argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Transport Supply Chains: Covid-19 — House of Commons, 2020-09-17
Topic: Mixed Topics
Mathew Richard Allen Rodda (Labour, Centre-left): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I would like to say that my thoughts, and I am sure the thoughts of the whole House, are with the injured and all those affected by the recent bus accident in Winchester Local coach companies are much loved small businesses with the owner’s name and the town of origin proudly painted on the side of the coach. These are local small businesses that have served their communities through thick and thin. However, day trips and coach travel for football supporters have disappeared because of the coronavirus, and four in 10 of these much-loved local companies could go out of business this autumn, with the loss of 27,000 jobs. Will the Minister reassure the House that the Government will take urgent action to support these family-owned small businesses, and will he meet me and the coach operators as a matter of urgency?
Rail Network: Accessibility — House of Commons, 2020-09-17
Topic: Mixed Topics
Catherine Elizabeth West (Labour, Centre-left): Will the Minister accept a wider definition of accessibility and comment on the plans to stop the free travel for under-18s, which gets students all around London? Is there a plan for the Government to assist Transport for London, given its financial situation, to bring back free travel from half-term for under-18s, so they can get to schools and to other pursuits?
Pollution: Covid-19 — House of Commons, 2020-09-17
Topic: Mixed Topics
Kerry Gillian McCarthy (Labour, Centre-left): I am pleased that the Government have listened to Labour and are considering bringing forward the date for the phase-out of the sale of new diesel, petrol and hybrid vehicles, but how is the Minister actually going to get us there? All we have had from the Government lately is gimmicks like green number plates and the suggestion that they will paint electric vehicle parking spaces green. The charging infrastructure is woefully inadequate. Other than painting everything green, what is her actual strategy?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2020-09-17
Topic: Public Lands
Christopher John Bryant (Labour, Centre-left): One thing that makes the British countryside unique, special and loved by everybody around the world is that, since the 1940s, it has been illegal to put up great big advertising hoardings outside towns and cities. That means that our motorways should be free of advertising, and people should just be able to appreciate the countryside. Unfortunately, on my journey back from London last night, I saw 23 such hoardings that have been plonked in fields by farmers and others. What is the Government going to do to return the British countryside to the way it should be without constant advertising along the motorway?
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-09-17
Topic: Mixed Topics
Tracy Lynn Brabin (Labour, Centre-left): The Health Secretary has announced restrictions in the north-east. He will know that, in my community, we have been under those restrictions for quite some time now. This has impacted on beauty businesses, soft play centres, wedding companies and, particularly, coach companies. With my constituents doing the right thing and trying to beat this virus, but with furlough ending and winter looking like we might have continued lockdowns, does he agree with me that we now need a financial package to support the businesses that are suffering so that they do wither on the vine, and so that my constituents can do the right thing in having to choose between leaving work in order to keep people safe and putting food on the table?
Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2020-09-17
Topic: Other
Rosalie Winterton (Labour, Centre-left): I thank the hon. Lady for her point of order, and I thank the Secretary of State for responding to it. I suggest that if the hon. Lady still wishes to send the emails to the Secretary of State, perhaps she should do so. It feels as though we can perhaps get to the bottom of this if we do it that way. There will now be a three-minute suspension.
Covid-19 Pandemic: Government Response — House of Commons, 2020-09-17
Topic: Other
Rosalie Winterton (Labour, Centre-left): We now come to the Select Committee statement. Mr William Wragg will speak for up to 10 minutes, during which no interventions may be taken. At the conclusion of his statement, I will call Members to put questions on the subject of the statement and call Mr William Wragg to respond to these in turn. Members can expect to be called only once, and interventions should be questions and they should be brief. Front Benchers may take part in questioning. I should say that we have two heavily subscribed debates afterwards, so I urge Members to ask brief questions I call the Chair of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, Mr William Wragg.
Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme — House of Commons, 2020-09-17
Topic: Other
Rosalie Winterton (Labour, Centre-left): I am sure right hon. and hon. Members will know that the two Backbench Business debates are very well subscribed, so there is likely to be a four-minute limit on Back-Bench speeches for both. As we are running behind quite a lot, that limit might have to go down further. With two debates, there will be two Front-Bench winding-up speeches, so the amount of time for Back-Bench contributions will be fairly short.
Support for Self-employed and Freelance Workers — House of Commons, 2020-09-17
Topic: Mixed Topics
Tracy Lynn Brabin (Labour, Centre-left): I thank the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) for securing the debate, and the Backbench Business Committee for agreeing to it I wish quickly to pick up on a comment that the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Anthony Browne) has just made. He suggested that, "As the Government have been saying all along, it is just too difficult." The fact is that the Government have not even met the Excluded UK all-party parliamentary group or Forgotten Ltd, even though we could help them resolve this. It is difficult, but we can help. The hon. Gentleman said that we must not forget that the self-employed can work. Let us not forget that awful week when the whole of the creative sector, restaurants, theatres and cinemas were ordered to close, sports were cancelled, schools were shut and millions were told to work from home if they could, but millions could not Although we are very grateful for the Chancellor’s furlough scheme, there were some quite frustrating days while we were waiting to hear whether the self-employed would get any support. It might have been a mistake on my part, but I put out a single tweet on 13 March asking for people who were self-employed or who worked freelance to contact me with their stories. My inbox almost exploded, with nearly 4,000 contributions, because people’s lives had been thrown into total chaos and anxiety. I heard about work that had been booked in for more than a year being wiped out. I heard from couples, often in the same sector, who lost a whole year’s-worth of work, with childcare costs and mortgages to pay. It had a seismic impact on people’s lives and futures. There is still no mention of support for freelancers. Finally we got the self-employed income support scheme, which I am enormously grateful for. But we cannot get away from the fact that there are still 3 million people excluded from that support One of the most recent emails I received was from a lady who is a freelance musician. Because of the crisis, she is now going to a food bank, and she is very grateful for that food bank. Unfortunately, she is not going to be the only one. The Trussell Trust has announced a spike in food bank usage and said that worse is to come, with a possible 61% increase in need compared with last winter, and with half the food parcels given out to first-time users. We are facing a tsunami of deprivation this winter I would like to add my support for Pregnant Then Screwed, and my good friend Olga Fitzroy, for all the campaigning they have been doing for maternity and paternity rights. In my remaining 23 seconds, I cannot fail to mention the creative industries, in which I was a self-employed freelancer for more than three decades. We are used to feast and famine, but this is unacceptable, particularly when the Government do not seem to be listening. Please may I urge the Government to extend the furlough scheme for those sectors that are the last to return and to meet with us and ExcludedUK?
Support for Self-employed and Freelance Workers — House of Commons, 2020-09-17
Topic: Mixed Topics
Wesley Paul William Streeting (Labour, Centre-left): That is absolutely true. One of the things I find most worrying about the trends we have seen is that—as if the inequality that has gripped this country was not bad enough entering the crisis—there have been two very different experiences of the pandemic. If people are in a job with stable employment and have had money coming in every month, they may well be one of the households who has contributed to a record rise in savings. They may well feel that their outgoings have gone down and that they can start planning for home improvements or a decent family holiday. However, if people have lost their job, or were self-employed or freelance and their business activity went completely down to zero, this has been an absolutely terrible experience. I do not think that any of us, unless we have been in that position, can really understand what those people are going through In conclusion, I say to the Minister, whose task in responding to the debate I do not envy—with the notable and honourable exception of the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Anthony Browne), I think she has found herself pretty alone in this debate—that the cross-party calls for the Government to listen, even to meet, are overwhelming. The privilege of being able to govern comes with the responsibility of taking action, of seeing people through difficult times. We know that the Government have a difficult job. We would not have wished this pandemic on anyone, but so many of us on both sides of the House simply do not understand the Chancellor’s intransigence, stubbornness and unwillingness to listen on this issue. So please, I beg the Minister, on behalf of millions of people across this country who have felt unheard or excluded: it is time to act.
Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill — House of Commons, 2020-10-23
Topic: Mixed Topics
Kerry Gillian McCarthy (Labour, Centre-left): It is always a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker. I congratulate the hon. Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder) on bringing this Bill forward today. I am glad we are finally in a position where an animal sentencing Bill might actually become law Everyone will be talking about their dogs today. I do not actually have a dog, but I have a dog in my life, which is my mother’s miniature schnauzer, Teddy, although he is actually twice the size of an ordinary miniature schnauzer, which just shows that Teddy is above other dogs. I am constantly telling him that he is the best dog. We do not have dog birthdays in our family, we have dog "got" days, and tomorrow is Teddy’s 12th got day. Congratulations to Teddy, who I am sure will be watching on video later Before we had Teddy in our family, we had a bulldog called Buster when I was growing up, and that was why the case of Baby the bulldog particularly struck home with me. It originally inspired Anna Turley’s Animal Cruelty (Sentencing) Bill back in 2017 when it was brought to public attention. It was not just a horrific story of the bulldog puppy being abused—I think it was thrown down the stairs—but the fact that it was videoed and put online. The perpetrators clearly thought it was something they could boast about and joke about and that they would not be brought to justice for it.
Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill — House of Commons, 2020-10-23
Topic: Other
Kerry Gillian McCarthy (Labour, Centre-left): I thank the hon. Gentleman for that. I was going to say that I thought it was a little churlish of the hon. Member for West Dorset to not mention her, because she did so much work on this issue. I know he was not in Parliament at the time.
Mobile Homes Act 1983 (Amendment) Bill — House of Commons, 2020-10-23
Topic: Housing
Mark Richard Tami (Labour, Centre-left): The hon. Gentleman referred to the charges that are made; does he agree that quite often those charges are made but the work is not actually carried out? Many owners are just interested in cramming as many mobile homes on to sites as possible.
Armistice Day — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Other
Lindsay Harvey Hoyle (Labour, Centre-left): They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them.
Prayers — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Immigration
Lindsay Harvey Hoyle (Labour, Centre-left): I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, that the Queen has signified her Royal Assent to the following Acts: Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Act 2020 Agriculture Act 2020.
Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Other
Lindsay Harvey Hoyle (Labour, Centre-left): Order. The question must have some relevance. The first question got through, but you were trying to push your luck the second time. We cannot do that. The question must be relevant. Sorry about that. We had better move on.
Co-ordinated Response to Covid-19: Devolved Administrations — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Other
Lindsay Harvey Hoyle (Labour, Centre-left): Order. Can I just say that I am very concerned that the question was a substantive question that was within this grouping? The problem is that the grouping is not good, but it was the Government who put the grouping together. So I think the Minister ought to try to see if he could answer the question from Allan Dorans, because it is within that section.
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Immigration
Ruth Margaret Cadbury (Labour, Centre-left): According to Home Office figures, just 12% of Windrush victims have received compensation and nine people have died waiting. This is two and a half years after the Windrush taskforce was set up. What will the Government do and what will the Prime Minister do both to rectify this injustice and to ensure that no others who have come to the UK to live and work suffer in the same way as the Windrush victims?
Engagements — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Mixed Topics
Keir Starmer (Labour, Centre-left): The answer is none: not a single face mask—at a cost of £150 million. That is not an isolated example. We already know that consultants are being paid £7,000 a day to work on test and trace, and a company called Randox has been given a contract, without process, for £347 million; that is the same company that had to recall 750,000 unused covid tests earlier this summer on safety grounds There is a sharp contrast between the way the Government spray money at companies that do not deliver and their reluctance to provide long-term support to businesses and working people at the sharp end of this crisis. The Chancellor spent months saying that extending furlough was "not the kind of certainty that British businesses or British workers need"—[Official Report, 24 September 2020; Vol. 680, c. 1157]— only then to do a U-turn at the last minute. Yesterday’s unemployment figures show the cost of that delay: redundancies up by a record 181,000 in the last quarter. What is the Prime Minister’s message to those who have lost their jobs because of the Chancellor’s delay?
Covid-19 Lockdown: Homelessness and Rough Sleepers — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Housing
Thangam Elizabeth Rachel Debbonaire (Labour, Centre-left): Thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question. The Minister’s words and the Prime Minister’s order last week to stay home will ring hollow for people with no home. In March, the Government told councils and charities that they should try to bring rough sleepers in, and the extraordinary effort prevented thousands of infections, more than 1,000 hospital admissions and 266 deaths. But now the Government’s rough sleeping tsar is no longer in post and she has warned that we are facing a "perfect storm of awfulness". Many of those brought off the streets have returned and thousands more are newly homeless, with a record high 50% increase in young people sleeping rough since last year in London alone What has changed since March? It is colder, and the cold weather fund is lower than it was last year. So can the Minister tell the House why the Government have lowered their ambition? Their plan provides neither the leadership nor the funding to ensure all rough sleepers have a covid-secure place; £15 million in funding will be given not to all councils, but only to the 10 with the highest rough sleeping rates. Seventeen health and homelessness organisations wrote to the Prime Minister to warn against the use of night shelters as not covid-safe. Why have the Government refused to publish the Public Health England advice on this decision? The plan makes no reference to people with no recourse to public funds. Instead there is a rule change so that rough sleeping will lead to deportation. Does the Minister agree that it is immoral for people to be deported for sleeping rough On Armistice Day, will the Minister ensure that the Government record whether homeless people have a service record, so that we can get an accurate picture of the scale and need of those who have served our country Finally, the homelessness crisis is the result of 10 years of Tory failure, so will the Minister now commit to abolishing section 21 evictions, as the Government said they would, to prevent a further rise in homelessness, and invest in the support and social housing we need so that we can genuinely end rough sleeping for good?
Covid-19 Lockdown: Homelessness and Rough Sleepers — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Housing
Clive James Charles Betts (Labour, Centre-left): First, congratulations are due on the efforts that were made to get rough sleepers off the streets from March onwards. Great work was done by councils with voluntary organisations and with good support financially from the Government as well. The real pressure on councils now, I am told by my own city of Sheffield, is from people presenting as homeless from the private rented sector. An increase has led Sheffield City Council, which is very good at dealing with these matters, to have 80 families now in hotels and another 200 in temporary accommodation. That will cost the council around £500,000 extra in this financial year. If dealing with homelessness has to be a priority for councils, which certainly it should be, will the Minister make it a priority for Government to make sure that councils have the extra resources they need directly to continue delivering the services that people in the private rented sector will need in the coming, very trying months?
Covid-19 Lockdown: Homelessness and Rough Sleepers — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Housing
Ruth Margaret Cadbury (Labour, Centre-left): A street homelessness reduction programme is not world leading if the numbers sleeping rough on our streets are rising. It is shocking that the number of young people sleeping rough on our streets is now at a record high. What will the Minister do to ensure that homelessness prevention services offer appropriate support to young people with particular needs, such as young prison leavers?
Covid-19 Lockdown: Homelessness and Rough Sleepers — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Housing
Florence Eshalomi (Labour, Centre-left): I am sure the Minister would agree that a number of homelessness charities have warned that tens of thousands of young people have been made homeless since the start of the pandemic. Many of these young people work in hospitality, so they have not had a job for many months. They are struggling to support themselves financially and make up the bulk of people in insecure accommodation. The Government’s decision to bring forward the eviction ban was welcome, but it is not working, so will the Minister outline what steps the Government will take to ensure that the ban is properly enforced? The Minister said she would work with bailiffs to stop the evictions, but the reality on the ground is that that is not happening. What concrete steps will there be to protect people from enforcement?
Covid-19 Lockdown: Homelessness and Rough Sleepers — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Mixed Topics
Rachel Louise Hopkins (Labour, Centre-left): The Children’s Commissioner has raised concern about the almost 130,000 children in England who spent the first lockdown in temporary accommodation, where poor conditions made it difficult to study, play and self-isolate. Why does the Minister think that there has been a 78% increase in homeless children since 2010?
Covid-19 Lockdown: Homelessness and Rough Sleepers — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Housing
Ian Robert Byrne (Labour, Centre-left): After speaking with ACORN Liverpool and local volunteers such as Councillor Sarah Morton who are out on the ground every night in Liverpool helping the homeless, I would like to ask about one of their many concerns right now. The enforced evictions guidance has no basis in law. It does not protect against bailiffs, despite the Government saying that they have asked bailiffs to hold fire, and people are living in fear of eviction during this lockdown. The only way to ban evictions is through legislation, as with the ban between March and September. Will the Minister commit to such legislation and consider increasing funding for local authority discretionary housing payments, which are a vital resource in supporting early intervention and preventing homelessness?
Covid-19 Lockdown: Homelessness and Rough Sleepers — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Immigration
Anthony Joseph Lloyd (Labour, Centre-left): The Home Office immigration rules published on 22 October make it crystal clear that among the reasons that would normally lead to a refusal of leave to remain in the United Kingdom is failure by the person to accommodate themselves or their dependants without recourse to public funds. Any provision of accommodation for the homeless would be recourse to public funds. My question for the Minister is very simple: what is the advice—be kicked out by the Home Office or freeze on the streets?
Covid-19 Lockdown: Homelessness and Rough Sleepers — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Housing
Samuel Peter Tarry (Labour, Centre-left): In 2019, one in 46 people in Redbridge, which Ilford South is part of, were homeless. That is a shocking statistic. While recent funding is obviously very welcome, I wonder if we can have a situation where I do not have to walk outside Ilford Exchange or outside my constituency office and see once again the many cardboard cities, which so miraculously disappeared, literally in a week, once the Government decided to act and house those homeless people and rough sleepers. Could the Minister ensure that, once lockdown ends, they will uphold their commitment to permanently ending rough sleeping?
Covid-19 Lockdown: Homelessness and Rough Sleepers — House of Commons, 2020-11-11
Topic: Housing
Margaret Olivia Hillier (Labour, Centre-left): I welcome the Minister to her post. I think she is the 12th Minister in this position in the past decade. Her enthusiasm for the efficacy of Government policy would be infectious but for the detailed work on the Government’s housing policies we have been doing on the Public Accounts Committee, which I commend to her. We are talking a lot about rough sleeping today, but I have far more families who are hidden homeless, or two households in one. They are struggling through the pandemic. It is a public health issue and it is damaging our children. Will she consider talking to me and my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck) about a housing market package to buy up hard-to-sell properties in the private sector and provide these people and rough sleepers with the Move On accommodation they so desperately need?