argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Scotland’s Fiscal Framework — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Mixed Topics
Stewart Sutherland (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I live on the other side of the border from my noble colleague Lord Beith but not far from the border. I share his perception from that side of the border of the impact of not talking about Barnett. Will the review’s terms of reference include looking at the consequences of retaining the Barnett formula?
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Mixed Topics
John McCluskey (Crossbench, Unknown): Before the Minister moves on, may I ask just one question? In the earlier debate, I asked whether the words "the people of Scotland" included Andy Murray, the tennis player, and he could not answer. The noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, has suggested a simple amendment that would make it clear that the persons entitled to vote are not the people of Scotland—which is a slightly meaningless phrase—but those entitled to vote as electors in a local government election in Scotland. What is wrong with accepting that?
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Other
John McCluskey (Crossbench, Unknown): Has the noble Lord thought of suggesting to the Minister that perhaps he could take an informal word from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, who also had a rather distinguished career in the law?
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Other
John McCluskey (Crossbench, Unknown): Do I understand the noble and learned Lord correctly that, without choosing between them, there are two ways to solve the problem he considers to be so important? One is to do what the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, has suggested—delete the word "normally"—and the other would be to adopt either Amendment 12 or Amendment 13, which provide specifically that the matter shall not be justiciable.
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Mixed Topics
John Kerr (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I will touch on a rather similar point to the one that the noble Lord, Lord Empey, just made. I was very surprised by the way the Minister reacted at the end of our discussion in Committee on this point, when the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, made a very convincing case and explained the status of the amendment he put forward, as he has done again today. We clearly have two duties: first, to put the Sewel convention, as it operates today, on a statutory basis; and secondly, not to make a defective statute. It seems to me absolutely clear that the inclusion of the vague word "normally" makes this statute defective and a cause of continued dispute. We cannot do that I looked at how the Minister reacted when this point was made in Committee. I wonder whether he was not saying something: like the noble Lord, Lord Empey, I wonder whether there is a reason why the Government wish to retain the possibility of acting in breach of the convention as it operates. I wonder whether, for example, he was thinking about the Defence of the Realm Act or the Emergency Powers Act, which almost certainly would go into areas in a national emergency or a state of war where the Scottish Government would normally have fully devolved power. This seems fanciful, but I find it very difficult to think of a logical explanation for the Government’s position that we must write "normally" into the law and thus guarantee dispute in courts of law If there are circumstances in which the Government envisage that they would want to act in breach of what has been the convention and what is about to become law, they need to spell out in the Bill what they are. They need to replace the word "normally" with a subsection that defines those circumstances. It seems very unlikely that this is their thinking, but if it is, I hope that the Minister will explain it to us. Otherwise, I can think of absolutely no reason for not supporting the amendment in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, and the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth.
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Other
John McCluskey (Crossbench, Unknown): Would the noble Lord support this possible solution? There is quite some time between now and Third Reading. If the Minister, with the support of others—he would certainly have the support of the Liberal party—could approach his new friends in Edinburgh in the Scottish National Party, and the noble Lord, Lord McAvoy, and say, "This is a mess agreed by Smith. It’s been demonstrated that it can’t be done. Would you agree that we simply drop this clause?", he might well find that they would be happy to let it be dropped and the Government could renew a statement that we will do what the Smith commission envisaged.
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Other
John Kerr (Crossbench, Unknown): I very much hope that the Government will give a serious, considered reply to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope. If it involved suggesting coming back at Third Reading with some variant of his wording, I would want to listen to that. But, it seems to me that we simply cannot do what the noble and learned Lord, Lord McCluskey, is asking for, which is to drop this altogether. It is an important point in the Smith report that the House of Commons has gone along with, and on which all the political parties agree. The idea of just dropping the clause is not possible, but we need to write one that is not defective.
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Other
James Hope (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I think I should thank the noble and learned Lord the Advocate-General for Scotland for his kind words. The amendments improve the intelligibility of these provisions. It is important that the system work as smoothly as possible, so I am extremely grateful.
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Mixed Topics
Charles Hay (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, for allowing him to put my name beneath his on this very cleverly drafted and interesting amendment. As I mentioned in Committee, I have a particular interest in and a special love for those assets that make up the Crown Estate today. I am very worried about the Crown Estate, and feel that it needs to go into hands that will look after it. I am therefore extremely attracted by this amendment, because the local councils concerned will fulfil my test of looking after things I was most interested in what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace, had to say about net income versus management. I thought I had to find one example of why it was important to send things down to the local level and I found one by talking to a householder outside Oban. He reflected that in the area outside Oban there are a number of fish farms, one of which had gone bust—of course, they need to have an arrangement with the Crown Estate—and no moneys were available to clear up the fish farm, which then created a pollution problem which affected a number of neighbouring fish farms. These businesses are quite small, but they employ significant percentages of people in the area around Oban. The solution was of course to get hold of the Crown Estate and ask it to take some simple decisions—essentially, to pay someone to clear up the mess. It took a very long time, because no one in London quite understood the urgency of the fact that pollution was killing off the fish. The householder told me that they were jolly glad that the Crown Estate would move to be more local. It was interesting that the same householder knew exactly what was taking place—I am using "double devolution" but I do not think it is that—and that in future, if a similar thing happened, it would be possible for someone to go directly to the appropriate person, because they would know the individual within the council who would look after it and could have the matter sorted out so that it would not cause the economic damage to the community which it did There is also of course the extraordinary thing we have been hearing today about the holy status of the Smith commission agreement document. However, in fact of course we have two holy documents, because it turns out that the Scotland Bill itself has a holy status. There is a conflict of holiness—
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Other
Charles Hay (Crossbench, Unknown): —or sacredness between these two documents, and it seems that it is incumbent on the House to try to find some way to resolve that. Given the very eloquent words of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, and my story of the householder from outside Oban, I am sure that the correct way for the House to consider the holiness is to go with the Smith commission agreement and to make the amendment that is being proposed here. I hope that other noble Lords feel the same way that I do.
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-24
Topic: Other
Charles Hay (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, the noble Lord is developing a very interesting point. I wonder whether, in doing so, he would like to refer to the no-detriment principle—principle number 5, of which I can hand him a copy now—and whether or not this offends that principle of the white sacred document, the Smith commission report.
Immigration Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-03
Topic: Immigration
John Montagu (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, in the interests of speeding things up, I shall be very brief in putting a question to the Minister about absconding. There is an overlap again between these groups of amendments. The relationship between support and appeals is very critical, and I do not believe that the Government have quite got it right; they are trying hard but not succeeding. We are discussing asylum seekers facing genuine obstacles to leaving the UK; the Government want to remove their right of appeal against decisions to withhold or discontinue support. Does not that relate to Section 9 of the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.) Act 2004? My understanding of the Section 9 pilot is that nearly one-third of the families disappeared to avoid being returned to their country of origin. The rate of absconding was 39% for those in the Section 9 pilot but only 21% in the comparable controlled group, who remained supported. Can the Minister comment on those figures, because they would appear to lend credence to the amendment?
Immigration Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-03
Topic: Immigration
Andrew Fleming (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, perhaps it is time for a different point of view on this subject. I have no difficulty with Amendment 227, which of course concerns children, but I would like to speak in favour of Clause 34 in respect of cases that do not involve children. In such cases, the aim should be to confine the application of the clause to vexatious appeals, which would help to speed up the process, as the noble Lord, Lord Horam, pointed out Much of the discussion in this Committee has focused on the rights of applicants at various stages of the process. That is entirely understandable, but should not we also have regard to the need for a swift and effective asylum system? That would surely be in the interests of genuine asylum seekers, who make up about 50% of those who apply, and in the interests of maintaining public support for the whole system. This clause is germane in that context. It is in effect the extension of a procedure that has already been applied to foreign national offenders, as has been mentioned already. I entirely accept that the people whom we are talking about are not offenders and are not usually of the same character, but I believe that the extension of the removal of non-asylum cases should be seen in this wider context. It is essential that we should break the link for those who are in reality economic migrants between setting foot in the UK and remaining indefinitely At present, removals of immigration offenders—not foreign national offenders—are running at a very low level, of only about 5,000 a year. That has to be tackled if we are to break this link, which I think is increasingly understood as you look at southern Europe and so on. We have to find ways of giving protection to those who deserve it and of removing those who do not. This clause is a step in that direction.
Immigration Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-03
Topic: Mixed Topics
David Alton (Crossbench, Unknown): As the noble and learned Lord says, it would be invidious to build a whole argument on just one case, but I must add two points to what he has just said. First, the lady told me that she had several convictions and custodial sentences but none had been for longer than three months, which does not suggest that these were hugely serious offences. Secondly, this is about returning someone to Mogadishu in Somalia, with all the problems that country faces at present. Every day one hears reports of bombings and last week there were reports of bazookas being used on the streets. This is someone who has lived in the United Kingdom for 26 years and has had three children in this country in that time. That is why the case is relevant to this afternoon’s debate about the undesirability of breaking up family life in those circumstances.
Immigration Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-03
Topic: Immigration
John Montagu (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, who spoke with such sincerity. I support these amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, and others. I am grateful to the noble Lord for mentioning absconding again. I hope we will get an early answer on that Amendment 230 would include a right of appeal against the decision not to provide support. There is a small army of campaigners on this matter out there, some of them in the House of Commons where this was a major issue in the last debate on the Bill. One of the campaigners was called Iain Duncan Smith. The Minister may already know that in a 2008 report, Mr Duncan Smith said that the then Labour Government were using forced destitution as a means of encouraging people to leave voluntarily. He said that it was a "failed policy"; only one in five left voluntarily. The same Home Office is again aiming to squeeze Section 95 and Section 95(9A) on support and to narrow down the eligibility of families of so-called refused asylum seekers, although I have never liked that term. That may even prevent, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, said, local authorities supporting children and families under Section 17 of the Children Act 1989. We were debating this in October, as the noble Baroness said, under the Motion to annul, and arguing whether £5 was enough for a person to live on. If you take into consideration food and clothing—shoes, for example—it is not. There are some sad examples of mothers and children facing destitution, and worse. These are taken from serious case reviews, which I shall not relate now, but they convinced me that the Government have to think again.
Immigration Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-03
Topic: Other
David Alton (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, the Minister will recall that I put five questions to him. Although he has in his ministerial reply touched tangentially on some of those points, I wonder whether he would be good enough to confirm that he will write to me with a response to the particular points I made.
Immigration Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-03
Topic: Immigration
David Alton (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, put the case eloquently and persuasively. She and I attended a briefing with the British Red Cross and she then tabled the amendment. I added my name as a signatory because it puts, as she said, a real and unnecessary injustice right. It is a basic safeguard against enforced destitution The Minister needs no convincing about the merits of the British Red Cross. He has not only raised significant sums for the organisation in a voluntary capacity but I know that he has huge admiration for the work that it does. Representatives told us in the briefing that we had with them that they had helped to reunite 300 refugee families last year in the UK. They also illustrated from their own experience that destitution in the asylum system is a worsening and deepening problem. They supported 9,000 refugees and asylum seekers who were destitute in 2015, compared with 7,700 in 2014, which is an increase of some 15%. That included people granted refugee status but not given enough time to transition to mainstream benefits in the way that the noble Baroness just described Nearly 44% of destitute refugees and asylum seekers supported by the Red Cross last year were from Eritrea, Iran, Sudan and Syria, all of which are among the world’s top refugee-producing countries. Although I agree with what the Minister said earlier about people seeking better lives from countries such as Albania—a point referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, in his intervention—we must never lose sight of some of the hell-holes from which people are coming When the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, and I were at Yarl’s Wood today, two men had just arrived off the back of lorries from Iran. Another had arrived from Mosul in Iraq. The situations they had come from were such that any noble Lord in the Chamber tonight would have attempted to escape from too. We have to be clear that these are not economic migrants or people who are just coming for a better life. Some of them have come from the most perilous and appalling situations If the Bill is left unaltered, it could plunge thousands more people in those kinds of situations into poverty, including families who are unable to leave the UK through no fault of their own, for example due to a lack of identification documents to provide their nationality or because they have no viable or secure place to return to.
Immigration Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-03
Topic: Immigration
Raymond Jolliffe (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I have a question which comes up in parallel to this huge group of amendments. It is as follows: if a young person or adult has been in this country for more than seven years without committing any serious offence and is therefore in a position where they would be eligible for British citizenship, if they applied for it, is it the intention of the Home Office to deport them? I will just explain that this question arises from the visit that my noble friend and I made to Yarl’s Wood today. I quite understand if the Minister does not feel able to give me an answer now but if he does not, will he please write to me and place a copy in the Library?
Housing Benefit (Abolition of the Family Premium and Date of Claim Amendment) Regulations 2015 — House of Lords, 2016-02-03
Topic: Mixed Topics
Colin MacKenzie Low (Crossbench, Unknown): Does the Minister not agree that I gave some concrete and tangible examples where people might be justified in needing to have their claim backdated for longer than a month, through no fault of their own—for example, where forms have gone missing or where they have been sanctioned in error? Would it really mean any skin off the Government’s nose to include an element of flexibility to take account of those cases? If someone has lost a form or they have been sanctioned in error, those are not instances of behaviour that can be changed by limiting the backdating rules to one month.
Immigration Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-03
Topic: Other
Raymond Jolliffe (Crossbench, Unknown): I have spoken to this amendment, and I thank those who supported it and mentioned it favourably. I give notice that it is a subject to which I am pretty certain we will have to return at Report.
Access to Palliative Care Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2016-02-02
Topic: Other
Ilora Gillian Finlay (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I understand that no amendments have been set down for the Bill and that no noble Lord has indicated a wish to move a manuscript amendment or speak in Committee. Unless, therefore, any noble Lord objects, I beg to move that the order of commitment be discharged.
Zika Virus — House of Lords, 2016-02-02
Topic: Mixed Topics
Narendra Babubhai Patel (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, the virus, having been found in 1947 with low infectivity to humans, has now gradually spread to larger populations. Three things are important. The first is surveillance: what surveillance measures need to be undertaken to identify where the disease is spreading? The second is vector control. It is a daytime mosquito, so insecticides and self-protection are important. However, in the long term, the vector itself must be controlled and this is where Britain has an important role to play. While vaccines will take a long time to develop, modern techniques of gene editing and gene modification of insects are the way forward. Britain leads the world in this science and Brazil is the next country that has expertise in it. The two countries can work together to produce, in a very short time, modification of these mosquitos so that the incidence of the disease is reduced. Will the Ross fund be used to help our scientists do this?
Zika Virus — House of Lords, 2016-02-02
Topic: Mixed Topics
Alexander Trees (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, Zika is the latest of a series of infectious diseases to have emerged in recent years in humans and animals. Some 75% of new infectious diseases emerging in humans are derived from animals. Does the Minister agree that, at this time, when our biosecurity is threatened by globalisation, we need to strengthen national surveillance capabilities for infectious diseases in humans and animals?
Charities (Protection and Social Investment) Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2016-02-02
Topic: Domestic Commerce
James Hope (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, as the Minister will recall, I had the privilege of chairing the Joint Committee that conducted pre-legislative examination of what was then called the Protection of Charities Bill. I cast my mind back to a year ago, when our committee was still sitting and considering the terms of our report. It is a pleasure to see some members of my committee in the House this afternoon. It is against that background that I pay my own tribute to the Minister and his Bill team for bringing the Bill to this stage: we are now truly at the last lap. One of our main concerns was that there should be no delay in the legislation we were examining. It is a great pleasure to see that matters have been taken this far forward with the changes made The only amendment I wish to comment on—I do not want to arouse too much controversy about this—is Amendment 2. I listened with great care to what the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter of Kentish Town, said and I appreciate the concern on the point she mentioned. However, the one feature I stress is that we did not as a committee have the chance to examine Clause 9. As the noble Lord said, that was introduced to the Bill on Report. It is the kind of clause that, speaking for myself, we would have wanted to examine with great care because of not only its implications on the point that the noble Baroness made but also its width. It is completely unqualified. If it had been more precisely targeted, we might have been a little more inclined to support it. I rather suspect that a clause as general as this would impose a very great burden on the Charity Commission. To a large extent, because of the protection of charity law generally, the clause would not be needed. I stress that I speak only for myself but I am relieved, against the background of what I have mentioned and having heard the Minister explain the reasons for it, that this amendment has come forward. I very much support it. My main point in rising to speak at all was to express my thanks and appreciation for the fact that we are now at this stage, in effect bringing the matter to an end.