argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Palestinian Territories — House of Lords, 2018-06-07
Topic: International Affairs
Jennifer Louise Tonge (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): My Lords I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Steel, on obtaining this debate, but sadly it gives me no pleasure to take part because this matter has gone on for far too long It is some 50 years since the Six Day War, when the intentions of the Zionist movement became clear: to carry on expelling and killing Palestinians, and grabbing their land and their homes until the ambition of a greater Israel is achieved from the Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea. It is not fooling us any longer. Our Government have stood by feebly, often abstaining on UN resolutions while slaughter and dispossession continue, bleating about a two-state solution and refusing to recognise the state of Palestine. We recognise Israel, of course we do, but which Israel is that? Where are its borders? What are we recognising? If that is the excuse for not recognising the state of Palestine, it applies to both states, and both states should be recognised as soon as possible, as many noble Lords have said The most recent excuse given by the Government for abstaining from UN resolutions and taking no action against the Israeli Government is, of course, the activities of Hamas. Most recently, our Government would not condemn Israel for the killings during the "Great March of Return" in Gaza because Hamas might have had a hand in it. Slings and stones were used against one of the strongest armies in the world with a nuclear arsenal. The Israel Defense Forces were shooting indiscriminately at children and medical personnel, as well as other Gazan people. Shame on them and shame on us for not reacting What if Hamas did have a hand in it? What if it did? I would remind this House that the Government of Israel helped to create Hamas. It is the product of Israeli Government policies, not the cause of them. A legitimately elected Hamas Government were prevented from taking office in 2006—never forget that—and we are supposed to be democrats Gaza, as we have heard, is a toxic slum and will be uninhabitable by 2020, according to the United Nations. Nearly 2 million people, over half of them youngsters, are being slowly squeezed to death, with no prospects of a future. Of course they protest, and they do so as violently as they are able. Many of them would rather die than continue as they are But we say, "It’s not our fault. Balfour was a long time ago. We have to have the international community with us. We cannot do anything". We listen to the Government of Israel trying to make Iran the object of our attention. We obey our masters in the United States of America, who obey the Israel lobby, as I suggest we do here. Of course, we must listen to the trade gods of Brexit For the sake of Jewish people who do not support the present Government in Israel, for the sake of the Palestinians, for the sake of the wider Middle East and for the conscience of our nation, I beg this Government of ours to take action, stop selling arms to Israel, impose sanctions and support justice for Palestine.
Government Vision on Prevention — House of Lords, 2018-11-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Manzila Pola Uddin (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): My Lords, those of us who have worked in community developments over 40 years have understood and valued the notion of prevention. It has to be recognised that funding has dissipated over the last 10 or 15 years, due to the finance extracted from local government. I welcome the Statement and I particularly welcome the fact that the Secretary of State makes reference to wanting to integrate housing and health and social care. This is very important. More specifically, I want to make a couple of points on learning disability and autism The Secretary of State recently came to a meeting of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Disability and we were really pleased that he stayed and listened throughout. However, the point that is still missing—I would like the Minister to respond—is on how the Government will ensure that organisations that have worked solidly with sterling records on the ground will be part of this discussion, because they know the answers. Minister after Minister and officer after officer will change, but many of these organisations have remained rooted, whether they have been funded or not, and I would like some assurance that they will have their say. Millions have been lost in services over the past decades, particularly in disadvantaged communities, so women and people with disabilities have not been able to access services adequately, either because they do not know that services exist or because government organisations simply fail to connect with them.
Social Workers Regulations 2018 — House of Lords, 2018-07-03
Topic: Social Welfare
Kamlesh Patel (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): Clearly, I have avoided speaking on these regulations because I have a clear and obvious conflict of interest, so I do not wish to comment on the debate that has just happened. But, just before the Minister sits down, I take this opportunity to reinforce what he said about the contribution that noble Lords in this House have made to the establishment of Social Work England. I have found them particularly helpful over the last few months. I have engaged with and received wise wisdom from many of them, and continue to do so I put my thanks on record to the several hundred people I have spoken to, from service users to higher education providers, and from the social work profession to employers, who again have been very engaged in discussions. That certainly will continue There is one reason I wanted to speak today and this is probably rarely done. I have worked with lots of government departments and officials in a number of guises, NDPBs and other things. I have not come across a group of officials before that have been so passionate and so committed, and given so much time to developing the foundations for this organisation to go forward. I put on record my thanks to the officials from the Department for Education and the Department of Health and Social Care, because they have really worked hard. I have never seen such passion and commitment to making an organisation come together.
Ivory Bill — House of Lords, 2018-09-12
Topic: Environment
William Fletcher-Vane (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): My Lords, I declare an interest as president of the British Art Market Federation, as I did on the first day in Committee May I ask the Minister about the comments about resources that the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, made at the beginning of his speech? On the first day in Committee I moved an amendment that the noble Lord will remember, about the requirement to register Clause 7—de minimis—exemptions. These exemptions, in the words of the Explanatory Memorandum, are there because they in no way, either directly or indirectly, contribute to the poaching of wild elephants. At the same time, the Minister told the House that government policy had been prepared with the benefit of the widest consultation, with all the relevant interest groups, including the wildlife interest groups. That being the case, having heard the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, surely it must follow, given the very small number of resources that are available to deal with the problems of ivory, that this stipulation that de minimis exemptions need to be registered is a serious misallocation of resources. The Government admit that they are not contributing to the destruction of wild elephants. Therefore, if it is an offence not to register, they are deflecting resources that could otherwise be put to better purpose. If the noble Lord says that it will not lead to any change or misallocation of resources, I will ask him what the purpose is of having that stipulation in the legislation at all, because it is conceded that it is not achieving anything.
Ivory Bill — House of Lords, 2018-10-24
Topic: Agriculture
William Fletcher-Vane (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): I am very grateful to the Minister for the way in which he responded to my earlier concerns in our previous debate. I found myself almost seduced by his silver tongue. I found myself wondering whether perhaps he was right, but all along there was a niggling doubt in the back of my mind. As I said in my remarks, the scheme which is being adopted globally to deal with ivory poaching is basically the same right around the globe. The interesting thing about that is that there is nowhere else on earth where there is a registration scheme associated with de minimis exemptions. It is also interesting that in the consultation that was held prior to the Bill, there was no mention of registration. It was a matter that came into the frame—if I may put it that way—right at the last minute. That makes me wonder My amendment does not change the substantive law, nor does it change the scheme that this Bill is intended to put into effect. If this amendment were to be passed, two things would follow. The first one is that the very real concern of my noble friend Lord Hague—that somehow we would be outside the scope and general thrust of the international efforts to deal with ivory poaching—could not be the case. We would merely be doing what other people are doing. Equally, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, made the important point that we do not want to be out of synch with other people. Indeed, you could make quite a strong case for saying that, on the basis of the facts, by including my amendment, we would actually be more aligned with other countries around the world rather than less so. I find it odd that we are being told that the right way to tackle this is rather different from the way that the rest of the world does so. It should be a matter for your Lordships to decide whether we want to be a bit different from everybody else or whether we follow the international pattern. Against that background, I would like to test the opinion of the House on this important matter.
Airports National Policy Statement — House of Lords, 2018-06-06
Topic: Transportation
Jennifer Louise Tonge (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): My Lords, at the end of the terminal 5 public inquiry, in which I was involved, we were promised that there would be no further expansion of Heathrow Airport, and especially not a third runway there. In view of the fact that the Minister has just told us that there will be huge expansion of capacity at Heathrow, can she tell us how long we have to wait before there will be plans for a terminal 6 or even a terminal 7 at Heathrow? Will there be any end to the expansion there? Finally, can she relay a message to the Foreign Secretary that I am very willing to lay down with him at any time, providing it is in front of a bulldozer?
Brexit: Negotiations — House of Lords, 2018-11-20
Topic: Foreign Trade
William Fletcher-Vane (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): My Lords, almost 30 years ago, in 1989, I was first elected as a Conservative Member of the European Parliament and was a spear-carrier in putting together the single market. The problem at that time was that the European economies, including our own, were being held back by what was known as "Eurosclerosis". This is because free trade does not actually mean that you can trade freely, which seems to be a bit of a paradox. Non-tariff barriers ensure this; they are ingeniously constructed and expensive to get through or around Free trade is a necessary but insufficient aspect of a frictionless international trading system, which is what our Government are looking for. Free trade is, after all, a late 18th-century and 19th-century phenomenon. Now, in the 21st century, we live in a world of regulated markets because of social attitudes, the size of populations, the nature of business and technologies and probably, to some extent, to avert revolutions It was 30 years ago that the Conservatives under the leadership of Margaret Thatcher, helped by Leon Brittan and Arthur Cockfield, drove forward the single market. They recognised that sovereignty can be exercised in differing and more or less sophisticated ways. Being clever about this led to the creation of transnational rules and enforcement procedures, which involved our participation. This has enriched our country, generating revenues for private and public sectors and paying, I suspect, for our net contributions to the European Union budget The road to Brexit is through a gate called the withdrawal agreement, and Brexit entails our leaving the single market. We have been told that trade with other countries will make up the difference. All I can say is that it did not do so in the 1980s. Other EU countries trade very successfully from the EU into the wider world. For example, I understand that both France and Germany are more effective at doing business with China than we are. I suspect that third countries are keen to flood this country with cheap goods but will be much less inclined or able to buy things from us It is therefore my view that we should pause and take stock. I do not see how a non-binding, somewhat tarnished referendum more than two years ago can mandate a sovereign Parliament to run pell-mell into something that its advocates sold on a flawed prospectus. It seems far from clear what the people of this country want now. Where do they want this country to go? The case for Brexit is invariably that it is what the people want, not that it is in the nation’s best interests As currently presented, it seems to me that Brexit looks like a curious cross between the revocation of the Edict of Nantes and a political form of the South Sea bubble. As such, it is something that we as parliamentarians, who must act in our fiduciary capacity for the country—past, present and future—should do our utmost to avert.
Trade Union Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-16
Topic: Labor
Hugh Dykes (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): My Lords, I add my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, for moving this amendment, and to the noble Baroness, Lady Watkins, for what she has just said. Once again this indicates that on the unaffiliated or Cross Benches there has been a considerable collective contribution of good suggestions to restore a sense of balance and proportion into what was far too ideological a matter in the original drafts of the documents that eventually became the Trade Union Bill launched by the Conservative Party in government I am advised by the research I sought to do that these matters are very important from the point of view of ordinary, routine, daily trade union activity with employers in the context of the public sector and private company entities in which they work. The main activities in the practical usage of facility time include: negotiating improved pay and conditions for members and the wider workforce and accessing specialist union training on employment rights; accompanying individuals in their disciplinary or grievance hearings; carrying out health and safety duties; training people who are not yet trained on health and safety matters; and promoting learning opportunities and opportunities for further intellectual activity in the entities in which they work Those are routine matters, not matters that, I am sure, in the original draft text in Conservative Central Office, before it became the Bill launched by this Government—on the basis of only 24% of the population—were ideological clauses based on the belief that there was some kind of union racket in this facility time element. That simply is not the case on all the evidence we have. Once again I hope that the Government will be tempted to see reason on this and accept the amendment.
Trade Union Bill — House of Lords, 2016-04-19
Topic: Labor
Hugh Dykes (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): My Lords, I add my comments in support of what has been said. I had a feeling that the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, the noble Lord, Lord Bridges of Headley, and the other Ministers associated with this Bill would be in listening mode, bearing in mind the contents of the debates hitherto My shock and dismay at the original text of this Bill was enormous and I think that was shared by people in all parts of the House. The Bill did not look properly constructed nor did it utilise non-extreme ideology to deal with any modernisation necessities for trade unions—some of which one doubts. In January I received a very interesting briefing from the FDA, an association of professional managers and others, which is not in any way known for extremism. In relation to the reference of the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, to trade union members dreaming about causing industrial action as they go to work in the morning, the FDA says: "Much of the portrayed justification for change relates to an utterly refutable assumption that trade unions call for industrial action on a regular basis and without cause. FDA members only embark on industrial action as a last resort. As a union with an almost 100 year history we have held national industrial action only once, yet it is a fundamental right for all working people to have the option to take industrial action and we strongly oppose moves to deny workers this right" In a way the same rights intrinsically belong to check-off and I sincerely ask Ministers to be in listening mode for other parts of this Bill, so that it can be improved if they insist on it carrying on—people have quite rightly indicated that there is probably no need for this Bill but since the Government are perhaps psychologically committed to seeing it progress I ask that they do that. In the mean time, my sense of shock has diminished. I did not write a speech over the weekend because I thought there might be some progress and I warmly thank the Ministers for their reaction today.
House Committee: First Report — House of Lords, 2016-04-14
Topic: Government Operations
William Laming (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): My Lords, this report recommends that access privileges may be withdrawn from a retired Member by the House Committee or a successor senior domestic committee. Colleagues will recall that the House has previously agreed that Members who lose their membership as a result of non-attendance or a sentence of imprisonment for more than a year should not have access privileges. Likewise, any Member who is expelled under the House of Lords (Expulsion and Suspension) Act 2015 will not have access privileges. Agreeing this report would mean that the House Committee could decide, on a case-by-case basis, whether a retired Member should have access privileges rescinded. I beg to move.
High Speed Rail (London-West Midlands) Bill — House of Lords, 2016-04-14
Topic: Government Operations
Andrew Adonis (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): If the Minister will forgive me, I am anxious to say this for the record because the record of this debate will now proceed. The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, clearly declared an interest in these matters. It is very important that proper attention is paid to precedence and it would be deeply damaging to the public interest if issues which had been considered by the Commons committee, in the context of additional provisions, were then reopened in this House. That would not only be contrary to precedent but, as he rightly said, lead to a big issue about this House seeking in a fundamental way to second-guess critical strategic decisions on the nature of the project that have already been taken by the House of Commons. So, in the interests of balance and for the record of this debate, it is very important, regarding those who have a clear interest in this matter—the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, has a very clear interest—that that is fully taken into account before any decisions are taken to breach established precedent in the consideration of hybrid Bills.
Trade Union Political Funds and Political Party Funding — House of Lords, 2016-01-28
Topic: Government Operations
William Laming (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): That a Select Committee be appointed to consider the impact of Clauses 10 and 11 of the Trade Union Bill in relation to the Committee on Standards in Public Life’s report, Political Party Finance: Ending the Big Donor Culture, and the necessity of urgent new legislation to balance those provisions with the other recommendations made in the Committee’s Report, and that, as proposed by the Committee of Selection, the following members be appointed to the Committee: L Burns (Chairman), L Callanan, L De Mauley, B Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde, B Drake, E Kinnoull, L Richard, L Robathan, L Sherbourne of Didsbury, L Tyler, L Whitty, L Wrigglesworth; That the Committee have power to appoint specialist advisers; That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers and records; That the evidence taken by the Committee be published, if the Committee so wishes; That the Committee do report by 29 February 2016; That the Report of the Committee be printed, regardless of any adjournment of the House.
Transport for London Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2016-02-09
Topic: Transportation
William Laming (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): That the Commons message of 17 November 2015 be now considered; and that the promoters of the Transport for London Bill [HL], which was originally introduced in this House in Session 2010-12 on 24 January 2011, should have leave to proceed with the Bill in the current Session according to the provisions of Private Business Standing Order 150B (Revival of bills).
Trade Union Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-08
Topic: Government Operations
Hugh Dykes (Non-Affiliated, Unknown): My Lords, I will be brief. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, on his speech. I missed only about 20 seconds, when the television screen changed back to the Committee, so I was technically here. I agreed with what he said. I hope that he and others agree that the other disturbing factor in this is the context of a Government supported by a low percentage of voters, and only 24% of the electorate. I do not think that there was a lower figure in recent decades. I may be incorrect, but I am pretty sure that that is right. To invoke the regular incantation that something is a manifesto promise is also flawed if the support from the natural electorate is so puny and minor as to render this an illegitimate exercise for such a controversial piece of legislative text that deliberately makes life more difficult for normative trade union behaviour There is an idea that because the manifesto is mentioned in the press in the context of an election campaign, therefore the thinking electorate, or the whole electorate, should be well aware of the proposals in it; but, of course, that is not the reality. Most members of the public, first of all, regard politics as a rather distasteful activity and they leave it at the back of all the important activities they have with their families, their holidays, their education and their children, and they go to politics when they have to, when elections come. Therefore they would not be very conversant with the contents of manifestos anyway. So the manifesto-itis element of these very badly drafted Bills that are coming through—skeleton Bills, often, with too many SIs following them and the rest of the problems—also affects this piece of legislation I remember when I was the incumbent Conservative MP—proud to be the most left-wing one, of course—for Harrow, the total number of people who came into our campaign office during the election campaign to ask for a copy of the manifesto ranged, over the seven elections I fought, from 10 to six, with an average of about eight. People just did not pay any attention to the details of manifestos. Any newly elected Government, in this case with a 12-seat majority on the basis of 30%-plus support, are entitled to say, "Well, they should have, shouldn’t they?", but it is not like that Therefore, we must produce intelligent legislation which is balanced and fair and consensually based—particularly, as in this case, with the sensitive subject of the trade unions, which have had a very difficult 15 years as a result of the way politics has moved—and we should be very concerned to make sure legislation does the right thing. Therefore, I hope the Government can respond to these realities by responding to intelligent amendments such as that just proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire.