argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Immigration Bill — House of Commons, 2016-04-25
Topic: Immigration
Stephen Twigg (Labour, Centre-left): First, I should refer to my relevant entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests: last October, I visited Jordan with Oxfam, making a visit to the Zaatari refugee camp. I join others in paying tribute to my noble Friend Lord Dubs, who is a living success story of how refugees can be resettled successfully and make a major contribution to their new society The Government’s continued commitment to providing humanitarian support to Syrian refugees is hugely welcome. In all parts of this House we can be proud of the role the Department for International Development has played alongside many non-governmental organisations in the humanitarian effort in the region. I pay tribute also to those countries in the region that have welcomed huge numbers of refugees, notably Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey. I welcome the announcement by the Government of an additional 3,000 places for resettlement, on top of the 20,000 they had already announced We can all celebrate the positive story about aid, and the positive story about resettlement is welcome. However, I do not accept the Government’s contention that this is somehow an either/or matter. It is not a choice between action in the region or action to help child refugees who are in Europe—we can do both.
Immigration Bill — House of Commons, 2016-04-25
Topic: Immigration
Alison McGovern (Labour, Centre-left): The speech that I follow was a fine one. There have been many fine speeches on both sides of the House. This is a cross-party campaign on a cross-party amendment with cross-party support from all parts of this Parliament. I want to say a few words about something the Minister said earlier. He said that this problem arose because of a situation "in which families see an advantage" I cannot but argue against those words, because I do not see what possible advantage there could be for the refugee families affected. The unaccompanied children we are talking about are just that: children I think that the Minister’s words demonstrate what the Government feel to be the cause of this situation. We are used to debating this analysis in terms of push and pull factors. Well, I think that is a strange kind of argument that bears very little scrutiny. We all know that, fine though this country is, it is the push of conflict that has caused the problem, and the answer to the conflict is peace. We have been trying for peace for months and months, but there is none, so what then The Under-Secretary of State for Refugees and I served together on the International Development Committee, and I have every respect for him. I ask him to read the report produced by our former colleagues, which asks the Government to take account of this request from Save the Children. [Interruption.] He is looking at me and I know that he will read it and look again at the request. Bringing people from the region was the correct approach, but it was too slow, and unfortunately the announcement last week that sought to spike this debate today was another classic almost U-turn, but it did not go far enough Therefore, as others Members have said, in the knowledge that there are children who need our protection, what can we do? This is our continent. It is our job to take care of those children. We know it, and that is why we must vote for the Dubs amendment.
Immigration Bill — House of Commons, 2016-04-25
Topic: Immigration
Jo Cox (Labour, Centre-left): We all know that the vast majority of the terrified, friendless and profoundly vulnerable child refugees scattered across Europe tonight came from Syria. We also know that, as that conflict enters its sixth barbaric year, desperate Syrian families are being forced to make an impossible decision: stay and face starvation, rape, persecution and death, or make a perilous journey to find sanctuary elsewhere. Who can blame desperate parents for wanting to escape the horror that their families are experiencing? Children are being killed on their way to school, children as young as seven are being forcibly recruited to the frontline and one in three children have grown up knowing nothing but fear and war. Those children have been exposed to things no child should ever witness, and I know I would risk life and limb to get my two precious babies out of that hellhole. I am deeply proud of the Government for leading the way internationally on providing humanitarian support to Syrian civilians. Their commitment in terms of finances and policy to help people in the region, and across the middle east and north Africa, will save lives. However, in the chaos caused by the Syrian conflict and many other conflicts, many thousands of already deeply scarred children have become separated from their parents and carers, and they are already in Europe. The Government’s generosity to date has not extended to those vulnerable children We know that identifying the exact number of unaccompanied minors is difficult, but the latest estimates suggest that there could be up to 95,000 such children in Europe tonight—four times the number we thought. That means that, if we decide tonight to take 3,000 of them, that will be just 3% of the total. That is our continent’s challenge, and we must rise to it I recognise that this is not easy, but tonight we are being asked to make a decision that transcends party politics. Any Member who has seen the desperation and fear on the faces of children trapped in inhospitable camps across Europe must surely feel compelled to act. I urge them tonight to be brave and bold, and I applaud the hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Stephen Phillips) for an incredibly principled, personal speech In the shanty towns of Calais and Dunkirk, the aid workers I spent a decade with on the frontline as an aid worker myself tell me that the children there face some of the most horrific circumstances in the world. Surely we have to do the right thing tonight and support the Dubs amendment.
Immigration Bill — House of Commons, 2016-04-25
Topic: Immigration
Naseem Akhtar Shah (Labour, Centre-left): This evening, we have had lots of passionate speeches about children from Members on both sides of the House. I will speak about my experience as a former foster carer, and somebody who has provided supported lodgings to minors who have presented themselves unaccompanied. Ikram was 15 when we fostered him in my home and my children were very young, and Hazrat was one of the boys we also looked after Hazrat told me in his own words how, when they were trying to get on to the back of a lorry, there was only one space for the two boys who needed it and one killed the other for that space. He witnessed that barbaric act, and he told me about it in person. It will haunt me for the rest of my life. It will haunt me when I look at my children; my daughter was young and I only had two children at the time Given the stories that these boys sat down and told us, I cannot begin to imagine the mental health trauma that they went through. Yet these boys wanted to work, to get an education and to leave that behind, so desperate were they to leave the horrors that they experienced while getting to this country for sanctuary. These children did not want to come to this country for our jobs, our benefits or anything else. These children’s mothers told them, "You have a better chance of making it past the traffickers and past the exploitation. You have a better chance of making it outside here, so go, my son, go." Those were the words their mothers spoke to these young people I am proud to come from Bradford West. Bradford is a city of sanctuary, in which 169 organisations have signed up to support refugees and asylum seekers. When the Minister visited, we had a conversation about Bradford being seen as a trailblazer for integrated health and social care, education and so on. Bradford could lead the way, and we would support other areas. The hon. Member for Rochester and Strood (Kelly Tolhurst) said that Kent does not get such help, but we would help: Bradford will help As my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol West (Thangam Debbonaire) said, this amounts to five children per constituency. Is that really an ask? Is a debate about five children per constituency really one we should have to have today? Can Great Britain really not extend such support, as one of the greatest nations on earth? It is a shame if we do not sign up for and accept the Dubs amendment. I will do so, and I would welcome Conservative Members joining us in the Lobby tonight.
Nepal Earthquake: First Anniversary — House of Commons, 2016-04-25
Topic: Mixed Topics
Gareth Thomas (Labour, Centre-left): Absolutely. I am very aware of my hon. Friend’s support for the excellent work Rotary International does, not just in Ealing if he will forgive me for saying so, but in many constituencies, including mine. I want to touch on its reaction, along with that of other non-governmental organisations, in a few moments.
Mosul — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Questions: What steps the Government are taking to support the people of Mosul; and what plans her Department has for such support once the Iraqi-led counter-Daesh operation has concluded.; What steps the Government are taking to support the people of Mosul; and what plans her Department has for such support once the Iraqi-led counter-Daesh operation has concluded.
Stephen Twigg (Labour, Centre-left): There is concern across the House about Daesh’s brutal treatment of minorities, including Yazidis and Christians. What approach will DFID take on that question, and will the Secretary of State speak to the Home Secretary about the potential for a medical evacuation or resettlement programme for Iraqi minorities, similar to that which we have for Syria?
Engagements — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Mixed Topics
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (Labour, Centre-left): My question was on defending the independence of the judiciary. We should all be doing that. We have an International Development Secretary who is opposed to overseas aid, a Health Secretary who is running down our national health service, a Chancellor with no fiscal strategy, a Lord Chancellor who seems to have difficulty defending the judiciary, a Brexit team with no plan for Brexit and, as has just been shown, a Prime Minister who is not prepared to answer questions on what the actual Brexit strategy is. We need a better answer than she has given us.
Calais Children and Immigration Act — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Centre-left): The qualifying eligibility criteria for children from Calais are a disgrace. The children have to meet one of the following criteria: they are aged under 12; they have been referred by the French authorities as being at high risk of sexual exploitation; they are aged under 15 and are Syrian or Sudanese; and they are aged under 18 and the sibling of a child in one of the former categories. They must also all meet the following criteria: it must be in the best interests of the child; they must have been in Calais on or before 24 October 2016; and they must have been in Europe before 20 March 2016. The criteria are a disgrace, and are certainly not in the spirit of the Dubs amendment On the basis of the criteria, it seems that any child at medium or moderate risk of sexual exploitation is on their own. A child is a child until the age of 18, and it is wrong to restrict children’s right to transfer based on their age. It is not clear what the basis or authority for determining the additional criteria are, or whether there is any appeals procedure The arbitrary dates mean that children who came to Europe after 20 March are on their own, whatever their age, and that children who came to Europe after 24 October are on their own. Children are at risk of all kinds of exploitation, including trafficking, forced labour and modern slavery, but this Government do not care. [Interruption.] If Members are not comfortable with what I am saying, that is not my problem. Without a proper asylum process, we risk pushing children into taking dangerous journeys to the UK in order to get a fair hearing for their asylum claim. None of this meets the Dubs amendment, which is that any child who would benefit from asylum in the UK should be granted it—up to 3,000 children. Will the Government now meet the full demands of section 67 of the Immigration Act 2016 as voted for in this House?
Calais Children and Immigration Act — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Yvette Cooper (Labour, Centre-left): The Minister will know that I have supported him and the Home Secretary in the important work they have done to bring the first few hundred children over from Calais and from France, but not on this. I remember the debates on the Dubs amendment and we did not discuss ruling out 13-year-old or 14-year-old Eritreans on an arbitrary basis. If this was simply priority guidance because we were going to prioritise the youngest children, people would understand, but why is he basing this on strict eligibility rules? I urge him to think again, turn this back into priority guidance, not eligibility guidance, and tell the House how many children he now thinks are going to come from France, because the number sounds considerably lower than the previous numbers that he and I discussed.
Calais Children and Immigration Act — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Diana Ruth Johnson (Labour, Centre-left): When this matter was last before the House, I asked the Home Secretary about reports that the number of Home Office officials who were dealing with bringing these children to the United Kingdom had been doubled from one to two. She was not able to tell me whether that was correct, so can the Minister say today how many Home Office officials are dealing with bringing these children to the United Kingdom?
Calais Children and Immigration Act — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Robert Charles Douglas Flello (Labour, Centre-left): In the run-up to the closure of the so-called Jungle camp at Calais, there were reports of a thousand or more people disappearing from the camp and melting into the countryside. What work is the Minister doing with his counterparts in France to ensure that when the French authorities identify people who melted away from the Calais jungle and who have vulnerable children, they too can be included in this programme?
Calais Children and Immigration Act — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Louise Margaret Haigh (Labour, Centre-left): As a proud city of sanctuary, Sheffield is doing everything it can to house these very vulnerable children, but it is being held up by Home Office incompetence around the central assessment process. Will the Minister ensure that funding is released urgently to all local authorities and that concerns around the central assessment process are addressed?
Calais Children and Immigration Act — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Andrew Francis Slaughter (Labour, Centre-left): My local authority, Hammersmith and Fulham, which has taken a lead on this, has not received the number of children it either offered to take or was told by the Home Office it would receive, because the Government have dragged their feet. Can the Minister give us some idea of how quickly assessments will take place of the children who are now dispersed across France, so that they can come here, because there are places for them to go to?
Calais Children and Immigration Act — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Karen Patricia Buck (Labour, Centre-left): Citizens UK has warned that the new guidelines make it impossible for the Government to fulfil their promise to take half the unaccompanied children from the former camp. Is it correct that that promise will be met in full? If not, what proportion of those children do the Government now expect to take into this country?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Mixed Topics
Catherine Jane Smith (Labour, Centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Are you able to give me any advice regarding incidents in my constituency? I have been contacted by a number of my constituents regarding letters that they have received from the hon. Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (David Morris) about the Boundary Commission’s proposals. Some of my constituents have been left confused, given the subject matter, believing that their MP has already changed under boundary changes. Given that the hon. Gentleman gave me no notice of his activities in my constituency, may I seek your guidance, Mr Speaker?
Autumn Statement Distributional Analysis, Universal Credit and ESA — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Other
Lindsay Harvey Hoyle (Labour, Centre-left): I remind Members to be cautious with the language they use. Also, I do not want this to degenerate into a debate about independence, and I know that the hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) wants to get back to his brief and not to be tempted by those who want to go out fishing today. To those Members intervening, I say this: when your speaking time is reduced to four minutes, do not blame me.
Autumn Statement Distributional Analysis, Universal Credit and ESA — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Other
Lindsay Harvey Hoyle (Labour, Centre-left): Order. Before I call the next speaker, let me clarify that we shall start with a seven-minute limit, but if Members can speak in less time than that, everyone should be able to have approximately equal time.
Social Care — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Mixed Topics
Barbara Mary Keeley (Labour, Centre-left): It is dreadful. The deficit in Greater Manchester is £1.75 billion, so the problem is the same up and down the country We have had six years of Government cuts to local authority budgets, and that has seen local authority spending on the care and support needs of older and disabled people fall by 11% in real terms. In fact, the number of people getting publicly funded support has plummeted: 400,000 fewer now than in 2009-10. Such facts are shocking, but behind the statistics are real issues: the impact that cuts to social care are having on the NHS, on people who need care and on unpaid family carers First, I will deal with the issues that the crisis in social care causes for the NHS. As the Nuffield Trust states: "Hospitals have struggled to meet the needs of the older age group in a timely way, in both emergency departments and inpatient admissions" The most visible manifestation of the pressures caused by cuts to social care budgets is the rapid growth of delayed transfers of care from hospital. The September figure of over 196,000 delay days is another record—the highest figure for six years—and it comes not in winter but at the end of summer. That means for the NHS 6,700 patients stuck in hospital. The most common causes are waiting for a care home placement and waiting for a nursing home placement The funding that was supposed to help with these issues is the better care fund, but there is no extra funding for social care in the fund this year and only £100 million next year.
Social Care — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Mixed Topics
Barbara Mary Keeley (Labour, Centre-left): It is indeed. The gap in my Salford local authority area is £1.1 million. We can raise only £1.6 million from the social care precept, while just paying the national living wage in the care sector is costing us £2.7 million Let me return to the matter of where the promised funding sits. In our motion, we call on the Government once again "to bring forward promised funding" for 2019-20 "to address the current funding crisis" in social care. I am sure that the Health Secretary hears plenty about the impacts on the NHS of the missing funding for social care, but let us also think about the impacts on the people who actually need that care The hon. Member for Faversham and Mid Kent (Helen Whately) mentioned the thousands of patients stuck in hospital. We should be aware that keeping them there longer than necessary can have a number of detrimental effects. Long stays can affect patient morale and patient mobility, and of course increase patients’ risk of catching hospital-acquired infections Effects on mobility can be particularly keenly felt by older patients. As Professor John Young said in the 2014 national audit of intermediary care: "A wait of more than two days negates the additional benefit of intermediate care, and seven days is associated with a 10% decline in muscle strength." As my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier), the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, observed when the Committee published its own report on discharging older people from hospitals: "Delayed discharge is damaging the health of patients and that of the public purse." Cuts to the funding of social care also affect a larger group of older and vulnerable people, and those cuts are now having a major impact on family carers. Age UK estimates that more than a million older people in England are living with unmet social care needs. I was struck by what the Unison staff told me about the many people they see during their care visits who are lonely and isolated Social care services have clearly failed to keep pace with increasing demand. Carers UK tells us that the drop in social care support, in the context of the increasing needs of our ageing population, is having a profound impact on the unpaid family carers who are stepping in to provide more care than ever before. It also tells us that the increase in the number of people providing care, and the increased number of hours of care that they provide, are being delivered at a huge personal cost to those family carers if they are not well supported—as, in all too many cases, they are not.
Social Care — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Mixed Topics
Barbara Mary Keeley (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend has made a key point. I have already mentioned the fragility of the care market. We shall not be able to explore that fully during my speech, but it is a serious factor. If we do not get the funding right, more and more care providers will simply walk away. At the Unison meeting, members of a Leicestershire rehabilitation team spoke of the problems that they experience when care providers walk away from a contract. When the staff are not there any more, they have to plug the gaps.
Social Care — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Mixed Topics
Madeleine Moon (Labour, Centre-left): As chair of the all-party group on Parkinson’s—and motor neurone disease—I have had repeated complaints about the 15-minute calls that local authorities are being forced to introduce because of cuts in their social care allowance. They mean that people are neglected: carers literally run in, and, if the person cannot communicate or has poor mobility, the quality of their care is appalling.
Social Care — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Andrew Murray Burnham (Labour, Centre-left): I heard the Secretary of State’s earlier words about EU carers. I am sure that they were genuine, but words are not good enough for them. The longer the Government leave them in limbo, the greater the risk is that they will leave. Our national health service and our care system could not cope with losing all those staff, so what more is he doing? Is he petitioning the Prime Minister for a decision now that will give them leave to stay and properly respects their contribution to our society?
Social Care — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Other
Nicholas Hugh Brown (Labour, Centre-left): claimed to move the closure (Standing Order No. 36). Question put forthwith, That the Question be now put Question agreed to. Question put accordingly (Standing Order No. 31 (2)), That the original words stand part of the Question.