Josh Babarinde
MP for Eastbourne · Liberal Democrat · United Kingdom
“Fly-tippers tend to vanish just as the mess gets traced back to them—much like Nigel Farage earlier this week. Closer to home, I led a community walkabout with the Friends of Outer Devonshire, alongside residents such as Emma Boyes and Kay Skinner, to look at fly-tipping hotspots in Eastbourne.”
“Civil compensation is disregarded from pension credit entitlement calculations, but military compensation is not. I know that the new Minister for Veterans is sympathetic to addressing this injustice, so I wonder whether he would meet me and the family of Pauline Cole—a veteran who was fighting to address this matter—in order to put it ri…”
“I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) for securing this debate. Beachy Head in my constituency is, regrettably, one of the most visited suicide spots in the world. Every year, brave coastguards such as Mark Francis in Eastbourne recover bodies from those cliffs and intervene at the cliff edge.”
“Disgracefully, there are some in this House who believe that it is for the England football team to prevent domestic abuse, whereas we all know that it is for perpetrators to stop their abuse.”
“Q12. As an Eastbourne boy born and bred, I can tell the Deputy Prime Minister that Eastbourne pier is an iconic part of our heritage, an iconic part of our local economy, and an iconic part of me; I literally have it tattooed on me, and I can show the Deputy Prime Minister afterwards.”
“Domestic abuse survivors who work in retail roles are at particular risk in that their perpetrators often know exactly where they are, which till they might be working at and what their shift patterns are. The perpetrators can continue to perpetrate abuse even while their victim or survivor is at work. Does my hon.”
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“Seventeen-year-old Oakley Meer lost his life in a collision on Beachy Head Road in Eastbourne. Will the Minister meet me and Oakley’s family to discuss how we can improve road safety on that treacherous road?”
“Fly-tippers tend to vanish just as the mess gets traced back to them—much like Nigel Farage earlier this week. Closer to home, I led a community walkabout with the Friends of Outer Devonshire, alongside residents such as Emma Boyes and Kay Skinner, to look at fly-tipping hotspots in Eastbourne. Will the Minister commend them for their work, and outline what steps the Government will take to support them and their community to tackle fly-tipping once and for all?”
“Civil compensation is disregarded from pension credit entitlement calculations, but military compensation is not. I know that the new Minister for Veterans is sympathetic to addressing this injustice, so I wonder whether he would meet me and the family of Pauline Cole—a veteran who was fighting to address this matter—in order to put it right.”
“I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) for securing this debate. Beachy Head in my constituency is, regrettably, one of the most visited suicide spots in the world. Every year, brave coastguards such as Mark Francis in Eastbourne recover bodies from those cliffs and intervene at the cliff edge. Their presence is often the difference between intervention and inquest. That is why I am outraged at the proposed changes that threaten to decimate our coastguard service and threaten lives. I urge the Minister, on behalf of not only our brave CROs, but the bereaved Beachy Head families, to pause the changes, to object to the MCA’s short-sightedness and to ensure that our CROs get the support that they deserve and that our communities need.”
“Disgracefully, there are some in this House who believe that it is for the England football team to prevent domestic abuse, whereas we all know that it is for perpetrators to stop their abuse. As for those making more positive and valuable contributions in this space, will the Minister join me in celebrating the amazing work of Eastbourne Survivors, who support folks on an entirely voluntary basis to recover from the abuse they have experienced throughout their lives?”
“Domestic abuse survivors who work in retail roles are at particular risk in that their perpetrators often know exactly where they are, which till they might be working at and what their shift patterns are. The perpetrators can continue to perpetrate abuse even while their victim or survivor is at work. Does my hon. Friend believe that the Government need to go even further to provide protections to specifically protect domestic abuse survivors in retail roles?”
“Q12. As an Eastbourne boy born and bred, I can tell the Deputy Prime Minister that Eastbourne pier is an iconic part of our heritage, an iconic part of our local economy, and an iconic part of me; I literally have it tattooed on me, and I can show the Deputy Prime Minister afterwards. On a serious note, the residents of Eastbourne have become concerned for the pier’s future, after a company connected to the pier fell into liquidation, and maintenance costs for piers across the country are sky high. Will the Deputy Prime Minister back my “Protect our Pier” campaign, and meet me to discuss emergency measures to safeguard our pier for the future?”
“I am leading the campaign to have Eastbourne pier registered as an asset of community value in order to safeguard its future. Will the Government back the campaign to ensure that Eastbourne pier continues to stand strong?”
“Residents of Park Avenue in Eastbourne like David Tomlinson and Cat Harris have been campaigning with the headteacher of Ratton school, Gavin Peevers, and folks in my team like Euan Morrison to make their road safer after cats have been struck by speeding cars and children have had near misses on the way into school. The previous Conservative-led county council failed to implement more traffic-calming measures to tackle speeding and road safety, so will the Secretary of State join me in encouraging the new Reform-led county council to tackle those issues on Park Avenue?”
“Following power outages at Eastbourne district general hospital that left operations and birth services suspended, hospital bosses submitted a strategic bid for more than £10 million to the estates safety fund to urgently fix the problem, which was rejected. How does the Secretary of State expect our hospital to provide consistent and safe care to patients if the power goes out?”
“That duty exists in school settings, but the situation is patchy for home-to-school transport. The Challenging Behaviour Foundation has rightly said that stronger safeguarding guidance, linked to “Working Together to Safeguard Children”, is required. Those are not complex or costly asks. They are nowhere near as complex or costly on a human level as the trauma that Lewis has experienced and the anguish that his family have been through.”
“When I raised the issue again at Prime Minister’s questions in November the Prime Minister looked into the eyes of Lewis’s mum, who was in the Public Gallery, and said that the principle of safety and tailored support for every child would be “central” to his SEND reforms. I am asking, and Lewis and his mum are asking, why the issue was not addressed in those reforms. Why was that gap in regulation not filled? The Challenging Behaviour Foundation, which does lots of amazing work and research in this area, has set out exactly what is needed. It has rightly said that we need national training standards for all staff on home-to-school transport—something that does not exist now but could have helped Lewis. We also need a statutory duty to record and report to parents any use of restraint on home-to-school transport.”
“That is because, shockingly, there is no statutory requirement to report incidents of physical restraint on home-to-school transport. We only know the specifics of what happened from looking at it, because it was captured on CCTV in the vehicle, and it was only captured because Eastbourne borough council—coincidentally, when I was a councillor—pushed for mandatory CCTV in cabs that facilitate home-to-school transport. I raised Lewis’s case at Education questions last April and secured a meeting with the Minister’s predecessor, the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell), who acknowledged that there is a clear gap in regulation.”
“I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Tom Gordon) on securing the debate. Members will be pleased to know that my speech will be under six minutes, so we will have brought that time back. I want to speak about home-to-school transport for children with special educational needs and disabilities and in particular about Lewis—that is not his real name, but he is a real Eastbourne boy with special educational needs. What happened to Lewis should never happen to any child. Lewis was physically restrained, relentlessly and brutally, by his passenger assistant on his home-to-school transport. His mum only found out when he came home that evening visibly distressed and bruised. She had not been told.”
“I completely agree. My little brother is autistic so, as a family, we see up close how important consistency is and how disrupting the consistency of a particular service can be hugely disruptive to the flow of his life. The same goes for many others with special educational needs and disabilities, so I would absolutely add that ask. I hope that the Minister can address it in her winding-up speech. Those four points are the minimum that Lewis and every SEND child travelling to school deserves. I hope that the Minister will meet me and Lewis’s mum to discuss this issue further—things fell through the cracks with the change of Minister at the last reshuffle—so that we can finally get closer to delivering on the promise that the Prime Minister made.”
“The Government have accepted the principle; it just has not been applied to Pauline, or the thousands of veterans like her. It must be applied to them, and that must be communicated to all of them. I urge the Minister to begin correcting this injustice by undertaking a financial assessment of this change, and communicating that to veterans in receipt of the war disablement pension. I urge him to meet me and Pauline’s sons, Simon and Les Haffenden, who are continuing the campaign, so that we can discuss provisions to correct this injustice before the Bill’s Report, and can ensure that no veteran is ever again penalised for serving our country.”
“When I raised this injustice with the Government via the DWP, they said that the Government have no plans to change this policy. When I asked a written parliamentary question on what it would cost to exempt military compensation from pension credit entitlements, the answer was that “no formal assessment has been made.” The Government say that they cannot afford to fix this, but they have not undertaken to find out what fixing it would even cost. They cannot hide behind affordability when they have never looked at the price tag. The Government have shown that they can act differently: after the Etherton review on LGBT veterans, the Minister confirmed that those compensation payments would, as is right, be exempt from tax and would not affect benefits.”
“In order to sustain herself on that new income, Pauline was forced to seek lower-cost accommodation, and moved out of her Eastbourne home to somewhere else in the county of Sussex. I raised the case with the Pensions Minister. Pauline came with me to the Department for Work and Pensions. I have raised the matter in this Chamber at Prime Minister’s questions, and Pauline sat in the Gallery. Sadly, she passed away a few months after having to move, in November 2025, never having seen this issue corrected. I have pledged to continue this fight around pension communications and pension entitlement in her honour, together with her sons Simon and Les Haffenden. The Royal British Legion has been clear that the current state of affairs is, in its view, a violation of the armed forces covenant.”
“After years of tribunals, the Government recognised her sacrifice and awarded her military compensation in the form of a war disablement pension. Before receiving that compensation, Pauline had been in receipt of £76.96 a week in pension credit. After receiving that compensation, her pension credit collapsed to just £9.23 a week. That is because military compensation is considered income for the purposes of calculating pension credit, even though compensation awarded in a civil context is disregarded from such calculations. Indeed, military compensation is disregarded from universal credit calculations, but not from pension credit. In this case, the Government gave with one hand and took with the other.”
“I speak in support of amendment 88, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire). It would require the Secretary of State to review the way that former service personnel are communicated with about their pension entitlements, and I support that wholeheartedly. I want to use this opportunity to raise again in this Chamber an injustice that goes far deeper than communication; it goes to the heart of what this country owes its veterans. I want to share with the House, for the sixth or seventh time, the story of legendary Eastbournian Pauline Cole. Pauline was a staff sergeant, and served this country with distinction during the conflict in Aden in the ’60s. As a direct result of her service, she suffered solar skin damage, resulting in cancer and post-traumatic stress disorder.”
“This Armed Forces Day will mark the first that Eastbourne commemorates without Staff Sergeant Pauline Cole, a local veteran who died last year. Pauline received military compensation for injuries she received during her service, but she had her pension credit cut because her compensation was considered as income. To mark this Armed Forces Day, will the Minister review that arrangement, so that we can make sure that our veterans are not punished for their service to our country?”
“I was staggered to find in the 1,500 pages published today that the victims and survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes are not referred to in any of the documents dated before Peter Mandelson’s appointment. The only reference to Epstein’s victims is an email sent after Mandelson was sacked. Victims and survivors should never be an afterthought, and they clearly were in this case. How will the Government ensure that the trauma of Epstein’s victims and survivors is never betrayed again?”
“I pay tribute to Bourne Out LGBT and Bourne This Way in Eastbourne, which do great work to advance the rights of LGBT folks locally. I also pay tribute to LGBT+ Lib Dems and Liberal Democrat Women, which do great work within my party to advance equality, unlike this code of practice, which is unworkable for all, immoral for all and undermines equality for all. The Government’s own equality impact assessment has said of the draft code that “Women who are considered masculine may face greater scrutiny about their sex as a result of the changes. This will likely have a negative impact on this group”. In what way does this enhance the privacy, dignity and safety of women?”
“Hon. Members will remember the harrowing images of three-year-old Alan Kurdi, who was found lying dead on a beach in Turkey after drowning when the boat that he and his family were on sunk. A Reform candidate at the 7 May elections, in describing that situation, blamed it on his parents’ “greed”. That candidate was very close to winning. Today, East Sussex Conservatives have done a deal that has allowed Reform to take control of East Sussex county council, despite Eastbourne voting against that. Will the Leader of the House grant an urgent debate on how we can ensure that towns like Eastbourne are governed by those they actually voted for?”
“NHS Sussex found that Eastbourne, despite being the sunniest town in the UK, is one of the most digitally excluded patches of Sussex. Great organisations, such as TechResort, run by Liz Crew and Will Callaghan, help bridge the digital divide. However, they will be scuppered by the closing of the digital inclusion innovation fund; its last grant expired last month. Will the Minister commit to reviewing the reopening of that fund, and set out a timeline for that, so that TechResort can benefit?”
“I am sure that the House will join me in paying tribute to the former Minister for victims, the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones), for her amazing work. I wish the new Minister the best of luck in the role. Some 90% of young men and boys incarcerated for violent offences have experienced or witnessed domestic abuse or another form of abuse at home. The Government are investing in increasing the number of independent domestic violence advisers available to adult survivors, but there is no like-for-like equivalent for children to access that kind of direct advocacy. Will the Justice Secretary consider that proposal, which a number of victims charities have advocated for, to ensure that young men and boys have the domestic abuse support that they need and deserve?”
“Conservative-run East Sussex county council has shut down its CLASS+ service, which supported people with autism towards independent futures, including with employment. With elections for East Sussex county council just around the corner, does the Minister agree that we should be expanding services to support autistic people into work and not shutting them down as the Conservatives are doing?”
“I pay tribute to the courage of the delivery driver and to PSNI officers, whose bravery saved lives in this deplorable attack. I also want to use this opportunity to pay tribute to one of my predecessors, Ian Gow, who was murdered by the IRA in a car bomb attack outside his Eastbourne home in 1990. His memory is enshrined in this Chamber via a shield above the door. As well as ensuring that the PSNI is resourced to ensure that terrorists face the full force of the law, can the Secretary of State tell us what assessment has been made of the threat that dissident republicans pose to the British mainland, with a view to ensuring that no community anywhere in the United Kingdom suffers what has scarred the people of Northern Ireland and the people of Eastbourne?”
“In February, Capita said to Eastbourne resident Keith that his civil service pension would be paid by March. By March, it said his pension would be paid in April. Now it says that it will not be paid before May. How will the Minister intervene to hold this cowboy corporate to account?”
“Twenty-four-year-old Eastbournian Chanté Lloyd-Buckingham was tragically found dead in her supported accommodation in the town in 2024, amid grave concerns about the quality of the care that she was—or, indeed, was not—receiving. Scandalously, many private supported accommodation providers are not CQC regulated, so many of them take our money but do not take responsibility. Given that Chanté’s parents, Emma and Karl, secured 70,000 signatures on their e-petition to regulate supported accommodation but did not quite make the 100,000 for a debate, will the Leader of the House consider granting a debate on this issue to honour the memory of Chanté?”
“T4. Eastbourne headteachers have expressed grave concerns about the impact of the new Ofsted framework on staff wellbeing, and its punishing impact on schools in deprived areas. Will the Minister meet me and Eastbourne headteachers for a roundtable to discuss how we can avoid disastrous consequences happening again?”
“Eastbourne’s historical bandstand is set to reopen this summer after a refurbishment programme. Mr Speaker, I would like to invite you to come and celebrate with us as our guest of honour at our famous Motown night in July; I know you are a big fan of Motown, so I will give you the invitation later on. We could have even more to celebrate at the bandstand if the Minister were able to review the criteria for the heritage at risk fund, which was announced earlier this year. The fund currently does not seem to cover local authority-run music venues, like Eastbourne bandstand, but we want it to do so, so that we can protect the bandstand for future generations. Will the Minister give an assurance that he will review the criteria?”
“Will the Second Church Estates Commissioner come down to Eastbourne—the sunniest town in the UK—to visit the church and back our appeal, of which I am a patron, to restore St Mary’s church?”
“St Mary’s church in Old Town in Eastbourne is a grade I listed church that was built in the 12th century. A recent survey has revealed that the roof and east window are in urgent need of repair with a half-a-million pound restoration. Mother Arwen, the vicar, therefore needs to know when the places of worship renewal fund will open. I hope that the Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, the hon. Member for Barnsley South (Stephanie Peacock), who is sitting on the Front Bench, might be able to help us all in answering that question. In the meantime, the church is launching a fundraising appeal to try to bring together community funds to restore the church.”
“I commend the Minister on this women’s health strategy, and particularly on action 59, which is to invest in the women’s maternity and neonatal estate. I am also grateful to the Minister for agreeing to meet me next week about power cuts at Eastbourne district general hospital, which have knocked out the maternity unit at various times. I am really disappointed, though, that although the invitation was originally extended to me and two guests—who included our chief executive—that has been withdrawn. Can the Minister confirm that those guests can attend, so that we can discuss how to put this strategy into action in Eastbourne?”
“Conservative-run East Sussex county council has a vendetta against local businesses. Most recently, it placed an enormous storage crate outside the Dickens Tea Cottage, which will affect local businesses. Will the Minister urge the council to remove it so that we can protect custom at that local business?”
“Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. I have given advance notice to you and the hon. Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage). There is an important tradition and custom in this House that Members remain in the Chamber for at least—”
“Sovereign Harbour in Eastbourne is the only marina of its kind in Europe; thousands of residents, rather than the Government, have to cover the cost of sea defences through an annual charge. The charge this year increased by 16%—way more than inflation—and there is poor transparency as to why. Will the Minister meet me and representatives of the amazing Sovereign Harbour Residents Association, who are in the Gallery, to hear more about the issues with the harbour charge, and to help us secure a fairer arrangement?”
“This is pushing our posties to breaking point: amazing posties like Manuel, my postie, and others across town, in particular Barry, who covers King’s Drive too. I make one short and simple request of the Minister in order to support us in Eastbourne to stand up and be heard. Will he meet with me and hard-working local posties, as well as representatives of the CWU, to hear directly from those on the frontline about what is going on in Eastbourne, the challenges they face, and the upstream changes that are urgently needed to make Royal Mail great again?”
“The Royal Mail leadership is failing our hard-working posties and failing Eastbourne. Eastbournians are missing vital medical appointments because letters from doctors have arrived late. Others are being forced to reschedule legal hearings because of to delayed documents, and some are missing important deadlines for paying fines and bills. Time and again, the Royal Mail has unacceptably attempted to pile the blame on our hard-working posties by citing long-term sickness and absence as the primary cause of the failures. That is not true. The problem is a toxic culture at the top—a culture in which staff feel unable to take well-deserved annual leave, and when they do, they return to weeks of backlog and are left playing catch-up because cover is not taken seriously.”
“1. If he will make an estimate of the potential cost to the public purse of disregarding the war pension scheme and the armed forces compensation scheme for the purpose of calculating pension credit entitlement.”
“The Minister will remember that Pauline was a veteran who was awarded military compensation for injuries sustained in her service, but that led to her pension credit being cut from £77 a week to £10 a week, because military compensation is considered income by the Department for Work and Pensions. I have introduced Pauline’s law—the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme and War Pension Scheme (Report) Bill—to ask the DWP to correct that injustice and disregard military compensation in those calculations. Will the Minister work with me, and with Pauline’s sons, Les and Simon Haffenden, to conduct a review into the merits of disregarding that income in order to protect our veterans in future?”
“What can the Minister do to support us, first, to get an alternative to the medication that she needs, and, secondly, to get Donna back home to Eastbourne safely?”
“A statement on consular assistance is no time for party political attacks. That does a disservice to hard-working officials such as Sarah Taylor, who has been doing amazing work, and it does a disservice to our constituents who are stuck abroad. I am pleased to report to the Minister that Cameron, the individual I mentioned to the Prime Minister in the Chamber earlier this week, who was stuck in a hospital in Dubai, is now back home safe in London. However, I want to raise the plight of another constituent, Donna, who I spoke to the Minister about yesterday. Donna has attempted to board six flights from the United Arab Emirates back to London, but each has been cancelled. She has a number of health conditions and has run out of medication. She cannot get that medication or its equivalent in the United Arab Emirates.”
“I have appealed to the Minister and the wider Government numerous times to accelerate that investment to Eastbourne and to bring forward our plans—after all, we were ready to go, but we were asked to pause. If the Government will not do that, however, will the Minister at least meet with the trust and me to discuss accelerating the release of the £42 million needed to replace the failing electricity substation that was responsible for the power cut, to ensure that Eastbourne residents get the consistent care and urgent investment that they need and deserve? I really do appeal to the Minister—if I need to, I will beg her—for that meeting so that we can figure out how to unlock that critical investment.”
“It is of grave concern to us, however, that we are in the last wave of that programme, which means that investment will not land with us until 2037 at the earliest. Meanwhile, many of our fears in Eastbourne have materialised. On 6 January, Eastbourne district general hospital suffered a power outage that hit many areas of the hospital. Nurses told me that they were forced to use their iPhone torches to light the way for the several hours that the power cut occurred. Because of that outage, operations were cancelled and our midwifery unit was closed for days. It stemmed from the insufficient power infrastructure that is in need of urgent investment—the very reason, in fact, why Eastbourne district general hospital was included in the new hospital programme full stop.”
“Indeed, the trust has said: “The age and standard of the current hospital buildings presents challenges for the consistent delivery of safe, effective, responsive and efficient care”. The half a billion-pound maintenance backlog bill that the trust faces is a financial representation of that. We were grateful to be included in the new hospital programme by the last Government—I am very sad not to see more representatives of that Government in attendance at this debate—but of course nothing happened under the Johnson Government. Eastbourne was therefore even more grateful to this Government for making a much more serious commitment to include it in the new hospital programme and to fund the DGH through the programme.”
“Thank you, Mr Western. I was half expecting to hear “Luke Babarinde”, but we got there in the end. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Bobby Dean) for securing this critical debate. I will focus my remarks on Eastbourne district general hospital, where I was born. It is at the core of life in Eastbourne. I want to pay tribute to the amazing staff at that hospital, who deliver for the people of Eastbourne and beyond day in, day out. However, over the years we have lost key services at Eastbourne district general hospital to hospitals such as the Conquest in Hastings, forcing Eastbourne residents to travel even further for the care they need. As well as that, our buildings are falling into a state of disrepair.”
“A 23-year-old Eastbourne lad, Cameron, is currently lying stranded in a Dubai hospital bed after falling very ill during a minutes-long stopover in Dubai over the weekend. During this window, the airspace closed. Cameron’s hospital bills are £1,000 a day, which he is being forced to pay up front despite having insurance. Cameron, who is watching, urgently needs to know the following. First, when will the Prime Minister outline his repatriation plan, if there will be one? Secondly, will he prioritise British nationals who are clinically vulnerable for repatriation, if it is medically safe? Thirdly, will the appropriate Minister meet me and Cameron’s family to ensure that he gets the treatment he needs before money runs out and to make sure that we get Cameron back to Eastbourne safe?”
“Does the hon. Member agree that what also fuels the division and the attacks on politicians is when some individuals, including Members of this House, express that they are driven mad by the sight of black and Asian people in different spaces in our society? Does she agree that that should stop, and that all Members have a responsibility to call it out?”