argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Coronavirus: Supporting Businesses and Individuals — House of Commons, 2021-02-23
Topic: Macroeconomics
Stephen Nathan Kinnock (Labour, Centre-left): In the past few days, Governments across the UK have outlined the first tentative steps out of lockdown and towards the reopening of our economy, but this will clearly not happen overnight, so the Government must avoid cliff edges and must also help businesses and individuals to get back on their feet. That is why Labour’s British recovery bond proposal is so crucial The hospitality sector has been particularly hard hit by this crisis. Speaking to pubs and restaurants in my Aberavon constituency, they tell me that the uncertainty over future economic support packages is making a difficult situation intolerable. They do not know whether they will have the money to pay bills and they cannot give their employees assurances over whether they will be furloughed because they are waiting for the UK Government to decide. The UK Government need to provide businesses and employees with clarity by extending and reforming the furlough scheme so that it lasts for as long as restrictions are in place and while demand is significantly reduced. Pubs and restaurants have not been able to take advantage of the reduced VAT rate, as for large parts of the year they have been shut, and when they have been able to operate, it has been at reduced capacity. Decisive action by the UK Government is therefore needed. Extending the temporary 5% reduced rate of VAT for the hospitality, tourism and culture sectors would allow businesses to plan for survival and invest in safeguarding jobs The UK Government also desperately need to address the gaps in support schemes. It is a travesty that after almost a year the Government continue to ignore the plight of so many who have been excluded from the support schemes and have not received support they desperately need. My Aberavon constituency is a hotbed of creative talent, following in the footsteps of Anthony Hopkins, Michael Sheen and Richard Burton. For many in the creative arts industry, it has been horrendous: their industry is closed down, their work has dried up, their income has fallen off a cliff and because of the nature of their employment, they have not qualified for any of the support schemes and their savings preclude them from universal credit Others outside the creative industries have also found themselves in difficult positions, for example, a driving instructor in my constituency, who was not eligible for any of the self-employment support schemes, received support through furlough, which only managed to cover his national insurance contributions The UK Government have been consistently slow in responding to the crisis and have failed to provide the long-term clarity about economic support that is required. We need to do the right thing, plug the gaps in the schemes and support hard-working people in Aberavon and across the country.
Coronavirus: Supporting Businesses and Individuals — House of Commons, 2021-02-23
Topic: Macroeconomics
Apsana Begum (Labour, Centre-left): Before the pandemic, a decade of austerity left far too many trapped in low-paid, insecure work and consistently failed by the social security system. The failing economic system has been further exposed throughout the coronavirus pandemic, which produced a policy that led to 3 million people being left out of economic support. That is simply unacceptable We are at a critical juncture in the pandemic and the Government’s stop-start approach has meant that many businesses are now being forced to make tough decisions about their future. In my constituency, Chrisp Street market, Watney market and surrounding businesses are key to our local economy. Indeed, given the close proximity in which they operate, their sustainability is tied together. Despite that, market traders were slow to receive any support from the Government in the last financial year. To make matters worse, many small and independent businesses could not access grants and relief measures because of the premises criterion, whereby because they did not pay business relief directly, they were left out of support. It took months for the Government to begin to address that Conservative Members are quick to claim that every single business has had some form of support in the pandemic, but that is simply not true, and too many have spent 2020 in turmoil. Perhaps the Minister can today outline how markets, traders and small independent businesses will be supported towards long-term and sustainable economic recovery Economic measures are vital for businesses, but they are also vital to protect individuals. Under this Government, in the pandemic, unemployment is spiralling out of control. Just today, Office for National Statistics figures confirmed yet again that the economic impact of the pandemic continues to feed on inequality, with people living in more deprived areas experiencing mortality rates more than double those in less deprived areas. Unemployment is higher among ethnic minority communities: 13.8% among black people compared with 4.5% among their white counterparts; and 10.6% for ethnic minority women If the Government’s economic support measures are sufficient, why are there such glaring disparities in pandemic unemployment? If the economic measures are so satisfactory, why does there need to be 18 food banks—18—in my borough, trying to keep households afloat with the bare necessities? The answer is simple. The Government’s support measures are insufficient, unfair and inconsistent. At this critical juncture, the Government must do better.
Further and Higher Education: End of Transition Period — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Emma Ann Hardy (Labour, Centre-left): The anxiety caused by the lack of answers on the impact of the end of transition upon students is only adding to the anxiety that they already feel because of the impact that covid-19 has had on their educational experience, their finances and their graduate job prospects, which is all made worse by the fact that students do not feel that their voice is being heard by Government. Perhaps the greatest injustice of them all, they feel, is being made to pay rent for accommodation that the Secretary of State has mandated they should not use. What is he going to do to right this wrong?
Covid-19: Remote Education — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Wesley Paul William Streeting (Labour, Centre-left): The fact is that up to 1.8 million children in this country do not have access to a device at home, and more than 800,000 do not have access to the internet needed. Even with the laptops that the Secretary of State has already provided and those he intends to provide, the provision of devices and dongles falls well short. Why is the Secretary of State willing to accept standards for other people’s children that he would never accept for his own, and why is it that, once again, the incompetence of his Department has left children across the country seriously disadvantaged?
Early Years Providers: Financial Stability — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Social Welfare
Stephen James Morgan (Labour, Centre-left): Nurseries and childcare providers in deprived areas are most likely to close, which is catastrophic for disadvantaged children. Coronavirus presents a significant threat to early years providers in Portsmouth, with many already struggling financially. What action will the Minister take to ensure we do not lose essential childcare places in less well-off communities as a result of the pandemic?
Early Years Providers: Financial Stability — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Katharine Helen Brooks-Osborne (Labour, Centre-left): With so many staff in early years settings having to isolate, it is becoming increasingly difficult to open the maintained nursery schools in my constituency, as they do not have surplus staff to rely on. What funding will be made available to mitigate that, so that support staff can be employed to cover staff who are shielding or self-isolating?
Early Years Providers: Financial Stability — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Social Welfare
Karl Turner (Labour, Centre-left): Many children’s nurseries in east Hull face severe financial difficulty from years of underfunding, and from exclusion from support during this pandemic. The Minister knows that childcare providers in disadvantaged areas such as east Hull are the most likely to close, and that that would be catastrophic for many young children, whose life chances are shaped by early education. Can she guarantee that we will not lose essential childcare places in less well-off areas such as east Hull as a result of covid-19?
Early Years Providers: Financial Stability — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Tulip Rizwana Siddiq (Labour, Centre-left): Ministers are telling everyone to stay at home, yet early years providers are being told to stay open for as many children as possible or lose funding. This month’s funding changes mean that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders will be punished financially for having lower demand than usual, or for limiting their opening during lockdown, and 19,000 providers could close by summer as a result. Is that a price the Minister is willing to pay, or does she think those warning about this are wrong?
Remote Learning: Laptops and Other Devices — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Daniel Stephen Zeichner (Labour, Centre-left): In the city of Cambridge last week, 1,748 children were without a suitable device for learning. Across the county as a whole, almost 6,500 were. Ministers have had almost a year to sort this out. When will every child have access to the learning they need?
Technical and Vocational Exams — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Matthew Toby Perkins (Labour, Centre-left): I pay tribute to everyone in the further education sector, and particularly those college leaders who have been left with very difficult decisions to make this January because of the BTEC exam fiasco. The Government’s farcical approach to those exams has left college leaders to show leadership and concern for pupil and teacher safety, in the absence of any from the Government. As the question from the hon. Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell) has just exposed, we now have students and colleges on different tracks to the same exams. It is all so unnecessary. How many more vocational students must suffer as a result of the Secretary of State’s inability to make the right decisions at the right time?
Covid-19 Lockdown: Safety of Staff — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Sarah Ann Jones (Labour, Centre-left): Last week, I was contacted by the inspirational headteacher of Tunstall Nursery School in my constituency. She and her team have worked so hard to ensure that vital education is provided to kids as safely as possible, but she contacted me to express urgent concern over the safety of her pupils and staff because of covid-19. Other nurseries and special schools in my constituency have contacted me with the same concern. Does the Minister agree that this situation is unacceptable and that, at the very least, they deserve to see the clear detailed scientific evidence and advice that the Government have received about the safety of early years settings? Why have we still not seen that?
Nursery School Funding — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Grahame Mark Morris (Labour, Centre-left): Maintained nursery schools in my constituency not only provide first-class early education but support many working families with childcare, yet many are facing huge financial pressures because of the pandemic, because they are not able to access the same support as schools and businesses. When will the Government live up to their promise of giving them a long-term future by guaranteeing their funding?
Secondary Schools: Refurbishment and Rebuilding — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Christian John Patrick Matheson (Labour, Centre-left): Upton-by-Chester High School in my constituency is a good school with an outstanding sixth form, but its buildings are not fit for purpose. What would the Minister advise me and the school leadership that they need to do to make sure they catch his eye in future programmes? Will he come to Upton, as soon as he is allowed, to visit the school?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Katherine Anne Green (Labour, Centre-left): The utterly inadequate school food parcels we saw last week were an absolute scandal, one that was, however, entirely in line with the Government’s own guidance. So why has it taken the Secretary of State until the third week of term to initiate a voucher system? Can he tell the House how many parents received vouchers today?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Katherine Anne Green (Labour, Centre-left): Ah, so we got the answer in the end. The truth is that the Secretary of State was late in planning the voucher scheme, late in getting laptops to students, late in consulting on replacing exams, and late in announcing that students will not return to school in January. After delay after delay, has he finally realised what parents, pupils and staff have known for months, which is that he is just not up to the job?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Social Welfare
Kerry Gillian McCarthy (Labour, Centre-left): As Ministers know, both the children’s commissioner and I are keen to get their support for a ban on placing looked-after children in unregulated accommodation, but I understand that the Department wants to do this only for under-16s, which would currently affect 90 or so children. There are many, many more 16 to 18-year-olds in unsafe accommodation who are still legally children and who are still meant to be in our care. Can the Minister explain the justification for treating them differently and, in doing so, potentially putting them at risk of harm?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Judith Mary Cummins (Labour, Centre-left): Ninety primary school headteachers from across Bradford have written to the Secretary of State to express their disappointment in his ability to support teachers and pupils. School-age children in my constituency have some of the lowest social mobility rates in the country. The Government say that they have a plan to ensure that children catch up on the learning that they have lost, but there are currently only enough places on the national tutoring programme for one in every five disadvantaged pupils in England. Will the Minister increase this as a matter of urgency, and commit to publishing a fully funded plan to ensure that the most disadvantaged children do not fall even further behind?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Education
Taiwo Owatemi (Labour, Centre-left): As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on Erasmus, I have a vested interest in ensuring that British students across the country have access to the best international education programme possible, so two weeks ago I wrote a letter, which was signed by colleagues across the House, about the Turing scheme that is replacing Erasmus. I have yet to receive a response from Ministers. Although we welcome the Turing programme, it could be greatly improved to become a notable and truly beneficial exchange programme, so will the Secretary of State commit today to arranging a meeting with my colleagues and I to discuss this further?
Police National Computer — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Law and Crime
Yvette Cooper (Labour, Centre-left): It is very hard to understand how 400,000 records could be deleted from such a crucial system without there being a proper back-up system in place. If this was the normal weekly process as ever, why was new coding being used? If new coding is often used, why are there not built-in safeguards? Is it true that Ministers were warned many months ago that their approach to the police national computer and database posed a significant risk to policing’s ability to protect the public? What did the Home Secretary do about that?
Police National Computer — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Law and Crime
Andrew John Gwynne (Labour, Centre-left): The Home Secretary likes to talk tough on crime, but the shocking loss of 400,000 records is a major failing on her watch and she is incapable of facing up to it. She should be here before the House today. The Policing Minister talked in his statement about mitigation. Can he give the House an absolute guarantee that no investigation has been or will be compromised because the deleted information could not be cross-referenced?
Police National Computer — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Law and Crime
Kevin Denis Brennan (Labour, Centre-left): Millions of people, including me, watched ITV’s excellent recent drama series "The Pembrokeshire Murders", which showed how painstaking police examination of old DNA evidence helped to convict a brutal serial killer many years after he committed his heinous crimes. Is it possible—and I think the public and victims of crime deserve an honest and candid answer from the Minister on this—that records that could help to convict serious offenders in the future have been lost forever?
Police National Computer — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Law and Crime
Matthew Raymond Western (Labour, Centre-left): The Minister will be well aware that this news will have caused great alarm right across the country, and certainly to the residents of Warwick and Leamington. Can he explain to us what assessment he has made in terms of safeguarding and those who are vulnerable, including the victims of domestic abuse? Does he agree that now is not the time to be cutting 87 back office staff from Warwickshire police, including the domestic abuse unit and all the corporate knowledge that goes with that?
Police National Computer — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Law and Crime
Mohammed Afzal Khan (Labour, Centre-left): This extraordinarily serious scandal happened on the Home Secretary’s watch, yet, disappointingly, she is not here. As a former police officer, I know at first hand the value of the PNC. The reality is that the loss of fingerprints and DNA evidence will mean that the police are unable to tie suspects to crime scenes. In essence, this will result in criminals walking free and evading justice. Will the Minister outline what steps are being taken to ensure that this sort of loss never happens again?
Police National Computer — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Law and Crime
Anthony Joseph Lloyd (Labour, Centre-left): Will the Minister confirm that among types of crime that very often lead to no further action are those involving domestic abuse? In that case, can he give an absolute guarantee to the House that there will be full recovery of all the data, or do we put at risk victims of domestic abuse when we know that building up a pattern of criminal behaviour is so important for the police and other agencies to bring offenders to book and to protect victims of domestic abuse?
Universal Credit and Working Tax Credit — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Social Welfare
Jonathan Neil Reynolds (Labour, Centre-left): I agree. Inequality, and the differential impact on people, has been one of the defining features of this crisis. I do not think anyone can avoid that. It is relevant to make that point in this debate We have to be honest about the state of our social security system going into the crisis. Since 2010, poverty has increased significantly in the UK. In addition, people who were in poverty in 2010 are now so much deeper in poverty than they were. This is not an argument about definitions. Conservatives themselves were the driving influences behind bodies such as the Social Metrics Commission, which came up with a new definition of poverty that was actually very similar to the one that has traditionally been used. The Government’s own estimate is that 4.2 million British children live in poverty. That is shameful, wrong and unnecessary The UK, along with Ireland, is an outlier compared with the rest of Europe when it comes to inequality. That means that the reality for millions of families is that they went into this crisis already under significant pressure. As the Resolution Foundation said in 2019, the 1.7% increase to universal credit that year was the first working-age benefit increase for five years. Last year, the real value of basic out-of-work support was lower than when John Major was Prime Minister, so anyone claiming that the system is too generous, or who is trying to resurrect the stigmatising rhetoric of George Osborne, simply has no case to make.
Universal Credit and Working Tax Credit — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Social Welfare
Jonathan Neil Reynolds (Labour, Centre-left): Yes, it is our policy to replace universal credit—not to abolish the welfare state, as some of those videos from Conservative central office have tried to make out today. After I address the causes and the question before us today, I will be happy to talk about some other problems that go beyond the core amount of universal credit, and about why replacing universal credit is the right policy. But before we get to that point, I have to stress that, if this cut goes ahead, it will leave unemployment support at its lowest level ever relative to average earnings. That is not just morally unjustifiable; it is economically incompetent. Cutting unemployment support in the middle of a recession is always the wrong choice, which is why no Government have done so since the great depression.
Universal Credit and Working Tax Credit — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Social Welfare
Stephen Creswell Timms (Labour, Centre-left): Is it now the policy of the Department, as the Prime Minister suggested at the Liaison Committee last week, that people should move from legacy benefits to universal credit in order to gain the £20 per week increase? If that is now the policy, what about the position of those who have been receiving the severe disability premium, who are not allowed to move to universal credit?
Universal Credit and Working Tax Credit — House of Commons, 2021-01-18
Topic: Macroeconomics
Jonathan Neil Reynolds (Labour, Centre-left): As the Minister has raised press speculation, will he comment on the news in the papers at the weekend that the reason he is here and not the Secretary of State is that the Secretary of State agrees with us and it is the Treasury that is behind the cut of £20 a week from April?