argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Children Act 1989: Local Authority Responsibilities — House of Commons, 2019-03-19
Topic: Social Welfare
Kate Ofunne Osamor (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend makes a valuable point. I will go on to discuss the hostile environment and its impact on the most vulnerable in society Project 17, an east London-based charity that I have been working with, works closely with families who have no recourse to public funds. Its recent report, "Not Seen, Not Heard", documents the experiences of children living under this condition—I call it a "condition" deliberately. In 2018, four of the eight families living in Enfield who attended Project 17—my constituency of Edmonton is in the borough of Enfield—were told to call the emergency out-of-hours service each night for extended periods, rather than being provided with accommodation. It is standard practice for some local authorities to wrongly refuse interim support when they are first approached by families who need help. One woman was forced to call the out-of-hours service every night for almost two months The practice of not being child-focused is deeply concerning for a number of reasons. First, families have no stable place to be. When they are asked to leave temporary accommodation by 9.30 am, they wander the streets and have no safe place to go. Secondly, it is unclear how long it will take the out-of-hours service to arrange temporary accommodation following a request in the evening. Thirdly, navigating the out-of-hours service can be difficult for anyone, not least for those who struggle with English as a second language I hear reports of more and more families sleeping in the A&E reception. The reasons vary from them not understanding the system to safety, warmth and, basically, being destitute. One such report comes from Joel, who is nine years old. His family were forced to sleep in the accident and emergency department when they were left street homeless after a local authority refused their request for section 17 support. Joel said: "We had to keep going to McDonalds every night and we would also go to A&E. I would have to wear my school clothes and sleep like that. They would say we have to sleep where the people wait but it’s just like lights and there is nothing colourful there. The chairs were hard. You know when you just sleep in the waiting room? I felt sorry for my mum because she had to stay up and my head had to be on her lap. She had to stay awake, her eyes were open like 24/7, all night and all day so she could watch over me. It was hard for her but also hard for me." Joel mentioned that he slept in his school uniform. That gives us more context on the plight of these children: despite having on fixed abode, Joel sleeps on his mother’s lap every night in an unsafe A&E reception. He is also expected to get up and concentrate in school I thank the Education Minister for being here today. I will not focus much on those young children’s experience in school, but I want to highlight the fact that, because a lot of their parents have no access to public funds, they cannot apply for free school meals and other things that would help their day in school.
Children Act 1989: Local Authority Responsibilities — House of Commons, 2019-03-19
Topic: Social Welfare
James Dolan Cunningham (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend is making an important contribution and is outlining the problem. Local authorities have obviously been underfunded in relation to childcare for a very long time, although the Government will not admit it; they keep telling us that they are putting more money in, but they are starting from a low base One thing that struck me in what my hon. Friend said—I have come across cases like this—is that kids, whatever their background, are expected to go to school, but they cannot concentrate on their education if they are worried about where they will live when they come home from school, whether they will get a square meal, whether their father and mother are together and whether there has been domestic violence. We can understand why kids sometimes become resentful in those circumstances. Does my hon. Friend agree?
Government Policies: Implications for Scottish Economy — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: Macroeconomics
Ian Murray (Labour, Centre-left): The Secretary of State and I had a conversation in the Tea Room on Monday, but given that he is not answering this question I will have to ask about something else. Brexit is obviously the biggest issue with regard to the impact on the Scottish economy, so can the Financial Secretary tell us how much the Scottish economy will shrink by if the Prime Minister’s deal is passed in this House?
Government Policies: Implications for Scottish Economy — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: International Affairs
Lesley Margaret Langan Laird (Labour, Centre-left): This question is specifically to the Secretary of State for Scotland. The Secretary of State for Scotland has three responsibilities: strengthening and sustaining the Union; acting as Scotland’s voice in Whitehall; and championing the UK Government in Scotland. Which one does he think he is doing best, and why?
Government Policies: Implications for Scottish Economy — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: Government Operations
Lesley Margaret Langan Laird (Labour, Centre-left): I have to express the Opposition’s disappointment that the Secretary of State for Scotland is repeatedly not standing up and being accountable. Once again, this question is directly to the Secretary of State for Scotland, because it is he who holds the office, not the right hon. Gentleman sitting next to him I am afraid that I have to tell the Secretary of State that I disagree with the previous response. His record is abysmal. He has failed on the stronger towns fund; failed on Brexit funding for Scotland’s businesses; failed to stand up for Scotland’s shipbuilding communities through his non-action on the fleet solid support ships contract; and failed to respect the devolution settlement. He has even failed to follow through on his own resignation threats. Secretary of State, how bad does it need to get for the people of Scotland under this Tory Government before you do the right thing and actually resign?
Leaving the EU: Public Services — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: Social Welfare
Questions: What discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union on the potential effect on public services in Scotland of the UK leaving the EU.
Paul John Sweeney (Labour, Centre-left): It is nice to get a chance to actually shadow the Secretary of State, instead of myriad other Departments that turn up from week to week, particularly as his own Government analysis shows that their plan for Brexit will result in a 4% drop in gross domestic product. If his party’s track record tells us anything, it will choose to impose austerity and poverty pay on public services and workers to make up for that decline. One of the worst consequences of austerity is rising food insecurity, resulting in food bank use rising faster in Scotland than across the rest of the UK. Given the pressure that the failed austerity agenda is putting on our public services, will the Secretary of State say how many food banks are currently operational in Scotland and does he predict that the number will go up or down under the current policies of this Government?
Engagements — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: Macroeconomics
Questions: North West Leicestershire voted overwhelmingly to leave the European Union and for the past two years the Prime Minister has told my constituents on over 100 occasions that we will be leaving on 29 March 2019 with or without a withdrawal agreement. At the last minute, she begs our EU masters for an extension to article 50, delaying our departure. Does my right hon. Friend realise that the good people of North West Leicestershire will forgive her for this? They are good people, but they are not stupid people, and they will never trust the Prime Minister again.
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (Labour, Centre-left): This chaotic and incompetent Government have driven our country into chaos. We know the scale of the crisis when the TUC and the CBI are united in writing to the Prime Minister saying: "A Plan B must be found—one that protects workers, the economy and an open Irish border" My question on Monday went unanswered, so will the Prime Minister now say what is her plan B?
Engagements — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: International Affairs
Questions: North West Leicestershire voted overwhelmingly to leave the European Union and for the past two years the Prime Minister has told my constituents on over 100 occasions that we will be leaving on 29 March 2019 with or without a withdrawal agreement. At the last minute, she begs our EU masters for an extension to article 50, delaying our departure. Does my right hon. Friend realise that the good people of North West Leicestershire will forgive her for this? They are good people, but they are not stupid people, and they will never trust the Prime Minister again.
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (Labour, Centre-left): The only problem with the Prime Minister’s answer is that her deal has been twice defeated in this House, in one case by the largest ever majority by which a Government have lost a vote in our recorded parliamentary history. Reports today suggest that a former Conservative Prime Minister is telling Conservative MPs that pursuing a customs union with the EU is the best way to get Brexit over the line. Does she agree with him, and will she be supporting any motions for a customs union this afternoon?
Engagements — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: Foreign Trade
Questions: North West Leicestershire voted overwhelmingly to leave the European Union and for the past two years the Prime Minister has told my constituents on over 100 occasions that we will be leaving on 29 March 2019 with or without a withdrawal agreement. At the last minute, she begs our EU masters for an extension to article 50, delaying our departure. Does my right hon. Friend realise that the good people of North West Leicestershire will forgive her for this? They are good people, but they are not stupid people, and they will never trust the Prime Minister again.
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (Labour, Centre-left): The Prime Minister knows perfectly well that our policy is for a customs union to protect jobs and society. She will also know that the TUC and the CBI have called for a customs union as part of a deal. In fact, the letter they wrote to all MPs yesterday said that "a deal that delivers a customs union and strong alignment with the UK and the EU rules is the preferred outcome for the business community" It is a bit strange when a Conservative Prime Minister says she does not want what the business community wants. These are indeed strange times. Can she say why she will not include a customs union in the options that will be discussed today?
Engagements — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: International Affairs
Questions: North West Leicestershire voted overwhelmingly to leave the European Union and for the past two years the Prime Minister has told my constituents on over 100 occasions that we will be leaving on 29 March 2019 with or without a withdrawal agreement. At the last minute, she begs our EU masters for an extension to article 50, delaying our departure. Does my right hon. Friend realise that the good people of North West Leicestershire will forgive her for this? They are good people, but they are not stupid people, and they will never trust the Prime Minister again.
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (Labour, Centre-left): In answer to a straight question to the Prime Minister, she was unable to guarantee what is called dynamic alignment with European standards. She knows full well that Labour’s proposals are to use EU standards as a baseline from which we would improve them, including giving workers full rights at work from day one of their employment, ending zero-hours contracts and many other things In the former Business Minister’s resignation letter, he also said to the Prime Minister that he hoped that she would "now act in the national interest and enable Parliament this week to find a consensus… negotiating position" If today or on Monday a consensus alternative plan emerges across the House, will the Prime Minister accept that decision of the House and accept it as the basis for the UK’s negotiating position with the EU henceforth?
Engagements — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: International Affairs
Questions: North West Leicestershire voted overwhelmingly to leave the European Union and for the past two years the Prime Minister has told my constituents on over 100 occasions that we will be leaving on 29 March 2019 with or without a withdrawal agreement. At the last minute, she begs our EU masters for an extension to article 50, delaying our departure. Does my right hon. Friend realise that the good people of North West Leicestershire will forgive her for this? They are good people, but they are not stupid people, and they will never trust the Prime Minister again.
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (Labour, Centre-left): That sounds awfully like a recipe for regression away from those standards and for damaging workers’ rights After the two largest defeats in parliamentary history, surely the Prime Minister should be listening to Parliament. She did not answer my question about whether an agreement reached in this House would become the Government’s negotiating position. I think that the House and, perhaps more importantly, the whole country deserves to know the answer to that question. This country is on hold while the Government are in complete paralysis. The vital issues facing our country, from the devastation of public services to homelessness and knife crime, have been neglected. The Prime Minister is failing to deliver Brexit because she cannot build a consensus and is unable to compromise and reunite the country. Instead, she is stoking further division and is unable to resolve the central issues facing Britain today. She is, frankly, unable to govern. The Prime Minister faces a clear choice—the one endorsed by the country and many in her party—which is either to listen and change course or to go. Which is it to be?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: Government Operations
Helen Mary Jones (Labour, Centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. The hon. Member for Erewash (Maggie Throup) made in Prime Minister’s questions some allegations about the petitions system. I point out that the petition to revoke article 50 had 96% of its signatures from the UK, and the Government Digital Service has in place both automated and manual systems to detect bots and other fraudulent activity. Can you do anything to ensure that, if Members wish to undermine the most successful parliamentary petitions system in the world, they do so on the basis of facts and find out those facts from the Committee before they raise it in this Chamber?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: Government Operations
Angela Eagle (Labour, Centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I ask this question to seek your guidance, because I think what I am going to refer to is a novel thing. It has become clear that the Government have been buying Facebook ads to send out—to all of our constituents, presumably—the Prime Minister’s views in putting herself on the side of the people and setting the people against MPs. Clearly, Facebook has not been available as a way to do this until recently, but we now have Government money being spent so that the Executive can actually say controversial and potentially dangerous things about the legislature. Can you give me any guidance on how we might pursue this, because it seems to me to be a very alarming new trend?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: Social Welfare
Marsha Chantol De Cordova (Labour, Centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Two weeks ago, the Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work, the hon. Member for Truro and Falmouth (Sarah Newton), resigned. To date, the Prime Minister has yet to appoint a new Minister to that post. The role has strategic importance and there is utter chaos in the Department for Work and Pensions—there are seven reviews into disabled people being wrongly denied social security, and the assessment framework for employment and support allowance and personal independence payment is in crisis. Those issues are important, and I seek your guidance on how I can go about holding the Government and the Department to account.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: Transportation
Alexander Cunningham (Labour, Centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. On 20 February at Prime Minister’s questions, I highlighted the decision by the Tees Valley Mayor to spend £90 million of taxpayers’ money on buying the loss-making Durham Tees Valley airport when local people in most parts of the area cannot get a bus home after 6.30 pm. I asked whether the Prime Minister could help them out. She answered by claiming that the bus service had been considerably expanded across the midlands and the north, but according to a letter from the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport, outlining the statistics, that is most certainly not the case. The Prime Minister may therefore have inadvertently misled the House. Is there anything you can do to encourage a Minister to come to the Dispatch Box to correct the record and acknowledge that the vast increase in bus services that the Prime Minister suggested simply has not materialised?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: Transportation
Daniel Stephen Zeichner (Labour, Centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. My hon. Friend the Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) made a point about the Prime Minister’s suggestion that there were 10,000 new bus routes in the midlands and the north. That was quite surprising to those of us who follow transport issues. I seek your guidance on how we could get on the record the actual figures from the Department for Transport. They are that 13,279 routes have been registered and 13,153 routes have been withdrawn, which means that there are actually only 126 new routes. I would grateful if you explained how that can be put on the record.
EU: Withdrawal and Future Relationship (Motions) — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: International Affairs
Stephen Nathan Kinnock (Labour, Centre-left): I thank the right hon. Member for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin) for his great work in making today’s proceedings possible. I rise to speak in support of motion (D) in my name and those of the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Nick Boles) and other hon. Members This really is five minutes to midnight—for this Parliament, for this Government and for our country—and we desperately need to find a way out of this mess. Our country has spent two years tied up in knots by the Prime Minister’s incompatible red lines, which offered such a narrow interpretation of the referendum result. A 52% to 48% vote was certainly not an instruction for a disastrous no deal or for a hard, Canada-style, job-destroying Brexit. It was an instruction to move house, but to stay in the same neighbourhood The European Free Trade Association/European economic area model offers just such a possibility. It respects the referendum result without wrecking the British economy. Not convinced? Well, it is worth remembering what Nigel Farage told a "Question Time" audience in 2016: "I hear people say ‘Wouldn’t it be terrible if we were like Norway and Switzerland?’ Really? They are rich, they’re happy and they’re self-governing countries." The right hon. Member for North Shropshire (Mr Paterson), a passionate Brexiteer, told us in 2015 that "only a madman would leave the market", and the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) has also been supportive of the single market in the past. The point I am making is that, in 2016, Euroscepticism meant something that it apparently no longer means today.
EU: Withdrawal and Future Relationship (Motions) — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: International Affairs
Keir Starmer (Labour, Centre-left): I welcome this debate. It is a historic day for this Parliament and for the power of MPs. In that spirit, I will keep my remarks very short, because this is a day for Back Benchers and for those putting forward their case for particular propositions. I believe there are some 47 Members who want to speak Labour’s approach today is that we will support amendments that are consistent with the two credible options we have set out on a number of occasions: a close economic partnership based on a customs union and close single market alignment; and a public vote to prevent no deal or a damaging Brexit. We will oppose those amendments that either offer no route forward or set out an approach that is inconsistent with our policy. In that spirit, I can confirm that we will be whipping tonight to support: amendment (K), in my name and in the name of the Leader of the Opposition; amendment (J), the customs union amendment tabled by the Father of the House, the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke); and amendment (M), in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby South (Margaret Beckett), which was tabled, of course, after much consultation and support from my hon. Friends the Members for Hove (Peter Kyle) and for Sedgefield (Phil Wilson). I will come on to amendment (D) in just one moment Let me start with motion (K), which mirrors the five pillars of the plan that we have set out on many occasions, both in this House and in the letter from the Leader of the Opposition to the Prime Minister in February.
EU: Withdrawal and Future Relationship (Motions) — House of Commons, 2019-03-27
Topic: International Affairs
Keir Starmer (Labour, Centre-left): I will just make some progress and then I will. Turning to motion (M), we will support this motion tonight, because at this stage it is now clear that any Brexit deal agreed in this Parliament needs further democratic approval. That is what this motion would do. It would put a lock around any deal that the Prime Minister forces through at the 11th hour or any revised deal that comes about at this very late stage. It would ensure that any Tory Brexit deal is subject to a referendum lock and it is consistent with commitments that the Leader of the Opposition and I have made from this Dispatch Box in recent weeks In relation to motion (D)—the common market and the Norway motion—I want to be clear that we have concerns about this proposal, and it has not been our preferred option. We have concerns about the lack of a commitment to a permanent and comprehensive customs union, although I listened carefully to the words that were just exchanged in the House. However, we recognise that this motion would deliver a close economic relationship with the EU and would help to protect jobs, rights and the economy. It is credible and it is deliverable, so we believe that this motion should remain an option and continue in the process. We will therefore be recommending that Labour Members vote for it tonight This is an extremely important and welcome debate. It is frankly two years overdue. This is the debate that the Prime Minister should have started two years ago at the beginning of the process, but we are where we are, and Parliament finally has the chance to shape the way out of the Prime Minister’s mess.