Nadia Whittome

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1. “It is shoving through this Bill, despite concerns from the Royal British Legion and senior military figures; it is breaching the armed forces covenant; it is stripping soldiers of their employment rights; and it is rewarding new recruits with poverty pay, with one of the lowest salaries in the public sector at just over £15,000 a year. For more than 300 years, torture has been illegal in this country. The Bill would overturn that principle, and that would be a moment of national shame. So tonight, as a matter of pride, I will be voting against this Bill—this irredeemable anti-veteran and anti-human rights piece of legislation—for the second time.”

   House of Commons3 November 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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2. “Speaking of the Human Rights Joint Committee report, the Minister was unable to explain which vexatious prosecutions would have been stopped by the Bill, so perhaps he can tell us today. No? thought not, because the answer is none. What is particularly disrespectful and distasteful is this Government’s disingenuous claim that anyone who opposes the Bill is anti-armed forces. I suppose that includes the Royal British Legion, too. A Government source, in characteristically anonymous fashion, told The Guardian this morning that Labour’s stance on the Bill “confirms their long-held disdain for armed forces personnel”. Let me tell Conservative Members what disdain for our armed forces personnel looks like.”

   House of Commons3 November 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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3. “Why is this legislation so out of step with the similar legislation of allied countries such as the US and Canada? I am proud of the strength and unity of Labour’s opposition to the Bill on final Reading, because our party has a record of championing human rights and fighting for the dignity of workers and for the rule of law—everything that the Bill flies in the face of. As my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman) said at the time of the recent publishing of the Human Rights Joint Committee report, it is not the drafting of the Bill that is the problem, because it is perfectly drafted in accordance with the policy; it is the policy itself that is the problem. This Bill is rotten to its core.”

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4. “Elizabeth Wilmshurst, the former deputy legal adviser at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, says that the Bill calls into question the UK’s commitment to a “rules-based international system”. As of today, nearly a dozen United Nations human rights special rapporteurs and experts have declared that the Bill will violate the “UK’s obligations under international humanitarian law, human rights law and international criminal law”. The Equality and Human Rights Commission says that it is “profoundly concerned by the risk to human rights that this Bill poses.” The Judge Advocate General of the Armed Forces says that the Bill risks bringing “the UK armed forces into disrepute”. How can the Minister justify sticking his fingers in his ears in the face of such grave concerns voiced by legal, defence and human rights experts?”

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5. “Does my hon. Friend agree that it is grossly unfair that while the Prime Minister, reportedly, is complaining about not being able to live off £150 k a year, he is expecting my constituents in Nottingham, and all the constituents of every one of us in this House, to live off two thirds of the minimum wage unless a proper economic settlement is provided?”

   House of Commons21 October 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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6. “My plea to the Minister today is that local action is not enough. We in Nottingham, and cities and towns across the country, need national action too. If we can afford to spend £28.8 billion on roads, as the Government have pledged, we can invest in green and affordable transport too. We can decarbonise and give the support that our private-hire and taxi drivers need to join the fight in decarbonising our country and our planet. The right to breathe clean air should not be a radical demand.”

   House of Commons20 October 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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7. “As my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) mentioned, the figure rises to 40,000 across the country. This year, the number could have been even higher, because there is growing evidence that exposure to polluted air increases someone’s risk of dying from covid-19. That risk is not borne equitably; we know that it is the poorest people, and disproportionally people of colour, who are suffering the most. It is no surprise that cities and towns across the country are taking matters into their own hands. I am extremely proud that Nottingham City Council has done that, leading the way in tackling the problem with policies such as a ban on motorists leaving their engines running in stationary vehicles, investing in a large fleet of electric and biogas buses, and retrofitting older diesel buses.”

   House of Commons20 October 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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8. “It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Charles. I am grateful to you for fitting me back into the call list and for allowing me to go and tend to my migraine. I promise I will not take any longer than two minutes— I do not think my head would allow it anyway. It is important for me to speak in the debate, because poor air quality is a silent public health crisis that is harming the lives of my constituents. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Withington (Jeff Smith) for securing the debate. Public Health England figures show that over 6% of adult deaths in Nottingham are attributable to manmade air pollution. That is more deaths than from alcohol and road traffic accidents combined. More than 400 people in my city die prematurely every year because of the quality of the air that they breathe.”

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9. “We have a responsibility to vote for these amendments and to treat people—our neighbours, our friends, our co-workers—who were born on a different soil in the way that we would want to be treated ourselves and the way that we would want our families to be treated.”

   House of Commons19 October 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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10. “Whether you are a retired miner from Mansfield, a Deliveroo rider in Nottingham or a Bulgarian mum who cleans this very building, we have more in common with one another than we ever will with those who try to divide us. We all want to protect our families. We all want to contribute to our communities. We all know what it is like to have no power, and we all know that it is Ministers who are making people powerless. We have an enormous privilege as Members of this House, but being paid £80k a year does not make our lives worth any more than those of people being paid £8.72 an hour.”

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11. “Our key workers are not low skilled; they are underpaid. They should be rewarded with a pay rise, not threatened with deportation. The purpose of the Bill is to close our borders with Europe. Those who make over £25,600 a year will be allowed in, and those who are paid less will be kept out. That is what a points-based system looks like. It is free movement for those who can afford it and a hostile environment for everyone else. This Bill will not solve the problems my community faces. It is not foreigners taking away jobs; it is this Government refusing to extend the furlough scheme. It is not migrants running the NHS into the ground; they are keeping it going. If the Minister is so committed to increasing wages, I urge him to listen to the Migration Advisory Committee and increase the wages of care workers to at least £10 an hour.”

    House of Commons19 October 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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12. “When I was a care worker, I worked alongside talented and dedicated carers from Zambia, Spain, Italy; we worked long hours to look after elderly people, yet the Government have the cheek to call them low skilled and to say that they do not belong here. When I went back to work during the pandemic, I had to retrain. My day would look like this: getting up at five; making notes during handover; administering medication; dealing with someone who had had a fall; hoisting someone twice my size, and being alert at all times to small changes that might indicate a serious medical problem. I would try my best to brighten someone’s day and make them feel valued, knowing that I would probably be the only person they saw that day, all while meticulously recording everything that happened on every call.”

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13. “It is a privilege to follow the hon. Member for Ynys Môn (Virginia Crosbie), who speaks with expertise and passion about healthcare in her constituency. It is a privilege, too, to speak to Lords amendment 1, which would require an independent assessment of the impact of ending free movement on the social care sector. It was not so long ago that everyone in this House hailed our key workers as heroes and we stood on our doorsteps and clapped for our carers. It is care workers, cleaners, cooks and delivery drivers who keep this country running, but they are also the people this Bill would keep out of the country. One in five health and social care workers was born outside the UK.”

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14. “That means a serious economic package to protect jobs and businesses, and fixing the privatised Serco test and trace system. Are the Government so wedded to privatisation that even when it is utterly failing and public health is at risk they just plough on? We also need to extend the eviction ban so that no one loses their home during this time. We know that lockdowns work only if people can afford to self-isolate, so why is it that, eight months into this virus, statutory sick pay is still £95 a week? The Secretary of State said that he could not live on that, so why are my constituents expected to? My final question to the Minister, in the last few seconds, is why have the Government not even followed their own scientific advice, which was to ban households mixing, close pubs and bring all university teaching online?”

    House of Commons13 October 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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15. “They failed to implement a test and trace system and they failed to listen to the OECD’s advice that the best way to protect the economy was to prevent a second wave, instead telling people one minute to go out to pubs, to eat out to help out, and then blaming them for doing so the next. The Government prioritised the interests of the economy over saving lives, yet failed to do both, and we are now faced with the worst recession in the developed world. Last week, MPs, councillors and members of the public were left to find out in the press that we were due to go under a local lockdown, without any details of what that would look like for residents and for businesses. People in Nottingham have made enormous sacrifices during this pandemic, but frankly people are fed up. People want the Government to do their part.”

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16. “A week ago, Nottingham showed for the first time a dramatic increase in our covid-19 infection rate. We needed immediate action from the Government, but all we got was confusion and delay. We were left in the dark for a week, with no action and no communication from the Government, and during that time the infection rate doubled to be the highest in the country. The saddest thing about that is that it was avoidable. The Government have failed us time and again during this crisis. They failed to protect elderly people and vulnerable people, who died at an alarming rate in care homes and nursing homes.”

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17. “The Government must make a just transition to a lower- carbon economy and, in doing so, create green jobs. Will the Minister outline the number of green jobs created since he has been in post, and specifically which green technologies and industries can expect investment from the Government over the next year?”

    House of Commons29 September 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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18. “The Secretary of State will be aware that in recent years, there has been increased understanding of neurodivergent people and the issues that neurodivergence presents in the criminal justice system, yet there are still neurodivergent individuals who face disproportionate prison sentences and who, in the case of foreign national offenders, could risk deportation to a country where they have no support. Will he commit himself to immediately reviewing all cases of neurodivergent individuals, particularly those who face imminent deportation?”

    House of Commons22 September 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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19. “The Government’s posturing will do nothing to protect the millions of workers in all four nations across the country who are worried about losing their jobs; nothing to reassure the British farmers who are worried about their products being undercut and dangerous trade deals that lower food standards; and nothing to foster the international co-operation that we need to defeat this pandemic or tackle the climate crisis. I urge people who have spoken passionately about our food, environmental and trading standards, and the Union, to vote for new clause 2 so that the Bill does not ride roughshod over our devolved nations, and so that it resembles something that is fit for purpose.”

    House of Commons15 September 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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20. “It is about the Government allowing themselves to sell off our rights and protections in dangerous trade deals that will undermine our future for decades to come. Meanwhile, when we tried to amend the Trade Bill at least to ensure parliamentary scrutiny, the Government rejected that, showing very clearly what taking back control actually means—not parliamentary sovereignty, but an Executive power grab. Now with this Bill, especially in its current, unamended form, the Government are trying to cement that power grab by giving themselves the right to impose lower standards on devolved nations while ripping up the withdrawal agreement that they so proudly campaigned on just nine months ago, and breaking international law in the process.”

    House of Commons15 September 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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21. “There is a pattern here: the Government promise to maintain our standards while simultaneously passing laws to allow themselves to lower them. Let us take, for example, the Environment Bill, which the Government used not to set targets, but to give themselves the power to set their own targets in the future. They voted against the principle of non-regression to stop environmental standards being lowered. We have also heard about agriculture today. The Agriculture Bill offered nothing to guarantee that food standards would not be lowered and undercut in new trade deals. Hon. Members might be wondering why the Government would keep making promises and then refuse to legislate for them. The agenda is pretty clear to me. This is about creating a race-to-the-bottom economy. It is about undermining our standards.”

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22. “It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Graham, and to speak to new clause 2, which was tabled by Labour’s Front Benchers. This new clause seeks to put common frameworks on a statutory footing. Only yesterday the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster reassured Members of the importance of common frameworks. If that is the case, I expect the Government to have no problem in accepting this amendment, which seeks to prevent Ministers from overriding and imposing lower standards on devolved nations against their will. However, the devolved nations have every reason to be worried because when it comes to empty words, meaningless platitudes and empty promises, I am afraid that this Government have form.”

    House of Commons15 September 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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23. “A report last year by the Foreign Affairs Committee, of which the Home Secretary was a member at the time, said: “In the absence of robust and accessible legal routes for seeking asylum in the UK, those with a claim are left with little choice but to make dangerous journeys by land and sea.” How many more people like Abdulfatah Hamdallah have to die before the Home Secretary creates those safe and legal routes?”

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24. “Successive Conservative Equalities Ministers have repeatedly stalled on publishing the results of the Gender Recognition Act 2004 consultation. Leaked reports of a potential roll-back on trans rights have understandably caused alarm. With hate crimes against trans people up nearly 40% on last year, does the Minister agree that her quibbling on this issue is fanning the flames of populist hate towards an already marginalised group?”

    House of Commons22 July 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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25. “My hon. Friend may have been about to make the point that analysis from the Women’s Budget Group shows that over 2 million jobs could be created in the care sector, which is more than are being created by any of the Chancellor’s schemes today. Does she agree that the Government should meet the Women’s Budget Group to address this clear oversight in their policy making?”

    House of Commons8 July 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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26. “Covid-19 has shown that we all have the ability to make drastic changes to our way of life, when necessary. We must learn from these changes, not merely return to the old habits and old ways of thinking, and that goes for Government too. As a minimum, any company support package from the Government must ensure there is a clear commitment to tackling climate change. Will the Minister commit to the principle of public money for public goods today, and will the Minister commit to a comprehensive training, jobs and investment programme built around net zero and the circular economy—a green industrial revolution?”

    House of Commons7 July 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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27. “In the light of what we have seen, or not seen, from the Government on climate change and the environment, I am somewhat sceptical about their new-found love for interventionist approaches. Analysis shows that policies opposed by the Government to date on onshore wind, offshore wind power, home installation, tidal power and transport would have led to nearly 70 million tonnes of CO 2 emissions savings per year by 2030. The UK is off track to hit our latest carbon budget emissions targets. We are missing most of our international biodiversity targets, and Natural England and the Environment Agency have been cut so severely that they are barely able even to fulfil their basic statutory functions. In the context of all this, the Cabinet Committee launched to co-ordinate climate policy has, remarkably, met just once.”

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28. “Just as the UK was not prepared for the covid-19 pandemic, so the Government are failing adequately to prepare and protect people from the effects of climate change. What are the latest Treasury estimates for the cost of the likely damage to communities, food, food production, and industry as a result of climate change and environmental degradation over the next five to 10 years? Although I welcome several of the measures touted to make the Chancellor’s Budget tomorrow, particularly the green homes grant scheme, a responsible approach to the climate and environmental emergency will require far more than just one or two eye-catching measures and a few slogans. To say that anything less than systemic, transformative fundamental change to society, the economy and lifestyles is needed would be to peddle a dangerous and reckless myth.”

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29. “I wish to close with words from the End Violence Against Women Coalition, which has stressed that “Amending the Bill is the only route to guarantee a fair system to all victims” and ensure compliance with the Istanbul convention, which this Bill seeks to ratify.”

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30. “However, as Pragna Patel, the director of Southall Black Sisters, has said: “The decision to leave migrant women out of this bill sends the message that their lives are not valued, they are disposable, they are second-class people, they are invisible”. This invisibility is exacerbated through clause 53, which neglects the commissioning of specialist support for BAME women in the community. There are only 30 specialist by and for black and minoritised women’s refuges for the whole of the UK, with 50% of BAME specialist refuges having been forced to close or been taken over by a larger provider because of Government funding cuts in the past decade.”

    House of Commons6 July 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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31. “The draft statutory guidance to accompany this Bill clearly recognises that migrant women face these additional obstacles to safety and are afraid of reporting. Does the Minister accept that the Government’s current policies in this area in effect encode and entrench the abuser-victim dynamic into the system? Will she acknowledge that the legislation, as it currently stands, does not match the facts recognised in the statutory guidance? It is promising that some key amendments have made the cut, including the recognition that children are victims of domestic abuse in their own right, as well as the expansion of the ban on abusers cross-examining the victims in court.”

    House of Commons6 July 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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32. “No recourse to public funds renders many of the most at-risk individuals completely powerless and increases their chances of being preyed upon by abusers or falling into destitution. The choice presented to Members today is whether this Bill progresses with or without leaving migrant women behind. Many migrant women are, in effect, excluded from the protective measures in this Bill as they have no recourse to public funds. What advice has the Minister sought as to whether the Bill, in its current form, is compliant with paragraph 3 of article 4 of the Istanbul convention? We know that migrant women face additional barriers to safety, because abusers commonly weaponise fears of immigration enforcement and separation from their children to control them.”

    House of Commons6 July 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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33. “It is an honour to follow the hon. Member for Thurrock (Jackie Doyle-Price). I wholeheartedly support the sensible and necessary amendments to this Bill brought forward by several of my courageous and learned colleagues. I particularly wish to mention my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Rosie Duffield), who has spoken courageously on domestic abuse, and my excellent colleague my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy), because of her ongoing work to have misogyny treated as a hate crime. I am proud to represent Nottingham East, the birthplace of the movement to recognise misogyny as a hate crime, and I pay tribute to pioneers at Nottingham Women’s Centre, as well as Juno Women’s Aid, and, in particular, to Mel Jeffs.”

    House of Commons6 July 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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34. “We must not forget that this Bill arrives before us today in the context of the Conservatives’ hostile environment—a hostile environment conjured as a pernicious smokescreen to blame migrants for the economic damage inflicted on working-class communities by Tory austerity, predatory capitalism and years of neglect and lack of investment.”

    House of Commons30 June 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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35. “Ultimately, nobody should be imprisoned because of where they were born, yet the UK is the only country in Europe that does not have a time limit on how long a person can be held in immigration detention. Twenty-eight days is absolutely the longest time allowed in any other context. I urge the Government to do the right thing, even at this late hour. They should not block the many sensible amendments and new clauses. Carers, shop assistants and cleaners are risking their lives on the frontline looking after us. The least we can do for them is to use our votes today to look after them.”

    House of Commons30 June 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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36. “Will the Minister, for the avoidance of doubt, clarify whether the Home Secretary still considers care workers low skilled? A recent report, “Detained and Dehumanised”, is based on interviews with people who experienced detention in UK centres. It was done before the pandemic. The report highlights a disturbing level of despair. One person said: “I saw people cutting themselves, someone who tried to hang himself, someone who died in detention”. Another said: “The most awful thing was an uncertainty: Not knowing whether I will be released and what they’re going to do to me”. As the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) has said, this is a terrible, inhumane position to be in.”

    House of Commons30 June 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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37. “Does the Minister have anything to say to these families waiting in limbo? This punitive, discriminatory piece of legislation is a slap in the face to the carers, cleaners, drivers and shop assistants who have risked their lives on the frontline to keep this country running throughout the pandemic, and who Members here have applauded every week. The scale of the Government’s hypocrisy is breathtaking—clapping for carers one day and downgrading their status in law the next. This Bill would class many vital jobs as low skilled and prevent people from getting a new work visa or extension. That would include care workers—people like my colleagues with whom I worked before becoming an MP and during the pandemic. The work may be low paid and badly undervalued by those in power, but it is not low skilled.”

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38. “Under such a system of employer sponsorship, workers are heavily restricted in their access to public funds, which puts many at risk of destitution. They are also less likely to join their colleagues in employment struggles for better terms and conditions. Migrants have been blamed for low wages, but it is not them who drive down employment standards—it is exploitative bosses who do, and it is this Government who allow them to do that. We have to make it clear that nobody’s rights should be linked to an employer. A person’s worth is not determined by their economic value. Instead of removing EU citizens’ rights, the Government should have focused on making up for the injustices that they have inflicted on the Windrush generation and other migrant communities. The Windrush compensation scheme is clearly not working.”

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39. “I will not be taking any interventions; I need to make progress. The hostile environment, from right-to-rent checks to the immigration health surcharge, is built on the premise that migrants should be discouraged from coming to the UK. Not satisfied with the disaster of the Windrush scandal, the Government seem determined to press ahead with this unjust, discriminatory and poorly designed piece of legislation. The Home Secretary has yet to set out the details of what will come in place of freedom of movement. This Bill does not do that. Instead, it introduces multiple Henry VIII powers, which remove much-needed scrutiny from our future immigration system. I am afraid that the benefits of a points-based immigration system are a myth.”

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40. “It was in that context that the Secretary of State overruled his advisers to reduce the amount of affordable housing required in the Westferry development. Let us take this slowly, because this point cannot be laboured enough. With an increase in street homelessness of more than 250% since 2010—”

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41. “Zoe McKendree, 33, told the BBC that she spends more than a third of her pay on rent for her shared flat. She dreams of having the keys to a home of her own, but for her and most people of her generation, let alone my generation, that remains a distant prospect. Instead, Zoe has to contend with what she describes as “callous” landlords and escalating costs. She has also experienced numerous no-fault evictions, where private landlords evict tenants at short notice without good reason. This country is deep in a housing crisis of the Government’s own making. Not only are people spending more than a third of their income on rent, but the number of rough sleepers in England has, shockingly—shamefully —increased by more than 250% since the Conservative party was elected in 2010.”

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42. “Transparency International defines corruption as “the abuse of entrusted power for private gain.” It has said of corruption in the UK: “Although corruption is not endemic in the UK, it is correct to say that in some areas of UK society and institutions, corruption is a much greater problem than recognised and that there is an inadequate response”—”

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43. “The Secretary of State is shaking his head, but those are the facts. With that increase, and with a generation of people trapped in precarious and poorly regulated rented housing, we have a Secretary of State in charge of housing fighting to reduce the number of affordable housing units in a development. How on earth do the Government justify that move? It seems baffling to me, considering that fact alone, that the Secretary of State should be deemed fit to represent the wider public interest as part of his brief. Reducing the ratio of affordable dwellings from one in three to one in five saved billionaire developer and Tory donor Richard Desmond another £40 million by enabling him to sell those units on the premium property market instead.”

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44. “People of the Windrush generation were deported as a result of the Government’s hostile environment policies, including the healthcare surcharge, no recourse to public funds, the illegal working offence, immigration detention and the right to rent checks, which have been found to cause racial discrimination. The Home Secretary has not answered the question yet: why are those policies still in place, and when will they be abolished?”

    House of Commons23 June 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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45. “The Conservative party is the party of the food bank and zero-hour contracts. The Living Wage Foundation calculates the real living wage—not the Government’s made up living wage—based on what people need to get by. It is set at £9.30 per hour outside London and that means that anyone paid below that is on a poverty wage.”

    House of Commons16 June 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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46. “The fact that 1.3 million children are routinely receiving free school meals shows that something is deeply wrong. We are a wealthy country, but that wealth is not fairly distributed; the wealthiest 10% in our country have about 45% of the wealth. That inequality is only increasing; wages for the majority have been stagnant for the past decade, employment is increasingly insecure and precarious, and we have a standard-of-living slide, all while the rich get richer. Even though they may be fed this summer, we will still have approximately one third of children living in poverty. The Government typically respond to this by saying that the best route out of poverty is through work, but that is simply a meaningless platitude in view of the fact that most children who live in poverty have at least one parent in work.”

    House of Commons16 June 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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47. “These pupils have been temporarily eligible for free school meals during the pandemic; will the Minister commit to ensuring that that continues, not just this summer, but as a permanent change in policy? It is telling that the Education Secretary should imply that children need access to nutritious, healthy meals only when they are at school. If it is wrong for children to go hungry, it is always wrong for children to go hungry, not just during a global pandemic and not only while they are at school. Despite the very welcome U-turn, this Government are by no means let off the hook for their shameful and damning record on child poverty and hunger. In the sixth richest country in the world, there is no excuse for letting a single child go to bed hungry.”

    House of Commons16 June 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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48. “The idea that children should not go hungry is one that most people would consider an issue of basic morality. I am glad that the Government have now conceded that the free school meals scheme should be extended to cover the summer, but given that the Under-Secretary of State for Education, the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford), was still arguing against this only a few hours ago, it is clear that this is not a moral change of heart, but a result of incredible pressure from campaigners such as Marcus Rashford and the Opposition. I would like to ask the Minister about one aspect of the policy. There are many children in this country who have committed no crime but the crime of being migrants —an accident of geography—and who therefore have no recourse to public funds.”

    House of Commons16 June 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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49. “We will try again. Does the Home Secretary agree that the Government should remove statues of British figures involved in the slave trade? Further, does she agree that the lives of black people who have died following contact with police, such as Sarah Reed and Rashan Charles, are worth more than any statue?”

    House of Commons8 June 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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50. “We should return immediately to hybrid proceedings and remote voting to enable Parliament to work safely and effectively during the pandemic and make improvements from there, not be forced backwards in this way.”

    House of Commons8 June 2020Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗

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