argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
No-deal Brexit: Schedule of Tariffs — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): I always stand ready to visit colleagues from across the House and their constituencies, and their local businesses, to understand the background to commercial decisions that are being made. I am not particularly aware of the detail of that one, but, again, if the hon. Gentleman thinks it useful, I would be happy to have a meeting with him. It may be more appropriate for him to meet colleagues from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, but I am very happy to talk to him.
No-deal Brexit: Schedule of Tariffs — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Mixed Topics
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that. I have not had direct talks with the UFU, but the voice of Northern Ireland is very effectively represented in government by the Secretary of State and the Minister of State, and the voice of Northern Ireland will always be heard when the hon. Gentleman is in this House.
No-deal Brexit: Schedule of Tariffs — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Other
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): I am enormously grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that. As I said, this is my first appearance at this Dispatch Box, but my cursory knowledge of these matters is that one is accountable at this Box for things within one’s responsibility. However vast the portfolio that I have the honour to discharge, the tweets of the President of the United States were not in my job description the last time I checked.
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): We come now to the next urgent question. At the risk of embarrassing him, the right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) tells me that this is the first time he has asked a question from the Back Benches in 14 years, but I am sure it will not show.
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Mixed Topics
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): I am not sure that it is helpful to have a running commentary on everything that is being said. I think those who are employed in distilleries in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency would be much more interested in what the Government are trying to do to get a successful outcome. I have told the hon. Gentleman and the House the exchanges and the conversations there have been, and those will continue. We are determined to use the next 10 days to try to persuade our friends in the United States that this is the wrong way to go.
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Mixed Topics
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): I am very grateful to my hon. Friend, and I am happy to reassure him by reiterating the comments I made to our right hon. Friend the Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) about cashmere and other product lines. This is not confined to Scotch whisky, although Scotch whisky will obviously dominate the coverage of this because it is such an iconic Scottish, and indeed British, brand. It is known everywhere, and only two days ago in Vietnam we were having conversations about the labelling of imports of Scotch whisky through third countries and how that was leading to an increase in illicit sales of Scotch whisky products. Diageo has been very vigorous in lobbying the Government on that and other related issues. We are absolutely determined to support this sector, and indeed the other sectors that my hon. Friend quite rightly highlighted.
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Mixed Topics
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): As the hon. Gentleman knows, these tariffs relate to single malt whisky products. I can say to him that I have visited Bushmills many times and that I am a fan of Bushmills whiskey. The old inn at Bushmills is among the finest places to stay anywhere in the United Kingdom. His father and my grandfather shared something in common: they never drank at all. I did not follow my grandfather’s example. I am sure he followed his father’s.
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Other
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): I congratulate my hon. Friend on yet another demonstration of what a powerful advocate she is for those who put their trust in her to serve as their Member of Parliament. I said earlier that the tweets of the President of the United States were slightly beyond my remit. I am afraid that the Chancellor’s next Budget falls into a similar but not distinct category, but I am sure that she will make that point very powerfully to our right hon. Friend, and that it will receive a warm welcome.
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Mixed Topics
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): I have not yet had the opportunity to raise this issue directly with Airbus, but I have put out a call to the American ambassador. As I hope the right hon. Gentleman will understand, the reason that I have not yet had the opportunity to talk directly to Airbus is that I returned to the UK only late last night after a visit last week to Vietnam. When I came into the office, I spoke to the chief executive of the Scotch Whisky Association and I reached out to our counterparts in Scotland and Wales. Such conversations will be happening urgently in the course of this week.
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Mixed Topics
Hugo Swire (Conservative, Centre-right): I congratulate my hon. Friend on his debut at the Dispatch Box. If he goes on like this, it will not be long before he is presenting the Budget, and he will have a chance to sip the devil’s buttermilk as he does so My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that America is the largest market for Scotch whisky. What other levers can he pull to promote whisky in the emerging markets of Asia and further afield—for instance by using the efforts of the GREAT campaign? This is a real opportunity to push our whiskies into other markets Perhaps you should lead by example, Mr Speaker. Mr Speaker’s 10-year-old single malt sells for £29 a bottle, which is a remarkable increase on what it retailed for 10 years ago. Perhaps as your parting shot, Sir, you should immediately commission, as a gesture of confidence in the Scotch whisky business, a new bottle of Speaker Bercow’s brew?
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Mixed Topics
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): After—how long has it been?—quite a long time during which we have enjoyed such wonderful consensus, I fear that we have now entered the press release-writing section of this urgent question No Conservative Member would ever speak of the Scottish economy in such denigrating terms. It is, in fact, because of our respect for the people of Scotland and the Scottish economy that Government Members passionately believe in Scotland’s integral place as a part of the United Kingdom. It is we who passionately believe that we are better together, and it is we who passionately believe that the best interests of the Scottish people are served by membership of this United Kingdom. It is this Government, serving every part of the United Kingdom, who will do all that we can to protect that sector, and to protect whisky producers in every part of this country. But if the hon. and learned Lady, who has taken some time off from her court cases to come here today, genuinely believes that the best way of resolving this dispute is to attack and denigrate personally the President of the United States, I think that shows how naive she is.
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Other
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): The funny thing about being a Minister is that it does not necessarily mean that everyone talks to you, and it certainly does not mean that they talk to you—[Interruption.] I did say to all colleagues in the House that we all have a role to play in this. It is not a matter of, as the hon. Gentleman says, "Give it to us". We are all in this together, and the people who work in the sector will not care whether it is the SNP, the Tories or Labour. What they will want to see is this entire House of Commons coming together to support the industry.
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Other
Conor Burns (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to my hon. Friend, particularly as he is the last in the thin blue line between me and a barrage of questions from SNP colleagues for the remainder of these questions. He makes a very powerful point indeed.
US Tariffs: Scotch Whisky — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I think that the House is grateful to the Minister both for dealing with this urgent question and the exchanges on it the last 77 minutes, and for his efforts on the previous such question. He mentioned to the House that he was making his debut at the Dispatch Box. I cannot readily call to mind an example of a Minister who on making a debut at the Box has had to answer successive urgent questions, and the hon. Gentleman has done so with considerable commitment and élan. We are grateful to him.
Operation Midland Independent Report — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Before I call the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) to ask his urgent question, I must inform the House that I have been advised that Carl Beech has appealed his conviction and sentence. Colleagues, those appeal proceedings are therefore sub judice under the terms of this House’s resolution and no reference should be made to the merits or otherwise either of that appeal or of the sentence imposed by the court.
Operation Midland Independent Report — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Mixed Topics
Timothy Paul Loughton (Conservative, Centre-right): Madam Deputy Speaker, you may recall that, six years ago, the then chief constable of Sussex was found to have breached privilege after an investigation by the Standards and Privileges Committee into a vexatious investigation against me. It then took the IPCC over three and a half years to uphold four of my five complaints, by which time all the officers investigated had retired, and therefore no penalties could be imposed It looks as though the same has now happened with the IOPC. The investigation took far too long, and only one of the officers was actually interviewed face to face. How is it that the damning Henriques report talked about Operation Midland in terms of "incompetently, negligently and almost with institutional stupidity", yet today’s IOPC report refers to "shortcomings" in the handling of the whole investigation. What will the Minister now do to ascertain whether the IOPC, almost two years after it took over from the IPCC, is actually fit for purpose?
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Other
Andrew William Murrison (Conservative, Centre-right): I share the sort of constituency issues to which the hon. Lady has alluded. I am sure that my colleagues in the Home Office will have heard what she has to say, and I will certainly draw their attention to her remarks.
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Immigration
Andrew William Murrison (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Gentleman is correct: there are other dual nationals who are discommoded in a similar way. Of course we talk to our interlocutors in other countries where people are dealt with in this way, to ensure that we see what common ground we have and what we might do together to address these issues. But the fact remains that Nazanin is an Iranian-British dual national. That makes her case different from the other case that we have been discussing today.
Census (Return Particulars and Removal Of Penalties) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Civil Rights
Kevin John Foster (Conservative, Centre-right): I will not prolong this part of our debate. The purpose of the clause is simple. It amends the Census Act 1920 in respect of England and Wales to remove the penalty for not responding to census questions on sexual orientation and gender identity. This means that those questions will be voluntary. As I am sure hon. Members will recall, this reflects the approach taken by the Census (Amendment) Act 2000, which removed the penalty attaching to a failure to answer a question on religion in the census Clause 2 amends the Census Act (Northern Ireland) 1969 to remove the penalty for not responding to census questions on sexual orientation and gender identity, in order to replicate the changes that we are making in law for England and Wales. The power to include questions on sexual orientation and gender identity already exists under the Northern Ireland legislation. Clause 2 does not create new powers to ask those questions; it simply ensures that if they were asked in a future census in Northern Ireland, they would be voluntary Finally, clause 3 sets out the territorial extent, commencement and short title of the Bill. The territorial extent of the Bill is England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Bill does not extend to Scotland, where the matter is devolved and where the Scottish Parliament is dealing with the relevant legislation Question put and agreed to. Clause 1 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill. Clauses 2 and 3 ordered to stand part of the Bill. New Clause 2 Questions on gender identity "(1) Any question or questions asked about gender identity under the Census Act 1920 or the Census Act (Northern Ireland) 1969 must be framed so as to enable statistical information to be obtained about gender identity within different ethnic groups (2) The ethnic groups in subsection (1) must include Sikhs." —(Preet Kaur Gill.) This new clause would mean that if the census included a question on gender identity, it would have to be written in such a way as to provide information about gender identity in different ethnic groups. Brought up, and read the First time.
Census (Return Particulars and Removal Of Penalties) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Mixed Topics
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Amendment (a) to new clause 2, in line 6, at end insert ", Jains and Zoroastrians" Amendment (b) to new clause 2, in line 6, at end insert "and Kashmiris" New clause 3—Homeless people and questions on gender identity and sexual orientation— "(1) The Secretary of State must make a statement to both Houses of Parliament on what steps the Office for National Statistics will take to ensure that people who are homeless have an opportunity to answer any questions about gender identity or sexual orientation under the Census Act 1920 or the Census Act (Northern Ireland) 1969 (2) The statement in subsection (1) must be made within two months of the passing of this Act (3) In this section, "homeless" is defined as set out in section 175 of the Housing Act 1996." This new clause is intended to ensure that the Office for National Statistics takes steps to increase the participation of homeless people in the Census so that data on sexual orientation and gender identity includes information from people who are currently homeless.
Census (Return Particulars and Removal Of Penalties) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Civil Rights
Kevin John Foster (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the Members who have contributed to the debate. The hon. Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson) said that he would not press Labour’s new clause 3. I am glad that the Labour Front-Bench team found the letter of interest and that it answered their concerns. From conversations with the ONS, I know that it is keen to ensure that everyone is counted in terms of the homeless community, that outreach work is done and that special measures are put in place to try to ensure as many people as possible fill in the census form. The Labour Front Bench raised the particular issue of those in the LGBT community who may be affected by homelessness in a different way and have a fear of it that differs from the rest of the community. A very worthwhile issue was brought up. I was therefore only too happy to send the letter, rather than wait until tonight. A copy of that letter has been placed in the Libraries of both Houses if Members want to consult the Government’s comments Turning to the substance of the debate, new clause 2 was passionately moved by the hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Preet Kaur Gill) and it confirms the importance of ensuring that the 2021 census provides detailed information on our society, and especially the Sikh community. The Government will be guided by the advice and recommendations of the Office for National Statistics, which has advised that the new clause’s effect can be achieved through analysis of information collected under its existing proposals for the 2021 census Most importantly, the new clause is potentially damaging to the integrity of the census and threatens the inclusion of a question on gender identity, which would be counter to the whole aim of this Bill. For clarity, the new clause would not make any changes to the proposals for a question on sexual orientation; it would make changes only to the question on gender identity. Under the ONS’s existing proposals for the 2021 census, it will already be possible to produce statistical information about gender identity within different ethnic and religious groups As in previous censuses, there will continue to be separate questions on ethnicity and religion, and the data from the ethnicity, religion and gender identity questions can be analysed to provide detailed information on gender identity across different cross-sections of the population.
Census (Return Particulars and Removal Of Penalties) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Civil Rights
Kevin John Foster (Conservative, Centre-right): I am happy to clarify that there will be a tick box for Sikhs under the religion section but not under ethnicity. There have been 55 requests for particular tick boxes on the census that the ONS is not recommending, and having a Sikh tick box under ethnicity is one of those that the ONS is not recommending.[Official Report, 14 October 2019, Vol. 666, c. 2MC.] As I said, the Government will be guided by the ONS’s recommendations on what the census should include. Of course, Members can discuss the issue more fully when Parliament considers the main census orders that set the questions, but the Government will be guided by the ONS’s recommendations in this area Anyone who wishes to identify in the 2021 census as having Sikh or Kashmiri ethnicity, or Jain or Zoroastrian religion, will be able to do so under the existing proposals using the write-in option or the new "search as you type" facility.
Census (Return Particulars and Removal Of Penalties) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Civil Rights
Kevin John Foster (Conservative, Centre-right): I am more than happy to meet the hon. Lady to have a more in-depth conversation about this issue, and I will make sure that ONS representatives are also present so that she can put her point directly to them I make it clear that the census is about data collection, and it is a criminal offence for a person not to respond to the overall census, but it is right that the questions are seen as having been professionally recommended for data collection purposes, rather than a Minister personally choosing the questions and tick boxes that are included Today’s debate is about the questions on these two issues being voluntary, rather than coming through schedule 6, which would make them compulsory. For reasons with which many of us will agree, this is a very sensitive area of data Given that these analytical possibilities already exist, we believe there are no grounds for this new clause, which is potentially damaging to the integrity of the census. It would require changes to questions that have been extensively researched, tested and consulted on by the ONS in its independent advisory capacity over the three years of evidence gathering to inform the proposals for the 2021 census. It would also serve to introduce the risk of confusion and concern for individuals completing the gender identity question. My early discussions with the ONS indicated that, as was referred to by the shadow Minister, it would be likely to recommend that this question was not included in census 2021 if this new clause were passed, given the changes it would make to that question.
Census (Return Particulars and Removal Of Penalties) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Other
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): As indicated on the Order Paper, Mr Speaker has certified that clause 1 relates exclusively to England and Wales and is within devolved legislative competence. As the Bill has not been amended during Committee, there is no change to that certification The appropriate consent motion has been tabled. Does the Minister intend to move it?
Census (Return Particulars and Removal Of Penalties) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2019-10-07
Topic: Civil Rights
Kevin John Foster (Conservative, Centre-right): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time I thank all right hon. and hon. Members who have contributed to the debate. I am grateful for the support for the Bill, especially from the main Opposition parties, with which, as I touched on earlier, we have had some constructive discussions, not only on the Bill but on how the census can be taken forward to be the best it can be The 2021 census will provide decision makers and citizens with comprehensive data on our society. Getting the best information is essential to inform policy, planning and funding decisions across national and local public services. The Bill is simple: it provides that two questions —on sexual orientation and gender identity—could be asked in the census in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, on a voluntary basis. It does not mandate that those questions should be asked, but it does give the opportunity for them to be done on a voluntary basis. With that, I commend the Bill to the House.
Transport Sustainability — House of Commons, 2019-10-24
Topic: Mixed Topics
Grant Shapps (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Gentleman will be interested to know that just the other day I went to see the aircraft that is being developed at Cranfield University by Britten-Norman for electric flights in the highlands and islands. The day before yesterday I had a meeting about biofuels, which are very important for meeting our commitment to net zero emissions by 2050 in aviation.
Transport Sustainability — House of Commons, 2019-10-24
Topic: Mixed Topics
Grant Shapps (Conservative, Centre-right): The interesting thing about the countries the hon. Gentleman cites is that largely they do not produce cars. It is very, very easy if you are not a car manufacturer to introduce all sorts of measures that essentially mean that only electric cars will be favoured and sold. In this country, we have a big car manufacturing sector and we export 80% of the cars we produce. I am very anxious to move the sector to a faster timetable, but to protect jobs as well as the environment it is a question of doing that at a programmed pace. We have managed to do that so far.
HS2 — House of Commons, 2019-10-24
Topic: Other
Questions: What recent discussions he has had with Douglas Oakervee on potential alternative routes for High Speed Two phases 1 and 2a; and if he will make a statement.
Paul Christopher Maynard (Conservative, Centre-right): I have no doubt that Mr Oakervee is watching proceedings here carefully this morning to hear what colleagues have to say. That will be one of the issues that comes within his terms of reference and he will be reporting on.