argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Social Welfare
Questions: We will be heading into difficult times with the end of furlough, so I want to thank my right hon. Friend for all the work she has done in support of the Leigh and Bolton jobcentres to help them prepare for those difficult times. Will she continue to ensure that they have all the resources that they need in order to support my constituents?; Despite the Government’s best efforts, many freelance and self-employed people in my constituency and throughout the country had a very tough time during the covid restrictions. Within the remit of her own departmental responsibilities, but also in her discussions in the Cabinet, what is my right hon. Friend doing to encourage people to take that extra risk in pursuing a future means of access to work by becoming self-employed?
David Melvyn Linden (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Many pensioners will be relying on pension credit to get by after the Tories’ brutal triple lock betrayal. Will the Secretary of State follow Scotland’s lead and commit herself to introducing a proper take-up strategy for reserved benefits, including pension credit, and will she consider the automation of payments to ensure that more people receive the support to which they are entitled?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Social Welfare
Questions: We will be heading into difficult times with the end of furlough, so I want to thank my right hon. Friend for all the work she has done in support of the Leigh and Bolton jobcentres to help them prepare for those difficult times. Will she continue to ensure that they have all the resources that they need in order to support my constituents?; Despite the Government’s best efforts, many freelance and self-employed people in my constituency and throughout the country had a very tough time during the covid restrictions. Within the remit of her own departmental responsibilities, but also in her discussions in the Cabinet, what is my right hon. Friend doing to encourage people to take that extra risk in pursuing a future means of access to work by becoming self-employed?; It is vital that disabled people are able to play an active role in public life, particularly those with visual impairments. Will my hon. Friend therefore update the House on what the Government are doing to support this?; When a domestic abuse survivor decides to leave an abuser, having a safe, affordable place to escape to is key. Otherwise, they face the risk of homelessness. The benefits system should be there to protect women and children who need to escape, but unfortunately it can often act as a barrier—for example, when a survivor leaves a working household that is not subject to the benefit cap and then becomes a lone parent in an out-of-work household that is subject to the cap. Will the Secretary of State commit today to exempting domestic abuse survivors from the benefit cap so that they can have the best possible chance of accessing a safe and affordable home?; More than 7,000 people in Salford are on the housing waiting list, which is forcing many to rent privately, but the under-35 rule means that younger vulnerable constituents claiming universal credit receive only enough to cover a single room in a shared house, with people they do not know. One of my constituents fled domestic abuse and they do not meet the narrow criteria for exemption until 2023. Will the Secretary of State commit today to urgently expand exemptions from the shared accommodation rate?; Some 11,000 people in my constituency are on UC, and it may come as news to Ministers but nearly 4,000 of those people are in work. More than 2,000 good jobs in Luton North are in aviation and they are under threat as furlough ends. When we look at this job cuts double whammy, it is hard not to conclude that the Conservatives are leaving Luton to fight this crisis on our own. Will the Minister tell the Chancellor to extend the furlough for aviation and to reverse this cut in UC?
Anum Qaisar (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Many constituents have emailed me to outline their concern that the planned removal of the £20 uplift will have a significant impact on their family and children. How does the Department expect families to survive Tory cuts to UC coupled with a national insurance hike?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Social Welfare
Questions: We will be heading into difficult times with the end of furlough, so I want to thank my right hon. Friend for all the work she has done in support of the Leigh and Bolton jobcentres to help them prepare for those difficult times. Will she continue to ensure that they have all the resources that they need in order to support my constituents?; Despite the Government’s best efforts, many freelance and self-employed people in my constituency and throughout the country had a very tough time during the covid restrictions. Within the remit of her own departmental responsibilities, but also in her discussions in the Cabinet, what is my right hon. Friend doing to encourage people to take that extra risk in pursuing a future means of access to work by becoming self-employed?; It is vital that disabled people are able to play an active role in public life, particularly those with visual impairments. Will my hon. Friend therefore update the House on what the Government are doing to support this?; When a domestic abuse survivor decides to leave an abuser, having a safe, affordable place to escape to is key. Otherwise, they face the risk of homelessness. The benefits system should be there to protect women and children who need to escape, but unfortunately it can often act as a barrier—for example, when a survivor leaves a working household that is not subject to the benefit cap and then becomes a lone parent in an out-of-work household that is subject to the cap. Will the Secretary of State commit today to exempting domestic abuse survivors from the benefit cap so that they can have the best possible chance of accessing a safe and affordable home?; More than 7,000 people in Salford are on the housing waiting list, which is forcing many to rent privately, but the under-35 rule means that younger vulnerable constituents claiming universal credit receive only enough to cover a single room in a shared house, with people they do not know. One of my constituents fled domestic abuse and they do not meet the narrow criteria for exemption until 2023. Will the Secretary of State commit today to urgently expand exemptions from the shared accommodation rate?; Some 11,000 people in my constituency are on UC, and it may come as news to Ministers but nearly 4,000 of those people are in work. More than 2,000 good jobs in Luton North are in aviation and they are under threat as furlough ends. When we look at this job cuts double whammy, it is hard not to conclude that the Conservatives are leaving Luton to fight this crisis on our own. Will the Minister tell the Chancellor to extend the furlough for aviation and to reverse this cut in UC?
Patrick John Grady (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Why are lifetime individual savings accounts counted as capital in the calculation of universal credit entitlement? They are designed not to be touched until the saver reaches 60 or is buying a house, so why are people like my constituent being hit by penalty charges because the DWP is forcing them to withdraw from a lifetime ISA early?
HGV Driver Shortages — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Transportation
Gavin Andrew Stuart Newlands (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): God help us all, Mr Speaker, if that comes to pass Ministers are said to be worried about Christmas, and they should be, but the crisis is upon us now, not in three months’ time. I wrote to the Secretary of State in spring urging action, but there has been nothing until now. The impact of Brexit on daily life is becoming clear, so does he regret the number of times that Members of his party said that the prospect of bare supermarket shelves post Brexit was some baseless "Project Fear" The loosening of regulation must not be allowed to put safety at risk. I have been contacted by training providers in my constituency that are facing overnight financial ruin. They were given no notice, no consultation and no explanation of what the Secretary of State and his Department are proposing on trailers and on B+E tests. My constituent has seen his full list of bookings until the end of the year cancelled. How will training firms going out of business or staff being made redundant due to a lack of work help when the longer-term problems of driver recruitment, retention and drivers’ facilities still have not been addressed Finally, the Government must listen to the Road Haulage Association, the Food and Drink Federation and pretty much everyone else outside the Department for Transport, and grant temporary visas for HGV drivers. Is the Secretary of State lobbying the Home Office for that—yes or no?
HGV Driver Shortages — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Transportation
Ronald Jack Cowan (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): In a Transport Committee meeting on 17 July 2019, I informed the then Secretary of State for Transport that post-Brexit we would be short of 50,000 HGV drivers. It would appear I was optimistic. If the Government have been working on this matter for a long time, as the Secretary of State just said, why are we facing this crisis?
HGV Driver Shortages — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Transportation
Alan Brown (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The Secretary of State rightly identified the long-term structural issues that have caused the shortage, but then he said it is a global issue and it is the pandemic. That suggests the measures put in place just now, on extra testing being available and longer driver journey times, will not work in the long term or the short term. On longer journey times for drivers, how many operators have notified the Department for Transport of relaxation and what analysis has it undertaken on how many operators are making their drivers drive for longer?
HGV Driver Shortages — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Transportation
Patricia Gibson (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Thank you, Mr Speaker, and no discourtesy was intended—it was because of transport difficulties We have been told by Government Members that the HGV driver shortages and the consequential food and supply shortages have nothing to do with Brexit and that these challenges predate Brexit, although nobody can remember empty shelves before Brexit or indeed find them currently in any European country. Will the Secretary of State explain to what extent he thinks ending free movement and his Government’s hostile environment have helped or hindered the shortage of HGV drivers in the UK?
Afghanistan Policy — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: International Affairs
Joanna Catherine Cherry (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I was pleased to hear the Minister mention in her statement that judges and women’s rights activists may be among those who would get priority, but the situation for female judges on the ground in Afghanistan is dire. There are about 220 of them, and they are trapped there in immediate fear of their lives. These people are desperate, and they have been on the phone to colleagues in the United Kingdom in tears every night. Basically, these women are waiting to be killed, so my question for the Minister is this. She says in her statement that one of the ways the Government are going to implement the scheme is to "work with international partners and non-governmental organisations in the region to put in place a referral process for those inside Afghanistan, where it is possible to arrange safe passage" Can she tell me whether these discussions are taking place and are taking place with the appropriate urgency in relation to the female judges trapped in Afghanistan, and can she confirm that these women will be welcome in the United Kingdom?
Afghanistan Policy — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: International Affairs
Patrick John Grady (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): How widely and generously will the definition of an "assisted UK effort" be applied? I have cases of two interpreters who were told that they did not qualify for ARAP because they worked for G4S rather than for the Army, but if they had been properly assessed, they could already be here. Will they now qualify?
Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill (Instruction) — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Government Operations
Joanna Catherine Cherry (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): One of the most notable things after the outcome of the case was that the Prime Minister did not express any remorse for having unlawfully prorogued Parliament, so I would not be so confident that he would not try it again. What initially worried me slightly about the hon. Gentleman’s new clause was that the current Prime Minister, with his huge majority, could seek to prorogue Parliament for a dubious purpose. However, I note that the hon. Gentleman has put in a requirement that it cannot be for more than 10 days. Of course, what was so objectionable about the last Prorogation was that it was so lengthy and came at a time when Parliament had very important matters to debate, so I presume that the hon. Gentleman put that in to guard against the possibility of the current Prime Minister using the rather large majority that he has, at least in England, to force through another dubious Prorogation.
Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Government Operations
David Melvyn Linden (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): On the wider point about how quickly an election takes place, can I take it as read from the Minister that the Government will always immediately move a writ for a by-election, and not drag it on any longer than usual?
Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Government Operations
Brendan O'Hara (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I will hopefully delight the Committee by trying to speed things up a little, and I will not detain Members for long I agree with the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith) that the Bill smacks of a Government who are still smarting from the events of 2019. I suggest that perhaps anger and revenge are no way to govern, and hopefully the House will help the Government to look beyond their bruised pride and get to a situation far beyond this Bill. Although in and of itself clause 1 may look fairly innocuous, and when taken in isolation might even be seen as trivial and almost unimportant, I caution the Committee that when viewed alongside other legislation currently going through this place—the Elections Bill, for example, and the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill—we are witnessing a strategy on the part of the Government to centralise power and control with the Executive at the expense of this House. Some clauses in Bill, including clause 1, give more power to the Executive, strip parliamentarians of their powers, and deny the judiciary the ability to scrutinise what they are doing, while at the same time eroding the public’s right to protest against it. As has been said, this is an unashamed power grab by the Executive at the expense of this House, and we believe that that is how it will be seen in the context of that wider picture However intensely hon. Members may dislike the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011, simply voting for the Bill this evening will not automatically return us to our position prior to 2011 when that Act was introduced. The Scottish National party has said it will oppose the Bill all the way through, and we will oppose it again tonight. New clause 2, and the idea that a general election could be called to dissolve Parliament and that that motion must be agreed by this House, is correct. It appears to me that if the Bill passes without new clause 2, the Prime Minister of the day will have full and unfettered control over the Dissolution of Parliament and the timing of any general election.
Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Government Operations
Patrick John Grady (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I wanted to make this point to the Minister. Not only will the Prime Minister have full power, but some of the clauses and consequential amendments in the Bill will have a profound effect on other aspects of the constitution. It specifically amends the Referendums (Scotland) Act 2020 as a consequential amendment. That Act states that a referendum in Scotland cannot be held on the same date as a UK general election, but it is not the referendum that takes precedence; it is the UK general election. So if the Scottish Government set a date for a referendum, say in May 2023, under this Bill, it would be entirely within the Prime Minister’s power to set that date for a UK general election and consequently shift the date of the referendum in Scotland. We are handing a gross power to the UK Government as a consequence of the Bill.
Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: International Affairs
David Melvyn Linden (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I guess that, like me, my hon. Friend finds it a bit perplexing, when sitting in this debate and looking at Conservative Members, who advocated for Brexit in their constituencies and for Parliament to take back control, that they will walk through the Lobby tonight to neuter Parliament. Do he and his constituents who voted against Brexit see the irony in what the Brexiteers will do tonight?
Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Government Operations
Patrick John Grady (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The hon. Gentleman is making an excellent point in his speech and with his amendment. It is not entirely clear from the answer that he got from the Minister why the Government would not simply accept the proposal, for the same reason that I cited in my intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O’Hara)—the potential of a UK general election being used to manipulate the date of a referendum, the date of a Scottish election or the date of a Welsh election. Once again, it is the power grab that the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) spoke of.
Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Government Operations
Patrick John Grady (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The hon. Member says that there is election fatigue and that people are worried about when election campaigns begin, but surely the effect of the Bill will be that the next election campaign will start now because nobody except the Prime Minister will know the date of the next election.
Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Government Operations
Patrick John Grady (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I apologise, Dame Rosie, that I have been bobbing up and down this afternoon wanting to speak and not wanting to speak, but I think that some of our discussion on the new clauses needs to be teased out a little more. First, I would like to hear from the Minister in response to the point on which I tried to intervene on her, which was about the consequential effects, particularly with regard to referendums. The hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) made a similar point about the ability of the UK Parliament essentially to take primacy over decisions already made by the devolved assemblies about the dates of elections and particularly of referendums Why could not the Bill have been structured in such a way that it simply stopped the Prime Minister from choosing a date on which a poll or plebiscite of some kind was already scheduled? Forcing polls or plebiscites in the devolved areas to be rescheduled instead entirely diminishes or takes away the idea that we are in some kind of union of equals and fundamentally reasserts the primacy of this place above all else. If that does not make the argument for the outcome of the referendum that I will be campaigning for, I do not know what does The point about setting the date of the election, which also relates to new clause 2, is particularly important. The effect will be not only that the Prime Minister alone will know the date of the next election, but that he will know all the consequent dates that fit alongside it, particularly the regulated periods, the short campaign and the long campaign. It will therefore affect the ability of parties and individual candidates—as the hon. Member for Bolton West (Chris Green) said, we are all individual candidates for election—to spend money and to decide when and how to do so That point relates to the Elections Bill, which is about to be considered in Committee, and speaks to the piecemeal approach that this Government are very slyly taking to what is actually a very serious package of constitutional reforms that undermine democratic protections and positions that people have enjoyed across these islands for some considerable time That was a bit too long for an intervention, Dame Rosie, so I have taken advantage of the fact that the Committee still had a bit of time to run. As the Minister was not willing to take my intervention, I hope that in her summing up she will be able to reply to some of my points.
Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Government Operations
Brendan O'Hara (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Madam Deputy Speaker, I thank you and your colleagues, the Clerks and all hon. and right hon. Members who have taken part in what has been a good-natured debate Having said that, this is still a thoroughly bad piece of legislation, and nothing I have heard tonight has changed my mind Conservative Members seem determined, on a regular basis, to turn the clock back, in this case to a system deemed undesirable and out of touch more than a decade ago. As we have heard, politicians and academics are still arguing about whether it is even possible to believe that the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 had never been enacted. We are being asked to pretend that it never happened. At the risk of showing my age, let me say that it is as though this Government have been taking advice from the scriptwriters of "Dallas", who asked the world to pretend that Bobby Ewing had never died and they could just go back and pick up the storyline as though nothing had happened previously and anything that had happened in the past would have absolutely no consequence now. While that academic debate rages on and we are heading back to the situation prior to 2011, there can be no doubt that this Bill is little more than a brazen attempt by the Executive to entrench more and more powers with themselves, at the expense of this Parliament. I repeat: as bad as that is in and of itself, when it is viewed alongside what else is going through this place, we see that we are witnessing a full-on attack on our democracy. For that reason, we will be opposing the Bill on Third Reading Question put, That the Bill be now read the Third Time.
Steel Imports: Removal of Tariffs — House of Commons, 2021-07-15
Topic: Foreign Trade
Marion Fellows (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The Trade Remedies Authority recommended revoking nine of 19 steel safeguards despite calls from the sector and the all-party parliamentary group on steel, which wanted all tariffs extended, but the UK Government will keep only about 15 of them. The UK steel sector is not on a level playing field with competitors because of higher energy costs and the lack of a corporate industrial strategy from this and successive Tory Governments. Is this not another broken Brexit promise to a domestic industry and its workers?