argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Laura Rose Farris (Conservative, Centre-right): One of the most damaging concessions made to the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee last week was that it was cheaper for P&O to dispense with its section 188 consultation obligations, and that it was more cost-effective for it to pay 800 protective awards and then move to agency worker rates of £5.50 an hour—below the national minimum wage. It is doing that by paying the British national minimum wage up to the limit of British territorial waters, and then moving to rates of below £2 an hour. I know how hard my hon. Friend is working on this issue, but we do not have such measures in the airline industry when people move between jurisdictions. Will he look carefully at the territorial limit of national minimum wage obligations?
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Mark Julian Francis Pawsey (Conservative, Centre-right): I congratulate the Minister on the robust approach that the Government have taken to this matter. Many small business owners and managers work long and hard to get personnel matters right, to do the right thing, and to comply with employment law. What signal will it send to them if P&O Ferries gets away with wilfully ignoring the law?
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman’s way of describing the Government’s approach—I do not think we could have been any more robust—but the overall thrust of his point, that workers should be protected, I agree with. We will come to the House and explain how we are going to do that as soon as we possibly can.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Paul John Holmes (Conservative, Centre-right): I welcome the Minister’s statement, but two of my neighbours and constituents, with a combined service period of 51 years, were laid off by email last week. They are understandably upset that they do not know whether money is coming into their households going forward. Can the Minister assure me that at the heart of the package of measures he will be introducing—I understand he cannot go into detail—are workers’ rights, so that in future no company like P&O will be able to take such actions?
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Richard John Holden (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the Secretary of State and the Department for the robust way they have taken on P&O over its disgraceful actions over the last few weeks. Can the Minister confirm a couple of things? First, will all contracts and relationships that P&O has with the Government be under review? Secondly, will he block the outcome that P&O is after, specifically trying to pay workers less than the minimum wage? Thirdly, does he agree with me that the CEO should either resign or be sacked immediately?
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Transportation
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): This country absolutely is a major seafaring nation and has taken the lead already; for example during the pandemic when we were the first country to declare seafarers as key workers and took the issue of their rights to the International Maritime Organization. I am very keen that we continue to take the lead. The right hon. Gentleman puts his finger on a number of really pertinent issues.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): Unfortunately, the hon. Lady is just wrong on a number of points. For example, in regulations from 2020 the national minimum wage was extended to the vast majority of seafarers working on the UK continental shelf, so she is just wrong about that. There is an issue here that we are seeking to address, and we are addressing it.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): The Government have reached the same conclusion as the hon. Gentleman about Mr Hebblethwaite, and that is why the Secretary of State has written to him in the terms that he has done today. It is a matter for a court, not the Government, to disqualify a person. That would be an unusual position for any Government to take, as I know the hon. Gentleman will understand. We are looking to see what else we can do to protect workers in this sphere, as I have explained, and I look forward to updating the House before the end of the week.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Transportation
Michael Louis David Fabricant (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank my hon. Friend for taking such a robust stance on this issue. May I invite him to make it absolutely clear that the despicable action of P&O Ferries is not connected in any way with P&O Cruises, because there is some concern about that? P&O Cruises is a completely separate company, owned by a separate organisation, and it is concerned that it may lose bookings as a consequence.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Transportation
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend is absolutely right that there is no connection whatsoever between P&O Ferries and P&O Cruises. They are wholly separate organisations, separately managed. No blame whatsoever for the actions of P&O Ferries attaches, or should be seen to attach, to P&O Cruises.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Government Operations
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): I entirely share the hon. Gentleman’s state of shock at the statement that Mr Hebblethwaite made in front of the Select Committee last week. The Secretary of State and I also share the view that Mr Hebblethwaite’s position is untenable. We have told him that he ought to go, and I urge him to take that on board very seriously.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): I take on board entirely the point that the hon. Gentleman makes. The most important thing we have to do now is to make sure that the rights of those workers, and others in a similar position, are protected. Government will be taking note of any lessons that we might have to draw in the wider sphere, but it would be precipitative of me to make any commitment about that.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): As the hon. Gentleman knows, this is not really a fire and rehire situation, but we are absolutely clear that the way that those workers have been treated is wrong. That is why I have said in no uncertain terms that we are bringing forward a package of measures and I will be able to update the House before the end of the week.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): This is a Government who are standing up for workers. We have been absolutely clear about our condemnation of the way that P&O workers have been treated in this case and we will be taking action, which I will explain in due course.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Labor
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): I agree with the hon. Member that the way that the workers have been treated is absolutely not on. We have been absolutely clear about that and we are keen not on words but on action.
P&O Ferries — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Transportation
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): I understand the hon. Lady’s concern. The thing that I hope will give her confidence is that we have the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, in which I have full confidence; it is an outstanding safety regulator. It inspects all those ships and if they are not safe to sail, they will not sail.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I was hoping for a plan, but none was forthcoming. The hon. Lady spoke about schools being closed. Labour, dancing to the tune of its union paymasters, wanted to keep them closed. If the hon. Lady thinks that that is a plan, perhaps she should go and visit one of those schools, as I did earlier today with the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms). If she had been with me at Monega school in Newham and observed the brilliant leadership of Liz Harris and her team, she would know that our reforms are working. There is a family of schools in a high-performing trust which is delivering for those children, 24% of whom are on pupil premium. Great leadership and great teachers are being supported by a fantastic teaching hub within the group that is part of that trust, delivering great outcomes for children rather than playing politics with our education system I seem to recall that it was the leader of the hon. Lady’s party who wanted schools to remain closed—and, of course, wanted to pause the whole vaccination campaign so that we would lose three months before we could vaccinate teachers. Because we did not do that, and because so many of the Leader of the Opposition’s Back Benchers went against him, we continued to vaccinate, we protected teachers, and we got schools open again The hon. Lady spoke about our standing in the world rankings. I can share with her the information that England achieved its highest ever scores in both reading and maths in two international comparison studies, the 2016 progress in international reading literacy study and the 2019 trends in international mathematics and science study. In 2019, following the introduction of the phonics screening check in 2012, the proportion of year 1 pupils meeting the expected standard rose from 58% to 82%, and the figure rose to 91% among those in year 2. That is a record of real delivery for young people of which the Government are proud. Of course we have had a pandemic since then, but the £5 billion invested in our recovery is making a real difference The hon. Lady questioned that recovery, and questioned what the national tutoring programme was achieving. We have just announced that the NTP has delivered 1 million 15-hour blocks of tutoring. It will meet its targets. School leaders told us that they wanted a school-led pillar—as well as the other two pillars which are also delivering—and we have provided that for them. Evidence that we published today, to which the hon. Lady referred, suggests that since the spring of 2021, primary school pupils have recovered about two thirds of the progress that was lost owing to the pandemic in reading, and about half in maths. That is real delivery.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Robert Henry Halfon (Conservative, Centre-right): I welcome the White Paper. I think that we are seeing the beginnings of a long-term plan for education, especially given tomorrow’s publication of the special needs review and the publication of the care review. The Government have begun to provide a washing line for all the clothes pegs of different educational initiatives. The parent pledge and the catch-up plan are also important The White Paper refers to a knowledge-rich curriculum. I am thoroughly in favour of that, but what about a skills-rich curriculum to sit alongside it? I see that the skills Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart), is paying close attention. Such a curriculum would prioritise skills including oracy and financial, technical and vocational education, reverse the huge decline in design and technology skills, and prepare students better for the world of work What does the White Paper do for children from care backgrounds, exclusion backgrounds and special needs backgrounds who underperform in GCSEs to such an extent in comparison with their peers? We know the grim statistics. How will this White Paper help them? How will the curriculum better prepare pupils for the world of work? Perhaps one of the most important priorities is the 124,000 Oliver Twist ghost children, who are possibly on our streets. What is he doing about those children who have not returned since schools reopened last year?
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the Chair of the Education Committee. He raises a number of really important questions. He is absolutely right to identify that the schools White Paper, with the SEND Green Paper—which we will consult on and publish tomorrow and share with the House—and the children’s social care review by Josh MacAlister, will for the first time give us the ability to knit together a system that delivers for all pupils, especially those with SEND and those that are most vulnerable in the care system. On financial education, the Schools Minister is looking at how we can take that further and embed it in the education system. My right hon. Friend will also know that I walk around the country wearing on my lapel a TL badge, which stands for technical level. T-levels are a fusion of A-levels and the great work we have done on apprenticeships, and that is what we will do to ensure that children have the runways that their career path can take off on. He is right to remind us of the 124,000 children who are out of education. That is why, for the first time in our country, we will have a register to ensure that we know exactly where those children are. There are many parents who deliver great home education, some of whom are in my own constituency, but many children are lost in the system and we have to make sure we know where they are.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Lady is right to say that there are many pressures on schools at the moment. The funding we secured at the spending review was £7 billion, with much of it—£4 billion—frontloaded to this year and next year. Energy costs are rising—they are 1.4% of the schools budget. A big part of the budget is obviously wages. We are keeping an eye on what is happening to energy costs in schools. On SEND, we have put in an additional £1 billion, so the total budget now stands at £9.1 billion, plus an additional £2.6 billion to ensure that we deliver the specialist provision that we need in the system, because there has been a lack of confidence among parents as to whether their child will get the right provision. Today’s White Paper supports mainstream schools to all be great SEND schools as well.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. We endowed the Education Endowment Foundation when the coalition Government came into office, and I have just announced a further endowment for the next 10 years. It has evidenced the qualifications and quality of teacher training that are required, whether in the early careers framework, initial teacher training or later in life in professional development, and we are following that evidence and scaling up half a million teacher training opportunities. That has never been attempted, certainly in my time in Parliament; it is a huge scale-up of teacher training and that is what we will deliver.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am slightly puzzled by the hon. Lady’s question. As I described, standards have consistently gone up because we have introduced things such as the phonics screening check. We are investing £7 billion in education, with £4 billion frontloaded for this year and next year, to make sure that schools have the funding they need. Andreas Schleicher of the OECD was in my office telling me that, actually, the United Kingdom is in the top quartile for investment in our school system. That is what this Government are doing, and this White Paper takes the evidence for what works and scales it for every child in this country. I want to see every child have the opportunity I had to achieve to the best of their talent.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): Ofsted’s 2019 framework has, in many ways, helped schools both to focus on literacy and numeracy and to have a knowledge-rich curriculum, from which this White Paper does not deviate. We are working in lockstep with our colleagues in Ofsted to make sure we deliver the highest-quality outcomes for children. If we focus on outcomes, we will not get it wrong.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I remind the hon. Lady that there are now 217,000 teaching assistants in classrooms, a 6,000 increase since 2010.[Official Report, 30 March 2022, Vol. 711, c. 5MC.] I speak to ASCL and the other unions to share evidence and to share our work on the White Paper, and they have been engaging with us. The Education Endowment Foundation, which provides evidence in other areas, has an excellent review of how best to use teaching assistants. Every school should look at that review.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend asks a number of questions, which I will try to unpack. We will say more on our work with the Department of Health and Social Care in the SEND Green Paper tomorrow. Suffice it to say that local evidence, the dashboard and that transparency will lead to much better outcomes for families and children. He is right about rural primaries; I have similar high-performing rural primaries in my constituency. My message to them is that they do an excellent job and, if they feel that they want to get together with other rural primaries, we will support them in setting up a multi-academy trust. Alternatively, where local authorities think they do a great job supporting their schools, they can set up trusts. With the White Paper, I am trying to ensure that we take everyone with us on this journey because, ultimately, if we all remember what we are in this for—to deliver better outcomes for every child at the right place and the right time for that child— we will do the right thing.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): This White Paper will define the role of each of those stakeholders that the hon. Gentleman just described in the system. With that clarity, and the support for good leaders in local government, good leaders of multi-academy trusts and—to push back slightly, with respect—the great leadership in Ofsted, we will deliver for those children that we all want, and I know he wants, to see delivered for.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Maria Frances Lewis Miller (Conservative, Centre-right): I welcome the White Paper and my right hon. Friend’s real focus on excellence in our schools, but we can only deliver world-class numeracy and literacy if schools are safe places to learn. The Government’s own inquiry last year pointed out that every school should assume that its students experience sexual harassment and online abuse at school, so will he include as central to his plans the culture in our schools and the roll-out of relationships and sex education?
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend is right to highlight that issue. I was in the Department when we rolled out relationships education and relationships and sex education in the curriculum, teaching young people what healthy relationships are like and how to identify unhealthy and abusive behaviour. That is a priority for me and it is in the White Paper under paragraph 80.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): That is exactly what this White Paper will do and it is why the issue of teaching is so important to our plan. I will certainly have a look at the children’s university the right hon. Lady mentions. Anyone who wants to join us on this journey is most welcome, and we want everyone to come along because, if we deliver for every child, we will have done something great for the future of our country.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Jonathan Edward Gullis (Conservative, Centre-right): I warmly congratulate my right hon. Friend on his White Paper and thank him for the fact that Stoke-on-Trent is now an education investment area priority, which comes with additional investment for our local area. I also thank him for the fact that the levelling-up premium to recruit and retain some of the best teachers across the country has been adopted from the Onward and New Schools Network report that I did on levelling up education. Most importantly, we want some of the best multi-academy trusts, which for too long have been clustered in the south, to come up to Stoke-on-Trent. How does this White Paper enable that to happen?
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend has always been a great champion for his schools and speaks with real experience as an accomplished teacher in his own right. He is right that we need our best, highest-performing multi-academy trusts to lift their ambitions. This White Paper will deliver that, including additional funding of £80 million to get that momentum going again. We are about to announce our 10,000th academy and we have 22,000 schools in England. I am ambitious for every part of the country, and we will deliver that ambition in Stoke-on-Trent as well as in other parts of the country.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): That is exactly what we have done. I hope that we can demonstrate in today’s work, but also in tomorrow’s Green Paper, the knitting together of how we deliver support to parents of children with special educational needs in our mainstream education system, because every mainstream school should be a great SEND school. There is also the work we are doing on alternative provision. We will set out more details tomorrow.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am slightly surprised by the hon. Lady’s question, because I briefed her personally on the details of the White Paper. Nevertheless, if she reads the White Paper, she will see that we are ambitious for a knowledge-rich curriculum but have also made it very clear that we will have a strategy for everything from sport to music to culture, because the evidence is that everything from extra-curricular activities to pastoral care and behaviour makes the real difference in providing the high-performing school standards that I want to see in every part of the country.
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nicholas Anthony Fletcher (Conservative, Centre-right): This is great news for the young people of our country. Specifically, it is good news for the people of Doncaster, as Doncaster is now a priority education investment area. That will give my young constituents the boost they need to level up their opportunities. My only concern is that while I welcome the half a million teacher training opportunities, will this not result in more teacher training days and therefore more days out of school for our young learners?
Schools White Paper — House of Commons, 2022-03-28
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): We are making sure that, especially in education investment areas, teachers in subjects like maths and physics have an incentive, with £3,000 tax-free. Many of them will want to go to those areas if they feel they have the support in place. That is why we want a strong family of schools working together in high-performing multi-academy trusts to offer the support that we saw so visibly during the pandemic.