argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Harriet Ruth Harman (Labour, Centre-left): I beg to move, That this House believes that it would be to the benefit of the functioning of parliamentary democracy that honourable Members who have had a baby or adopted a child should for a period of time be entitled, but not required, to discharge their responsibilities to vote in this House by proxy May I join others, Madam Deputy Speaker, in wishing you a happy birthday? You honestly do not need to worry about numbers. I am 67 and I have discovered, as I get older, that I know a lot more things that I did not know when I was younger. There is nothing wrong with getting older I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) and the other members of the Backbench Business Committee, which he chairs, for agreeing to the subject of the motion. As the Backbench Business Committee was introduced when I was Leader of the House, I was very glad that its members did not turn me down when I went before them to ask for this debate The right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) is in her place. I thank her for all her work on this issue. This has very much been a joint enterprise between her and me. I really cannot speak highly enough of her work as the Chair of the excellent Women and Equalities Committee. I do not usually say good things about people who have been in the Cabinet in Tory Governments, but she is really very important to us all in her role I thank the 52 hon. Members from all parties who supported the application for this motion, including right hon. and hon. Friends in the Labour party, so many of whom are here today; I thank them so much for attending. Members of the Scottish National party have been active and supportive co-workers on this issue, as have the Liberal Democrats and many hon. Members on the Tory Benches. This is very much a cross-party issue I am pleased to see that the Leader of the House is in her place and that, in a week that has not been unbusy for her, she will be responding to this debate personally. She has been prepared to give me her time and talk about the issue, and she is here to respond to the motion. That is testament to her commitment to the issue, along with the shadow Leader of the House, who is also present. Mr Speaker’s Reference Group on Representation and Inclusion has also looked at this subject This motion asks the House for its in-principle agreement to make arrangements for when a Member has a baby or adopts a child. At the moment, we have no such arrangements. In this House, we set the rules for parents outside the House having babies or adopting a child, and we do so because we think that it is important for the child and for the parents. We do it because we want new parents not to have to ask for favours, but to be clear about where they stand. But there is no such system for Members of this House.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Mixed Topics
Harriet Ruth Harman (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend is absolutely right. No one in this House wants us to give ourselves better conditions than people outside, but we are now actually lagging a long way behind and are in danger of setting a bad example in that respect.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Helen Elizabeth Hayes (Labour, Centre-left): I pay tribute to my right hon. and learned Friend and constituency neighbour for tabling this motion, and for her work over more than 30 years to advance equality for women in this place and in the wider world. Last week, I visited a girls’ secondary school in my constituency, where students asked me what it is like being a woman in the House of Commons. There were gasps in the room when I mentioned that there is no maternity leave for women Members. Does she agree that we owe it to a generation of young women who are now thinking about their future to make this place somewhere where they feel welcome and have the same rights as every other woman in workplaces across the country?
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Harriet Ruth Harman (Labour, Centre-left): Absolutely; my hon. Friend is spot on "Erskine May", our parliamentary rules bible, says absolutely nothing about pregnancy, which is no surprise at all. It used to be the case that the overwhelming majority of Members were men. It was not that those men were not parents; it was just that they regarded a baby as the sole responsibility of their wives. There were hardly any women in this House then, and those who were here were mostly older women whose children had grown up or who had no children. That was certainly the case when I had my three children as a young Member of this House. I was the only woman in the House having babies at that time. Things have now changed, and the sight of growing pregnant bumps in our Division Lobby is commonplace and celebrated on both sides of the House.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Other
Harriet Ruth Harman (Labour, Centre-left): I certainly do agree and I congratulate my hon. Friend. I am looking forward to meeting the new arrival. The reason we are proposing this change now is that the House has changed profoundly in its attitudes and its membership. Now, many men want and expect to play their part with a new baby.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Mixed Topics
Michael John Gapes (Labour, Centre-left): In 1993, when I informed the Chief Whip that my wife was going into hospital and that I intended to be at the birth, I was told, "That’s alright, as long as you’re here on Monday night to vote on Maastricht matters." As it turned out, my daughter was born on the Sunday, and I was able to leave the hospital, come in and stay until 2.30 am. The dilemma applies to men as well as to women.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Harriet Ruth Harman (Labour, Centre-left): That might well be the case in future, but for the moment we are talking about maternity, paternity and adoption, and we should focus on that I never thought I would see the day when the sons of the women’s movement arrived in this House—but they are here. They want and expect that they should play their part with a new baby. All credit to them, and let us change the rules to recognise that. The hon. Member for North East Fife (Stephen Gethins) told me: "My wife and I had our son Patrick just 2 weeks before the General Election last year who was a welcome addition to our family and a loved brother for our daughter Mhairi who is 3. My wife is and remains a star who, like other MPs’ partners, has to put up with so much because of this job, its challenging hours and need to be away from home. I wish I could have had some paternity leave when Patrick arrived so at least just after he was born I could have been a greater help than I have been. My wife has never complained and like others got on with it but she deserved more support than I was able to give her and I hope that we can fix this for other MPs." I hope that that is what we will do There are more women Members than ever before, in all parts of the House—over 200—and younger women as well. It is a democratic imperative that we have women in this House as well as men to make the House representative of this country, and it is a biological inevitability that young women will have babies. There have already been 17 babies born to women Members since 2010.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Mixed Topics
Harriet Ruth Harman (Labour, Centre-left): I thank the hon. Lady, who has been unstinting in her support. We have worked together on this. She is absolutely right. That is why I called it baby leave rather than maternity and paternity leave, and why I refer to parents and their children As I say, there have been 17 babies born to women—and countless born to male Members of Parliament but which we do not know about. In the absence of any official recognition of these babies being born to Members, the way things work currently is that women MPs who are giving birth, or men MPs who want time with their baby, ask the Whips for a pair, and their Whips then make an arrangement with the Whips on the other side of the House. The situation in relation to the Whips is nothing like it was when I was having the first of our three children 34 years ago and I had to ask for a few weeks off from the Whips Office when most of them thought that a woman, let alone a pregnant woman, should not be in the House of Commons. I know that attitudes in the Whips Office are now completely different, but each Member still has to make a request. We would not agree to that happening in any other workplace. Furthermore, it is in the discretion of not just one Whips Office but two, because both Whips Offices have to agree.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Margaret Greenwood (Labour, Centre-left): I congratulate my right hon. and learned Friend on securing this really important debate. Does she agree that Professor Childs was absolutely right to argue in her "The Good Parliament" report of 2016 that "to become a truly inclusive institution the House of Commons must accommodate and facilitate both the pregnant woman Member and co-parenting and caring MP"; that the current informal arrangements lead to misunderstandings about the effectiveness of MPs, particularly women; and that the change that is being sought is long overdue?
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Laura Pidcock (Labour, Centre-left): The negotiation between Whips is important in other circumstances. However, I am sure that many women in this House who take time off to be with their baby in the first few weeks want to practise the act of democracy that is voting so that they are representing their constituents while being a new mother, and it should not be suggested that they simply have not voted.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Harriet Ruth Harman (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Why should a constituency lose the right for a vote to be cast in its name because its MP is having a baby? You cannot be voting when you are in a birthing pool, Madam Deputy Speaker, but your constituency has a right to have its voice heard.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Harriet Ruth Harman (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend makes a very important point. We need to do this for defensive reasons, because women who are off having babies or men who are off with a newborn baby are criticised, and that is wrong. But it is even more important than that—our constituents should have the right to have their voice heard, and we want to protect that right even though their MP is off at certain times with babies.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Mixed Topics
Rachel Jane Reeves (Labour, Centre-left): I thank my right hon. and learned Friend for her powerful speech and for all the work that she has done over the years on these important issues. I am responsible for two of the 17 babies who have been born since 2010. When my first child was born almost five years ago, one of the campaigning organisations that email constituents about votes emailed my constituents to say that I had not bothered to turn up to a vote. I would very much have liked to turn up to vote on all the issues, but with a very young baby it simply was not possible. That needs to be rectified as well, because in the minds of constituents we are not here and not representing them, but we are doing very important work at home.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Other
Emma Elizabeth Reynolds (Labour, Centre-left): I apologise for intervening again, but I think I am responsible for the latest addition to the 17 babies. He was born on Good Friday last year. I was criticised by a Sunday newspaper. I will not name it, because although I should not have had to ask, when I got in touch with the political editor, he kindly took my name off a story that rated me as the second worst MP in this Parliament, without mentioning that I had been on maternity leave since the election.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Other
Harriet Ruth Harman (Labour, Centre-left): I will draw my comments to a close. In this centenary year, 100 years after women first won the right to stand for Parliament, I hope that we will agree to the motion and that the Procedure Committee will look at the matter expeditiously. We do not have all the time in the world. At least two more parliamentary babies are in the pipeline. The hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) is awaiting her second baby, and my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith) is also expecting. While we talk, nature is taking its course, so let us agree this and get on with it.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Seema Malhotra-Saluja (Labour, Centre-left): Speaking as another member of the Speaker’s Commons Reference Group, I want to say how important this debate is. It is rooted in real and new evidence about Members’ experiences. By bringing the House into line with the policies of other workplaces, we will set the right tone and precedent for the future, particularly in this week, when we will be celebrating 100 years since women got the vote.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Margaret Eve Hodge (Labour, Centre-left): I congratulate my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman) on securing the debate The right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) is talking about this place, but I want to raise another issue. I chaired the Fawcett Society’s inquiry on the representation of women in local government, and it was shocking to discover that only 2% of local authorities have maternity leave policies, and that a number of women councillors who had babies were then sacked from their jobs as cabinet members. Does she agree that while what we are debating is hugely important, all of us as politicians from political parties ought to engage with our colleagues in local government to secure the necessary changes there that will ensure the proper representation of women?
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Mixed Topics
Emma Elizabeth Reynolds (Labour, Centre-left): I thank the right hon. Gentleman, and I urge him to do that quickly, because as we have discussed, various colleagues have a very tight deadline, which the Committee should work to I want to put on record my thanks to my husband’s employer. As Members of this House will know, new dads have a right to shared parental leave, but they have to give several weeks’ notice of their intention to take it. It happens to be eight weeks’ notice, which is about the same time as an election campaign. Thankfully, his employer agreed to bring his parental leave forward. I am not sure that we would have been able to cope if he had been working full time while I was running the campaign, so I am grateful to his employer for doing that. I encourage new dads to take up this right, because it is a crying shame, as I said in an intervention, that only 5% do We got through the election campaign. A week after I gave birth, Richard Angell, whom some hon. Members will know, brought a whole group of people to come and help. The local paper sent a snapper, and one of the Sunday papers also sent a photographer. They came to my office. I had given birth literally a week before. Baby Theo was there; he peed everywhere. One of my party members said, "Yeah, that’s called the hosepipe trick," and I said, "Oh right, I hadn’t heard of that before," but now I am experienced in it. I was having this meeting to gee up my members. The photographers got a photo of me and baby Theo. I was feeling pretty exhausted, but they insisted on joining me on the campaign trail. Little did they know that I did not really want to go on the campaign trail, because I was still pretty tired. If I did it again, I would now have the experience to say, "No. I came to do the members’ meeting and gee everybody up, and I’m going home," but I did not, and I went out campaigning seven days after giving birth—and I suffered for it physically. Then I had a rest We had all these deadlines; people will know that even before the short campaign—and this was such a short campaign—there are deadlines for letters, leaflets and as much stuff as we can get out.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Mixed Topics
Jessica Rose Phillips (Labour, Centre-left): It is a massive honour to follow all those who have spoken so far, and I feel that we are hon. Friends across the House today. I suppose that I should register not an interest, but a total disinterest in ever having another child, so this measure would not benefit me in the slightest. I could not be more disinterested I found the testimony of my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East (Emma Reynolds) incredibly moving. It put me right back at that moment when I was 22 and a new mum, and I was terrified that I was going to break that little thing. I will not put you through it, Mr Deputy Speaker, but some of the things that happen to a woman’s body immediately after she has had a baby are terrifying, and you do not expect them. I thought my internal organs were falling out. [Interruption.] The thought that I would have had to get up and go to a meeting—
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Other
Rachel Jane Reeves (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend is making an incredibly powerful speech. Does she agree that, by the time we are done with this, we should match if not better the best Parliaments in the world? Also, may I just say that, physically, having the second child is harder?
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Tulip Rizwana Siddiq (Labour, Centre-left): I thank my hon. Friend for that note of confidence. I absolutely agree with what she says: we have to do even better if we want to make Parliament a more welcoming place for female representatives and if we want to act in the way that my constituency Labour party did when I stood for election. One after another, its members stated categorically that they wanted more women in Parliament and wanted an all-women shortlist. The constituency had had a female MP for 23 years in the form of Glenda Jackson, and they wanted another one. That is what we should all be encouraging in the House of Commons.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Mixed Topics
Gavin Shuker (Labour, Centre-left): I could not agree more, which is why I feel confident that the motion will be approved. We should take confidence from that and encourage the Procedure Committee to consider the matter swiftly. I know that the Committee has already done some preliminary work on how such a system could work The model of care for a child in the first year of life is split between two parents, and that sets the pattern for child rearing all the way through the child’s life. All the studies seem to show that. If we want people to live up to the expectation of being present for their children, we should try to reflect that in our practice, too I have a four-year-old daughter, and I have always juggled life in Parliament with making the most of the flexibility that is offered on votes so that I can try to be present in her life. We all make it work, whatever our way of life, whether it means using some time on a Monday, getting back for the school run on a Thursday, or shifting days around at the weekend. We might take a day out in the middle of the week, but turn up for the votes later I have never had a formal conversation with my Whips Office about the implications of my having a child. I have never sat down and said, "Here are my working patterns." Until now, I have never really broadcast what that looks like, and that is because of two fears, which probably play on the minds of young fathers as well as of young mothers The first fear is whether I might be open to criticism for not being hard at work. When I added up my time over my first year in Parliament, excluding the commuting, I was working a 70 or 80-hour week. That has eased off as I have got better at the job, but that fear should not be a legitimate concern. There is no shortage of work, and we are all doing it—it is fairly obvious when we are not.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Civil Rights
Luciana Clare Goldsmith (Berger) (Labour, Centre-left): I welcome the strong contribution the hon. Lady is making. She makes a point about the opposition candidates may face at the time of an election if they are a new parent, and I reflect on the abuse I got as a candidate from someone from a different political party who stood against me. He took to Twitter to criticise me for not attending an evening debate during that election period, accusing me of being timid for my refusal to attend. I told him that I had not refused to do any debates, but that with a newborn baby evening events are near impossible, and that I would gladly take him on any day. He responded by saying that he did not realise we were still in the 1950s, when only a woman could look after a child, and that he thought the Labour party believed in shared paternity. Let me take this opportunity to tell him strongly that the Labour party most certainly believes in shared paternity and champions it. My final response was to remind him that we had not been expecting a general election; that he did not know my personal circumstances; and that, as far as I was aware, men still could not breastfeed. I also suggested he might want to stop digging, but I left it at that. The point I am seeking to share with the House in telling that little anecdote is that the issue we are discussing today pertains to what happens in this House, but the point the hon. Lady is making about what happens at election time and how candidates treat other candidates, particularly on this issue, is still relevant. It shows that in 2018 we still have an issue to address.
Baby Leave for Members of Parliament — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Other
Gavin Shuker (Labour, Centre-left): I appreciate the thoughtful way in which the Leader of the House is approaching this matter from first principles and setting out some of the issues mentioned by Members. Will she go slightly further and acknowledge that there is a reputational issue around Members of Parliament not being present to vote and thereby being reported as absent, when actually they are taking up the responsibilities that she has said are vital?
Hospital Car Parking Charges — House of Commons, 2018-02-01
Topic: Other
Julie Elizabeth Cooper (Labour, Centre-left): I am pleased to have the opportunity to respond to this debate on a very important subject. I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) for bringing this subject forward. He and I agree on most aspects of the issue, and he has campaigned passionately on it for so many years.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2018-04-17
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Anneliese Jane Dodds (Labour, Centre-left): Despite promising to tighten up on Scottish Limited Partnerships, not a single non-compliant SLP appears to have been fined, which could have raised up to £2.2 billion. When will SLPs be banned, and what action are the Government taking on other shell companies to stop tax fiddling and money laundering?