Zarah Sultana
MP for Coventry South · Your Party · United Kingdom
“In September, the Prime Minister stood at that Dispatch Box and told the House that he had full confidence in Peter Mandelson, a man whose relationship with convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein was public knowledge.”
“I rise in support of the motion tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough and Thornaby East (Andy McDonald) to disagree with Lords amendment 312.”
“US congressional staff were told on Sunday that Iran was not planning to strike American forces or bases unless Israel attacked Iran first. In other words, there was no intelligence indicating an imminent threat. Yet we have already seen pre-emptive strikes attacking a girls’ school, killing over 100 children.”
“That’s right: the leader of the Labour party and Prime Minister had full confidence in a man who was besties with a convicted nonce. What a disgrace! What we are witnessing is not accountability but the Westminster club protecting its own. This is not just about this Labour Government; large sections of the media also played their part.”
“This situation stinks. Peter Mandelson maintained a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein after he had been convicted. It was not before anyone knew about his grotesque crimes, not when it was being whispered about, but after his conviction, when the world knew exactly who and what Jeffrey Epstein was.”
“Suddenly it is about experience, pragmatism and “getting things done”. This is how power protects itself. What about the victims—the girls and young women abused by Epstein? They received an apology from Mandelson only after sustained pressure. It was not freely given, not offered because it was the right thing to do.”
The complete record
Every one of 600 lines we hold for Zarah Sultana, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 10 of 12.
“That is what is driving this mental health crisis, so although funding is vital, so is building a society that nurtures people, gives them security and safety, and truly values and cherishes them. A report presented to the United Nations in 2019 argued that the best way to tackle the global mental health crisis is to build a supportive environment, including everything from the building of good homes to secure and well-paid work. If we are to solve the mental health crisis faced by children and young people, we must build a society where basic needs are met, where young people find decent and secure employment, where housing is both affordable and liveable, where education is understood to be a right and a good in itself, and where people do not have to work every hour of the day, but instead have time to live their lives to the fullest.”
“It is estimated that depression has tripled for those aged between 16 and 39. We cannot look just at the consequences; we have to look at the causes, too. Asthma, for example, is a health condition, but people do not suffer from it totally at random. If someone lives in an area of high air pollution, they are more likely to suffer from asthma. It is an individual problem, but it has social and political causes. The same is true for many mental health issues. The more stress, anxiety and trauma there is in people’s lives, the more likely they are to experience mental ill-health. For children and young people who have grown up under austerity, life is getting more stressful and less secure.”
“Since 2011, mental health trusts have faced a real-terms cut of more than 8%. Huge cuts to school funding have put even greater pressure on budgets, forcing schools to have bigger classes while cutting mental health services. Nearly half of young people with moderate to severe mental health needs have to wait more than 18 weeks to start treatment. That is a cruel failure for children and young people. Mental health support needs the funding across the board that it deserves—for services such as NHS services and school counsellors—to guarantee that every single young person who needs support can get it when they need it. Although funding for support is vital, the mental health crisis cannot be tackled with funding alone. It is getting worse, and more and more young people face mental ill-health.”
“Schoolchildren have been missing out on vital education and have often been stuck in overcrowded homes with overstretched parents. Things have got even worse for oppressed groups. Nearly three in four children with autism have a mental health condition, but in Coventry waiting times for autism assessments have been growing, and were doing so even before the pandemic. Working-class and LGBT+ young people, and children from black, Asian and minority ethnic communities all have greater rates of mental ill- health. What makes this not just a crisis but a scandal is the totally inadequate support for children and young people’s mental health. More than a decade of austerity has cut away the support that was once provided, while deepening the problems that give rise to mental ill-health.”
“As staff and volunteers made clear to me, this is an incredibly challenging time for young people, with more than half of safeguarding reports at the centre being about children’s and young people’s emotional wellbeing and mental health. The pandemic, and the new stresses, strains and isolation it has brought, has added to what was already a mental health crisis for children and young people. Before coronavirus hit, one in five young people aged between 16 and 24 suffered mental ill-health, and for school-aged children the figure was one in six. That has only got worse in the last 12 months. University students have been trapped in accommodation, away from friends and family, and have missed out on what should be the most exciting time of their lives. Almost two thirds of the people who have lost jobs during the pandemic are under 25.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Gary. A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of visiting Positive Youth Foundation in my constituency. I had the best time, as videos on my social media show. It is a fantastic organisation providing young people in Coventry with a huge range of activities and opportunities. Visiting the centre, I saw the bonds that had been formed between the staff, volunteers and young people and the confidence and support that gave them. I want to begin by paying tribute to everyone at Positive Youth Foundation from its founder and CEO Rashid Bhayat to all the staff and volunteers.”
“That means taking ownership out of the hands of the out-of-touch elites and giving it back to the fans, and that is what the 50+1 rule would do, as it does in Germany, where no teams were part of the super league plans and where ticket prices are significantly lower. Football was created by the working class, but it has been stolen by the rich. It is time that we took it back.”
“In a single season, the premier league clubs made combined operating profits of £900 million, compared with the combined losses of more than £400 million for the 72 clubs in the championship, league one and league two. Financial unsustainability for these clubs is now an ever present danger. We know this also from Coventry, where financial challenges prevented the Sky Blues from owning the stadium that they had helped to build, repeatedly forcing the team to play home games outside the city. I am pleased to say that next year they are returning to Coventry, but the underlying problems remain. The European super league plans might be gone, but billionaire owners will continue to put their greed before our clubs and our communities. Instead of tinkering around the edges, we need to address the problem at its root.”
“In response to boos by supposed fans and to Conservative MPs who said that they would boycott the team, the manager has been clear that we have a duty to stand up for our values, so I would like to commend Gareth Southgate, the players and the vast majority of the fans, who backed the decision to take the knee. Our clubs are not just businesses; they are part of our communities and the social fabric that binds us together. The European super league debacle showed once and for all that clubs should not be the playthings of billionaires, but that was not the beginning of the problem. Football has been going down this trajectory for a number of years, as can be seen in the ever widening gap between the clubs at the top and the rest of the pack.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Elliott. I want to begin by congratulating England on their win against Croatia. This group of players showcase the very best of a multicultural, socially conscious country. Sunday’s goal was assisted by a player of Jamaican and Irish descent, and finished by a striker who was born in Jamaica and raised in a diverse borough in north-west London. However, what is special about this team goes beyond the pitch—from Raheem Sterling, who was recognised this week for his anti-racist work in sport, to Marcus Rashford, who has ensured that millions of working-class kids have been fed during the holidays. It is not just the players.”
“The ministerial code states that Ministers must give “accurate and truthful information to Parliament, correcting any inadvertent error at the earliest opportunity.” So I ask the Minister, given this blatant discrepancy between the facts and what the Home Secretary said, why is she not here today to correct the record, or will she learn from her predecessor, who resigned as Home Secretary for inadvertently misleading MPs?”
“The Home Secretary told the House in January that Napier barracks was “in line with Public Health England guidelines.” —[ Official Report , 26 January 2021; Vol. 688, c. 177.] She reiterated that earlier this week when she told the House that her Department worked fully with PHE, but it is not true, as the High Court ruled last week, with the honourable Justice Linden writing that “the arrangements at the Barracks were contrary to the advice of PHE”.”
“In January I asked the Home Secretary about Napier barracks, highlighting the unsafe, inhumane conditions. She told me “to listen to the facts” —[ Official Report , 26 January 2021; Vol. 688, c. 178.] Well, here are the facts. On Thursday the High Court ruled that the conditions were unlawful. They were described as “squalid” in court, and evidence suggests that Public Health England guidance was not, and is still not, being followed. So I ask the Home Secretary: how many people are currently sleeping in each dormitory, why is Public Health England guidance still not being followed, and why did she claim that the standards were very high when they were unlawful?”
“Educational recovery spending is £1,600 in the US and £2,500 in the Netherlands, but with this Conservative Government it is just £50 per pupil. With an old Etonian, Bullingdon boy Prime Minister, a Chancellor whose old school’s fees are in excess of £40,000 per year and an overwhelmingly privately educated Cabinet, it is no surprise that working-class kids across the country are being failed. I ask the Education Secretary, if he truly cares about the education of all children: will he fund their futures with a £15 billion recovery plan, investing in children, schools and teachers, as demanded by the National Education Union, the Labour party and, it is reported, his very own education recovery commissioner?”
“I ask for your guidance, Mr Deputy Speaker, on how to ensure that the record is corrected and that it was the Home Secretary, not me, who misrepresented the facts to the House.”
“On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. On 26 January in the Chamber I highlighted to the Home Secretary the unsafe conditions at Napier barracks. She replied by telling me to “listen to the facts” and claimed that the barracks were of a “very high standard” and “in line with” public health guidance. Last week, the High Court ruled that the conditions at the barracks were unsafe and unlawful. The judge wrote: “The ‘bottom line’ is that the arrangements at the Barracks were contrary to the advice of PHE”— Public Health England. Today, at Home Office questions, I brought this to the Home Secretary’s attention, but she accused me of “misrepresentation” without specifying how anything I said was false.”
“The Prime Minister once said: “If I am ever asked…to produce my ID card as evidence that I am who I say I am…then I will…physically eat it”, so why the change of heart? It is not because of evidence of voter ballot fraud, because just six cases were confirmed at the last election while millions of people risk losing their vote because they do not have photo ID. Might it instead be because the Conservatives want to copy voter suppression tactics used in the USA, disproportionately disenfranchising black, Asian and ethnic minority communities, Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, working-class people, trans people and young people—all groups less likely to vote Conservative?”
“Tala, 13, Rula, just five years old, her big sister Yara, aged nine: three Palestinian children killed in an Israeli air-strike. The Israeli military murdered 63 other children and 245 Palestinians in its recent assault on Gaza. The call for Palestinian freedom has never been louder, but this Conservative Government are complicit in its denial. They have approved more than £400 million in arms to Israel since 2015, so can the Prime Minister look me in the eye and tell me that British-made weapons or components were not used in the war crimes that killed these three children and hundreds of other Palestinians? [Interruption.]”
“They are also funded by a third of UK billionaires and, of course, they are led by the super-rich, too—not just an old Etonian Prime Minister who complains that his £150,000 salary is not enough, but a Chancellor who went from an elite private school to Oxford to investment banking, before becoming the wealthiest Member of Parliament in this House and using his power to cut the services of the working class. Instead of this rigged and rotten system, we could make the super-rich pay their fair share to fund our public services and end poverty for all. That is the least the Government should be doing, so they should back the plan for a global minimum corporation tax. They should also back my proposed new clause, which would shine a light on the scandal of tax dodging.”
“The plans put forward by the US could prevent the likes of Amazon, Google and Facebook from dodging tax and refusing to pay their fair share, and end the race to the bottom on corporate tax rates. Even at a moderate rate of 21%, such a measure could raise £13.5 billion for the UK Treasury, according to Tax Justice UK. We should not really be surprised by the Government as they are on the side of big business and the super-rich. For a decade they have been cutting taxes while cutting the budgets of schools and hospitals throughout the country.”
“There is nothing in the Bill to fairly tax the obscene profit that companies such as Amazon have made during the pandemic, with the Government refusing to embrace a windfall tax. There is nothing in the Bill to provide the necessary investment in Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs to tackle tax avoidance and evasion by the super-rich and big businesses. Instead, the Government are standing by as the tax gap stands in excess of £35 billion. What is in the Bill is £15 billion more in annual cuts to Government Departments and a super deduction tax cut in capital spending that the rich are already reported to be using to purchase jacuzzis. To top it all off, there is the Tory Government’s refusal to embrace plans to tackle global tax avoidance.”
“Amazon, which this year has raked in record revenues of £38 billion across Europe, paid nothing in corporation tax. This is not just a broken economic model—it is not just unfair and unequal—it is rigged. It is redistribution, but not in the way that we might traditionally understand: it is taking from the many and giving it to the few. That is what is happening when we see that food bank use is up 35% and billionaire wealth is up 25%. This Conservative Government not only refuse to tackle that but aid and abet it. There is nothing in the Bill to tackle the tax loophole that means that income earned through wealth, owned overwhelmingly by the rich, is taxed at a lower rate than income earned through work.”
“I remember when the pandemic first hit and the Chancellor said that we would all be in it together. Well, the reality has not turned out that way. It has been the story of the many and the few. For the many, it has meant food bank use rocketing—it is up 33% on a year ago. Universal credit claimants have doubled in my constituency and child poverty now affects more than one in three children in Coventry South—nearly 7,000 kids in my constituency alone—and nearly 4.5 million across the country. While the majority have struggled with falling wages, unemployment and rents that they cannot afford, for a wealthy few it has been a bonanza. Last week The Sunday Times rich list revealed a record growth in UK billionaires, of whom there are now 171 in total. Their wealth stands at £600 billion—up nearly 25%.”
“As an MP for Coventry, where, in recent years, our football club has repeatedly forced fans to drive miles from the city to watch home matches, and as a diehard Liverpool fan, one of the clubs involved in the proposed breakaway European super league, I know fans’ anger at owners’ decisions all too well. Ultimately, this will be changed only with fan ownership, like the 50+1 rule in Germany, but the Government could make a more immediate change to improve this. On major decisions such as moving ground or forming a new league, they could require clubs to secure a 50% plus 1 majority of season-ticket holders. Will the Government heed that demand or will they just kick the problem into the long grass?”
“This past year, we have seen that it is not millionaire bankers or hedge fund managers who keep society going; it is our nurses, cleaners, teachers, shop assistants, taxi drivers and bus drivers. It is the working class in all our diversity. It is about time that we built a society run by and for them.”
“This is building back for big business and bad bosses, for Tory donors and property developers, and while it is deepening economic inequality, it is also attacking our democratic rights. The Electoral Reform Society called the Government’s voter ID plans “dangerous, misguided and undemocratic”. This is not about stopping voter fraud; it is about voter suppression and stopping young people, black and ethnic minority people and poor people voting. In short, that means people who are less likely to vote for this Government in the first place. If we do not like that, the police crackdown Bill represents an unprecedented attack on our right to protest, as groups such as Liberty have warned. If the Government get their way, not only will people be disenfranchised, but even our right to protest will be curtailed.”
“Health academics have described the NHS White Paper as consolidating the “market paradigm” in the NHS. Although the Queen’s Speech contains promised new laws for property developers and private healthcare companies, there is absolutely nothing about workers’ rights. There is not a sight of the promised employment Bill. There is no ban on fire and rehire and no end to zero-hours contracts. There is nothing for more than 5.7 million people in low-paid or precarious work, nothing for the 4.2 million children growing up in poverty, nothing for the one in seven adults without access to the social care they need and absolutely nothing that comes close to tackling the climate emergency. This is not building back better.”
“A programme such as this can rise to the challenges we face. It meets the needs of the people and takes on the fossil fuel billionaires who are polluting our planet. That is what a true people’s Government would do, but it is not what this Queen’s Speech is doing. Instead, it tries to take us back to business as usual—to the rigged economy of the past. Let us look at what is in it: “reforms” to planning and the NHS. We have seen what Tory “reforms” mean. They mean cuts and deregulation, creating the “next generation of slum housing.” That is not what I am saying; it is what the president of the Royal Institute of British Architects has warned about the White Paper. Today, a Campaign to Protect Rural England branch has called the plans a disaster.”
“To do that, we need to bring industries into public ownership—rail, mail, water, energy and more—and we need to empower workers, which means repealing anti-trade union laws, so that the needs of many come before the greed of the few. This programme could revitalise industries in Coventry, across the west midlands and across the country. It would kick start a green industrial revolution, building everything from electric cars to wind turbines. While we do that, we need to be tackling inequality, raising the minimum wage and ending poverty pay once and for all. We need to be giving our NHS workers a 15% pay rise, to make up for a decade of lost pay, and raising taxes on the very richest and the biggest businesses, with a windfall tax on corporations that have made obscene profits during the pandemic.”
“That is why at the heart of this Queen’s Speech should be a people’s green new deal, a state-led programme of economic transformation to build a country that can not only avert the climate emergency, but truly be one that works for the 99%, not just the 1%. It is a programme designed and discussed by trade unionists, think tanks, activists and policy experts that would create millions of well-paid, unionised, skilled green jobs. It would do so by mass investment in green technologies; expanding and electrifying public transport; building electric vehicles, with investments in gigafactories in places such as Coventry; creating a national care service; and retrofitting the country’s homes, cutting both costs and carbon. We would go from an economy controlled and run for profit to a society that is working for all of us.”
“We face a crisis of public health, with a Government who let bodies pile high in their thousands and underfunded the NHS for a decade. We face a crisis of poverty, inequality and unemployment, with a Government who hand out billions in dodgy contracts to wealthy Tory donors but refuse to give working-class kids food in the holidays. And looming over us is a climate crisis that threatens the future of us all. This is not a time to tinker around the edges or return to the old, unfair and unequal society and economic model that got us here in the first place. It is time to match the scale of the challenges we face with an ambition like that which the Labour Government had in 1945.”
“In 1945, in the aftermath of the second world war, a transformative Labour Government were elected on a promise to win the peace. Instead of returning to the old, unfair and unequal society of the past, they promised to build a country for the future and for the people. They created the NHS, and built the welfare state and millions of council homes. They brought industries into public ownership, to be run for the people and not for private profit. They borrowed to invest, taxed the richest and set out to eradicate poverty and unemployment. They faced a country brought to its knees by war. It was a crisis like no other, but they rose to that challenge. Today, as we emerge from the pandemic, we, too, face crises like no other.”
“The images from India are horrifying—from people gasping for air and dying— [Inaudible] —with hospitals overrun, to seas of blazing makeshift pyres. This is a human catastrophe for India, and, with a virus that does not respect borders, none of us is safe until we are all safe. Vaccine supply is artificially limited by patents, leading to the global vaccine apartheid. At the Word Trade Organisation, India and South Africa have proposed a temporary waiver to vaccine patents, allowing production— [Inaudible] —expand . Public money funded these vaccines, so will the Government put public health before the profits of big pharma and support a waiver of the vaccine patents?”
“No one’s basic needs should depend on charity. People seeking asylum are not a problem to be managed or a useful scapegoat to distract and divide. They are people deserving of dignity and respect. Napier barracks must close immediately, there must be funding for local authorities and the dispersal scheme, with the housing stock invested in and upgraded, and those seeking sanctuary should be offered the opportunity to rebuild their lives with an end to the ban on the right to work.”
“In Coventry, I have seen at first hand the appalling conditions and disgraceful treatment people are subjected to. Mothers with young babies moved into rooms with insect infestations and mould covering the walls. Parents separated from each other with no reason and no warning. All the while, the outsourcing companies that run the services, such as Serco, make huge profits from Government contracts. The people seeking asylum are denied the right to work, and local authorities, even if they are eager to help, are starved of necessary funding. In Coventry, we are lucky to have organisations such as Coventry Asylum and Refugee Action Group and Carriers of Hope, which provide meals and essential items for people seeking asylum. I want to pay particular tribute to Loraine Mponela and Sue Sampson for the incredible work they do in Coventry.”
“No, in the eyes of the Government and much of the right-wing press, they are not people; they are a problem. That is how the asylum system treats them. As hon. Members have said, those people have been crammed into camps in Penally and Napier and forced to share dormitories with dozens, predictably causing mass outbreaks of coronavirus. When I challenged the Home Secretary about that at the end of January, she promised me that the camps were of a very strong standard. We now know that that is not true. Instead, they were against public health guidance and recommendations from the local health boards. It is not just the camps. During the pandemic, an unprecedented number of people seeking asylum have been left in unsuitable and often unsafe accommodation.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Neil Coyle) on securing this important debate. The poet Warsan Shire wrote: “you have to understand, that no one puts their children in a boat unless the water is safer than the land”. When the Government and much of the media cover channel crossings or the supposed migrant crisis, there is rarely an attempt to understand that. The stories of the people themselves are ignored. It is not said, for example, that many people seeking asylum in the UK had homes destroyed by British bombs and British wars. It is not said that when fleeing poverty and persecution in their homelands, people are desperate to be reunited with loved ones already here in Britain.”
“My constituency is home to Liberty Pressing Solutions, part of the Liberty Steel Group. The threat of the company’s collapse risks losing good, skilled, unionised jobs in Coventry and across the country. This would be a disaster for the city and for British manufacturing, so rather than waiting for the company to go bust before taking action, risking workers’ jobs, terms and conditions, will the Government step in now, with all options on the table, including bringing the business into public ownership, guaranteeing its future and retaining the skills we need to rebuild and to tackle the climate emergency?”
“The wrongful conviction of the sub-postmasters is one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in British legal history. Post Office bosses aggressively prosecuted workers in spite of full knowledge that the Horizon data system was unreliable and that many convictions were unsafe. People’s lives were ruined, with some tragically passing away before their names were cleared. To get the answers that workers deserve and hold to account those who were responsible for this injustice, will the Government heed the Communication Workers Union’s call for a proper public inquiry into what happened, put it on a statutory footing and give it the necessary powers to compel witnesses and require them to give evidence under oath?”
“Here is an alternative plan: instead of spending billions more on new weapons of war or giving more fortunes to private Test and Trace consultants, we could give NHS workers the pay rise they deserve—15% to make up for a decade of lost pay. Instead of letting tax dodging run riot and corporate greed dominate, we could bring in a new windfall tax to make the likes of Amazon pay their fair share and to raise the pay of all our key workers, public and private sector alike. NHS workers are always there for us. Now it is our turn to stand with them.”
“Now, according to research, two in three nurses have to work overtime to pay the bills, and reports of nurses forced to rely on food banks are far from uncommon. Tory Ministers call them heroes. They clapped for them while cameras were watching, but now they think they can get away with a cut in their pay. They pit NHS workers against other workers, saying that if one group has had their pay frozen, it is not fair for another group to have their pay raised. They say that if private sector workers are losing their jobs, others should make sacrifices, too. It is classic divide-and-rule tactics. It is an attempt to turn working people against each other, leaving all of us worse off, while their donors and wealthy mates laugh all the way to the bank.”
“While Tory donors have been getting rich off this pandemic, it has been NHS workers getting us through it. On the frontline, nurses, doctors, cleaners, porters and all of our healthcare workers have been truly incredible, battling the virus, working overtime, enduring stress and trauma. Nearly 1,000 health and social care staff are estimated to have died from the virus, with workers too often not provided with the protective equipment they needed. Nearly half of intensive care staff report symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, severe depression or anxiety. All of this comes after a decade of NHS staff being overworked and underpaid, with nursing vacancies in the midlands alone standing at 7,500 and pay down as much as 30% for some staff.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hosie. I would like to begin by congratulating my hon. Friends the Members for Liverpool, Wavertree (Paula Barker), for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) and for Luton South (Rachel Hopkins) on securing this debate. An extra £16 billion for the military, £37 billion for the private Test and Trace system, and billions more in dodgy contracts handed to Tory donors. But for nurses just £3.50 a week. The Prime Minister says it is all we can afford, but the fortunes handed to arms dealers, Serco bosses and the Health and Social Care Secretary’s former neighbour and pub landlord tell us something different. When inflation is factored in, the 1% “pay rise” for NHS workers is really a pay cut—from clapping for carers to cutting their pay. Even for this Government, this is shameful.”
“Like women across the country, I have not been able to stop thinking about Sarah Everard; my thoughts are with those who knew and loved her. All women know the fear of walking home at night. We hold keys tightly between our fingers, we quicken our pace, and we pretend to make phone calls. It is almost second nature. But women should be able to walk home without fear. Does the Leader of the House agree that we, as parliamentarians, should make it clear that the emphasis must be on tackling violence against women and girls and the norms that too often sustain it, rather than victim-blaming narratives that say women should not be on the streets at night?”
“The disgraceful 1% pay rise for NHS workers is really a pay cut when inflation is factored in. The Prime Minister claims that it is all we can afford. The Government had no problem finding £37 billion for the private test and trace system, an extra £16 billion for the military budget, or hundreds of millions of pounds in dodgy covid contracts for the Health Secretary’s WhatsApp contacts. NHS workers have seen their pay fall by more than 10% in real terms in the past decade, so instead of handing out fortunes to mates and donors, will the Chancellor heed the calls of trade unions and NHS staff and give them the pay rise that they deserve, which is 15% to make up for a decade of lost pay?”
“It has been revealed that almost £2 billion has been handed to Conservative party friends and donors in dodgy covid contracts. That includes the likes of Steve Parkin, who has donated over £500,000 to the Conservatives. He is the chairman of Clipper Logistics, which was awarded a £1.3 million PPE contract. Another Tory donor, David Meller, has given £65,000 to the Tories over the past decade. His company, Meller Designs, was awarded PPE contracts worth over £150 million. Those people did not get rich giving their money away for nothing, so does the Minister believe that it is appropriate for the Conservative Government to hand out fortunes—public money—to Conservative party donors?”
“What recent assessment her Department has made of the (a) accuracy and (b) efficiency of contracted-out health assessments for (i) employment and support allowance and (ii) personal independence payment.”
“The outsourcing of assessments for employment and support allowance and personal independence payments to companies such as Capita has been a travesty. Constituents tell me how they have been signed off work by their GP, only for non-specialist Capita assessors to refuse their claims. When they appeal, they are forced to wait absurd lengths of time for the decision, which causes severe financial hardship. Coventry Law Centre, which deals with the majority of appeals in the city, has found that a staggering 90% of appeals are successful. This pandemic has shown that things can be done differently, so will the Minister take this opportunity to scrap these cruel assessments, kick out outsourcing companies such as Capita and bring in a framework that treats disabled people with dignity and respect?”
“The Minister began his remarks by saying that improving the situation for Yemenis was “a priority for this Government.” How he can say that with a straight face I do not know. Not only has he announced a 50% cut in aid to Yemen, but since the Saudi-led war in Yemen began, his Government have licensed £6.7 billion-worth of arms sales to the Saudis. That is British-made bombs dropped from British-made jets flown by British-trained pilots. Instead of warm words and crocodile tears, will the Minister take the necessary action for peace and end arms sales to Saudi Arabia?”
“When I challenged the Minister on the disproportionate impact of covid-19 on black and minority ethnic groups after the first wave of the virus, she denied that systemic injustice was to blame. This new report shows that, in the second wave, Bangladeshi and Pakistani people were three times more likely to die from covid, and that black and minority ethnic communities as a whole are still significantly disproportionately in critical care with it. Does the Minister now acknowledge that it is systemic injustice that black and minority ethnic communities face from higher rates of poverty and overcrowded housing to higher rates of frontline work and barriers to accessing healthcare?”