right hon. Gentleman’s argument, but it is important that we strike the right balance between innovation and regulation.”
The complete record
Every one of 465 lines we hold for Mr James Frith, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 5 of 10.
“It is pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Mr Western. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Gateshead South (Mrs Hodgson) on securing this important debate and on her contribution to ensuring that this profound therapy is better heard, better known and more available to choose for a great many in our society. When there is so much to resolve, so much to fix and sort out, it feels like smaller causes struggle to be heard or seen. Our politics seems too busy to care about even more causes; it is all just too much. Alternatively, it can be said that the last Parliament did good things for the deaf community, so to expect new money for new causes is a stretch too far, naive even. We must believe in better.”
“Does the Minister agree that, for all the good intentions of ICBs, our healthcare system is atomised, but that if they were to take instruction from guidance provided nationally, the pillar-to-post experience of a lot of families seeking auditory verbal therapy would end? Will he commit to updating the nine-year-old guidance to ICBs, or at least acknowledge that it needs updating, with a national pilot that proves the efficacy of AVT for families seeking that intervention?”
“In Bury North we confront a grim reality: 42% of children in Bury North are living in absolute poverty. Poverty must no longer simply be glanced at by our politics. We must reach into it. It is a concentrated poverty—dense, multiple and compounded.”
“I am pleased to speak in support of the Bill and wish to speak to the cost of living impact it begins to address. Every child matters: not just political guidance, but an ideal to live by and to come into politics for. I therefore welcome the first steps that the Bill represents: steps towards a change in the security and fortunes of all young people in Bury and Britain. Ensuring the wellbeing of a child and the whereabouts of a child in Bury North has been one of my main priorities as an MP. It is also why I have long championed, both in this Parliament and in my previous time in this place, improvements to the appalling state of the special educational needs system. A child’s wellbeing, or their vulnerability, does not exist in a vacuum. It is tied to the conditions they grow up in.”
“We will not let the inheritance from the Conservative party stop us. This will be a period of renewal and hope. Bury North’s poorest are failed by living down the road from those doing just all right; another town overlooked and underserved by funding formulas that have only ever glanced at the place and its problems, and by the failures to level up, let alone even out. Let us be clear: the Bill is only the beginning—a good start. We must keep going, because every child matters.”
“Free breakfast clubs for all primary school children will save hard-pressed parents up to £450 a year per child. Critically, that can help working parents to make their hours. The ambitions of the Government go well beyond what the Bill starts. Eyes and expectations will turn to the child poverty taskforce and its recommendations, as well as the future work of this Parliament. We need to tackle the roots of these experiences, not just the symptoms. The Government are determined to transform the lives of children, with structural, strategic changes to life in Bury and Britain. It has been done before: Sure Start, the Building Schools for the Future programme, the maintenance allowance, the power of progressive social policies, the importance of the first 1,000 days of a child’s life, foundation learning, and, yes, phonics and choice.”
“I will not. It is a poverty that has crept up on us faster and faster in recent years, where one mile’s difference between postcodes can mean as much as a seven-year gap in life expectancy. It shows itself in poor, squalid housing, too few teachers in schools, a lack of accessible public or social services, an absence in quality public transport, the scourge of antisocial behaviour, victims of unpunished criminality, and even worse streets than the better-off wards are rightly animated by. Worse still is the poverty of opportunity, with children unaccounted for or not attending school at all. I strongly support the Bill’s first moves to ease the burdens faced by so many families, by cutting the cost of children going to school. Common sense on school uniforms will save parents more than £50 a child on the back-to-school shop.”
“Incentives for trusts that improve wait times are welcome, but does the Minister agree that the focus should be on average wait times—affecting the maximum number of patients—rather than rewarding trusts that reduce the longest possible wait time for fewer patients? I understand the capacity demands that will come with that, but it is a hugely important distinction. Although reducing the longest wait times is important, focusing on that metric alone, and rewarding trusts for it, risks leaving many patients with painful and debilitating conditions and trusts ducking their responsibilities. This Government have made it clear that we will address that on our watch.”
“If that figure, which is currently at 59%, improves to 65% by March next year, that will give comfort to those who rightly expect to feel the change that Labour will bring on their own doorsteps. I also welcome the aim of ensuring that community diagnostic centres can operate 12 hours a day, seven days a week. Thanks to the Chancellor’s Budget, local doctors will be incentivised to consult specialists to explore alternatives to hospital treatment. In Bury, where Fairfield general hospital has the second highest average wait times for elective surgery in the country, the new national standards for elective care are welcome.”
“She spent eight hours waiting in two different hospitals before being admitted overnight, only to be discharged the next day and told to go to a third hospital, where no rheumatologists were in place. Her emergency appointment was 11 days later. She was left in tears and unable to speak, so her husband had to advocate for her to get the appointment she desperately needed. NHS backlogs take a personal and punishing toll on people’s lives, including through lost income from lost jobs or, worse still, lost years with loved ones from late or missed cancer diagnoses. Today’s commitment from the Labour Government that 92% of NHS patients will wait no longer than 18 weeks for treatment by the end of this Parliament is an enormous, transformative ambition.”
“Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Dr Spencer)—who spoke very well in the debate on assisted dying—on what I would call the democratic deficit for MPs in relation to ICBs and acting on health inequalities at a local level, well beyond what we might achieve through parliamentary questions or writing to and meeting Ministers. I am pleased that the Government will not allow the dire record and wasted years of Tory government to prevent Labour from doing what we do best in power: fixing and fast-forwarding the NHS. In Bury North, a constituent I will call Jackie has rheumatoid arthritis. After a severe, debilitating flare-up she waited two days for a GP to call back.”
“A happy new year to you, Madam Deputy Speaker. If the House will indulge me briefly, may I begin by wishing my grandmother well? She had a fall last night and broke two of her ribs. She is doing okay, but at 98 she may need a little longer in hospital that I, her eldest grandson, might have needed—although that is not a given. Tackling deep-rooted health inequalities in Bury North is my priority for this Parliament. The difference there of a mile between postcodes can mean a seven-year difference in life expectancy for men and a five-year difference for women. I wish to reach across the aisle and associate myself with the remarks of the good doctor, the hon.”
“Can the Minister clarify the difference between his term “rights reservation” and previous reports of the Government’s preference for an opt-out system? Those systems have already been called out and considered unjust by our creators. There are AI leaders who recognise the need for fair licensing. What assurances can the Government provide to support both human and AI innovation? Does the Minister, with his creative industries hat on, agree that respecting copyright would see the introduction of an opt-in system as essential?”
“Someone’s consideration of this decision could depend on which doctor they see—one who raises assisted dying as an option, versus one who refuses. That is a deeply troubling prospect. The ideation of assisted dying will become a ballot. We know our GPs have a range of views on assisted dying, so we cannot deny that who someone ends up seeing with their terminal illness might be how they end up. That could be at the doctor’s, possibly in the presence of a loved one who is under strain and in need of respite themselves, and the first suggestion is the beginning of a journey towards, yes, assisted dying. That is before we consider the forces of marketing and commercialisation, and the industry that will spring up if the Bill proceeds and is sewn into our NHS.”
“The Bill asks us to make a profound and irreversible decision on the principles of our health service and end of life care. With end of life care funded too often on a shoestring for many, the Bill takes our focus to ending life, not improving living as life draws to a close with terminal illness. I believe it poses significant risks. Our wider societal and cultural norms will be changed forever. Those who refuse to acknowledge that prospect now do so with the benefit of things as they are now. My point is that this concept changes immediately today if this Bill is passed. The safeguards may sound rigorous on paper, but the strained state of our NHS means that many patients do not have a consistent relationship with a named doctor. We are attributed to health centres nowadays, not named doctors.”
“Shortening those expectations with a system that endorses assisted dying would forfeit that too. Finally, as legislators our responsibility is to protect the most vulnerable and consider all eventualities. We disagree on slippery slope arguments, but if the Bill proceeds it will be a moment of no return, and that is why I am not prepared to support it.”
“For many the Bill represents not a choice but a principle shift that undermines the value we place on protecting the vulnerable. It falls to us as the strongest to stand up and vote against the Bill. Passing the Bill today will not improve palliative and hospice care. My belief is that it will forfeit it. The end of life is complicated; end of life care often is not complicated enough. On reflection, my mother-in-law deserved a frank, trusted conversation about the risk of secondary illnesses and amputation that would follow with the automatic cancer treatment that she was given in her final months of life. We should expect more agility from our NHS, and while dying is the ultimate binary experience, end of life care should be more sophisticated and more personalised.”
“No, I will not. It is possible that we cannot imagine being the victim of coercion, or that as MPs our agency is so baked in to our experiences of living, that we cannot envisage a scenario where those who already claim to feel unseen are directed towards meeting their end sooner than it otherwise might have been. Our casework from constituents is already full of people struggling to access the rights that we have enshrined in law—access to justice, health, education support, the disaster in our special educational needs system—and of victims often of state neglect or state coercion, and the failure of safeguards that were once supported on paper and passed into law. Disability rights groups and advocates have raised their voices, wanting us to talk about the dangers of normalising assisted dying.”
“Thomas White was sentenced to three years for theft of a mobile phone in 2012. He remains in a category A prison 12 years later, having received an imprisonment for public protection sentence. Two medical reports this year have confirmed his deteriorating mental health. He recently attempted to set himself on fire and has since stopped taking his medication. Will the Secretary of State meet me and his sister, Clara White, to discuss his case?”
“The 2014 reforms put SEN rights at the heart of the special educational needs system, but the then Government did only half the job, failing to honour the resources that they had promised. EHCPs take too long to access, and children are often sent out of borough to receive specialist education, which is more expensive. How will the Government provide more SEN provision in our mainstream schools in towns such as mine?”
“T4. News of the impact of last week’s Budget on schools was greeted with relief in Bury North. The Derby high school is a top-performing school, but its main building dates back to 1959 and faces critical issues. It was due for renewal under Labour’s Building Schools for the Future programme but was ignored during the 14 years of the Tories. Will the Minister meet me and the school’s leadership team to discuss the urgent need for refurbishment funds?”
“In Bury North, child poverty rates are at 43%, densely populated in three of our nine wards: Bury East, Redvales and Moorside. Does the Minister agree with me that minimising tax rises for working people is just the starting point, and that tackling the crippling level of impoverishment for those in work requires a laser focus and intervention from this mission-driven Government?”
“In Bury North, rents and mortgages are still sky high as a direct consequence of the economic legacy of the last Conservative Government. Does the Minister agree that it is no surprise that the Conservatives want to talk about anything other than their economic record?”
“I join the Government in condemning the decision by the Israeli Parliament. Does the Minister agree that cutting ties and undermining UNRWA leaves us aghast at a time when we need institutions to work effectively, independently and without prejudice to build any prospect of peace and a future after a ceasefire and the return of the hostages? Worst of all, the ban further compounds the misery for the Palestinians and for those of us who still hope for a two-state solution.”
“These very advances, initially opposed by the Tories, have now come to be seen as the very standard of how working life in this country should be, and I am all for it, Madam Deputy Speaker—with time to spare.”
“Member for West Suffolk (Nick Timothy) asked which chief executives support this provision. I met chief executives on Friday who told me that as leaders in their field, they already do much of what we are advocating—so I say to those on the Opposition Benches: get with the programme. Labour has a proud record to recall again today, as we advance these new rights. We have a record of raising the floor and the horizon for workers’ rights, whether through securing maternity, paternity or foster care leave, introducing the minimum wage or ensuring bank holidays. Through a principled link with our trade unions, the Labour party has fought for and delivered rights that once seemed radical but are now woven into our national life and experiences of work.”
“They are keen to talk among themselves, with their plans to end maternity rights and all the progress the Labour party has made sacrosanct in British law and the experience of work in our economy, but I urge them to look at the result of the election and understand the direction of travel: the Labour party is once again making progress in this country. Today’s leap forward for workers’ rights sits alongside the Government’s No. 1 mission of economic growth—that is, done with the workers not to them. We will be more productive, protective and prosperous, pro-business and pro-worker. The Bill rejects the idea that justice and fairness in the workplace need to come with an arbitrary waiting period. Day one rights will capture headlines, but will not cause alarm for most employers. The hon.”
“I will start by offering some home truths to Opposition Members: someone can be both a member of a union and an employer. I am a proud member of GMB, which donated to my campaign, but I am also proud to have started my own business. I have been an employer, taken risk, and understand the balance of risk and reward. Throughout the debate, Conservative Members, who claim to represent the party of business, have made false representations that are out of date and out of kilter with the debate that we are leading, having been elected with the majority that we have.”
“My final comment is about the assets that we enjoy in Bury, from Broad Street Social—I think I am allowed to mention my favourite bar and my good friend Jen Smith, who helped me to prepare my remarks—to Wax and Beans, which is a great independent record shop, Bloom, which is a terrific eatery and coffee shop, and a wine shop called Kwoff; the House is getting a bit of a sense of where I spend my time. Crucially, people need that time off work, whether it is through flexible working or through a rebalancing of expectations post-covid with their employer, to get out and spend their hard-earned money in the towns that we all want to see thriving. I welcome this debate, in which there is still plenty more to say, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North once again.”
“Friend the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport has described. I ask the Minister for an assurance that the three-year pact with local authorities and the funding that we are due to get for our towns will both be clear as soon as possible after the Budget. I also ask that while waiting for the three-year pact, we do not drop the ball on what is required right now. Despite the financial inheritance of a £22 billion black hole, this Labour Government are saying, “We will not let the mess we have inherited determine every single decision we make about towns and cities and their redevelopment.” Self-determination is hugely important.”
“Austerity continues, whether that is in the special educational needs crisis, in investment in our road networks or in whether we can afford to cut the weeds and make places look nice enough to visit. It is about the simple things, alongside bigger fixed items such as funding, having a plan and bringing the buses back into public ownership, as our friend Andy Burnham, the Greater Manchester Mayor, has done so effectively. It is also about taking the last Conservative Government’s levelling-up analysis, which was accurate, and saying, “They were right with the analysis, but they forgot to do the impact assessment. They forgot to do the impact, full stop.” It is not enough to point at projects that may or may not be funded and pit one local authority area or town against another in the “Hunger Games” style of funding that my right hon.”
“I am delighted to be back as the Member of Parliament for Bury North. My constituency has three key towns: Tottington, Ramsbottom and Bury itself. This debate is also about cities, but I want to remark specifically on the role of towns, which are often in the shadow of our greatest English cities, of which Manchester is the nearest to Bury. The plight of our football club shows that community assets are often diminished by policy or decisions taken about us without us. Towns feel ignored when decisions on cultural assets, social capital and economic capital that affect us are taken elsewhere. People in Bury want a degree of self-determination. We have an innovative council that has been trying for well over 10 years to do as much as possible with a diminishing amount of money.”
“It is a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Mr Vickers. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North (Catherine Atkinson) on securing such an important debate for those of us who are a bit geeky on towns. It is always nice to stand up in the presence of my good friend the Minister. This is the first time that I am in a position to address him as the Minister in a formal capacity, so let me congratulate him in the hope that it bumps me up the line for community ownership funding as we await the difficult decisions that the Labour Government have to take. First and foremost, I ask that bids that are already in do not fall victim to the general election, that there is no fancy footwork and that we can be assured that the funding bids that made the cut under a previous Administration will now receive funding and authority.”
“It has been neglected in favour of a creeping trend towards hospital services, under the failed principle of leaving it late—the crisis mode setting that applied across our public services under the last Government. By design, people ended up in A&E because of a failure to plan for GP and primary care, with 16% fewer GPs than other high-income countries. The review also points out significant health inequalities, with deprived areas historically receiving insufficient resources. In Bury North, child poverty is up to 43%, densely concentrated in just three of our nine wards. Life expectancy for those living in Bury North ranges enormously: the difference in life expectancy between North Manor and East Ward is five years for women and nearly seven years for men.”
“Some of us newly elected or returning MPs have only just got our accommodation and offices sorted out, so I commend the Government on the speed with which they have got surgeons back to work, resolved the doctors’ strike, reviewed and assessed the crisis and made announcements for a decade of national renewal. They have also affirmed the view that our NHS should be treated not as a shrine or beyond question, but as something that must be returned to deep service to our country and play its part as a health and economic public service. Lord Darzi’s review for the Government highlights the critical issues in the NHS and the state we are in, and particularly the underfunding of primary care.”
“A boost to the engagement patients can have with health decision makers via the NHS app and an improved trusted status for healthcare professionals will boost this too and reduce the bureaucracy in our caring system. There is a well known saying in good hospitals, “The best hospitals keep people out of them and get people out of them.” This principle strikes at the heart of what has gone wrong in recent years. The problems in A&E, emergency services and waiting times stem from a failure over the past 14 years to design by this doctrine. The key to resolving those issues lies in primary care—preventing people from needing hospital services in the first place and enabling faster discharges when they do. That is where the focus must be.”
“That update should take into account the weight of funding pressures for areas such as mine, with a mix of economic and demographic inequality, including the fact that so much of the revenue that our local authority raises is immediately swallowed up by adult care and the disastrous special educational needs system—a symptom of the crisis mode mentality under the previous Government. The Government have wasted no time, investing £82 million to recruit a thousand newly qualified GPs and addressing the dental care crisis with 700,000 urgent dental appointments. The Government also aim to expand the role of pharmacies—a measure I hugely welcome—to reduce the burden on our GP and hospital care, and crucially also for those living with chronic illness or conditions.”
“My colleague makes a valid point; I defer to her knowledge of the public health system. The distance of a mile or so has a huge impact for the men and women living in east Bury. I urge those carrying out the Government review to see how, in constituencies like mine, specific interventions could address those deep health inequalities and identify the work we need to do to resolve that impoverishment in densely populated areas and that ingrained health inequality. I urge the Government also to adopt multidisciplinary care models and shift care closer to home to address these issues—a sentiment that I know Ministers share. Taking a wider view, the funding formulas are outdated and an update is long overdue.”
“I am amazed to hear the hon. Gentleman’s tone the day after the business investment summit. Anyone would think that this debate is happening in a different world or galaxy. What about the billions of pounds that were pledged yesterday? That is action and commitment from businesses that have confidence in this Labour Government, with their mandate and their deep commitment to a new partnership with business. Did he not read the newspaper this morning? Those record-breaking figures spell the truth about Labour’s record-breaking commitment to business investment.”
“The Minister is making a powerful and clear argument for this Government’s commitment to a new partnership with business. Does he agree that although the sum of investment yesterday is important, grabs the headlines and gets people confident about the future, part of the brief he is responsible for is small businesses, and seeing that they get part of the large investment that was committed to? Will he explore in his final remarks how important that is to small business?”
“It presided over a catastrophic financial crisis for local schools and authorities trying to support children with special educational needs, while SEN families have faced immense frustration, misery and often obnoxious bureaucratic barriers. These parents are forced to navigate labyrinthine systems in pursuit of services that they are legally entitled to access but that remain hidden from view under lock and key.”
“They are not exclusively innovative, but on a personal and character level, I have loved meeting them and those they teach. Bury Grammar in Bury North is one example. However, as someone who served as a state school governor until recently, I have seen at first hand the budgetary pressures enforced on the schools that teach 93% of our children. Let us take a moment to consider the Conservative party’s time in office and what has brought us to this point. Under its leadership, we saw an atomisation of our school system, zero accountability for multi-academy trusts, the narrowing of the school system, the off-rolling of children with different abilities, and many young people left without the support they need.”
“Although that presents new financial considerations for those schools, I would gently push back on the notion that the costs will automatically mean the same in terms of fee rises. Private schools have a range of financial capabilities to absorb some of these costs: reclaiming VAT on supplies and services; drawing on interest from trust funds or assets; considering how the fees for the use of school assets by the wider community can contribute to the overall budget; introducing fee structures or fees for additional specialist support; and joining with schools in neighbouring areas or nationwide to pay for centralised services. They will remain free to determine what to do, but that is necessary in considering business costs. None of this is new to schools. I have met some of the brilliant leaders in our private school sector.”
“I understand the aspirations of parents who work hard and save to provide for their children. I can introduce any Member to thousands of them in Bury North. Many live in some of the poorest wards in the country. Few could ever afford to pay for private education for their children, so I do not expect them to pay for the private education of someone else’s children with a state subsidy and their own hard-earned money. Forty-three per cent. of children in Bury North live in poverty, and that is concentrated in just three of our nine wards. That is an abject failure of the Conservative party’s 14 years in government—a spike of 10% in as many years. We cannot ignore growing inequalities. Under this Government’s plans, private schools will become subject to VAT.”
“I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I am pleased to speak in this debate. I am proud to do so for the first time since being put back in my place by the people of Bury North. Returners do not get to be maidens again, so I will just send my best to my predecessor and his family, as is customary. There was not much on which we saw eye to eye, but I respect his work and time in office. I know how losing feels, so I sincerely send him my very best. It will not surprise you, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I speak in favour of this Government’s laser focus on tackling inequality in our education system. I support Labour’s plans to end the state subsidy of private schools, and it is right that they pay VAT, as businesses expect to pay.”
“There is a huge amount to do, and this measure will only touch on a fraction of the legacy that Labour must clear up from the last Government and their 10 Education Secretaries.”
“They confirmed to the same meeting that, even with the 3.5% that had been kept in reserve to meet the contribution they were expecting in Bury to make the pay rise, they would face a budget deficit because the teachers would no longer be on strike. That is right—the Tories designed a system where the leaderships of our state schools have to rely on the unfair treatment of our teachers in order to come in under budget. That is the reality that we face, and it is their everyday experience. There have been no maths teachers for year 11s, and the leadership have been weighing up whether to buy in multiple teaching assistants for cover rather than a science teacher for science—if they could find one.”
“My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We are not anti. We are for the many and the few. Conservative Members want to remain in their comfort zone following their election defeat. We have all been there, but it is the wrong place to be. It is right that people pay VAT on school fees. I was at a termly governors’ meeting—Opposition Members will like this—when news of the last Government’s bare-minimum teachers’ pay rise came through. There was some welcome surprise that the then Government had done even the bare minimum. That was quickly replaced by the hard-headed financial reality from the business manager.”
“I thank my hon. Friend for securing this important debate on the anniversary of the attacks, and for delivering such an eloquent speech. As we mark a year since the appalling attacks, I proudly add my voice to the Bury Faith Forum and the Bury Council of Mosques in emphasising our shared bonds of faith and humanity, and in calling for a sincere, lasting resolution for Israel and Palestine that begins with the safe return of hostages and an immediate ceasefire. Does my hon. Friend agree that even in these darkest of times, the smallest shard of light shines brightest, and that that light is the release of the hostages; a ceasefire; a sustainable, peaceful, secure Israel; and a sustainable, peaceful Palestinian state?”
“Whenever the general election comes, Bury knows that we have unfinished work to do together. I will ask that they keep their faith in me, as I keep my faith in the work that we will do together—and we will keep going.”