Neurodivergent Pupils: Mainstream Schools
8. What steps her Department is taking to improve educational outcomes for neurodivergent pupils in mainstream schools.
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Neurodivergent Pupils: Mainstream Schools
I thank the Minister for her reply. Sixty-five per cent of teacher training providers say that new teachers are not equipped to support SEND pupils in mainstream schools, with too many teachers still leaving training without the skills and confidence to support neurodivergent children, including those with dyslexia. Will the Minister consider reforming the initial training requirements so that every trainee educator is able to demonstrate practical competency in identifying and supporting neurodivergent children before achieving their qualified teacher status?
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Water Sector: Public Ownership
It is a pleasure to speak with you in the Chair, Sir Jeremy. Since being elected, I have heard repeatedly from constituents about flooding, sewage discharges and failures of basic water infrastructure. My constituency is served by Severn Trent Water and South Staffordshire Water—double the problem, some might say. Recently, I met South Staffs Water after concerns about the installation of meters without what many customers felt was adequate notice. The crux is that customers feel that they have zero influence over the decisions affecting them, and that companies do not seem to explain clearly why decisions are taken. I heard from constituents in Chadsmoor, for example, who have had to put up with water leaking out at incredible rates all around their properties and dangerously high water pressure for 11 months following the installation of meters. Whatever the ultimate cause, however, the refusal of the water companies to take responsibility for finding fixes is just another example of why their customers have lost trust. On the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, as my hon. Friend the Member for Mid and South Pembrokeshire (Henry Tufnell) said, we grilled the chief executives of nine water companies and looked at many issues. Crucially, however, the corporate culture that has taken hold in the sector is so divorced from the lives of customers that it is really to blame for a lot of what we are discussing. Despite already knowing that public confidence was in tatters and that the sector was up sewage creek without a paddle, we were shocked by what we heard. For me, questions of governance are as important as ownership. Who has control? Who carries risk? How is investment financed? What voice do customers have? The Government have recognised that the broken status quo cannot continue. Powers have been strengthened and Ofwat is to be replaced with a new unified regulator, but given the mammoth issues in the sector, we should ask, as so many have today, whether that is enough. We cannot assume that public ownership would resolve all the issues. We should remember that some pre-privatisation water boards were failing their customers too. That is why, as a member of the Co-operative party, I hope that the Minister will look further at empowering customers and introducing mutual structures and co-operative principles. Our constituents rightly demand greater control over something so fundamental to their lives. Water is different from almost any other service, because we cannot take our money elsewhere. The test of the Government reforms should be simple: when people turn on their tap, look at their bill or walk by their local river, do they feel that the system is working in their interests? If the answer is no, we should have the courage to change it.
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Independent Fostering Agencies
We must expand fostering to create the 10,000 extra places in foster care for children that we need this Parliament. We are shaking up the system to deliver this through the fostering action plan, and independent fostering agencies can play their part, bringing fresh energy and supporting new fostering hubs.
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Independent Fostering Agencies
I thank the hon. Gentleman for bringing this important issue to the attention of the House. We are introducing fostering hubs, including in the local authority in the area that he represents, and rolling out regional care co-operatives across the country. In the coming weeks, I will publish a new rule book for fostering that simplifies the system, consolidates a whole series of different bits of guidance and humanises foster care.
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International Skills Partnerships
The UK is joining Erasmus+ in 2027. Colleges and training providers will have access to funding for partnerships with organisations across Europe and beyond. I take this opportunity to wish Team UK success at WorldSkills Shanghai next week, especially Oliver Coombs, who has the chance to be crowned the best young person in the world in additive manufacturing and who trained at Bath college, in the hon. Lady’s constituency.
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International Skills Partnerships
I thank the hon. Lady for the question and for highlighting the British Council’s role in these partnerships. A focus of the set-up of Erasmus+ will be to ensure that smaller providers can access the opportunities that comes from the programme. That is absolutely a focus of this Government. I am sure that these issues will be talked about at the summit, as they frequently are.
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International Skills Partnerships
My hon. Friend is right to highlight that one of the benefits of Erasmus+ is that it builds on the Turing scheme as well as expanding opportunities available through the partnerships to staff and students. It is a very good example to draw to the House’s attention. Around the world we have amazing practitioners teaching in a variety of settings, and it is in everyone’s benefit for them to connect with one another and be at the cutting edge of research and teaching.
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Kinship Carers: Financial Support
Part of the kinship zones pilot is testing an allowance equivalent to the fostering allowance alongside a robust impact evaluation, but we are not waiting for that evaluation to improve England’s approach to kinship care. Our Families First reforms are unlocking the potential of kin-based care across the country through family group decision making by default, and practical support through family network support packages.
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Kinship Carers: Financial Support
I will. I would also like to pass on and share my thanks for all the amazing kinship carers we have across the country. Outside kinship zones, a number of councils are showing that they can take steps to go further than others, and Plymouth city council, Sheffield city council and North Tyneside council are great examples of that.
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Topical Questions
I welcome Become’s report, which builds on the review into the early deaths of care leavers that I commissioned a few months ago. I would like to thank Ashley John-Baptiste and Clare Chamberlain for their important work in bringing to the country’s attention the tragic number of young care leavers who die far too young. That transition to adulthood is an important moment to get right. PAs play a crucial role in that. We are looking at additional training for PAs and also at changing the regulation that sits around them, so we can set a higher expectation.[Official Report, 12 October 2026; Vol. 791, c. 2WC.] (Correction)
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Water Sector: Public Ownership
It is a pleasure to serve with you in the chair this afternoon, Sir Jeremy. I want to speak this afternoon about the River Stort, one of the globally significant chalk streams that runs right through my constituency. It is a place where families walk, where anglers spend their weekends, and where countless residents connect with nature. It delivers enormous social, recreational and environmental benefits for our community, but at the start of the month, raw sewage was again discharged into the Stort navigation in a spill that lasted more than eight hours, leaving dead fish and visible pollution in its wake. I have been requesting a meeting with Thames Water to discuss protecting the Stort since the start of the year, following hundreds of hours of sewage discharges. It has repeatedly failed to engage with that process, only agreeing to meet with me this week after I said that I would effectively turn up at one of its sewage treatment sites to demand an explanation. That is not good enough. We know that, whatever Thames Water says when I meet it later this week, the truth is that the privatised water industry is failing in its duty of care to our environment, and that privatisation has been a failure. There is simply no other way to put it. We were told that private ownership would drive investment, efficiency and better outcomes, but too often, we have seen the opposite. As others have said, water is not a luxury; it is an essential public service. We therefore need a system that puts the public interest before shareholder returns, investment before extraction, and environmental protection before corporate profit. To my mind, the only credible path forward is to call time on a failed system and move to a model of public ownership of our water industry. We should start by bringing Thames Water into special administration now. The pollution of our rivers and waterways cannot continue. For the sake of the River Stort, for communities across the country and for future generations, we must take this opportunity to choose a different path. I am grateful to the Minister for taking the time to meet me earlier this year regarding Thames Water and the River Stort. As I said, I will be meeting Thames Water later this week, so I would be very grateful if she set out in her response what message she would deliver to Thames Water were she in my position, and whether she would consider meeting me again to discuss these repeated failures.
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Speciality Steel UK
With permission, I shall make a statement on Speciality Steel UK, but before I do so, I would like to say that I know the thoughts of the whole House will be with the Prime Minister following the passing of his father Roy earlier today. The workers at Speciality Steel UK have faced years of uncertainty. The plants have been mothballed and the jobs furloughed for several years. This outrageous situation is a monument to years of neglect by successive Conservative Governments who let this industry decline, but this Government and I have taken a different approach. We have done all we can to rebuild the sector, and we have confronted its challenges head-on. In the case of Speciality Steel, complex ownership structures and opaque financing arrangements have amplified the headwinds of the wider sector. I do not need to remind the House about this case’s links to a prominent ongoing corporate scandal involving a former Conservative Prime Minister. As the House may recall, Speciality Steel UK entered liquidation in August last year, with the independent court-appointed official receiver managing the liquidation process. Since then, the Government have provided funding to enable the official receiver to carry out his statutory duties, including maintaining site safety, supporting employees and conducting a sales process for the business and its assets. Throughout that period, our priority has been facilitating a private sector solution. The official receiver engaged with a range of interested parties and earlier this year identified a preferred bidder. That bidder subsequently requested Government support to make its purchase of Speciality Steel UK possible. However, following extensive engagement between the bidder and its advisers, and having done all the due diligence and given the case the consideration that taxpayers would expect, the Government have decided that they cannot provide support on the proposed terms. This decision has not been taken lightly. For over a year, we have funded the official receiver process, while working constructively on efforts to secure a private buyer. We took a long, hard look at the offer that was on the table, but the truth is that we had serious concerns about the proposed financing of it, the protections for UK taxpayers, and whether it could offer long-term stability for the local economy and community. Having concluded that we cannot support the preferred bidder’s proposal, we are faced with a choice: we can allow events to take their course through the liquidation process, and risk being left with no say in the future of the sites, or we can act. This Government choose to act. We have made a commitment to reindustrialise Britain—to bring good growth to every postcode of our country. Backing the proud communities of Stocksbridge, Rotherham, Wednesbury and Brinsworth is absolutely part of that commitment. These workers and those across the wider business have endured a prolonged period of uncertainty. The Government cannot accept the prospect of another prolonged process that will create more worry and anxiety for workers, deter businesses and hang over the local community. Nor can we accept a situation in which decisions impacting the future of communities in South Yorkshire are effectively taken by default, rather than through a deliberate assessment of what will best support growth, opportunity and prosperity in the years ahead. We will therefore engage with the official receiver’s sale process and develop a proposal for the public acquisition of SSUK. This will preserve strategic control and ensure that all credible future opportunities can be properly considered before irreversible decisions are taken. We are taking this step because SSUK occupies a unique place in the UK’s steel ecosystem. It offers specialist capabilities that have served advanced manufacturing supply chains, including in aerospace and defence. In other words, it is capable of supplying the growth-driving sectors of our economy—those that we have committed to supporting through our industrial strategy. SSUK’s strategic value extends well beyond its economic contribution. It lies in its specialist steelmaking capabilities, which have historically produced products like aircraft landing gear, helicopter rotors, missiles and munitions. It would not be right to let this go by default. I want to make an important clarifying point: we will work towards public acquisition, but that is not the end of the process, or the end of the conversation about the long-term future of the business and its sites. It means that we are keeping our options open while Government, local leaders, industry experts, private investors, workers and other partners consider what is best for these strategically important locations. I want to thank those Members of this House with SSUK sites in their constituencies for their engagement with my Department, and I welcome their continued input. That includes my right hon. Friend the Member for Rawmarsh and Conisbrough (John Healey), and my hon. Friends the Members for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Dr Tidball), and for Tipton and Wednesbury (Antonia Bance). I recognise the role played by the Mayor of South Yorkshire, Oliver Coppard, and his team in ensuring a joined-up vision for the future of South Yorkshire. I welcome the work that I know we will do in lockstep to deliver this future. Working towards public acquisition will create the time and space necessary for undertaking a full assessment of the opportunities available. It will let us consider future industrial use, regeneration opportunities and the role that specialist manufacturing capabilities could play in supporting growth and our national resilience. One option that will be assessed carefully is the future of speciality steel production. However, we are not prejudging the outcome of that assessment. All options will be considered rigorously against their economic and industrial benefits, their impact on regional growth and their value for money. I should note that all future decisions and spending commitments will be subject to detailed due diligence and funded from existing Government budgets. Our announcement today must also be seen in the wider context of the Government’s commitment to the future of the British steel industry. Steel remains fundamental to our economy, our infrastructure, our energy system, our advanced manufacturing base and our national security. It underpins critical supply chains and supports thousands of skilled jobs across the United Kingdom. That is why we nationalised British Steel earlier this year; why we intervened to secure stability and maintain production at the site while we develop long-term options; and why we secured a better deal for the steel communities of south Wales, with £500 million of Government support for a new electric arc furnace at Port Talbot. In our steel strategy, we committed to stabilising and rebuilding the steel sector. What is more, we set out a goal of supporting productive and profitable steel producers that can meet their customers’ needs, strengthen our national security and provide high-quality, secure, long-term jobs, backed by private investment. That was not an empty promise or wishful thinking. We have acted to tackle the challenge posed by global steel overcapacity through trade measures that protect our domestic production from unfair pressure and support the viability of the nation’s steelmaking. I want to speak directly to the workers of Speciality Steel UK, who have been stuck on furlough, unable to do the jobs of which they are so rightly proud, through no fault of their own. I know that they feel ignored and let down by previous Governments, but as Business Secretary, I will not duck these difficult decisions, and neither will this Government. I will do all that I can to secure a bright future for you, your communities and your families. Taken together, these actions demonstrate that this Government are serious about reindustrialising Britain, and the steel sector playing its part. We want to attract private investment, strengthen domestic supply chains and ensure that industrial communities have a genuine opportunity to thrive in the decades ahead. That is why we are moving towards the public acquisition of Speciality Steel UK. As ever, I commit to keeping all Members informed as this important work progresses. I commend this statement to the House.
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Speciality Steel UK
I thank the shadow Minister for his response. I particularly appreciate his words for the Prime Minister, which I know he will appreciate, as will his family. The shadow Minister began with a long list of neglect regarding the policy, operations and ownership of this particular set of steel businesses. The obvious question is why the Conservatives did not do anything about it when they were in power—it certainly was not for want of requests to act from Labour Members. He has asked for reassurances about the workforce, and I am happy to give those to him. The cost of funding the official receiver, both to date and ongoing, is essentially the wages of the staff. They are in a position where they will be paid, which is paramount. The shadow Minister talked about the business environment. I say politely to all Conservative colleagues that they left us with the highest industrial energy prices in the developed world. That was the legacy—it is not due to any policy changes made by Labour. What do our industrial subsidies mean? For a sector such as steel, where an electric arc furnace is obviously incredibly energy intensive, the supercharger package—not the BICS package, because the supercharger package applies in this case—will bring down average electricity prices from approximately £168 per megawatt-hour to £86 per megawatt-hour. It is not just about being competitive with peers; that is a genuinely competitive position with our rivals. We introduced those subsidies because we were aware that the business environment we inherited from the Conservative party was not satisfactory. We had to act, which is why we have done so. Turning to wider measures, yes, we have activated a substantial trade defence policy. That is not just about maintaining domestic production; it is about being a country where the rules of the game apply. If we want people to be based here in the UK, they have to be able to take advantage of effective trade remedies when they are facing unfair competition. I know that that is an issue for the downstream users, but it is the position that I think the country has to take. What the shadow Minister has said about carbon border adjustment mechanisms is, I think, a new policy since I was last Secretary of State—the Conservatives are perhaps disowning the policies they had at the end of the last Government, because they were certainly committed to CBAMs then. Of course, CBAMs are fundamentally about trying to maintain fair competition between carbon-intensive sectors in developed countries such as ours and the rest of the world, so there is a little bit of incoherence there, to say the least. On the issue of working capital, the opportunity presented to us by Speciality Steel UK is that previously, the business only produced when the customer effectively supplied working capital—a highly irregular position, but one reflective of the opaque and byzantine financing arrangements under the previous owners. I believe the opportunity exists to operate a successful business in this space. There is nothing ideological about this; my ideal is for the business to be run in the private sector. The shadow Minister has asked why we could not take forward the preferred bidder. I will not go into the details, but when I come to this Dispatch Box I have to be satisfied that any public support given meets the reasonable conditions we would expect, such as that taxpayer money will be protected and will not be spent without delivering the outcome for which it has been granted. If I cannot do that, I cannot grant that subsidy, which I think is the position any Secretary of State would have to take. What is the barrier to a private sector solution? Effectively, it is risk—the fact that this was left so long without activity from the Conservative Government and the workforce have not been making steel. The customers are therefore in a position where that is a big, substantial challenge for any private sector entity to take on. If we do end up with a public ownership position, I think the state will be better able to take on that challenge, but it is the legacy of neglect that has been the barrier. That is exactly what this Government are determined to resolve.
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Speciality Steel UK
I thank my hon. Friend for her engagement, her support and her advocacy on behalf of her constituents. This has been and is a difficult situation for them, and it is exactly because of our commitment that we are seeking to resolve things in a favourable way. The work we can now do will have to look at the capacities, the potential for new investment that might be required, the product lines, where the customers are and so forth. The key issue—I am not sure if this has ever been put on the record in Hansard before—is homologation. That is the assets of these sites and the accreditations they have for such a speciality set of products. Those assets are incredibly valuable. Not many parts of the world can produce to the standard that we are talking about. We now have a process—I want that to be as short as possible—where we can assess that. I will remain in close contact with her. I want to be in a position where, if we can take this forward, we can pass that good news on to her constituents.
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Speciality Steel UK
I thank the hon. Lady for her questions. I entirely endorse what she said about the centrality of steel to security and infrastructure, and, indeed, I echo her words. This is entirely pragmatic. I am seeking to resolve a series of long-running problems, which a great many of my Conservative predecessors—and there were a great many—ignored, considering them to be too difficult. That is the central lesson that I would learn: we have to be willing to confront these hard problems. We might think that we can pass them on to the next person, but that is not serving the country in the way that is required. Let me now deal with the hon. Lady’s specific questions. I expect this process to take between four and six months, but I want it to be resolved as quickly as possible. I think it important to point out that there are costs either way: there are costs involved in running the business in public ownership, and there would also be costs to the state from the remediation and regeneration, partly because of the legacy of public ownership but also because such big steel industrial sites come with so many issues to resolve if they are remediated that some of that would fall on the Exchequer. If this were a matter of public ownership, we would have to pay off the creditors, reach an accommodation with them, acquire the assets, and then inject some working capital over a period of between one and three years. I would expect the cost of that to be about £350 million, and I would expect something comparable were the option to be regeneration and remediation. The hon. Lady asked about existing budgets. We knew when we came to power that we needed to pay attention to the steel industry. There was a commitment in our manifesto for £2.5 billion, on top of on top of the £500 million that was granted to Tata in Port Talbot under the previous Government. We have spent some of that, although the lion's share of the sum has gone to British Steel, but the support for Tata has continued. Some of the money has gone on the official receiver process here. We have that existing budget in which to commence this work. These are obviously significant assets, and I think that this is an entirely appropriate use of them. The hon. Lady also mentioned the relationship with Europe. She will know that when the European Union changed its own trade defence measures on steel, that had some adverse consequences for us. My call to Commissioner Šefčovič was one of my first in the job, for a number of reasons. We talked explicitly about this, and are seeking a resolution specifically on steel, which I believe would be in our interests and those of the European Union.
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Speciality Steel UK
I am grateful to the hon. Member for her support and engagement on behalf of her constituents. There is a co-dependency between the four sites in terms of how the business operates, but any long-term consideration, whether in the private or the public sector of the business, will have to include consideration of products, customers and markets if the business is to be run profitably. That will be central to the assessment that we can now make. However, I can give the hon. Member the reassurance that every part of this business clearly has worth—which is why they have been grouped in this way, historically and in a contemporary sense—and, of course, we are seeking the best solution for the workers in all four of the plants.
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Speciality Steel UK
I am always grateful for the support of the Father of the House, who has a long-standing interest in all industrial matters. However, I consider myself more obsessed with industrial energy prices than, frankly, any other Member of this House. I am great company when this subject comes up. On electric arc furnaces—which are the technology in use here and will be, I hope, in Scunthorpe at some point —we already have in place a set of policies that do not just put us on a par with some of our rivals, but actually give us a competitive position. That is the supercharger scheme for the most energy-intensive electricity users. The Father of the House will know that we have also launched, as part of the industrial strategy, the British industrial competitiveness scheme which is about to come into force. In effect, it is a scheme for manufacturers, and again it significantly moves the dial on their competitiveness. I recognise this issue, but we have done more than previous Governments, and we will continue to do more on it. I agree entirely with the Father of the House’s case, but I think we must recognise the very substantial work that has already gone on. I considered BICS to be the centrepiece of the industrial strategy when we launched it, because it moves the dial so significantly on our competitiveness not just for steel, but across a range of manufacturing sectors.
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Speciality Steel UK
Again, I am grateful to my hon. Friend, with whom I have been discussing steel matters in this House for many years. I am aware of the specific challenges at Llanwern. I believe it is a very sound business, and our trade defence measures will directly benefit it. Again, we have to strike a balance. People would sometimes like us to go further in one direction than the other, but this is all part of the support we have given the steel industry. I believe that the downstream use she mentioned will be central to the future of steel production in Wales.
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Speciality Steel UK
The right hon. Member will understand that I will not comment on matters pertaining to the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, but stick to the considerable number of issues in the domain of BIST. He specifically asked about cost. The cost for the official receiver is £11 million a month, which is in the main to meet the payroll cost of the more than 1,200 members of staff that the sites employ. That is what we have done to date, and it is what we will continue to do. On returning it to the private sector, we first have to see whether there is an opportunity to save this business. That may require public acquisition, as I said in my statement. If we follow the path in that direction, we would have to inject working capital—the process can now ascertain what that sum of money would be—to make the products and the business plan attractive and enable a return to the private sector, but that is a long way down the road. If we put in public money, I would want a return for that public money. I am more than willing—keen, in fact—to see this business return to the private sector, but if we put in public money to turn it around, I would obviously want to protect that money. I think is an entirely pragmatic and reasonable consideration.
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Speciality Steel UK
The process to date has in effect been working with potential private sector bidders on the viability of their plans. That task is entirely different from what we can do now, which is essentially to assess whether there is a viable future for this business under public acquisition. If there is—and, again, the strength of the products and the history of these sites are well known, as we have discussed in the House today—the opportunity would present itself to return to steel production. My hon. Friend mentions the changes to procurement, and yes, there have been considerable changes to what we can do. In the main, I would say that when steel products are made in the UK, they do tend to be purchased in the UK. There is a significant export side to the UK business, but they are in the main purchased around that. Historically, the problem has been goods and products that we do not make in the UK and have had to import. Again, I think there are gaps in the market in that regard.
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Speciality Steel UK
I welcome the support from the hon. Gentleman for the decisive action we are taking. On his point about potentially combining British Steel and, if it were acquired in the public interest, Speciality Steel UK, I urge caution in that regard. The job required at Scunthorpe and Teesside for British Steel is in itself a significant industrial transformation. Not many transformations of this kind or scale have actually been done in Europe. What Tata Steel is doing with us in Port Talbot is a significant example of that. This is another set of issues. I think the House is aware that a different set of factors that really pertain to ownership have led us to this situation, so there are two distinct problems. We are taking action on both, but they are distinct and I would not at this stage recommend the bringing together of those two things. That is too big a task. We are better served by looking at them as distinct things to solve.
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Speciality Steel UK
I thank my hon. Friend for her support and for her question. My ideal is that I want steelworkers making steel. I do not think that is complicated, but it has been too complicated to date. All we are seeking is a chance for those proud people to return to the jobs that they so love and which have defined their communities for so many years. It will not be easy. I am grateful for the support across the House today, but it will not be easy. We are deliberately taking on this challenge rather than ignoring it and walking away, as I believe other Governments have done. I will remain closely engaged with her on the question she raises about how best to do that.
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Speciality Steel UK
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. He and I have discussed this issue many times. I remember calling him to tell him that we were about to recall Parliament at that particularly significant time for the site at Scunthorpe. I am always aware of his substantial constituency interest. We will rekindle that relationship, if that is the right terminology. He will have seen that we have just appointed a chair of British Steel. I am eager to crack on with the work that is required on a transformational plan for Scunthorpe. As soon as I have substantive information to share, I am always happy to come to the House to talk about steel. If he has any specific questions, he knows that he can contact me directly and I will always seek to give him the answers he needs.
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Speciality Steel UK
The quality of the downstream products we create in the UK, particularly in Wales, is well known, but there are gaps in the market. I often compare the level of domestic consumption in most European countries to where we are with domestic production in the UK, and there are clearly gaps in that market. That has always been about the need to improve the business environment, so that the sector can work constructively with the Government to provide the public-private capex solutions that we have seen a lot of across Europe but have not seen many of in the UK. I am grateful to my hon. Friend and to all colleagues who make the case for what is, I believe, a business and a sector fundamentally important to the UK.
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Speciality Steel UK
I acknowledge the issues that the hon. Lady raises. She knows that our trade defence measures are a necessary response to global over-production. It is a problem that every Trade, Commerce and Business Minister around the world must grapple with. The role of our trade defence measures is to provide a level playing field for domestic production. If the hon. Lady believes that there is inconsistency with the products that are needed in her constituency, we are happy to meet her to take the matter forward. There is sometimes misalignment between certain product codes and trade defence measures. However, I genuinely believe that there is a consensus across the House that we have to be a country that is willing to intervene sometimes to ensure that there is a level playing field, both for the sectors directly affected and because, frankly, no one would base their business here if they thought it could be wiped out by the unfair competition that, I am afraid, is sometimes a feature of the global economy.
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Speciality Steel UK
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her advocacy on behalf of her constituents. She and I have discussed the matter several times. For colleagues who are less aware of the issue, Dalzell is a separate legal entity and company from Speciality Steel and thus separate from the full plans that we are talking about. Dalzell is still owned by the Gupta Family Group, but many of the same issues are found there. My hon. Friend knows that because that part of the business is not being run by the official receiver—it is a different set of circumstances—with any interest that we had, we would have to establish the level of liability, and the flow of public money that would be required, given the former associations that it has. We do not have current plans to do that, but we will remain closely engaged with my hon. Friend. I know that her constituents want to be back at work, and I share their frustration, but the House should be aware that Dalzell is in a different position from the rest of SSUK.
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Speciality Steel UK
Yes. On both a per capita basis and on a straightforward cash basis, Wales had until fairly recently had the lion’s share—the biggest allocations —from Government because of the significance of the transformation programme at Port Talbot, which remains a fundamental part of the steel sector across the UK. Being frank, it is also one of the sector’s success stories: the transformation of Port Talbot is a major project supported by significant public money and significant private capital, and it is exactly the kind of transformation we are seeking in other parts of the UK. It is to the credit of the workforce at Port Talbot that they are at the forefront of this; notwithstanding the difficult issues involved in such a transformation, it is something to be proud of.
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Speciality Steel UK
My hon. Friend tempts me to comment on certain issues, which I might swerve a little. He is right to say that the priority for politicians should be trying to resolve these issues and get steelworkers back to work, and anything that detracts from that or that goes in a different direction is deeply regrettable.
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Speciality Steel UK
The hon. Gentleman is right to say that historically these plants have served a number of first-class manufacturers and engineering works in Northern Ireland, although they have not been doing so to date, as the workforce has been furloughed and the plants have not been operating. I would love to rekindle that relationship and see these issues resolved—that is the focus of the statement and the decisive action that the Government have taken. On the wider complexities of steel imports and the movement of steel products between Northern Ireland and the island of Great Britain, that is a complex situation that reflects the Windsor agreement. There are things, particularly in the reset of the Government’s relationship with the EU, that Northern Ireland stands to gain from, and this is one of those areas. Again, that is a priority for the Government to resolve.
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Topical Questions
T8. This summer we found that the number of GCSE and A-level music entrants was down, in line with the general trend that we have seen over the past 16 years. I know that the Government want to address that, which is why they commissioned the National Centre for Arts and Music Education, which was due to start its work at the beginning of this academic year. Can Ministers tell me whether the centre is up and running, and who has won the contract to run it?
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Israel and Palestine
My hon. Friend is making a hugely powerful and, I think, intelligent speech. He may well come on to this, but will he join me in asking the Government to redouble their efforts to secure the international fund for Israeli-Palestinian peace, which would give those communities a chance to build peace up from the bottom when the political leadership is failing from the top?
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Israel and Palestine
I agree with my hon. Friend that it is very good that we heard from the Government last week that they recognise that Israel’s occupation is unlawful. Does he agree that, given that it is unlawful, it is absolutely vital that it is the Palestinian people, but also the international community in the widest sense, who get to set what happens in the future in the territories of Palestine, rather than it being solely Israel’s responsibility, which is the view of Israel?
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Battle of Cable Street: 90th anniversary
Does my hon. Friend agree that peace walks, such as the one I attended yesterday in Rugby, where members of the community, members of different faith groups and people of no faith, walked between different religious establishments, are an important part of that inter-faith work, showing that ordinary people want to come together, irrespective of their background, faith or ethnic background, and unite as one community against those who would divide us?
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Young People not in Education, Employment or Training
6. What steps she is taking to help reduce the number of young people not in education, employment or training.
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Young People not in Education, Employment or Training
Over the summer, I met many brilliant businesses in Glasgow East that are desperate and determined to give young people apprenticeships, opening the door to a lifetime of opportunities. However, many of them told me that they have to give young people basic training in maths to help them thrive in jobs such as plumbing, joinery and welding. They rightly think that schools in Glasgow and across Scotland should be teaching this. Does my right hon. Friend agree that much more needs to be done in Scotland to improve the teaching of maths in schools?
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Water Sector: Public Ownership
Will my hon. Friend give way on the subject of Thames Water?
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Water Sector: Public Ownership
For my constituents, the performance of Thames Water is a continual source of huge frustration, not least its failure to fix a long-running leak at Swanscombe station. However, a particularly egregious example of poor customer service is its failure to fit a water meter to the house of my constituent, Mr Richard Jones, despite it only requiring a small adjustment to the outside of his house to do so. As a result, he is paying an assessed household charge and therefore paying far more for his water than he should be. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is an example of incredibly poor service by Thames Water?
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Water Sector: Public Ownership
I am glad that my hon. Friend raised the public health and environmental issues related to the water system. I have received representations not only about sewage at Bournemouth beach but, most recently, about exceptionally high levels of E. coli in Christchurch harbour, which flowed out of the Stour river in my constituency. Does my hon. Friend agree that the public interest of clear accountability in such contexts should always come before shareholder interest?
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Topical Questions
T4. Changes to higher education funding affecting high-cost creative subjects will cost Arts University Bournemouth in my constituency more than £300,000 this financial year. This will affect jobs and course availability, and it undermines the creative industries as a pillar of our industrial strategy. Will the Secretary of State meet me to discuss the funding crisis affecting our creative arts university and work with us to protect these vital institutions?