argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Gender-based Violence — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Civil Rights
Andrew Edmund Armstrong Selous (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Lady is absolutely right to raise this completely horrific practice. I can tell her that the Bishop of Gloucester has led discussions with Ministers about the role of faith communities, which are often the first point of call for people in need. Parishes are often willing to scale up support for people suffering from gender-based violence and domestic abuse. It is important that there is a level playing field for all providers of support and advice services, including church ones. That is what we are doing in the UK, but I take her point about the global nature of this issue and the important role that the Anglican communion has in engaging with it.
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Other
Jeremy Richard Streynsham Hunt (Conservative, Centre-right): May I welcome the Prime Minister back from his splendid isolation to the place that he has no doubt been itching to get back to more than any other—this House of Commons—and say how wonderful it is to see him here?
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Civil Rights
Julian Charles Sturdy (Conservative, Centre-right): As the Government continue to impose further unprecedented restrictions on people’s freedoms, it is important to give people hope and justification. As York’s covid rate continues to fall and is the lowest in Yorkshire, can the Secretary of State outline how we can get to tier 1 as fast as possible? Will he publish the assessment and the data based on which York was placed in tier 2, so that we can best judge how to get to tier 1? He talks about regular reviews, but a weekly review would be much more desirable.
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Immigration
Matthew John David Hancock (Conservative, Centre-right): I am afraid that I cannot confirm that with respect to the Welsh border, because the legal restrictions on travel were a decision by the Welsh Administration, rather than by the UK Government for England. We have taken the view that travel restrictions should be in guidance, because there are all sorts of complicated circumstances in which people might need to travel. We have done that when we have been in national lockdown across England, as well as locally. I am sorry that I cannot be clearer than that. On the point about renewal and when we review these matters, we are proposing to review first on 16 December and then regularly thereafter to ensure that we keep the tiered restrictions as up to date as possible.
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Civil Rights
Christian Wakeford (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the Prime Minister for the flexibility that the Government are providing so that we can all have a family Christmas. However, let me ask my right hon. Friend the Health Secretary: what consideration has been given to Hanukkah, which starts two weeks today, regarding family gatherings and public menorah lightings? Does he think it is fair if no flexibility is shown to the Jewish community?
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Mixed Topics
Matthew John David Hancock (Conservative, Centre-right): We carefully considered this issue, consulted on it and discussed it widely. Christmas is a national holiday, as well as being very much a Christian celebration. That is reflected, for instance, in the fact that we have two days of bank holidays. We consulted members of different faiths around precisely the question that my hon. Friend rightly raises, and there was a strong degree of support for having something special in place for Christmas for everybody, even though we have not been able to put that in place for Hanukkah or for other celebrations of other faiths.
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Other
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the Secretary of State; we have completed our exchanges on the statement In order to allow the safe exit of hon. Members participating in this item of business and the safe arrival of those participating in the next item of business, I will now the House.
Official Development Assistance — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Other
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): Order. It is fine for the Secretary of State to ask a rhetorical question. It is not in order to have a dialogue from a sedentary position. A rhetorical question does not require an immediate answer.
Official Development Assistance — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Mixed Topics
Peter James Bottomley (Conservative, Centre-right): May I suggest that we squint at the nettles in what was said yesterday and what has been said today? Clearly, it would be illuminating to see the messages that the Foreign Secretary will have sent to the Treasury and the Prime Minister arguing against the cut. We know that this is not his idea May I ask the Foreign Secretary how much the amount of money would have gone down if we had kept 0.7% with an 11% contraction of the economy? Is that well over £1 billion? How much extra is being taken by coming down from 0.7%? Is the proposed legislation designed to make sure we come back to 0.7% or to make it possible to avoid coming back to it for a long time I end by saying that I first stood for election when the Foreign Secretary was born, and I became a trustee of Christian Aid to fight to get the Government to meet the commitment they had made a long time before to 0.7%. I rejoiced when we met it. It was not put on us by the Liberal Democrats; it was in our manifesto in 2010. I am glad that the Foreign Secretary was able to say in July that we would stick to 0.7%.
Official Development Assistance — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Other
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): Before the Foreign Secretary answers that question, I must point out to the House that when a Minister makes a statement, the idea is that people ask short questions. They are not meant to be making speeches. A question is one phrase with a question mark at the end. It does not require lots of statistics, a huge preamble or lots of rhetoric. We are only a quarter of the way through the list of people who have asked to speak in this statement, but we have used up three quarters of the hour allocated to it. That simply is not fair to the other people who have yet to ask their questions, so I beg for short questions—and if the questions are short, it will be easier for the Foreign Secretary to give shorter answers.
Official Development Assistance — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Other
Dominic Rennie Raab (Conservative, Centre-right): I think that’s Twitter lined up for later on in the afternoon. The hon. Gentleman asks what the public expects. I think they ask us in a sober way to look at all the choices. We have done that.
Official Development Assistance — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Civil Rights
Nusrat Munir Ul-Ghani (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend has said that, going forward, the right decisions will be made to deal with everything from poverty to extremism. For that to be the case, he has to focus on the safety and security of women and girls, which requires access for them to good and safe education. Will he update us on how we will continue to do that? During this, the week of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, the greatest number of women being abused are Uyghur women who are being abused by the Chinese state. Will he update us on what support he can provide to Uyghur women?
Official Development Assistance — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Mixed Topics
Dominic Rennie Raab (Conservative, Centre-right): I pay tribute to my hon. Friend, who has championed this cause relentlessly and with great passion and great eloquence. We are a global leader in this and we should be proud of it—I am proud of it. We are proud to be the Equal Rights Coalition co-chair with Argentina, and we are ambitious about what we can achieve through that strategy and the impact it will have. He talked about NGOs. Civil society has an incredibly important role to play, and we are committed to working with all the NGOs, including the United Kingdom Alliance for Global Equality, in the weeks and months ahead.
Coronavirus Outbreak: DWP Response — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Other
Nigel Martin Evans (Conservative, Centre-right): I have asked Members to consider a five-minute limit. We are not putting the clock on, but Members who go wildly over five minutes will be doing a great disservice to those lower down the call list.
Coronavirus Outbreak: DWP Response — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Mixed Topics
David Mervyn Johnston (Conservative, Centre-right): We could make the case for all public servants to be given a pay rise at all times, but of course we have to keep a good control over the expenditure that the Government make on behalf of taxpayers. Considerable support has been given, in one of the most generous packages in the world, through the covid period, and I think that has to be taken into consideration when we talk about a pay rise. And of course some public sector workers are getting a pay rise; in fact, I think the majority still are I also want to give credit to the ministerial team and the way in which they have worked flexibly, whether in bringing forward the use of Government Gateway identification by six months or in suspending the conditionality on job-seeking for this period. All those things mattered and played an important role. Some of the criticism that has been made of the DWP involves things that I think are reasonable. For example, I think it reasonable still to require evidence of health conditions if someone wants to claim health-related benefits. I accept the point about not everyone having the right level of digital literacy, but on the other hand, we wanted a system that was quick and easy to access, and we were keeping everybody inside, and I think that probably affected a small but not insignificant minority of people. Some of the other criticisms are about problems that people have with the system as a whole, such as the benefit cap or no recourse to public funds. I am not saying that those issues have not been exacerbated, but they are broader questions than just about the performance of the DWP during this period. I agree with some of the criticisms, however. The delays to mandatory reconsiderations, for example, are a problem. I have seen this for myself, and we have to sort it out. I know that the Department is committed to doing so, and the faster it can do so, the better After the Health and Education Departments, the DWP has had tremendous pressure placed on it, and the reason we have heard a lot less about it is that things have gone so well. That is not the case with everything, but it is a service that has gone a lot better than could have potentially been expected at the outset of this crisis, given the increase in the number of claimants. That is backed up by the statistics. The bottom 10% saw no reduction in the income level that they received, and the Government’s package overall reduced the scale of losses by up to two thirds, in the majority of cases, for working people The Department should be commended for this. It has some big things on its plate, like the kickstart programme—which I take a particular interest in, given my previous work with young people—and the new Restart programme. It is right to target those people who have been unemployed for at least a year. I think that what we have seen so far bodes well for how it will deliver these programmes.
Hydrogen Transport — House of Commons, 2020-11-26
Topic: Other
Rachel Helen Maclean (Conservative, Centre-right): I heartily congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley (Alexander Stafford) on securing this excellent Adjournment debate. I cannot believe it is the first debate we have had in the House of Commons solely on this topic, but I am sure it will not be the last.
Business Before Questions — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): It is with great sadness that I have to inform the House of the death of the hon. Member for Newport West, Paul Flynn. A dedicated, principled, fearless and award-winning parliamentarian, Paul represented and championed the Newport West constituency and the wider interests, as he saw them, of Wales for 31 and a half years in this House. From drugs policy to pensions, from animal welfare to Europe, from parliamentary reform to the war in Afghanistan, Paul Flynn spoke with conviction, with total commitment and without fear or favour. He was every inch the exemplar parliamentarian whom he strove over three decades to be As many colleagues will know, Paul spent the vast majority of his career as a Back Bencher. I often teased him, affectionately and with respect, about that well-thumbed tome that he penned, "Commons Knowledge: How to be a Backbencher". He was a fine parliamentarian, a dedicated socialist, and much loved in his constituency and beyond I hope that I speak for the House, in concluding my tribute to that very fine man, to whom I last spoke on Saturday 26 January, when I say this. Paul Flynn was a standing rebuke in his parliamentary service to two categories of people. The first are those who think that the only point of coming into politics is to become Prime Minister or a Minister—at the very least that shows a lack of imagination. Paul knew that there were so many other ways in which you could achieve real gains and derive fulfilment Secondly—I am sure that there are people on both sides of the House, who sit in certain positions, who will recognise the veracity of what I am about to say—Paul was a standing rebuke to those who thought that it was vital always to be in the closest possible regulatory alignment with one’s Whips Office. It was not. He spoke his mind. He did it his way. He did it with eloquence, with knowledge, with character, and often, as we all know, with mordent wit Paul will be greatly missed by his wife of the last 34 years, Sam, and by the wider family. We respectfully remember him, and I hope we always will.
Armed Forces Covenant — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Housing
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): This goes to the heart of what the covenant is all about. I want to see all homeless people looked after, and I want to make sure that if they are veterans, the covenant is recognised and enforced. However, if we are to do that, it is not the MOD that needs to do it; it is actually local government. Thanks to the veterans board, we are now enforcing the covenant and encouraging Government Departments to ask, "Are you doing enough?" Each local authority has an armed forces champion, who should be looking at these issues to make sure that the authority is tackling homelessness issues in its area. If there are any areas where there is a problem with that, please let me know.
Armed Forces Covenant — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Mixed Topics
James Whiteside Gray (Conservative, Centre-right): It is anecdotally alleged, although not necessarily backed up by statistics, that a disproportionate number of prisoners are veterans. What consideration has my right hon. Friend given to making better use of the MOD prison estate—particularly Colchester Prison, for example, which I understand is relatively empty at the moment? Would that not be more appropriate housing for soldiers and veterans who are in civilian prisons?
Warship Construction — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Other
Questions: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that when decisions are made about the placement of orders for vessels for the Royal Navy, which have seen an encouraging increase in number, and about who wins them, contributions to UK prosperity will play an important role?
Mark Lancaster (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. May I take this opportunity to thank him once again for the valuable contribution he made through his report last year? He made, off the top of my head, some 41 sensible recommendations, and we are looking to address them shortly.
Armed Forces Personnel — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Having known the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) for 35 years, I hope he will take it in the right spirit if I say that I really do wish he would tell us what he really thinks.
RAF Scampton — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Public Lands
Tobias Martin Ellwood (Conservative, Centre-right): I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend’s determination to ensure that this place recognises the work, the heritage and the history of RAF Scampton, which will, I think, be noted by his constituents and others. It is important for the museum there to continue As my right hon. Friend will know—[Interruption.] Is that okay Mr Speaker? As my right hon. Friend will know, the location of the Red Arrows is partly due to an operational capability to ensure that they are serviced. The airspace is run by the Civil Aviation Authority, and that is the subject of a separate discussion to be had with them.
RAF Scampton — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): We want to enjoy the benefits of the Minister’s mellifluous tones. That was my only exhortation. It is quite understandable that a Minister looks back at a Member, but the rest of the House wants to savour the experience of hearing him.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Mixed Topics
Gavin Alexander Williamson (Conservative, Centre-right): The next time I go to Norway, I will be sure to bring my right hon. Friend along so that we can go for a dip together My right hon. Friend raises an important issue, and it is one that has been ongoing for a very long time. I have had the opportunity to meet a large number of those affected, and we are keen to work across the Government to find a solution. This is a burning injustice, and I know that those women feel it very deeply. I am committed to finding a solution, and I very much hope that we can deliver that across all Departments.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Other
Questions: Does my right hon. Friend agree with the former shadow Chancellor, the hon. Member for Nottingham East (Mr Leslie), when he questioned the Leader of the Opposition’s ability on defence by criticising his pursuit of policies—
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Order. I do not want to be unkind to the hon. Lady, but she has taken too long to ask a question about Opposition policy, and we really cannot get into that. Questions are about Government policy, not that of the Opposition.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: Does my right hon. Friend agree with the former shadow Chancellor, the hon. Member for Nottingham East (Mr Leslie), when he questioned the Leader of the Opposition’s ability on defence by criticising his pursuit of policies—; The introduction of a dry dock in Portsmouth for the nation’s new carriers could create and protect hundreds of jobs in my constituency and be worth £1 billion to the local economy. I am keen to see the facility based in Portsmouth, which is home to the Royal Navy, so will the Secretary of State give a timeframe for the decision?; Suicide claimed the lives of 71 military personnel and veterans last year, and mental ill health is a clear and present danger to our servicemen and women and to our veterans. What assessment have Ministers made of making an automatic link between those leaving the service and their local Royal British Legion to help them to ease their way back into civilian life?; I associate myself with the tributes to Paul Flynn. He was a great Welsh patriot, devolutionist and campaigner, and we will miss him.According to a report by the National Audit Office, the RAF estimates that, at the current rate, it will be another 20 years before it has enough pilots. What urgent steps is the Minister going to take to rectify this?; Mr Speaker, I join you and other colleagues in paying tribute to Paul Flynn for his generous advice, which he gave all the time, especially to me when I was first elected in 2007.Given the Cameron Government’s decision to scrap our maritime patrol capability and this Government’s decision, several years later, to buy maritime patrol aircraft off the shelf, why do we not yet have a capability in place? What is the Ministry of Defence doing to patrol our territorial waters in the meantime, particularly in the North sea?
Mark Lancaster (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend is right to champion this issue. Over the past year, we have held a number of medical symposiums in which we have been looking very carefully at what medical standards we actually require in the military, not least because of the length of military service. Many conditions do not actually become an issue until later in life, when recruits would potentially have already finished their military service.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2019-02-18
Topic: Other
Questions: Does my right hon. Friend agree with the former shadow Chancellor, the hon. Member for Nottingham East (Mr Leslie), when he questioned the Leader of the Opposition’s ability on defence by criticising his pursuit of policies—; The introduction of a dry dock in Portsmouth for the nation’s new carriers could create and protect hundreds of jobs in my constituency and be worth £1 billion to the local economy. I am keen to see the facility based in Portsmouth, which is home to the Royal Navy, so will the Secretary of State give a timeframe for the decision?; Suicide claimed the lives of 71 military personnel and veterans last year, and mental ill health is a clear and present danger to our servicemen and women and to our veterans. What assessment have Ministers made of making an automatic link between those leaving the service and their local Royal British Legion to help them to ease their way back into civilian life?; I associate myself with the tributes to Paul Flynn. He was a great Welsh patriot, devolutionist and campaigner, and we will miss him.According to a report by the National Audit Office, the RAF estimates that, at the current rate, it will be another 20 years before it has enough pilots. What urgent steps is the Minister going to take to rectify this?; Mr Speaker, I join you and other colleagues in paying tribute to Paul Flynn for his generous advice, which he gave all the time, especially to me when I was first elected in 2007.Given the Cameron Government’s decision to scrap our maritime patrol capability and this Government’s decision, several years later, to buy maritime patrol aircraft off the shelf, why do we not yet have a capability in place? What is the Ministry of Defence doing to patrol our territorial waters in the meantime, particularly in the North sea?; Paul Flynn was a funny, generous man, and we will miss him in Gwent.Capita’s performance on Army recruitment has been hopeless. When is the Secretary of State going to sack them?
Mark Lancaster (Conservative, Centre-right): I feel this is a monthly exchange between the hon. Gentleman and me. All I can do is refer him to the answers I gave earlier in this session. The visible signs of progress are now there for all to see.