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I thank my hon. Friend for her leadership on that critical issue. As the Secretary of State said, we are investing £3.7 billion into new specialist places. I will meet her to discuss the specific school she raises.
We have been absolutely clear about the investment we are making in the SEND system, with £4 billion for early intervention and £3.7 billion in capital investment—funding that did not come when the previous Government were in power. We welcome the opportunity to work cross-party and for Members to work alongside Ministers, as this is too important an issue not to bring all the ideas of the House together. I am waiting to hear what Opposition Members think about SEND reforms; I look forward to their clarifying that.
We are determined that our schools be inclusive for all children, including those with neurodivergence. The work undertaken by our neurodivergence task-and-finish group has informed our proposed reforms to the special educational needs and disabilities system, including the national inclusion standard and the investment in continuous professional development and teacher training.
I thank my hon. Friend for her ongoing thoughtful work on this issue, which has very much informed our thinking. We have strengthened SEND content in the initial teacher training and early career framework, with Ofsted reporting that SEND is well integrated in that initial training. However, we do want to go further, and SEND will be a core focus for the 2027 review, as well as the £200 million we are investing into teacher training on special educational needs and disabilities.
I thank the hon. Member for raising this important issue, which came up time and again when we were travelling round the country talking to parents—both the need to support young people who have fallen out of education or are in EOTAS and the need to have a full conversation about this. The Government took forward a consultation about EOTAS, which I hope the hon. Member’s constituent has responded to, and we are looking carefully at all the responses to that.
Our reforms focus on better meeting pupils’ needs through earlier and more effective interventions. Children can present very differently even if they have a similar diagnosis, and we want to ensure that schools have the tools to identify children’s individual needs. Our special educational needs and disabilities training for staff works on areas of development, and our national inclusion standard will support that approach by ensuring mainstream settings have the knowledge, training and specialist support to deliver it.
I can confirm that I am working closely with the independent prevalence review. On PDA especially, I have heard similar things from many parents. We have a national independent panel—they are in Parliament this afternoon, and there are sessions for all parliamentarians, so I encourage Members to come along and talk to them directly. We have asked them to look at PDA because there is not a strong evidence base, which has been asked for. As well as the teacher training, which is a huge priority, these new experts—educational psychologists, occupational therapists—will provide support for teachers in classrooms.
This Government are investing £1.8 billion over three years to deliver the Experts At Hand service, which will give mainstream settings access to health and education specialists for SEND. We will also deliver new SEND and inclusion training courses and materials as part of a £200 million investment for teachers, leaders and support staff.
We are determined to ensure that every child who needs a specialist place has access to one. That is why we are investing £3.7 billion in specialist places and are proposing the new specialist provision packages system. We recently had a full consultation on the proposals, and we are carefully working through the detailed responses that we got to the consultation questions. We will bring forward the Bill as quickly as possible.
I can confirm that, after very strong lobbying from my hon. Friends the Members for Camborne and Redruth (Perran Moon) and for Truro and Falmouth (Jayne Kirkham), I will be visiting Cornwall to talk to them directly and see the issues at first hand. I absolutely recognise the issues around recruitment and retention in rural areas, and we are very much working on that.
I really appreciate that question. I have talked to SENCOs around the country, and I know how much pressure they are under and how often they feel that they have to go into battle for the children they support. They play a critical role, and they need more support. Inclusion has to be the business of the entire school, not just one individual. We are determined to support them.
Over the past two years, that £3.7 billion investment that I have mentioned has started. That money is going into local authorities today, so that they can start building schools, creating places, and taking the action that the Conservative Government failed to take.
I hear the same stories from families about long waits. The new system that we are proposing is all about identifying needs as early as possible. Through the national inclusion standards, which the independent panel is working on, new tools will be developed to support schools to identify needs early, and then work will be done with the Experts at Hand service to put in place interventions to support those young people.
I absolutely agree that we need more places in our schools. We are working as quickly as possible to get money into local authorities to deliver that capacity. That includes growing the number of inclusion bases, which can be built faster and often allow children to be educated in their community. As I travel around the country, I have seen how life-changing that has been. The money that we have put in is already creating new places, and we will continue to invest this year and next.
I have heard from parents, young people, teachers and hon. Members across the House the scale of the challenges facing the SEND system and the impact on families. We are transforming support for special educational needs across early years settings, schools and colleges so that more children and young people can get the right support locally.
I can confirm that these reforms are designed to ensure that the right support is available for children in every community and that there is accountability on every part of the system to deliver for families and young people, who have been let down for too long.
The Department is bringing forward reforms to improve the SEND system long term. With this investment in local authorities and other parts of the systems comes a strong focus on improvement. Through SEND reform plans, we will be carefully monitoring performance and offering support, but also intervening strongly where there is persistent failure.
My hon. Friend has been a passionate campaigner on this issue. It is because of representations from her constituents and those of many others around the Chamber that we will be introducing compulsory professional development on special educational needs and disabilities for teachers, backed by £200 million.
I will meet the hon. Member to discuss that; I have heard directly from Surrey parents and from him. We invested £16 million last year and have invested close to £19 million this year in specialist places in Surrey. We are carefully looking at Surrey’s reform plan as part of our work on local authority accountability. I will keep working with the hon. Member on these important issues.
I am deeply sorry to hear about the experience of my hon. Friend’s constituent; nobody should have to go through that. We want every school to be an inclusive school, in which there teachers are trained and there are experts on hand to support children, so that no one is in that position in future.
I congratulate my fellow London MP and hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Apsana Begum) on securing this timely debate. She referred to a number of issues that sadly are still happening on our streets. She also referred to the tragic death of 25-year-old Altab Ali in 1978. I remember when I first learned about the history of that park and the fact that it was renamed in 1998 following his death in 1978. When people go to Whitechapel and see that arch, the history and significance of that is powerful. My hon. Friend and my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney (Rushanara Ali) highlighted their shared connection in that proud part of the east end. The battle of Cable Street was a defining moment in the history of the city that I and my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse proudly represent. When Londoners blocked Mosley’s antisemites from marching, they showed the world that hatred and intolerance have no place on these streets. London, both then and now, is built on solidarity across our differences. I am proud that we are a hugely diverse city—it is a key component of our success. We are bonded by being Londoners. We look out for each other in London. This is the point that the fascists back then could not comprehend, and it is exactly what far-right extremists today fail to understand. The 4 October 1936 was not just a significant moment in London’s history; it was pivotal in the history of British Jews. It was Jewish communities that Mosley was targeting, and it was Jewish communities who led the response and built the barricades against the fascists, made with anything they could find from nearby streets and builders’ yards. In the many years since, the Jewish community has been at the heart of London’s culture, identity and great achievements. Yet, 90 years on, Jewish people continue to face the same ugly brutality and racism here in our city. I can testify to that first hand. As an MP working directly with many different communities, I was deeply disturbed to be confronted by the casual, day-to-day antisemitism on our streets. We remember with deep sadness the victims of Heaton Park—I attended a memorial with the Secretary of State on the bank holiday on 31 August, meeting the families of the two people who were tragically killed—and the stabbing of two Jewish men in Golders Green. But we must do much more than remember; we must confront this hate where it persists in educational settings, workplaces, public services and beyond. Today we are here to celebrate the resistance of 1936, but we must also draw lessons from it in how we confront the hatred we see today. In the aftermath, as my hon. Friend mentioned, Ministers introduced a ban on marching in uniforms and required demonstrations to notify the police of their intentions. These principles remain important today. The Government have demonstrated through action their unwavering commitment to tackling antisemitism. We must also be alert to how Mosley’s political violence was financed by far-right extremists abroad and raise our defences again today. But the most important lesson from Cable Street is that it was the local community that stood up against hate and division.
I thank my hon. Friend for raising the importance of that solidarity, which our hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse also highlighted. It was local residents from many different backgrounds, including trade unionists, east-enders and those from migrant communities, who told the vocal minority, “Your hate does not represent us.” Today, our Jewish friends and neighbours, in the face of antisemitism, need us all to stand with them again. This Government have taken a firm stance against antisemitism and are tackling it across businesses, civil society, health, education, culture and policing. That commitment is backed by action, including £32.4 million for Jewish community protective security, alongside a wider £251.1 million policing package over the next three years, a £1 million expansion of the Common Ground programme for communities facing antisemitism, and up to £7 million to tackle antisemitism in schools, colleges and universities. In 1936 the fascists wanted to march through the east end because its boroughs were predominantly Jewish. Today it is also home to Muslims, and for that reason the far right today often try to whip up their hate through so-called demonstrations through the east end. They will not succeed, be it in Whitechapel or elsewhere in the country, for the same reason that they failed back then: London and Britain are home to good, decent people—people who are proud to be British across ethnicities and religions. We are addressing the root cause of division through investment in cohesion and inter-faith initiatives. As we set out in our social cohesion action plan, “Protecting What Matters”, we are providing a further £800 million to bring communities together to decide where investment is spent in our neighbourhoods. Overall, our Pride in Place programme is providing up to £5.8 billion over 10 years to support 284 places. This will serve as a cornerstone of this Government’s support for communities. We are also supporting inter-faith work, continuing to bring forward programmes such as Near Neighbours, which brings people together in religiously and ethnically diverse neighbourhoods, and growing Inter Faith Week to strengthen understanding and interaction between people of different faiths.
I thank my hon. Friend for raising that. Many community initiatives, including many peace walks, some of which I have attended in my constituency, are so vital where people can come together—as my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton West (Warinder Juss) mentioned, local people, real people and trade unionists all coming together to show that solidarity. We are taking wider steps to boost faith and belief literacy. But none of this can substitute for a very clear position that antisemitism, far-right extremists and political violence have no place in Britain. So I say to the blackshirts then and to the thugs now, we continue to say, “No pasarán! They shall not pass!” Question put and agreed to.
rose—
My constituents in Putney are angry about Thames Water. They can see that they are paying more but getting less because of the model that we have. Does my hon. Friend agree that Thames Water needs to go into special administration and that all our water companies need to be nationalised?
On a functioning state, one of the issues raised with me by constituents who have come to my surgery—people from the synagogue and people who volunteer in Palestine—is that the Israeli Government have withheld $5 billion in revenue from the Palestinian people. It was curtailed in 2019 but then stopped in 2023. That money should be going towards hospitals, schools and a functioning state, as the Minister says. Has he had meetings with the Israeli Government about the return of those revenues, maybe through a third party that they could trust, to make sure that the money goes to the right places?
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Barker. I am grateful to the 208,000 people who signed the petition. For many of my constituents, this debate could hardly be more timely. Last month, a burst water main on Bramley Road left thousands of households across Enfield North without water, or experiencing low pressure for many days. Around 4,500 properties were affected. Thames Water’s own planning identified almost 3,000 priority services register customers in affected areas, and 24 tankers were deployed. However, those figures alone cannot describe the complete misery caused for my constituents. One told me: “I’ve been a resident in Lavender Hill for 27 years and I’ve never had to endure the incident that I am currently facing. I live in flats and have had NO water for over 3 days.” Many others described the distressing impact on the most basic aspects of everyday life, including cooking, drinking, washing and sanitation. In response, I managed to persuade the local Morrisons store to make its industrial washing machines and dryers available free of charge, and I am really grateful to it for that. Let us be clear: this was not just an inconvenience; for many, it was a crisis. The disruption even reached Chase Farm hospital, where operating theatres lost their water supply, forcing operations to be cancelled for two days while emergency tankers were brought in.
I totally agree with my hon. Friend. When a failure in water infrastructure can disrupt NHS treatment, we are no longer talking simply about poor customer service; we are talking about critical national infrastructure. What made this incident particularly unacceptable was not simply the fact that a pipe burst—we all know that infrastructure can fail—but what happened afterwards. My constituents faced conflicting information about whether their water would return, and they struggled to contact Thames Water. Bottled water stations were located in places that were extremely difficult for elderly and disabled residents to reach without a car. When I raised that issue with Thames Water, this was its extraordinary response: “It’s not uncommon for us to set up bottled water stations in the London area without considering residents without a vehicle.” Think about that: an essential utility provider responding to an emergency affecting thousands of people admits that it does not routinely consider whether vulnerable customers can actually reach the emergency water it provides. If an essential service fails, surely the absolute minimum people should expect is to be told what has happened, what they should do, where they can get help and when the service should be fixed. This experience inevitably raises a much bigger question: who is our water industry ultimately being run for? I welcome the Government’s determination to strengthen regulation, but we should also ask whether regulation alone can solve the problem.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Jeremy. I offer my sympathy to the Prime Minister on the loss of his father. Losing a parent hurts, whatever age you are. I thank my hon. Friends and other hon. Members for being so kind when I lost my own dad earlier in the year. Thanks, everybody. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Paul Davies) for securing this important debate. He cares deeply about this issue, as do so many members of the public—many more, I imagine, than the 208,000 people who signed the petition. I pay tribute to all the citizen scientists, environmental groups, campaigners and Members of Parliament from across the House. I particularly mention Julie and Reuben; I hope I am not giving too much away when I say to Julie how deeply moved both I and the previous Secretary of State—my right hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Emma Reynolds)—were after we met her, and how touched and privileged we felt to be presented with one of Heather’s shells as a reminder of the need to campaign on this. I promised her that we would focus much more on public health. We have generally lost that focus, and one of the key things in all the reforms we are trying to make is putting public health back at the heart of water. That is why we created the water system to begin with—for public health—and it should be focusing on that right now. All the failures that hon. Members mentioned—all the people who have become sick and the impact on places that people love—are outrageous. They talked about the places where they used to paddle but cannot now, and places they used to visit. It is horrific that we have ended up in this situation. I have always wanted to introduce a water Bill that meets the political moment and the public appetite for change. I am delighted that it feels that we are closer to that. The change in Prime Minister has opened up options that were previously not available; as I will mention, more things are suddenly on the table. I apologise in advance for being an irritating politician—we can quote that one—who is not going to give specific answers, but that is honestly because we are working through things right now. We are working through things across Government, and are looking to introduce a Bill that meets that appetite for change. Hon. Members have had many key messages. As the shadow spokesman, the hon. Member for Epping Forest (Dr Hudson), mentioned, I would normally respond to everyone. I apologise that I am not going to do that, because too many spoke. However, I hope hon. Members recognise that I have been a very open Member of Parliament. We received a parliamentary question from an Opposition Member asking how many meetings Ministers have had with Back-Bench MPs. I have done 141.
We are looking at all of the sector and what can be done right across it. The Prime Minister has been absolutely clear, in all the comments he has made, that, in his words, the current water sector is “a leaking monument” to a system that prioritises private over public. He has used similar words on a number of occasions. I completely understand why people are asking fundamental questions about ownership. For too long, pollution, poor performance and financial instability in the water industry have left customers and communities to pay the price. Infrastructure is crumbling, as we see with water outages. Lots of hon. Members mentioned national security, water and resilience. How can we meet the changing climate when we have a system that is so ineffective? I want to move towards a better system, in which we are thinking about the management of water in a catchment—about water, flooding, wetlands and nature, and how we can do all that together. To do that, we need significant reform to give people and places greater control and to make the industry work for them again. Believe it or not—I know that nobody here would question it—there are some who question whether climate change is real. It is real, everyone. Just remember what it was like in summer. Our water industry must be fit for climate change of the future, delivering clean waterways, reliable services and fair and predictable bills. Whatever the ownership model, we face a challenge around ageing infrastructure. We need major investment. The provision of basic services and the prevention of sewage spills is a fundamental requirement of the sector. Some 30 years of privatisation has not left the system in a good state, and that is probably an understatement. I want to create a system that protects customers, improves the environment and secures reliable water services for the future. There is no single easy fix, but the Prime Minister has been very clear that the failures of the past cannot continue. We will look at all possible solutions for the water industry and bring forward reforms to make the sector work for people and places again. As the Prime Minister has said, later in the year our 10-year plan for Britain will set out plans for stronger public control over essentials such as water. I will not pretend that there is one simple answer to the problems facing the sector, but what is not in question is the need for significant reform. That means tougher regulation, which we have started to see through the increased inspections by the Environment Agency, the court cases coming through and the fines it is starting to issue. We have that tougher regulation, but we still need greater enforcement, greater financial resilience and absolutely a stronger voice for customers and communities. Many hon. Members talked about democratic voice, which I agree is missing from the water sector. Yesterday, my hon. Friend the Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) and I had a quick conversation about how we need to bring people’s voices and that accountability back into place. I know that the Prime Minister is completely committed to looking at devolution and at how organisations can be responsive and answerable to place. Bathing water sites are prioritised for upgrades. The hon. Member for Glastonbury and Somerton (Sarah Dyke) is no longer in her place, but I know that she and I share a love of pre-pipe solutions, which is looking at nature, wetlands and how we can create spaces for water to go to prevent it from entering the system. On looking at assets, we have introduced MOT tests, which has uncovered more problems. When people first go in to inspect, they will identify different problems, and we are seeing that. I want to pick up on a point made by one hon. Member—I apologise; I did not write down their name—about the trade unions and the workers. We can never forget that the workers on the frontline are not responsible for the failures of the water companies. I have absolute respect for them. I meet with the trade unions on a regular basis, and one thing they mention is the abuse that workers get when they are out working. They are not responsible—in fact, I would say that the workers out there on the frontline are the ones holding these companies together. I pay wholehearted tribute to the trade unionists and workers in all those water companies, who are doing a great job in incredibly difficult situations. I completely agree that the system is not fair at the moment. We need to look at rain water management. England’s drinking water is world-leading. There are many things where we can say there is failure, but our drinking water quality is incredibly high. On referendums, my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton Itchen (Darren Paffey) mentioned that he was scarred by a previous referendum, the result of which I still feel deeply myself. But I think we know what the public think about this sector. The Prime Minister has been clear that the Government’s priorities must be the public’s priorities. People want more ownership and control over the things that matter most to them. Public trust in the sector has been damaged by pollution, financial difficulties at some companies and a failure to invest sufficiently in infrastructure. Channel 4’s “Dirty Business” further highlighted the public concern about sewage pollution, shining a light on issues that matter to communities. Public interest should be at the heart of how our critical services operate. For decades, the essential services that underpin daily life, including water, have suffered from over-privatisation, leading to high costs to the public. The Government are clear that the public have a right to expect those services to be affordable and accountable. We have established a public control taskforce that will rewire the state, examining how public control across sectors, including water, can be utilised to return them to public service and bring down costs for families. That ambition is reflected in the reforms we are already taking forward: strengthening accountability, improving performance, giving customers and communities a stronger voice, and ensuring that the water sector works in the public interest. We know that bold action is needed, and that is why we are fundamentally reforming the water sector. I conclude by thanking the campaigners, the 208,000 people and everyone involved in working together on this issue. I hope we can all unite and push forward together to build the water system that we need for our communities, for our environment and for our public health.
My remarks today will focus on the murder of healthcare workers in Palestine and on the tremendous work of Jewish-led organisations that campaign against the illegal occupation. There is one moment that will always stick with me from my last two and a half years as an MP. On 24 June 2025, I was making my way to the Chamber for oral questions when I received a phone call from my colleague, Dr Rebecca Inglis of Healthcare Workers Watch. She told me that a GP like myself who worked in Gaza had just been shot in the head by an Israeli soldier. More than 2,000 healthcare workers and 595 humanitarian aid workers have been murdered at the hands of the Israeli army, and 95 Palestinian healthcare workers remain detained by the Israeli authorities and subjected to the most inhumane conditions and reported torture. Despite even the ceasefire, this goes on. In fact, a UN commission found that the Israeli state had committed the crime of genocide through deliberate targeting of the Gazan healthcare system. The practice is not restricted to Gaza; it took place in Syria and Sudan as well. It has a new name—healthocide—and this British Government must fight against it. Over 90% of the Gaza strip’s healthcare infrastructure has been either destroyed or damaged. Cables have been cut to stop people in Gaza getting proper healthcare. I have heard directly from British doctors in the area who have witnessed the deliberate destruction of medical equipment in front of their eyes. This healthocide extends to the west bank. My hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket (Dr Prinsley) and I were denied access when we tried to look at the healthcare facilities in the west bank approximately a year ago. The Israelis have withheld billions of dollars of tax revenue from the Palestinian Authority, which means that healthcare workers are not being paid. Some have not been paid for the last six months, so workers are cutting their hours and clinics have had to close. I found out today from Medical Aid for Palestinians that healthcare workers have to wear bullet-proof vests when they go outside because they are being targeted by Israeli forces. Medical staff are regularly harassed, ambulances’ movements are restricted, and checkpoint delays are costing lives when every minute matters in medical emergencies. Things are getting worse. The WHO said that in June of this year there were eight attacks on healthcare workers, and in July there were 37 attacks. Also in July, a four-month-old Palestinian boy died after Israeli forces at a military checkpoint west of Ramallah prevented his transfer to a hospital. I agree with our Prime Minister: our party’s rhetoric and our Government’s actions have been totally inadequate in response to these atrocities, but we are now beginning to right that wrong. We have a Foreign Secretary who has restored dignity and credibility in this Chamber, and we have a Government who are finally acknowledging that war crimes have been committed and that the occupation is illegal, and they have backed it up with meaningful action—a Government who will stand up and not stand by. It is long overdue, and we must go further, but it is such a welcome change. I want to end my speech on a positive note. Amid all the horror of the last few years, there have been people who have refused to give up on the possibility of peace. I pay tribute to two brilliant Jewish-led organisations, Standing Together and Na’amod. Standing Together brings Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel together around a simple belief: that the future of one people cannot be built on the destruction of another. Here in Britain, Na’amod have shown extraordinary moral courage. They are a movement of British Jews campaigning against the occupation for the freedom and dignity of Palestinians. I was proud to be hosting them here in Parliament two hours ago. I am glad that our Government will no longer be bystanders, but we must be bolder and move faster. We must use every lever possible to help to bring this illegal occupation to an end, because history will judge us on whether we did enough when it really mattered.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mrs Barker. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Paul Davies) for securing this debate. What should be at the centre of a discussion about public ownership of water? I think it should be public health. Imagine a family spending an afternoon beside a river. The children are playing near the bank. One asks whether they can paddle. The parent looks at the water and hesitates. Hon. Members might think it is because the river is deep or flowing quickly, and they might be right, but just as importantly, the parent does not know what has been discharged into it. That should concern every one of us. In Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket, the rivers connect our towns and surrounding villages. They should be places that communities enjoy and take pride in, not places from which parents feel they must warn their children away. Yet when we discuss the water and sewerage companies, the conversation too often begins with the company finances and ends with arguments about regulators. I think we should begin with the family beside the river. Julie is the mother of Heather, who was just eight when she died in 1999 after contracting E. coli during a family holiday in Devon. Her family story featured in the Channel 4 drama that we have heard about. Julie continues to speak out, so that Heather is not forgotten and so that other families understand the risks, but behind that campaigning is a mother who should have been watching her daughter grow up. That is why I believe the case for public ownership of our water and sewerage companies must be made in terms of the people this essential service exists to protect. The purpose of the water system should be straightforward: to provide clean, safe water. We need water and sewerage companies that have more actual engineers than financial engineers. Our constituents should not have to become experts in the sewage discharge maps before deciding whether to enjoy their local river. No parent should be left wondering whether an ordinary afternoon outdoors puts their child’s health at risk. We cannot promise that open water will ever be entirely risk-free, but we can insist that preventable pollution be treated with the seriousness it deserves. Water is essential to life, and the way we own and manage it must reflect that.
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. It is an honour to speak in the debate. There have been endless debates on this subject since I became a Member of Parliament. What can be done in Israel-Palestine so that all its inhabitants may live in peace and tranquillity, with none to make them afraid? Those are the lines of the sacred prayer for peace that we say in our synagogues every shabbat. We have prayed in vain for what seems like an eternity, and here in Parliament we have endlessly debated this. Since the dreadful attacks of 7 October, the seizing of hostages and the mass destruction in Gaza, there have been countless debates and questions to Ministers. Last year, the Government recognised the state of Palestine, fulfilling a manifesto commitment. That was controversial at the time as there were still hostages, but I supported it, for the formal recognition of a Palestinian state separate from a secure Israel is the two-state solution that we all know must come and it represented the repudiation of Hamas and its sinister refrain, “From the river to the sea”. Now we have a fresh package of sanctions, internationally co-ordinated. The need to act at a time when we see increasing settler violence and so little progress in Gaza seemed urgent. That, I am sure, is the view of our new Foreign Secretary, for whom I have the greatest respect. However, I worry about the timing of the announcement, for the Knesset is dissolved and there is an election in Israel. I fear that the attitude of the Netanyahu Government will simply harden and the electorate may swing behind Netanyahu in reaction. That is the very last thing we want. What I would like to see is surely what many hon. Members would like to see: a new Government in Israel with a completely new approach. This weekend, we celebrated the Jewish new year, Rosh Hashanah, for 5787. I wish all hon. Members a happy and peaceful new year. Next Monday is Yom Kippur, a holy day of repentance. Let us politicians pray for progress and pray for peace.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Barker. Severn Trent customers in Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire have seen their bills rise by 22% this year, and they are expected to rise by a further 47% by 2029. At the same time, Severn Trent reported pre-tax profits of £320 million in the last financial year, and the company’s long-term incentive plan could raise the chief exec’s annual remuneration to a staggering £3.1 million. In 2024, Severn Trent was responsible for more than 300 pollution incidents, and in 2023 the company was responsible for over 60,000 sewage overflows. People living on Paddock Rise in Trentham recently had to deal with the most appalling situation of having raw sewage in their street, presenting a serious public health risk. I have raised many times the challenges faced by the village of Upper Tean, including constant flooding, blown manhole covers, the children’s playground and the recreation ground being flooded with sewage water, and dead rivers with no fish. New developments are creating additional challenges. Although water companies are consulted on planning applications, they are under no statutory obligation to ensure that they upgrade their mains infrastructure to meet increasing demand. Developers meet obligations, as they should; water companies should also do so— especially if we intend to build 1.5 million homes. It is fundamentally wrong that my constituents in Stoke-on-Trent South are facing higher water bills and poor services, while profits are siphoned off into the pockets of shareholders and chief execs. Basic necessities that we all need to survive should not be privatised and subject to profit incentives. Water is a basic human right. Our water should be under public ownership, not “control”, whatever that means—I would appreciate it if the Minister could provide clarity on the difference—and we need to listen to the 208,000 people who signed the petition. We need a water renationalisation plan now, and ownership of our water to be returned back to the people of this country and out of the hands of shareholders—owned by us and run for us.
My hon. Friend is giving a very thoughtful, detailed and balanced speech, and I am grateful for that. A report by the West Bank Protection Consortium documents forced nudity, invasive searches, sexual harassment and threats of sexual violence against Palestinian women, men and children. It found that sexual violence against women and girls was a factor in families deciding to leave their homes. Does she agree that, where sexual violence is used to intimidate and forcibly displace Palestinians, we must make it clear to the Israeli Government that those responsible must be held to account?
Further education colleges play a crucial role in apprenticeships and in supporting education. Will the Minister tell me what extra measures the Government are bringing in to ensure that further education colleges naturally provide a wide range of education and technical skills to apprentices?
My hon. Friend is making a passionate speech. I am sure that like me, he will have had many constituents lobbying him on this issue over the past few years; in my constituency, the Hanwell Friends of Sabastiya, which is a village on the west bank, have often come up to speak to me. Does he agree that community organisations and friendship groups like that have had an important role to play in influencing this Government to take the robust steps that they have now taken?
As far as I am aware, Sir Jeremy, you do. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship. I thank the hundreds of Southampton Itchen constituents who signed the petition because they know that the current model is an abject failure. Trust is completely gone, and they are fed up with being ripped off. My constituents’ bills doubled last year. Southern Water has racked up £7 million-worth of fines just this year. It won a record—not a record it wanted—£90 million fine five years ago after sewage poured into the River Test, one of Hampshire’s chalk streams. The other chalk stream is the Itchen, from which my constituency takes its name. Rare Atlantic salmon come to spawn in the Itchen, but E. coli is rife for people trying to swim there and the stench of sewage is so vile that schools near the river and the treatment works often do not let the kids out on to the playground. The public agree that the model has failed, not just Labour voters—those of us with a history of being pro-nationalisation—but people across the political spectrum. Some 68% back nationalising water, and support keeps growing. More than three quarters of Conservative voters—though possibly not as many Conservative MPs—want water back in public hands. That is as close to a national consensus as we get, so I understand why so many have signed the petition. I part company from the petitioners on one point, which has been reflected by several hon. Members: although I agree with the destination, I am traumatised by previous referenda. People are making their voices heard and telling us what they want. We are a Government with a majority; instead of a referendum, we need a plan of the kind that this Government have already shown they can produce. We did it for rail: a phased, legally underpinned route back to public ownership, transferring operators as contracts expire under a single new body and with no compensation from the taxpayer. I welcome the Prime Minister’s vision for greater public control of essential services but reforming a broken model is not the same as ending it. The public see that, so I ask the Minister: please, let us just crack on with it and get water back into public hands.
A new report by the charity Become shows that personal advisers are in some cases supervising up to 46 young care leavers each. These are the people who can make the difference between young people setting out into adulthood well or feeling completely on their own. Will the Minister therefore commit not just to reviewing the support, but to a funded national strategy and a cap on caseloads, so that no care leaver in Southampton or anywhere in this country has to face adulthood alone?
Is the situation my hon. Friend describes—Thames Water not being there when crises happen, while at the same time hugely increasing customers’ bills and failing to invest in infrastructure—not exactly why we cannot have a sweetheart deal with its creditors and shareholders? They must be held to account; they cannot continue with their record of failure on the backs of hard-working Londoners.