argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2019-01-28
Topic: Immigration
Paul John Sweeney (Labour, Centre-left): When I consider the whole issue of immigration in this country, the first thing that comes to mind is thwarted opportunity—squandered opportunity. I am reminded of Billy Connolly’s eulogy at Jimmy Reid’s funeral. He was talking about the conversations he used to have with Jimmy Reid, with one wonderful anecdote being about driving past a high-rise tower block. Jimmy was saying, "Think about this, Billy. When you look at all those windows, imagine that behind each of them is a world champion horse rider or a Nobel prize winning chemist. They are all there. They are all there with that potential, but they will never realise it because they have never been given the opportunity to achieve it—because society has determined from their youngest years that they will never realise their inherent potential to be as good as they can be and to realise their talents." That is a question of not only poverty, but our immigration system. The same dynamic plays out. Tragically, it is often a function of people in poverty finding the wrong scapegoat—the wrong enemy—for their situation. The perennial problem of labour versus capital is the root cause of many of the tensions in our society today and many that caused this country to vote to leave the EU. Unless we understand those reasons and those underlying dynamics, we will fail to address those tensions Before I was elected as a Member of Parliament, I had a tangential involvement with immigration in this country—many people do, as they do not have many day-to-day dealings with it—but I remember one case that came close to home. I was working in the shipyards on the Clyde, having joined after graduating from Glasgow University. My starting salary was just £24,000, which is far below the £30,000 threshold. Many people of all sorts of nationalities—Australians, Canadians and Malaysians—were graduates working in the shipyards on the Clyde. One colleague had been awarded a PhD in unmanned underwater vehicles by Queen’s University Belfast, and she was a fantastic researcher. She also happened to fall in love at the same time with a Brazilian man who lived in Dublin and was studying there. She was in the invidious position of having to choose between her career in Glasgow and getting married to her fiancé.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2019-01-28
Topic: Immigration
Paul John Sweeney (Labour, Centre-left): Yes, perhaps she ought to have done The Home Office told my colleague that because her fiancé was resident in Dublin, he could not come to live with her in Glasgow. They had to move away to Brazil in order for him to apply to come to live in the UK, even though they had both been living in Ireland. What a bizarre anomaly that is! It is just one example of the absurd situation—the Kafkaesque nightmare—that many people encounter. As a result of that situation, my colleague had to go to work in Dublin. She left her job on the shipyards on the Clyde: another example of potential lost to the industry on the Clyde and to Scotland.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2019-01-28
Topic: Immigration
Catherine Elizabeth West (Labour, Centre-left): It is a pleasure to make some concluding remarks in this debate and to follow the excellent speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) that outlined the problems for EU nationals. I will be joining him in the No Lobby, because the powers the Bill would give to Ministers are far too wide. It feels rushed, and the slogan of ending free movement has become a theme tune for the Conservatives. Apart from that, we have actually seen quite a lot of consensus across the House on the key question of the £30,000 threshold, and I welcome that. In fact, I welcome the tone of the debate, which has been very positive. So many Members, in press interviews and elsewhere, have been calling for the subject of immigration to be debated in a responsible and measured way The key areas of the economy mentioned by many Members were farming, food processing and fishing. I would just mention that while fishing is worth about £1.8 billion to the economy, fashion is worth £35 billion. We must put the various sectors into perspective. The other huge sector is the NHS, which many Members mentioned. My own hospital, the Whittington hospital in the west of my constituency, which most of my constituents use, has a 12% to 15% vacancy rate, put down almost entirely to fears over Brexit and uncertainty.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2019-01-28
Topic: Immigration
Mathew Richard Allen Rodda (Labour, Centre-left): We have exactly the same issue in my constituency. We have a very large number of NHS workers from the EU who make a significant contribution to our local community. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that point and I fully concur. I also support the point she makes about key industries. There are a whole range of other industries in west London and the Thames valley, including IT.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2019-01-28
Topic: Immigration
Catherine Elizabeth West (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend represents an area with a university. So many universities have contacted Members with concerns relating to science and technology. The fact is that many people coming through—perhaps not top professors, but people who are technicians or those coming over on the PhD route—may not be earning the £30,000 that the Bill would require of them I want to be positive and say that we have an opportunity to put some things right. The Mother of the House, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman), has put forward an excellent proposal to end indefinite detention and to bring us in line with European justice systems. Many of us have visited detention centres, for example Yarl’s Wood. The excellent work of Bail for Immigration Detainees and other voluntary sector groups shows that introducing proper procedures and stopping indefinite detention will lead to the speeding up of casework. Instead of having people languishing without any proper legal aid provision and individuals effectively falling off the radar of the Home Office, we would have a system where people’s decisions were made much more speedily Secondly, we have an opportunity to put right the anomalies that led to the Windrush scandal. Thirdly, we would have an opportunity to lift the ban on asylum seekers working, which my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East (Mr Sweeney) mentioned. Preventing asylum seekers from working results in the most incredible loss of human potential. They just sit around, not able to fulfil the key things they could contribute. I was very pleased to hear the Home Secretary mention a more welcoming approach to students. In a written question, which I believe my office has already sent to him, I have asked him to confirm the exact detail. I understand from his initial remarks earlier this evening that he will be more generous, but we need reassurances for our tertiary education system In conclusion, I want to make some final points about the issues I have with the Bill. It appears that, following all the Brexit debates we have had and the various votes the Government have lost, the Government are still repeating the same mistake of giving Ministers incredibly wide powers and not really consulting with Parliament quickly enough. There is the nature of the Bill being rushed and the nature of the slogans around free movement. Finally, there is the short-term visa problem, which we know from hon. Members who have spoken could lead to the possible exploitation of those who are successful in attaining such visas. We need to look much more carefully at the evidence on visas. If short-term visas do lead to exploitation, what evidence do we have from other immigration systems that they actually work Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, for your indulgence in allowing me to speak despite not being in the Chamber for the whole of the debate.
Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2019-01-28
Topic: Immigration
Mohammed Afzal Khan (Labour, Centre-left): We have heard passionate speeches from Members on both sides of the debate. By my count, 27 Members have contributed. The hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) raised the niche but important issue of immigration in football. I thank the SNP spokesperson, the hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald), and I hope he will continue to work with us in Committee A new immigration system must not damage our economy and our society. My speech will cover the four broad areas that Labour’s objections to the Bill fall into.
Proxy Voting — House of Commons, 2019-01-28
Topic: Mixed Topics
Emma Elizabeth Reynolds (Labour, Centre-left): My baby was born on 14 April 2017, and four days later the Prime Minister made the announcement outside No. 10 that she was going ahead with a snap election, contrary to what she had said before Easter. Nothing can really legislate to prevent a general election from being called when someone is in that position, but we were perhaps overly optimistic about the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 From July to December 2017, I was absent for the vast majority of votes in Parliament. I came in for a handful of votes, and I want to take the opportunity to put on record my thanks to both Whips Offices. There has been some airing of the problems that others have had in this debate, but some people are new to the party as I do not remember them taking part in the two debates and several urgent questions we have had. There is a bit of what-aboutery going on Let me be clear about why pairing is not enough. I want the right to have a baby and be able to represent my constituents. That is the simple answer. A second part of the answer is that some of us are suffering and have suffered reputational damage just for daring to have a baby and wanting to be a Member of this House. I was branded by a national newspaper as having the second-worst voting record in Parliament. I was not asked before the publication of the article why that might be the case, so I did not have a right to reply. My hon. Friend the Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell) was branded as one of Britain’s laziest MPs in one of the tabloids, although it did print an apology.
Proxy Voting — House of Commons, 2019-01-28
Topic: Civil Rights
Luciana Clare Goldsmith (Berger) (Labour, Centre-left): It is a real pleasure to speak in this debate. It is heartening that so many colleagues from both sides of the House have waited until 11 pm to participate in this important and historic conversation. There is a historical perspective on this. Members may not be aware that until 1868, according to "Erskine May", Members had the opportunity to have a proxy vote in the House of Lords, and there were also proxies in our medieval Parliament, so in fact we are reinstating an age-old tradition To bring us back to the present day, it is just a few weeks until the arrival of my second child. A colleague said in jest that I am sitting here in self-interest. Let me be very clear that this change cannot come quickly enough for my constituents and for what we can and should be doing on behalf of the country If this motion does not pass tonight, I will continue to do what I did last time. When I had my first child, I came back to the House for some urgent votes. Colleagues might recall seeing me sitting in the Lobbies breastfeeding my baby when they were less than three or four months old. I did so until 11 pm one evening in the Tea Room. That is not the best environment for a new-born, although I would do it again if I had to. At this critical juncture for our country, it is important that no Member on either side of the House should have to make that choice and be here only for certain votes I echo the point that colleagues have made about the example we set. We legislate for maternity and paternity rights, and in 2019 we should be leading by example. The fact that we rely on an informal pairing system that depends on the Whips is not acceptable. I also echo the important point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East (Emma Reynolds). I did an interview on television earlier, although I will not embarrass the presenter who made this just about mums. As has been said, this is not just about mothers; it is about dads, too, and I hope that after this year-long trial we can make further strides to extend it beyond the two-week paternity leave—important though that is—to cover shared parental leave. Having secured that in the House, we should be leading by example and having it here too In conclusion, I thank the Leader of the House, the shadow Leader of the House, your good self, Mr Speaker, and the Procedure Committee for being impatient that this has taken so long. There have been steps on the way that have urged it along. We should not have to choose between our responsibilities as Members of Parliament and our responsibilities as parents. The two really can go hand in hand. If we are serious about making this a place that welcomes people of all ages and backgrounds and about encouraging people to consider standing for public office, and particularly if we are serious about addressing the gender imbalance we still see, this move will make a really big difference. I hope the House supports it tonight.
Proxy Voting — House of Commons, 2019-01-28
Topic: Other
Rachel Jane Reeves (Labour, Centre-left): It is important to stress that no one has to take a proxy vote; it will always be voluntary, and Members could continue with the pairing system. Like other Members, when I was on maternity leave, the campaigning group 38 Degrees emailed my constituents and said, "Where was Rachel Reeves?" The answer was I was on maternity leave with a very young baby, but it did not bother to check its facts. Many of my constituents thought I had just not bothered to turn up.
School Exclusions and Youth Violence — House of Commons, 2019-01-28
Topic: Mixed Topics
Victoria Jane Foxcroft (Labour, Centre-left): I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman. Therein lies one of our problems: when kids are seen to be excluded, they are not only excluded from school; they can sometimes feel like they are absolutely excluded from society as well To go back to my point about figures and statistics, I believe that this is incredibly concerning, particularly given that the Government’s own serious violence strategy recognises school exclusions as one of the risk factors for involvement in serious violence.
Online Platforms: Extremist Content — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Mixed Topics
Paula Michelle Sherriff (Labour, Centre-left): The evidence strongly suggests that much more needs to be done to tackle this growing issue. What penalties does the Home Secretary envisage imposing on the internet giants, which have so far proved reluctant to help stamp out extreme content online?
Asylum Seekers: Right to Work — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Immigration
Emma Ann Hardy (Labour, Centre-left): My constituent Ehi Izevbaye has been in the UK for more than 14 years with no right to work and he has a 10-year-old daughter. He has been repeatedly turned down for leave to remain and now faces deportation. They say he has run out of options. The Home Office has made a catalogue of errors and mistakes with this incredibly complex case. Please will the Minister look personally at the case and review it, and either agree to meet me to discuss it further or consider what she can do to help him?
Windrush Generation: Compensation — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Immigration
Mohammed Afzal Khan (Labour, Centre-left): Since our urgent question, the Jamaican commissioner has joined calls from across the House to halt deportation flights to Jamaica. After Windrush, where we know that hundreds of people were wrongfully deported or detained, this Government cannot be trusted to follow the correct process. What is their plan for future deportation flights, and will the Home Secretary suspend them until the lessons of Windrush have been learned?
EU Settlement Scheme — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Immigration
Yvette Cooper (Labour, Centre-left): The Home Affairs Committee heard in a recent evidence session that those who did not register under the EU settlement scheme in time would be unlawfully resident. Can he confirm whether that is the case? What rights will those people have if they have not registered with the EU settlement scheme?
Domestic Abuse — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Housing
Questions: Domestic violence protection orders give essential support to the victims of domestic abuse. Effective training for police officers on these orders is key, so will the Minister review the funding of the “Domestic Abuse Matters” training course, which is unclear for next year, in order to support the victims of domestic abuse in the future?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Centre-left): Diolch, Mr Speaker. [Hon. Members: "Hear, hear!"] Now that we have seen how narrow the draft domestic abuse Bill is, will the Minister confirm that there is scope to expand it? We have concerns about many areas of the Bill, not least about housing. A joint tenancy can be ended by just one partner, which means that the perpetrators of domestic violence are able to oppress their victims by ending the tenancy and leaving them homeless. We must legislate to stop that.
Police Funding — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Immigration
Questions: What recent assessment he has made of the potential effect on police forces of changes in the level of Government funding for the police in 2019-20.;   I am very grateful to the Secretary of State for his commitment to preventing child sexual exploitation. The authorities in Telford who agreed to hold an inquiry into CSE a year ago have only this past week started to look for a chair to lead the promised inquiry. Learning lessons from the past is vital to protecting our young people today, so does he agree that that shocking lack of urgency in getting this inquiry started could place more young people at risk of CSE in Telford?
Diane Julie Abbott (Labour, Centre-left): Ministers will remember that last Monday the Home Secretary said: "We must, of course, observe international law, and we cannot strip someone of their British citizenship if doing so would leave them stateless. Individuals who manage to return will be questioned, investigated and, potentially, prosecuted."—[Official Report, 18 February 2019; Vol. 654, c. 1193.] Ministers will be aware that the Opposition think that the latter would have been the correct course of action. By Wednesday, however, the Home Secretary had stripped Shamima Begum of her citizenship rights. Can he share with the House whether he contacted the Bangladeshi high commissioner or the Bangladeshi Government before taking this decision?
Relationships and Sex Education — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Civil Rights
Diana Ruth Johnson (Labour, Centre-left): I very much welcome today’s announcement, but I should also say that of course 10 years ago the previous Labour Government made very similar proposals to the ones that have been announced today and, unfortunately, the Conservative party at that time could not agree with them or support them. I am delighted that there has been that change of heart I want to draw to the attention of the Secretary of State two constituents in my area, Stephanie Trotter and Vicky Parkey, who had a note put through their door on Thursday evening, which basically said that their relationship was immoral. It questioned their right to have a child together and told them that they should move away from the area. That bigotry and prejudice, which is still out there in some communities, has very effectively been challenged in my community by neighbours displaying the rainbow flag and putting up supportive posters for that family. That is why I am really pleased that the Secretary of State talked today about the need for healthy, positive, respectful and safe relationships of all kinds to be taught in our schools and the need for sensitivity to all types of families, so congratulations and well done.
Relationships and Sex Education — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Civil Rights
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): Well, I for one say hoo-bloody-rah—well done! I am absolutely proud of what the Government are doing, because in September 2010 I introduced a private Member’s Bill to this effect. It is just a shame that they have taken such a long time to get round to it. Seriously, though, I am delighted, not least because what passes on poverty in so many cases around the country is teenage pregnancy. A young girl who has a child before she is 15 or 16, apart from the legality of the situation, will end up having a child who grows up to be a teenage mum as well. All the evidence shows that really good sex and relationship education makes sure that children delay their first sexual experience, take fewer risks when they do so, and end up being better, more rounded, more fruitful, happier children. So hoo-bloody-rah!
Relationships and Sex Education — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Mixed Topics
Lilian Rachel Greenwood (Labour, Centre-left): I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement. I strongly support the introduction of compulsory relationships education. It is vital that all young people grow up understanding and respecting the diversity of modern relationships and modern families. How will his Department monitor the delivery of these subjects to ensure that all children are taught effectively, including about LGBT issues, and that same-sex relationships are always presented in a positive and respectful way?
Relationships and Sex Education — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Civil Rights
James McMahon (Labour, Centre-left): I thank the Secretary of State for bringing forward these reforms, which I broadly welcome, particularly the element of relationship advice and what constitutes a good relationship, but there is no doubt that this is concerning parents in my constituency—I have received a lot of correspondence on this. Clearly we need to get the balance right on our common shared values of understanding and tolerance, but can he give reassurance to parents who are concerned about modesty and appropriateness that the balance will be right and appropriate for the age group?
Exiting the European Union (Consumer Protection) — House of Commons, 2019-02-25
Topic: Mixed Topics
Sue Hayman (Labour, Centre-left): Once again, my hon. Friend makes an extremely important point. Of course, we also need to look at the huge costs to companies of these actions. The problems and difficulties that will be caused are not short-term but long-term Does the Minister acknowledge that a no-deal outcome brings with it huge risks to industry, jobs and our environment? Due to the numerous deficits and risks posed, we will be voting against this SI and would encourage Members across the House to do the same in good conscience.