argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Sale of Arms: War in Yemen — House of Commons, 2020-07-13
Topic: Defense
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade if she will make a statement on her decision to resume the sale of arms to the Saudi-led coalition for use in the war in Yemen.
Gregory William Hands (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend raises a good point in relation to jobs in the north-west at BAE Systems. I was getting a little bit worried about the Opposition’s approach to this. I am going to read out a quote: "we have a brilliant arms industry in the United Kingdom, and I have no problem with arms sales to other countries, as long as they are properly controlled"—[Official Report, House of Lords, 10 July 2020; Vol. 804, c. 1346.] I agree with that—and it was from the Labour spokesman in the House of Lords at a similar urgent question on Friday. I think we can all agree that BAE Systems and others in this field do a great job for the UK overall.
Sale of Arms: War in Yemen — House of Commons, 2020-07-13
Topic: Defense
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade if she will make a statement on her decision to resume the sale of arms to the Saudi-led coalition for use in the war in Yemen.
Gregory William Hands (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend also has great expertise in this area, particularly in relation to military operations. What may or may not be happening in Yemen is of course taken into account in the assessments done by the Ministry of Defence and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
Sale of Arms: War in Yemen — House of Commons, 2020-07-13
Topic: Defense
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade if she will make a statement on her decision to resume the sale of arms to the Saudi-led coalition for use in the war in Yemen.
Gregory William Hands (Conservative, Centre-right): We have, of course, looked at the assessment of the previous incidents, and I have already described how those incidents must be assessed as having taken place, even if this is still questionable or in any way disputed, as part of that process. We are confident that we now have the right system in place to make sure that there is not a clear risk that the export of arms and military equipment to Saudi Arabia might be used in the commission of a serious violation of international humanitarian law.
EU Exit: End of Transition Period — House of Commons, 2020-07-13
Topic: Health
Michael Andrew Gove (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his question. It is the case that there is global collaboration through the CEPI programme to try to ensure that all countries that are determined to deal with the covid-19 threat can work together to develop a vaccine. We have relationships with European and other nations, which are there to ensure that we are in a strong position to be able to provide a vaccine for our citizens once one is effectively tested.
EU Exit: End of Transition Period — House of Commons, 2020-07-13
Topic: Health
Michael Andrew Gove (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the hon. Lady for making that point. As the whole House knows, she is a very distinguished NHS consultant and she is right to raise the issue of insulin, along with that of other drugs and medical devices we need. The Health Secretary and his Department are working with mine to ensure that we have stockpiles for any eventuality, but I will look forward to updating her, with the help of my right hon. Friend, in due course.
Independent Pharmacies — House of Commons, 2020-07-13
Topic: Health
Paul Bristow (Conservative, Centre-right): I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight (Bob Seely) on securing this important debate, and I am grateful to him for willing me to participate. This has been an extraordinary period. Despite its challenges, the coronavirus emergency has revealed many of the strengths of our health and social care systems. One of the most important—a system that extends into the community well beyond our fantastic doctors and nurses—is, of course, the pharmacy sector. Community pharmacists are a vital part of the frontline. For example, the Newborough pharmacy was crucial to that village’s response to covid, and I want to place on the record my thanks to Meb Datoo, his wife and their team at Newborough village pharmacy Just as the role of care workers has become better appreciated in the last few months, I believe it is time to value our pharmacists. They have been an essential face-to-face part of our response. According to the latest research, more than 60% of the public visited a pharmacy during lockdown. Three quarters agree that the NHS should make more of pharmacists’ skills, both in the ongoing covid-19 situation and more broadly I am a member of the Health and Social Care Committee, and I am sure that in the future we will look at the value of pharmacies. The Chancellor of the Exchequer is the son of a pharmacist—that is perhaps not well known—so I am confident that the sector is appreciated not only by the Minister and her Department, but in Downing Street. That appreciation is needed Although the role and potential of pharmacies is now obvious, many are struggling to keep their doors open. The five-year financial deal for community pharmacies came into effect last summer, but I fear that it is not sufficient to keep the sector going, at least by itself. The Government have increased funding for the NHS by a record amount, and I am proud of that. I am also proud of the huge additional support to tackle coronavirus and deal with its consequences. Pharmacists deal with those consequences every day, and they deserve their fair share. We cannot let them shoulder greater responsibilities without the associated funding I agree with my hon. Friend that the sector needs to know whether it is, in effect, being asked to pay for the costs of covid—whether it is being asked to pay back the £370 million in Government loans. I do not necessarily expect the Minister to provide that answer tonight. I am sure she is sympathetic to the points that have been made, and I therefore hope that she agrees that, although our pharmacies are an excellent place to acquire a sticking plaster, they deserve a lot more than a sticking-plaster solution.
Covid-19 Vaccine: Developing Countries — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Anne-Marie Belinda Trevelyan (Conservative, Centre-right): I start by wishing you, Mr Speaker, a very happy birthday The UK is leading global efforts to ensure that equitable access to covid-19 vaccines is possible. We worked night and day to make the global vaccine summit last week a success. Not only did we significantly beat our fundraising target to buy vaccines for the world’s poorest people, but we pledged £1.65 billion of UK aid to be the world’s largest donor to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. We have also pledged £250 million to vaccine research through the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and are a key part of the brand new scheme to ensure global vaccine production. But it is not just about money; the summit showed what true collaboration can do. The UK will leave no stone unturned to make everyone safe.
Covid-19 Vaccine: Developing Countries — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Virginia Ann Crosbie (Conservative, Centre-right): Businesses in M-SParc, a scientific park in my constituency, are developing innovation to fight the coronavirus pandemic, while at the further education college, Coleg Menai, and across the bridge at Bangor University, everyone is working hard in the fight against coronavirus by developing innovative technologies. For example, the science park businesses are developing proteins for vaccines and have made more than 8,000 visors. Can the Secretary of State tell me how we are supporting innovative British businesses to play a role in fighting coronavirus and developing a vaccine for the rest of the world?
Covid-19 Vaccine: Developing Countries — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Anne-Marie Belinda Trevelyan (Conservative, Centre-right): It is lovely to welcome a scientist to our Green Benches. As my hon. Friend suggests, organisations right across the UK are playing a vital role in innovating to develop a coronavirus vaccine. It is a great pleasure to thank all the communities across the island of Ynys Môn helping to fight coronavirus with their technological solutions. My officials are also working closely with the Action for Global Health network to draw on the expertise of a range of UK charities and organisations as part of our approach to shaping global vaccine efforts. If UK-backed candidates for vaccines are successful, the Department for International Development funding for international efforts will help to ensure that those are scaled up and support equitable access for all who need them globally.
Covid-19 Vaccine: Developing Countries — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Anne-Marie Belinda Trevelyan (Conservative, Centre-right): The vaccine challenge, and the race for scientists to crack that code and for industry to come in behind them to support, to produce and to deliver, is critical. AstraZeneca is leading the way with us and has now signed a licence for 300 million doses, should the Oxford vaccine be successful, which it has committed will go to low and middle-income countries, which is fantastic news. This is a huge piece of work, which is led by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and which DFID is involved in, to draw together that scientific effort. The key point about any vaccine that is found—obviously we hope one will be found—is delivery, which is why Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance is so critical, because it can reach out. It has effective networks for delivering vaccines in those poorest countries, where we want to make sure that everyone who needs it gets that vaccine.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Ian Levy (Conservative, Centre-right): If she will make a statement on her departmental responsibilities. Happy birthday from Blyth Valley, Mr Speaker. Does my right hon. Friend agree that to tackle the virus, so that we can all be safe from future waves of infection—
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Anne-Marie Belinda Trevelyan (Conservative, Centre-right): Strong, resilient health systems are vital to national and global health security, and to helping to protect the world from infectious diseases, including covid. The UK has so far pledged £764 million of UK aid to help end the covid-19 pandemic, in support of the co-ordinated international response through the international financing institutions, multilaterals and global health initiatives, alongside DFID programmes. Through our multilateral partnerships and our regional and national programmes, we support developing countries to make their domestic healthcare systems stronger and more resilient and to better prepare for, prevent, detect and respond to health crises, including covid.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Shaun Stephen Bailey (Conservative, Centre-right): Wishing you a bostin’ birthday from the Black Country, Mr Speaker. I was recently lobbied by a year 12 student from Wednesbury called Queenie, who wanted to ensure that no one in the world cannot access a vaccine. So I wish to ask my right hon. Friend: in addition now to being the largest funder of Gavi, The Vaccine Alliance, what work is the UK doing and what message does she have for Queenie to ensure that she can carry on in her fight to make sure that everyone can access vaccines globally?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Anne-Marie Belinda Trevelyan (Conservative, Centre-right): Queenie is clearly a wise young person, and it is a really important question. The UK is at the forefront of efforts to drive global collaboration and resourcing, including through our engagement through the access to covid tools accelerator and through industry for the development of new vaccines at the speed and scale required to ensure access for all those who will need them. As well as contributing £1.65 billion to fund Gavi’s core programme we have committed £48 million to its newly launched covax advanced market commitment, aimed at incentivising manufacturers to produce sufficient quantities of a potential vaccine to ensure future access for low-income and middle-income countries.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): Yes, I can tell the hon. Lady that we certainly will be doing as much as we can in the near future to ensure shielded people get guidance about how they can come out of their shielded environment safely, in a way that is covid secure. Her point about furlough is a very important one, and clearly newly shielded people may be asking themselves whether they will be entitled to furlough funds. I have been made aware of the issue very recently. I can assure her that we will be addressing it forthwith.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): Not only is it already clear, but we are already acting. I can tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman that as a result of the report by Professor Fenton, which again we commissioned, we are looking at the particular exposure of black and minority ethnic groups to coronavirus. We should be in no doubt that they have been at the forefront of the struggle against coronavirus, whether that is in the NHS or in public transport. Some 44% of the NHS workforce in London are black and minority ethnic workers. That is why what we are doing first and most directly is ensuring that those high-contact professions get expanded and targeted testing now, and that is what I have agreed with Dido Harding from NHS Test and Trace. I think that is the first and most practical step we can take as a result of Professor Fenton’s report.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): Let me just say that on the death figures for this country, we mourn every one; we grieve for their relatives and their friends. But I must also tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman—he has raised this point repeatedly across the Dispatch Box—that the best scientific evidence and advice is that we must wait until the epidemic has been through its whole cycle in order to draw the relevant international comparisons. I simply must repeat that point to him As for what this country did to fight the epidemic, I must say I strongly disagree with the way he characterised it. I think it was an astonishing achievement of the NHS to build the Nightingale hospitals. I think it was an astonishing thing that this country came together to drive down the curve—to follow the social distancing rules, in spite of all the doubt that was cast on the advice, to follow those rules, to get the number of deaths down, to get the epidemic under control in the way that we have. This Government announced a plan, on 11 May, to get our country back on to its feet, and that is what we are going to do. We have a plan, we are following it and we are going to stick to it.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): I must say that I disagree with the right hon. Gentleman. I have read a huge amount about a disease that affects our entire nation. I have actually read many papers on the social distancing rule, and it is a very interesting point. Members across the House of Commons will want to understand that I believe that those measures—the 2 metre rule—need now to be kept under review. As we drive this disease down and get the incidence down, working together, I want to make sure that we keep the 2 metre rule under constant review, because, as I think the right hon. Gentleman indicates, there is all sorts of scientific advice about that particular matter.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): Actually, the people of this country are overwhelmingly following the guidance that the Government give. Tomorrow the House will be hearing a bit more about what has happened with NHS Test and Trace, and they will find that there is an extraordinary degree of natural compliance and understanding by the British people In spite of all the obscurantism and myth making that we have heard from the Opposition parties, I can tell the right hon. Gentleman that there are all sorts of views about the 2 metre rule. He is absolutely correct in what he says about the SAGE advice, but, clearly, as the incidence of the disease comes down—I think members of SAGE would confirm this—the statistical likelihood of being infected, no matter how close or far people are from somebody who may or may not have coronavirus, goes down.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We want to reopen hospitality as quickly as we possibly can. The House will remember that, according to the road map, we were going to open outdoor hospitality no earlier than 4 July. That is still our plan, and we are sticking to it. Guidance is now being developed for such hospitality. What we do not want to see is a roiling, Bacchanalian mass of people who can spread the disease, so it is very important that people understand the continuing risks that this country faces.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Mark Rory Logan (Conservative, Centre-right): Prime Minister, we have seen much disinformation about the R value in Bolton and the north-west. Does he agree that having increasingly up-to-date local data will give correspondingly greater confidence to Boltonians in reopening our businesses, schools and places of worship?
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): Yes, which is why I am encouraged by NHS Test and Trace and the progress that it is making. With the help of the joint biosecurity centre, we are now able to identify hotspots, to do whack-a-mole and to stamp out outbreaks of the epidemic where they occur.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): Because I think the British public, with their overwhelming common sense, have ignored some of the propaganda that we have been hearing from the Opposition about our advice. They have ignored the negativity and the attempts to confuse and they are overwhelmingly following advice, and indeed, they are complying with NHS Test and Trace—which is the way forward—which will enable us to defeat this virus both locally and nationally.
Horizon: Sub-Postmaster Convictions — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Paul Stuart Scully (Conservative, Centre-right): I am aware that a former chief executive of the Post Office took up a role as a non-executive director at the Cabinet Office until she stood down. I am also aware that the Care Quality Commission has written to Imperial following a fit-and-proper-persons referral. The CQC is considering this. Lord Callanan wrote to the Department of Health and Social Care on 18 May to draw the Department’s attention to the strength of feeling about the position in the NHS of the former chief executive of the Post Office.
Horizon: Sub-Postmaster Convictions — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Paul Stuart Scully (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank my hon. Friend. One of the problems with this case is that it has happened over 20 years, which means that a lot of people have moved on or moved around, and it has been difficult to follow those who have gone through the system in all this time. [Interruption.] I hear the right hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) say from a sedentary position that we gave the former chief executive a CBE. We have followed that up: she went through the independent honours commission, which works on that in a separate process, but we have actually made sure that we have written to the Care Quality Commission to ask if she is a fit and proper person in terms of the position she now holds.
Rolls-Royce (Redundancies) — House of Commons, 2020-06-10
Topic: Health
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): With respect to the hon. Lady, I completely disagree. At the beginning of this epidemic, when we were in the contain phase because the number of incidences was low, we had a triage at ports and airports for passengers coming from hot countries and places such as Wuhan and the rest of China, northern Italy and then the whole of Italy, Japan and of course Iran as well. But as we moved from contain to delay, because the virus began to spread in our communities, the scientific advice was very clear that having that sort of triage at airports was making very little difference. Now that we have the virus under control, and the numbers are reducing every single day and the spread in our communities is becoming very low, it is dangerous not to have a quarantine, because we could easily import the virus from other countries. We are reviewing this every 21 days, and, of course, working on the air bridges that we have heard the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Transport talk about for the future. That is important; lives are incredibly important, but so are livelihoods.
Covid-19: Quarantine — House of Commons, 2020-06-08
Topic: Health
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): As set out in my statement last week in the Commons, the public health measures at the border that are being introduced from today are the latest cross-Government measures in our collective response and fight to save lives, protect the British people and, importantly, prevent a second wave of coronavirus. Alongside the Minister for the Cabinet Office and the Secretaries of State for Transport, for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, and for Health and Social Care, I have worked across Government and the devolved Administrations, with science and industry, to carefully develop this health policy from a cross-Government perspective.
Covid-19: Quarantine — House of Commons, 2020-06-08
Topic: Health
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): First of all, the policy is clear and it has been outlined not just by me but by other colleagues across Government—this is a cross-Government policy. The hon. Lady will be aware that the regulations are public health regulations, and in addition, the specific measures that clearly have an impact on the transport sector are being led by the Department for Transport and other Government Departments. From a health perspective—this is all about health; these are public health measures at the border—we have been guided not just by the science, but by working with the Department of Health and Social Care and SAGE advice and scientific advisers, in how this policy has been developed.
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2020-06-08
Topic: Health
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Lady is completely wrong in her categorisation. First, public health measures are available right now, in addition to the fact that this is a public health emergency, so it is wrong to assert that in the way she has done. Also, I have outlined the funds. Working across Government, with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, vital funds and resources have been provided to local authorities to provide support to people who need that extra support. That is something the Government are committed to.