Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

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1. 29 Oct 2026·Parliament·Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

   Budget Resolutions

   It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Edinburgh East and Musselburgh (Chris Murray), although I suspect that we will have slightly different assessments of this Budget. In my view, this is a thin gruel of a Budget, and with its 98 measures tinkering at tax and spending, it is not un-reminiscent of Emperor Nero in Rome, fiddling while it burned. This is ultimately a Budget of delay: it kicks the big decisions into the long grass; it is anaemic in terms of its assessment and forecast for growth; and it quite simply does not set out a compelling vision for our economic future. That inertia has a cost, which is obvious in two areas. The first area, of course, is defence. We are living in an increasingly unstable world. It is negligent—a failure of a duty of government—not to properly fund our armed forces. A consequence of having a plan for a road map to 3% of GDP is that there is no strategy whatsoever. I am afraid that the absence of that plan, from this particular Chancellor especially, does nothing to enhance his credibility in front of the British public and the markets. The second area, which I will touch on briefly, is welfare. I will touch on it briefly because there was barely any mention of it in yesterday’s Budget, and yet welfare spending is predicted to go up by £19 billion this year, and total welfare spending is anticipated to be £431 billion by 2031-32. That is utterly unsustainable. I want to concentrate on a particular hidden tax measure in the Budget. It is buried in section 6.147 of the Red Book, but it has enormous implications for those who are self-employed and pay their tax under self-assessment. I am one of those individuals, from my historical earnings at the Bar and my aged debt. <span id="535" class="column-number" data-column-number="535"></span>Under the new proposal, individuals will pay their taxes perhaps on a monthly or quarterly basis—it is unclear yet—and some 50% of tax returns will almost certainly be brought forward in terms of when they are paid. The obvious effect for the Treasury is that receipts in year 1 will increase by £1.3 billion and by year 3 that will be £1.8 billion. However, it will be ruinous for the individuals concerned because they will end up paying tax on issues that they have not yet received. It does not reflect the seasonality of payments and it is, quite frankly, a rather silly policy that has been cooked up by those who have no understanding of business at all.

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2. 20 Oct 2026·Parliament·Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

   Young People’s Health

   Thank you, Mr Speaker. May I start by associating myself with your remarks on the tragic events involving Helen Haines over the last 24 hours? According to a recent report from Future Minds, more than 2.7 million referrals have been made since the last election to children’s and young people’s mental health services in England, with more than a third of those referred still awaiting treatment. How can the Government seriously claim to be tackling the rising number of young people not in education, employment or training while simultaneously overseeing the waiting list run out of control?

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3. 15 Oct 2026·Parliament·Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

   Unpaid Carers

   It is always a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Barker. I congratulate the hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Alison Bennett) on securing the debate and all hon. and right hon. Members on their very thoughtful and, at times, moving contributions. As we heard during the debate, across the United Kingdom 5.8 million people provide unpaid care. Those carers collect prescriptions, organise appointments and help with all aspects of personal care, and many do so either before or after they have done a full working day. For millions of families up and down the country, this has become part and parcel of ordinary life, but we should never underestimate the toll it takes over time. Of those 5.8 million carers, 1.7 million provide at least 50 hours of care each week—more than a full-time working week—and they often do it alongside employment or while raising a family or managing their own personal health needs. Of course, caring responsibilities rarely fit neatly within the timetable that defines our normal week. Likewise, the way that care, and the need for it, presents itself is often varied and complex. For some, it can come with little forewarning; they may need it after a sudden accident, such as a catastrophic spinal injury. For others, it comes much more incrementally, over a period of time: needing help with shopping becomes needing help with medication, or an occasional visit becomes a daily necessity. Eventually, it can feel as though it is becoming all consuming. Clearly, individuals must adapt because someone they love needs that help. However, our services must adapt, too. Too often we assume rather than asking whether the person who is undertaking the care is able to manage, and whether they have been shown what to do or how to use the necessary equipment and so forth. It is worth remembering that a relative’s presence is not in itself a care plan, and nor should their willingness to help be taken as proof that they do not need any support themselves. We have heard a plethora of examples of what happens when those questions are ignored. One can only imagine the frustration encountered by so many carers who are forced to describe their circumstances, often repeatedly, only for nothing to happen. That risks leaving the carer carrying entirely the same burden and responsibility as they had beforehand, but with less confidence that if they ask in the future it will make an iota of difference, and consequently, potentially, with declining physical and mental wellbeing. Others are forced to cut back on essentials just to make ends meet. These individuals deserve a clear plan from the Government. Carers frequently find themselves putting the needs of those they care for above their own. As we have heard, employment can become more challenging, which often leads people to reduce their hours in order to make caring manageable, which of course has a knock-on impact on their income. Some are ultimately forced to leave work, which brings further financial pressures and often makes returning to the workplace much harder. As a society, we should be helping people preserve their working life wherever possible. Work provides not only financial freedom, but an environment where carers are recognised for achievements beyond their incredibly commendable responsibilities as carers.<span id="235WH" class="column-number" data-column-number="235WH"></span> We must remember, too, that many older carers are managing their own fragility, and that younger carers are often in education and their own childhoods can be affected. Support must reflect people’s different circumstances rather than assuming that every family can manage in entirely the same way. Alan Milburn’s interim review identified around 300,000 informal carers aged between 16 and 24. It described young carers as “one of the least visible groups in the NEET conversation and one of the most systematically miscounted.” A young person who misses college, declines an apprenticeship interview or struggles to attend a job or university may be managing responsibilities that somebody has simply not asked about. In those circumstances, it cannot be right that their commitment to a loved one should cost them opportunities. The previous Conservative Government took action through the 2018 carers action plan, the carers innovation fund and support for statutory carer’s leave. I welcome this Government’s publication of the unpaid carers action plan in July. The task now is to ensure that those commitments actually reach the people the plan is intended to help. With that in mind, I have three specific questions for the Minister. First, with NHS England to be abolished by April 2027, who will have ownership of the actions in the unpaid carers plan thereafter? Secondly, NHS England currently has powers to support service integration between local authorities and the NHS and for the functions of the better care fund, a major source of funding and resourcing for unpaid carers. The BCF in its current form requires the NHS and local authorities to pool budgets for the purpose of service integration, as there is a requirement to use section 75 agreements. That means that to pool budgets, the BCF must involve local authorities. The impact assessment for the Health Bill sets out that, following the abolition of NHS England, that function will be conferred on the Secretary of State. In addition, what is currently a mandatory requirement on the use of section 75 will change to a discretionary power. In short, the Secretary of State will retain the power to require pooled budgets should they wish, but that will not be the default position, as is currently the case. Does the Minister share the concerns of carers’ charities that this change may lead to significant cuts for schemes that support unpaid carers? Thirdly, the Prime Minister set out in his conference speech the bare bones of a plan for a national care service. The Government have of course proposed to fund that through reforms to the triple lock. However, those reforms will, self-evidently, not be sufficient to fund and deliver such a service. Notwithstanding the statement in the main Chamber earlier today, the details of the funding still appear to be somewhat lacking. Much more detail of what the Government are proposing is needed. Do the Government intend to set out further details of how the national care service will be funded, and will the Minister rule out increased borrowing or tax rises to fund it? The Conservatives look forward to working constructively on this issue. It is an important issue that we all face in our inbox every day, but for too long, across the political spectrum, we have kicked it down the track and not got a grip of it. In that spirit, we look forward to the ongoing cross-party talks on the issue. Ultimately, the marker of <span id="236WH" class="column-number" data-column-number="236WH"></span>success must be whether carers can obtain the help that they need, are able to access respite breaks when they need them, and can look after their own health and wellbeing at the same time. That of course requires proper policy consideration, not just headline announcements, and I hope the Minister is able to provide greater clarity on that front today.

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4. 14 Oct 2026·Parliament·Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

   Inheritance Tax

   One of the liberating elements of speaking at this stage of the debate is that many excellent and eminently sensible points have already been made, so I can do an assorted highlights of the best bits that have come out of it. But it has made me reflect that perhaps if we all took a stroll down to Clapham, got on the omnibus, and spoke to the man and woman who had boarded it, I suspect that their vision of this country would not be the same as the purported utopia that we have heard from those on the Government Benches today. I suspect that if we asked people what they want to see from the tax system, they would want to see something that is not unnecessarily detrimental to a single group and not punitive in its intent. Fundamentally, it should not be something that disincentivises those who have done the right thing.<span id="468" class="column-number" data-column-number="468"></span> Looking at the tax landscape in this country, it has become far too complicated and burdensome—we are now at more than 20,000 pages of tax codes, whereas in 1997 there were fewer than 5,000.

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5. 14 Oct 2026·Parliament·Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

   Inheritance Tax

   I recommend that the hon. Gentleman get on the Clapham omnibus, because it is a great opportunity to have his finger on the pulse of the British public. I think most will say that they want a fair system so that when they have worked, strived and built up a legacy for the next generation, they have something to hand down, because that is the most loving thing that people can do. I have not built up a family business or run a family farm, and I cannot imagine the stresses and strains that that involves, but these individuals understandably want to hand their businesses down to the next generation. We need them to do so, because if we do not have the farmers of tomorrow and the generation after that, we will not have on our tables the food that we enjoy today and that we hope our children will enjoy in years to come.

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6. 14 Oct 2026·Parliament·Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

   Inheritance Tax

   I fundamentally do not agree with the hon. Lady’s point, and I suspect that farmers in this country will be wondering why her party has not stood up for farmers over fertilisers today.

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7. 14 Oct 2026·Parliament·Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

   Inheritance Tax

   From a sedentary position, my hon. Friend makes a very valid point. Let us not kid ourselves: this debate has been framed as though we have some sort of Dickensian model of the idle rich and then the poor who are propping up the state. That is not the truth. The reality is that, as my hon. Friends have said, those who are very rich will inevitably put their affairs into trusts and escape inheritance tax. We are talking about those who are just about managing: those who are trying to earn a crust and to support their families. It is the middle class who get caught—those who go out to work every day to provide for their families. The average property price in my constituency of Solihull West and Shirley is now £345,000. Such properties are owned not by the toffs who are often derided by those on the Labour Benches, but by people who get up every morning and often work more than one job to provide for their families. People have tripped into paying inheritance tax by virtue of property prices being pushed up and the threshold remaining the same. The reality is that this tax is not operating as it was <span id="469" class="column-number" data-column-number="469"></span>intended. It is not capturing the individuals it was intended to capture; it is capturing the ordinary man and woman. The fact that the Government have frozen the threshold until 2031—a threshold that was first put in place in 2009—means that, whereas only 4% of deaths were captured by this particular tax between 2001 and 2024, 9.5% of deaths will be captured by 2030. When we compare ourselves with other OECD nations, we see that 18 of those 38 nations do not pay any inheritance tax at all—Australia, Canada and New Zealand among them—and none of the remaining 20 has it at such a punitive rate as we have here. The purpose of a tax system is of course to help fund our public services, but it also has to be fair, sensible and aspirational in its intent. It must ensure that those who strive and work hard are not penalised as a consequence, and I am afraid that this Government’s direction of travel is simply taking out those that do work hard—our family farms, our family businesses and others—by the knee.

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8. 13 Oct 2026·Parliament·Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

   Courts and Tribunals Bill

   I draw the House’s attention to the fact that I am a member of the Bar of England and Wales, and my wife is an employment judge. Notwithstanding some noble and commendable elements, particularly in clauses 12 to 17, in totality, I am afraid that this is a bad Bill. It was a bad Bill when it came before the House on Second Reading; it was a bad Bill when it left Committee; and without significant refinement, it will be a bad piece of law, should it come on to the statute books. This is not the Lord Chancellor’s legislation; he inherited it from his predecessor. It is right to welcome his efforts on the amendment that recognises that clause 3 is unsustainable; it would be churlish not to. He has listened to the legal profession, to this House, and most importantly, to the public, who have raised serious and significant concerns. But I am afraid that the measures do not go far enough. If this Bill is the answer, then the exam question is fundamentally wrong. Nowhere can that be seen more clearly than in clause 6. That is why I am very supportive of amendment 7 in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Dr Mullan), which seeks to remove clause 6. The clause, as we have heard, merely moves the problem from one part of the system to another. It pushes, on a conservative basis, some 25,000 cases into <span id="276" class="column-number" data-column-number="276"></span>the magistrates court. About 5,500 of those are likely to be trials—and not necessarily straightforward trials; they may take more than a day or two to be heard. We are asking an under-resourced and ill equipped magistrates court to deal with them. That is not the way to deal with the magistrates court backlog, which, in the last year, increased by more than 9.5%.

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9. 13 Oct 2026·Parliament·Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

   Courts and Tribunals Bill

   The hon. Gentleman, as always, has his finger on the pulse on these issues. The Government’s proposals would narrow the pool of magistrates able to deal with these cases, by virtue of the time commitments that would be foisted on them. I want to spend a little bit of time on clause 4, which deals with complex and lengthy cases. In essence, through new schedule 3ZA to the Criminal Justice Act 2003, the clause confines complex and lengthy cases to fraud or fraud-aligned cases. However, importantly, there is a provision that the Secretary of State can increase the number of offences captured in this provision. The danger is that there will be a slow accretion of such offences. It is not beyond the realms of possibility that misconduct in public office could be added to that list. The provision fails to recognise the very important work done by Jonathan Fisher KC in his independent review. He pointed out that these cases are not held up because of a jury; under the Bill, they would be delayed, because a judge would have to weigh up the evidence, and reach and write up a judgment. The provision also fundamentally undermines the point that facts of dishonesty—the offences in the schedule are offences around dishonesty—are matters for judgment by the ordinary citizen. Removing the jury element risks the erosion of civic ownership of these cases by the criminal justice system, and the criminal justice system’s engagement with them. The provision would also have a chilling effect, in that the powerful narrative can be developed that these cases are being heard behind closed doors. This stems from a single case from 2005, the Jubilee line case. When the case was reviewed, the very sensible conclusion was reached that the issue came down to poor strategy by the CPS in processing the case; the issue was not jury trials themselves. Amendment 4 from my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle is therefore eminently sensible. If the House is not with me on that, there is an alternative. Amendment 52 by the shadow Justice Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk (Nick Timothy), seeks to limit the scope of this provision to trials where all the offences that a defendant is charged with are captured by new schedule 3ZA. That seems eminently sensible in the circumstances. I want to mention the rule of law. If the rule of law is to be taken into account, we must have an impartial system of adjudication. That means having a fair hearing, which in turn means having the ability to challenge. Therefore, amendment 54 must be right. It must be <span id="277" class="column-number" data-column-number="277"></span>right that in complex or lengthy cases, a defendant has an opportunity to challenge the decision that the case will be heard by a judge sitting alone. I want to spend a few moments on new clause 25. When this Bill was brought before the House, the narrative that we heard from Government repeatedly was that it was being introduced so that we could deal with a backlog in the Crown court. It appears from the Minister’s remarks—she knows that I have enormous respect for her—that it is more of an ideological argument. The question today is whether hon. Members want to do this to deal with a backlog—a specific problem—in which case a sunset clause would be eminently sensible, or whether they are making an ideological argument, which I think is much more chilling on our society.

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10. 15 Sep 2026·Parliament·Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst

    Trial by Jury

    <Question HRSContentId="{DF50ED5D-2299-4FEB-87F5-89C932D835CE}">1. <QuestionText HRSContentId="{AB4338B4-EF7A-4BDA-9A27-9278391A1A4B}">Whether he plans to proceed with the legislative proposals in the Courts and Tribunals Bill to restrict trial by jury. </QuestionText></Question>

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