Engagements — House of Commons, 2018-06-20
Topic: Education
Questions: Dorset is the home of the Jurassic coast, but my right hon. Friend will be pleased to know that it is not full of dinosaurs. [Laughter.] We are a modern, embrace-the-day sort of a county.All my North Dorset constituents want to ensure the safety and dignity of women. As a husband and father, I do, too. Will the Prime Minister confirm that we will make the horror of upskirting illegal quickly, and in Government time?; Reports from the Health Foundation across our front pages this week conclude that millennials will face worse health problems than their parents and that a key cause of this is relationship challenges, yet only 31% of millennials say they had strong relationships and support networks while growing up. What action is the Prime Minister taking in response to calls from over 60 hon. Friends to strengthen family relationships?; Last year, the number of children in the care system in England rose to a record of 73,000, with huge social and economic consequences. The care crisis review, published last week, found that the drivers of that increase included a risk-averse blame culture and a failure to direct spending to family support. Will the Prime Minister ensure that her children’s Minister considers the review’s recommendations, and will she commit to ensuring that state intervention to remove children from families is used only as a last resort?; If I can summarise what we have just heard: President Trump has locked up 2,000 little children in cages and is refusing to release them unless he is allowed to build a wall; he has quit the United Nations Human Rights Council; he has praised Kim Jong-un’s treatment of his own people; and he has turned away Muslims. What does this man have to do to have the invitation that the Prime Minister has extended revoked?; Residents across Amber Valley are worried about proposals to build housing on land next to sites on which contaminated waste was tipped in the 1970s. Does the Prime Minister agree that planning guidance should be changed to make it clear that a thorough, competent assessment of the risks of contamination should be carried out before permission is given to build houses on such sites?; The Government granted a licence to British Sugar to grow cannabis on an industrial scale and licensed medical cannabis produced by GW Pharmaceuticals. They have now stalled, proposing that a panel should decide on a one-by-one basis who can benefit from medical cannabis. I am wondering what will happen on day one when 20,000 people apply to that panel. Can the Government not see the writing on the wall? Will they move now to provide medical cannabis under prescription to the many people who would benefit?; Last Saturday marked two years since the murder of our colleague Jo Cox. Although she is no longer with us, Jo’s legacy still lives on through the work done in her name covering many issues, including loneliness. I welcome yesterday’s announcement of a £20 million fund to combat loneliness, and will my right hon. Friend join me in paying tribute to groups such as Age UK and Brightlife in my constituency that do so much to tackle rural isolation?; Thames Water and other water companies have profit margins close to 20%, paying out a huge £1.4 billion annually often to overseas owners that could be used to cut bills and accelerate repairs. Given that only Welsh Water, a mutual, makes no such payments, when might the Prime Minister get behind the efforts to double the size of the mutual and co-operative contribution to our economy?; My right hon. Friend will be aware that I have raised the issue of more beds for Hereford County Hospital no fewer than 12 times over the years. Will she now confirm that the funding is in place to deliver those much-needed beds?; It is said there is no greater pain than losing a child, especially in circumstances that are entirely and easily avoidable. My Slough constituent Mark Scaife, whose son Michael tragically drowned in the Jubilee river, was shocked to learn that schools are not required to teach water safety and the impact of cold water shock. Does the Prime Minister agree that, as we are currently in the middle of the Royal Life Saving Society’s annual Drowning Prevention Week, now is the opportune moment to discuss this matter with ministerial colleagues and to announce the compulsory inclusion of these vital lessons?
Theresa Mary May (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising this important issue. Our sympathies are with the family We take the teaching of water safety very seriously, which is why we are supporting the National Water Safety Forum’s national drowning prevention strategy, which aims to achieve a 50% reduction in drownings by 2026 by encouraging people to stay safe while enjoying themselves. We have made sure that swimming and water safety is compulsory in the national curriculum for physical education at primary level, but we recognise there is more to do. We have established an implementation group, and we are reviewing the recommendations of the report, which is part of the Sporting Future strategy that aims to improve the swimming curriculum.