argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Sport and Recidivism — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Edward John Comport Argar (Conservative, Centre-right): The right hon. Gentleman is right to highlight again the importance of sport. The report published by Professor Meek in the summer, of which we have accepted 53 of the 54 recommendations, sets out a clear direction of travel—that is, alongside education and developing skills, and provisions for mental and physical health, sport plays a key role for prisoners in the rehabilitative process.[Official Report, 22 October 2018, Vol. 648, c. 3MC.]
Court System — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Lucy Claire Leigh (Frazer) (Conservative, Centre-right): I was pleased to meet my hon. Friend, together with Heather Buchanan from the all-party group on fair business banking and finance. The APPG has produced a thorough report on this very issue, which I have read with interest. As he identifies, it is important that small businesses can bring claims against the banks when they need to do so. I have spoken to the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, who is carefully considering the APPG report, together with—when it comes out—the Financial Conduct Authority’s consultation on expanding the role of Financial Ombudsman Service, and who will consider Simon Walker’s independent review of complaints. I know that he is keen to set out the Government’s position as soon as possible after that.
Court Experience for Victims and Witnesses — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Edward John Comport Argar (Conservative, Centre-right): With regard to litigants in person—I am conscious that you might wish me to keep this answer short, Mr Speaker—we already spend well over £6 million supporting them, and we continue to look carefully at how they can continue to be supported.
School Exclusion — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: Thank you, Mr Speaker, for allowing me to come in on this question. Scotland aims to be the world’s first trauma-aware nation by considering the link between adverse childhood experience and future offending, so will the Minister look at the work being done in Scotland to break the cycle of offending and imprisonment of some of the most vulnerable individuals in our society?
Edward John Comport Argar (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the hon. Lady for her question. I am always happy to look at the devolved nations for examples of best practice from which we might learn. She is right to highlight the links in this area, which is one reason why, in the victims strategy, we allocated moneys to support children who have witnessed domestic abuse in their past—to help to break that cycle and give them a chance of recovery.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Other
David Michael Gauke (Conservative, Centre-right): As my hon. and learned Friend mentioned a moment ago, we will conduct a call for evidence shortly. That will be an opportunity to look at all these issues. I express my condolences to the family of the hon. Lady’s constituent.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: What steps are the Government taking to ensure that when two parties take the decision to divorce, the legal process does not exacerbate conflict?; One problem that we have faced in Harlow with unauthorised encampments is the cat-and-mouse scenario that when camps are evicted they can just move further down the road. What can my hon. and learned Friend do to strengthen the law and end the problem of unauthorised encampments once and for all?
Lucy Claire Leigh (Frazer) (Conservative, Centre-right): As I represent a rural constituency, I completely understand my right hon. Friend’s point. The Government have recently consulted on the powers available to local authorities to deal with such problems and we are now looking at how we might strengthen the powers of local authorities and landowners.
Food Labelling and Allergy-Related Deaths — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Other
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what action he is taking to improve the quality of UK food labelling to prevent further allergy-related deaths.
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Order. Before I call the Minister to respond, I should make it clear that I have waived the sub judice resolution to allow reference to the inquest into the death of Mrs Celia Marsh. However, I ask right hon. and hon. Members to exercise caution in referring to that case—if they are minded to do so at all—in order to avoid any possible prejudice to those proceedings.
Food Labelling and Allergy-Related Deaths — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what action he is taking to improve the quality of UK food labelling to prevent further allergy-related deaths.
Marcus Charles Jones (Conservative, Centre-right): These are tragic cases, and it is clear that the law needs to be updated. Will my hon. Friend tell us how quickly he expects the law to be changed in this regard? Will he also say more about what the Government are doing to provide guidance to retailers, to ensure that this type of tragedy does not happen again?
Food Labelling and Allergy-Related Deaths — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what action he is taking to improve the quality of UK food labelling to prevent further allergy-related deaths.
Kevin John Foster (Conservative, Centre-right): It is 30 years since my father was diagnosed as a coeliac—a condition that I know is shared by at least one person on the Treasury Bench this afternoon. In that time, we have gone from having to walk round a supermarket with a book, hoping that ingredients had not changed since it was published, to being able to rely on the labelling on a product to know whether it is suitable for him What further progress does the Minister think that the Government could make in looking at technological solutions that allow consumers to use smart phones and apps to get a full list of ingredients, not just the ones that might be on a label?
Food Labelling and Allergy-Related Deaths — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what action he is taking to improve the quality of UK food labelling to prevent further allergy-related deaths.
Thomas Christopher John Pursglove (Conservative, Centre-right): I absolutely share the sentiments that have been expressed this afternoon, but in advance of being able to change the law is there any scope for an industry-led approach, working with Government, to see things improve sooner?
Food Labelling and Allergy-Related Deaths — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what action he is taking to improve the quality of UK food labelling to prevent further allergy-related deaths.
David Henry Rutley (Conservative, Centre-right): It is important that we take forward this review to ensure that this is done robustly, but it is crucial that businesses step forward and address any concerns that consumers have. It is good business practice and businesses should be doing it.
Food Labelling and Allergy-Related Deaths — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what action he is taking to improve the quality of UK food labelling to prevent further allergy-related deaths.
David Henry Rutley (Conservative, Centre-right): I cannot given any further indication, other than that we will be working at pace and taking the report forward as soon as possible. As Members have said—and I feel the same way—we want to make sure that all consumers are safe. I re-emphasise, though, that the coroner’s report has only just been received and we need to take it into account in the final conclusions.
Dangerous Waste and Body Parts Disposal: NHS — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Stephen Paul Barclay (Conservative, Centre-right): The Chair of the Health Committee raises an important point regarding residents in the areas where the sites are located, and I see the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) in her place. The Environment Agency has confirmed that the waste is being stored safely; it is the amount of waste that is the issue. Many of our constituents are waiting for operations on these sites and will want reassurance that those operations can continue in a timely fashion. That has been a key focus of the Department, and I pay tribute to the work of officials in the NHS, the Department of Health, DEFRA and the Environment Agency, who have ensured that that strategic objective has been maintained.
Dangerous Waste and Body Parts Disposal: NHS — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Philip Thomas Hollobone (Conservative, Centre-right): In the end, the system has worked. There has been no back-up of clinical waste in hospitals—it has just been overstored in these sites. However, it is worrying, if it is true, that 13 warning notices and two compliance notices were issued to the company. Does the Minister think that he should be alerted earlier by the Environment Agency if this sort of thing happens in future?
Government Overseas Aid Commitment: Private Investment — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Desmond Angus Swayne (Conservative, Centre-right): If we are to avoid a growing army of underemployed, desperate and angry young people, we need 600 million new jobs over the next decade. Does the Secretary of State imagine that that can be provided without an enormous mobilisation of private sector investment in the developing world?
Government Overseas Aid Commitment: Private Investment — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Penelope Mary Mordaunt (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend is right. We are entering into the final decade and the last push towards the global goals. We have to be realistic. If we are going to achieve them, and I want to achieve them, we have to let other people help.
Government Overseas Aid Commitment: Private Investment — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Penelope Mary Mordaunt (Conservative, Centre-right): I hope that the hon. Lady will welcome the announcement that was made at the UN General Assembly and that I reiterated in my speech today. For the first time, we have a tool that allows us to see how companies are graded against the delivery of the global goals—to see what they are doing socially and environmentally to ensure that the global goals are met. The benchmarking alliance unveiled at UNGA will be a huge tool not just for Parliaments and investors, but for the public, who, I think, care very much about how their savings and pensions are invested.
Government Overseas Aid Commitment: Private Investment — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Penelope Mary Mordaunt (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I think that only one in five high-net-worth individuals invests in ethical businesses, and businesses that will help us to deliver the global goals. We must do more if we are to deliver those goals, and we want to explore how we can help that to happen.
Government Overseas Aid Commitment: Private Investment — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Penelope Mary Mordaunt (Conservative, Centre-right): I agree with my hon. Friend. We have talked about distant investors and pension funds, but this is also about British entrepreneurs. I had a meeting with an entrepreneur this afternoon; he is a young gentleman who is setting up factories to produce clothing around the world. He is taking women who have been living on the streets and giving them a job, and giving them healthcare, education and childcare. He is doing amazing things. Business can be a huge force for good. We now have tools to monitor what business is doing and what progress businesses are making, and we ought to get behind them and let them help.
Government Overseas Aid Commitment: Private Investment — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Penelope Mary Mordaunt (Conservative, Centre-right): We have all sorts of choices ahead of us as we take back control of that money. I have outlined today that I think we should be doing more investment to create the jobs and livelihoods that these nations need to lift themselves out of poverty and to bring a return to the UK, so that we can make the work that we do more sustainable and, if we choose, increase it.
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Order. I have had reason to say to you before, Mr Spencer, that I am quite worried about you. I always regarded you as a rather laid back, gentlemanly farmer, but you seem to have mutated into something altogether more vociferous and aggressive. I cannot believe it is what you are eating. Calm yourself, man!
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Dominic Rennie Raab (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend is certainly right to point to the countervailing opportunities that a no deal scenario would have, but it is only responsible to be very clear—as we have in our 77 technical notices and our wider planning—that the no deal outcome is sub-optimal because there are risks and short-term disruptions, including a buffeting to the UK economy and all those other things. I am confident that we could get through that, but it is by far and away a superior outcome to get a good deal with the EU that is good for the UK and for the EU, that preserves our trade and security co-operation, and that at the same time liberates us to trade more energetically with the growth markets of the world.
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Dominic Rennie Raab (Conservative, Centre-right): No, I do not accept that sort of binary choice. The one thing we must all do in this House, as democrats, is respect the result of the referendum. We are seeking to achieve the win-win of retaining our strong trading and security links and co-operation with our EU partners and being free to not just take back control of our own laws but trade more liberally with the growth markets of the future, from Latin America to Asia.
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Dominic Rennie Raab (Conservative, Centre-right): All I will say to the hon. Gentleman is that we are ambitious for our post-Brexit relationship with the EU. The economic news from the Bank of England on GDP accelerating in growth terms and rising real wages is important. This is the moment to go into these negotiations with some economic self-confidence and political ambition. If we do that, this country’s best days lie ahead.
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
David Ian Jones (Conservative, Centre-right): The Japanese Prime Minister recently declared that Japan would welcome the United Kingdom into the Trans-Pacific Partnership "with open arms". Does my right hon. Friend agree that membership of the TPP is highly attractive and should be pursued? Does he also agree that membership of it is virtually impossible for so long as we remain part of the customs union?
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Dominic Rennie Raab (Conservative, Centre-right): The technical notices set out our proposals and all the actions that airlines and the aviation industry should take. We cannot control what the EU would do in a no deal scenario, but as it set out earlier this year, this is one area where it would envisage at least some sort of bare-bones agreement. I think that is important for giving people and the industry the reassurance they need.
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Civil Rights
Jack Edgar Brereton (Conservative, Centre-right): Will my right hon. Friend please remind those who are calling for a people’s referendum, particularly in the Labour party, that we have actually already had one, and that it was one of the greatest democratic exercises that this country has ever undertaken?
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Civil Rights
Rachel Helen Maclean (Conservative, Centre-right): In Redditch, we were fortunate enough to have a visit from the Leader of the Opposition recently. I was unable to attend, as I was busy seeing constituents in my surgery. If he had spoken to my constituents, as I do, he would have found that the vast majority do not support a second referendum, because they believe that it would undermine our democracy. Can the Secretary of State confirm for my constituents that he does not support a second referendum either?
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Civil Rights
Dominic Rennie Raab (Conservative, Centre-right): I can happily confirm that neither I nor the Government support a second referendum. Of course, it would be a betrayal not just of my hon. Friend’s voters, but of all those who voted for Labour at the last election and who thought that the Labour party was serious about respecting the verdict in the referendum.
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Immigration
Michael James Tomlinson-Mynors (Conservative, Centre-right): I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement, particularly his clarity and reassurance towards EU citizens living and working in this country. Contrast that clarity with the response from Labour’s Front Benchers, who have refused to set out what their party’s position is and who are still facing both ways on the issue of a second referendum.
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Other
Dominic Rennie Raab (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I do not know what Brenda in Bristol would think about all the proposals from the Opposition parties. The vast majority of the people in this country want to see unity of purpose and for us get the best deal. They are fed up with the political opportunism of those on the Opposition Benches.
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Other
Margaret Ann Throup (Conservative, Centre-right): My constituents tell me that they are concerned about the Labour party’s hokey-cokey approach. They also tell me that they have had their people’s vote, in June 2016, and do not need or want a second one. Does the Secretary of State agree with my constituents?
EU Exit Negotiations — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Mixed Topics
Dominic Rennie Raab (Conservative, Centre-right): I understand the points the right hon. Gentleman makes. He will have seen the statement made by the Prime Minister in the aftermath of the Salzburg summit. We have been very clear that the backstop would need to be a temporary and finite bridge to the future relationship, which would subsume and supersede the need for any backstop at all. Of course it cannot be right to have any distinction, in terms of customs regulation, for any one part of the UK. We proceed as one.
Business Rates: Small Retail Businesses — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Geoffrey Robert Clifton-Brown (Conservative, Centre-right): I am privileged to follow the emotional and sensitive debate secured by my hon. Friend the Member for Eddisbury (Antoinette Sandbach). I sometimes wish the public could see more of such debates, where sensitive subjects are discussed so constructively on a completely apolitical, non-partisan basis. I congratulate my hon. Friend Madam Deputy Speaker, I am grateful to you and Mr Speaker for scheduling this important Adjournment debate on reforming the business rates system for small retail businesses. I am particularly grateful to the Paymaster General and Financial Secretary to the Treasury, my right hon. Friend the Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride) for being here to answer this debate at such a late hour, when I am sure he would much rather be at home with his family I am quite sure that right hon. and hon. Members from both sides of the House will agree with me when I say that protecting our country’s small businesses is of paramount importance. There are more than 5.7 million small and medium-sized enterprises in the UK, and we must recognise their importance to the local economies of all our constituencies in providing much-needed jobs for our constituents I have been working closely with the British Independent Retailers Association and with many businesses in my constituency to promote their business rates reform proposals. It is an eminently sensible idea for the so-called small business rate relief, which has a £12,000 threshold and has to be claimed, to be replaced by an allowance which would be automatic. That would benefit the huge majority of the small businesses that currently qualify for the small business rate relief. Retailers pay nearly a quarter of the collective rates bill, amounting to a staggering £7 billion a year. They pay far more than those in any other industry. The present system does not value business rates on the basis of business profitability. That unfortunately results in a system that fails to place the burden of taxation on the businesses that are most able to pay The national decline of the British high street is a worrying trend. More than 8,000 shops have closed over the last 18 months, and one in eight high-street shop units in England and Wales now stands empty. Large shopping centres away from town centres qualify for much lower rates than smaller retailers on our high streets, owing to their peripheral locations. That, of course, does not take into account the significantly higher turnover of retailers such as the "big four" supermarkets.
Business Rates: Small Retail Businesses — House of Commons, 2018-10-09
Topic: Housing
Geoffrey Robert Clifton-Brown (Conservative, Centre-right): Yes. The whole thrust of my speech is that we shall ultimately need to reform the rates system, but it will take time. The Government have to be very careful to guard the huge amount of revenue that they gain from the rates in any change that they make. I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Financial Secretary will have something to say about my proposals in that respect I have a problem in the Cotswolds. The rents are very high, which influences the rateable value. It takes time to deal with that when there are a number of empty units, such as the ones in York that the hon. Lady mentioned. When the rents are lowered the rateable values follow, but the district valuers are, of course, reluctant to lower the rateable values, because they do not want to lose revenue. That problem is increasing, as I shall explain shortly. Offline businesses, IT businesses and so on, do not need premises as large as those required by some of the businesses in the hon. Lady’s constituency. For example, furniture shops, bed shops and cycle shops need large premises, which inevitably means large rateable values, but they do not necessarily have the turnover to match those rateable values. The ability to pay is not necessarily reflected in the rates that must be paid. However, I sympathise with the hon. Lady.