Labour Party MP for Sunderland Central since (elected). An MP continuously since .
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312
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| Party | Office | Area | Period | Began | Ended | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Labour | MP | Sunderland Central | – present | elected | — | Party history |
Parliament's party history for this member: Labour ( – present).
Every entry the member has in the Register of Members' Financial Interests, as Parliament currently publishes it. The wording and values are the member's own declarations; nothing here has been assessed by this site.
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| Date | Category | Entry | Declared value | Sitting for | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| date registered | 8. Miscellaneous | Vice Chair of Labour North Regional Executive Committee. | — | Labour | Register record |
<Question HRSContentId="{14E40FDE-7C3B-4E72-8162-4A21988F99F1}">T7. <QuestionText HRSContentId="{E451A23B-3D7E-4930-8060-CA6A68674FD3}"></QuestionText>As the Government prepare their taxi and private hire vehicle Bill, will the Minister ensure that local authorities such as Sunderland have the enforcement powers and resources that they need to regulate all vehicles operating in their area, regardless of where those vehicles are registered?</Question>
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Abtisam Mohamed) on securing this debate and I congratulate Members from across the Chamber on their contributions. It should not be said that issues facing our universities are the preserve of MPs from big cities or the leafy suburbs. As Sunderland Central’s MP, I want to highlight the importance of the University of Sunderland to my city. This is as much a red wall issue as it is anywhere else in the country. I want to mention the university’s educational and economic impact, and what the higher education funding environment means for our city. The university comes from the proudest of polytechnic traditions. It is rooted in the city, with a mission to be open to anyone who can benefit from higher education. It is shaped by what local employers and professions need. Nowhere is that clearer than in health. Sunderland trains the nurses, pharmacists, paramedics and doctors whom our NHS rely on. Its medical school was explicitly set up to bring more working class and local students into medicine. It is now moving into dental education, in a region where too many people struggle to see NHS dentists. When it <span id="149WH" class="column-number" data-column-number="149WH"></span>was named university of the year for social inclusion, more than six in 10 of its students were the first in their family to go to university. If I may, I will associate myself with the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton Itchen (Darren Paffey) on the intergenerational and social mobility missions of our universities. That is crucial in Sunderland, as it is elsewhere. This is what widening participation looks like in practice: young people from Pallion, Hendon or Southwick in my constituency having the chance to get a degree and, by living at home, de-risking some of the financial issues facing students that we have talked about. The university, as we have heard, also brings people to the north-east from across the country and, as successive Governments’ international strategies have encouraged, from around the world. On its economic impact, independent analysis found that the University of Sunderland adds around £250 million a year to our city’s economy and supports more than 4,000 jobs in the city. It is one of our biggest employers. The university, however, is under real financial pressure, which has serious consequences for the city as a whole. Home tuition income has fallen behind costs, and the visa landscape for international students has changed rapidly and unpredictably. As a result, the university has had to set out plans to save £40 million over the next two years, and staff are understandably worried about their jobs. That pressure did not come from nowhere. For years, the previous Government froze tuition fees while costs kept rising, with no long-term plan. As others have said, the Government now expect to fund just 16p in every pound of home student funding. Universities that do the most to open doors, like Sunderland, are left the most exposed. I know the Government are working with significant fiscal constraints. I know they have taken steps to set stable expectations for future fee income so that proper financial planning can happen. I, of course, welcome the return of targeted maintenance grants. But in previous responses the Government have been keen to highlight that universities have always been autonomous institutions. I understand that. In my experience, they take the responsibility to be financially sustainable seriously, even when that means making deeply painful and locally unpopular decisions such as the withdrawal of funding from our National Glass Centre in Sunderland. But we cannot treat them as autonomous institutions and assume that they will always be there as anchors in communities like Sunderland and across the country. I hope we will hear more about the Government’s long-term strategy.
<Question HRSContentId="{D374E250-463C-4A3A-8C0F-0CEAD096A870}">Q14. <QuestionText HRSContentId="{4C204728-FAFD-4811-8C1F-E4C64ABAFFE7}"></QuestionText>Waits for NHS mental health care are far too long. Our constituents are 200 times more likely to wait 18 months for help with a mental health condition than for a physical health condition. A key reason is that, for a long time, there have been clear standards set for physical health access that we are all familiar with—four hours for A&E, and 18 weeks for physical health—but such standards have not been set by successive Governments for mental health. Our manifesto promised to reform the NHS to give the same focus and attention to mental health as to physical health. Will the Prime Minister ensure that the forthcoming mental health strategy delivers on that and sets clear standards, to reduce mental health waits for people of all ages?</Question>
The peace that Northern Ireland has today rests on the reconciliation process that we have seen in recent decades, civil rights and the rule of law, as well as the recognition that differences must be settled through dialogue and democratic means, and with respect for the rights and perspectives of every community and tradition. The peace in Northern Ireland today was also built on the service and sacrifice of the men and women of Operation Banner, thousands of whom came from Sunderland. They did not go from Sunderland to Northern Ireland to be on either side; they went because they were actively recruited by the British state at a time when there was high unemployment in places like Sunderland. They stood on Northern Ireland’s streets, overwhelmingly as a protective force, on sentry and patrol duty, guarding civilians, on constant alert against those who were trying to kill. Over 38 years of Operation Banner, 1,441 of our British service personnel died; 722 were killed by paramilitaries. I listened carefully to the debate yesterday. As others have said, there were many fantastic and moving contributions. I pay particular tribute to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Birmingham Selly Oak <span id="1001" class="column-number" data-column-number="1001"></span>(Al Carns), and my hon. Friend the Member for Southend East and Rochford (Mr Alaba), who is not in his place today. The contribution that moved me most, and most closely reflected the experience of my veterans in Sunderland, came from the hon. Member for South Shropshire (Stuart Anderson), who is not in his place today. He described serving as a young rifleman on the streets of Northern Ireland, and not knowing, when a civilian raised their hand, whether they were making a purely innocuous gesture, or about to throw an incendiary device. That was the experience of the constituents I met at our local Gunners Club in the recess just gone, for a two-hour roundtable to discuss the issue. The reality is that without the Army’s deployment in 1969, Northern Ireland faced the risk of far more bloodshed than it unfortunately experienced. Those who served held the line for decades—long enough for politics to finally take its place—and we must never stop saying thank you to them. As others have said, it is not right to set veterans against victims, and to suggest that veterans were not, in many cases, victims themselves. Serving both, and all, allows us all to move forward to a peaceful future, but that will take changes to the law, through this Bill, and full co-operation and transparency from the British and Irish Governments. I am clear that the previous Government’s legacy Act failed on multiple counts. It commanded the support of no community and no party in Northern Ireland, and it undermined the ongoing process of reconciliation, which recent weeks show is still absolutely essential. It also failed victims of every background, including the families of the British soldiers murdered by the IRA in Guildford and on the M62, whose killers would have been offered immunity. We should never forget that those bereaved military families were among the most vehement critics of the previous Government’s legacy approach; indeed, they were part of the legal action against it. Many who came home still carry the cost. In the conversation I had with veterans recently, they shared their remembrance of what they saw in Northern Ireland, how that affected their life still, and how, when they got home, they had far too little support on discharge from the British state. The reality is that there were 300,000 Operation Banner veterans, and six prosecutions of them. However, too often since the Good Friday agreement, it has felt as if the legal system was built to scrutinise the split-second actions of frontline soldiers—process as punishment. At the same time, comfort letters were given to suspected terrorists, the very people the soldiers were sent to protect civilians from. That system has also felt focused on individual frontline soldiers, not on failings in the chain of command, although in some cases, its decisions profoundly affected civilians. Those who served with honour deserve to live out their life in peace, with our country’s thanks, not fearing a knock at the door. They were offered false and undelivered promises by the previous Government, and they did not feel that the Bill as introduced was appropriate. In that spirit, I have engaged with our Ministers on this, including my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds South (Hilary Benn), over the past year. For a significant time, I was clear, in our private meetings, that I could not support the legislation unamended. I sought many amendments, and some of them were <span id="1002" class="column-number" data-column-number="1002"></span>discussed yesterday. New clause 32, which was agreed to, is clear that action taken in the course of duty must never be treated as equivalent to terrorism. New clause 43 sets a tight time limit of 14 days for an application for judicial review; that will give some clarity about whether be lawfare can take place long after legal proceedings seem to have closed. I am pleased that the amendments that we are discussing today go further on the assurances that veterans have asked for and that I have pushed for over the past year. As the Secretary of State said, under new clause 50, no one can be prosecuted for the most serious troubles-related offences without the consent of the Attorney General. That applies to everyone, so it is not an amnesty. The peace that we have in Northern Ireland was built on the rule of law, not sectional favouritism for one group. The new clause offers a senior independent check from outside Northern Ireland’s politics. That will go some way towards winning the trust of veterans who have lost faith in the system. The reality is that following the acquittal of soldier F, no one expects further prosecutions. A second point about the amendments that we are considering today is that they offer no special exit for terrorists. As hon. Members have rightly pointed out, the collapse of the trial on the Hyde Park bombing—an attack that killed four soldiers—was the result of an apparently mistakenly issued letter of comfort. The hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sorcha Eastwood) rightly said that such terrorist action was always wrong; there should never have been any doubt about this House’s condemnation of that. Veterans saw that old soldiers were questioned decades on, while suspected bombers held letters saying that they were not wanted. That ends today. Thirdly, and for most veterans most importantly, there will be an end to being investigated and questioned again and again. Yesterday’s amendments mean that investigators must go through the state’s own records first, and give particular weight to whether compelling new evidence exists before requiring any veteran to give evidence. Under new clause 84, which we are discussing today, a resumed inquest must not repeat what has already been done, unless that is essential. I welcome the Secretary of State setting out the clear process by which inquests will end altogether. A veteran who has given his account should not be made to relive the same night, and answer the same questions, every few years. As my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Adam Jogee) underlined, there will be protections for veterans against cold calling and returning to Northern Ireland, which have been welcomed by the Royal British Legion. I will support the Bill, as the amendments are sufficient, in my view, to win the confidence of veterans. However, the Bill cannot be the end of Parliament’s interest in the issue. I had an exchange with my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds South about how the changes will be kept under review. I welcome the fact that under amendment 251, there will be an independent inspection of the legacy commission, and a report to the House on what the UK and Irish Governments are doing to ensure that the promises made in the Bill are kept. Transparency must run both ways across the border, and this House must play its part in holding both Governments to their promises.<span id="1003" class="column-number" data-column-number="1003"></span> If this legislation passes, veterans will have significantly more protections than at any time since the Good Friday agreement—protections written into law, and protections that support justice and answers for all, including the families of British soldiers murdered by the IRA. But I know that some veterans feel today that we are not yet there; too many have been told that. My local veterans’ charity receives calls from people who served 30 years ago who have never been subject to any questioning or doubt. They have been picking up the phone and saying, “What’s this I hear about the Government wanting to come after me?” What they have heard is clearly not accurate. Of course, I respect the right of anyone in this House to scrutinise the Government through each of our votes. However, anyone who says that they care about veterans’ welfare is acting absolutely shamefully if they scaremonger, raising fears among 300,000 veterans who have never been subject to any doubt about their conduct, and the honour with which they served. There is a difference between political scrutiny and political point scoring; the latter does no service to our veterans, and I hope that the rest of the debate is the former. Our veterans deserve peace and reconciliation as much as the people of Northern Ireland do. It is through the foundations that they laid, through their service, that the reconciliation that we see across Northern Ireland is partly possible. It is in honour of their service that we must create the conditions for that reconciliation to continue. In honour of those who have served and every victim of the troubles, I will support today’s amendments and the Bill tonight.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Wishart. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Luke Akehurst) on securing this important debate. We have heard from colleagues representing constituencies covered by the Northumbria, Durham and Cleveland forces about what a huge issue this is for the north-east. That is because our forces, collectively and individually, have been asked to do more with less for longer than anywhere else in the country. There is a clear case for the north-east to be prioritised in responding to this challenge, for example, in the same way that Mission North East has prioritised schools in the north-east. For my own force, Northumbria, between 2010 and 2019, central Government funding fell by more than 31% in real terms. No force was hit harder. It lost a quarter of its officers and we know that when budgets are cut, it is unfortunately the neighbourhood teams that often go first. Today, Northumbria has 255 fewer officers than in 2010. As my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham said, that was a political choice by the previous Government which skewed funding formulas and completely ignored deprivation and the need for places like the north-east to be policed appropriately.<span id="95WH" class="column-number" data-column-number="95WH"></span> We know that demand is higher than elsewhere. In the Office for National Statistics’ figures, the north-east records 98 crimes per 1,000 against 85 per 1,000 nationally—the highest of any region. In Sunderland we saw 27,000 recorded crimes last year, which is down 3%, but still above the national rate. However, recorded crime only tells us a small amount. Recorded crime is not all crime; it only shows what is reported. The ONS survey suggests that about a third of crimes people experience are reported to the police. The gap between what people live with and what they report itself tells us about the confidence in policing. Of course, police deal with much more than crime. Mental health incidents in Northumbria have risen by 152% since 2017—demand that never shows up in any crime figures. As other hon. Members have already done, I want to also express my thanks to our officers. The range of what we ask them to do is extraordinary. I was three weeks into being elected when officers placed themselves in harm’s way in Sunderland city centre as thugs threw bricks and stones at them. They stood protecting our community and places of worship. Just two weeks ago, we had a terrible tragedy on the River Wear in Sunderland. Again it was police officers along with other emergency services responding and not just doing the search and rescue and the investigation of the incident, but liaising in the most difficult circumstances with the bereaved families. Every day, officers are on our streets, with people in crisis, tackling crime. Our constituents tell us that police visibility is crucial, and it is probably what constituents raise with me more than anything else. When I am out on walkabouts with officers in Hendon, Pallion and the city centre, I see the response of the public to visible policing. I can sense that residents and shop workers feel safer, and that potential troublemakers are thinking twice. People stop to talk and share intelligence with the police about what is going on. Too often, of course, residents do not see the police. When they do not see an officer and when they wait too long for a response to a call or an online report, they stop reporting and their trust and sense of security reduce. We need to boost visibility as a way of boosting confidence and reporting. Nowhere is that clearer than with antisocial behaviour, which is absolutely not low level. It is drunken, intoxicated behaviour; e-bikes and off-road bikes around estates or parks; yobbish behaviour. It wears down our communities night after night, and it is not good enough. Visible policing matters. That is why I welcome the Government’s decision to replace the previous headcount target with a neighbourhood policing target, because Northumbria could hit the previous Government’s headcount target and still not have on-the-ground policing in Fulwell in my constituency. Northumbria is adding 54 neighbourhood posts by next March, which is a good first step, but those posts must be protected. We must have more and they must reach the estates and villages, not just city centres. The Government have talked about structural reform of the police alongside funding formula reform. I will not speak for colleagues, but I am open to regional reorganisation. We already have a north-east regional organised crime unit, which does effective work across <span id="96WH" class="column-number" data-column-number="96WH"></span>our forces. Where there are capabilities such as firearms, or potentially drones, we have seen a significant amount of mutual aid, particularly in recent months following events in Cleveland. There is a reasonable case that moving to a north-east-wide regional force, if that is what the Hogan-Howe review recommends, would strengthen resilience and potentially produce some efficiencies in those areas, but people will only accept a bigger force with two guarantees. The first is to ensure that local policing areas are strong and protected, and that local officers still know Sunderland and have a local commander who we can hold to account. The second, crucially, is funding reform. Merging three underfunded forces would give us one large, underfunded force. We have to move on both together. I will finish by asking the Minister a couple of questions. As she considers police force reorganisation, and if a north-east force is proposed, can we move faster than others? Others have also mentioned the funding formula, and there could be transformation funding as part of a move to a regional force, if that is helpful to the Home Office and considered necessary. There is clearly a case for the north-east to be treated differently—
I was not in the House in 2021—I think the hon. Gentleman was—when the Conservative Government introduced the emissions trading scheme, which introduced the carbon levy on UK producers of fertilisers and other such produce. Is the hon. Gentleman against the ETS now, and if so did he speak against it at the time, or is he just against levelling the playing field for UK producers? What has changed?
Will the right hon. Member give way?
I welcome the Secretary of State to her place and look forward to engaging regularly with her and the ministerial team. International evidence makes the link between extreme heat and poorer mental health across the population increasingly clear. The Office for National Statistics estimates that one in every 32 suicides in recent years in the UK has been attributable to extreme heat. Will the Secretary of State give her assessment of the impact of extreme heat on mental health? As she goes about her role, will she ensure that she pays as much attention to NHS mental health waiting lists as she does to physical health waiting lists?
The deaths of PC Matthew Blades and PC Tom Clough have, of course, been felt acutely in Cleveland, but they have also <span id="109" class="column-number" data-column-number="109"></span>been felt more widely across the whole north-east and the policing family. I pay tribute to colleagues across the House, including my right hon. Friend the Member for Redcar (Anna Turley), who has spoken with dignity as a local representative in the light of those terrible events. As the Home Secretary said, some of the officers stepping forward to provide mutual aid are from neighbouring forces, such as Northumbria, Durham and others. Unfortunately, the sad reality is that three of the four forces that have had the highest fallen officer numbers from 2015 are north-east forces. That makes the Home Secretary’s point about the need for fundamental change in the funding formula. Those officers are, despite the cuts, putting themselves back into duty and providing mutual aid at enormous personal cost. As she reviews the funding formula, will she ensure that officers have ongoing access to wellbeing and mental health support to help them respond to communities as they have been?
Fulwell community library, which is run by a fantastic team of volunteers led by Richard Beck, provides a welcoming space for people to enjoy books and a cuppa, as I did there the other week. In the centre of Sunderland, Culture House, the new home of our city library, will be opening soon, providing access to books and learning seven days a week, thanks to the investment and decisions of the previous council administration. Will the Leader of the House celebrate the National Year of Reading, and consider giving time for a debate on the importance of library facilities? Does he agree that they are not vanity projects, but core facilities for our community?
Held . Recorded result: Lab Hold. Majority 6,073. 39,957 votes cast from an electorate of 76,145. Parties are as each candidate stood at the time.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lewis Atkinson | Labour | 16,852 | 42.2% |
| Chris Enyon | Reform UK | 10,779 | 27.0% |
| Greg Peacock | Conservative | 5,731 | 14.3% |
| Niall Hodson | Liberal Democrat | 3,602 | 9.0% |
| Rachel Featherstone | Green Party | 2,993 | 7.5% |
| Seat | Dates |
|---|---|
| Sunderland CentralElected 1 time | – present |
| Committee | Dates |
|---|---|
| Home Affairs Committee | – present |
| Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill | – |
| Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill | – |
| Petitions Committee | – present |
| Statutory Instruments (Joint Committee) | – present |
| Statutory Instruments (Select Committee) | – present |
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