argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Asylum System: Reform — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Chris Ian Brian Mynott Philp (Conservative, Centre-right): I can confirm that Napier was set up in response to the enormous pressures placed on our asylum system by the coronavirus pandemic. We have set it up in such a way as to be safe, and it is of course accommodation that was previously used by the brave men and women of our armed services. We ensure that it is clean and secure and that there is health provision on site. It is not intended for use in perpetuity. I know that my hon. Friend spoke to the Home Secretary over the weekend, and we would be very willing to maintain a close and active dialogue with him and the local council to ensure that it is managed as well as it possibly can be.
Asylum System: Reform — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Chris Ian Brian Mynott Philp (Conservative, Centre-right): No apology is due. As I just said, the barrack accommodation units in question were previously used by the brave men and women of our armed services. They were good enough for the armed services and they are certainly more than good enough for people who have arrived in this country seeking asylum. We fully comply with all the relevant guidelines On the hon. Gentleman’s question about this country’s stance on asylum seekers, we now spend getting on for £1 billion a year on accommodating them. That record bears comparison with any country in Europe and, indeed, around the world. No apology is due and certainly none will be made.
Asylum System: Reform — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Chris Ian Brian Mynott Philp (Conservative, Centre-right): The closure of the barracks would be made a lot easier if more councils in Scotland—other than only Glasgow—would accept dispersed accommodation. That is the sort of thing that puts pressure on our accommodation estate. Thanks to the generosity of our approach, the number of people we are accommodating has gone up from 48,000 to 61,000 during the pandemic, because we have taken a thoughtful and protective approach. That is the right thing to do and we stand by it.
Covid-19: Border Measures — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Kevin John Foster (Conservative, Centre-right): Throughout the pandemic we have kept our border measures under constant review, including through regular liaison with the devolved Administrations, given their responsibilities in this policy area. On 27 January, the UK Government announced further action for outbound and inbound passengers to minimise travel across international borders and reduce the risk of covid-19 transmission.
Covid-19: Border Measures — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Kevin John Foster (Conservative, Centre-right): Given the overall positive engagement that we have had with the Scottish Government in this policy area, it is disappointing to hear the tone of the hon. Gentleman’s question. In deciding on border measures, the UK Government must take into account a number of factors, including the rather obvious need to keep open key supply lines across the short straits, and routes to and from the Republic of Ireland To give some background, since the health measures came in we have conducted more than 3.7 million spot checks of passengers arriving at the border, as part of the new testing requirements, carriers are required to check test results, and a fine of up to £4,000 in England and Northern Ireland and £960 in Scotland and Wales can be levied on passengers who fail to comply with the requirements.
Migrant Channel Crossings — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Chris Ian Brian Mynott Philp (Conservative, Centre-right): The Government are taking a huge range of measures to prevent these dangerous and illegal crossings. Most notably, the Home Secretary reached an agreement with her French counterpart in late November to increase the number of gendarmes deployed on the French beaches and to take a variety of other steps aimed at preventing embarkations from the French shores. To anyone considering this trip, I say that it is dangerous, they are putting their lives at risk, it is illegal, but, most of all, it is unnecessary because France is a safe country where it is perfectly possible to claim asylum.
Migrant Channel Crossings — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Caroline Ansell (Conservative, Centre-right): Last month, the Eastbourne Royal National Lifeboat Institution rescued more than 30 migrants who had got into difficulty in the channel. I commend its sterling work. Its mission is simply to save lives at sea. I have every concern for those it rescued, but, as my hon. Friend has just outlined, there are serious concerns that this is pump-priming human traffickers, and the fact remains that people are putting themselves at risk. Can he outline to the House the work that is being undertaken with the French and with our European neighbours to intercept and close down human traffickers long before they reach the channel coast?
Migrant Channel Crossings — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Natalie Cecilia Elphicke (Conservative, Centre-right): Will my hon. Friend join me in thanking Kent police and the police and crime commissioner, Matthew Scott, for their important work on this issue of migration and border policing? Can he assure me that, across my whole constituency, in Dover and Deal and at nearby Napier barracks, Kent police are having extra funding for carrying out this vital work?
Unauthorised Encampments — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Sarah Elizabeth Atherton (Conservative, Centre-right): The Home Secretary will know that I wrote to her back in June regarding unauthorised encampments. I thank her for her response. Although the majority of Travellers stay on authorised sites, a disproportionate amount of council and police time is spent dealing with the effects of unauthorised encampments. Does the Minister agree that communities such as mine in Wrexham need more protection against trespass on sites where there is no right of access?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): I am proud to say that on 31 January the Government launched the Hong Kong British national overseas immigration route. The commitment to create this route was made following the Chinese Government’s imposition of the new national security law in Hong Kong. It is an unprecedented and generous offer and reflects the historical and moral commitment of this country to the individuals who retained ties with the UK at the point of Hong Kong’s handover Through this route, we will welcome BNO status holders and their family members to the UK on a pathway to citizenship. From 23 February, those with a BNO, Hong Kong special administrative region or European economic area biometric passport will be able to apply for the route through the fully digitalised process, using new technology developed through the UK’s points-based immigration system. I am clear that we must give BNO status holders every opportunity to thrive in the UK, and officials are working with colleagues across Departments to look at integration. This absolutely speaks about global Britain and how we will always stand up for what is right in the world, welcoming those who come to the UK in the right and proper way.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Philip Andrew Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): The Government have made it clear that they want to change the law to make it easier and swifter to deport illegal immigrants, foreign national offenders and those making bogus claims for asylum. That is something that I fully support and the overwhelming majority of the country will support. Will the Home Secretary give us some idea as to when that legislation will be brought forward to Parliament, because, as far as I am concerned, the sooner, the better?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend makes some very good, strong and important points that, absolutely, the British public support the removal of foreign national offenders, those who come to our country to cause harm, and also those who are, quite frankly, making asylum claims that are not legitimate. We intend to introduce legislation later this year. I have spoken frequently about the need for a firm but fair asylum system, with fairness to target those who genuinely need our help. I have already spoken about one new safe and legal route that this Government have supported. Absolutely, fairness is needed, and firmness is needed to stop abuse of our system and to make sure that we remove those who come to our country to create harm and participate in criminality. I should remind my hon. Friend—he will know this—that Labour has been campaigning against that over the past 12 months.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): It is absolutely right that we provide accommodation—the right kind of accommodation—for people who have come to our country to claim asylum, and we have a statutory duty as a Government to do so. No one would dispute that at all. With regards to Napier, I spoke to one of the ward councillors at the weekend, and I have been in touch with local MPs and representatives from the local authority. We are working with everyone to make sure that base is secure, which it absolutely is; that it is covid compliant, which it has been from day one; and that all the suitable accommodation measures are put in place, which is absolutely correct.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Public Lands
Mark Ian Jenkinson (Conservative, Centre-right): Workington has a significant problem with unauthorised Traveller encampments. Can my right hon. Friend update me on planned legislation, but at the same time offer reassurance to groups such as 1st Seaton 5th Workington scout group in my own village, which has relayed concerns to me about the impact on individuals and small groups who might wish to get closer to nature?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Civil Rights
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend is absolutely right. In fact, we have already mentioned this afternoon that the legislation will soon be coming before this House, and I am sure that his constituents and many other constituents will welcome the change. I would like to give my hon. Friend and his constituents reassurance that the legislation we will bring forward will address many of the issues related to groups that have that disproportionate impact on the local community.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): As I have said several times already, all measures are under review. Colleagues across Government are working to implement the hotel quarantine policy and the logistics involved in that, but this is not just about hotels. This is absolutely about compliance and enforcement, and we have measures in place at our ports and airports to ensure that people are being checked and to ensure compliance.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Jack Edgar Brereton (Conservative, Centre-right): In Stoke-on-Trent, one in every 250 people is now an asylum seeker, putting disproportionate pressure on local services. What is my right hon. Friend’s Department doing through Operation Oak to ensure that genuine refugees are proportionately spread, instead of putting all the pressure on places such as Stoke-on-Trent?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Housing
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend and I have spoken about this previously, and I very much recognise the pressures experienced in his constituency. Obviously we have had accommodation pressures throughout the pandemic, and we are implementing a recovery programme, with which he is familiar. Within that, we are looking to accelerate, where we can and in a covid-compliant way, working with Public Health England and all the relevant organisations that he is familiar with, the movement of people out of contingency accommodation and into much more dispersed accommodation across the UK.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Gentleman will know my very strong views on this—I have spoken about it previously. Last year when the pandemic started, we saw the most appalling abuse and attacks on shop workers. We are working with colleagues in Government, so please let me give the hon. Gentleman my assurance on that. This type of violence and abuse should never, ever be tolerated at all, and we will also continue to work with employers to ensure that they are doing everything possible to protect shop workers—their employees.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): The scheme has only just been launched. I reassure the hon. Lady that we are working with all sorts of civil society organisations, and I have spent a lot of time in dialogues and roundtables with a range of representatives. Therefore, having just launched the scheme, which is a bespoke humanitarian route created for BNOs, we are absolutely looking at how we can ensure that the route works well. We are also engaging with non-governmental organisations and civil society to ensure that we do not miss people.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Immigration
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): If I may, this is an important point that the Minister responsible for immigration compliance and the courts, my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp), touched on. I am so disappointed to hear that colleagues across the House are not supportive of asylum accommodation, when many local authorities fail to co-operate with the Home Office to identify sites in their constituency. Quite frankly, the hypocrisy of basically saying, "We don’t want asylum seekers here, send them elsewhere." is simply not acceptable. We consult with everybody—I can assure the right hon. Lady—
Yemen — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Civil Rights
James Spencer Cleverly (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Gentleman makes a very important point. As he knows, freedom of religion is something this Government take very seriously. We welcome the long overdue release of six Baha’is from Houthi detention, but it is worrying that they were detained for their beliefs in the first place and that they cannot live freely in their country. We continue to follow the treatment of the Baha’is in Yemen closely, including through meetings of their representatives in the UK and lobbying the relevant authorities, and we strongly—strongly—condemn the continued persecution of religious minorities in Yemen.
UK Shellfish Exports — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will make a statement on the EU ban on UK shellfish exports.
Charles George Eustice (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend makes an important point. We believe that the EU has simply made an error in interpretation of the law in all the regulations it has cited. We are working closely with it to try to resolve this at a technical level. We do not think that the ban it has put in place is at all justified and, indeed, it represents a complete about turn on everything the EU has told us to date. We want the EU market to have access to the fantastic shellfish we produce in constituencies such as my hon. Friend’s.
UK Shellfish Exports — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will make a statement on the EU ban on UK shellfish exports.
Charles George Eustice (Conservative, Centre-right): We will not accept regulatory alignment. This country voted to become an independent, self-governing country again, and to make its own laws again. We were elected as a Government on a clear manifesto commitment to deliver what people voted for in the referendum, and that is what we have done. Of course, there have been teething problems in these early stages, as people familiarise themselves with new paperwork—not just businesses, but border control post inspectors in France and in the Netherlands, who are also on quite a steep learning curve. They are getting better, and we are working with them to iron out difficulties: for instance, the French at one point said that everything needed to be in blue ink, but they now accept that that is not correct and is not what is required in law. We are working to iron out those difficulties, working with authorities in France, the Netherlands and Ireland to try to improve these processes, and of course we would be willing to have a discussion with the European Commission about how we might modernise some of the forms they have to make them more user-friendly.
UK Shellfish Exports — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will make a statement on the EU ban on UK shellfish exports.
Kevin Paul Hollinrake (Conservative, Centre-right): I did not realise that "bollocks" was parliamentary language, Madam Deputy Speaker, but obviously that is for you to decide My right hon. Friend is very familiar with the Filey fishing community, and lobster and crab are important markets for them. Food exporters of all types are currently finding it more difficult in instances to export to the EU than to non-EU countries and, as he said in his opening remarks, this seems to be a consistency problem related to a common understanding of the rules. Will he do whatever he can to build an agreement that deals with food and plant exports and resolves these issues as soon as possible?
UK Shellfish Exports — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will make a statement on the EU ban on UK shellfish exports.
Charles George Eustice (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend makes a very important point. I have focused my comments so far on bivalve molluscs, where the European Union is now proposing an outright ban, which is a change from its former position. We are aware that there have also been some teething issues in other sections of the shellfish industry, notably crabs and lobsters, particularly when they are exported live. There have been improvements: a lot of consignments are now going through the short straits, clearing border control posts, often in no more than 45 minutes, and reaching their destination on time. However, I agree with my hon. Friend that the paperwork associated with that could be improved. That would require the EU to engage constructively in such a discussion.
UK Shellfish Exports — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Other
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will make a statement on the EU ban on UK shellfish exports.
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): On the matter of unparliamentary language, the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) is quite right to question the matter. The hon. Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Deidre Brock) uttered a phrase that I would not have allowed had she directed it specifically at any individual Member of this House. I did not interrupt her for the way in which she used it in her question, but I remind all hon. Members that regardless of whether they are participating virtually or physically, they ought to be very careful never to use any language that could be considered offensive. We are honourable Members in this place.
UK Shellfish Exports — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will make a statement on the EU ban on UK shellfish exports.
Charles George Eustice (Conservative, Centre-right): I absolutely share my hon. Friend’s frustration at the way the EU has conducted itself in this matter. It changed its position just last week, having assured us all along that it simply sought a new export health certificate for wild-caught molluscs. That is why we want to work with the EU to try to get this situation resolved. There is no justification for it whatsoever.
UK Shellfish Exports — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will make a statement on the EU ban on UK shellfish exports.
Charles George Eustice (Conservative, Centre-right): As I pointed out earlier, it is not the case that we sought assurances or thought we had them and that the EU has not made a change to accommodate this trade. Nor is it the case that the EU had a ban on the trade from third countries for bivalve molluscs. Indeed, its own health certificate—in the notes to guide it—makes it very clear it is within scope, because it states: "This certificate is to be used for the entry into the Union of consignments of live aquatic animals intended for all other aquaculture establishments including purification centres" So the status quo law the EU has does allow this trade to continue. That is the guidance that the EU gave us all along. It has changed its position. In the short term, our objective is to get the EU to abide by its own laws and legal processes here. Obviously, if it refuses to do so, or it decides to change its law to make things more difficult, we will consider what steps are necessary at that point to support industry.
UK Shellfish Exports — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will make a statement on the EU ban on UK shellfish exports.
Charles George Eustice (Conservative, Centre-right): The reality of the trade and co-operation agreement is that its fisheries section delivered a 25% uplift in fishing opportunities, a rebalancing of the sharing arrangements and an abandonment of relative stability as the quid pro quo for granting the EU continued access to our waters for five and a half years. We are free to review it after that. We also have the freedom to set our own regulations in this area. But we recognise that there have been teething problems. That is why the Government announced a new £23 million fisheries disruption fund to support those businesses that struggled with the paperwork in the initial weeks.
Armed Forces Bill — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Mark Gino Francois (Conservative, Centre-right): The Minister is not the problem; the problem is the Northern Ireland Office, as everyone knows. My right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith) chairs the veterans support group in this place; he has been followed by my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), a previous Chairman of the Defence Committee and now Chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee; and I am a member of the veterans support group. The Prime Minister promised 18 months ago that we would have this legislation before the next general election. Well, we have had the general election and we have had a year, so with the greatest of respect, will the Minister take back to the Northern Ireland Office the fact that our patience is now exhausted? We do not want words and we do not want to be patronised; we want a Bill. Where is it?
Armed Forces Bill — House of Commons, 2021-02-08
Topic: Other
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): Before I call the shadow Secretary of State, it will be obvious to anyone who has examined the call list that a very large number of Members wish to participate this afternoon, so there will be an immediate time limit on Back-Bench speeches of four minutes.