argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-17
Topic: Energy
Bryony Worthington (Crossbench, Unknown): In the absence of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, I will speak to Amendment 63 and the other amendments in this group, which all relate to the specification of public charging points We need to set standards and provide some clarity for the sector in thinking about how charging points are going to be standardised; otherwise, I fear we will have the same situation we had with phone chargers, where we all had about 16 different chargers in our drawer and none of them seemed to be the right one at the right time. There is already a degree of complexity in the market which is unhelpful, in that there are two types of rapid charger plugs and every charge point has to accommodate those. The amendments aim to elicit from the Government statements on when and how we will see these regulations that set standards come forward There is a question about the power ratings. Amendment 64 requires minimum power ratings at public charge points. There are a lot of different descriptors of chargers. There is the slow charger, which is around 2 kilowatts to 5 kilowatts and takes around 12 hours to charge a car. These are usually used at home to plug into overnight. I am told that a fast charger is 7 kilowatts to 22 kilowatts and takes over three hours, and is suitable for some destinations but it would have to be a train station, airport or workplace car park, where your car is expected to be for a period of time. There is the rapid charger, from 50 kilowatts to 120 kilowatts, which is where you get your 25-minute charge. Then there is this other class of superfast charger up to 350 kilowatts, which can charge quite a powerful, long-range vehicle in a very short time—just tens of minutes This is an area where—the Government are right—the technology is moving quickly. But we believe that the more the Government can do to provide some standardisation, clarity and regulations that can really help shape the industry’s investment so that we do not get a huge, confusing mass of plugs and chargers of different scales and sizes, the better. Range anxiety normally occurs when you are travelling from your home or place of work a relatively long distance and you have to dock into the rapid or super-rapid charge networks. It is really important that in those instances we set some minimum standards of what we are expecting in the use of those charge points There is an opportunity cost. Whenever a charger is plugged in, it occupies a parking space. As we have discussed, the spaces are limited. So we have to get this right and ensure that we have a network that is fit for purpose and is going to endure. I hope that these probing amendments elicit some statements from the Government about the standardisation efforts they are going to undertake. I beg to move.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-17
Topic: Environment
Bryony Worthington (Crossbench, Unknown): I thank the Minister for her response. I am encouraged that there will be some good news on the Road to Zero strategy—we look forward to that—and that Clause 10 will be elucidated in regulations. We have talked about this before, but this is one aspect of the Bill that it would be good to attach a timeline to. Perhaps we can talk about that between Committee and Report. On the basis that these issues will be addressed, I am happy to withdraw the amendment.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-17
Topic: Energy
Bryony Worthington (Crossbench, Unknown): In moving Amendment 89, I shall speak to other amendments in this group. I should perhaps comment that we have seen Clause 11 stand part of the Bill, which we have touched on but not properly mentioned; it is a very important part of the Bill, and I am glad that it is in there. Like Clause 13, it feels like an essential part of what makes this Bill worth doing. The provision of information to consumers is hugely important and is currently very fractured and frustrating I am encouraged by the scoping note showing that the Government’s thinking on Clause 13 is fairly well advanced, so we can expect regulations quite soon. The amendments in my name make a simple point; as drafted, the clause appears to provide powers to make regulations about the sale and installation of charge points, but we simply wanted to ensure that they were also used and that the smart capabilities were used. There is no point in requiring them to be made available if there is no similar requirement that they are switched on, working and useful for consumers. I am not entirely sure that our wording is exactly right, and I would very much welcome discussing this further The intent of the amendments is to say that we know that the advent of electrification in transport provides a potentially great way to balance our supply and demand on the grid. The Environmental Defense Fund in Europe and WWF have had a great collaboration with the National Grid around making more visible what is happening on our grid at any given point. We helped to launch a carbon intensity tool with them, which shows you in real time how clean the grid is. On a sunny, windy day like the one that we have just had, you will find that the carbon per kilowatt hour generated is now below 100 grams. That is an extraordinary testimony to the amount of hard work and effort that has gone into encouraging investment into clean-air forms of electricity. There will be times in the day and month when it is extraordinarily clean to charge your infrastructure, your vehicles and indeed heat needs from the grid. That will unlock a huge potential for batteries in vehicles and, indeed, homes, to be used as part of the grid’s balancing of supply and demand, soaking up the excess when there is excess and then providing back to the grid at times of need It is great that this provision is in the Bill. We would just like to have reassurances that there will be regulations to cover the use as well as the installation and sale of the smart components of this hugely important part of the charging infrastructure. I beg to move.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-17
Topic: Energy
Bryony Worthington (Crossbench, Unknown): I thank the Minister for his response. I am not fully reassured. This seems to come down to whether we put in regulations or allow the market to set incentives as regards whether this smart capability will be part of our future charging infrastructure. I can see that to rely on market incentives might mean that the consumer is much more vulnerable than if we were to regulate. The reason for that is because of my experience in America, where all electricity bills are set, state-by-state, by different regulations. Where there are few protections and regulations, the market prices the marginal excess use very highly. If there are no protections, you find that if you tip over a certain volume of electricity use, your charge per unit spikes enormously, which means that people are vulnerable to failing to realise that they have gone over that threshold. So in this instance the market cannot necessarily be relied on to provide the right incentives, and it may lead to a considerable exposure to risk for consumers who are not perhaps fully informed. Therefore I do not fully believe that we should just leave this to the market I take the point that regulating to insist that, for example, time of use tariffs are in place everywhere may also not be the answer. However, we definitely need to do something here to ensure this. We may not put this on to the super-rapid chargers or the rapid chargers in the motorway infrastructure, because there you may well need to charge at 5 pm when you are en route somewhere, and you do not want to be exposed to differential prices. However, the vast majority of charging—the backbone of this—will be done at home, or as at-destination charging, and there is a need to set some standards and regulatory requirements there on the use of the smart capability. I come back to the fact that while Clause 13 is welcome, it just covers the sale and installation and does not do enough to reassure me that we will also talk about the usage of that smart capability. I would like to come back to this, but I recognise that the wording we have may not be perfect, and it would be good to talk about it further. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-17
Topic: Government Operations
Bryony Worthington (Crossbench, Unknown): It is good to reach the final group. With this amendment I seek further information about the Government’s intentions for commencement. It feels as though there could be further delays and that this already not very powerful Bill could become even less powerful if it does not reach commencement until we pass regulations that we might not need to pass. The fact is that nothing in the Bill requires anybody to do anything at any time ever, and commencement seems to be required to wait for that non-event. I am not sufficiently versed in the legal details of Bills, so I have tabled the amendment to find out what it means. Why can it not be commenced immediately upon the passing of the legislation?
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-17
Topic: Transportation
Bryony Worthington (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I thank the Minister for her response. We are caught with this. It is a narrow Bill and therefore I think that it should have a narrow title, although I would prefer it to have a broader title and to contain a broader set of powers. As I said at the start, given the scarcity of time and the importance of spending public money wisely, it is a bit of a waste of everyone’s time to pursue this narrow Bill. We know that a strategy which requires far greater powers is imminent, so that is regrettable. I value the fact that the noble Baroness has said that there will not be any desire to try to claim more than what is being brought forward in this Bill, which does not even address the things that the Government think need to be addressed; it just takes powers for things that they might address. However, we have had the debate The Explanatory Notes state: "The Bill also sets out the regulatory framework to enable new transport technology to be invented, designed, made and used in the United Kingdom" That is simply not a reflection of this Bill and perhaps in the future we should refrain from using phrases of that kind and be clearer about what it does and does not do. I think that there is still time to ensure that the things it is seeking to do are actually done well. I look forward to working with the Minister and her officials between now and Report. On that basis, I am happy to withdraw the amendment.
Integrated Communities — House of Lords, 2018-03-15
Topic: Education
Ruth Deech (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, may I ask the Minister what more the Government can do to further integration in higher education? The Government have abolished maintenance grants, and that means, for example, that if you are a child growing up in a rather segregated secondary school in some of the trailblazer areas, you cannot afford to leave that area and go to another university where you will be able to mix with people from different backgrounds; you are stuck in that one area for ever. And I am sorry to say that hate speech is still flourishing on our campuses. The CPS and the Equality and Human Rights Commission are doing next to nothing to stop it and prosecute, as the case may be. Segregation, to some extent, and extremist and hate speech are going on in our universities. We have to make sure that our future leaders are fully integrated.
Economy: Spring Statement — House of Lords, 2018-03-15
Topic: Labor
Robert Skidelsky (Crossbench, Unknown): I completely agree. If you want to get a comprehensive view of what underemployment consists of, that would be a very important factor. I was just citing the most convenient measure we have, which is the measure of the International Labour Office: people who want to work more hours than they are allowed
Nuclear Safeguards Bill — House of Lords, 2018-03-01
Topic: International Affairs
Alexander Carlile (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I support this and the other amendment in the group. One of the concerns we have, as expressed on the first day in Committee and at Second Reading, is about disclosure of the actions and steps that have been taken by the Government to meet the undoubtedly genuine, real and merited concerns that have been expressed about the process of leaving Euratom and this Bill In that context, I thank the Minister very fully for the letter he wrote to me on 28 February, which has been placed in the Library, relating to the activities that have taken place between the Government and the IAEA, the European Commission and various third countries, which he named in the letter. He has provided a wealth of information which enables us to understand more about the part of the process with which it deals. The amendments seek disclosure about other parts of the process Although I support the amendments, I do not regard it as necessary for statutory provisions to be created to provide the information that is set out. What I do regard as essential is a similar generous and helpful approach by the Minister in which the items set out in the two amendments are the subject of an undertaking that the Government will keep the whole of Parliament fully informed about the process and progress of discussion of the items referred to. That is not an unreasonable demand, but is the least the House can reasonably expect.
Syria — House of Lords, 2018-04-16
Topic: International Affairs
Michael Hastings Jay (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I am grateful to the Leader of the House for repeating the Statement. I spoke against intervention in Syria in 2013 because I thought it was ill thought-through and poorly presented. I support the intervention this time: I believe it is properly thought-through, limited, focused and well concerted with allies. It is clearly designed to deter the use of chemical weapons. It may well do so and such deterrence is clearly to be welcomed, but this action will have little or no effect on the longer-term conflict in Syria. Will she say more about the Government’s intention to work with others—including, however difficult, the Russians and Iran—to achieve some sort of settled solution in Syria? Only in that way will there be an end to the humanitarian disaster that we now see.
Syria — House of Lords, 2018-04-16
Topic: International Affairs
David Hugh Alexander Hannay (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, does the Minister recognise that I, along with the noble Lord, Lord Howard of Lympne, was one of the rather few people who supported the Government’s line in this House in 2013? It is therefore not altogether surprising that I should be quite clear in my own mind that the action taken on Friday was proportionate, justified and legitimate Perhaps the Minister could answer two questions which have not yet come up in the discussion. First, the situation now is, in legal and international terms, quite different from that of 2013. At that time, Syria had not yet signed the chemical weapons convention and was not bound by international law, other than the agreement of 1928, not to use them. The situation is now completely different; it has signed and ratified the convention in bad faith and is now using sarin, in some cases, and chlorine, which it is illegal to use as a weapon. That makes the situation far more clear-cut. Secondly, do the Government not recognise that there will not be a peaceful settlement in Syria until all parties to this conflict—heaven knows, there are far too many of them—recognise that there is no possibility of a sustainable peace won by a military victory? I would like to hear what the Government plan to do to ensure that that truth is brought home to some of those who are engaged in that unhappy country, so that we do not have to repeat this exercise.
Syria — House of Lords, 2018-04-16
Topic: International Affairs
John Kerr (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I strongly agree with what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris, said about legality and I think the Kosovo precedent is very apt. I support the Government on it. I also very much agree with what the noble Lord, Lord King, said about the circumstances in which one can and cannot consult Parliament in advance, and I support the Government on that. My unease is precisely over not knowing what the future strategy is. When the Statement speaks about diplomatic action, I would feel happier if it told us about when we are going to get an embassy in Damascus. I would feel happier about the idea of our involvement in international discussions on the future if we stopped saying that the man who is actually winning the civil war must go before there can be any future settlement. It seems to me that we have parroted that slogan for too long, and we have to face the fact that we have not done very well. As many people have been killed in that country, where we have not intervened, as have been killed in Iraq, where we have intervened. We need to be a little humble about our approach and think about a strategy for real diplomatic engagement.
Syria — House of Lords, 2018-04-16
Topic: International Affairs
David Alton (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, in the snake pit of competing interests and proxy wars in Syria, it will have been of little comfort, as the noble Lord said a few moments ago, to hear the words "Mission accomplished", certainly for the relatives of some 400,000 people who have died and the 12 million displaced in Syria. I too would welcome more from the noble Baroness about what diplomatic action we are going to take to try to bring a conclusion to this terrible conflict I would also like to return to what she said about the veto that has been used in the Security Council and the accountability to which people will be held, whether they are responsible for genocidal crimes against humanity, in the case of Daesh, or for chemical weapons being used, in the case of the Syrian regime. What are we doing to create new mechanisms, such as a regional court that does not need a decision taken by the Security Council, which could be established by the United States, France, the UK and our allies so that those who have been responsible for these depredations will be brought to justice? Surely what marks us out from people like Assad or, for that matter, Daesh is our belief in the upholding of the rule of law.
Syria — House of Lords, 2018-04-16
Topic: International Affairs
Andrew Fleming (Crossbench, Unknown): I declare an interest as a former ambassador in Damascus and as a member of the board of the British Syrian Society I understand the reasons for the Government’s actions, I support them and I strongly endorse what the noble Lords, Lord Kerr and Lord Jay, said on the subject. I also endorse their concern at a lack of strategy in tackling what is an extremely complex situation, as the noble Lord, Lord Hain, so clearly explained The reality is that the Assad regime is winning the civil war and, given that it has the support of Russia and Iran, it is going to stay there. So we had better wake up to that. This will not be popular, but we need to move from the support that we are giving to his opposition to a neutral position where we can actually help, with such influence as we have, to get some kind of discussion going. Let us face it, it will be a discussion that will leave in place the present regime in Damascus, whether or not it is led by Bashar—which, by the way, is very much the wish of many of those in the government-controlled region, especially the minorities, and especially the Christians.
Policing and Crime Act 2017 (Consequential Amendments) Regulations 2018 — House of Lords, 2018-02-07
Topic: Law and Crime
Ian Warwick Blair (Crossbench, Unknown): Before the Minister steps up, I would like to echo the comments of the noble Lords, Lord Kennedy and Lord Paddick, about the 28-day rule. Would the Minister be prepared to agree that the Home Office or the inspectorate should examine in a year’s time, after the enactment of all this, as to whether this limit works? Intuitively, it does not; intuitively, certainly when we look at the stuff that we have heard recently about rape cases collapsing because the material had not been looked at, 28 days is almost an impossibility in a serious case, if there was only one case. We know that rape investigators in London are carrying 25 cases simultaneously, which means that they have to deal with all this in one day, effectively. There is something very honourable in the attempt to keep people off police bail, but, intuitively, this may go absolutely wrong. I would like the Minister to agree to seek agreement from the Home Office or HMIC that this matter be reported back to this House in 12 months’ time as to the effects of this well-meant provision.
Nuclear Safeguards Bill — House of Lords, 2018-02-07
Topic: International Affairs
Alexander Carlile (Crossbench, Unknown): I am grateful to the noble Lord for what he has just said, but are we to take it that the sentence in the factsheet on the Bill that was given to your Lordships’ House at some very useful meetings still applies in relation to radioisotopes: "This will be part of the broader negotiations of the UK’s future with the EU" If so, will he tell us what that means?
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2018-03-07
Topic: Law and Crime
David Neuberger (Crossbench, Unknown): I suspect that the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, whose amendment it is, is better placed to answer. My answer would be twofold. First, it specifically tells the judge what to have regard to; it does not leave it completely open. Secondly, it uses a rather more familiar expression, "relevant". A judge will be able to say, "When construing this, I have looked at the document"—namely, the agreement referred to in subsection (2B)—"to which I am required to have regard. In my view, it tells me to do this or that". It is specific guidance, albeit indirect specific guidance, through the agreement referred to in subsection (2B), whereas the term "appropriate" leaves it completely open for the judge to decide whether it is appropriate, if I may use that word, to consider matters that he or she is not specifically told to take into account. The judge has to make the decision, "Do I think about x; do I take that into account?" Here, the judge knows what he or she has to take into account because it is spelled out; namely, the agreement.