argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-03-05
Topic: Social Welfare
Maeve Christina Mary Sherlock (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I thank the Minister for her introduction to this order and both noble Baronesses who have spoken. As we have heard, the purpose of the order is to make changes to the rates of those benefits which have been fortunate enough to escape the Government’s freeze, which is causing so much damage, as we have heard from the noble Baronesses. We now have a series of different categories of benefit which get treated in different ways when it comes to uprating time We have a category which is going to be uprated by at least the increase in earnings: the state pension because of the triple lock; the standard minimum guarantee of pension credit; and some aspects of widows’ and widowers’ pensions in industrial death benefit. They all get to go up by 2.6%, which is the increase in earnings Then we have a category which will have to be increased by at least the increase in prices. This includes attendance allowance, carer’s allowance, DLA, PIP, severe disablement allowance, other aspects of widows’ benefits, the additional state pension, graduated retirement benefit and increments to the state pension. They all get to go up by CPI—inflation Then there is a category over which the Secretary of State has discretion. She has decided to use that discretion by uprating some benefits by CPI—by inflation—including statutory sick pay, maternity and paternity pay, adoption and parental leave pay, the support group components of ESA, disability and carer premiums, the carer element of universal credit and the limited capability for work and work-related activity element of universal credit. They go up by 2.4% Then there are the benefits which are not being uprated at all. These include all the main means-tested working-age benefits, including: the personal allowance elements of income support; jobseeker’s allowance; the personal allowances and work-related activity components of ESA and housing benefit; and the standard allowance, limited capacity for work element and the lower disabled child addition of universal credit. Those are the main things on which most of our poorest fellow citizens depend. However, they have been frozen at the 2015-16 cash levels, having previously been increased by only 1%. Now, as we have heard, we have to add to the list bereavement support payment. It will be paid at the same cash rate as it was last year, which means that, like all those benefits, its value is being cut yet again. There is no triple lock for anybody except pensioners.
Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-03-05
Topic: Social Welfare
Margot Aline (Labour, Centre-left): On the point about encouraging women back into work, which I very much agree with, would the Minister be willing to take away my point about work allowance? At present, second earners have little incentive to get back into paid work. She made the point that we need all adults to be in paid work to have the full impact on poverty. I do not expect her to say that the Government are going to do that but perhaps she might consider my point when developing universal credit policy.
Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-03-05
Topic: Labor
Maeve Christina Mary Sherlock (Labour, Centre-left): On the affordability question, will the Minister address the point that I and another noble Lord made: the Government are likely to save half a billion pounds more on this freeze than they did from the 2014-15 Budget, so why could that money not be put to this purpose? While she is at it, her comments about work are very interesting, but if I could bring her back to the order under discussion, if the aim of this freeze is to incentivise work, why are the Government freezing payments made to some of the people on employment and support allowance whom they have deemed not fit to work? Why does the freeze include benefits paid to mothers of very young children, whom the Government do not require to work? Why does it apply to in-work benefits designed to make work pay?
Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-03-05
Topic: Labor
Frank Ashcroft Judd (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, the Minister is speaking with great passion and conviction about her commitment to get people back into work. Is it not also incumbent on us all, irrespective of party, to keep constantly under review exactly what some of this work amounts to? It is hardly surprising that there are large numbers of families still not in work: the attraction of going into the sort of work available is the attraction of going into hell.
Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-03-05
Topic: Social Welfare
Margot Aline (Labour, Centre-left): I sense that the Minister is about to sit down—I apologise if she was not—but I made one point on which I asked her to respond. It would be a new policy but would not cost anything, other than the administrative costs of doing it. It would be to routinely publish the poverty depth statistics, which would help to answer for the future the question that my noble friend Lady Sherlock asked, which has not been answered. What attempts are the Government making, or have they made, to measure the impact on poverty of this freeze?
Stronger Towns Fund — House of Lords, 2019-03-05
Topic: Government Operations
Joyce Gwendolen Quin (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, the money announced for the north-east of England amounts to £5 per person in the north-east for each of the seven years. Is it not the case that this in no way mitigates the cuts in local government spending across the region, nor the effects of Brexit, particularly under a disastrous no-deal scenario? Does this £5 per head of population not contrast dramatically with the £245 per head of population in Northern Ireland as a result of the deal concluded between the Government and the DUP?
Stronger Towns Fund — House of Lords, 2019-03-05
Topic: Macroeconomics
Peter Smith (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I declare my interests as a member and former leader of Wigan Council, and as a vice-president of the LGA. I welcome the Statement, for two reasons. First, it is an admission by the Government that austerity has damaged the north and the Midlands much more than any other part of the country. At least we are hearing that from them and they are going to try to do something about it. Secondly, they are saying that if we are to have an equitable form of funding, deprivation has to be taken into account. We welcome that but cannot understand why it is not done through the new fair funding formula for local authorities, because that new formula will mean the very authorities that the Government are trying to help here will lose about £390 million per year. That loss will hardly be compensated by this additional money. The north-west of England will get £40 million in total and my own authority has lost £160 million since 2010. That is some bribe.
Stronger Towns Fund — House of Lords, 2019-03-05
Topic: Government Operations
Jeremy Hugh Beecham (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I refer to my interests as a councillor in Newcastle and vice-president of the Local Government Association. The north-east will receive this wonderful benison of £15 million a year for seven years across the region. It is still a trifling sum given the scale of the problems that the region faces. What role, if any, will county councils have in the process? I understand that the Minister is saying that they will not get no money, but they will surely have a role in promoting any improvements, particularly on the economic side, of the constituent district councils in those areas. What will that role be in practice? How will the Government evaluate the proposals being made? How long will the process take? Can the Minister give any assurance that the north-east in particular will benefit from significant improvements to its infrastructure, which is desperately in need of improvement? How much would he expect such a modest sum to afford when the county council in Durham has a deficit of £245 million a year?
Financial Services (Gibraltar) (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-03-05
Topic: International Affairs
Denis Tunnicliffe (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, we have no objection to these two SIs, but I have two or three brief questions. The position is summed up in the Explanatory Memorandum to the first set of regulations, paragraph 7.21 of which surprised me. It states: "The UK government will work closely with the government of Gibraltar to design a long-term permanent framework" My impression until I got to that sentence was that the provisions here would change the situation into a stable framework. I would be grateful if the Minister could give us a feel for the extent of difference between the UK system and the system in Gibraltar that means that this bespoke framework is needed, and particularly what will happen if it is not agreed by the end of 2020 The Minister can respond in writing to my second comment if he would like to do so. I refer to the first bullet point in paragraph 7.15 on the second set of regulations. This is really a cry of anguish because one has slogged through so many of these SIs and has to read every one, and then one reads this final sentence: "This framework will not apply to the automatic recognition procedure of resolution actions between the UK and Gibraltar" I do not have the faintest idea of what that means and not the faintest idea of how to find out what it means. I ask the Minister as a matter of sheer curiosity what it means, and I will accept a letter.
Trade Bill — House of Lords, 2019-01-21
Topic: Foreign Trade
Angela Smith (Labour, Centre-left): At the end insert "and resolves that the committee’s report be not received until Her Majesty’s Government has presented to both Houses proposals for a process for making international trade agreements once the United Kingdom is in a position to do so independently of the European Union, including roles for Parliament and the devolved legislatures and administrations in relation to both a negotiating mandate and a final agreement."
Trade Bill — House of Lords, 2019-01-21
Topic: International Affairs
Winifred Ann Taylor (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I do not want to follow the two previous speakers by talking about what happens, deal or no deal, but I will say a word about the difficulties facing the House on this Bill and on other legislation before us. My noble friend mentioned the Constitution Committee, which issued a report on the Trade Bill in October last year. We did so because we wanted to get ahead of the game by advising the House on our approach to that Bill, as we had done on the EU withdrawal Bill in a way that I think was constructive for the whole House and, ultimately, helpful to the Government because our constructive criticisms meant that the Bill was more fit for purpose when it left this House We did that early because we knew of the weight of legislation that would come before us. We have tried to get the Government to give us more information on what legislation we will face and asked to see some things in draft, which we would have been willing to see in confidence. The House will have to face other legislation. We are already seeing arguments about the number of SIs and the difficulty of giving them proper scrutiny in the time available. Time is running out. The Constitution Committee—and, I think, the House as a whole—want to be helpful in making sure that any necessary legislation is actually fit for purpose and will do what is expected of it, but also that so we as parliamentarians can fulfil our role and responsibility to give proper scrutiny I ask the Chief Whip and the Leader of the House to reconsider their approach to giving information to the House about what our future work programme will be. It will be extremely difficult to consider as we should all the legislation that will be before us, whatever the outcome of discussions in another place. I have been a member of the usual channels, albeit in the other House. I know that there are indicative timetables on all occasions—maybe more than one in this instance. If the House is to function properly and fulfil all its obligations, it needs greater information to come through the usual channels about what our programme will be and what responsibilities we will face to get the necessary legislation fit for purpose, and to allow us to fulfil our responsibilities.
Trade Bill — House of Lords, 2019-01-21
Topic: International Affairs
John Reid (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I have only one brief point to make in response to our noble colleague the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde. He said that this is an extraordinary procedure. That is because we live in extraordinary times. No one in this country would have imagined even two or three years ago that we would be standing on the eve of the biggest act of self-immolation in economic terms in some 80 years and yet have no plans for the future. I was going to say that the continuity of which has been spoken is a vacuum, but that is too substantial a word for it. It is the most extraordinary set of circumstances that we have seen in my memory, having been involved in politics for over 40 or 50 years, and every day it gets more extraordinary. Quite apart from the Bill, this morning Downing Street was apparently briefing that the solution would be for Downing Street to amend the Good Friday agreement—forgetting that even if that course of action might commend itself to this House, the Good Friday agreement is the product of two sovereign nations in a bilateral agreement, along with an American President and eight parties in Northern Ireland itself. Yet they speak as though they are ordering a pizza—as if they can just phone up and suddenly the order will be changed. If the noble Lord worries about extraordinary measures taken by this House, he should seek to remove the Government from the extraordinary position of incompetence and blindfold Brexit in which they find themselves.
Trade Bill — House of Lords, 2019-01-21
Topic: Government Operations
Peter Hain (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I apologise to the Committee for coming into the Chamber just a couple of minutes into my noble friend Lord Stevenson’s speech. I hope that it is in order to continue to make a brief contribution I follow the speeches of my noble friend Lord Wigley and the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, as well as that of my noble friend Lord Stevenson, in saying that it is vital that, particularly in respect of the devolved Administrations— I speak as a former Secretary of State for Wales and Secretary of State for Northern Ireland—we do not see an action replay of what we saw earlier in this whole fiasco. I am talking about a power grab by the Government that repatriated to Westminster powers that had already been devolved but were under the European Union’s aegis. That showed a cast of mind in the Whitehall machine of the Government that I encountered as a Secretary of State, whereby the natural instinct of other departments—particularly Defra and the Home Office, although it went more widely—is to centralise, grasp and keep power, not to devolve it. It is essential that, as the amendment seeks, there is a recognition by Ministers that the natural instinct will be to consult the devolved Governments—and in the case of Northern Ireland, whatever is there; maybe senior civil servants, as now. That should be the immediate instinct of every Minister and every senior official in every government department as they process all this My second point relates to paragraph (e) in the amendment, which refers to "appropriate consumer groups" and so on. Will the Government consult the CBI, the FSB, the IoD, the TUC and consumer groups, let alone all the other NGOs that might have an interest? Will that be a natural reflex, as in consulting the devolved Administrations, or will they have to come back in right at the end? I hope that the Minister will be able to give us some reassurance on the record about all that.
Trade Bill — House of Lords, 2019-01-21
Topic: Foreign Trade
John Stephen Monks (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, perhaps I may interject, having been general-secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation for eight years and, during those eight years, having been consulted on the trade arrangements and negotiations being made by the European Union, particularly with Canada, South Korea and, to some extent, Japan. It was a very structured and ordered process, and the logic of it was that free trade generates tremendous wealth and a lot of economic activity but can result in wiping out areas of activity where our industries are less well placed than those in some other countries. So, having a social dimension or some social protection was always our aim in the discussions in the European Union—with mixed success, I might say. The South Korean agreement I am rather pleased with; less so, probably, the Canadian one, surprising as that may seem I want to see in the agreements balance between free trade and some protection for the sectors that will be particularly affected. I do not necessarily mean protectionist protections. Welfare state protections, adjustment protections, retraining and redeployment programmes were the kind of things that were encouraged in the trade agreement process. That was because trade unions, employers and others were encouraged to take an active part in the formulation of these agreements. I am looking for assurances from the Government in support of these amendments that, as they approach this new responsibility for a British Government for the first time in many years, they will have that sort of philosophy and approach, and will not simply—desperate as no doubt Dr Fox is to make some agreements pretty quickly—let these be agreements that give up on the need for proper protection for the people who will be adversely affected, as they will be by these agreements.
Trade Bill — House of Lords, 2019-01-21
Topic: Government Operations
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, the previous debate was about process and how approval mechanisms were in play. This amendment has been grouped with Amendment 5, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, which I support Amendment 4 shows the sorts of arrangements and concerns that we might have in trying to ensure that procurement works more generally in favour of social objectives—a point made earlier by my noble friend Lord Monks about the work he did in Europe in relation to trade Bills and discussions on these areas. We do not need to spend much time on Amendment 4. The list that appears in it is a familiar one to anyone involved in policy on business during the last three or four years. There has been a sense of the Government beginning to emerge from a period of non-engagement with many of these issues into having similar concerns to those on this side of the House about the way in which it is occasionally necessary for government to raise standards, by making it clear that certain behaviour within business is not acceptable. For example, many Members of the House present today will be aware of the long-running saga over the maximum periods for payment of invoices. Over the years, we have tried to get some movement; yes, there has been some, but it would be nice to see the Government pick up and run with this issue for a change The list in the amendment is variable in what it does. There are some high-level issues, for example, to do with, "the transparency of laws, regulations, procedures and practices regarding government procurement". I hope that that provision would be unexceptional. The amendment refers to, "minimum employment standards, rates of pay and similar employment rights", which I think feature in the Statement that we are shortly to receive which was made in the other place earlier this afternoon. I have mentioned the payment of invoices and the scandal of late payment; the drag on the economy from that is now worth something like £40 billion. The list also refers to, "environmental standards … human rights obligations … equalities legislation", and all those arrangements have been well worked through in terms of discussion. Would it be so difficult to require that anything done under the GPA in relation to Her Majesty’s Government’s work, or by those devolved authorities which are also involved, tries to ensure that we raise standards in the workplace? These proposals are worthy of consideration and I beg to move.
Trade Bill — House of Lords, 2019-01-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): I fully accept what my noble friend has said, and I am sorry if I misrepresented him. I think he has the right point there. It picks up what I was going to say about the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, that contracting is often seen in terms of large contracts issued by central government to very large manufacturers, and of course it is not like that. The work of the BEIS department in setting up not only the industrial strategy itself but the way it will roll out to the smaller end of the market is a very important element of that. I am sure we all accept that there is a future there for a much broader engagement with big and small projects, but also for a wider range of activity where innovation, skills, flexibility of movement and the ability to adapt to new environments—such a hallmark of SMEs—are used and capitalised on for the benefit of our public good In a sense, it is good to hear from the Minister the progress in setting and achieving high standards in our procurement arrangements. The points that need to be brought forward are not just the range and need for these issues to be picked up in all our consideration of contracting; we must not be left behind if other countries are using the GPA, or indeed other measures, to achieve change in their environment and economies, and benefiting from it. We must not miss out on that; we need to have a strategy for it The points made about the SME end of the market, particularly in relation to making sure—
Trade Bill — House of Lords, 2019-01-21
Topic: Government Operations
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, this group of amendments plays back themes that we have already discussed in the first and second groups, so I will not spend much time on them. Amendment 6 suggests that additional consultation with relevant stakeholders would make it easier to understand what the process is in the clause. Amendment 7 tries to pick up the point which was made in a number of committees of your Lordships’ House and was raised in the other place when this issue was discussed. It replaces "appropriate" in line 16 on page 2 with "necessary", because it implies that it is not a judgment on a passive basis of what may be considered appropriate, which may be a variable, and it has a particular purpose. I hope the Minister will respond to that Amendment 11 again came from the Constitution Committee’s comment, although it has not been picked up elsewhere, that it would be helpful to insert a refining phrase into the documentation related to whether legislation that is retained EU law might be better defined. We touched on this already. There was a concession that, although it was not thought to be strictly necessary in an earlier phase, it was appropriate that that phrasing could be adopted. I wonder whether that will also be the case here. I look forward to hearing the debate. I beg to move.
Leaving the European Union — House of Lords, 2019-01-21
Topic: Government Operations
Alan Thomas Howarth (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, does the Leader of the House agree that parliamentary government requires that the Government lead? Does she accept that there is a widespread view, shared by the ghost of Mr Gladstone, that procedural initiatives by Back-Benchers in another place, to wrest from the Government control of the agenda and the timetable for parliamentary business, are subversive of parliamentary government and set a dangerous precedent?