Engagements — House of Commons, 2022-01-12
Topic: Social Welfare
Questions: Education is one of the biggest factors when it comes to levelling up. It is what ensures that people throughout the country have access to the same opportunities, and it is a key part of my mission to transform lives in Burnley and Padiham. With that in mind, will the Prime Minister work with me to ensure that Burnley becomes the best place for people to study, whether they are in primary or secondary school, looking for an apprenticeship in advanced engineering, or undertaking a degree in cyber-security?; On Friday I met the chief executive of my local hospital trust, the University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust, to discuss how the trust was managing covid and the impact that it was having. That impact is stark. Between 12% and 15% of the workforce are away isolating, and 140 beds—about 20% of the total—are blocked because the hospital cannot get people back out into social care in the community. With that in mind, will my right hon. Friend consider reducing the isolation period to five days if it is seen to be safe to do so, and also accepting any MACA—military aid to the civil authorities—requests that are received, to help get people back into the community and into social care?; I recently visited my local jobcentre, and I am pleased to announce that the adult claimant count is down 28%, and the young adult claimant count is down 40%. Will the Prime Minister join me in thanking Stourbridge jobcentre for all its hard work, and for its dedication in achieving those results and contributing to the jobs revival that is happening across the west midlands, with 61,000 new jobs since March 2021?; Another week, another scandal for this Prime Minister and his utterly shameless Government. For two years my constituents made sacrifice after sacrifice, spending time away from their loved ones and missing out on important life events. Some paid the ultimate sacrifice, while he partied away. Figures released just last night show that 79% of people in Scotland think the Prime Minister should step down. Does he realise that it is now clear to all that, although he may not understand how to be socially distant from others, there is no doubt that he is morally distant from the rest of us across these nations, and that the best thing he can do now is to go? Resign, Prime Minister!; This is a different topic to that raised by my right hon. and learned Friend, the Leader of the Opposition, but it is related. Last week at Prime Minister’s questions, the Prime Minister was asked whether his previous claims about inflation were unfounded. In his reply he told the House that he had said “no such thing”. Within minutes the inevitable happened, and people were watching videos on social media, saying exactly that. Would the Prime Minister like to take this opportunity to correct the record and apologise for misleading the House on that matter?; The Prime Minister has not apologised for breaking the rules and breaking the law; he is sorry because he has been caught. He is bang to rights. When my constituents were making unimaginable—unimaginable—decisions, he was hosting a boozy party in Downing Street. So how does he think he can still maintain one rule for him and another for the rest of the us? He cannot, and he must resign.; We have all had Prime Ministers who we disagreed with or we did not rate, but there has never been one who has debased the office in the way that he has. He is now forced to lie down in the back of his car to keep away from photographers. We all know that the Prime Minister was sacked from two previous jobs for lying, so can he explain to the House why he believes that the great office of Prime Minister can be held to a lower standard than those previous jobs that he was sacked from?; I, too, wish to join colleagues in paying tribute to Jack Dromey. I knew him first in the early ’70s and worked with him on the Grunwick strike. He will be greatly missed. Thousands of men and women in Afghanistan supported the NATO mission and they have been abandoned. After six months, we do not have a credible route to help people out of Afghanistan safely. The most recent update from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office is directly contradicted by the UN. While the FCDO claims that from spring the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees will make referrals to evacuation schemes, the UNHCR’s own website is clear that it makes no such referrals. Are the Government creating a Kafkaesque system to intentionally fail those we owe something to, or is this yet another case of the amateurism and hopelessness that prioritised Pen Farthing’s pets over human beings?; In my Stockport constituency, the average rent for a two-bedroom property is an unaffordable £800. Rents have significantly increased in the last 13 years. One constituent recently contacted me to explain that she and her husband, who are in their 70s and suffer from ill health, have just been served with a section 21 notice after living in the property for almost 20 years. The Prime Minister’s own manifesto promised a better deal for renters, which included abolishing no-fault evictions. So when will he scrap that practice and reintroduce the much-needed renters’ reform Bill, which seems to have been kicked into the long grass?; This session shows how much of a distraction the Prime Minister’s behaviour has been. After a recent survey showed that 37% of small businesses felt totally unprepared for the introduction of import controls, rules of origin and the upcoming sanitary and phytosanitary checks, will he listen to the Federation of Small Businesses and introduce financial and technical support for those small businesses, or is he just too busy drinking in his garden?; The Government’s flagship green homes grant scheme collapsed in a £1.5 billion shambles at the end of last year, with just 81 vouchers issued in Cambridge and just 85 issued in the Prime Minister’s constituency. With energy bills about to go through the roof, what is it about this Government that makes them so peculiarly unable to run a basic loft-lagging scheme?; The Government commissioned the National Centre for Social Research to research the use of health and disability benefits, but they have yet to publish the findings. Their own protocol for publication states that social research“must be released in a way that promotes public trust.”The cost of living crisis is hitting disabled people hard, at a time when many people are already struggling. It is surely time to start rebuilding their trust, so will the Prime Minister commit today to publishing that research?
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): We will do everything we can to support people throughout the recovery from the pandemic, we will support disabled people and we will continue to increase our support for families up and down the country. The hon. Lady requests that we publish the research, and we will do so as soon as we can.