Health Bill
Clause 59 states: “The Health Services Safety Investigations Body is abolished.” It is going to be abolished.
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Health Bill
I am most grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising the HSSIB question. The Dash review accused HSSIB of exceeding its remit. That is completely wrong in law, and it was always intended to look at systemic problems across the system. The new investigation function in the CQC will not be able to do that, because it will not be independent.
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Lord Mandelson Humble Address: Government Response
First, through the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister, may I thank all of the officials at the Cabinet Office who have dealt with this matter in a very thorough, professional and—as far as I am concerned—courteous way? For that, I am grateful. Casting forward, it is probably perfectly correct that a Prime Minister should be able to make a political appointment to an ambassadorial position, but there seem to be two key lessons that need to be learned here, and I wonder whether the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister could say a word or two on both. The first is that as a matter of course, vetting should be conducted prior to making public an announcement of appointment. The second is that there seems to be confusion—the earlier pages of part I, published today, indicate this—about what being a member of the Privy Council, a Member of the House of Lords, or a former member of the Cabinet means for what type of vetting is required. Can the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister assure the House that those key lessons have been learned, and that very clear direction has been given to those who are charged with this important and sensitive job, so that they know precisely how and when to do it, and so that there is a level playing field for applicants?
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Topical Questions
The SDR acknowledges that a significant proportion of the reserves work in the NHS and that, if they were to be deployed, there would be significant issues. Given that defence medical services and the NHS have to work together, will the Government set out what plans they are putting in place for this?
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Health Bill
As an active user of the NHS, I welcome steps that can be taken to help improve patient experience and care, but the NHS is a delicate ecosystem: mistakes and errors do not just lead to a loss of money—they can be life-changing and, quite literally, a matter of life or death—so it is absolutely essential that we get these changes right. Conscious of time, I will focus on a few points that I want to raise. The single patient record has already been mentioned a number of times. There is no hospital within the boundary of my constituency of South Northamptonshire, so my constituents can be treated at a variety of hospitals, including Northampton, Milton Keynes, Kettering, John Radcliffe or the Horton. Working cross-county and across the country, I can see the value in creating a single patient record, ensuring that notes are available. It really could transform care co-ordination. For example, the wife of one of my constituents was almost given medication that would have killed her—she would have had an allergic reaction—because of the use of old notes. Only her husband’s presence saved her life. We cannot allow that in this day and age. As the Royal College of Nursing has indicated, we must ensure that any new system has robust safeguards around data privacy, transparency, access, procurement and secondary uses of data. I acknowledge that the Secretary of State has put an emphasis on looking at that, but I think we all need more assurances. Even the Royal College of General Practitioners is asking whether the Government will provide any assurances around indemnity for GPs to protect against liability if there are breaches of data protection regulations or instances of mishandling patient records. All in all, the single patient record will work only if the system has the confidence of patients and staff. Nursing staff have been asking through the Royal College of Nursing if they will be involved in the creation and design of the single patient record, to make sure that it will actually work in practice. Will the Minister confirm whether that will be the case? Without careful safeguards, structural changes could risk undermining some of most significant advances that we have seen in recent years. As many Members will not fail to know, I am a type 1 diabetic and I will always passionately talk about diabetes. Diabetes UK has highlighted concerns about some of the changes. We have seen some incredible movements in diabetic technology, including the development of continuous glucose monitoring and, most recently, of hybrid closed-loop systems, which I am wearing and using as I speak. Central co-ordination has ensured that funding agreements are secured and access is prioritised. A shift to purely local decision making risks fragmentation and widening inequalities. Many new treatments are being created and progressed. For example, I introduced a ten-minute rule Bill about type 1 diabetes screening in children. We need to ensure that this is prioritised, along with access to emerging immunotherapies. As this is an incredibly specialised area, it requires expert national oversight and co-ordination. It would be inefficient and potentially ineffective for such developments to be pursued on a purely local basis. We want to ensure that we do not see any progress falling through the cracks as changes are made. Finally, I want to touch on patient voices. The abolition of Healthwatch England has been mentioned numerous times during the debate. Many patients have to be incredibly vocal about the care that they need. Often, they cannot make those points as strongly as we might, so it is vital that we maintain bodies that can speak on their behalf, especially those that ensure the voices of young children and youth are prioritised. I am supportive of some of the changes that are coming, but we do need to exercise some care and caution.
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Health Bill
The shadow Secretary of State is making an excellent speech, and I commend his speechwriter! I am sure my right hon. Friend wrote it himself. On accountability, the Secretary of State spoke repeatedly about devolving powers, but this Bill is a massive power grab by the Secretary of State, and our constituents will not get the accountability that they crave and that some of the reforms we implemented in 2022 gave them. Does my right hon. Friend share my concern?
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Health Bill
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Birmingham Erdington (Paulette Hamilton), not least because I agree with a lot of what she just said, especially around accountability and the impact on integrated care boards and Healthwatch. I will try to speak quite swiftly in the time allocated to me. I campaigned for ICBs, because when I was a new Member of Parliament I had to deal with clinical commissioning groups. In summer 2020, the CCG that I was dealing with told me that I was going to get two new urgent treatment centres at the cost of about £1 million each, but I had a call with the same CCG a month later and it denied ever saying that to me. Luckily, one of my staff members had been on that call. I went to see the Health Secretary at the time, and I thought, “This is not possible.” I am not a health expert, but I have been in business, and accountability and transparency really matter. That is why I supported the Health and Care Act 2022 and the introduction of ICBs. The consequence of the Act was much more local accountability and delivery. That is why, since 2020, we have seen the introduction of an urgent treatment centre at Solihull hospital, a locality hub, state-of-the-art surgical units with robotics, and the second-largest community diagnostic centre in the country. That was opened under this Government, but it was allocated and instigated by the previous Government. I am a big advocate for transparency and accountability, which is why I have great concerns about the Bill. I have great respect for the Minister, but I hope she will appreciate that the cross-party concern on the legislation is very valid. There is a bit of a power grab going on here; the central pillar of the Bill is to centralise powers. Despite the Secretary of State—I would welcome him if he was in his seat—saying that the Bill is not about politicisation, it is inevitable that that centralisation of power will be a politicisation. In fact, the integrated care boards in the form that we created them reduce politicisation. I will not stress that point more than the hon. Member for Birmingham Erdington did, because I was in total agreement with her. Moving on to Healthwatch, I will start with a compliment to the Department of Health, because I wrote to it last year on 12 September and had a response on 15 September. That is pretty good going—long may it continue—but my compliments will stop there, because I am greatly concerned about the abolition of Healthwatch. The Secretary of State kept talking about integrating it into ICBs, but the response I had from the Minister clearly says that the changes will close local healthwatch organisations. I do not agree with the term “integrated”; a new mechanism is being created that will take away patient voices and patient independence. Healthwatch plays an important role in gathering local intelligence. The hon. Member for Birmingham Erdington talked about inequality, and I have great concerns about that. Two of the most deprived wards in the country are in my constituency, and Healthwatch also plays an important role in giving a voice to the voiceless. I was not reassured by the Secretary of State that that role will be preserved as those powers are taken into the ICB or centralised into the Department of Health, where the Secretary of State will be an important arbiter. There was one question that I wanted to ask the Minister. The inequality I referred to includes huge amounts of digital exclusion, another area in which Healthwatch plays an important role. When I talk about the voiceless, I mean the people who do not have the strength or confidence to address those issues. What work has the Department of Health done regarding the digitally excluded? That is a really important question, and I share the concerns about accountability and transparency that have been expressed. I hope the Minister can address them.
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Health Bill
My hon. Friend is delivering a passionate speech. Is he reassured in any way by the changes the Secretary of State alluded to that will help strengthen the patient voice?
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Draft Agriculture (Delinked Payments) (Reductions) (England) Regulations 2026
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Desmond. It is perhaps not surprising that we are here talking about yet another piece of legislation that will impose further harm and unnecessary burdens on our farmers. We have already had the family farm tax, which has now regrettably come into force, the added financial costs of the increase in employer national insurance contributions, and, of course, uncertainty and mixed messages on things such as fuel duty and the rising costs of fertiliser. After leaving the EU, the previous Conservative Government committed to transitioning farmers in England away from direct payments to domestic environmental land management schemes, or ELMS, as they became known, which pay for the direct delivery of public goods. To fund the new schemes, direct payments, now called delinked payments, were scheduled to be reduced gradually from 2021 to the end of 2028. This Labour Government, however, are accelerating that transition. The draft regulations propose a staggering 98% reduction on the first £30,000 tranche that a farmer would previously have received under direct payments, in effect limiting payments to a maximum of £600 per year in 2026 and 2027. When the previous Conservative Administration brought forward delinked payments, we intended a gradual phase-out by 2028 in favour of environmental land management schemes, where farmers and landowners receive payments only for public goods. However, this Government accelerated that decline dramatically last year and have continued at a similar rate this year, which in effect has ended the seven-year transition well before the 2028 deadline that farmers had been led to expect. That was not announced before the last general election, so farmers were under a false illusion when the Labour Government came to power, which undermined their budgets at a time of already unprecedented worry and uncertainty. This is not a party political point that I make here, but one that reflects the concerns of the whole sector. When the percentage reductions for 2025 and 2027 were announced in June last year, the vice-president of the National Farmers Union said: “Having had significant reductions to delinked payments announced only last autumn in the Budget, to have further big reductions starting next year will be yet another financial blow to many farmers who haven’t had the time to effectively plan for them.” The then president of the Country Land and Business Association said that “the sharp fall in BPS payments was expected but is nonetheless unwelcome. It will hit especially hard those whose profit margins are now cut to the bone…While there might be a consolation that the new SFI 2026 scheme could be ready for applications in spring 2026, there is as yet no clarity on what that will look like and who will have access to it”. This Labour Government promised that farmers would be able to access new income streams as direct payments were phased out, but that has not happened. The SFI closed to applications in March 2025 and it remains closed. While I accept that the Government have committed to opening SFI 2026 this month, it is not open yet, and it will only be open for smallholdings of up to 50 hectares. Currently, farmers lack access to replacement support during this period of high cost inflation and market volatility, much of which has been brought on by policy decisions made by this Government. Many SFI 2023 agreements and countryside stewardship mid-tier agreements are due to expire at the end of this year and in early 2027. With no clarity on when farmers can expect to see an SFI 2027, or a further replacement from SFI 2026 opening to all from September, they face being locked out of funding schemes until early 2028 through no fault of their own, by which point, under these draft regulations, the delinked payments will in effect have ceased. Additionally, due to the first-come, first-served nature of the new SFI approach for 2026 and the long period of inaccessibility, demand for SFI 2026 in September is expected to be high. The NFU and the CLA have also expressed concerns about the capacity issues that the Rural Payments Agency is expected to experience. Farmers approaching the end of their environmental agreements face being unable to apply unrestricted for a new agreement until the window has already closed, due to the budget being allocated. Given the well-documented cash-flow crisis in the farming sector, what assessment has been made of the volatility impact on farming businesses that have had their basic payments reduced by at least 98% and are unable to apply for SFI, capital grants or countryside stewardship higher-tier schemes? I also note that no impact assessment is associated with these draft regulations. Why has no full impact assessment been undertaken by the Government, despite the policy change that we are debating having huge financial implications for many—in fact, probably all—farming businesses in England? We support the long-term fair transition of delinked payments, but we cannot do so at this accelerated pace. Conflict in the middle east has caused uncertainty about fuel and fertiliser prices and grain prices remain low, undermining arable farmers’ profitability, but it is not just external factors that add pressure on farmers. Deliberate choices made by this Labour Government have left many farmers more vulnerable. The early closure of the SFI window applications last year, the family farm and family business taxes, increased employer national insurance contributions and the Government’s refusal to consider the Conservatives’ cheap power plan to lower energy costs have had a cumulative impact. Ultimately, these draft regulations do not help farmers precisely at a time when global events and this Government’s choices threaten their viability, let alone their profitability. That is why the Conservatives will vote against the passage of the regulations. I urge the Government to rethink their plans.
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Draft Agriculture (Delinked Payments) (Reductions) (England) Regulations 2026
If the Minister were speaking to a farmer, would she say that this is dancing on the head of a pin? We are talking about reducing an annual delinked payment to a farming business from a potential £30,000 to about £600. Given all the additional overheads placed on farming businesses that produce food, the Opposition believe that that is too quick a drop, and it comes without sufficient notification.
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Child Sexual Offender Data
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Siobhain. I congratulate the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone), who opened the debate on behalf of the Petitions Committee; the lead petitioner, the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth (Rupert Lowe); and the many campaigners who have fought tirelessly, and continue to fight, for justice for the victims of child sexual exploitation. The petition is asking for “a statutory requirement on councils, the police, the Crown Prosecution Service and all other related institutions to collect, record and publish the nationality, ethnicity, immigration status and religion of child sexual offenders, including gang based crime”, and rightly so. It believes that to properly protect children and prevent the mistakes of the past, it is essential to collect and record all that information. I agree with the petition, which states that data would “protect children and inform public policy…allow for better understanding of offender demographics, ensure transparency, and support targeted safeguarding strategies.” It also states: “Without this information, critical patterns may be missed, weakening efforts to prevent abuse and protect vulnerable children.” I agree with this narrative, and I join the over 260,000 people who have taken the time to sign the petition. Although I appreciate that the petition covers several areas, I would like to start by focusing on the importance of the retention of data in cases of grooming gangs and child sexual exploitation. In her audit published in June last year, Baroness Casey rightly recommended a full national inquiry into grooming gangs. As part of her recommendations, as is set out clearly on page 151, Baroness Casey rightly said that it should be mandated that all local authorities, police forces and other relevant agencies retain all relevant records. Any evidence or data that could help the national grooming gangs inquiry should be retained, and the Government should be mandated to inform that retention. After much back and forth with various Home Office officials, the previous permanent secretary at the Home Office, the previous Safeguarding Minister and the previous and current Home Secretary, I learned that it took the Home Office 212 days to issue that direction to our police forces and other key Home Office agencies instructing them to preserve those records after Baroness Casey’s report was published in June last year. That is nearly seven months after publication. I then learned that it took eight months for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to write to local authorities with the same instruction. That is a staggering failure at the heart of this Government to address a key recommendation from Baroness Casey. My first question to the Minister is “Why such a delay?” Secondly, what kind of records are likely to have been lost, or potentially destroyed, in the seven months that it took the Home Office to issue the specific instruction to police forces and the eight months that it took MHCLG to issue the same instruction to local authorities? That question is worth asking, because the reality is that many local authorities up and down the country resisted more openness and transparency on this issue for years—for decades—including Bradford council, whose area my constituency is in. Another key issue in cases of organised child grooming gangs is not only the lack of data, but the lack of certain types of data. In her audit, Baroness Casey stated: “The appalling lack of data on ethnicity in crime recording alone is a major failing over the last decade or more. Questions about ethnicity have been asked but dodged for years. Child sexual exploitation is horrendous whoever commits it, but there have been enough convictions across the country of groups of men from Asian ethnic backgrounds to have warranted closer examination.” I have seen that for myself in my Keighley constituency, within the Bradford district, where the vast majority of convictions have been of men of Asian ethnic background, whose offences were predominantly against white young girls. We have to be sensible when talking about this issue because, as Baroness Casey rightly found in her audit, only 37% of suspects had their ethnicity data recorded. That is simply not good enough, and addressing it is a key recommendation by Baroness Casey. I welcome the recommendation that the Government mandate the collection of ethnicity and nationality data on all suspects in child sexual abuse and criminal exploitation cases; I only wish that it had come sooner. In my view, the very same approach should apply to the immigration status and religion not only of the victim, but of the perpetrator, so that we can get to grips with the complexity of this issue. A national inquiry is now taking place. The areas subject to local investigations will be announced by 13 July. Why on earth is that taking so long? I commend the work done by the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth, but is the information collected by his inquiry being fed into the national grooming gangs inquiry led by Baroness Longfield? It is crucial that that information is considered.
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Child Sexual Offender Data
The point is that all hon. Members in this place have a duty to represent our constituents and to feed any information that we have to Baroness Longfield, as the chair of the national grooming gangs inquiry, so that we can make sure, now that the terms of references have been set, that the local inquiries that form part of that national inquiry take place in the right areas. That brings me to my key point. Keighley and the wider Bradford district is an area where people have been ignored and abandoned, at a local and national level, for far too long. For years people there have fought hard for our area to be included but they have been ignored. Since I was first elected to this place to represent the people of Keighley and Ilkley, I have stood alongside victims and survivors such as Fiona Goddard and alongside leading child abuse lawyers such as David Greenwood to call for one simple thing: a full independent inquiry should take place across Keighley and the wider Bradford district. These heinous crimes did happen and are happening right now. For decades, child sexual exploitation and gang-related grooming have haunted communities that I represent. Lives have been shattered. Trust has been broken. Far too often, those crying out for justice have been met with silence. My second question for the Minister is: will she announce in this debate that Keighley and the wider Bradford district will be included as part of the national grooming gangs inquiry? If the Government were confident enough in January 2025 to announce that Oldham would be included, why on earth are they not confident enough today to announce that Keighley and the wider Bradford district will be included? As I have said many times before, I fear that the scale of the issue across the Bradford district will dwarf that in places such as Rotherham, Rochdale, Telford and Oldham, where previous inquiries took place. Bradford has been referenced a lot in relation to child sexual exploitation, and many victims and survivors have unfortunately been trafficked through the city. I would therefore like to hear a positive response from the Minister. My final point is about the cost of the national grooming gangs inquiry. The Government have allocated £65 million to that inquiry, but we are yet to understand which local areas will form part of it. My third question to the Minister is: will the Government expand the allocation of funds to the national grooming gangs inquiry if the inquiry’s chair, Baroness Longfield, deems that more money is needed because more areas need to be looked at as part of the inquiry?
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Child Sexual Offender Data
I completely concur with my right hon. Friend. I do not want the Government’s independent inquiry to be restricted by the amount of funds that it has been allocated. We need to make sure that the inquiry is robust, transparent and open, and that no stone is left unturned.
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Child Sexual Offender Data
I absolutely concur with the hon. Member’s point. Youth services are a key indicator. Many of those who work for local authorities engage with victims and survivors, and of course they have a safeguarding responsibility and an ability to spot the signs of abuse. If youth services are one of those mechanisms, and if certain local authorities say that funding is an issue, then yes, of course—if that results in the right outcomes. My final point is that there is always much focus on the national grooming gangs inquiry, but it seems that there is less focus on the report of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, which was an excellent piece of work by Professor Alexis Jay. It made 22 recommendations, but here we are, 22 months into this Government, and only six of those recommendations have been acted on. I fully acknowledge that the report came out in 2022 and that the previous Administration did not make enough progress on the recommendations in the 20 months that they had to act on them before the general election, but we are now 22 months into the new Government. My fourth question is: what additional progress are the Government making on implementing all 22 IICSA recommendations? I acknowledge and welcome the progress that has been made.
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Child Sexual Offender Data
The Crime and Policing Act did not go anywhere near far enough to provide the safeguarding mechanisms to protect vulnerable victims and survivors who have experienced heinous crimes of child sexual exploitation. I will not vote for poor, badly thought-through legislation introduced by this Government. Beyond the six that have been acted on already, what additional progress will be made on the 22 recommendations? I conclude by advocating that the Minister include Bradford and Keighley in the national grooming gangs inquiry.
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Child Sexual Offender Data
If that was the case, why did Baroness Casey feel strongly enough to include this issue as part of a recommendation in the report?
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Child Sexual Offender Data
Will the Minister answer two questions? If the Government were confident enough to announce Oldham more than 18 months ago, why are they not confident enough to announce that Bradford and Keighley will be part of the national grooming gangs inquiry? On the £65 million cost, are the Government challenging the independent chair of the inquiry, Baroness Longfield? Last week she stated to me, in front of the Home Affairs Committee, that she felt that £65 million was about right, yet she has not announced which local areas, or how many local areas, the inquiry will look at.
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UK Coastal Waters: Protection
I know that, like me, those on the Government Front Bench welcome the regulating for growth Bill, which will enable the modernisation of regulations for maritime autonomy testing and the creation of regulatory sandbox powers. That is vital for the unmanned vessels that we need to protect our coastal waters, but defence firms such as those in my constituency cannot afford unnecessary delay due to the parliamentary timetable, or we will risk losing ground to international competitors. What conversations is the Department having with colleagues across Government to speed up the progress of the Bill through Parliament? I am planning to ask the Leader of the House about that in due course.
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Topical Questions
There were concerning reports at the weekend about the global combat air programme’s being delayed. We know the funding for Edgewing, agreed in April, is due to run out this month. Can the Minister guarantee that a new deal will be signed and in place before the end of June?
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Equality Act 2010: Code of Practice
This is definitely better late than never, and after listening to the Lib Dem spokesperson—I cannot believe I am going to say this—I am actually grateful that we have a Labour Government and not a Lib Dem Government, because what the Lib Dems have just said is absolutely shocking. They do not respect the rule of law at all. On that note, I am going to ask a technical question. Did the Secretary of State formally reject the draft code of practice, as submitted by the EHRC in September 2025? If so, please can the Minister provide us with a copy of the written reasons given, as per section 14 of the Equality Act 2006?
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Lord Mandelson Humble Address: Government Response
The Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister is well known for being courteous and passionate at the Dispatch Box, and I am a fan. [Hon. Members: “Hear, Hear.”] This is where I get to the bad part: he is not necessarily known for answering everybody’s questions when they ask them. On the question asked by the Father of the House, my right hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh), will the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister commit to opening the debate on Wednesday and, with the leave of the House, closing it, so that every Member of this House can ask him questions?
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Health Bill
Order. Interventions are going to make it very difficult for everyone to speak in the debate. I call Dr Beccy Cooper.
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Health Bill
Order. To ensure that the final four speakers can get in, the speaking limit will become two and a half minutes.
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Coastal Communities: Government Support
Order. Ms Martin, I do not think my beaches were being discussed.
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Armed Forces Recruitment and Retention
May I begin by saying that we Conservative Members stand four-square with the Government on their response to Romania? It is a NATO ally, and it deserves our support. While overall trends in recruitment and retention may have stabilised, there is still a serious problem of personnel leaving the special forces. We know from the personal accounts of former Special Air Service commanders that this is due in no small part to the Government’s facilitation of lawfare against their comrades who served in Northern Ireland. To aid retention, what is the Secretary of State’s personal response to the three special forces regimental associations that publicly warned him in late April that “The egregious mistreatment of veterans and the ongoing infringement of their rights has to end”?
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Armed Forces Recruitment and Retention
The Secretary of State said he did not recognise “my” description. It is not mine. It is in a statement of 22 April from the three special forces regimental associations. Those are not my words; they are theirs. I will ask him again. If we are to persuade people to continue serving their King and country in uniform in very high-threat situations, we need to address these legitimate concerns. For months now, the Government have been promising to table amendments to their benighted troubles Bill to provide additional protections for veterans, but as with the defence investment plan, we are still waiting for Godot. When exactly will those long-promised amendments be published, and by which Minister?
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Child Sexual Offender Data
My hon. Friend is making a fantastic speech. Does she agree that although the public perception seems to be that these crimes are a northern towns issue, there are also young girls who have historically been abused in London? It is disgraceful that people in authority in London are still in denial that these crimes are happening here, in our capital city.
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Defence Procurement
FalconWorks, which is part of the BAE Systems family and the enterprise zone at Warton, has been at the cutting edge of learning the lessons from rapid deployment and redesign of unmanned aircraft in Ukraine. A key part of that is including the pre-investment in research and development as part of the procurement of defence systems. Will the Minister commit to continuing to work with companies such as FalconWorks that support huge numbers of jobs in Fylde and across Lancashire?
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Equality Act 2010: Code of Practice
I thank the Minister for advance sight of the statement. It is understood that the Secretary of State first received the draft code of practice in September last year, nine months ago—nine months in which the law has been clear, the Supreme Court had ruled, and women, girls, public bodies and businesses across the country have been waiting for the Government to act. What did the Government do when they received it? Instead of action, we saw delay after delay from a Government reluctant to face their own Back Benchers and protect vulnerable women and girls. First, the Secretary of State claimed that she needed impact assessments; then she said that consultation with devolved Governments was required, despite this being a reserved matter; after that it was purdah; and finally, having exhausted every excuse, she chose to lay the code of practice before the House on the very last day before the Whitsun parliamentary recess, seemingly actively minimising scrutiny. That is not acceptable. It is also telling that the Secretary of State has sadly not even come to the House herself to account for these decisions—it seems the lure of Makerfield is too great. The Secretary of State previously told the House that she requested only minor changes to the EHRC’s draft. If that is the case, I ask the Minister, in the Secretary of State’s absence, why it took eight months to request them. The statement talks about engagement—in the interests of transparency, who was that with? My right hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho) and I have written to the chair of the EHRC asking for clarity on what changes were made. Under the Equality Act 2006, the Secretary of State must provide written reasons for rejecting the original draft. As changes plainly have been made, will the Minister commit to publishing the detail on what has changed and why? The code of practice is right to emphasise the importance of protecting single-sex spaces and services for women, but the law has been settled since the Supreme Court judgment over a year ago. Sex means biological sex, and yet the Secretary of State has failed to enforce that ruling and women have faced ongoing harassment and discrimination for stating that basic fact. We have seen cases such as the Darlington nurses, who were hounded out of their roles or drawn into lengthy tribunal processes for asserting their legal right not to share changing rooms with men. The Government have done nothing to protect them. What does the Secretary of State and the Minister say to those many women whose privacy, safety and dignity have been compromised during these nine months of inaction? Why did the Secretary of State fail to get a grip on her own Government when Department after Department claimed that they could not update their policies while awaiting the code? The Minister said in her statement: “We are committed to doing this and are working across Departments, considering the implications of the code to policies and activities.” Is that why, more than a year after the Supreme Court ruling, the NHS still has not updated its policy on single-sex spaces for staff? Perhaps following the new Health Secretary’s recent remarks there may be greater clarity in the wider Labour Government about what a woman is, but this revisionist mindset about Labour’s supposed long-term support for single-sex spaces will frankly be fresh news to the hon. Member for Canterbury (Rosie Duffield). Will the Minister set out the steps that all Departments will now take to comply with the code, and will they all do so without further delay? In the meantime, some have sought actively to misrepresent this issue as an attack on trans people. It is not. It is simply about applying the law correctly while safeguarding women and girls. I think the Green party’s deputy leaders’ inflammatory rhetoric is reprehensible and unhelpful, especially at the start of Pride Month. Not to be outdone, we are witnessing peak Lib Dem-ery, with the party leader claiming to accept the Supreme Court’s judgment while opposing the guidance that flows from it. As has rightly been said, that position is unprincipled. Only the Liberal Democrats can claim to support the rule of law while rejecting the practical application of it. This code of practice is welcome. As the Minister said, it covers a broad range of areas including age, disability, pregnancy and maternity, race and so much more, but, disgracefully, it has landed nine months overdue—and helpfully after local elections in which we women voted. During that time, women have paid the price of inaction. Now that the code has finally been published, women and girls need proper action—not hiding away, not further delay and not more excuses. We need the immediate enforcement of the rights that women and girls are entitled to under the law of this land.
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Child Sexual Offender Data
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Vickers. I begin by thanking all Members who contributed to the debate, the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth (Rupert Lowe) for bringing forward this important petition, and the more than 260,000 people who signed it. I pay tribute to those victims who have lived through some of the most horrific issues and incidents and are bravely doing so much to support others and prevent this from happening to others. The scale of support for the petition demonstrates the strength of feeling on this issue across the country. Child sexual exploitation and abuse are among the most horrific crimes that can be committed. The offenders are the most vile, sick and evil individuals among us; their actions leave lasting scars on victims and destroy young lives. Our first duty, as legislators and as a society, is to do everything possible to prevent these crimes and bring perpetrators to justice. For many people who signed the petition, this debate is inseparable from the grooming gangs scandal that has scarred towns and communities the length of this country. We saw not only despicable actions by offenders, but the failure of institutions. Vulnerable children were abused while too many warning signs were missed, too many concerns were ignored, and too many difficult questions went unasked. That failure remains one of the darkest chapters in this country’s history. The crimes themselves were horrific, but what makes this even more shocking is that, in too many cases, victims were failed by the very institutions that existed to protect them. If we are serious about ensuring that such failures are never repeated, we must be willing to gather the evidence, confront the facts and learn the lessons, however uncomfortable they may be for some. At its heart, this petition asks whether we are collecting enough information about those who commit these crimes to properly understand who they are and stop them. The truth is that we need to know who is committing the crimes. The more accurate information we have, the better informed this House, this Government, the police and safeguarding agencies will be when deciding how to prevent them.
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Child Sexual Offender Data
The hon. Lady is entirely right. As many people have said, sunlight is the best disinfectant. We need to be more transparent and know who the victims and perpetrators are so that we can seek solutions and give victims the support they require. As Baroness Casey’s recent audit highlighted, there have been significant shortcomings in the collection of data relating to perpetrators of group-based child sexual exploitation. I welcome the fact that the Government have now accepted her recommendation that ethnicity and nationality data be collected more consistently. However, accepting the principle is only the beginning. The real question is whether, how and when that commitment will be delivered in practice. This is not a new issue. During the passage of the Crime and Policing Act, I and colleagues tabled amendments that would have required greater transparency around the collection and publication of ethnicity data relating to sexual offenders and grooming gangs. The purpose was simple: to ensure that collection of this information did not depend on changing priorities or varying practices between police forces. Those proposals were resisted by the Government. I therefore welcome their change of position, but I wish it had come sooner. We need to confront the failings now and not wait for another report, another scandal or another public outcry. For too long, a lack of proper data has meant that legitimate concerns were dismissed and public confidence was undermined. A striking feature of this debate is that independent researchers have often been able to identify trends and patterns that official systems have struggled to capture. It cannot be right that academics can sometimes build a clearer picture of offending patterns than the institutions responsible for recording and responding to the crimes. The state should know what is happening within its own criminal justice system. This debate is not about stigmatising communities, but about protecting victims and confronting the facts, wherever the evidence leads. Baroness Casey’s audit contained one particularly troubling example. She described finding a children’s case file in which the word “Pakistani” had literally been Tipp-Exed out. Whatever the reason for that, it is not how safeguarding should operate. We cannot protect children if information is ignored, obscured or left unrecorded. As Becky Riggs, the national policing lead for child protection and abuse investigation, has acknowledged, this data helps police to understand risks, vulnerabilities and where resources should be targeted, which is why improving its quality and completeness matters so much. The Government have accepted the principle; the question now is how quickly, comprehensively and consistently it will be delivered across every police force in the country. The public need to be confident that the authorities are prepared to ask difficult questions, collect evidence rigorously and publish findings honestly. I welcome the Minister to her place, and I would be grateful if she addressed three specific points. First, what discussions have the Government had with chief constables and police leaders about improving the collection of ethnicity, nationality and other relevant data relating to group-based child sexual exploitation? Secondly, how will progress be measured? What expectations will be placed upon forces, and how will compliance be monitored? Thirdly, when will Parliament next receive an update on progress so that we can assess whether the commitments that were made following Baroness Casey’s review are actually being delivered on? Better data alone will not solve the problem—we also need effective policing, strong safeguarding, successful prosecutions and proper support for victims and survivors—but it is an essential part of the solution. The lesson from every review, every inquiry and every survivor testimony is the same: difficult facts do not disappear because institutions choose not to record them. The failures of previous generations of authorities to tackle child sexual exploitation are a stain on this country’s record. We owe it to survivors to do better. That means putting safeguarding before institutional reputation, putting evidence before ideology, and being prepared to follow the facts, wherever they lead. The victims of these appalling crimes deserve justice, truth and confidence that every possible lesson has been learned. For that reason, I welcome this debate and thank the petitioners for bringing the issue before Parliament. I hope that the Government will now ensure that the commitments they have made on transparency and data collection are fully and consistently delivered. Let us deliver justice for victims, hold perpetrators to account and do everything we can to prevent these crimes from ever happening again.
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Child Sexual Offender Data
Order. I remind Members not to address the Public Gallery, but to speak through the Chair.
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Lord Mandelson Humble Address: Government Response
I thank the Minister for his statement. The media are going to have a frenzy over the tittle-tattle of all this stuff during the next three days, but to my mind the whole Mandelson affair represents a very serious breach of national security. Can the Minister reassure me and the House that the Foreign Office and the security services are turning over with a fine-toothed comb every minute of Lord Mandelson’s time as ambassador to make sure his actions in that office were in the national interest?
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Child Sexual Offender Data
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Siobhain. The petition calls on councils, the police and the CPS to publish their child sexual offender data on nationality, ethnicity, immigration status and religion. I cannot overemphasise the importance of that in making sure that the victim’s voice is heard. I would like to use an historical example from the Sikh community in my constituency, who came forward when the child rape gang scandal was in the news. So many of my Sikh constituents came to me in tears, publicly. They said, “We came forward saying that our girls were being raped and targeted in schools. We were trying to protect them, but we were told by the police, politicians and the media that it was an Asian problem and that we needed to just deal with it within our own community.” They were ignored—no one wanted to listen to them, because it was Pakistani Muslims who were attacking their girls. They were trying to do things to protect them, and they have historically been ignored and told it was an Asian problem that they could deal with themselves. I was not the MP at the time, but I have dealt with cases, including historical cases, that have come to me. It would be remiss of me not to say that I believe it is vital that the religion, immigration status, ethnicity and nationality are mentioned in reporting, because how can we target specific areas of criminality if we do not know those key details? Another historical example that occurred before I was an MP involved a girl who was abducted, raped and killed in an area for which I was a councillor. The person who committed those crimes was from an eastern European country that was exporting its criminals. It would let them out of prison, and they could either go to the UK or go back to prison—those were their choices, so we were getting a huge number of sexual offenders and murderers coming to the UK. Without recording ethnicity data in the police stations in areas where crimes were being committed, we could not link those things together. If Interpol did not release that information, we were not aware of that crime, which is why it is essential that we publish that information. When we look at mass rape gangs and the protection of group-based child sexual exploitation, which is a very specific kind of exploitation—the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth (Rupert Lowe) spoke about the horrific, sadistic abuse and torture that these girls have endured—no one wants to hear these things out loud. It is disgusting; it is an abomination; it is a shame and a blight on our country. It would be remiss of us not to do everything in our power to uphold the rule of law and ensure that any ethnic or religious groups that were targeting those girls are brought to justice. If this was a Catholic rape gang, or a Protestant rape gang, or something like that, we would be shouting from the rooftops that something needed to be done. We need to be honest about what is happening, where and why these abuses are taking place, and what ethnic and religious groups are targeting our young women.
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Child Sexual Offender Data
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point; London has had horrific abuses. I worked with a girl who the Children’s Society intervened on. She had been gang-raped and exploited. She had been moved from local authority to local authority, and it had been covered up. We are not addressing these things, because we have been drowning in a sea of political correctness and we are afraid to call out the truth.
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Child Sexual Offender Data
We do need to ask those questions, and we need to be unafraid to stand up for the girls who have been raped, exploited and lied to—who have been let down by the local authority and let down by political correctness gone mad. We have forgotten who we are here to protect—the victims, the girls. No matter how unpleasant this truth is, we need to face it. Whether it is Pakistani gangs or other ethnic groups, we need to face it in the broad light of day, and we need to make sure that the victims’ voices are heard. [Martin Vickers in the Chair]
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Child Sexual Offender Data
As a fellow Scottish MP, the hon. Member will know that, sadly, these gangs operate across all parts of the United Kingdom. Does he accept that we need consistency in the collection of data in Scotland, Wales, England and Northern Ireland?
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Topical Questions
Having recently visited Wiltshire cadets in Old Sarum, I very much welcome what the Minister said about National Cadet Week. Will she ensure that all schools, particularly those in Pride in Place areas, such as the one in Salisbury, are made aware of the transformational opportunities of attending the cadets? That will be a great way of expanding the uptake, which I am sure she is aiming for.
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Business of the House
I thank the Leader of the House very much for that business update and for the news of the debate on Wednesday. That will be an opportunity for Back-Bench Members to put matters on the record—but for scrutiny of the Government, actually, by far the best way is through the questions that will follow the next statement, although I am afraid that the Mandelson files were released publicly only at 2 pm and, at 1,500 pages, no Back-Bench Member can be expected to have mastered them. The Leader of the House recognises the importance of parliamentary scrutiny. Since those files could have been put in the public domain at 9.30 this morning, could I register with him that we are all owed a slightly higher quality of scrutiny than this has received?
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Topical Questions
On Thursday I was on the water with King’s Lynn Sea Cadets and Royal Marine Cadets. As the Minister will know, the Army and Air Force cadets are wholly funded by the Ministry of Defence. What provision will the Royal Navy make to fund vital equipment, such as the new boats that those cadets need?