argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Government Operations
Bernard Christison Jenkin (Conservative, Centre-right): Yes, of course they do. In the end, no public appointment of the general nature that we are talking about is made without a Minister signing off that decision. The question is twofold. First, are Ministers being presented with a choice of candidates that they consider appropriate? If they are, can we be certain that the process has not been fixed to get friends and cronies through the appointment process? We need a balance that the public will respect and have faith in. On job specifications, if we get the process right at the outset, there should be no need for the Minister to complain. If we take away too many safeguards, it is Ministers who will be criticised for the appointments they make, not civil servants who have been sitting on panels and been ignored.
Procedure committee — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: International Affairs
Philip Andrew Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): I shall aim to be brief. In saying that the first Bill on the Order Paper should be guaranteed a vote, my hon. Friend failed to mention that the first Bill on the Order Paper can already be guaranteed a vote. All it requires is for 100 MPs to turn up to support it. As we saw with the overseas aid Bill—the International Development (Official Development Assistance Target) Bill—the European Union (Referendum) Bill and the Assisted Dying (No. 2) Bill, if a matter is important enough to hon. Members, plenty of them turn up to debate it. Does my hon. Friend not agree that if a Bill cannot muster the support of 100 MPs out of 650, it clearly does not have the support that others might claim it has?
Procedure committee — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Government Operations
David Nuttall (Conservative, Centre-right): One problem with private Members’ Bills is that pressure groups raise the expectations of the public that every private Member’s Bill stands a really good chance of becoming law. Does my hon. Friend not agree that it is incumbent on us all to make sure that the procedures for private Members’ Bills are more widely and better understood?
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Labor
Philip Andrew Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): I want to make a few brief points in the time available. The first—we have to have a few home truths here—is that the whole concept of a national living wage is intellectual nonsense. The amount that people need to earn to cover their living costs depends on all sorts of factors. It depends on their housing costs. It depends on how close they live to their workplace and how much it costs them to get to work—the cost is obviously a lot less for somebody who lives right next to their place of work than for somebody who lives a considerable distance away. The idea that one national living wage can apply to everybody in the country, irrespective of their personal circumstances, is therefore nonsense, and we should make that clear from the start. What we are talking about with the living wage is an increased minimum wage, so let us just be honest about our terminology The right hon. Member for Enfield North (Joan Ryan) made the usual mistake of thinking that every employer in the country is some rich baron who lives in a huge mansion, drives around in a Bentley and has all the goods in the world. Actually, the vast majority of businesses in this country are small and medium-sized enterprises. I advise her speak to a few shop owners down her local high street, because she will actually find that many are struggling to earn a living. In fact, many of the people she is talking about do not earn the minimum wage or the living wage—whatever anyone wants to call it—themselves. She berates them for trying to do down their staff, when many of them are working desperately long hours to keep their staff in employment because their staff matter to them.
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Labor
Philip Andrew Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): The right hon. Gentleman should be aware that what is more likely to send people to a food bank is not having a job at all When the Chancellor announced the higher rate of the minimum wage, the Office for Budget Responsibility estimated that 4 million hours a week would be lost, half resulting from reduced hours for workers and half resulting from the loss of 60,000 jobs. The great thing about the OBR is that at least we are now able to understand the consequences of such a policy There are a lot of advantages to having a higher minimum wage. A lot of low-paid people have found themselves in higher-paid jobs, and I very much welcome that. However, Labour Members who praise the policy should at least be honest about its consequences.
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Labor
Philip Andrew Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): I am afraid that I cannot give way, because there is not much time left Finally, I have two very quick points to make. First, the increased national minimum wage will almost certainly lead to even more people from the European Union coming to the UK if we do not leave the EU in the forthcoming referendum. That is a basic fact. Secondly, a higher minimum wage is great for people who are already in work and getting paid. However, it can be as high as we like, but it will be of very little use to those who do not have a job. Many people in this country already find it very difficult to get on the jobs ladder, for all sorts of reasons I have made this point before and got into terrible trouble for it, but the fact, whether people like it or not, is that too few disabled people in this country are employed. It would not be good if they were put further away from the jobs ladder, and I want the Government to think about what they are going to do, when wages are higher, to help disabled people find a job, including subsidising employers to bring them up to the living wage. Something has to be done. We cannot just leave people on the scrapheap unable to get a job because the first rung of the jobs ladder was too far away to give them a chance in the first place. We have to think through the consequences of all these high-minded policies.
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Labor
Richard Quentin Fuller (Conservative, Centre-right): I have listened to several speeches from Opposition Members and the hon. Lady is making the same argument. It is important to understand that the living wage should be seen in the context of hourly pay. She is right to say that employers look at the total wage bill and look for other changes, but she should not conflate the two. I think she wants to support the Government’s intention of increasing the hourly pay of workers. Does she agree?
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Labor
Rebecca Faye Clark (Pow) (Conservative, Centre-right): I am depressed by the negativity of this debate. People who have come to me in my constituency are pleased that they will have £900 more in their pockets. Some 40% of people will get a wage rise. This is something that the Government have been speaking up for. People want more money in their pockets and they are going to get it. On the whole, businesses in my constituency are in favour of the national living wage. It is difficult, but they are for it.
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Labor
Richard Quentin Fuller (Conservative, Centre-right): On that point, the change in the living wage over five years will effectively mean a 30% increase in the labour costs for companies. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that the Government did not want that to result in people losing wages, but what would he say to the employers—the small business people that my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) spoke about—who have to meet that increase in costs? What is the alternative that the hon. Gentleman wants them to undertake—an increase in prices? What else would he like to see?
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Labor
Richard Quentin Fuller (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Gentleman may have heard Labour Members say that they want to ensure that no employee is made worse off by the change to the national living wage. Do the Scottish Government have a policy to ensure that that is the case?
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Labor
Richard Quentin Fuller (Conservative, Centre-right): A number of other Members have referred to what has happened when the national minimum wage has been increased in the past, but does the hon. Lady accept that this is a different approach? In the past, increases in the minimum wage resulted from discussions and decisions on the part of the Low Pay Commission, in conjunction with business, whereas the introduction of the national living wage constitutes a Government-imposed increase.
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Macroeconomics
Nicholas Edward Coleridge Boles (Conservative, Centre-right): This has been an excellent debate. My, how we have missed the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh). We are all agreed on that. If she is listening, I hope that she is enjoying the hospital grapes. We look forward to her rejoining us and adding great wisdom to our deliberations. However, she was well represented by the right hon. Member for Enfield North (Joan Ryan), who brought equal passion to her argument for working people in her constituency and across the land, who, as we all agree, deserve a pay rise I was struck by the fact that most Opposition Members failed to recognise the significance of the achievement. Call it a national minimum wage or a national living wage—I do not really care—but please recognise that it is a significant increase in the legal minimum hourly rate for workers across the country. I would have hoped that there might be a little more recognition of that, although I acknowledge that the right hon. Member for Enfield North and the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes) were gracious enough to call it a step in the right direction. Indeed, the hon. Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan) did the same from the Front Bench, even if there was a little sting in the tail, as there always is with him However, none of the Opposition contributors recognised why the Government are able to do this now, namely because of the steps that we have taken to ensure that the economy is strong. If the economy was weak, unemployment was rising and business failures were increasing, such an intervention would have been profoundly damaging to the British economy and to the interests of the working people whose pay we would like see increase. There would have been millions of job losses and a far greater loss of income than gain. The reason why we have been able to do this now is because of the difficult steps—every one opposed by the Opposition—that we have taken to secure a strong economy and to create the platform from which we were able to make this intervention.
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Social Welfare
Nicholas Edward Coleridge Boles (Conservative, Centre-right): I do not accept the hon. Lady’s analysis. A total of £3.5 billion of extra revenue is being provided through the social care precept and the Better Care Fund, which is more than adequate to cover the cost of the living wage.
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Labor
Nicholas Edward Coleridge Boles (Conservative, Centre-right): I will not give way again We agree that we want everyone to benefit from the pay rise that that national living wage represents. I want to be clear about how we will ensure, as a Government and as Members of Parliament, that that is the case. The first and most important thing is to ensure that all employers fulfil, in full and in every case, their legal obligation to pay the national minimum wage at whatever level it is set for those under 25 and the new national living wage for those over 25 I can report to the House that we are enforcing the national minimum wage more robustly than any previous Government and will be enforcing it more robustly every year. In 2015-16, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs identified more than £10 million of arrears for more than 58,000 workers across the economy—three times the arrears identified in 2014-15 and for twice as many workers. I am delighted to be able to share with hon. Members that we will increase the HMRC enforcement budget to £20 million in 2016-17, which is up from £13 million in 2015-16 and from only £8 million in the last year of the Labour Government. Spending on enforcement of the national minimum wage and the national living wage next year will be more than double what it was in the last year of the Labour Government.
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Labor
Nicholas Edward Coleridge Boles (Conservative, Centre-right): If the hon. Gentleman will give me a moment, I will move on to discuss the enforcement of what I consider to be moral obligations that fall upon all employers capable of meeting them. First, let me remind him about the previous Labour Government, whom I am sure he supported. He was not in that Government—he was not yet in the House, and nor was I—but they spent only £8 million on enforcing the national minimum wage in 2009-10. At a time when they seemed able to spend unlimited amounts of money on almost everything else, they thought it rated only £8 million. We are going to spend £20 million next year, which is why the amount of arrears secured and the number of workers being helped is significantly greater now than it ever was before Furthermore, we have introduced the scheme of naming and shaming companies that do not pay the national minimum wage or the national living wage and do not have a good reason for explaining why. That has been an extremely effective approach. Hon. Members should see some of the letters I receive from employers trying to persuade me to exclude them from a naming and shaming round; they take it very seriously indeed, as they do not want their customers and suppliers, and indeed their neighbours, to know that they have broken the law. I do, however, agree with the hon. Gentleman that legal obligations are not enough—not for us as individuals and not for employers either. I welcomed the contribution of the hon. Member for Burnley (Julie Cooper), who talked about her experience in employing 10 people and insisting on paying them a proper living wage because that was good for them, for her as an employer and for the business. Without being too pompous about it, let me say that that is the kind of moral responsibility we would hope and expect every employer to seek to fulfil I recognise the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) that some small employers will find the national living wage very difficult. I do not criticise them for an instant if they are not able immediately to ensure that every aspect of an employee’s conditions is preserved in full, because I am sure we would all agree that if the alternative is to fire some people, we would prefer to have more people being paid the legal national living wage than to have people losing their jobs. However, I am clear that for larger employers there is simply no excuse for trying to evade the effect of the national living wage by cutting other benefits and premiums.
National Living Wage — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Macroeconomics
Nicholas Edward Coleridge Boles (Conservative, Centre-right): I will in a moment. First, I want to remind the House of the other measures the Government have put in place to benefit businesses, which are of substantial financial value to them We are cutting corporation tax from 20% to 17% in 2020, and the Chancellor announced an additional percentage point specifically to make up for the impact of the national living wage. Together, all our cuts in corporation tax since 2010 will be worth £15 billion a year to businesses. We have also introduced the employer allowance, which is now being extended from £2,000 a year to £3,000 a year. As many hon. Members mentioned, we have also expanded small business rate relief, and 600,000 small businesses will be paying no rates at all from 2017. We have taken a number of steps to ensure that businesses large and small can point to other savings that have come from the Government which they can use to fund in full the increase of the minimum wage, through the national living wage, without eroding other aspects of compensation Although I hope hon. Members will understand why I am not going to start naming names at the Dispatch Box, they will have observed that the work of the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden and of my right hon. Friend the Minister for Small Business, Industry and Enterprise has been peculiarly effective. My right hon. Friend met one of companies that was much discussed and it has already shifted its position, and I know that other companies will do the same if the spotlight falls on them. I wish to conclude by making this proposal to hon. Members in all parts of the House: please bring to me and my right hon. Friend any case of a company that seems to be trying to evade the spirit of the legislation in an unreasonable way. I am talking about companies that are profitable and will be benefiting from the dramatic cut in corporation tax, and companies that will be benefiting from the employer allowance or from the cut in business rates. Bring those cases to me and I promise hon. Members that we will use the full force of our office, little though it sometimes feels to be, to put pressure on those companies to live up not only to their legal obligations, which are our job to set out in making legislation in this House, but to their moral obligations, which are the ones we feel matter a great deal more.
Educational Attainment: Yorkshire and the Humber — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Education
Graham Charles Stuart (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Lady is making a powerful case and her point about the gap between Yorkshire and London is valid. She cites the evidence, but will she join me in agreeing that having 1.4 million fewer children in underperforming schools is a significant national improvement, although, as we will be discussing tonight, we need to ensure that that success is everywhere and not just concentrated in some areas.
Educational Attainment: Yorkshire and the Humber — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Education
Philip Andrew Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): Yes, I very much agree, and I am sorry that Labour-controlled Bradford Council does not seem to believe in that as much as the hon. Lady does. Bradford Council has raised the funding formula for schools with me. I would be interested to hear the Minister’s view of the formula, and of whether it takes into consideration the current standard of educational attainment in places such as Bradford and makes sure that no action is taken that puts that already poor educational attainment under further pressure. The consultation is only at the first stage, and we are unaware of the numbers or the possible effects of the new regime, but concerns have been expressed that the parameters being set will disadvantage schools in the Bradford district. Need and pupil mobility are not necessarily guaranteed to be part of the new formula. As outlined by Ofsted, the Bradford district, in particular, has high levels of need, as well as the highest number of in-year admissions in the country. Attainment standards are already below average in the district, and if the new formula does not acknowledge the specific challenges there, schools could be unfairly disadvantaged and face a tougher task in addressing those challenges It is important to mention that the big disparity between schools in my constituency and schools in other parts of the Bradford district. We must not let schools coast in what might be seen as better areas, where educational standards are not as low, because we are focusing too much on the schools with the lowest attainment. We must make sure that all schools do their best for every pupil, but we sometimes overlook that priority Leadership is an important issue in our schools. We must do much more to attract the very best leaders and headteachers to our schools. My hon. Friend the Minister visited Beckfoot School in Bingley, which has an outstanding headteacher, who has transformed it into one of the best schools in not just the Bradford district but the country, and it is now rated as outstanding. We need to find ways of getting more leaders into the most difficult schools.
Educational Attainment: Yorkshire and the Humber — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Education
Philip Andrew Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): Yes, I very much agree with my hon. Friend, who makes a good point, as he always does on education matters I emphasise that we have some fantastic schools and some fantastic teachers, who are all working incredibly hard. I am very pro-teacher. My dad is a retired teacher, so I will certainly not criticise them; they work very hard in sometimes very difficult circumstances. I am not often a big fan of all the teachers in the National Union of Teachers, but teachers on the whole work incredibly hard, and it is important that we do not criticise them when we are discussing some of these educational standards, because they often operate in very difficult circumstances Finally, I was struck by the good point the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) made about opportunities being harder to come by for people in the north than for those in places such as London, and I would like to float an idea. We often give student loans to people who want to progress their career through the university route; I wonder why others, if university is not for them, should not be able to get some form of student loan to allow them to do things such as come to London to access work experience placements. I do not see why student loans should be only for the benefit of the most able and perhaps the wealthiest and most advantaged. How about giving loans to some of the most disadvantaged people in the country to allow them to pursue their career? How about giving people in Yorkshire the opportunities that people in other parts of the country get? I hope that the Government will look at that. Social mobility is what the Conservative party should be all about, and we have to look much more imaginatively at this issue.
Educational Attainment: Yorkshire and the Humber — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Education
Philip Andrew Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): I am going to finish; otherwise, Mr Deputy Speaker will get annoyed with me, and I do not want that to happen I hope that the Conservative party, which I believe is about social mobility, will look more imaginatively at what we can do to help kids from poorer backgrounds who are perhaps not the most academic to access the best opportunities. I would like to think that student loans could be extended to them for their benefit.
Educational Attainment: Yorkshire and the Humber — House of Commons, 2016-04-18
Topic: Education
Philip Andrew Davies (Conservative, Centre-right): I certainly agree with the hon. Gentleman about the need for better careers advice. Does he agree that it is also important for people to have realistic but inspirational role models so that they can see that there is a path to a better life and that they can achieve what they want, whatever their background? A good role model is a great way of demonstrating that to people.