argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Labor
Gavin Andrew Stuart Newlands (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): As usual in these debates, the hon. Gentleman makes a good point. I will outline how Scotland has a very forward-looking approach to manufacturing, particularly in the area in which Rolls-Royce operates, but he is right that when these types of jobs go, they rarely return. I shall elaborate on that later When the Minister responds, I hope he will give us a full update on the work that he and his colleagues have undertaken to save the jobs of not only my constituents but those at Rolls-Royce sites right throughout the country. There is no doubt that in the short term there is a period of great challenge—perhaps the greatest ever challenge—for Rolls-Royce and the entire aviation and aerospace sector, but given the history of excellence at Inchinnan, there is also no doubt that as the sector recovers over the coming months and years, there will be a customer base for its output, and Rolls-Royce will benefit from that The unions recognise that and want to help. From the start they have set things out clearly to their members and to management and asked how they think the short-term operation of the site can work so that it has a long-term future. Throughout the process, the unions have been pragmatic, serious and forward-thinking, looking for a way forward that supports their members and the company’s operations. Anyone who thinks that the unions at Inchinnan or anywhere else in the Rolls-Royce business are interested in anything other than the long-term future of production at the sites is living in a parallel universe.
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Labor
Patricia Gibson (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I thank my hon. Friend for giving way; I predict that he will continue to be generous with his time as we all seek to intervene on him. I appreciate that the focus of this debate is on Rolls-Royce, which is quite appropriate given that my hon. Friend has been leading on this issue as a constituency Member who faces a lot of redundancies in his constituency. I know he will agree with me, because he has done a lot of work on the fact that BA has also announced 12,000 redundancies, added to the 9,000 at Rolls-Royce and the terrible treatment of the workforce at BA. I know that my hon. Friend shares my concern that this is only the tip of the iceberg; is he, like me, hopeful that the Government will intervene? This is the tip of the iceberg and we are going to see tens of thousands more jobs lost across the whole aviation, travel, tourism and aerospace sector. Does he agree that we need urgent Government action right now?
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Transportation
Gavin Andrew Stuart Newlands (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I think I was told that I would agree with my hon. Friend, so I do agree with her—I agree completely with what she says. I will come on to discuss British Airways, so if anybody else has an intervention on British Airways, perhaps they should wait until that section of my speech .
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Transportation
Gavin Andrew Stuart Newlands (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The hon. Gentleman makes a strong point, and I could not agree with him more. We constantly hear Ministers, particularly from the Department for Transport, talk about things being "under review", but it has been four months now; we do not have time for further review. We need action, so I totally agree with the hon. Gentleman.
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Macroeconomics
David Melvyn Linden (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I am grateful to my friend for giving way. Although he is a friend of mine, I do wish to pay tribute to him for the amount of campaigning work he has done on this issue. A number of constituency Members throughout the country have a situation in which the local economy appears to be collapsing, and my hon. Friend has really led this charge, so I pay tribute to him for that I have constituents in Glasgow East who, like my hon. Friend’s constituents, work at the Inchinnan plant and are incredibly concerned about the situation. The Government have shown, whether through things like the furlough scheme or other aspects of how they have handled coronavirus, that they will intervene, and it is right that when they do things right we pay tribute to that. This is a Government who have in the past intervened, stood up and strongly signalled when they needed to see action, so may I say to the Minister and the Government , through my hon. Friend, that on this issue the Government need to speak up and reassure my constituents back home in Glasgow East that they are fighting to try to protect these jobs as much as possible?
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Labor
Alan Brown (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Obviously, we must focus on the long term, but there is an immediate and short-term issue. Does my hon. Friend share my concern that some companies seem to have rushed to make decisions on closures when the furlough scheme has been on the go and available for a while now? I have a company in Kilmarnock, Wabtec, which has announced it is closing its plant, ending railway works at the site after more than 100 years. It refuses to consider the furlough scheme, and I do not understand why. It seems to me that Rolls-Royce might be having the same knee-jerk reaction. It could utilise short-term support, then look at the long-term future and see whether it could get long-term Government support.
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Labor
Gavin Andrew Stuart Newlands (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): My hon. Friend makes a good point, but I would have preferred it if the Government had not signalled their intention to end the furlough scheme in October, because for many businesses, it will just push redundancies from earlier in the year to later. Perhaps the Government should look at extending it and phasing it out a bit more gradually than they have said. However, the scheme exists and is here until October, and too many businesses are not utilising the scheme to the maximum.
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Transportation
Gavin Andrew Stuart Newlands (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The hon. Gentleman makes a very good point. My constituency has Glasgow airport in it, so as he can imagine, there are many aviation jobs and a strong aerospace sector. We face a pretty tough time in the coming months.
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Labor
Gavin Andrew Stuart Newlands (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The hon. Gentleman makes a very strong point about the misuse, almost, of the furlough scheme. I know that this has drawn some criticism from Ministers, but if only they had listened at the start, because when they introduced the scheme, we all said that there are no protections in it for redundancies. Other countries have put in protections to stop this sort of behaviour, but the UK Government did not listen, and here we are with regard to British Airways.
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Labor
Christopher Charles Stephens (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I was pleased to co-sponsor my hon. Friend’s Bill yesterday. There is a wider point about redundancy, particularly as it relates to Rolls-Royce. We are seeing, far too many times, firms choosing to lay off UK workers because it is easier to lay off a worker, in terms of redundancy, in the UK than in other countries. For example, Germany has 120 days’ notice and there has to be a far tougher process. As we come out of lockdown, should not the UK Government be looking at and discussing the whole issue of redundancy when it comes to their legislation going forward?
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Labor
Patricia Gibson (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I thank my hon. Friend for giving way so frequently. This is a debate about Rolls-Royce, but is it not a concern that when bad practice is used for all to see, it emboldens other companies in bad behaviour? British Airways has set a bad example with its arrogant attitude to its employees, and it has always had terrible industrial relations. It fails to appreciate that the company is built on the back of the loyal workers; some have worked there for decades. In that context, we are all afraid of what might now happen with Rolls-Royce.
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Labor
Gavin Andrew Stuart Newlands (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I hear what the Minister says about liaising with Scottish Enterprise and so forth, and I am aware of the engagement that Rolls-Royce has had with Scottish Enterprise and the Scottish Government, but what are this Government doing, other than warm words with Scottish Enterprise? What are the Government doing to keep the jobs in this country?
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Macroeconomics
David Melvyn Linden (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I want to press the Minister further on the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands). The Minister speaks about dealing with Scottish Enterprise and officials in Scotland, but I am afraid that that sounds to me like looking at the impact of this and thinking about the pace and so forth. Every time I visit a Government Department there are posters up all over the place saying "Britain is GREAT", "Britain is open", and "Britain is great for manufacturing". The Minister mentioned that the Secretary of State had a conversation with Rolls-Royce on 18 May; has the Secretary of State picked up the phone to Rolls-Royce since then, or is it the UK Government’s view that it is just inevitable that this is going to happen, and in fact Britain is not open and Britain is not good for manufacturing? That is the message that I am getting at the moment.
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Transportation
Patricia Gibson (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I am very interested in what the Minister has just said about looking at ways to facilitate an improvement and an increase in air travel given the crisis we have just gone through. Does he agree with me and probably all his own Back Benchers that not having the quarantine, which has been brought in with no real medical evidence to support it at this late stage in the game, would help, and that to impose it will in effect deliver a hammer blow to some of the industries that he says he is trying to help?
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Energy
Alan Brown (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I thank the Minister for giving in and giving way. Let us go back to the welcome support he outlined, which he is saying the Government are putting in for the future of aviation and cutting-edge technology, and being ahead of the world. If the UK is going to be so far ahead of the world and the Government are providing all that long-term certainty, can he explain why Rolls-Royce is still laying off so many workers in the UK? That still does not square. Let us go back to back the earlier intervention about small modular reactors. This is an unproven technology and good money is being thrown after bad. If we are looking at diversification, should it not be into green renewable energy? Should we not be looking to throw money into this in that way, to help sectors diversify, instead of looking at more nuclear energy?
Covid-19: R Rate and Lockdown Measures — House of Commons, 2020-06-08
Topic: Macroeconomics
Richard Gordon Thomson (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): We know that the Secretary of State does not want to see the R rate rise above 1—none of us does—but the high-profile recent mixed messages that have come from his Government might well lead to that happening anyway. In those circumstances, is he prepared, if necessary, to reintroduce restrictions on movement and activity, and will he do whatever it takes to persuade the Chancellor to continue with financial support to the employed and self-employed for so long as it is necessary?
Covid-19: R Rate and Lockdown Measures — House of Commons, 2020-06-08
Topic: Macroeconomics
Stephen Mark Flynn (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): We have already heard about the good news from Scotland, where we have gone two days without a death, but we do need to be careful and also mindful of the fact that the R rate may increase in the future; indeed, others in the Chamber have concerns for their areas. Can the Secretary of State give a commitment that if the R rate does rise and the lockdown needs to be reimplemented, he will make every effort to ensure that the Chancellor makes sure that businesses, employees and the self-employed receive the financial support they deserve?
Public Order — House of Commons, 2020-06-08
Topic: Law and Crime
Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Many Elizabethan British heroes used violence to enhance their wealth. Does the Home Secretary agree that violence is never part of the solution, but if we can educate our citizens in where we have been, what we have done and to whom, that will provide the basis for an equal and humane society?
House Business during the Pandemic — House of Commons, 2020-06-08
Topic: Labor
Christopher Charles Stephens (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The Leader of the House talks at great length about responsibilities. As Members of this House, we have responsibilities also to those who are employed here and work in this building, so why are the trade unions so concerned about some of these arrangements and deem this place an unsafe workplace?
Strategic Defence Review: Timescale — House of Commons, 2020-11-02
Topic: Energy
Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Ahead of Remembrance Sunday at the end of the week, we wish well all of those organising events in a different fashion. The day does not lose its meaning at all On the integrated review, I am sure that the Secretary of State is more frustrated than most. As an avid reader of National Audit Office reports, he will know that pushing spending to the right will ultimately leave him with less money to spend. A multi-year settlement, as long advocated by SNP Members, would allow future-proofed planning. Can he tell us what the consequences of the postponement are for the future nuclear warheads system and, in particular, the W93?
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-02
Topic: Labor
Ian Blackford (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): It is right that the UK Government extend furlough as a consequence of new lockdown measures; it is right that economic support is put in place when Governments restrain work opportunities as a consequence of the health measures; and it is right that flexibility to take necessary financial decisions is also held by the devolved Administrations when they are taking lockdown decisions. That is why, since the start of September, I have asked the Prime Minister on no fewer than six separate occasions to extend the furlough scheme—yet every time the Prime Minister rejected that call This weekend’s last-minute U-turn on furlough has finally buried the nonsense of a Union of equals. People across these islands saw exactly what happened at the weekend: a mini-extension to furlough was granted only at the 11th hour when one part of the United Kingdom needed it. This is a democratic disgrace. The Prime Minister acted only when England needed support; when Scotland needed full furlough support, Westminster said no For many, this U-turn is already far too late. Thousands have already lost their jobs unnecessarily. Many good businesses have gone under and millions of the self-employed are still excluded Today I have one very direct question for the Prime Minister: if requested by the devolved Governments, particularly if they need to put in place additional lockdown measures, will the Prime Minister guarantee that the Treasury will make 80% furlough payments available when Scottish, Welsh or Northern Irish workers or businesses need them over the coming months? It is a simple question, Prime Minister. For once, give us a straight answer to a question which the people of Scotland want to know. No more ducking and diving—is it yes or no?
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-02
Topic: Labor
Patrick John Grady (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The Prime Minister’s furlough is in place until December; the German equivalent is in place until December 2021. That is the kind of certainty that employers and employees in Glasgow North are looking for. He said that the furlough scheme is UK-wide, so does that mean that, if parts of the United Kingdom are still in a lockdown beyond December, devolved Administrations will have the resources they need to extend the 80% furlough?
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-02
Topic: Government Operations
Richard Gordon Thomson (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): It was reported at the weekend that the chair of the UK Government’s vaccine taskforce showed official sensitive Government documents to an event for US venture capitalists—a move that a former chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life described as "seriously ill-advised". With jobs being awarded, even in the midst of a pandemic, without recourse to the approved recruitment processes, and billions of pounds of public procurement being awarded without going through open processes, what steps does the Prime Minister plan to take to restore public confidence in the competence and probity of his Government, and to help to reassure people that there is not a cronyvirus at the heart of his Government that requires eradication every bit as much as the coronavirus outside of it?
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-02
Topic: Labor
Peter Wishart (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I think I just heard the Prime Minister confirm to the hon. Member for Moray (Douglas Ross) that if the Scottish Government require furlough funds beyond 2 December, those will be available to Scotland. Can he now get to his feet and confirm that that is what he said and that that is what he meant?
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-11-02
Topic: Labor
Steven Bonnar (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The Scottish Government have repeatedly called for months for an extension to the furlough scheme. However, such calls were completely ignored, with the uncertainty resulting in the loss of many jobs here in Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill. He may not wish to think it, but that is the reality of this Prime Minister’s governance. It is lost on absolutely nobody that the Prime Minister refused to extend furlough until the 11th hour, and only did so when the situation in the south of England ran out of control. At the risk of seeming disbelieving, I must ask him to confirm his U-turn: does the Prime Minister now fully commit to an extension of the furlough scheme available across all nations of the UK on a when-required basis to protect further against otherwise preventable job losses in Scotland and elsewhere?
Trade Agreements: Food and Farming Standards — House of Commons, 2020-11-19
Topic: Foreign Trade
Stewart Hosie (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): After listening to these Whips’ questions, I think I would like some English wine as well, Mr Speaker I had a long and detailed discussion with NFU Scotland on Monday. In its words, it is "really worried" about future trade deals. Fundamentally, the UK is a high cost, high food standard regime. It argues that it simply cannot compete with low-cost competition with lower food standards elsewhere. Is it not now time for the Government to change tack, and include chapters on food, animal welfare and standards in trade agreements?
Trade Agreements: Food and Farming Standards — House of Commons, 2020-11-19
Topic: Agriculture
Stewart Hosie (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Putting an organisation on a statutory footing is one thing, but protecting food standards is something different. I think the Minister’s answer is what Americans call doubling down on a previous mistake. Let me give an example. UK egg producers simply cannot compete with imported eggs produced where the density of laying hens may be twice that permitted in the United Kingdom. The only way they could do that would be to massively lower food production and animal welfare standards, something we know from the recent Which? survey the public are implacably opposed to. Is it really the Government’s intention to be on the wrong side of food standards, the wrong side of animal welfare, the wrong side of the farming industry and the wrong side of public opinion?
Trade Agreements: Food and Farming Standards — House of Commons, 2020-11-19
Topic: Foreign Trade
Angus Brendan MacNeil (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): A very good morning to you, Mr Speaker, on the day you have been waiting for: the day of the first report on the UK-Japan comprehensive economic partnership agreement from my Committee. I am sure that you are looking forward to reading it. Indeed, we are hoping to have a debate in your Chamber, Sir, before the end of the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act process—just to let you know On food and farm standards, yesterday we heard from Tony Abbott, the former Australian Prime Minister and now adviser to the Board of Trade, who said that when he had an important deal to do with China, he took the state premiers of Australia with him. I wonder whether the Ministers at the Department for International Trade will consider doing the same for important trade agreements, taking the Welsh Minister, Jeremy Miles, the Northern Irish Minister, Diane Dodds, and the high-flying Scottish Minister, Ivan McKee, who might indeed be leader of the Scottish National party and First Minister one day. We need that to happen given that the UK Government are ready to burn particular sheep farming in Wales and Scotland by being outside the 45% tariffs. It is not just our standards, but the standards of our neighbours that are really going to matter for farming.
Business Exports: Administrative Burden — House of Commons, 2020-11-19
Topic: Foreign Trade
Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Around 250,000 businesses export to the EU and not to the rest of the world. Many of them are small, not VAT-registered and difficult to reach, and to continue to trade they will need to go through a long and tedious process to acquire an economic operator registration and identification number. As the party that wants to reduce red tape, what action are the Government taking to reduce the administrative burden to ensure that SMEs can continue, or start, to export into Europe but do not suffer disproportionately from a madcap Brexit?
Business Exports: Administrative Burden — House of Commons, 2020-11-19
Topic: Transportation
Martyn Day (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): Rod McKenzie, the Road Haulage Association’s policy director, gave evidence to the Scottish Parliament in which he highlighted a no-deal Brexit scenario in which lorry drivers would be forced to rely on European Conference of Ministers of Transport permits, of which the UK has been allocated around 4,000, despite more than 40,000 being required. In effect, that would stop the best part of 90% of companies trading with Europe. What assurances can the Minister give today that traders and hauliers will experience minimal disruption?