argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2018-03-05
Topic: International Affairs
Peter Goldsmith (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I look forward to the answers that the Minister will give to the questions asked by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick. I have Amendment 44 which deals with the timing of the Francovich claim. I can be brief. My noble friend Lord Davies of Stamford set out very well what we are talking about. The noble Lord, Lord Carlile, indicated the problems to which the Government’s approach gives rise. One can look at it this way: at the moment the Bill appears to say that if the Government were to commit an act that was unlawful—a breach of Union law, for example—before exit day, the Francovich claim could not be brought, except in circumstances where the claim had been brought before exit day. I do not see the justification for that. That amounts to whitewashing an unlawful act and, as has been said—and it seems to me to be absolutely right—it is quite inconsistent with the promise that has been made that we will have the same rights the day after exit day as the day before I look forward to the answers to those questions. Even if any change does not go as far as my noble friend Lord Davies of Stamford, said, it must at least apply, as the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, put it, to accrued rights, so that any act which is committed before exit day which gives rise to a Francovich claim should continue to do so.
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2018-03-05
Topic: Law and Crime
John Davies (Labour, Centre-left): The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, dealt with that point. In practice, damages are not usually available under judicial review. The general view of the public is that there is a very small chance of getting damages that way. That is the difference between that and Francovich, and it is very important.
National Security Situation — House of Lords, 2018-04-19
Topic: International Affairs
Alan William John West (Labour, Centre-left): Does the Minister believe that there is any possibility whatever of getting a diplomatic solution if we try to ignore Assad, who is a fact of life on the ground? Looking back over the years, Prime Ministers and Foreign Secretaries of this country have had to shake hands with some pretty loathsome people because that is realpolitik—what the world is like—much as we do not like them. But if you do not do it, things can become worse.
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2018-01-30
Topic: International Affairs
Andrew Adonis (Labour, Centre-left): At end to insert "but that this House regrets that the bill makes no provision for the opinion of the people to be secured on the terms on which Her Majesty’s Government proposes that the United Kingdom withdraw from the European Union."
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2018-01-30
Topic: Labor
William Manuel Morris (Labour, Centre-left): I accept the noble Lord’s comments and will wind up In view of the points already made, British workers will not return to the status of poor relations. They will defend the working time directive, the drivers’ hours regulation and the social charter. As with all major challenges, there is no turning back. As a nation, we have made our bed, and there we must lie.
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2018-01-30
Topic: International Affairs
Eric Hoyle (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, as my noble friend Lord Morris of Handsworth said, this debate is not about whether we leave. That decision has already been taken. It is a decision of which I personally approve, but it is right that there is a discussion and that questions are asked as to where we go from here. I am also very pleased—the media has got it wrong—that there has been no suggestion from any noble Lord that the House could overturn a democratic decision of the British people There are two sides to this. We very often concentrate, as I have said in previous speeches, on the jobs that are created in this country by Europe. I want to look also at the benefits that we afford Europe, because those are quite substantial. Europe has a £40 billion to £80 billion trade surplus with us, so we are a very important market. Indeed, Germany alone has a trade surplus of £25 billion to £26 billion, and a fifth of German car exports come to this country. The point is that it is in Europe’s interests as well as ours to reach an agreement on these matters. If we look at it from that point of view we will see that we are just as important to Europe as it is to us, and that is the basis on which to conduct negotiations I also want to emphasise that workers’ rights need to be enshrined or looked at again. It is very important, as has been mentioned several times, that they are safeguarded. The other thing I want to discuss is the position of Gibraltar. It is only due to the intervention of Europe that Gibraltar’s frontiers are kept open, and consequently it is extremely concerned about what may happen. I hope that the Minister can reassure us that Gibraltar’s position is being looked at and discussed. The Chief Minister of Gibraltar expressed concern the other day in relation to this matter and it is very important that we take Gibraltar along with us I have been very impressed with the nature of the debate. Everyone who has spoken has tried to be constructive in stating their position. This is one of the most important decisions this country has to make. Going forward, I want us to have a debate with Europe on equal terms where we get together and make progress. I see no reason why we cannot do that. A lot of good could come from going forward in a harmonious fashion rather than being at loggerheads with each other—there is no need for that I have really enjoyed listening to what noble Lords have had to say today. This has been a very important debate and I think that, having listened to all the points of view, we will all go away looking at the matter in a different way. I look forward to moving on to the next stage.
Iran Nuclear Deal — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: International Affairs
Raymond Collins (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating that Statement. Of course, as every independent inspection has confirmed, the nuclear deal is working; Iran is complying in full, so to suggest otherwise is simply false. On the back of the success of this deal we also have a platform to make real progress on the issues the Minister referred to: in particular Iran’s ballistic missile programme, its regional activities and its human rights record. In the other place Boris Johnson said that the US has decided that there is another way forward. I welcome the Minister’s commitment to get from the US exactly what that way forward is and what it means for international peace and security. The Minister also referred to the fact that there are signatories to this international agreement. One of the sad things about this is that the opinions of those in Iran who shout, "Never trust the West" will be reinforced by this decision Alistair Burt said on the "Today" programme that the UK strategy was to de-escalate and hold to the agreement, as the Minister said. However, that requires Britain, the EU, China and Russia to act in concert. Can the Minister tell us exactly how we will work in concert with them to urge Iran not to respond in kind to this confrontational act, but to work with all the signatories to the international agreement? Not least, how will we work with partners in the agreement to ensure that firms trading with Iran do not face financial penalties? We need to ensure that this agreement holds; we can only do that by working collaboratively with every signatory. I hope the Minister will be able to tell us just what the Foreign Secretary is doing to work with our EU allies, Russia and China.
Iran Nuclear Deal — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: International Affairs
Alan William John West (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, we stand on the brink of a disaster in the region. There is no doubt that, prior to the JCPOA, Israel was within days of carrying out an attack on what it thought were all the nuclear facilities in Iran. It is highly likely that if this falls apart, which it could, Iran will start work on a nuclear weapon again. What happens then? I am sure Israel will not allow that, and will attack—and if it attacks, people will assume that America is part of it and that we are part of it, and goodness knows what will happen in the entire region. Have we thought through what could happen, and what actions we need to think about taking? Inevitably, in a military sense, we will be pulled into this if that happens.
Iran Nuclear Deal — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: International Affairs
John Davies (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, there are a number of deeply disturbing and worrying aspects to this matter. The most powerful country in the world has broken an international agreement, and that is deeply destabilising for everyone. The cause of moderation in Iran and the position of Rouhani personally may have been undermined, which would not be in the interests of stability either. Particularly seriously, there is now a major rift between the United States and its European allies. The Government have taken exactly the right line on this, though the decision to send Boris Johnson to Washington, a man who is generally regarded as a slightly ludicrous figure—his previous intervention in Iran was certainly disastrous—was a tactical mistake. Can the Minister tell the House how it is going to be possible to prevent British or other European companies from being, in practice, so intimidated by the threat of fines from the United States Treasury as to de facto observing the US embargo whatever the British Government’s wishes on the matter might be?
Iran Nuclear Deal — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: International Affairs
Desmond Browne (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement. I commend the Government for standing four-square behind the JCPOA and I associate myself with the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Hannay. But with all due respect, businesses that are conducting perfectly legal business with Iran need more than advice. The Foreign Secretary said today in the other place: "We will do our utmost to protect UK commercial interests" On 24 April, in the context of a Private Notice Question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Pittenweem, I asked a very specific question about this issue, asking what the Government intended to do in the light of developments at the Foreign Ministers’ meeting in the EU to bolster and support our businesses, which were already concerned about the reimposition of US sanctions and secondary sanctions. I was not given an answer, but I was given an assurance that I would be written to. I await that letter; I am content about that. But surely the time has now come for us to tell businesses more than that they should take some legal advice and await further advice. We need to give them some specific indication of the extent to which the Government are willing to go to protect their interests from the devastating effect of these potential sanctions.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Transportation
Denis Tunnicliffe (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I shall speak to my Amendment 33 and comment briefly on the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson. The debate today will cover several areas, but one of them will be safety and I shall speak more about that later. My amendment covers safety, and lights particularly upon hacking. This is not a controversial Bill as I see it: virtually all the amendments are probing amendments and I hate to say it to the Minister but I think the speaking part on this occasion will be principally hers rather than mine Clause 7 sets out the terms for when a car is deemed to be driving itself, or in automated mode. However, it makes no mention of what happens if the vehicle is designed or manufactured faultily, or if it is hacked due to a failure by the manufacturer to install adequate software safeguards. While we all welcome the opportunities that this new technology will bring, we also have to recognise that it will bring new risks. A lot of these risks will be around the software used and therefore may be harder to pick up than in a conventional vehicle. This is a good opportunity to put in safeguards to give protection around this area now, rather than later down the line The amendment tightens up this area of the Bill by setting out when an automated vehicle is capable of driving itself safely. This would give the driver protection with regard to liability if it was proven that there was a manufacturer’s fault or the vehicle had been hacked. The purpose of the amendment is to get a general debate started in relation to this area, particularly on the hacking element.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Technology
Julian Charles Roland Hunt (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I was on the Science and Technology Committee and we discussed automated vehicles. After our session, I met some industrialists—people making and selling cars—in the context of automated vehicles. One of the things it was suggested that the Secretary of State might consider—it would come under Clause 1, referred to earlier—is that people purchasing vehicles, particularly those that are partially or wholly automatic, should understand the properties of the vehicle. There were some examples this year or last year when someone had a blackout and the vehicle took over control and moved them. So it seems that already some of these level 3 properties are not well understood by the people buying the cars. For some people, as I understand it, once you have paid by credit card or hire purchase the car arrives at your front door and off you drive. Even Tesla makes you have 95 minutes of training before you buy and use one of its cars. This is an area covered by subsection (1)(b) that the Secretary of State should be considering very strongly.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Transportation
Anthony Gueterbock (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I support the first amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson. It is important that we keep the scope of the Bill as wide as possible. The noble Lord, Lord Borwick, mentioned manufacturing in China. I suspect that by the time many of these cars and technologies have come on to the market, a very large proportion of the equipment will come from China anyway. There has to be some world standard—I am not sure which; we will come to that later—otherwise we will be in dead trouble. I also share the noble Lord’s concern about Amendment 2 I was interested in the comments from the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, about turning railways into roads. We heard this before, about 30 years ago.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Transportation
Anthony Gueterbock (Labour, Centre-left): I am grateful for the noble Lord’s explanation. It depends on whether the road is as defined in Clause 1(1)(a), "roads or in other public places", on whether or not it will be a railway I want to point out that autonomous railways are happening at the moment. The centre section of the Thameslink railway is effectively driverless. It does not go very far—from Kings Cross St Pancras to Blackfriars—but it does not need a driver. Of course, a driver is there, but that is the state of technology on the mainline railways, and the underground railways and metros have done it for a long time. Whether the same number of passengers could be taken by these autonomous pods up a railway, road or whatever, compared with a 12-car train every two minutes with people standing is a debate we can have. But I am not sure that I would support widening this Bill to get that far I have also been studying a few issues related to the content of the Bill, and recently met the author Christian Wolmar who has written a book, Driverless Cars: On A Road To Nowhere. I recommend that the Minister and other speakers to read it; I am not going to give it away today. Without necessarily supporting what he says, there are issues relating to the human reaction to automation that are quite useful to study, including how close a vehicle can get to the one in front, and all the things we spoke about on Second Reading, which I shall not repeat today. It may take rather longer than some noble Lords think for all this to come about. We are certainly right to debate it now and to concentrate on common standards I certainly support my noble friend Lord Tunnicliffe. I think he was speaking to Amendment 8, which I did not know was in this group, but he made a good speech and I certainly support it.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Foreign Trade
Anthony Gueterbock (Labour, Centre-left): Could the noble Baroness explain what she means by "manufactured in Great Britain"? She is aware of all the Brexit debates about certificates of origin, and that bits and pieces and components go right across the world and back again. What exactly do we mean by "manufactured in Great Britain"? Is it just the name on the front?
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Transportation
Julian Charles Roland Hunt (Labour, Centre-left): You are still not explaining how people will understand and be informed of this. Is there no regulation for that? As I understand it, even manufacturers are conscious of this being uncontrolled. When you buy such a car, you do not know what kind of information you will have and how you are going to be taught about it. As I mentioned, British cars are being provided with little information, unlike the Tesla car. Even for that complicated car they apparently need an hour and a half or whatever it is for training. Is anything being done about that?
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Transportation
Denis Tunnicliffe (Labour, Centre-left): The Minister made a very important statement at the beginning, so I want to make sure that I heard it correctly. I think that she said that the responsibility of the Secretary of State would be to list the vehicles that could safely be driven automatically or would safely drive themselves automatically on the roads. Does that mean that the Secretary of State will effectively be certificating these vehicles as being safe?
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Transportation
Denis Tunnicliffe (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 29 in my name. I accept the noble Baroness’s congratulations on behalf of my staff—which is one quarter of a very able lady—who managed to get this past the Public Bill Office. The proposed new clause would protect insurers against accidents caused by vehicles repaired by unauthorised technicians. It would also require the Government to establish a scheme for the authorised inspection, repair and maintenance of automated vehicles by licensed and accredited technicians The automotive industry already relies on hundreds of thousands of individuals who support work on and maintain vehicles. As the technology develops, so too must the skills of those working on them. We are already aware of an existing skills gap in the industry. As the technology develops, that gap may well worsen but, as it stands, the Bill does not address a worsening skills gap. If we do not start planning for this now, we will be left with a huge hole in the support structures for these new vehicles I am of the generation where I was privileged at the age of 17 to buy a car for seven pounds and 10 shillings. The car was seven years older than me. It tended to go only about 10 miles before having to have its plugs cleaned and so on—which made courting my wife a bit difficult at times. But we were of a generation when the skill of looking after automotive technology was very straightforward, and widely understood by a large section of the population. Now I drive a Prius, and I would not dare touch anything on it. Not only is it unduly complex, but it could be very dangerous, with the very high voltages involved and so on. There is nothing I could do to that car that would do anything other than worsen its performance.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Transportation
Anthony Gueterbock (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I support Amendment 29 in the name of my noble friend Lord Tunnicliffe. He is right about the need for such an authorised inspection regime, and in his worry about unauthorised repairs. The Committee may or may not be aware that a lot of trucks, and probably many modern trains and other big pieces of plant and equipment, are already remotely monitored. Where I live in Cornwall, outside the front door of the house is a 200-tonne gantry crane that operates on rubber tyres. It was manufactured in Italy and erected in Cornwall, and if the driver does the wrong thing, or the wrong person drives it, the people in Italy know exactly what is happening and they will stop it: they will prevent it from operating. If it tries to lift 300 tonnes when it is capable of lifting only 250 tonnes it will be stopped, so that the equipment does not get severely damaged. That is very common, so my noble friend’s amendment is absolutely right. I hope that the Minister will see the need for some kind of scheme to cover at least the specialist equipment that will be in the vehicles I worry about Amendment 3 and the suggestion by the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, about the word "adapted". She said that adapting a vehicle would probably be done in a back yard somewhere, by somebody who probably would not know what they were doing, and could therefore be dangerous. That is certainly a worry. But the word "adapted" would also cover current vehicles adapted for people with certain disabilities—for example, if someone cannot use a brake pedal so there has to be a brake behind the steering wheel. I know we are talking about a different technology, but the word "adapted" will be difficult. I suggest to the noble Baroness that, if Amendment 29 were accepted, all vehicles, whether specialist, adapted or not, would have to be covered by the authorised "inspection, repair or maintenance", so it would be better to go down that route rather than inserting the word "adapted", as she suggests in Amendment 3.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Transportation
John Alston Maxton (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I too have some difficulty with this because I drive, I must confess, a Skoda. I am told that a brand new Skoda is built to my specifications when I order it, not before. It is not produced on a line but only when I order it and, therefore, each adaptation is my instruction to the manufacturer. Whether or not that is an adaptation I do not know, but we have to bear it in mind when considering this amendment.
Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Agriculture
John Alston Maxton (Labour, Centre-left): The noble Lord will remember that, when we were considering this issue in the Science and Technology Committee, it was suggested that one of the first uses of a fully automated vehicle would be in agriculture, with it going up and down a field. A story was told of a van suddenly appearing at the back of a field and the farmer going up to two men and asking, "What are you doing here?". They said, "We are from Germany, and we are here because the big end on your combine harvester is about to go".