argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Health Protection (Coronavirus, Wearing of Face Coverings) (England) Regulations 2021 — House of Lords, 2021-12-01
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the noble Baroness for raising the point, but it depends on how it is reported. The real issue here is that a number of different experts are advising. Of course, you can pick and choose which expert you decide to listen to. A few weeks ago, noble Lords were picking up on comments made by the NHS Confederation. That is not a scientific body, but noble Lords claimed that it showed that we need to lock down. It is very easy to pick and choose your experts, but we continue to listen to a wide range of experts One of the great things about science that we should remember is that there is no such thing as "the science says". Science should remain contestable. Can you imagine if science was not contestable? We would still be saying, "You can’t challenge the notion that the solar system revolves around the earth." Scientists challenged that, and that is how we advance knowledge. It is really important that we continue to contest. Scepticism is one of the most important factors in science to make sure we make progress. We will listen to a range of experts I ask those noble Lords who really want to lock down more, and who say that we not only have not done enough but should do more and lock people down, to look at the impact that has on people’s mental health and on our economy. I ask them to think about the wider impact and to remember that we are not in the same place we were a year ago. We have been absolutely clear that vaccines work and that the best thing we can do to get through this is to get vaccinated. It is not too late to get your first or second vaccine. I am grateful to noble Lords who have asked questions—
Government Policy on Russia — House of Commons, 2018-03-06
Topic: Defense
Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): First of all, my thoughts go to Mr Skripal and his daughter, who we hope will recover. Does this not demonstrate the different types of threat that we face? The threats are not always obvious or traceable. This is not a classic article 5 scenario, but this type of scenario is not unknown to our allies in the Baltic states. Does this not cut to the heart of the modernising defence programme in terms of how we protect human assets like Mr Skripal in this country? Can the Foreign Secretary tell us whether this type of scenario will lead to a review of how we best protect these people across the United Kingdom?
NHS Winter Crisis — House of Commons, 2018-02-05
Topic: Health
David Melvyn Linden (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Scottish National party Members want, first and foremost, to put on record our thanks to NHS staff. A number of members of my family work for the NHS. I spent time with them at the weekend, and we got that time because they were working over the Christmas period. We know that Christmas and the winter period has been profoundly challenging due to flu, but it is important that resources follow that. That is why we have record funding support for the NHS in Scotland and NHS Scotland A&E departments are the best performing in the UK Last week, the Scottish Parliament voted to abolish the public sector pay cap and to look at bringing in a 3% pay increase for our public sector workers. That is action, rather than warm words. Far too often we hear warm words from this Government, but in the national health service we need to see action, particularly on the public sector pay cap. What steps is the Minister taking to tackle wage stagnation within the national health service?
National Security and Russia — House of Commons, 2018-03-26
Topic: Defense
Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I am very grateful to the Prime Minister for giving way. She will know that the 2015 strategic defence and security review states that state-on-state threats have dramatically reduced, but given what she has just said and what we all know, can she tell us whether the modernising defence programme will seek to update the part that underpins the SDSR?
Covid-19 Update — House of Lords, 2021-11-10
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank my noble friend for the question. As noble Lords will know, I see myself as a bit of a civil libertarian. Personally, I have asked a number of questions internally about the whole issue of compulsion. It is a very difficult issue, but I understand the arguments on the other side—that we want patients to feel safe and feel that they are looked after by staff who have been vaccinated. Stakeholder analysis and round-tables came out in favour of compulsion on the Covid vaccine and boosters. When it came to flu, interestingly enough, there was a significant disagreement on the practical timing of the flu vaccine supply and the vast majority of doses being available. We have promised to keep it under review, but that is not mandated at this stage.
Covid-19 Update — House of Lords, 2021-11-10
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): In many cases, that decision will be left to the individual trust or care home. We know that a number of care homes and different trusts are already concerned about unvaccinated visitors. Many will know already that during the previous lockdowns it was very difficult to visit your loved ones in hospital. I was not able to see my father between January last year and when he died last September. It was incredibly challenging, but we understood the reasons given by the care homes.
Covid-19 Update — House of Lords, 2021-11-10
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): I am afraid that I was not there, so I do not know what advice he had been given at that moment by that particular trust. Noble Lords can do trial by TV as much as they like, but while you go in with a mask on by default, when you are there with workers from the NHS who are often giving advice, they may say at times, "In this part, it’s fine. You do not need to do that." That may well have been the case, but I am afraid that I do not know the details.
Ministry of Defence — House of Commons, 2018-02-26
Topic: Defense
Stephen Patrick Gethins (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): My hon. Friend makes a good point. Other hon. Members have raised the point—I think it is worth repeating, and I know that Ministers will hear it with some sympathy—that when it comes to defence spending, the housing that is provided for service personnel and particularly for their families is of critical importance. A number of my constituents have approached me about the housing conditions in Leuchars, and I hope that my hon. Friend will urge the Minister to look into this to ensure that military bases are as family-friendly as possible.
Ministry of Defence — House of Commons, 2018-02-26
Topic: Defense
Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I am quite confident that the Minister has heard my hon. Friend’s point, and that he will do just that. I shall go on to talk about the equipment plan report, but I think another National Audit Office report came out the day before that one, which covered the Annington deal on military housing. Admittedly, that does not affect Scotland, but the report states that if that deal had not been signed by the Conservative Government in, I think, 1996, the taxpayer could have saved some £4 billion. We could undoubtedly have had better military housing as a result I want to offer an alternative to the financing model, to which I have alluded in the past. The model that is used in Sweden and Denmark involves longer projections for funding and reaching defence agreements that last more than just 12 months. The Danish model, which admittedly is imperfect, has a defence agreement that involves all the political parties. The heat of the politics is taken out of the agreement, allowing the Government to sign up to a funding model lasting somewhere between five and six years, so that even when there is a change of Government, the model can still be adhered to. Obviously, there are caveats, such as that if the Parliament chooses to diverge from the plan, it ultimately has the power to do so, but it means that the Government are not constantly chasing their tail. I would encourage hon. Members who regularly attend these debates to consider that model, which we are certainly keen to see the Government explore.
Ministry of Defence — House of Commons, 2018-02-26
Topic: Defense
Angus Brendan MacNeil (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): My hon. Friend makes a prescient point. At the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy today, the experts were recommending the Danish model as something that the UK should follow, and I am sure that the Ministers are listening to that point.
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Lords, 2018-04-23
Topic: Defense
Frank Ashcroft Judd (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I thank our noble friends on the Liberal Benches for having put this amendment forward. It seems self-evident in its logic. Indeed, not to respond to what it calls for would be to forgo the responsibility of government to put the defence and well-being of our people in Britain first and foremost. I have had posts in defence and in the Foreign Office and it seems inconceivable that in any significant conflict in which we would be involved we would not want to work with our allies and friends. It is much better to prepare for that and to have the arrangements in place to make sure that we make the best of it. This is not just a matter of fixing something when a crisis arises; it is a matter of having a culture of co-operation in which people feel they have a shared responsibility, that they want to develop that responsibility together, they understand each other and their training and organisation are geared to co-operation with others. From that standpoint, this is a wise amendment and I hope the Minister will respond positively.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-10
Topic: Health
Douglas Hogg (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I will make a very brief point in support of what has just been said by the noble Baroness and the noble and learned Baroness. There are a number of professions where you have to establish that you are a fit and proper person. I act as a legal assessor to the Nursing and Midwifery Council, and I am aware of the registration process: you have to assert that you are a fit and proper person. I can see that a caution of the kind that we have been discussing might stand in the way of a registration being effective, and that would be a great tragedy.
Ministry of Defence — House of Commons, 2018-02-26
Topic: Defense
Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I rather suspect that I cannot get the Government not to go ahead with its modernising defence programme. My preference would be for a proper SDSR, rather than this mini review, but we are where we are. Despite the supposed lifting of the fiscally neutral element, I fear that we are heading in the same direction. The hon. Gentleman will remember the statement: three of the four announcements were cuts. Let us not dress that up in any other language; they were cuts. I fully expect that to happen again when the announcement comes later in the year Setting aside our views on whether we should have the nuclear deterrent, the other alarming aspect of the NAO report is its rising cost. All of a sudden, it has gone up by £1 billion—overnight, it seems. It has gone up by so much that the MOD’s director general nuclear is having to review the costings, so I would welcome some information on when that review will happen, when an announcement will be made and when Parliament can expect to get the information I want to end on a note of consensus, so my final point is that the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Andrew Bowie) made the very good point, with which I can find no reason to disagree, about making it easier for people from the British overseas territories to join up, instead of making them wait five years, which would be eminently sensible given the existing recruitment problems. Those problems have been well documented in the House, not least by the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) —I have just learned that I have been mispronouncing his constituency the entire time, but he is such a gent that he has not even told me This has been an important and informed debate, as it always is, and the House is better informed as a result. We look forward to the results of the mini defence review and to engaging with it. As the Secretary of State knows, the Scottish National party hopes that there will be a particular focus on the activity, or lack of it, in the high north. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say in his winding-up speech.
Routes into Nursing — House of Commons, 2018-02-06
Topic: Health
Martyn Day (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Unlike in Scotland, where student nurses receive free tuition and a nursing bursary of over £6,500 a year, nurses in England now face debts of £50,000 on graduation. Owing to that, training applications in England have dropped by a third since 2015, and the new nursing apprenticeship attracted only 30 trainees against a target of 1,000. Will the Secretary of State not accept that he got it wrong, and reinstate the nursing bursary?
Routes into Nursing — House of Commons, 2018-02-06
Topic: Health
Martyn Day (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The Secretary of State has claimed that the removal of the bursary would fund 10,000 extra training places, but the first 5,000 will start only this autumn and the nurses will qualify only in 2021. With more than 36,000 nursing vacancies in England, more nurses leaving than joining and a 90% drop in EU nurses coming to the UK because of Brexit, exactly who does he expect to care for patients in the meantime?
Children’s Health — House of Commons, 2018-02-06
Topic: Health
Gavin Andrew Stuart Newlands (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health recently praised NHS Scotland’s innovations to improve children’s health. The Scottish initiative Childsmile, which is now 10 years old, has greatly improved children’s dental health, reducing fillings by 24% and cutting annual dental treatment by £5 million. It is good that the UK Government have finally set up trial sites, but with multiple dental extractions under general anaesthetic up by 11%, why is this initiative not being rolled out to all children in England?
Maternity Transformation Programme — House of Commons, 2018-02-06
Topic: Health
Alison Emily Thewliss (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I am glad to hear that progress is being made. The World Breastfeeding Trends Initiative’s 2016 report highlighted several gaps in access to breastfeeding support, including deficiencies in clinical training and a lack of integration between the NHS and voluntary sector services. What can be done through the maternity transformation programme to ensure that women can access, and health professionals can provide, the best-quality infant feeding advice right across the country?
Smoking Cessation: Prescription of E-cigarettes — House of Lords, 2021-11-02
Topic: Health
Patrick Cormack (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I understand from my noble friend Lord Patel that some of the devices and products to which he referred do not bear health warnings on their packaging. Why is that so? Surely that at least should be on all of them.
Smoking Cessation: Prescription of E-cigarettes — House of Lords, 2021-11-02
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): The noble Baroness raises an important point about nicotine itself being a very addictive substance. I am sure that the MHRA will be looking at the guidance, but if the noble Baroness would like to write to me, I can confirm that.
International Business Community — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Defense
Questions: What steps he is taking to ensure the Government engage with the international business community during negotiations for the UK to leave the EU.
Martin John Docherty-Hughes (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I was astonished to read in yesterday’s National Audit Office report on the equipment plan that the Ministry of Defence’s inability to hedge effectively against sterling fluctuations could cost up to £5 billion. Will the Minister advise us what DExEU is doing to support other Departments that are struggling with Brexit as they engage with the international community?
Hospital Car Parking Charges — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Health
Lisa Cameron (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): It is an honour to speak in this debate, and indeed in any debate in which the NHS is at the heart of what is being discussed. I particularly thank the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) for bringing the debate to the House. As has been discussed, the matter is extremely important to patients, charities, emergency workers, volunteers, carers and NHS staff, so it is a credit to him that he secured this debate. He set out his case most eloquently and comprehensively The SNP Scottish Government scrapped hospital car parking charges approximately 10 years ago in all car parks that are owned by the NHS. I urge the UK Government to follow both this principle and policy As an NHS employee for more than 20 years, I must declare an interest. I was part of the campaign, all those many years ago, as a Unite rep, to scrap NHS parking charges. I was so pleased when we succeeded, because that has made a great difference to many people, and has saved some of the most vulnerable who are already facing so many financial difficulties from spending money on parking.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-04-17
Topic: Defense
Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I brought this to your attention this morning so that I can raise an important matter. It has been brought to my attention by several sources that the Government have been selectively offering intelligence and security briefings by the Prime Minister’s National Security Adviser on the current situation in Syria and the UK’s military response to it. The briefings appear to have been offered to members of the Labour Opposition not on the basis of Privy Counsellor status, but on the basis of those who are sympathetic to the Government’s position. That leads to concerns that the Government are using intelligence briefings to manipulate Parliament and to bolster support on the Opposition Benches for their behaviour based not on security terms, but on politics. Is it right that the Government should treat members of the Opposition in that way? What mechanisms are open to get to the bottom of the matter?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-04-17
Topic: Defense
Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. I would not dream of trying to invest you with powers that you do not have or do not wish to have. My point is that you preside over a Parliament that the Government have done everything to sideline since last week, and it has now been brought to my attention that they are using intelligence and security briefings here to manipulate Opposition Members—not to inform those Members but to potentially bolster their own case I understand your point, Mr Speaker. Of course the Government can share briefings on Privy Council terms with non-Privy Counsellors, but surely the deeply cynical fashion of only doing so if one agrees with the Government cannot go unchallenged.
Military Action Overseas: Parliamentary Approval — House of Commons, 2018-04-17
Topic: Defense
Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I am extremely grateful to the Prime Minister for giving way at this stage in her speech. She may know that I raised a point of order with Mr Speaker prior to this debate to ask whether the National Security Adviser has given intelligence briefings to Members of the Labour Opposition who are not Privy Counsellors, but who were selected on the basis that they were sympathetic to the Government’s airstrike policy. Will the Prime Minister confirm whether that is the case?
Military Action Overseas: Parliamentary Approval — House of Commons, 2018-04-17
Topic: Defense
Ian Blackford (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I have to say that that is wrong on so many levels. I remind the hon. Gentleman that we met, we discussed and we voted in 2015 to take action against Daesh. Nobody is saying that intelligence matters have to be declared to Members of Parliament— of course not. We are talking about the principles of taking action. Do not hide behind the smokescreen of saying that intelligence information has to be shared. It does not, and nobody would expect that.
Health Incentives Scheme — House of Lords, 2021-10-28
Topic: Health
Richard Balfe (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, perhaps I may first apologise to the Opposition Front Bench for my confusing an Urgent Question with an Oral Statement. I thought that we had only 10 minutes for all of us My reaction is that this system will be quite easy to game. One cannot measure fruit and vegetables, and size of portions, by wearing a wristwatch; one can only use it to input data. That is the same for step counting, which, on a wrist counter, is well known as being not as accurate as elsewhere. I hope that the Minister and his officials will look carefully at the possibilities for gaming the system. If they are collecting the data remotely, they should be able to tell whether it is being gamed. As a former president of the British Dietetic Association, I ask the department to look carefully particularly into the obese and overweight category. There is evidence that a BMI of around 26 does no harm to people, and I should like to see more medical evidence produced on that. I invite the Minister to ask the department to look at that Finally, will the department look at producing an app for all citizens, not with rewards attached but just an app of good practice that could be made available for free through the App Store so that we can all share in the wisdom of the department?
Health Incentives Scheme — House of Lords, 2021-10-28
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the noble Baroness. I would like to know on what basis she thinks I should take part—I hope I am not looking unhealthy. I also apologise to noble Lords if I have come across as prickly; maybe I just got too excited about this scheme. As someone who been quite critical in the past of schemes that do not work and who has looked at evidence behind such schemes, I am excited that this is a real pilot, as opposed to a one-size-fits-all national system. We can see what works and then roll it out. I also thank the noble Baroness for making me aware of the scheme in GP surgeries. Maybe the noble Baroness could do me a favour and send me some details, so I can look into it in more detail and see how we could roll it out.
Medicines and Medical Devices Safety Review — House of Commons, 2018-02-21
Topic: Health
Neil Charles Gray (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The Secretary of State was right to say that patients’ views have been neglected, and that they need to be central to this review. My constituents who have been impacted by Primodos lost faith in the working group’s review, not least because of that concern. How far will this review go? Will it, for instance, look into the fact that there might be a diminished amount of evidence available because the medical records of women who took Primodos were destroyed, including those of my constituents?