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12,832 spoken contributions under 12 words (interjections such as “Will the hon. Member give way?”) are hidden. Show them
The hon. Member is making an excellent speech. He draws attention to the wider issues that result from this debate. Does he agree that it is precisely the current Home Office policies that are creating the environment in which paradoxical effects are being felt? In my constituency there are shortages of labour in fishing, farming, social care and health care, and hospitality? That is exactly the point I think he is trying to make.
My hon. Friend will not be surprised to hear that I agree with everything he says. I note that the Father of the House, the right hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh), chose not to use the word “illegal”. Does my hon. Friend agree with me that it is anathema to see the word “illegal” in this motion, because there is no such thing as an illegal migrant?
The hon. Lady has mentioned the ECHR a couple of times, and her motion refers to the UK’s exit from the convention. I know that she is all over her brief, so can she tell me what that exit would mean for the devolved settlement? What implications would it have for the Scottish Parliament?
It would also have huge implications for settlements across the United Kingdom. The Conservatives did not know this, but there would be a massive implication for Scottish devolution, for all our legislation is predicated on a commitment to being compliant with ECHR regulations. Will the hon. Gentleman tell the Conservatives exactly what this would do to our internal arrangements across the UK?
When I saw the motion on the Order Paper, I had to look twice as I was absolutely certain that it must be a Reform motion, but then I remembered that they do not get Opposition days. The motion is indeed in the name of the Conservative party. For all this “I will never work with Nigel Farage” and so on that we hear from the Conservative leadership, they are now literally indistinguishable from Reform, with their antipathy towards asylum seekers, immigration and human rights now defining these new “Reformatives”. The Conservatives are responsible for the crisis that we are currently confronting in the asylum system, having created huge, outstanding backlogs from their time in office that required the use of facilities such as those at Bicester. I know very little about the situation in Bicester, so I am not going to comment on the particularities, but when the Government are dealing with asylum seekers, they are absolutely right to try to ensure that there is equity across the whole of the United Kingdom, so that towns and cities like those in my constituency are not left to accommodate the masses of asylum seekers that we currently have. It is right that every constituency must play its part in trying to clear up the mess that was bequeathed by the Conservatives. The last place where this “not in my backyard” principle should apply is when we are dealing with real people’s lives. There is blanket opposition to accommodation for asylum seekers right across the United Kingdom, and that has been created by the culture, climate and the language that is used just now when we come to describe asylum seekers. Some of the language that I have heard from Members on the Conservative Front Bench and in some of the contributions by Conservative Members is simply appalling: demonising, othering and trying to present whole communities as deviants—sexual deviancy and the rest. I find that absolutely unacceptable. It is no wonder that communities are really upset about the prospect of people coming into their constituencies.
No one in this world is illegal—[Interruption.] I hear chuntering from the Conservative Front Bench as usual. People are fleeing for their lives from situations across the world. They are fleeing from oppression—
The right hon. Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp) says they are fleeing from France, but where does he think they have come from? They come from some of the worst war-torn countries. I challenge him to go there and live for six months just to see how he would get on—[Interruption.]
Look at them! The appalling behaviour from the Conservatives on sensitive issues such as this and the language that they have used today is an absolute and utter disgrace. No wonder communities up and down this country are concerned about their very safety, given the language that these Conservatives use. The issue that most concerns me is the Conservative proposal to leave the ECHR. That would send a deeply troubling message to communities across the country and to our partners internationally. It would deprive our citizens of valued and essential human rights and diminish our very sense of ourselves. The new Reform and Tory hostility towards human rights is well established. Their disdain for international co-operation and consensus is now a defining characteristic. Yet the fact that they would drag us out of the ECHR tells us something reassuring about the ECHR, because when the likes of the new right Tories and Reform want to do that, that shows that the ECHR is doing its job properly and defending us from the likes of them. That tells us why we actually need it. Let us remind ourselves of the company we would keep if we were to leave the ECHR: Russia and Belarus—bastions of human rights and freedoms. Let us remind ourselves about this document. The ECHR was born from the ashes of the second world war, when the horrors of the Holocaust still cast a shadow over the world. The UK was at the heart of its creation. It was Winston Churchill, a giant of a Prime Minister—a Conservative Prime Minister—who was the designer and who ensured that we got it in place. Leaving the ECHR, as the Conservatives suggest, would do absolutely nothing to stop the boats coming to the UK, as it would do absolutely nothing to end irregular immigration. However, what it would do is put a huge statement to the rest of the world that Britain is closing down, does not value international co-operation and has become more insular. I loathe the idea of a world that is going to be run under that type of culture and language under a Conservative-Reform coalition.
Absolutely. Whole communities across the United Kingdom are now concerned about their safety. They are very anxious about the type of culture that is evolving and developing in every constituency and community. They are right to be concerned, because I hear it in my constituency myself. On the subject of the small boats, the truth is that there are more National Lottery millionaires each year than there are foreign nationals who have won human rights appeals due to the ECHR in the United Kingdom. If the ECHR were removed, it would deprive us in Scotland of our basic fundamentals in the Scottish Parliament, which is that every part of our legislation has to be ECHR-compliant. It is not just the devolution process in Northern Ireland that will be compromised; it will be my Parliament and our democracy in Scotland, which the Conservatives care not a jot about, and they would pursue our leaving the ECHR without giving it a second thought. For all of these reasons, this is a thoroughly bad motion—an abhorrent motion—and I despair of the language that has been used. I hope when the Conservatives sum up we will hear a little bit more about decency and the common values that we could all buy into, but I doubt that very much—
Current cost estimates for Sizewell C are close to £40 billion, and the Government estimate that the necessary nuclear waste facility will cost up to £60 billion. It has been described by one Government Department as “unachievable”. Independent experts are suggesting that costs could be closer to £70 billion for the waste facility alone. Is it not unacceptable to pile those eye-watering costs on to bill payers? Should we not instead invest in cheaper, cleaner energy technology, such as deep geothermal and tidal stream energy, which could deliver the baseload?
The hon. Member suggests that new nuclear would cut bills, but the nuclear power stations that are being built are manifestly not cutting bills. Building new nuclear power stations will add to bills. A nuclear waste facility could cost as much as £70 billion; nobody has described how that is actually going to happen, even though it needs to happen, and how it will be paid for. It will probably go on to bill payers. How will that reduce bills for anybody within any kind of reasonable timescale?
To emphasise a point that I made earlier, there are alternatives. We could invest in things such as geothermal; deep geothermal can generate huge amounts of heat, and therefore steam, to power the turbine generation of electricity. It can be done for a fraction of the price, it can be built in a fraction of the time, it is clean and it leaves no waste legacy in the way that nuclear does. Does the hon. Member agree that that would be a useful way forward?
I just want to know how the hon. Member thinks that energy from nuclear power stations the length and breadth of the country would be transported about the country.
I welcome the Minister to her place, but to suggest that to be anti-nuclear is to be anti-baseload or anti other forms of useful energy that can provide baseload is absolute nonsense. Will she accept that looking only at nuclear, and not properly backing things such as geothermal or tidal energy, is a blinkered approach? We could be creating many jobs in Scotland from those forms of energy—God knows we know how to drill a hole and get stuff out of it.
Four years ago, I was the first Conservative Minister to say publicly that, to stop the boats and protect women and girls, we needed to leave the European convention on human rights. My hon. Friend the Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage) has been advocating for departure from the ECHR for many years. Will the shadow Minister take this opportunity to apologise to the nation, on behalf of the Leader of the Opposition, for refusing to support my policy proposal when her party had the opportunity, power and, indeed, duty to stop the boats and deal with the invasion?
I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate. I was honoured to visit Piddington a few weeks ago, with my hon. Friend the Member for Runcorn and Helsby (Sarah Pochin), representing my party, Reform, as one of the first female MPs to respond to the women of Piddington when they wrote to all female MPs in this House. It is interesting that there are no female Labour Back Benchers sitting in on this debate. That is how seriously the party in government takes this issue. When I met the women of Piddington, I was staggered. They are scared, they are angry and they feel like no one in government is listening to them. The people there are not far-right thugs. Many of the women—and, indeed, the men—that I met are elderly pensioners. Some of them are widowed and living alone. Many are parents speaking on behalf of their children. This small rural village is right now fighting against the British state right in order to protect itself. It is a scandal that no one in this Government is willing to listen to the women and girls of Piddington. Unfortunately, this is not confined to Piddington; it also involves the people of Waterlooville. Last year I led a campaign with 10,000 local people to fight the Home Office and the Labour-Lib Dem plans to house asylum seekers there. We were successful on that occasion. Now I am supporting people in Gosport and in Portsmouth who are taking to the streets in peaceful protest against illegal migrants arriving on their shores.
I will not, because I want to respect the direction given by Madam Deputy Speaker. This issue is extending across our country, and it is out of control. The Government say it is getting better, but the boats are getting bigger, the people are coming in higher numbers, and British people are more scared than ever. And they are right to be scared, because the facts are that Afghan and Eritrean migrant men are 22 times more likely to be convicted of sex crimes than Brits, and 40% of sexual assaults in London over the last five years were committed by foreign-born men. I am not making that up. That is data. These are not irrational fears, but they are being treated with contempt. The tragedy of all this is that it is caused by the ECHR. People come here on the boats illegally. They claim to be victims of persecution and to have family rights here—all gaming human rights laws against us. I saw this as Home Secretary, as Attorney General and previously as a barrister working in the field. I wrote a paper about it last year, which was dismissed by the Conservative party. The truth is—we have got to be honest about this—that we might not even have had to be here talking about Piddington or Gosport or Fort Blockhouse or Waterlooville. This problem could have been fixed. The tragedy is that the last Conservative Government utterly refused to do the right thing—[Interruption.] I will come to that. I was the first Conservative Minister who said publicly that to fix this crisis we needed to leave the ECHR. I said it as Attorney General and as Home Secretary. What happened? The Leader of the Opposition said that I was having a nervous breakdown. The Conservatives said that I had mental health problems. They demonised me, isolated me and blocked me from doing the right thing. I have asked them to apologise today. They have refused to apologise to the nation for causing this crisis and I will not let them off the hook. I have just published a book setting out the painful battles I had with my Conservative party colleagues to fix this, so I will not take any lectures from anyone in the Conservative party about their promises to leave the ECHR. Do not believe them. What do we need to stop this invasion and fix this national security emergency that my hon. Friend the Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage) has been talking about for years? We need to leave the ECHR, with credible leadership. We need to suspend our asylum system now, void all those grants of asylum, deport all those people who are applying for asylum—deport 90,000 people—and, yes, deploy the Royal Navy into the channel to ensure that we properly secure our borders. This Labour Government will not do it. The last Conservative Government did not do it. This Conservative party cannot be trusted. Only Reform will stop the invasion and stop these boats.
MI5 boss Sir Ken McCallum yesterday revealed that there have been 50 arrests in the last year linked to Iran, and I have to say that this Government deserve praise. They deserve praise for proscribing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps—a very important move. But every single week there are young, unidentified males from Iran coming into this country, some of whom pose a genuine security threat to our nation. Is it not time the Government recognised that what is going on in the English channel is a national security emergency?
5. What recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the Crown Prosecution Service in ensuring access to justice for victims of crime.
I thank the Attorney General for her answer, but a constituent from Guildford has endured repeated delays to a domestic abuse prosecution. Causes included the Crown Prosecution Service failing to secure a barrister, and a trial collapsing after eight days as the proceedings had overrun and jurors could no longer continue, due to other commitments. She now faces the prospect of waiting for justice until June 2028, almost five years after her husband’s arrest. By then, there is a real risk that crucial evidence will have been lost. Does the Attorney General recognise that administrative failures like these undermine victims’ confidence in the criminal justice system? What accountability is there when CPS failings cause such devastating delays?
My hon. Friend is making a really strong statement about the schools in her patch and in wider Stockport. The oversubscription of schools impacts Cheadle too. Schools such as Woodford primary school have been oversubscribed for some time. Does she think that if we crack the funding issue and make funding fairer, that would help the admissions system and give parents the peace of mind that they can choose the school that is best for their kid?
It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stuart, and to follow the hon. Member for Salford (Rebecca Long Bailey) and my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Marie Goldman). I have four NHS trusts serving my enormous constituency, which is the second biggest in England: the North Cumbria foundation trust, which is ranked 117th out of 134; the Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne and Wear foundation mental health trust, which ranks 39th out of 58; the University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay foundation trust, which ranks 97th out of 134; and the Lancashire and South Cumbria foundation mental health trust, which ranks 54th out of 58. What do those four trusts have in common? They are run and staffed by outstanding people who are wonderful, compassionate, committed and capable. They all also struggle with a common underlying challenge: rurality, which this Government, like their Conservative predecessors, fail to understand and, indeed, to tackle. Let me start with the Morecambe Bay trust. It has three hospitals, but it is funded as if it had just one. This year, NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care are forcing £32.5 million-worth of cost savings on the trust, causing it to have to close 42 beds, despite the fact that it has been at level 4 of the operational pressures escalation levels framework—the highest level of alert and extreme pressure on services—a total of 14 times over the last 12 months, including three times in June, July and August. We have some of the worst cancer waiting times in the country, and it is no surprise, because in south Cumbria we have no direct or close access to radiotherapy treatment. The OECD average, and the target, for the proportion of people with cancer who receive radiotherapy is 53%. In the UK, that figure is a mere 36%, and Lancashire and south Cumbria is the worst area in the worst country in the OECD, at only 29%. In north Cumbria, people use the Penrith urgent treatment centre, which is brilliant, but it is often under enormous pressure because the nearby Keswick urgent treatment centre—in the constituency of the hon. Member for Penrith and Solway (Markus Campbell-Savours)—is often closed because of understaffing. Mental health provision in the two mental health trusts is under enormous pressure. When Cumbria has a suicide rate twice the national average, that is unacceptable. In addition, the local council is proposing to close Applethwaite Green care home in Windermere because of a 31% cut that the Government have made to the council’s funding this year. Why have the Government done that? Because they do not get rurality and they do not fund services in rural communities. I want to finish by mentioning a Policy Exchange report, the foreword of which was written by my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) and the title of which reads: “The Rural Penalty: How NHS funding formulas are disadvantaging rural and coastal areas and putting health devolution at risk”. It is not just putting health devolution at risk; it is putting the health and the lives of my constituents at risk, and I hope the Minister will put that right.
I beg to move, That this House has considered the future of nuclear energy in Scotland. It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Stuart. I am grateful to see that so many Members wish to speak about this issue. I welcome the Minister to her first debate. I grew up in Aberdeen, the home of North sea oil and gas. I was there when Aberdeen became a cosmopolitan city. At first, workers from the US and Australia arrived to work on the rigs; then came people from all over the UK. Local Scots developed the skills to join the offshore workforce. Our economy boomed, local businesses grew, businesses relocated and new businesses emerged. New housing was built, and the price of existing homes skyrocketed as incomes rose. The oil extraction bandwagon arrived and communities thrived. Scotland benefited from the economic boost and became known as an energy producer. Now, those oilfields are in decline, the reserves are depleted and the oil and gas bandwagon is leaving town. We must ensure that we do not lose the skilled workforce, and offer it an alternative future in Scotland. Although the climate emergency means that we need to move away from fossil fuels to low-carbon energy sources, no country has achieved that with renewable electricity alone. Scotland already produces the electricity that it needs from renewables, including hydro and onshore and offshore wind, with the balance of demand coming from Torness nuclear power station—although that is due to end in 2030. With a much greater demand for energy across the UK, Scotland could again be known for energy production and the good-quality, high-paid jobs that it brings. Our green transition has been successful—I welcome that, and the continued economic growth that it brings—but the wind does not always blow, and we import much of the equipment. We still rely on gas power stations to meet demand and keep the grid stable. Nuclear offers something different. Rolls-Royce is designing small modular reactors that could be built by British workers and give us steady, low-carbon power, whatever the weather. Nuclear offers a future for the people who work in oil and gas, ensuring that they are offered real opportunities outside oil and gas and that we do not lose them to work abroad.
I agree. The important thing is that we identify suitable sites. Nuclear power generation offers skilled, well-paid jobs and a long-lasting and predictable energy supply. For the first time in history, more than 100,000 people work in the industry across the UK—but, sadly, they are not in Scotland. Since 2014, England has gained more than 47,000 nuclear jobs, but Scotland has gained just 661. One in 10 workers at Hinkley Point C is a Scot forced to travel hundreds of miles each week to work in England. Let us compare that with Wales, where the Wylfa small modular reactor will bring an initial investment of £2.5 billion to Anglesey and up to 3,000 jobs at peak construction, all at one site. The Welsh Government have signed an agreement with Sizewell C that could be worth up to £900 million to their supply chain. The SNP has signed no such agreement, despite the UK Government offering to sit down with its Members to put opportunities on the table. I welcome the Minister’s recent attempt to start talks with the Scottish Government on maintaining production at the Torness site beyond its current scheduled closure in 2030. Will she ensure that young people in Scotland can access apprenticeships at new sites such as Wylfa? I do not believe that young Scots deserve to have their career opportunities limited by the short-sighted political games of the SNP. Communities that already host nuclear know its value. East Lothian council passed a motion asking the UK Government to investigate the possibility of a new power station on the Torness site. The community wants nuclear to remain, but regardless of the community’s wishes or of how many families could be supported by jobs, how much it could reduce energy bills and how much it could improve UK energy security, the SNP’s position will prevent that. The SNP ignores the economic benefits that low-carbon nuclear power generation could bring to Scotland. That feels like the short-sighted approach of the Conservatives when they sold off the British National Oil Corporation, then Britoil, in 1982. Given that the SNP is willing to sacrifice our energy security and the jobs that support nearly 800 families at Torness, will the Minister say what plans there are to balance the grid when Torness goes offline? How much is it expected to impact electricity prices, and how many employees at Torness have been offered alternative employment?
We should include other energy sources in the baseload. The strike price of wind has been lower than nuclear, but it is important that there is a geographically predictable source of energy for the grid. That helps to reduce transmission costs. Although the investment will be significant, it is likely to be less than the hon. Member mentioned and will produce a stable, reliable source of energy, which in time will bring down household bills. This issue is about more than jobs within the nuclear industry. Nuclear can strengthen the UK’s energy security and give heavy industry—from steel and ceramics to new tech companies—the steady supply of power that they need to grow.
I apologise, Mr Stuart. I was not around in 2010. I always take situations as they are and look to the future. We have to take steps to work on where we are now and not regret what happened in the past. A stable, reliable power supply will bring down transmission costs and household bills. Siting new small modular reactors at Hunterston and Dounreay could also breathe life back into the highlands and islands, just as oil and gas once did for the north-east. Where remote rural communities are losing their young people, a nuclear site brings the jobs and investment that gives them a reason to stay. We have seen what happens when a country turns its back on nuclear. Germany took an approach—much like the SNP’s—of decommissioning and deindustrialising, and has gone from exporting 26 terawatt-hours of electricity a year to importing 22 terawatt-hours and relying on coal-powered plants. Now, more than ever, we have a responsibility to protect our environment. Personally, I would rather follow the lead of France than shy away from nuclear. France chose to invest in a low-carbon energy supply, and that has paid off. French households pay around a quarter less for their electricity than households in the UK, and the communities that host nuclear plants have seen the direct benefits in childcare, transport, hospital upgrades and affordable housing. Scotland could see the same—well-paid jobs, new house building, increased tax revenue and real community benefit, giving people a future and good, well-paid and secure jobs—but the SNP says no. At a time when Scotland faces chronic housing shortages, bus services have been cut by a sixth in just five years, Scots pay some of the highest electricity prices in Europe and remote and rural areas pay exorbitant energy charges, the SNP refuses to even consider such a clear solution.
I know that there is new pumped hydro storage coming online from Loch Sloy, and other projects are in the pipeline, but we are considering the situation for nuclear. The SNP refuses even to consider the nuclear solution, even when it is funded by Westminster. When I speak to my Mid Dunbartonshire constituents about energy, their position is clear: they want to tackle climate change, they want the Government to look after the environment and deliver net zero, and they want cheaper bills. I want the same, as I believe do most people living in Scotland and across the UK. There is a clear solution: small modular reactors producing a predictable cheap, low-carbon energy system. The waste product of nuclear fission is a concern, but nuclear is the only form of energy that prices in decommissioning and waste disposal at the start of the project. Scotland deserves better than the student politics and political games of the SNP, but I support the stance of the Minister for Energy not to impose unwanted nuclear infrastructure on Scottish communities. The Scottish Parliament should decide, and I am pleased that we now have 10 Liberal Democrat MSPs in Holyrood to influence the debate going forward.
I agree that on most issues it is for local authorities and planning authorities to make the decisions, but for national infrastructure in Scotland, there is a place for Holyrood to be involved. The plans announced by the shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Andrew Bowie), to override devolved planning laws, should be roundly rejected. Nuclear offers Scotland thousands of jobs, millions in tax revenue, billions in investment and an opportunity to revive the communities of remote and rural Scotland, which have far too often been left behind. I am proud to be Scottish, with our own education system, health system and legal system. To protect our Scottish identity, Scotland could once again be a leading energy exporter in a way that protects our environment, grows remote and rural communities by providing housing and jobs, and helps to pay for improved connectivity and for saving the Gaelic language. Scotland has always worked closely with the rest of the UK, with connected and mobile people and products. Nuclear power can continue that tradition by providing low-carbon energy to contribute to our evolving sustainable energy system, to reduce household bills and to supply industry. With that in mind, I have one final ask of the Minister: to build on their assessment of Scotland’s potential nuclear power plant sites by setting out, before the end of this parliamentary term, the jobs and economic benefit that new nuclear could bring to Scotland. That way, we can see in real terms the cost of the SNP’s approach to nuclear.
I am really pleased to have heard so many excellent contributions to the debate this afternoon, and I thank the Minister, the Opposition spokesperson—the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Douglas Lumsden)—and my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone) for their comments. It is clear that there is majority agreement in the room, it is clear that there is an opportunity for Scotland to be an energy source and powerhouse for the UK, and it is clear that the SNP is refusing to grasp this opportunity for families and companies, despite the good examples of success in other countries. I urge the Government to keep pressing the Scottish Government to reconsider their position. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered the future of nuclear energy in Scotland.
7. What steps she is taking to ensure the UK meets its legal obligations under the European convention on human rights.
The Conservatives and Reform want to leave the ECHR—a convention Winston Churchill championed—putting us alongside Russia and Belarus. Does the Attorney General agree that that is no place for a country that helped to write it?
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stuart. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Marie Goldman) on securing this extremely important debate. I serve the population with the highest number of frail elderly people, and the irony is that our hospital is frail and elderly. It is the third oldest in the country, and the poor quality of the estate massively impacts the service that can be delivered to my community. More than 80% of it is not fit for purpose. We were one of the areas promised a new hospital by the previous Conservative Government, but sadly we are now in wave 2. There have been more than 700 sewage leaks across the hospital in recent years, and that impacts on clinical areas. Members can draw their own conclusions about how that has shunted treatment for patients down the line. The tower block at Torbay is swathed in scaffolding to stop bits of it falling off and braining patients. In February, my hon. Friends the Members for Newton Abbot (Martin Wrigley) and for South Devon (Caroline Voaden) and I wrote to the Minister, backing our NHS managers, who desperately need an £8 million investment to sort out the tower block. We wrote again, and I met the Minister in September to bang the drum again, and we got £1.8 million, rather than £8 million. Devon and Somerset fire and rescue service has now served a fire safety notice on our trust, as it has serious safety concerns about patients, and the CQC served another warning notice in the last few days. The chickens have now come home to roost. We need action. We need the cheque that I asked for in September in the post to tackle the fire safety issues in the tower block. The staff are doing incredible work, but the patients deserve better. Will the Minister meet me and other colleagues from south Devon constituencies to explore the impact of the fire safety notice and the CQC warning? There are rumours swirling around the internet about the closure of beds in Torbay hospital.
8. What steps she is taking to help increase prosecution rates in cases of violence against women and girls.
Last year, the Public Accounts Committee warned that the Government would not meet their manifesto commitment to halve violence against women and girls if they did not get to grips with the evolving nature of abuse. Technologically facilitated abuse is growing rapidly; referrals to Refuge rose by nearly 80% last year. This includes intimate image abuse; offences rose by 27%. However, over the same period, the proportion of cases resulting in a charge fell from 5.8% to 4.5%. What steps is the Attorney General taking to help increase prosecution rates in cases of technologically facilitated abuse?
Q7. In rural Somerset distance has a price. Every school bus, bin round and pothole fix costs more, yet the Government are diverting hundreds of millions from rural to urban councils, leaving Somerset £21 million a year worse off. Roberta from Martock told me yesterday that people need more affordable homes, but slashing funding will not build a single one. Will the Prime Minister use December’s settlement to restore remoteness funding to Somerset—yes or no?
It is an honour to serve with you in the chair, Mr Stuart. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Marie Goldman) for securing the debate. When we discuss underperforming trusts, we must recognise that some NHS trusts are operating in circumstances that would challenge even the best management teams. The Royal Devon University Healthcare NHS foundation trust serves a largely rural and coastal population, with an ageing demographic, workforce pressures and significant barriers to access. I do not want to blame the Royal Devon leadership team. This is certainly not about blaming hard-working staff, because they do a brilliant job in very trying circumstances. But let us face it: the geography and demographics are stacked against them. The chief medical officer, Sir Chris Whitty, has repeatedly highlighted the unique health challenges facing rural and coastal communities, including when he visited Devon in May this year. Sir Chris has warned of “the health challenges of coastal towns”, and that attracting staff in such areas is significantly harder, noting that transport links are often limited. In his 2023 report Sir Chris warned: “People living in peripheral areas experience issues relating to accessing primary and secondary healthcare, domiciliary care, medicines, shopping and transport. The response times of health care professionals are often longer because of the distances involved, which is particularly important for emergency presentations”. Steve Brown, the director for public health in Devon, said: “In Devon, our records show that some people are dying up to 15 years earlier than they should because essential building blocks of health…like reliable transport…and services that people can reach…are missing.” My constituent Hilary Robarts-Arnold, from Seaton, wrote to me to describe the lack of transport and the difficulty of getting services in east Devon. Her husband is increasingly frail and suffers from skin cancer. Until recently, he attended dermatology services at Axminster hospital, seven and a half miles away. Those local services have now gone, and patients are instead forced to trek to Exeter, if they can. For her and her husband, that would be 22 miles, which is simply not possible because it is just too challenging a distance. As a result, his cancer is not being dealt with. The RDUH told me that “this is a workforce and capacity issue, not a reflection of the clinical priority we place on patient care”. If Government oversight of NHS trusts is to be meaningful, they must recognise the realities of rural and coastal healthcare and weight funding accordingly.
Q10. Despite the desperate need for pitch space in my constituency, Udney Park playing fields in Teddington have lain derelict for over a decade. The most recent owner, a Chinese business man, has now been sanctioned by the British Government and has had his assets frozen. Given that the Prime Minister has made it clear that he wants communities to take back control of precious sites like Udney Park, will he work with me to ensure those playing fields are put back in the hands of the community, right where they belong?
10. What steps she is taking to help increase prosecution rates for domestic abuse.
Last month, Your Sanctuary, a women’s refuge in my constituency, hosted a conference to tackle domestic abuse. One of its key asks is tackling the 2020 harm review, “Assessing Risk of Harm to Children and Parents in Private Law Children Cases”, which has not been implemented. What steps is the Attorney General taking to correct that wrong?
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms McVey. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Reading Central (Matt Rodda) for securing this debate about our support for a country that is a friend and an ally, and one to whom we have owed gratitude over more than 200 years. I start by adding my condolences to the families and friends of all those who lost their lives or remain missing in Nepal and Tibet, following the August floods and the floods in Nepal over the weekend. I pay tribute to the UK rapid deployment team and humanitarian crisis response specialists who have supported British nationals and the wider crisis response to the floods in Nepal. Those brave and skilled teams are a clear example of the UK’s world-leading excellence and expertise. The news might have moved on, but the people of Nepal face rebuilding their country while experts note that such disasters might become more frequent in the region in the coming years. Indeed, the UK Government’s national security assessment of global biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse cites severe degradation or collapse of the Himalayas as particularly significant for UK national security. The August floods were not unexpected. Nepal’s mountains are warming rapidly. In 2023, the UN Secretary-General reported that they had lost almost a third of their ice in just over three decades. The wider Hindu Kush Himalaya region is also warming significantly faster than the global average. All the while, international agreement founders when it comes to action that truly meets the moment. Rebuilding comes at a great financial cost. The Government of Nepal have written to the UN loss and damage fund to request $20 million, which is 0.7% of the reported $2.7 billion it has estimated in physical damage to infrastructure and economic losses. The loss and damage fund itself is suffering from a lack of finance. It has reportedly already received requests totalling $2.8 billion from 119 countries, but only $400 million has been given by the international donor community. The demand vastly outstrips supply. With the impact of climate change intensifying, and with the super El Niño in the process of biting, it is deplorable that the international community continues to fail when it comes to preparing for climate shocks. Although I welcome the rapid deployment of UK personnel and the £5 million in humanitarian aid to help with the crisis, that £5 million is not enough and does not reflect the closeness of our relationship with Nepal. I remain deeply concerned about the wider UK aid budget, which has been slashed to 0.3%. That includes the cutting of the UK humanitarian crisis reserve by 12%, from £85 million to £75 million, leaving less flexible money for rapid support in humanitarian emergencies. Cutting the humanitarian crisis reserve at a time when many of the world’s poorest countries—the ones often most vulnerable to the impact of climate change—are dealing with those impacts is strategically illiterate. I ask the Minister, as I have before: when will the Government set out a road map for a return to spending 0.7% of GNI on official development assistance, and will the Government revisit the cut to the humanitarian crisis reserve? Climate finance has also been cut—there has been a halving of the UK commitment to the Green Climate Fund and a significant cut to our international climate finance, despite an ambitious new Government ICF strategy. The reality does not match the rhetoric. It is also a matter of national security for us here at home, as I have mentioned. The national security assessment of global biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse is brutal in its assessment of the impact on our national security and prosperity, with crop failures, intensified natural disasters and infectious disease outbreaks. It points out the critical ecosystems that support major global food production areas and impact global climate, water and weather cycles, and their importance, including in the Himalayas, and how their degradation and collapse will lead to water insecurity, severely reduced crop yields, fisheries collapse, changes to global weather patterns, release of trapped carbon exacerbating climate change, novel disease and loss of pharmaceutical responses. It will drive migration and serious and organised crime and lead to black markets in scarce food, pharmaceuticals and critical minerals, with non-state actors gaining control over scarce resources, and there are pandemic risks. As instability grows, it leads to conflict and military escalation. Wider development finance can provide some solutions, but definitive action on debt sustainability, illicit financial flows and reform of the multilateral development banks is necessary. Given that the countries most vulnerable to climate change are often also vulnerable to debt distress, it is imperative that the Government use their upcoming G20 presidency to take real and meaningful action on the issues, as well as charting a course forward on climate finance. This is, after all, a fairness issue—a justice issue. Nepal is responsible for only 0.1% of global emissions, yet it is bearing the consequences of runaway carbon emissions and global inaction in tackling them. As the Nepali Prime Minister recently said at the UN General Assembly, countries like Nepal are “hit by the climate we did not warm and hit again by the wars we did not start.” What does fairness look like? Estimates that we heard at the International Development Committee, on which I sit, put the UK’s fair share of international climate finance, as the world’s sixth-largest economy and fifth-largest historical emitter, at £9 billion a year. Add in inflation and the changes to the Government’s accounting methodology, and the ODA element of ICF4 diverges even further from the UK’s fair share. Given all those factors, our ICF allocation is roughly 50% lower than ICF3. Failure to tackle the climate crisis will erode development gains and push more people into humanitarian need, resource competition and a vicious cycle of poverty and instability, and will damage the UK’s reputation as a leader in climate and development. With COP31 fast approaching, what will be the Government’s strategy for real and meaningful action? How will the Foreign Secretary go beyond words to action that is reflected in tangible UK commitments, both domestic and globally? The floods in Nepal have shown us what can happen and what will continue to happen if we do not act. There is still time to take action. World Bank research estimates that climate change could force 260 million people to move within their countries by 2050, but that immediate action to reduce global emissions could reduce that number by up to 80%. I urge the Minister and the Government to take bold steps with our development and climate strategy, our aid and our G20 presidency so that the catastrophe in Nepal does not become the norm for communities everywhere. The UK has an opportunity to lead, and we should take it.