argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Equitable Life — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Macroeconomics
Peter Heaton-Jones (Conservative, Centre-right): I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) on securing this incredibly important debate. In common with Members on both sides of the House, I have received a considerable amount of correspondence on the issue and met people in my surgeries who have been affected by it Other Members have mentioned this, but I want to pay particular tribute to the Equitable Members Action Group, which has done extraordinary work to highlight the issue and to represent members who have suffered as a result of the unfairness. The group members are persistent, dogged and effective campaigners and lobbyists. I have had the pleasure of meeting the EMAG chairman who covers the whole of the south-west. He is an extraordinarily effective campaigner As many Members have said, this is an issue of fairness. Policyholders who were doing the right thing and saving for the future have found themselves in an awful position. We need to take account of that. They have our sympathy, without doubt. Whatever solution we find, however, we also have to keep it in mind that we need to be fair to taxpayers as a whole. Although £2.6 billion is a considerable amount of money that would plug the gap and ensure that those who lost out are compensated in full for their losses, it does, none the less, place a burden—it is a big ask—on the taxpayer and the Treasury to find it. We need to be aware of that I am glad that the Treasury has responded to a number of letters from me. There has been a considerable amount of correspondence back and forth. I am particularly happy to have received a letter from a Treasury Minister, which addresses the need and, indeed, the desire to keep the matter under review. As my hon. Friend the Member for Tewkesbury (Mr Robertson) says, time is short, so I urge the Treasury not only to keep the matter under review, but to bear it in mind that, sadly, the passage of time means that it needs to be addressed quickly. The letter, which I received in response to a letter I wrote on behalf of the chairman of EMAG in the south-west, makes it clear that the Treasury welcomes submissions and ideas for my right hon. Friend the Chancellor to include in the Budget statement. I am sure that the Treasury is taking account of all those submissions It is worth bearing in mind that the Chancellor has already announced—and I am sure he will announce more—extremely welcome changes and reforms to the pension system. I hope we can look at the issue as part of that wider package of reforms.
Equitable Life — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Labor
Thomas Georg John Tugendhat (Conservative, Centre-right): As the Treasury looks at that wider package, may I urge it to ensure that helping the EMAG pensioners is very much part of setting the conditions for other people to save? If people feel that their savings will go unrewarded, that undermines the tone that the Chancellor and the Economic Secretary have rightly set in the various pension arrangements they have made, helping people to realise that pensions are worthwhile and will help them in the future.
Equitable Life — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Labor
Peter Heaton-Jones (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend makes a very good point. That is, indeed, the tone of the pension package reforms that the Chancellor and the Treasury have made and will continue to introduce. The Equitable Life policyholders need to be part of that wider package.
Equitable Life — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Macroeconomics
Peter Heaton-Jones (Conservative, Centre-right): I entirely agree. The Government have done a great deal to support savers and to support and encourage those who invest for the future, and have done a great deal for pensioners as well. That is undeniable. I hope that, as part of the package, there will be some movement on the issue, and that it will be kept under careful consideration The letter that the Treasury Minister wrote to me in response to the letter that I wrote on behalf of the EMAG representatives in my constituency contains the welcome information that she is open to submissions in relation to the Budget. She also points out that the Parliamentary Ombudsman’s report was published in 2008, and that—as we heard from the hon. Member for Angus (Mike Weir)—it is only since the Conservative-led coalition Government came to office in 2010 that any compensation has been paid. It is important to remember that this Government started the ball rolling.
Equitable Life — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Labor
Crispin Jeremy Rupert Blunt (Conservative, Centre-right): May I briefly make the point that there is a taxpayer interest here? If the savings culture is undermined, the taxpayers’ interests are absolutely at stake. We need people to invest in pensions to ensure that they are not dependent on the taxpayer in their retirement.
Equitable Life — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Macroeconomics
Huw William Merriman (Conservative, Centre-right): I was elected on the basis that there would indeed be a budget surplus. I think that it would be wrong of me to stand up and try to proclaim—this was mentioned earlier—that £2.6 billion could be found down the back of the sofa. If only it were that easy. I also believe in being direct and straight with my constituents, and I hope that the hon. Gentleman thinks that I am doing so now I support the Government in their approach to this difficult issue. Let me end by asking the Minister, on behalf of my constituents, whether the funding of the scheme is indeed final for this term, and whether the use of the Scottish Widows policy benchmark was justifiable.
Equitable Life — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Labor
Kevin John Foster (Conservative, Centre-right): Does the hon. Gentleman agree that this is partly about building intergenerational confidence? We want people to start saving for pensions in their late 20s and their 30s. They need to have confidence that that money will still be there in a pot in future, and that there is a proper system of regulation. This is about building confidence for those who will save in future, and not just about the Equitable Life policyholders who have been affected in this instance.
Equitable Life — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Macroeconomics
Damian Patrick George Hinds (Conservative, Centre-right): I will have to disappoint my hon. Friend, because the public finances remain in a very difficult state. Although the economy and our public finances have improved compared with where they were, money is still extremely tight We established a set of rules for the payments, based on the Government’s full acceptance of the parliamentary ombudsman’s findings. The scheme was based on the assumption that all policyholders considered the incorrect regulatory returns when making their investment and would have decided not to invest in Equitable Life had those returns been correct. Obviously, those are quite conservative assumptions. The Government used the ombudsman’s findings to calculate the resulting individual loss by assessing the Equitable Life returns against those of comparator companies. That led to an assessment of the loss from Government maladministration of £4.1 billion Despite the constraints facing the public purse, the 2010 spending review announced that up to £1.5 billion would be made available for payment to eligible policyholders. Out of that sum, following consultation, we decided to pay the with-profits, or trapped, annuitants in full. As a result, this group of policyholders will receive an annual payment for life, and the actuarial assessment of those payments is that the Government will be making payments to this group well into the next decade and probably beyond The total cost of those payments is assessed to be around £625 million—though that is dependent on how long policyholders live. Importantly, the £100 million contingency fund, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East referred, is an accounting provision to provide a safety net in case the annuitants live longer than the central forecast. The remaining £775 million of available funding was distributed pro-rata to other policyholders on the advice of an independent commission, and that resulted in a figure of 22.4 pence in the pound of their relative loss Of course I know that that was deeply disappointing to many, but these were difficult decisions that were taken in the light of the position of the public finances. As I said just now in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Mr Walker), public finances remain in a very difficult position, and we have to take decisions in the interests of overall fairness to all taxpayers.
Equitable Life — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Government Operations
Damian Patrick George Hinds (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Lady’s definition of "on that very point" has a degree of elastic in it The motion notes that the ombudsman recommended in her report that policyholders should be put back in the position that they would have been in, had Government maladministration not occurred. What the ombudsman went on to say just after this recommendation, however, is that it was appropriate also to take into account the impact on the public purse when considering the funding of payments.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): I beg to move, That this House believes that the recent EU restrictions on recreational sea bass fishing are unfair and fail to address the real threat to the future viability of UK sea bass stocks; and calls on the Government to make representations within the Council of the EU on the reconsideration of the imposition of those restrictions I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting this very important debate. Let me place my cards firmly on the table: I am a recreational angler, and a very passionate one. I have cast from many a beach in Cornwall. I have fished with plugs and lures from rigid-hulled inflatable boats. I have regularly fished and ledgered on the Camel estuary and taken great pleasure in digging my own lugworms—big long trenches of lugworms—and ragworms. It is great to be on the coast looking out over Daymer bay and Padstow with the sun going down, the tide coming in and the lines dipping into the sea, waiting for that bite.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): That is a shameless plug, but it is a fantastic fishing shop, I have to say. The chap there has some very good fishing rods and tackle that can be purchased at very reasonable rates I have set the scene for my fishing expeditions on the Camel. However, the situation this year is very different from that in previous years. For the first six months of this year, if I, as a recreational angler, caught a bass that was of legal size, I would not be allowed to keep it—I would have return it to the estuary—yet a commercial fishing boat that was netting on the estuary would be able to claim that fish and take it for the table.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): I will come on to some of the different elements of the fishing industry when I talk about the Cornwall inshore fisheries and conservation authority I am here today not just to speak for myself as a recreational angler but to speak up for the 900,000 recreational sea anglers in the UK. There are many parts of the fishing industry, as my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray) pointed out. When I served on the Cornwall sea fisheries committee, we saw people with beam trawlers, people from the under-10-metre fleet, rod-and-line anglers, and many others who made a living out of fishing. There needs to be a properly managed inshore fleet so that we can have a sustainable future for our fishing industry.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Timothy Paul Loughton (Conservative, Centre-right): As another MP with a coastline, may I ask my hon. Friend to acknowledge that not only are some 10,400 jobs dependent on sea angling, but there is a whole lot of leisure industry business that supports sea anglers—accommodation and everything else—with sea bass fishing being, of course, the most popular form of sea angling? An enormous business worth over £1.2 billion, it is estimated, lies behind this.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend makes an exceptionally good point, and I fully agree. I will go on to talk about some of the tourism benefits. We have seen some great uplifts in places such as Ireland and the USA, where there have been big recreational fisheries for a long time The crux of my argument is that it is grossly unfair to penalise rod-and-line anglers for the first six months of the year while commercial boats are allowed to operate in that period.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): I agree with my hon. Friend that it is important to have data. The issue is that the data recently presented to the EU show that the bass fishery is in decline and needs to be managed effectively.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Gentleman is correct. I believe that Ireland relies solely on the recreational sector, but that has been of huge benefit to the tourism industry. In the spirit of the Opposition, I will read not from Jeff or Rosie but from Paul. Paul is a sea angler in north Cornwall who wrote to me: "After enjoying free and unfettered access to the inshore bass fishery for countless generations, it is understandable that many anglers feel aggrieved that they are suddenly having the right to take fish for the table so severely limited that in effect for many it will equate to zero What is not in doubt is that bass stocks are in serious decline and most anglers agree that steps should be taken to…reverse this situation. Despite the assertion that the cause of the decline has little or nothing to do with angling pressure, most anglers are content to accept reasonable reductions in the number of fish they can retain. Hence the widespread, uncomplaining acceptance of the three fish ‘bag limit’ introduced for recreational sea anglers in September 2015 However, within the RSA community it was naively believed that the commercial sector would have been asked to make similar reductions in catch effort. No such drastic reduction in commercial effort was achieved. At this stage, many RSAs were both angry and perplexed"—
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): I am aware of those regulations, but I am also aware that gillnetting and commercial fishing are still permitted in bass nursery areas Paul continued in his letter: "The results of the negotiations are well known and in effect fall a long way short of the scientific recommendation…We call for an immediate review of the regulations in respect of the daily ‘bag limit’ for RSAs and a prompt correction of ill-judged legislation. It belies the intelligence of the EU commissioners not to recognise how illogical the rule is in its present form."
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): I was not aware of that, and I thank the hon. Lady for making those points. I want to talk about some of the EU changes. I welcome the ban on French pair trawlers between January and April. They account for about a third of the bass taken in British waters, and many of the bass that they catch are spawning fish. Taking large spawning fish out of the ecosystem means there are no smaller fish to grow and become bigger fish. In the EU changes, we should be talking about reclaiming our territorial waters. The EU holds the common fisheries policy up as a shining example of joined-up thinking, but I am yet to find a commercial fisherman or a recreational sea angler who believes that the CFP is a good thing.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): I will try to check out that column in The Times. It is not my regular newspaper—I normally read The Telegraph and The Sun—but I will go back and check it. Such agreements may be fine in other waters, but we should have an understanding that our territorial waters inside the 6-mile limit should be protected for our fisheries and our people.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Christopher Robert Chope (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend is making a splendid speech, which I know will be much supported by Christchurch fishermen. Does he agree that Iceland decided to take control of its own fisheries and that those fisheries are a fantastic success?
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. I recently read a book about the Bering sea and the mass stocks that it used to have. No fishery can be managed properly unless it is looked after effectively. We used to see huge shoals and salmon and sea trout regularly running the Camel, but such stocks no longer materialise.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): If our fishing boats have to go outside the 6-mile limit to catch fish, that surely shows that the fish are not actually within that limit and that fish stocks have been depleted over the years Recreational sea anglers fully accept that fishery resources are finite and that there should be controls on their activities—minimum landing sizes, bag limits, seasonal closures—to protect this public resource from over-exploitation. The Council of Minister’s recent decision to prevent recreational fishers from taking any bass for the first six months of 2016, while sanctioning commercial fishing for bass for the first four months, is irrational. The decision is a symptom of a fisheries management regime that is broken and a common fisheries policy that is unfit for purpose. The EU has displayed utter contempt for our recreational sea anglers and those whose livelihoods depend on recreational sea angling.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Huw William Merriman (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank my hon. Friend for securing this debate. Does he agree that, as those of us with coastal constituencies know, there is real anger about this interference? Does he also agree that we need to send a message from this House that we want locally line-caught sea bass back on our menus?
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Kevin John Foster (Conservative, Centre-right): I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. Does he agree that we must consider not just the direct value of angling, but the wider impact on the economy? For example, those who come to Torbay for the sea angling will not only stay in a hotel, but buy a scone done in the correct way.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank my hon. Friend for making that point I will give two accounts from different parts of the sector before I wind up. The first is from a tour guide in the west country, who writes: "About to start the new fishing season with a great deal of concern and trepidation for the future of recreational angling and how it may affect my business. Prior to the new rulings regarding Bass, I had a full diary for the year ahead, due to the uncertainty of our weather patterns in this country, this has proved to be an economic necessity as we lose so many days Now I find myself shielding daily emails from booked customers asking if the new rulings will apply to them, and would I consider turning a blind eye to the odd fish for the table as opposed to a cancellation!!!!" I do not want anglers to be criminalised—that seems ridiculous. He continues: "I consider myself as indeed are most of my customers to be conservation minded, but find these new rulings to be extremely harsh, especially when you consider that commercial fishing with rod and line and indeed netting will be allowed to continue within my ‘low pressure sector’. It is highly possible that I will be forcing anglers to return a fish right in front of a commercial line drifter", which could then keep the fish that has been returned. He went on: "There is also the wider picture to consider, local cafes, tackle shops, bed and breakfasts" and all the people who rely on that sector TV fisherman and bass guide Henry Gilbey—one of my personal favourite fishermen—stated: "I am a full time fishing writer and photographer with a ridiculous obsession for bass fishing. I live within walking distance of the sea in south east Cornwall yet I spend more than two months each year in Ireland. Why? Because the bass fishing is better. I run guided bass fishing trips and I need as many photographs of bass fishing as I can get, and I would love to be promoting bass fishing in Cornwall. But I can’t. My local bass fishing isn’t good enough. The fact is that to access really good bass fishing I need to travel away from my home in Cornwall and help promote Ireland as a sport fishing destination. We could have bass fishing like they have in Ireland though…but we don’t. We need more and bigger bass for anglers to catch, and this can only come about via better management of the stocks. Bass are the king of our saltwater species and anglers want to catch them." They are simply being denied.
Recreational Sea Bass Fishing — House of Commons, 2016-02-11
Topic: Agriculture
Scott Leslie Mann (Conservative, Centre-right): I will not give way because I want to make progress To conclude I will quote from John Buchan who said: "The charm of fishing is that it is the pursuit of what is elusive but attainable, a perpetual series of occasions for hope." I do not want to take that hope away from our recreational sea angling community, and I urge the Government to do a few things. First, will they review this decision and reverse the unnecessary catch-and-release policy for recreational sea anglers? Will DEFRA consider making a study of how much benefit rod-and-line angling produces for British tourism industries, and will it consider a complete ban of gillnetting in bass nursery areas? I look forward to hearing the views of other hon. Members, and I hope to sum up the debate at the end.