argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Dietary Advice and Childhood Obesity Strategy — House of Commons, 2016-05-23
Topic: Mixed Topics
Norman Peter Lamb (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): May I join in a partial, and rather surprising, alliance with the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) in questioning the sense in taxing just one particular type of product? Would not the Government instead—this is where I part company with him—consider taxing sugar as an ingredient to create an incentive for reformulation of products to reduce sugar content across the board, rather than just picking on one type of product?
Neighbourhood Plans — House of Commons, 2016-06-06
Topic: Housing
Gregory Thomas Mulholland (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): Some councils, including Leeds City Council, are prioritising "easy" areas with neighbourhood plans and ignoring and not properly assisting those where it is difficult and there are huge pressures, such as Aireborough. Will the Secretary of State look at the guidance issued to councils, particularly as developers can carry on developing even though neighbourhood plans are being produced?
BHS — House of Commons, 2016-06-06
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Gregory Thomas Mulholland (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): The first concern of everyone in this House are the people who have lost jobs and pensions, and there are many questions to which they and we still want to hear answers. Looking forward, however, will the Minister assure the House that the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills will look at the lessons from this and the failure of Austin Reed? Will she consider launching a retail strategy, working with business, so that we do not end up with high streets that are all just payday lenders and betting shops?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2016-06-06
Topic: Mixed Topics
Gregory Thomas Mulholland (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I seek your advice for the second time in a matter of months. A ministerial visit has been organised to the excellent Makkah mosque in Headingley in my constituency. On this occasion, I had to drag it out of the office of the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what the visit was for. I was delighted he was doing it, but can you make it clear to Ministers that, while we welcome their visits, they should have the courtesy to tell us where they are going and what they are doing?
Investigatory Powers Bill — House of Commons, 2016-06-06
Topic: Other
Alexander Morrison Carmichael (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I am grateful to the hon. and learned Lady for giving way, because I agree with what she is saying. May I suggest that there is one means by which the Government could demonstrate good faith? In order to get to a vote on new clause 21, we will first have to vote down new clause 5. If the Government are serious about listening to the House, could they not withdraw new clause 5 to allow us to have a vote on new clause 21?
Investigatory Powers Bill — House of Commons, 2016-06-06
Topic: Other
Alexander Morrison Carmichael (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): Given the lateness of the hour and the number of right hon. and hon. Members still wishing to catch your eye, Mr Speaker, I hope to confine my remarks principally to those amendments that stand in my name, but I would also like to pick up on one or two more general points.
Tourism — House of Commons, 2016-10-19
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Mark Fraser Williams (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I associate myself and my colleagues with the tribute to the people of Aberfan on the 50th anniversary In a previous life, the Minister was a very passionate supporter of the campaign to reduce VAT on tourism. He has made some very pronounced comments about that campaign in the past. Does he stand by them? More importantly, what representations will he make to the Treasury to make such a case to benefit tourism in our communities?
Sale of Annuities — House of Commons, 2016-10-19
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Gregory Thomas Mulholland (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): (Urgent Question): To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will make a statement on why the Government have abandoned plans to allow savers to sell their annuities in return for a cash lump sum.
Sale of Annuities — House of Commons, 2016-10-19
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Thomas Anthony Brake (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I will ask the Minister a third time why this announcement was not made to Parliament before it was made to the media. Also, what is he going to do to inform people who may have intended to cash in their annuity, but who are now not going to be able to do so?
Rights of EU Nationals — House of Commons, 2016-10-19
Topic: Immigration
Alexander Morrison Carmichael (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I think we can agree that the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) is right to say that no one in this House would want to see EU nationals who are living and working here expelled. The point is that there are people out there who have been emboldened by the current political climate who want to see EU nationals living here expelled, and worse. The sort of signal that the hon. and learned Lady is calling for, which I support, would be very powerful in saying that the views of those people are wholeheartedly rejected by all right-thinking people.
Rights of EU Nationals — House of Commons, 2016-10-19
Topic: Immigration
Alexander Morrison Carmichael (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I share the Minister’s aspiration to protect the rights of UK citizens living elsewhere in the European Union, but may I suggest that the best way to achieve that end would be to make a commitment to EU citizens living here, thus creating an atmosphere in which positive negotiations on other matters might take place?
EU Migrants: National Insurance Numbers — House of Commons, 2016-05-12
Topic: Immigration
Gregory Thomas Mulholland (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): Is it not the case that national insurance numbers that have been issued are not subsequently removed? Has the Minister made an estimate of how many of the numbers relate to people who are no longer here? Will he also gently ask the Brexit campaign not to descend into dog-whistle politics over immigration?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2016-04-27
Topic: Immigration
Thomas Anthony Brake (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek your help in finding a mechanism whereby the House might be able to force a binding vote on the Government, as a matter of urgency, following the new Lord Dubs amendment to the Immigration Bill. Vulnerable unaccompanied children require help now, but it would seem that the House of Commons is not likely to consider the Bill for another two weeks, the intention being, presumably, to avoid further embarrassment to the Government Let me also say, Mr Speaker, that I should like to avail myself of that prime ministerial correction procedure in order to enable the Prime Minister to retract his comment that other European countries are able to cope with those children. They have, of course, asked the United Kingdom to participate in a relocation scheme, and Frontex has identified the issue of vulnerable children as one of the most concerning aspects of the refugee crisis.
Wales Bill — House of Commons, 2016-09-12
Topic: Civil Rights
Mark Fraser Williams (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I agree with the hon. Lady’s last comment, having served alongside her on the Welsh Affairs Committee. She mentions Paul Silk, who spoke about the need to review this matter within 10 years. The "Justice in Wales" report from the Wales Governance Centre referred to a standing commission. I think that was the view of the First Minister as well, when he announced the Bill that the hon. Lady mentioned. Given that there is an evolving picture, surely we should be monitoring it with a view to changing it in the near future? I may well share the final destination that she and her hon. Friends seek to reach, but there is a case for carrying people forward on the basis of experience over the next few years.
Wales Bill — House of Commons, 2016-09-12
Topic: Mixed Topics
Mark Fraser Williams (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point about the finances of any such butchery, as he describes it. Does he agree with the great concern of several of my constituents about the impact of that butchery more generally in west Wales on well-established long-distance trade routes between Aberystwyth and Birmingham International or Manchester?
Wales Bill — House of Commons, 2016-09-12
Topic: Other
Mark Fraser Williams (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): The hon. Gentleman is quite right. I have studied the amendment very carefully, as indeed I studied the Bill that the First Minister presented to the National Assembly and the exchanges between the party leaders about the wording of the Bill on 8 March. The First Minister laid great emphasis, as did my colleague Kirsty Williams, on the timing, and that is the crucial point. I happen to share the aspiration, but I have concerns about the timing. That is why I cannot support amendment 60 tonight—I will not vote against it—and why I am deeply saddened that the Government have not understood the real importance of the issue.
EU Nationals in the UK — House of Commons, 2016-07-06
Topic: Other
Alexander Morrison Carmichael (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I seek your reassurance. Resignations can come at a bewildering pace these days in Westminster, so can you tell the House whether we still have a Government Whips Office? For the bulk of the debate there has been only one Government Back Bencher in the Chamber. That used to be the job of the Government Whips Office. Have they given up?
Tributes to Jo Cox — House of Commons, 2016-06-20
Topic: Immigration
Timothy James Farron (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): We stand united as colleagues, indeed comrades, to mourn someone who was an enormous figure in the House and who would have gone on to be much greater still. For me and millions of others, the snatching away of a wife and mother, hugely loving and hugely loved, is what has moved Britain to stand in collective grief this last few days Others who knew Jo well have commented on her huge achievements in her career before Parliament and in the time she served during the past 13 months as an outstanding Member of Parliament. My path crossed hers as we took the same side in the campaign for this country to show compassion to desperate refugees, especially child refugees, fleeing Syria and elsewhere. Her winsome, authentic and informed contribution to the refugees debate seemed to me critical. Her legacy is one of building bridges and not walls; of getting this Lancastrian to wear this white Yorkshire rose; of combining passion in what she believed in with kindness in how she expressed it. Can we all agree now that that is how our politics shall be conducted? We are shocked and heartbroken at her loss. On behalf of my party, on behalf of everyone in Cumbria, I want to say that our enduring love and sympathy is with Jo’s family.
Immigration Bill — House of Commons, 2016-04-25
Topic: Public Lands
Alexander Morrison Carmichael (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I remember those debates well. They started from the presumption that Yarl’s Wood was not an appropriate place to detain children any more than Dungavel would be. Why are the Government now taking a different position?
Immigration Bill — House of Commons, 2016-04-25
Topic: Immigration
Timothy James Farron (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): The Minister is being very generous. He makes the point that action to help those who are stranded in Europe would somehow act as a pull factor. With respect, I think that that view is bogus, not least when we consider that there are four times more refugees in the region. The idea that Europe is the only place to which they are heading is nonsense. Even if one were to accept that, his decision not to accept the Dubs amendment is to ignore the tens of thousands of children who are in Europe now. The reality is that 10,000 have gone missing in the past year. They are in the hands of traffickers now. What will he do to help those children who are here on this continent now?
Immigration Bill — House of Commons, 2016-04-25
Topic: Mixed Topics
Timothy James Farron (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I want to challenge the notion that the EU-Turkey deal is a success. I was at the Idomeni camp on the Greek-Macedonian border a fortnight ago. The camp is meant to host 300 or 400 people as they pass north towards northern Europe, but there were 25,000 people—there were children there as well—crammed into that small space, and they were absolutely desperate. The reason they are not moving from that place is that they have no trust whatever in the system or in the fact that wherever they are moved to next will not mean deportation out of Europe. The EU-Turkey deal may be great in principle, but in practice it has been stitched up for the benefit and convenience of politicians, not of those desperate people rotting in the camps.
Immigration Bill — House of Commons, 2016-04-25
Topic: Immigration
Timothy James Farron (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): The hon. and learned Gentleman is being very generous in giving way. On the pull factor, I agree with him that the evidence is at best mixed. In the sense that I found any kind of pull factor in the camps I visited in northern Greece, in the islands or in Calais and in meeting refugees who have been settled in Cologne, it was that Europe is a peaceful, decent, stable place where people can raise their children without fear of their being killed. We should be proud of such a pull factor.
Immigration Bill — House of Commons, 2016-04-25
Topic: Immigration
Timothy James Farron (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): Last autumn, I used my first Prime Minister’s questions as party leader to press the Prime Minister to take these 3,000 unaccompanied children—refugees from the camps—in Europe. I had seen the situation for myself in Calais, Lesbos and other places. As we have heard today, something like a third of those unaccompanied children in Europe go missing. They are now in the hands of child traffickers who exploit them and use them in child prostitution The Government have done some good over these past few months, much of it under pressure, but, to date, they are utterly and totally stubborn on the matter of helping even a single person, particularly vulnerable children, in Europe I was at the Indomeni camp in northern Greece just a couple of weeks ago. It was the saddest of all the visits that I have made, because of the desperation that I saw and because of the number of children living in squalid and unsafe circumstances. These people are at risk, they are alone, and they are scared, and we could help them We have had a series of announcements from the Government, but they all missed the point, which is that those children who are most at risk are the ones who are now in the camps in Europe. Making the argument in favour of doing more for refugees and of taking refugees from Europe is difficult when there is a narrative out there that says that most refugees are coming to Europe. That is not true. Perhaps one in five from the region is coming to Europe. People will say that they are not really refugees, but economic migrants. Well, 95% of them are deemed to be refugees by any objective standard. Perhaps that is where the Government’s reluctance comes from. They fear unpopularity, but is this not the time for this Government not to follow, but to lead and to do the right thing? There are always reasons not to do the right thing When I was in Greece and Macedonia two weeks ago, a fence had been erected by the Macedonian Government in 36 hours. If a country has the political will, they can do these things. We can take these children. The blueprint that I produced over the past three or four months in consultation with Save the Children, Home for Good and local authorities gives the Government all the ammunition they need to show how they would put such a scheme into practice, and I refer the Minister to that blueprint. We need to stop the excuses and do the right thing This is the biggest humanitarian disaster, or crisis, facing Europe since the second world war, and this Government choose to turn their back not just on geo-political reality and on our neighbours, but on the desperate children somehow existing in the camps and in the ditches up and down Europe. This proposal before us today, amendment 87, is not the most we can do; it is the least we can do.
Calais Children and Immigration Act — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Thomas Anthony Brake (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): (Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if she will make a statement on the Calais children and the guidance document published by her Department for section 67 of the Immigration Act 2016.
Calais Children and Immigration Act — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Thomas Anthony Brake (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): The chaotic demolition of the Calais camp, which abandoned some children on the street, leaves upwards of 1,000 children in basic and temporary care facilities in France. In the days running up to the demolition, the Home Secretary made statements that pointed to the UK offering a home for up to half of the children in the camp. It is unclear how that will be achieved given the criteria in the guidance document, so I hope that in answering my questions the Government will be able to explain how that will be done. What progress has the Home Secretary and her Department made with local authorities on agreeing the number of vulnerable children the UK will take from Calais and other European camps? Will the guidance and the criteria apply to other European countries, such as Italy and Greece? When will the criteria for those countries be produced? Why has the Home Office limited one of the criteria to Sudanese and Syrian unaccompanied children? Why are Eritrean children excluded? Can the Minister explain why they have chosen to exclude 16 and 17-year-old children from the eligibility criteria in Calais given the universal recognition that they are still children and still vulnerable? Given the Government’s commitment to tackling modern slavery and exploitation at home and across the globe, will the Minister clarify why the vulnerability of these child victims is not included in the "at risk" criteria? Finally, what guarantees can the Minister give that the children who will eventually be allowed into the UK will not be deported on reaching the age of 18 This House agreed to the Dubs amendment and our Government must now set out how they are going to honour its letter and spirit.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Other
John David Pugh (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Today’s calendar of business shows no Government business for Monday 21 November. Rumour has it that it will be the Higher Education and Research Bill and the Clerks have been told that the amendment deadline is tonight. Members are gifted, but they are not psychic. Can you do anything, Mr Speaker, to clarify what is clearly an unsatisfactory situation?
Social Care — House of Commons, 2016-11-16
Topic: Immigration
Norman Peter Lamb (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I totally share the sentiment that EU workers are welcome in our country and that we must guarantee their future as soon as possible Does the Secretary of State ever feel that he is confronted by a pretty fundamental choice? He can either preside over a system that deteriorates with an increasing number of failures of care, which I know he cares passionately about, or he can be the politician in government who confronts that, who works with other parties and who comes up with a sustainable long-term solution. It is one or the other. I urge him to take the latter course.
Homelessness — House of Commons, 2016-12-14
Topic: Housing
Thomas Anthony Brake (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I thank my neighbour for giving way, and I appreciate what he has just said about supporting vulnerable people. He will know, because I made it earlier, that this intervention is about the question of housing benefit for under-21s. I do not quite understand how that fits into the Government’s homelessness prevention programme. Does he recognise that, as charities have suggested, if just 140 extra young people are made homeless as a result of the change, it will cost more than the Government will save?
CQC: NHS Deaths Review — House of Commons, 2016-12-13
Topic: Civil Rights
Norman Peter Lamb (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I also pay tribute to Sara Ryan, the mother of Connor Sparrowhawk, who has fought tirelessly for justice for those with learning disabilities. I warn the Secretary of State that I think she will take some convincing that things really will change, given all the resistance she has come up against. I hope he has managed to meet her; if not, would he be willing to meet her, with me, to discuss the plans going forward One key issue not covered in the report or statement is the timeliness of investigations. A report nine months or a year after the incident is often no good at all: the organisation has moved on, and people have forgotten what has happened. I commend Mersey Care, which does a very quick, thorough investigation within 48 hours, when the information is really current and people are still shocked by what has happened. That is how Mersey Care seeks to implement the lessons from every tragedy.
Neighbourhood Planning Bill — House of Commons, 2016-12-13
Topic: Housing
Gregory Thomas Mulholland (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I thank the hon. Gentleman, who is my constituency neighbour, for making that point—I also thank him for his support on pub issues in the past—but his concerns are entirely misplaced. I may not have the time to convince him of that today. The reality is that profitable pubs are being closed up and down the country, but that is nothing to do with the banks. No one is saying that, when a pub is not viable and no one wants to buy it to run it as a pub, it should not be given planning permission. However, because of these absurd loopholes at the moment, people are deliberately targeting profitable pubs because they will make a good supermarket. Surely as someone who believes in localism, he cannot support that.