argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Healthcare (International Arrangements) Bill — House of Lords, 2019-02-21
Topic: International Affairs
Peter Hain (Labour, Centre-left): I resigned. However, she is very welcome and I wish her all the best What worries me about this—and I hope that the Minister can give us concrete assurances—is that, on the Brexit agenda, it seems to be in the DNA of Whitehall not to have regard for the devolved Governments. The only reference I can find in the Bill to the Welsh, Scottish and Northern Ireland devolved legislative bodies comes right at the end, when it says that it applies to them. At the very least it is essential that a requirement to seek legislative consent and to consult is written into the Bill, because of course health policy is devolved to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland The Government have form on this issue in the way that they approached the Brexit legislation earlier in the process. As your Lordships will recall, there was a crisis and a real confrontation with the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Government—and there might well have been with the Northern Ireland Assembly if it had been up and running. It must be in the DNA of Whitehall, because it has simply done it again. That really worries me. I hope the Minister can give reassurances which mean that we do not have to vote at Report on something very similar to these amendments. If a major concession is not made, we will need to do that and seek to defeat the Government I endorse what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace, and the noble Baroness, Lady Humphreys, said. I ask the Minister to give very specific assurances, spelling out that, if she does amend the Bill—and I hope she will assure us that she will—she will do so only having agreed those amendments in precise terms with the Welsh Government and the Scottish Parliament, and having consulted officials in the Northern Ireland departments.
Healthcare (International Arrangements) Bill — House of Lords, 2019-02-21
Topic: Government Operations
George Foulkes (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I want to endorse everything that my noble and learned friend Lord Wallace of Tankerness has said. He has the great distinction of having been for some time Deputy First Minister of Scotland and, for a short period, acting First Minister. Very few people can claim that distinction. Again, I agree with every word he said. I describe him as my noble and learned friend in every sense of the term—I hope that is not misunderstood. I also agree with everything said by the noble Baroness, Lady Humphreys What I find difficult to understand is why this Bill has received the legislative consent of the Scottish Parliament—which is usually more reluctant to give consent—and not that of the Welsh Parliament. I can only assume that it is because the noble Lord, Lord O’Shaughnessy, kissed the Blarney Stone before he went to Edinburgh again, and was able to persuade them. I am interested to know why and will try to find out from my contacts in Scotland before Report I suspect that a lot of the points made about the omissions in this Bill have arisen because this legislation, like much of the legislation we are considering at present, is being rushed because of Brexit, without proper consideration being given. I do not blame the officials, who have so much work to do. I went to a briefing they held right at the start of this process and I know that they work very hard. However, I would rather see them doing more constructive work than some of what they are being required to do on Brexit I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Hain—and I find this not only in health but in a lot of other areas—that some officials, particularly at the higher level in Whitehall, still have not come to terms with devolution; they do not quite understand what it means, or that the health service in Scotland is run completely by the Scottish Parliament. It is difficult for those officials who have been involved since before devolution to understand that fully. I hope that we will do more to get the message across as we move forward. I hope that the next Government, of whatever shade—a non-Conservative Government; I will put it that way—take more care of the devolved settlements The noble Lord, Lord O’Shaughnessy, said that he has had discussions with the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport in Scotland, Jeane Freeman. The Minister has taken over very recently and will not yet have had time to do this, but can she assure us that she will have an opportunity to meet with Jeane Freeman to discuss this issue between now and Report? I hope she will be able to report back to us in more detail on the attitudes of the Scottish Parliament and let us know whether it is satisfied on some of the points that have been raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Humphreys, and my noble and learned friend Lord Wallace of Tankerness.
Healthcare (International Arrangements) Bill — House of Lords, 2019-02-21
Topic: International Affairs
Peter Hain (Labour, Centre-left): I am grateful to the Minister, and reassured by what she has said. Perhaps I will withdraw the tone of some of my earlier remarks, which were made without knowing what she was going to say I ask the Minister to bear in mind, in terms of advice to Whitehall officials working on Brexit legislation of this kind, that it is not an accident that these extra consultative arrangements she is now describing were not in the original Bill. This has been true all the way through the Brexit process, and I am afraid that when I said that it seems to be in the DNA of Whitehall, it is as though the default position is that these consultative rights are not put on the statute book. I ask the Minister to use what influence she has with the rest of the ministerial team to say that this must not happen again, in any other legislation.
Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-02-28
Topic: International Affairs
Peter Hain (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I endorse what the noble Baroness has said, and what my noble friend Lord Collins said in Committee. Can the Minister give us a categorical assurance that there will be no gap when Britain is no longer a signatory and supporter of this scheme? I declare an interest as I was the British Foreign Office Minister who initiated this treaty and Britain’s involvement in it. Britain led the way to get the international treaty, and we got the rest of the European Union signed up to it—initially against resistance from the World Diamond Council but, ultimately, with its support. This is a very important scheme, making sure that conflict diamonds do not enter the international arena illegally and fuel conflict, as they once did in Angola, Sierra Leone and the DRC.
Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-02-28
Topic: Government Operations
George Foulkes (Labour, Centre-left): There was someone in the Chair too, yes indeed. This is symptomatic of what is going on at the moment. I believe the noble Lord, Lord Collins, described it in Committee as an "SI stampede". I have described it on occasion as a veritable tsunami of statutory instruments. I think we were told yesterday that 740 statutory instruments have been laid, but most have not yet gone to the committees, let alone to the Grand Committee and to the House. This is an astonishing situation. As my noble friend Lord Hain said—as did the noble Baroness, Lady Northover—this is a very important statutory instrument. We have important statutory instruments, Lord Speaker—sorry, I mean noble Lords, but maybe one day we will be able to address him properly; we have them simultaneously in Grand Committee and here. How can we possibly carry out our proper duty of scrutiny This is being pushed through because one woman is so adamant and determined to have her own way and treats both Houses of Parliament like rubber stamps. She appears more like an elected dictator than a Prime Minister in a Cabinet Government in a parliamentary democracy. It is getting totally out of hand.
Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-02-28
Topic: International Affairs
Raymond Collins (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, before the Minister rises, how can I resist making a contribution? The debate in Grand Committee lasted for some considerable time despite there being only the two of us; we were able to debate the issue in quite a lot of depth. One point raised, which the Minister ought to address today, is that we may await the consent of the other nations to join the convention: is there a potential gap, if we fall out of the EU, in not being a full member of the convention?
Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) Order 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-02-28
Topic: International Affairs
Leslie Turnberg (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I strongly support the Government on this order There can be little doubt that Hezbollah has completely taken over control of Lebanon. It is certainly in the Parliament but it is also in the military—it is everywhere—and Lebanon and its Government can do little without Hezbollah. The deputy secretary-general of Hezbollah, Naim Qassem, has repeatedly said that the political and the military wings are as one—they are not distinct. There is little doubt too that Hezbollah is funded and supported by Iran and represents an outpost of that country, with its Shia expansionist policies, and that those policies are not only anti-Israel and anti-Zionist but anti-Semitic; wherever Jews exist, one just needs to see the sorts of terrorist attacks Hezbollah has made on Jewish installations around the world. It is not just Jews—they have attacked and killed British troops in Syria, as well as the poor Syrians It is not only Israel that has worries in the Middle East; Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt are all extremely worried about Hezbollah’s activities, and we have a good example in Yemen, where it has a role too. Its interests have nothing to do with the plight of Palestinians. They are just pawns in their game, and if a peaceful resolution and a two-state solution eventually emerge, which we would all like to see, it will not stop Iran and Hezbollah in their anti-Semitic activities. Against this background, it is impossible to believe that the so-called political wing of Hezbollah was unaware of what goes on. How can the political wing not be pulling the strings with Iran to produce 150,000 or more missiles and rockets in southern Lebanon, and digging six tunnels under the border with Israel? How can that possibly be thought of as a purely defensive action? Both wings are as one, both should be proscribed, and I hope we agree.
Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) Order 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-02-28
Topic: International Affairs
Meta Ramsay (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, one does not often hear these words from the Opposition Benches, but I congratulate the Government, particularly the Home Secretary, on doing the right thing about Hezbollah There is no division of Hezbollah. Nasrallah has explicitly said time and again, "We do not have a military wing and a political wing". He must get quite frustrated with the British Government for not understanding that, but he keeps repeating it. It is true; Hezbollah is one. Due to my professional past, I am the last person to criticise the Foreign Office but I feel that it is to blame for our Government not taking the correct, logical and obvious position of proscribing the whole of Hezbollah. I can see that an ambassador in Lebanon might find it difficult if the Government with whom he is trying to co-operate include terrorists We seem to have paid a very high price in not proscribing Hezbollah for so many years out of diplomatic convenience. There is no doubt about it: you can have perfectly normal relations with the Lebanese Government without the problem of Hezbollah being in the Government and being proscribed. The heavy price referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, included Hezbollah flags flying on the streets of London time and again in 2017 and 2018 during demonstrations. They flew under the excuse that they were for the political, not the proscribed, wing. That is unacceptable on our part Hezbollah is not just anti-Israel. It is deeply anti-Semitic and makes no pretence about that. The noble Baroness, Lady Deech, quoted Nasrallah as saying that it is very useful if all the Jews gather in Israel because then Hezbollah does not have to go round the world looking for Jews to kill. His deputy has also said that God imprinted blasphemy on the Jews’ hearts. That is an extreme anti-Semitic point, even for some of the anti-Semites we know about in Britain. We must accept that it is an unacceptable, nasty, anti-Semitic, dangerous terrorist organisation that threatens all our democracies, not just those in the Middle East. It is high time that it was proscribed and I congratulate the Government on doing so.
Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) Order 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-02-28
Topic: Law and Crime
Frank Ashcroft Judd (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I want to put on record my deep appreciation to my noble friend Lord Rosser for the speech that he made at the beginning of this debate. It was penetrating and analytical, and it is absolutely essential to the cause to which we all subscribe that he gets a full and explicit reply from the Government. I have been a Defence Minister and a Foreign Office Minister, and I totally understand that when we operate in this kind of context there are things that have to be confidential. But that makes it doubly important to be as explicit and transparent as we can possibly be in the support of the case that we pursue. If there have been, in a short period of time, the changes that have been described in this debate, it is absolutely, inescapably obvious that we have to give a very good account for why this has happened One good thing about this debate is that it has aired the issues a little more widely. It would be totally naive to imagine that the issue of anti-Semitism is simply about Jewish people. I personally believe that the total unacceptability of anti-Semitism is because it is about people. But not to understand that it has sinister—I use that word quite deliberately—implications would be very naive. It is obviously about other political objectives as well. To refuse to face that fact will not help at all The one crucial point that I want to make is this. I know that I have made it before, but I will go on making it until my dying day. We are ultimately in a battle for hearts and minds. It is in the sphere of hearts and minds that we will build lasting security, not by administrative arrangements or containment operations. It is by winning people’s conviction, understanding and appreciation of why the values about which we like to talk in this House are so indispensable to the future of humanity. That is the issue: hearts and minds That is why, when we are introducing anti-terrorism legislation, it is terribly important that all the time right in the forefront of the minds of those charged with the responsibility of coming to a conclusion are the words and thoughts: what are our values? What will be the down cost of this? What will play into the hands of extremists, as they exploit genuine anxieties and doubts amongst young people but not only young people? That is the issue that must not be ignored. What is the counterproductivity of what is being proposed It is a very difficult balance and a very difficult decision, but I urge that we always keep that concern about counterproductivity very much in mind in our deliberations.
Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) Order 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-02-28
Topic: International Affairs
Dale Norman Campbell-Savours (Labour, Centre-left): I have been listening to this debate quite closely. What happens in the event that a Member of the Lebanese Parliament—Lebanon is a member of the IPU—comes to the United Kingdom as part of a delegation? Would there be any difficulties for that person in entering the UK?
Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) Order 2019 — House of Lords, 2019-02-28
Topic: International Affairs
Roger John Liddle (Labour, Centre-left): On the EU side of things, can the Minister tell us what the attitude of the French Government is towards these questions? France is our closest security partner and it would be very relevant to know its views.
Honda in Swindon — House of Lords, 2019-02-19
Topic: Macroeconomics
John Davies (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I am afraid I thought that the complacency in the Statement and in the Minister’s answers was really quite horrific. I remind the Minister that unemployment figures are lagging indicators. The leading indicators, such as inventories, look extremely sick. Is it not the case that the Government have been warned from this side of the House consistently over the past two years that the course they were pursuing was going to undermine the basis for manufacturing in this country? How many more of these "devastating" announcements—I use the same epithet that the Minister herself used—will we have to hear, and will the people of this country have to suffer, before the Government realise the error of their ways?
Honda in Swindon — House of Lords, 2019-02-19
Topic: International Affairs
Dave Watts (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, can the Minister be clear on what Brexit deal she would like this side to support? Is it the Prime Minister’s deal, which she did not vote for, or a mystical deal that does not exist?
Honda in Swindon — House of Lords, 2019-02-19
Topic: Foreign Trade
David Edward Lea (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, was it not Baroness Thatcher who said that, for Japan, one of the unique selling features of Britain was that it was in the European Union, part of the customs union and part of the single market, and therefore cars could be sold freely around the European Union? What part of that analysis is no longer true?
Honda in Swindon — House of Lords, 2019-02-19
Topic: Energy
Dale Norman Campbell-Savours (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, does the Minister accept that car manufacturers will build electric cars only in the event that charging infrastructure is in place? The Government have today announced £400 million, which is peanuts, for charging appliances—maybe it was preannounced but it was repeated today and the Minister referred to it. I estimate that to be about 20,000 charging units. How can we expect manufacturers to stay in a market where the Government do not back them up with the very infrastructure needed to ensure that sales of electrical cars make that worth doing in the United Kingdom?
Healthcare (International Arrangements) Bill — House of Lords, 2019-02-19
Topic: Foreign Trade
Clive Brooke (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, first, I apologise to the Committee for not having been able to speak at Second Reading. Secondly, I welcome the Minister to her new post and wish her well with it, although I am sorry, like the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, that she has been given a hospital pass on this one. I shall speak briefly in support of Amendment 1 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton. I am sorry to hear that the clause stand part may not be pushed to a vote, but perhaps the way that the debate goes may necessitate that My interest goes back before the Minister came into the House. I asked a series of questions about the proposed trade agreement between the UK and the USA. I have been particularly concerned, as have many in the health industry, that this agreement will open up an opportunity for the USA to come in very strongly indeed. The health industry in America is a very big part of the economy, and one area in which it has not been able to make great movement is within the NHS. Some of us have been concerned that the trade agreement would open that up, and we have been seeking to have it taken off the agenda. I have tabled Questions asking for it not to be on the agenda, and the Government have so far not been prepared to give any such assurance. I have contemplated moving an amendment to this Bill to ensure that, while the Minister is saying that this has nothing to do with that, she could accept such an amendment and set my mind at rest very quickly I read very carefully what she said in response to similar criticisms of the Bill at Second Reading: "The Government are completely committed to the guiding principles of the NHS—that it is universal and free at the point of need. Our position is definitive: the NHS is not and never will be for sale".—[Official Report, 5/2/19; col. 1488.] She was not saying anything there with which I would disagree, but one worries about trade agreements whereby people can effectively take over and, while not owning it, can run parts of a major utility such as the NHS. That is why some of us have been seeking an agreement that it would not be on the agenda at all and the NHS would be left as it is, free of any trade agreement, particularly with the United States. I would be grateful, therefore, if the Minister could reassure me that in no way would a trade agreement with the USA have the NHS as part of it. If not, I may have to go away and see whether I can bring back an amendment on this issue.
Healthcare (International Arrangements) Bill — House of Lords, 2019-02-19
Topic: International Affairs
Robert Maurice Lipson Winston (Labour, Centre-left): I have the greatest respect for the noble Lord, Lord O’Shaughnessy, who we feel did a great job while he was in the department as a Minister, but does he not see that this is indeed a Brexit Bill? Out there in the community, people voting in the referendum said, "Take back power". It was about taking back control and the paradox in this amendment—it may be irony, I am not quite sure which—is that we are not taking back control. Parliament will not have the control, which is what the people wanted at the time of voting for Brexit. That is fundamentally wrong and inappropriate, therefore I am quite certain that this amendment is appropriate.
Healthcare (International Arrangements) Bill — House of Lords, 2019-02-19
Topic: Foreign Trade
Elizabeth Andrews (Labour, Centre-left): I take the noble Lord’s personal assurances on that. Who could disagree with what he has just said about the need to have these sorts of vigorous, expansive and generous trading arrangements, which we hope will involve skills, health and knowledge? My question is really: why are these powers in this Bill? If they are necessary and within our reach, why can we not have them in an appropriate Bill with appropriate powers, which we can all be certain will not be exploited and lead to perverse consequences?
Healthcare (International Arrangements) Bill — House of Lords, 2019-02-19
Topic: International Affairs
Dorothea Glenys Thornton (Labour, Centre-left): As much as I admire and love my noble friend, he should probably not intervene at this moment, but he has lots of opportunities to do so in the next few hours and I know he will take them The letter that the Minister sent, and the representations of the Government to the DPRRC, really did not take these concerns seriously. My noble friend Lady Andrews was right when she said that while these long letters are full of interesting things, they do not address the powers. The powers are not just for Brexit and the following years—they are for ever. That is the point While of course I will withdraw the amendment, because that is what we do in Committee, I assure the Minister that unless something changes in the next few weeks regarding discussions with her, I suspect we will be returning to this at the next stage of the Bill. I beg leave to withdraw.