argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Questions: According to an equalities assessment undertaken by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, the UK Government were aware that women and girls were more likely to be harmed by cuts to the UK foreign aid budget. The Tories’ recent international development strategy lists their new approach as being framed around education, empowerment and ending violence against women and girls, but it does not detail any explicit funding commitments for that. What discussions has the Minister had with her colleagues in the FCDO about the impact of the aid cuts on women and girls?; Last week, I held a reception in Parliament to launch the first female-only veterans charity in the UK, Salute Her UK. Although there are more than 1,800 veterans charities, this is the only one run by women for women. We know that female veterans have specific needs, so what discussions has my right hon. Friend had with the Office for Veterans’ Affairs to better support female veterans?; Last year, the Ministry of Defence pledged to develop a strategy on rape and serious sexual assault, which is long overdue. What conversations is the Minister having with colleagues in the MOD about the strategy and the wider treatment of women in our armed forces?; This week is Carers Week, and I hope the Minister will agree that unpaid carers make an invaluable contribution to our society but are often unseen. Will she commit to making being an unpaid carer a protected characteristic under the Equality Act 2010, as Carers UK has called for?; The cost of a full-time nursery place for children under two has risen by 16% in the past five years, and for the first time in decades, the number of women leaving the workforce has increased. Does the Minister for Women and Equalities think that this Government’s failed approach to childcare, which is pricing some women out of work and others out of parenthood, is remotely acceptable? What recommendations is she making to the Treasury and the Department for Education to sort out the problem?; The Government promised that a comprehensive women’s health strategy would be published last year, but we are still waiting. Meanwhile, waiting lists continue to soar. Given that the number of women on waiting lists for gynaecological services is in excess of 570,000—a 60% increase on pre-pandemic levels—is it not time that the Government stopped constantly trying to protect the job of a lame duck Prime Minister and got on with resolving the day-to-day issues affecting women in our country?
Maria Colette Caulfield (Conservative, Centre-right): As I have said in answer to many questions this morning, the women’s health strategy will be published shortly. We had over 100,000 responses, we published our vision document in December and we will be publishing the women’s health strategy in the coming weeks. [Interruption.]
Engagements — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Questions: The whole House will unite behind the Prime Minister on his determination to hold Ukrainian war criminals to account, but is he aware that there are five alleged Rwandan war crimes perpetrators living freely in the UK, who have been doing so now for 16 years and have neither been extradited nor put before the British courts under our existing laws? As he prepares to go to the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Rwanda, will he look carefully at this issue, because it is bound to be raised with him? Will he reassure the House and the Rwandan Government that he takes these matters extremely seriously, and that what has so far been justice massively delayed for 16 years will not be grotesquely denied?
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): Everybody knows that when the pandemic hit, it was an entirely novel virus for which the whole world was unprepared. Nobody at that stage knew how to test for it and nobody knew what the right quarantine rules should have been. But, as it happens, not only did the UK Government and our amazing NHS approve the first vaccine anywhere in the world but we were first to get it into anybody’s arms and we had the fastest roll-out anywhere in Europe, none of which would have been possible if we had listened to the right hon. and learned Gentleman.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Questions: The whole House will unite behind the Prime Minister on his determination to hold Ukrainian war criminals to account, but is he aware that there are five alleged Rwandan war crimes perpetrators living freely in the UK, who have been doing so now for 16 years and have neither been extradited nor put before the British courts under our existing laws? As he prepares to go to the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Rwanda, will he look carefully at this issue, because it is bound to be raised with him? Will he reassure the House and the Rwandan Government that he takes these matters extremely seriously, and that what has so far been justice massively delayed for 16 years will not be grotesquely denied?
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): I am afraid that the right hon. and learned Gentleman is simply wrong. He is wrong about what we are doing. Of course, we have got to clear the covid backlogs. Everybody understands that, and everybody understands the pressure that the NHS is under, but it is responding magnificently. I can tell him that, thanks to the investments that the Government have put in, we now have 4,300 more doctors and record numbers in training, we have 11,800 more nurses this year than last year and 72,000 in training. That is because of the investment that we put in, which was opposed by the Opposition. The only reason why we were able to make that investment is because we have a strong and robust economy thanks to the decisions we took.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Questions: The whole House will unite behind the Prime Minister on his determination to hold Ukrainian war criminals to account, but is he aware that there are five alleged Rwandan war crimes perpetrators living freely in the UK, who have been doing so now for 16 years and have neither been extradited nor put before the British courts under our existing laws? As he prepares to go to the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Rwanda, will he look carefully at this issue, because it is bound to be raised with him? Will he reassure the House and the Rwandan Government that he takes these matters extremely seriously, and that what has so far been justice massively delayed for 16 years will not be grotesquely denied?
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): It is entirely right that, after the pandemic, people are now coming forward to get their cancer tests. We have actively encouraged that, and that is the right thing for people to do. But as a result of the community diagnostic hubs that we are bringing in— 100 of them across the country—we are able to cut the times for cancer diagnosis and help people to get their scans and tests faster. Above all, we can do that because we are hiring more radiographers, we are hiring more nurses and we are hiring more professionals in our NHS because of the investments that we made, which, as I say, the party of Bevan tragically opposed.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Questions: The whole House will unite behind the Prime Minister on his determination to hold Ukrainian war criminals to account, but is he aware that there are five alleged Rwandan war crimes perpetrators living freely in the UK, who have been doing so now for 16 years and have neither been extradited nor put before the British courts under our existing laws? As he prepares to go to the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Rwanda, will he look carefully at this issue, because it is bound to be raised with him? Will he reassure the House and the Rwandan Government that he takes these matters extremely seriously, and that what has so far been justice massively delayed for 16 years will not be grotesquely denied?
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): This line of criticism is satirical coming from Labour, attacking our hospital building programme when the Labour Government were the authors of the PFI scheme that bankrupted so many hospitals. [Interruption.] They were. What we are doing instead is building 48 new hospitals—[Interruption.] Yes, we are—thanks to the biggest capital investment programme in the history of the NHS. From memory, we put in £33 billion as soon as we came in, then another £92 billion to cope with the pandemic, plus another £39 billion in the health and care levy. Labour Members opposed that funding. They opposed the health and care levy. They do not have a leg to stand on. We are building the foundations of our health service’s future and they should support it. [Interruption.]
Engagements — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Questions: The whole House will unite behind the Prime Minister on his determination to hold Ukrainian war criminals to account, but is he aware that there are five alleged Rwandan war crimes perpetrators living freely in the UK, who have been doing so now for 16 years and have neither been extradited nor put before the British courts under our existing laws? As he prepares to go to the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Rwanda, will he look carefully at this issue, because it is bound to be raised with him? Will he reassure the House and the Rwandan Government that he takes these matters extremely seriously, and that what has so far been justice massively delayed for 16 years will not be grotesquely denied?
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): Not only have we raised standards in the NHS, and not only are we reducing waiting times for those who have had to wait the longest, but more fundamentally, we are doing what the people of this country can see is simple common sense: using our economic strength to invest in doctors and nurses and get people on the wards, giving people their scans, screens and tests in a more timely manner and taking our NHS forward. We are on target to recruit 50,000 more nurses, thanks to this Government—[Interruption.] I am just going to repeat this, because the right hon. and learned Gentleman does not seem to have heard it so far—and thanks to the investments that the Labour party opposed. Perhaps he can explain why they opposed them.
Health and Social Care Leadership Review — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Sajid Javid (Conservative, Centre-right): I am not surprised by the typical response from the hon. Gentleman: not really engaging with the real issues and showing once again that he is more interested in theatrics than in the real issues facing our NHS. He started his comments by trying to make some kind of joke about the leadership news this week, but we all know that he is only interested in one leadership review in a political party in this House, and it is not the Conservative party’s Let us look at the issues that the hon. Gentleman raised. He rightly talked about the importance of the workforce overall and how we need more doctors and nurses. He should know that we have more doctors and nurses than ever before and that we are recruiting at a faster rate than ever before, with 10,000 more nurses and over 4,000 more doctors in the past year, and more in training than ever before. However, he will know that dealing with the challenges of getting more workers and building those hospitals, all of which are on track, requires proper funding, yet he and his party voted against the funding that the NHS needed to achieve that The hon. Gentleman is right to talk about when things go wrong in the NHS. Of course they need to be properly investigated, as they were in Telford and Shropshire, when we learned about the terrible things that had been going on under successive Governments in that trust. When there is a need for other investigations to take place, including independent ones, such as the one I have just asked for in Nottingham, that will be done. But the hon. Gentleman should understand that the best thing, which is far better than doing a review when things go wrong, is not having things go wrong in the first place. That is why he should have welcomed this report.
Health and Social Care Leadership Review — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Theresa Mary May (Conservative, Centre-right): This is an important review. There have been regular radical changes in the management of the NHS throughout my 25 years in this House, so may I suggest that my right hon. Friend proceeds with care? He rightly says that good leadership of the NHS is important, for example, to ensure that we can deal with the covid backlogs, and that includes consultants. Too many experienced consultants are leaving the NHS because of problems with their pensions, so will he now commit to an urgent review of this issue, including looking at the change in the abatement scheme?
Health and Social Care Leadership Review — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Sajid Javid (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Lady is right to highlight the importance of this issue and she will know that my predecessor had asked for a review on it. It was done and we have accepted its outcome, and it is being implemented. I hope she will understand that in implementing the outcome of that review it is important that we listen to clinical advice from within the NHS and make sure that we put the interests of each patient first.
Health and Social Care Leadership Review — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Jeremy Richard Streynsham Hunt (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the Health Secretary for this excellent report and commend Sir Gordon Messenger and Dame Linda Pollard for all their work in putting it together. It has some very important recommendations. People who run hospitals are doing one of the most difficult jobs in Britain today, and anything we can do to give them better support in their careers will help all of us Does my right hon. Friend agree that the elephant in the room is that one thing that makes their job most difficult: we have more national targets in the NHS than any other health system anywhere in the world? That means not only that there is a risk of patients turning into numbers, but that we remove the autonomy from managers to show the leadership that Sir Gordon is advocating in this report. So as my right hon. Friend implements the recommendations, will he look at the role of national targets in the NHS and whether we need to simplify and reduce them?
Health and Social Care Leadership Review — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Sajid Javid (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank my right hon. Friend for his support of the report. Of course he speaks with incredible experience. He is right to raise the issue of the importance of targets, and sometimes targets can have unintended consequences. The report does talk a bit about the importance of that issue. I can assure him that as we make changes and work with our colleagues in the NHS to make reforms, we will certainly be taking that into account.
Health and Social Care Leadership Review — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Sajid Javid (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Gentleman is right to talk about the importance of recruitment in the NHS—bringing in the right people in the first place and then retaining them—but I hope that he will also recognise that good leadership plays an important part in that. This morning, I went to Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, which is an outstanding and incredibly well run hospital, and heard from the leadership team about the important role that they play in attracting and retaining talent. I hope that he recognises that point as well.
Health and Social Care Leadership Review — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Sajid Javid (Conservative, Centre-right): The short answer is that, yes, the hon. Lady is right to talk about the importance of retaining and recruiting more nurses. When it comes to nurses’ pay, she will know that we gave a 3% rise last year when there was a freeze for the public sector workforce generally. This year, we will be listening carefully to what the independent recommendation is.
Health and Social Care Leadership Review — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Sajid Javid (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the hon. Gentleman for bringing Mr Calvert’s case to my attention. The Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield), has listened to that carefully. She is meeting some of the families affected by that case very shortly, and Mr Calvert is someone to whom she can reach out directly Like the hon. Gentleman and, I am sure, the whole House, I am very concerned about what I have heard about this ambulance service. I am not satisfied with the review that has already been done. We need a much broader and more powerful review. I will have more to say on the matter very shortly.
Health and Social Care Leadership Review — House of Commons, 2022-06-08
Topic: Health
Sajid Javid (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend is right: it is important that, where people who are working within the NHS or social care see wrongdoing or things that concern them, they have a safe space to report that and to make sure that their concerns are properly addressed. She will know that the Health and Social Care Act 2022 contains new provisions, including one for the Health Services Safety Investigations Body, but I have listened carefully to what she has said and I will consider what more we can do.
Patient Transport Services: Northern Lincolnshire — House of Commons, 2018-01-16
Topic: Health
Nicholas Dakin (Labour, Centre-left): I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. I have regularly had messages commenting about patient transport arriving late to pick people up, sometimes too late to get to appointments in time; patient transport sending unsuitable vehicles, so that disabled patients cannot access the transport; transport arriving late to a pick-up from hospital. That is a consistent theme. I have met with Thames. They held their hands up and said they had got problems. They said they were going to sort them out, but sadly, a month later, the problem is not getting any better.
Patient Transport Services: Northern Lincolnshire — House of Commons, 2018-01-16
Topic: Health
Diana Ruth Johnson (Labour, Centre-left): I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this evening’s debate. In Hull, we were also covered by Thames Ambulance Service. They are already under a contract performance notice because of their failure to do what their contract says they should. A constituent—a cancer patient—contacted me just today to tell me about being left, being forgotten, not being able to get to chemotherapy sessions, not being able to get to radiotherapy sessions. That constituent had seen people who had had to wait up to four hours for a journey back to Scarborough or Lincolnshire, in a waiting area with only upright chairs, when all one would want to do at that stage is sleep. It is totally unacceptable and the service does not seem to have improved, despite that contract performance notice.
Patient Transport Services: Northern Lincolnshire — House of Commons, 2018-01-16
Topic: Health
Melanie Onn (Labour, Centre-left): I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way. It is fair to say that all our constituents have suffered for reasons that Thames Ambulance Service Ltd has brought on itself to some extent. It has decided not to pay volunteer drivers, who have been the backbone of the service for some time, to travel to and from where patients must be collected. That means that it has lost 40 of those volunteer drivers. Should it not be rewarding the people who have been the backbone of the service rather than treating them that shoddily?
Patient Transport Services: Northern Lincolnshire — House of Commons, 2018-01-16
Topic: Health
Nicholas Dakin (Labour, Centre-left): It is interesting to reflect that back before Thames took over the contract we did not have these problems. When we, as northern Lincolnshire MPs, met the hospital trust, it confirmed that these problems were related to how Thames was operating the contract and that it was adding to their problems trying to deliver high-quality care.
Patient Transport Services: Northern Lincolnshire — House of Commons, 2018-01-16
Topic: Health
Nicholas Dakin (Labour, Centre-left): I congratulate the Minister on taking up her new post, which I am sure she will do very well. She said that CCGs should take swift action when things are not working. What does swift action look like? This has been going on for some time now; how quickly should the people of northern Lincolnshire expect to have the patient transport service they deserve?
Patient Transport Services: Northern Lincolnshire — House of Commons, 2018-01-16
Topic: Health
Diana Ruth Johnson (Labour, Centre-left): This is not just one CCG; it involves more than one. I have already mentioned the fact that Hull contracts with Thames Ambulance Service. Does the Minister really think that this business—it is a profit- making business—is fit for purpose?
Defence Industry — House of Commons, 2018-01-15
Topic: Defense
Daniel Joseph Carden (Labour, Centre-left): Will the Secretary of State confirm that, by 2020, 20% of our defence budget is set to be spent in the United States, not supporting UK jobs in design, engineering and manufacturing? Will he look again at defence procurement policy, which currently excludes social, economic and employment policies?
Defence Industry — House of Commons, 2018-01-15
Topic: Defense
Stephen James Morgan (Labour, Centre-left): The defence industrial policy refresh was extremely disappointing, particularly in its failure to include a change to how the Ministry of Defence calculates value for money to include employment and economic impacts in cities such as Portsmouth, despite many defence companies urging the Ministry to make that change. Can the Secretary of State explain why?
Defence Industry — House of Commons, 2018-01-15
Topic: Defense
Emma Ann Hardy (Labour, Centre-left): As the Defence Secretary will know, the Government recently signed a letter of intent with the Qatari Government for six new Hawk aircraft, but workers at the BAE Brough plant say that, even if that deal goes through, there will still have to be a headcount reduction in line with future aircraft production rates. What can the Government say to reassure these workers about their jobs?
Defence Industry — House of Commons, 2018-01-15
Topic: Defense
Wayne David (Labour, Centre-left): I congratulate the Minister with responsibility for defence procurement, the Under-Secretary of State for Defence, the hon. Member for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb), on his new job. I am sure he will do his best to ensure fairness in defence procurement. I very much hope that the Defence Secretary will dispel the rumours regarding the £3 billion contract for the new mechanised infantry vehicle. Will he take this opportunity to give a commitment that there will not be a cosy deal with the Germans, but a fair and open competition for the prime contract?
Strategic Equality Objectives — House of Commons, 2018-01-15
Topic: Defense
Roberta Carol Blackman-Woods (Labour, Centre-left): Having more diverse armed forces clearly adds to their effectiveness, but, unfortunately, the latest figures show that the number of black, Asian and minority ethnic regular personnel has risen only 0.5% since 2015. What specific initiatives does the MOD have to improve on this?