argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Engagements — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Civil Rights
Questions: Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that legislation to establish a tough independent regulator of internet companies empowered to challenge the automatic right to anonymity online should be a priority for the Queen’s Speech?; On Saturday, I was out knocking on doors with my listening team, listening to the views of local people, as we do every week. The message to me, whether they were leave or remain voters, was crystal clear: get Brexit done by 31 October. Deputy Prime Minister, can you reassure my constituents that we will leave the European Union by the end of this month, come what may, no ifs, no buts?; Housing, I believe, is the first of the social services; without it, we cannot have education, productivity or health. The NHS has a diagnosis code for inadequate housing. The Department of Health wrote to me saying that poor housing costs the NHS £1.4 billion a year, but that figure is now four years old. Will the Secretary of State ensure that the Department of Health writes to me with the most up-to-date figures and places that information in the Library?; The Government update of the national planning policy framework published in July 2018 changed the policy we have had for generations of not building on the green belt. The policy now allows future development to be considered. Local planning authorities are coming under great pressure from developers who do not want to spend money to improve brownfield sites. Unspoilt areas such as the Seven Cornfields on the edge of my constituency are now under threat from inappropriate development by house builders who put profit above all else. We should not be building on such sites, especially at a time of concern for the environment. I ask the Prime Minister to review the green belt policy to protect areas such as the Seven Cornfields from developers.; On Monday, my constituent Richard should have been paid. It was the first time in his life that he was not. Richard, like many others whom I met with his union, Unite, was a dedicated employee of Thomas Cook. Given that the warning signs were there for months, if not years, will the Government use the extra parliamentary time that we now have to bring forward emergency legislation to stop a further airline collapse? Will the Government pledge now to expedite Richard’s redundancy pay and to recoup the millions taken by the directors in the past few months?; Can the First Secretary of State set out clearly and unambiguously for this House in what circumstances the Prime Minister will write to the EU Council President, as set out in the terms of the Benn Act?
Shailesh Lakhman Vara (Conservative, Centre-right): May I join in the tributes paid earlier to the right hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) for her historic achievement today Today marks the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi. Does my right hon. Friend agree with me that Gandhi’s message of non-violence, religious tolerance and greater rights for women is as applicable today as it was in his lifetime?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I would have thought it the normal course of events to proceed with the ten-minute rule motion, but if colleagues particularly want to raise their points of order now, a simple nod of the head in acquiescence in such an arrangement and empathy with it will suffice. Not surprisingly, the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards), who is invariably of an amiable disposition, seems content that we proceed in that way. We will come to the hon. Gentleman erelong, but first of all I believe there is a very important point of order from the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy).
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Civil Rights
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the hon. Lady for her point of order. At the outset, I know she will understand if I say that in respect of some of the other matters to do with tax treatment and funding that she mentioned, I cannot comment. It is perfectly reasonable for the hon. Lady to set out those matters, but they do not require a response from me and it would not in any way be authoritative However, as far as what I regard as her major point is concerned, I will be absolutely explicit in my response. I believe that campaigning of that kind, with the intensity involved and the explicit public threat, to its apparently endless continuation, is vile, unconscionable and despicable. There is a major difference—it is important that we should be clear about this—between putting a point of view with considerable force and insistence on the matter of abortion or any other matter of public dispute and putting it in extreme and provocative terms, and in doing so saying, "We will go on doing so until you stop exercising your right as a Member of Parliament to campaign for what you want. Give in to our intimidation, our threats and our bullying, or it will be the worse for you." That to me, colleagues—I hope that I carry the support of the majority of the House in saying this—is rank, unacceptable and displays, if I may say so, and I will, an absence of any moral compass. Anybody who thinks seriously about these matters cannot seriously think that that is right. It would be wrong in any case, but for the hon. Lady to be subject to that treatment when she herself is pregnant, and those intimidating and harassing her, ultimately unsuccessfully, know that to be so, is double appalling. With reference to what the hon. Lady said—and it is a challenge, which I take in good part—about thus far an absence of support from the House authorities, I am very disappointed to learn of that. I cannot comment on the particulars. What I do undertake to do is to meet the hon. Lady within 24 hours, if she wishes to meet me, and I will, as appropriate, be accompanied by people in this House who are best placed to advise. I am delighted that the Mayor of London and his team are supporting her, but she is entitled to proper and unstinting support from the House authorities. If she feels that that is not the case and there is more that we can do, or there are things that we have not done at all that we should be doing, I am determined that she should get that help The hon. Lady is respected across this House as an extremely dedicated, articulate and principled campaigner for her causes. Nothing on earth can be allowed to prevent her from continuing in that vein. Although it is not a matter of order within the Chamber, it is right that she should seek the support of Parliament’s spokesperson, as she wants to reinforce her right to go about her business in a legitimate way. She has that right, and I stand absolutely with her in insisting on the continued exercise of that right.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Centre-right): Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Having discussed this matter just this morning with the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy), may I say that the Government are similarly concerned about the nature of the campaign against her? Indeed, my hon. Friend the Financial Secretary to the Treasury has already communicated her concerns to his Department, and my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has already offered to meet the hon. Lady. We take these allegations very seriously, and we will see what can be done.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I hope that those replies will do for now, but let us get together, as I have suggested, and no doubt the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) will want to meet the Minister at the appropriate time.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Civil Rights
Maria Colette Caulfield (Conservative, Centre-right): Further to the point of order from the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy), Mr Speaker. As someone who sits on the opposite side of the abortion debate, may I express my solidarity with the hon. Lady? The abuse and the billboards do nothing to further the debate. Abortion is a very personal issue. We should use this place as a forum for debate, but should do so in a constructive, collaborative manner. Let me echo the point that those people do not speak for all of us who may have a different view.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I hope that colleagues will agree that that was a very welcome point of order from the hon. Lady, and I think that I speak on the House’s behalf when I thank her for saying what she has said I think there was another point of order from the hon. Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner), on a wholly unrelated subject.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I do not treat what the hon. Gentleman has said with any levity when I say that conflicting accounts of a Government’s position on a given subject are not a novel phenomenon. There have been many precedents, under successive Governments and in relation to a plethora of different Departments, sometimes including No. 10 Downing Street itself. I do not sniff or cavil at what the hon. Gentleman has said about the apparent inconsistency that perturbs him, and I am grateful to him for giving me notice that he would raise the matter. However, I do not think that this is a point of order. The hon. Gentleman is seeking procedural advice By the way, when I say that this is not a point of order, I say it for the purpose of the intelligibility of our proceedings to people observing them. The great majority of points of order are not points of order. They are ruses by which to raise matters that are of particular concern to Members at the time—in the most recent instance, the point of order from the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy), quite the most compelling and pressing case to raise As far as the hon. Gentleman is concerned, I think that he should work on this basis. If he wishes to pursue what he sees as a potentially or actually inaccurate parliamentary answer, he should take the short journey from here to the Table Office and seek advice on how to pursue it. I hope that he will forgive me if I say that, in doing so, he should adopt my—I think—now established motto in these matters by way of advice: persist, persist, persist. I say this to the hon. Gentleman. Table further questions. Do not take no for an answer. Write letters. In a legitimate, as opposed to an illegitimate, way, make a nuisance of yourself, man If there are no further points of order, we come now to the ten-minute rule motion, for which the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr has been so patiently and good-naturedly waiting.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I will call the Secretary of State for Justice in a moment to move the motion, but before I do so, and in recognition of the fact that there are no time limits on Front-Bench speeches, I will tell the House that more than 40 right hon. and hon. Members are seeking to catch the eye of the Chair. I know that colleagues will want sensitively to take account of that in framing their contributions.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
Robert James Buckland (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the hon. Lady for raising that issue, and the Bill provides an opportunity to delve into it. It is important that we outline those principles on Second Reading. In Committee, we will have an opportunity to debate the detail. I am particularly interested in the points that she made. I want to make the Bill as good as possible, and I need the help not just of colleagues in government but of all hon. Members to do that.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Mixed Topics
Robert James Buckland (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the right hon. Lady. On her second point, I will meet her. On her first point, the important thing is what we do to embed the legislation, and that has to be by way of further training and seeing the operational effect of the strategy we set out and the direction that the primary legislation takes.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Immigration
Robert James Buckland (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful for the hon. Lady’s persistence, because it has resulted in an important point. I assure her that the review is not just an internal review; it involves the sort of agencies that she and I would want to be involved. Not only the review, but this Bill and the debates we can have in Committee can help us to get to a situation where we are providing the appropriate support for all victims, including migrant women. I thank her for her intervention.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Mixed Topics
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I am extremely grateful to the hon. Lady, as the House will be, for being commendably succinct. Momentarily, a 10-minute limit will begin on Back-Bench speeches, and the right hon. Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley) will be the next speaker. However, just before I call her to contribute, I think that the House will be interested to know what I have just been advised by the Minister on the Treasury Bench; namely, that the designate Domestic Abuse Commissioner, Nicole Jacobs, is observing our proceedings today. Welcome to the House. We very much appreciate your interest in the legislation from which we hope will flow your very important responsibilities. [Hon. Members: "Hear, hear."]
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the hon. Lady for that speech, which was simultaneously as horrifying and as moving a contribution in the Chamber as I have heard in my 22 years of membership of the House. Thank you.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): I am extremely grateful to the hon. Lady, and I think the whole House will be, both for what she said and for the extraordinarily sympathetic and empathetic manner in which she said it. I knew she would do that, which is why I called her We will have one speech lasting six minutes by the Mother of the House, Harriet Harman.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Civil Rights
Maria Frances Lewis Miller (Conservative, Centre-right): It is a great pleasure to follow the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman). I thank her for the evidence that she gave the Joint Committee, as it helped our deliberations. I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for Canterbury (Rosie Duffield), who had enormous strength to come to the Chamber to share such a personal story. I am sure that she will take strength from the fact that those who have heard her will feel more empowered to act to put themselves into a safe position. She and I have campaigned a great deal for a number of years to get more women into the House, and I count myself lucky to have worked alongside her, given the strength and courage that she has shown today. I commend my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), because without her I am not sure that we would be here today. She had the vision to pull the Bill together and, along with Ministers on the Front Bench, to create an opportunity for a step change in the national response to this issue. I was privileged to chair the Joint Committee on the draft Bill, and I thank Members both here and in the other place who gave so much of their time, those who gave evidence and related their personal experiences and, above all, the staff of the House, who gave us the most extraordinary professional service This is an incredibly important Bill, but I would like to make a couple of points. First, the Government need to make clear what the Bill deals with. They have tabled some amendments and promised others, but I am not sure that the Bill is in its final format regarding what the Government want to do. The Minister might want to make sure that Members of both Houses are thoroughly briefed on the final Bill, including all amendments, before Report. This is an important Bill, but the Government introduced amendments midway through our deliberations with regard to the statutory duty on local authorities to provide refuge places. The consultation still needs to report, so perhaps the Minister will confirm that she will ensure that the House is fully briefed before Report Secondly, I make a plea not to Ministers but to colleagues. Members need to resist the temptation to use the Bill to remedy all the issues, concerns, and campaigns in recent years to do with domestic abuse. Some of them have been quite open about their wish to include abortion reform in the Bill, and while there is clearly a strong case for reform, with which I would agree, this is not the place to do it. I do not believe that we have the time in this Parliament to give that issue the attention that it demands. My plea is for a separate Bill, sponsored by a Back-Bench MP in the usual way, to deal with that, and to deal with it swiftly.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
Maria Frances Lewis Miller (Conservative, Centre-right): I have a huge amount of respect for the hon. Lady, but we run the risk of derailing a Bill that is long overdue. I urge people to have some sense of restraint on what we might do to amend it.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Civil Rights
John Henry Hayes (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend is making a valid point about the breadth of this issue and the need for Departments to co-operate. One of the most disturbing cases ever brought to my surgery—we all know how disturbing surgery cases can be—was that of a disabled man whom I had known in a different context as a cheerful, light-hearted person but who had been abused for years by his wife, who was of course much stronger and more powerful than him. Disabled people and other vulnerable people need to be taken into account here, which is one reason why we need to work across Government.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Mixed Topics
Maria Frances Lewis Miller (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend needs to accept the fact that women are more affected by domestic violence than any other group. Does he not agree with the Joint Committee recommendation that, rather than putting it on the face of the Bill—perhaps for some of the reasons he is talking about—we should take the approach that the Government have accepted and have statutory guidance to ensure that those who commission services are clear about the need to reflect the needs of women in the services that they provide?
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Mixed Topics
Timothy Paul Loughton (Conservative, Centre-right): As with so much to do with child safeguarding, getting it wrong is the most expensive thing We need to do much more work on prevention. We should task the Domestic Abuse Commissioner with looking at not just how we respond and making sure that perpetrators are locked up, but how we can prevent it in the first place, and better education in schools about what constitutes an appropriate relationship is an important part of that I want to make a few other quick points. Proper funding of refuge places, which has been promised by the Government, is essential. There was still a shortage of refuge places last year. It is not just a question of money, though; technical factors are also impeding the availability of urgently required beds. Women without children who are fleeing violence and who seek safety in refuges are not automatically considered to be in priority need of housing. I have been told by refuges that in some cases women are staying in hostels for several years, which is again a false economy, when they could be in independent housing, living safely with their children. We also need to give children who are living in refuges priority access to schools, as we have done for children in care and adopted children We have to look holistically at the issue. It is not just about better funding for refuges; it is also about making sure that we have better services across the board, including specialist domestic abuse service providers, child support workers, outreach workers and especially better joined-up working for women fleeing out of local authority areas when they have to go to a refuge. We need a network of refuges across the country This is a fantastic Bill. It can be improved. It is long overdue. Let us not ruin it by making it too complicated.
Domestic Abuse Bill — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Other
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): Order. From now on, if we have interventions, it will mean that other people will not get in, which would be a great pity, so it would be better not to intervene at this stage. If the hon. Gentleman insists, he will of course be in order, but he will be stopping other people speaking.
Welsh Language — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Civil Rights
Edward Glyn Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): Diolch, Madam Deputy Speaker. Rydw i’n falch iawn o gael y cyfle i wneud araith am yr iaith Gymraeg yn San Steffan heno. Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for the opportunity to speak about the Welsh language here in the Palace of Westminster tonight I tabled my request for this Adjournment debate for several reasons: first, because I believe the Welsh language to be of such importance that it should be on our agenda here at Westminster at least once in every Parliament; and for the rather more selfish reason that this may well be my last speech in the House of Commons before I retire at the forthcoming general election, and I wanted to speak on an issue of special personal interest and importance to me.
Welsh Language — House of Commons, 2019-10-02
Topic: Civil Rights
Edward Glyn Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): Again, I very much agree with that point Because Welsh language policy is devolved, I accept that our role here at Westminster is largely, though not exclusively, a supportive role. The main policy levers lie with the National Assembly for Wales, but in my view it is important that the UK Government make clear policy statements that we support constructive policy objectives, rather than just pay lip service. Over time, we have seen some objections to interventions designed to grow and protect the Welsh language, because they do carry responsibility and cost. However, I hope we can all support a policy that all children should have meaningful contact with the Welsh language, and that we can support increasing opportunity to use Welsh outside the education environment, particularly in the workplace. Personally, I believe we should encourage more learning of Welsh through sport and culture, and where young people take their forms of entertainment.