argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): To be honest, when the law behaves in such a pernickety way as to be able to provide a ludicrous—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Witney (Robert Courts), who has some legal expertise, is laughing at the idea of lawyers being pernickety. I know that that is sort of their job, but when we end up with loopholes being abused in such a way, the law ends up looking like an ass. It is therefore incumbent on us sometimes to draw legislation as widely as possible to ensure that all such offences are caught. That has been the deliberate intention of the Bill Incidentally, I hope that in drafting the Bill, with the assistance of Government draftspeople and ministerial help, we have managed to land on a piece of legislation that is more effective than the parallel legislation that exists in Scotland. Scotland may, in fact, want to look at our legislation and reshape its own law to reflect this.
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): There are two aspects to the Bill. The first is the offence of common assault, which I think is now drawn in such a way that the courts will be able to circumvent some of the arguments that have thus far been used to prevent any kind of successful prosecution. The second aspect relates to the aggravated offence, and the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that we have not included every single offence in the world. If amendment 3 is accepted this morning, I think that we will have included all offences that could relate to emergency workers The Minister was right to say that it is important that we take cognisance of the fact that, with this Bill, we are saying that emergency workers are going to be treated slightly differently in law from the rest of the wider public. It is not that I want to create great hierarchies in society, with some people being more important than others; it is that emergency workers are suffering these attacks and assaults because they are emergency workers, and that places a greater onus on us to ensure that they have the protections that they need I return to amendment 2 and the question of whether spitting is common assault. The Sentencing Council has in recent years looked at whether spitting increases the culpability and seriousness of the offence, and it removed spitting from each of those categories in 2012. Quite a lot of magistrates and judges have now started to say that this is one of the primary reasons that there has been a deflation in the number of successful prosecutions and in the sentences that are handed down. I regret the fact that spitting was removed by the Sentencing Council and hope that it will revisit that decision in the near future. I hope that the Minister might also be able to say something about how we can ensure that the courts take spitting seriously as a part of common assault offences There is an argument that putting the words "including spitting" in the Bill could mean that there is a danger that the courts in other incidents of common assault might say, "Well, it doesn’t include those words, so Parliament intends that not to include spitting." I am guessing that the Minister may make that argument. If so, I am quite happy to listen to his point. It may well be that we will not need to divide the House on this, but I want to ensure that the courts are clear that common assault could involve merely spitting.
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. It is always a delight to have a lawyer in the House, but not too many, eh? [Interruption.] I think I have carried the House with that one The hon. Gentleman does, however, make a serious point. I tabled the amendment simply so that we could have this debate and the message goes out completely unambiguously from the House that merely spitting—I use the word "merely" legalistically; in other words, spitting alone—can constitute a common assault. That is true of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, and spitting at an emergency worker of any kind should constitute an assault under this Bill My other amendment—amendment 3—relates to sexual assault. The major part of the Bill introduces an aggravated offence; that is to say that the Bill lists a series of different offences that, when perpetrated against an emergency worker, will be considered to be aggravated. When I drew up the Bill, I was primarily thinking of physical violence towards emergency workers. But the truth is that, since I have been working on the Bill, my hon. Friend the Member for Halifax and I have received lots of representations, particularly from health service workers, about the sexual assault of ambulance workers, nurses, mental health nurses, doctors and others. One difficulty, both for the Government and for us, has been that these statistics have never been gathered by NHS Protect, which no longer exists anyway. However, the numbers of such incidents reported by the trade unions working on this matter are quite dramatic, particularly given that the figures show increases Since 2012, such incidents are up 143% in the East of England ambulance service; up 40% in London; up 133% in the North West ambulance service; and up 1500% in Northern Ireland. Incidents have increased by 400% in South Central ambulance service since 2013; by 100% in the South East Coast ambulance service since 2015; by 400% in Yorkshire ambulance service since 2013; and by 500% in the West Midlands ambulance service since 2012. I wanted to say that it is true that these are not large numbers, but there have been 238 reported cases of sexual assaults on ambulance workers in the East of England ambulance service. Parliament has to take cognisance of such figures and we have to act.
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): The hon. Lady is absolutely right. All too often, in some of our towns and villages, it is far too easy to get very cheap alcohol, and vast quantities of it. Under-age people are growing up with the expectation that they will able not just to get half a pint of cider on a Friday night but to get a whole bottle of vodka, doing themselves irreparable damage. I have been doing a bit of work on traumatic brain injury of late, and in particular how it affects the criminal justice system. It is depressing that people who get violent after alcohol will often take enormous risks with their own personal safety or will get violent with others. The brain injuries that can result from alcohol develop especially between the ages of 14 and 21, when the executive function of the brain, which sits largely at the front of it, has not yet fully developed. The damage that is done is then seen in the criminal justice system, because we have thousands and thousands of people in our prisons who have brain injuries that were never properly looked at by medics and dealt with As the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) said, it would be bizarre not to include sexual assault when we are looking at other areas of assault. I know that the Government have been reluctant about this and have said that we want to treat sexual assault differently, but I think it is better for us to treat it in the same terms. Alcohol Concern recently said that between a third and a half of all emergency service people who responded to their research had suffered sexual harassment or abuse at the hands of intoxicated members of the public. Over half of ambulance service workers reported that they had been the victim of intoxicated sexual harassment or assault, and 41% of police had been sexually harassed by drunken people I do not want to pretend that legislation, of itself, solves a problem. That is true of the whole Bill, and I will say a little more about that when we get to Third Reading. After all, if legislation, of itself, ended offending behaviour, we would have no murder, no theft and so on. However, we need to send out a clear message that trying to touch up emergency workers, make inappropriate advances to them, or make even more advanced forms of sexual approach is wholly inappropriate behaviour. It prevents emergency workers from doing their job properly, undermines morale, and makes it more difficult for us to lead a safe life. That is why I very much hope that the Government will signify, first, on amendment 2, that they accept that spitting is part of common assault or battery; and, secondly, that sexual assault should be included as an aggravated offence.
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): Let me explain briefly why we ended up with this process. If we had included only the aggravated offence element of the Bill, then there would have been no greater sentence for common assault. It seems to me that two years for common assault where there has been no lasting physical damage to the person might be thought by many people to be excessive. That is why we ended up with two tools for prosecuting authorities. I am sure that they would usually go for the second where they wanted to get a sentence of more than 12 months.
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): The hon. Gentleman is speaking specifically about police officers, but there is already an existing offence regarding police officers in the Offences Against the Person Act 1861—a rather elderly piece of legislation. However, there is no similar provision for other emergency workers.
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): That is another reason for structuring the Bill in this way. All too often, the courts might have borne in mind the fact that an offence was against an emergency worker when sentencing, but that might be completely unknown to the emergency worker. The mere fact that, because of the Bill that aggravating factor must be stated in court, will be of some comfort to the victims.
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): However, the truth is that now, large numbers of ambulance workers never bother to report an incident because they feel that it will not be taken seriously. All too often, they have a sort of message from society, the law and prosecuting authorities that somehow or other, this is sort of part of their job. That is why it is important that we say, very firmly, "It is not part of their job and there should be prosecutions."
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Mohammad Yasin (Labour, Centre-left): It is a great honour to speak in this important debate and it has been nice to hear legal experts making some very important points In March, I received a letter from the Bedfordshire police and crime commissioner explaining why the Bill is so important to protect our emergency workers. In Bedfordshire, a police officer who has been assaulted is contacted by a member of the senior team within 72 hours of the assault. Sadly, such calls are a weekly event. Some 24,000 police officers were assaulted in 2016-17, as were more than 70,000 NHS workers and staff in England alone. Assaults on emergency workers should not be viewed as an occupational hazard. While some judges will add an additional penalty if an assault on an officer is proven in court, that is not automatic. CPS judges have historically viewed an assault in the course of arrest as to some extent just part of the job. We must not tolerate that any longer.
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Mohammad Yasin (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend makes an important point. We need to change the culture in this country because it is currently not acceptable We must put legislation in place to guarantee that a tough line will be taken on anyone who assaults an emergency worker. This must extend to spitting—a disgusting and aggressive attack—and sexual assault. The regional Crown prosecutor for Bedfordshire advises officers and staff to give the same amount of attention to their own witness statements as to those of other victims, and to provide personal impact statements to the court. The chief constable of Bedfordshire police has agreed to supply a supplementary personal statement in the event of any serious assault, detailing its impact on the force and colleagues, to add weight to the argument for the maximum penalty. However, such good practice is weakened if there is not legislation to back it up. That is why this Bill is so important and why I support it.
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): I hate the idea of an ingenious lawyer, but the Minister is right—I accept that there is a danger of that. Are there other things that the Government could do to ensure that the prosecuting authorities take spitting as common assault very seriously?
Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Law and Crime
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): I will not delay the House long on these amendments, but I should explain why I tabled them. They would take three clauses out of the Bill, which I am fairly confident will have the support of the whole House Although these clauses are about the taking of samples, in particular when an emergency worker is in danger of contracting an infectious disease by virtue of being spat at or through some other means, the aim of the Bill was never to take samples. The aim of the Bill was always to stop spitting. Thanks to the Minister’s earlier interventions, and to today’s debate more generally, I think we have had a clear statement from Parliament that spitting is included as part of common assault or battery.
Employment and Workers’ Rights Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Labor
Stephanie Louise Peacock (Labour, Centre-left): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time As a former officer of the GMB trade union, I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests It is no secret that our economy and the jobs that people do have changed rapidly over recent years, particularly in my constituency of Barnsley East. Coal once provided jobs for more than 30,000 people, but the economic landscape is now very different. We have seen a substantial increase in precarious work practices, such as zero-hours contracts, the gig economy and fake self-employment, where the guarantees of secure and well-paid work that people once enjoyed are no more Agency work has boomed, from retail and distribution through to the teachers and nurses filling the staff shortages in our public services. It is estimated that the number of agency workers will reach 1 million by 2020. Agency workers are some of the most exploited workers in our economy, and this employment practice is simply too one-sided in favour of those who hire them My Bill takes steps to change that. It will close the loophole that allows agency workers to be paid less than permanent members of staff undertaking the same role for the same company. After three months, agency workers will be able to request a contract of employment and the hirer will have a duty to assess it. After two years, agency workers will have the right to become a permanent employee.
Employment and Workers’ Rights Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Labor
Eleanor Claire Reeves (Labour, Centre-left): I welcome this Bill. I read clause 5 with great interest, as it seems to give an agency worker the right to become directly employed by the hirer after two years except in exceptional circumstances. Such a measure is long overdue. Will my hon. Friend clarify that it is her intention that workers would have continuous service from the date they started work with the hirer and would therefore have rights against unfair dismissal from the moment they reached two years, rather than the clock starting again?
Employment and Workers’ Rights Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Labor
Stephanie Louise Peacock (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend is right that these measures are long overdue. She is also right about the intention of clause 5 I would like to share some examples with the House, particularly the case of agency workers in BT call centres, including the one near my constituency in south Yorkshire, and others who take 999 calls. The majority of them are kept on continuous assignments, working for years in the same role. In practice, they are nothing less than permanent staff, but they have no job security and are on lower pay than other workers. The nature of their contracts means that the equal pay exemption can be exploited. On average, they are paid about £500 a month less than their colleagues on permanent contracts. Some do not even take annual leave, because they simply cannot afford to do so There is the case of the lorry driver who has worked for the same national supermarket for the best part of 20 years but could be sacked by the hirer without notice, reason or redundancy pay. They would be left with no legal recourse against the hirer to claim unfair dismissal. Take the warehouse worker in Barnsley who works up to 20 hours a day on their feet, but is constantly threatened with immediate dismissal if they do not hit their target. It even happens in the public sector. As a former teacher, I have heard of too many cases of agency teachers being paid less than those they teach alongside. It is simply unfair Financial security has been lost as hard-working people in my community live week to week, rota to rota, and pay packet to pay packet. Proper working rights, pay and conditions that truly benefit employees have been sacrificed in the name of flexibility for unscrupulous bosses The Bill is founded on the important premise that two people working in the same role, or doing the same job for the same company, should be entitled to the same fair and equal rights. It will simply level the playing field for agency workers in Barnsley East and across the country in the face of unfair working practices, and provide them with the proper workplace rights and pay that they are overdue.
Employment and Workers’ Rights Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Labor
Joanna Meriel Stevens (Labour, Centre-left): One of the great disappointments of the Taylor review—there were many—was that it could have referred to the use of the ministerial power in section 23 of the Employment Relations Act 1999, meaning that we would not need the excellent Bill promoted by my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock). Why will the Government not support the implementation of that section?
Employment and Workers’ Rights Bill — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Transportation
Louise Margaret Haigh (Labour, Centre-left): The hon. Lady is absolutely right that we do not have comprehensive research or assessments from across the country, but all Members will have been made aware of shocking examples. In my constituency, a man was forced to return to work as a lorry driver in the afternoon following an eye operation, which was dangerous not only for him, but for everyone else on the road. Are such examples not good enough for the Government and the rest of us to unite and take action now?
Dagenham Diesel Engine Production — House of Commons, 2018-04-27
Topic: Environment
Jonathan Cruddas (Labour, Centre-left): That shows the cross-party agreement on some of the points I am making today. The trouble is that in the UK, Germany, France and Spain—the markets where anti-diesel rhetoric is highest—diesel consumption is declining fastest. Sales of diesel cars have slumped as regulators and politicians announce plans for bans, levies and additional taxes in many cities In truth, we in Dagenham fear that diesel has become a bit of a political football. In 2001, Gordon Brown introduced a new system of car tax aimed at protecting the environment—a sliding scale to make it cheaper for cars with lower CO2 emissions. That helped stimulate a dash for diesel after its introduction in 2001 and its extension in subsequent years. There are now some 12 million diesel cars on British roads, while back in 2000 there were only 3 million In recent years, diesel has accounted for around half of the new car market. In 2000, by comparison, only one in seven new cars was a diesel model, yet following a 2017 BBC report on the dangers of diesel, the Environment Secretary jumped into the debate to make political capital: "The dash for diesel was pursued under a Labour government…This is yet another example of a Conservative government having to clean up Labour’s mess…We are taking action…ending the sale of new diesel and petrol cars and vans by 2040." Political game playing should have no role, given the challenges facing the sector, as reflected in the comments made by colleagues across the House today Since the 2015 VW revelations, cities have taken the lead over national Governments. Berlin banned the oldest, highest-polluting diesel cars from its centre, Paris, Madrid, Mexico City and Athens have said they plan to ban diesel vehicles from city centres by 2025, and Sadiq Khan ordered the replacement of the capital’s diesel bus fleet and enforced a £10 toxicity charge, or T-charge, on the highest-polluting cars as of October. The measures are part of a wider plan to create an ultra-low emissions zone in central London from April 2019. I do not dispute the push back against older diesel vehicles—it has to be the right way to proceed—but the danger is that we throw the baby out with the bathwater and fail to challenge the wholesale demonisation of the technology.
Access to Social Care — House of Commons, 2018-05-08
Topic: Social Welfare
Michael John Gapes (Labour, Centre-left): Age UK says that 1.2 million older people have unmet social care needs. Is it not time that we thought about integration in a practical way, and where we have acute hospitals with land next to them, such as King George Hospital in my constituency, we start to build sheltered accommodation or intermediate care on those sites so that people can easily be transferred into and out of the beds, freeing them up for other people who need them?
Access to Social Care — House of Commons, 2018-05-08
Topic: Social Welfare
Laura Smith (Labour, Centre-left): In December, the health survey for England revealed that older people in more deprived areas are twice as likely as average to have unmet social care needs. Is this not yet another example of Tory cuts reducing councils’ abilities to meet the requirements of people with care needs?
Social Media: Children’s Mental Health — House of Commons, 2018-05-08
Topic: Education
Lucy Maria Powell (Labour, Centre-left): Speak to any young person about what is causing child mental health issues, and the No. 1 issue is not social media, but exam and test pressure in schools, as we have found in the joint inquiry by the Health and Education Committees. Will the Secretary of State be as harsh on his colleagues in the Department for Education as he is on the social media companies when it comes to child mental health?
Learning Disabilities Mortality Review — House of Commons, 2018-05-08
Topic: Social Welfare
Catherine McKinnell (Labour, Centre-left): Last October, I secured a Westminster Hall debate on supporting and safeguarding adults with learning disabilities, following the horrendous murder of my constituent, Lee Irving. Following that debate, what reassurance can the Minister give me that one of the major lessons coming out of that case—that families must be involved in the decision making about a person’s care—has been learned?