argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Covid-19: Businesses and the Private Sector — House of Lords, 2020-05-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
John Mann (Labour, Centre-left): I echo the points made by the noble Lord, Lord McConnell, on consumers. He will be pleased to know that a shining example of good practice is the Scottish Youth Hostels Association. Sadly, I will not be spending time with it this weekend As we approach the likelihood of a second, or perhaps third or fourth, wave of this epidemic, it will be critical that entrepreneurs step forward, not just specifically to assist taking on Covid-19 but to move the economy forward. We cannot afford an economy that will stagnate or worse over the next two years. The Bank of England needs to use the full range of instruments at its disposal to ensure that investment in the economy continues apace by both private investors and the state. That new economy needs to learn the lessons that Japan learned after the Second World War by using W Edwards Deming and total quality management to change the paradigm within which industry operates We will be entering a new economy post Covid-19. That economy will have new products. We need to be self-sustaining and self-reliant as a nation and an economy, with the electric car, the driverless car, energy-generating building materials, artificial intelligence and robotics, goods movement shifting on to freight and effective 5G everywhere. We need to take action to move into that new economy now. We must not delay.
Northern Ireland Protocol — House of Lords, 2020-05-21
Topic: Agriculture
John Morris (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I want to ask four specific questions, if I may. First, will the Treasury provide finance now to develop the necessary facilities at relevant ports? Secondly, would it be helpful to have a trial run now so that by the autumn, we could confidently tell the EU that we have practical solutions? Thirdly, given that Northern Ireland sends its milk to the Republic to be processed, will there be extra costs to dairy farmers? Against this, the key to the working of the arrangement will be the joint working party. When did it last meet and when will it meet next?
Northern Ireland Protocol — House of Lords, 2020-05-21
Topic: Foreign Trade
Peter Hain (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I appeal to Ministers to be more frank about this. In promising unfettered access, the Command Paper states that there will be "no change to how Northern Ireland goods arrive in Great Britain ports compared to today. … These arrangements will not cover goods travelling from Ireland or the rest of the EU being exported to Great Britain." Without costly checks and barriers, how is this compatible with the legally binding Irish protocol, which must differentiate between goods explicitly from Northern Ireland and those transited through from elsewhere, for which customs rules and tariffs apply?
Northern Ireland Protocol — House of Lords, 2020-05-21
Topic: International Affairs
George Foulkes (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I will return to the point about the Belfast office raised by the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Bennachie, and my fellow supporter of the union, the noble Lord, Lord Caine. Does the Minister not recall that in February last year the British Government told the European Union that they wanted the EU to have an office in Belfast, in part to contribute to the implementation of this protocol? That was then reneged on by Michael Gove. On a day when the Prime Minister has made a spectacular U-turn on fees for NHS staff from overseas, will the Minister—who we know is a man of influence—take the courage in his hands and do a U-turn on the Belfast office? If he does, he will be really popular with many people throughout Northern Ireland.
Northern Ireland Protocol — House of Lords, 2020-05-21
Topic: International Affairs
Roger John Liddle (Labour, Centre-left): This is a step forward but a very modest one. Does the Minister agree that this is a proposal that has to be agreed with the European Union and the European Commission in the joint committee and the specialised committee On the question of the union’s presence in supervising these arrangements, I have the protocol in front of me, and Article 12.2 makes clear that "Union representatives shall have the right to be present during any activities of the authorities of the United Kingdom related to the implementation and application of provisions of … this Protocol" It goes on to say: "Where the Union representative requests the authorities of the United Kingdom to carry out control measures … the authorities of the United Kingdom shall carry out those control measures", and that if we do not then this is subject to the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice. Will the Minister be honest about what the provisions of the protocol are?
Covid-19: R Rate and Lockdown Measures — House of Lords, 2020-06-09
Topic: Social Welfare
Jill Pitkeathley (Labour, Centre-left): The Minister will know from research published yesterday by Carers UK—I declare an interest as a vice-president—that more than 4 million extra people have taken on caring roles at home for family and friends during the pandemic. Following the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, I ask: in the event of a second wave, how will the Government ensure that these carers are provided with adequate PPE and access to services?
Corporate Insolvency and Governance Bill — House of Lords, 2020-06-09
Topic: Macroeconomics
John Mann (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, in any major economic crisis—and this is part of the current world crisis—there will be winners and losers. I was quite amused but not surprised to hear that the hot tub industry is doing incredibly well as people with sufficient money are installing them in their garden—in lieu perhaps of holidays to hotter climates. There will be winners, and entrepreneurs will be critical in coming out of any economic recession. There has been some fascinating research into how new entrepreneurs were critical to economic regeneration in the southern states of the US after some of their climatic disasters Some of them will be winners. There will also be losers, some of which may be big and well known. I do not wish to pour gloom by suggesting which kinds of companies, but household names may not survive the next six months, because of how shopping is changing and may permanently change as a result of consumer behaviour. Therefore, this Bill has many importances—some perhaps beyond its initial worthy impetus. One area that has less accountability and is more poorly regulated than elsewhere is that of insolvency practitioners. From my experience, they always seem capable of charging the fees they are entitled to charge but sometimes, in cases where I have assisted companies, they do not seem to do a great deal more than that. That is a small sector that needs stronger regulation There are also landlords exploiting the situation, some of them offshoring, doubtless often for tax purposes, and in receipt of taxpayer support, and endangering the small, emerging businesses—which are sometimes well located and paying higher rents—which are precisely the businesses that will be the engine of recovery and which could be killed by cash flow. The invidious position of those offshoring is not addressed here and could be considered Pension funds have been raised already. If major, traditional, long-standing companies end up being the losers, some of them will have major pension funds. It is not just the social justice question, which is of significance in itself, but the economic repercussions for both the local economy and the UK economy if a group of pensioners or soon-to-be pensioners have a significantly lower purchasing power when they have a higher propensity to spend. So the protection of pension funds deserves more attention in the progress of this Bill There is also the question of employees. I have assisted people going to employment tribunals where the assets of the company and the directors remain; they start trading again on the same premises, doing the same work the next day, having got rid of a lot of people who then find that, even if they win in a tribunal, there is nothing to claim from. That is not a sensible way to run any economy. The Minister may wish to comment on whether this Bill will have any impact on strengthening that position Finally, there is the question of football clubs. That will be a big one that we should be very aware of, in terms of some of the names that may go under.
Corporate Insolvency and Governance Bill — House of Lords, 2020-06-09
Topic: Labor
John Hendy (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, preserving companies in financial difficulties as going concerns is laudable. The workers of such companies will welcome measures that keep at bay corporate predators intent on stripping a company’s assets, thus destroying jobs. But the Bill does not eliminate the dangers to workers. Indeed, it contains no specific provisions to protect workers. Let me amplify some omissions which have been touched on by my noble friend Lord Stevenson and others Most fundamental is the absence of any obligation that workers and their representatives be involved in proposals for a moratorium or a restructuring—proposals likely to affect them profoundly. The Companies Act 2006 requires directors to take into account the interests of the workers, but they are not obliged to ask the workers for their views. We know that directors commonly ignore workers’ interests when a company is in financial difficulty. Often, the workers first learn that the company has gone bust on TV—well after all key decisions have been taken. The 1992 trade union Act requires consultation before redundancy, but we know that too often that does not happen, even where administrators have been appointed. It is cheaper to pay compensation than to keep the company going while consultation takes place. In the Woolworths administration, £67.8 million was paid out in compensation for failure to consult; at Comet, it was £26 million Another point is that those payments were not made by the companies, the directors or the administrators. They were made by the taxpayer, under legislation that requires the National Insurance Fund to pay some awards, unpaid wages and pension contributions. The burden is shifted to the taxpayer because the workers’ claims are insufficiently protected by insolvency law. It is true that the Insolvency Act 1986 confers preferred creditor status on employees in respect of some unpaid awards, wages and pension contributions. Preferred creditor status sounds good, but it ranks behind all secured creditors, including, often, the shareholders themselves, where private equity is invested by way of secured loans rather than share purchase. After the secured creditors have been paid out, often there is not enough to go around the preferred creditors. In the case of Bernard Matthews, the pension fund recovered next to nothing, while the secured creditors were paid in full. Debts owed to workers outside preferred creditor status rank at the bottom, with all other unsecured creditors. Since the company is, by definition, in financial difficulty, usually there is not enough for them. What is required is to make the benefits of this Bill contingent on the company fulfilling its obligations to their workers first. Noble friends and I will table amendments to achieve this if the Government do not.
Corporate Insolvency and Governance Bill — House of Lords, 2020-06-09
Topic: Labor
Christine Blower (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I have no specific interests to declare in the context of the debate, but I declare one as a lifelong trade unionist. As such, I always look at proposals from any Government in the light of how they will impact on employees and workers. There is, I am sure, a widespread fear that in the aftermath of the pandemic there is likely to be wide-scale job loss and the prospect of not a little unemployment. This prospect must focus our minds on what can be done to avoid or alleviate it. The pandemic has brought into sharp focus the significant levels of inequality in this country. Many more people are now aware of just how little others had to live on before the pandemic, and many will look for a better and more equal society in post-Covid Britain, as well as globally. If we are to see a fairer Britain, it will be ushered in by ensuring that employees and workers have well-respected legal rights On the surface, this Bill is about rescuing financially distressed companies; I think we can agree that there may be a number of them. We can also agree that maintaining companies so as to maintain jobs is an important objective. However, what potentially may be enabled through the Bill’s proposed company restructuring is a situation in which companies restructure their liabilities while remaining in business, with the impact of such restructuring falling very heavily on the workforce—perhaps in particular on employees’ pensions. Can the Minister clarify what recourse an ongoing restructured business would have to the Pension Protection Fund Further, can the Minister explain the lack of intention in the Bill’s proposals to limit in any way executive pay and bonuses, even for a specified period? Nowhere in the Bill is there even a nod in the direction of the need to consult the workforce, much less engage in meaningful negotiations. If this legislation is in part modelled on Chapter 11, as it is popularly known in the United States, it may open the door to what has been seen in some companies in the US: the strategic use of insolvency as a means of jettisoning previously agreed collective bargaining arrangements in order to depress wages, conditions and pensions There is an opportunity in the Bill to legislate for the requirement to consult the workforce in any company that is genuinely facing difficulty. This would indicate a desire that restructuring should not be used in an unreasonable strategic fashion. The much-vaunted agenda of levelling up will ring hollow if legislation is not seen to take into account the voices of workers in their own futures. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, on his remarks in this regard and his recognition of pensions as deferred wages I trust that the Minister will consider favourably amendments that will be brought forward from these Benches to remedy the lacunae in the Bill.
Corporate Insolvency and Governance Bill — House of Lords, 2020-06-09
Topic: Labor
Pauline Bryan (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, Covid-19 has made people more aware of the effects that changes in working practices have had on many workers. It is not long ago that the gig economy and zero-hours contracts were defended on the basis that some workers benefited from not having guaranteed hours or being able to plan and budget for rent, food and other expenses. The vast majority of workers know that there is no substitute for a job with a proper contract, holiday pay, sick pay, maternity and paternity pay, and, at the end, a good pension This pandemic has made many people even more conscious of how important these things are. There have been any number of scandals involving insolvency by unscrupulous employers playing fast and loose with pensions, which, as has been said, are workers’ deferred earnings Can the Minister assure the House that the Government have learned from those high-profile cases and that they recognise that those who suffer most from insolvency are the employees Following the collapse of Thomas Cook, many workers, sometimes more than one in the same family, not only lost their wages and long-saved-for pensions but struggled to pay rent and mortgages, putting their homes at risk. These uncertainties increase the likelihood of marriages breaking up and other social, physical and mental health problems. The Bill makes one think that the Government have not learned the lessons about insolvency from the failures of Carillion, BHS and all the others. If they had, they would have included employee representatives in the discussions around insolvency and would have amended regulations so that pension schemes were among the secured creditors Another concern about the Bill is that it may not prevent a restructuring plan being used to undermine workers’ terms and conditions. We should be concerned that the legislation has been compared to chapter 11 in the United States. I am more worried than some Peers that this could allow employers to end agreements with trade unions, sack workers, and rehire them on lower wages and poorer working conditions Many people hope that some good will come out of this pandemic. They hope that we will do things differently, that our society can be fairer and more equal, and that people’s lives can be made more secure. We must of course welcome the aim of keeping companies in business in such difficult times, but this needs to be done with the co-operation of the workforce. This can happen only if employees feel properly valued. As the Bill stands, it is business as usual. I hope that the Minister recognises that that is not good enough and will consider adopting some of the amendments that will greatly improve the legislation.
Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) (No. 2) Order 2020 — House of Lords, 2020-07-16
Topic: Law and Crime
Stewart Martin Wood (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I thank the Minister for setting out the facts of the case with regard to FKD. I of course support its inclusion on the proscribed terrorist organisations list. I have a couple of brief questions about the system by which terrorist organisations get proscribed First, with reference to previous cases, particularly Kurdish terrorist organisations, can the Minister explain what material difference it makes to redesignate an organisation on the proscribed list as a separate terrorist organisation rather than an affiliate of another large organisation? That has been the subject of previous orders and I am sure will be the subject of future ones Secondly, does the Minister agree that there is a need for a better, more internationally co-ordinated system for the designation of proscribed terrorist organisations? I declare an interest as chair of the United Nations Association UK. There is currently no UN system for designating terrorist organisations, just a collection of organisations with approved sanctions passed by individual resolution. Each country has its own list, which may or may not overlap with those of other countries. Should the UK not argue for a multinational regime capable of providing a comprehensive and authoritative list of proscribed organisations that would be at least expected to be binding across countries?
Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) (No. 2) Order 2020 — House of Lords, 2020-07-16
Topic: International Affairs
John Mann (Labour, Centre-left): I congratulate the Minister and the Home Secretary on their appropriate action in relation to FKD, and the Sonnenkrieg Division and the Atomwaffen Division previously. I also commend the Anti-Defamation League, in America, which has been critical in exposing both those organisations, and with which I have constant communication and contact Have there been discussions with Estonian ministerial counterparts, given that the FKD and the Sonnenkrieg Division appear to have strong Estonian links? If not, would the Government consider such discussions to see what we can learn about the reason for the growth in such organisations in the Baltics?
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-07-16
Topic: Agriculture
Frank Ashcroft Judd (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, this is a very important amendment. It is a rather historic occasion, because I cannot recall any other occasion on which I have associated myself with the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, politically, but I completely associate myself with him on this occasion. For me it is quite simple: if we will the ends, we have to will the means. It is clear that agriculture not only contributes to the problem but could be doing far more to help solve the problem. We all have to think, wherever we are in society, how we can change our ways in order to play a practical part in this urgent priority for the survival of the human race. I therefore commend the amendment and am very glad to see the other amendments in the group addressing ways in which agriculture can contribute towards the objective—not just how it can restrain itself, but how it can contribute. This is a practical priority, and I hope the Government take it very seriously.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-07-16
Topic: Agriculture
Barbara Young (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I support Amendments 272 and 274 in the names of the two noble Baronesses, Lady Jones and Lady Jones, respectively—you can never have too many Lady Joneses, in my view These amendments would put an urgency and a framework into the objective of substantially reducing the carbon impact of farming, and would include a series of targets and interim targets in line with successive carbon budgets under the Climate Change Act. The noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, said that the amendments were too declamatory and mandatory, and that is why I support them. We need a bit of backbone to make sure that this vital purpose is achieved Agriculture accounts for 11% of UK greenhouse gas emissions, and that percentage has not reduced very much over the last 10 years. Unless change can be incentivised financially, agriculture will account for a greater proportion of our UK emissions, as other sectors decarbonise quickly. On the other hand, land is an essential resource for tackling climate change through its ability to sequester and store carbon, and that needs to be taken into account at the same time. I know that the Minister will say that the purposes in Clause 1 already enable support to be provided for measures to combat climate change. However, the amendments before us provide a much stronger framework to drive the urgent changes required in agricultural practice, and I urge him to consider the extra welly that they will provide for this vital purpose.
Agriculture Bill — House of Lords, 2020-07-16
Topic: Environment
David George Clark (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I very much associate myself with the thrust of these four amendments. They highlight something which is absolutely critical, and we can think of this as we go through Covid-19, because, although the pandemic is serious, it is not as serious as climate change Here, we have a set of amendments that sets modern agriculture in Britain within the context of our climate change challenge. It is a big challenge but one that we have to face and, in fact, win. I very much associate myself with the comments of my noble friend Lady Young of Old Scone. In particular, I support Amendment 272 in the name of my noble friend Lady Jones of Whitchurch, although I equally support the amendment in the name of the other noble Baroness, Lady Jones If we had to invent a machine to lead the campaign against carbon emissions, that would be quite difficult, but nature has provided us with just such a machine. It has provided us with trees. Trees absorb carbon as they grow and retain carbon as they mature: in their leaves, their trunk, their bark, their roots and their soil—it is all there. Although we do not have many woods and trees in this country, we all have ambitions to have more. To give one statistic, one young mixed wood captures 400 tonnes of carbon per hectare. It is a very efficient way of meeting our climate change target, and this Bill will help, because more trees will be planted I want to raise something with the Minister which I hope he or she will look at. We all talk about planting trees because they provide so many benefits—in this case, we are talking about climate change—but if you remove trees, you do exactly the opposite, with the saving grace that if you replant, you start the whole process again. There is a law in this country that says that before a tree of a certain size is felled, a licence must be obtained. However, I am afraid that that legislation is hardly ever applied. It is when it comes to large areas of trees, because, just as individuals might get grants to plant trees, they have to get permission to fell.