argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Deregulation: Public Services and Health and Safety — House of Lords, 2017-07-13
Topic: Government Operations
John Patten (Conservative, Centre-right): When I talked about one in and three out I was referring to my much-encouraged cull of spads in central government. As the noble Lord’s colleague recognises, we were having a little fun at the expense of spads. I was not discussing the general issue.
Deregulation: Public Services and Health and Safety — House of Lords, 2017-07-13
Topic: Environment
David Prior (Conservative, Centre-right): I have forgotten where I had got to. The noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, raised a rather existential question at the beginning of her speech when she asked, "What kind of state do we want to live in?". Many noble Lords on the other side may be thinking about that at the moment, as noble Lords on our side may also be. I heard the Mayor of London on "Newsnight" last night talking about London and the tale of two cities: the invisible people as well as the visible people. This awful tragedy at Grenfell goes far beyond the narrow issues we have been talking about today. It asks all of us what kind of state we want to live in. However, I take issue with one point the noble Baroness made, when she said that we were ideologically opposed to regulation. As someone who was chairman of the Care Quality Commission for several years and has been quite heavily involved in education for many years, I can tell the noble Baroness that we are not ideologically opposed to regulation; I will address that issue later on in my speech I will go further than that and say that regulation is essential to any civilised society. The noble Lord, Lord Whitty, referred back to Lord Shaftesbury. I had hoped that Lord Shaftesbury was a Tory, but I note that as it happens, he was a Whig. However, many former Conservative Prime Ministers throughout the Victorian age were at the forefront of bringing regulation into the factories, to chimneys and the like. So let us be absolutely clear that regulation has a long and proud history and that it is an important and crucial part of improving people’s lives. That does not mean, as a number of noble Lords said, that all regulation is perfect, or that some regulations have gone beyond their sell-by date. All regulation needs to be kept under constant review We have heard a number of examples from the environmental field, particularly from the noble Lord, Lord Smith, and there has been no question that regulation has achieved hugely beneficial things. The noble Baroness, Lady Young, mentioned beaches and water quality, as well as air quality and the like. There is no question that regulations have had a huge impact to the good in that area. However, the noble Baroness is concerned within the context of Brexit about some of the principles that underlie some of that EU regulation. For example, she mentioned the principle that the polluter pays. There is nothing to stop us incorporating that as a principle in our future environmental legislation here, and in a post-Brexit world we can carry on many of the good things that have come out of Europe, of which there are many. The noble Baroness mentioned pollution in the inner Thames. The Thames tideway project will remove 60 million litres of raw sewage out of the Thames, and we can do that both in or outside Europe.
Local Government Finance — House of Lords, 2017-07-13
Topic: Government Operations
George Young (Conservative, Centre-right): I will be even more careful by moving quickly on The noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, made the interesting proposal that we should somehow topslice DVLA proceeds and VAT and give it to the local authorities. However, they would not then have the certainty that they have at the moment, because they would not know how much they would raise. Local government would be out of pocket because it would have kept the money and we might simply reduce the RSG to that local authority by the amount that it was going to get from the VAT, so actually you would be back where you started. I note that in the many reviews of local government finance that proposal has not found favour. In conclusion, local government has met some major challenges recently. It has faced immediate demands from emergencies: terrorist attacks in London and Manchester and the fire at Grenfell Tower. It is dealing with these emergencies against a background of rising demand for services in key areas such as adult social care. It has shown willingness and ability to work together across boundaries of all kinds, not just geographic boundaries but social and political ones as well, to best support the communities it represents Despite such challenging conditions, councils continue to deliver, and council tax is expected to be lower in real terms in 2019-20 than it was in 2010-11. Councils have embraced innovation and transformed the way they work to deliver services for their local areas. We must create the conditions for strong local public services to serve our communities. This will support the important work that our public sector workers do in ensuring that all our citizens are provided with high-quality public services at local and national level at every stage of their lives.
Merchant Shipping (Homosexual Conduct) Bill — House of Lords, 2017-04-06
Topic: International Affairs
Tariq Ahmad (Conservative, Centre-right): I acknowledge my noble friend’s point. Of course, ships are reflective of the flag under which they are registered. In terms of specifics and in terms of territories, when they are in Britain they should reflect the laws of our land, especially laws relating to British territorial waters and British land. I will write to my noble friend on the issue and share that with all noble Lords.
Farriers (Registration) Bill — House of Lords, 2017-04-06
Topic: Agriculture
Malcolm Sinclair (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part in the debate. It is with sadness that I have to say that my noble friend Lord Shrewsbury, who had his name down to speak, and would have been a great asset to our debate given his knowledge of the horse industry, clearly spread a plate before coming under starter’s orders. But I know that he fully supports the Bill as it stands I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Addington, but I think he painted a gloomy picture of the real situation. I thought it was a little negative. If we go back to the consultation exercise and look at the question on the mix of registered farriers to lay persons, 67% of the respondents thought that the current mix was right. On another question, 67% of respondents thought that the chairman should continue to be appointed by the WCF. The Government agreed that initially and said that the status quo must remain, but they have moved significantly. I think that they are probably right to have done so; they have shown a willingness to listen I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, for supporting the Bill. It is quite right that such a Bill should go out of this House with unanimous support, as a message to all. To my noble friend the Minister, I thank him for his support and time. He was absolutely right to say no foot, no horse—and don’t I know how difficult it is to get shod when one has poor feet. I can at least say that my feet hurt, but the poor horse cannot. Therefore, we rely very much on the skills of the farriers, to which the noble Lord, Lord Addington, drew our attention This Bill does not need any more rasping. I believe that we can clinch it and get it well shod. I wish all noble Lords a very happy Easter and thank the Government for making time for this Bill. I beg to move.
Free Childcare Hours — House of Lords, 2017-07-18
Topic: Social Welfare
John Nash (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, with the leave of the House I will now repeat a Statement made in the other place earlier today by my honourable friend the Minister of State for Children and Families "Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, and I thank you for allowing this Urgent Question, as it gives me the opportunity to highlight this Government’s determination to invest a record amount in childcare, supporting early education and helping parents financially. Our support will total £6 billion per annum by 2020 My department is committed to ensuring that all three and four year-olds have access to free early education. All parents, regardless of income and employment status, are entitled to 15 hours of free early education for their three and four year-olds, and for those parents who work we are providing access to an additional 15 hours of free childcare from 2017. Parents who want to take up 30 hours of free childcare can apply through the digital childcare services. They can access the application via the Childcare Choices website, which provides information on all the Government’s childcare offers. The application process takes about 20 minutes. I have recently had a walk-through of the service myself; it is straightforward and the format will be very familiar to parents who have used other government digital services The childcare service is a complex IT system, which checks parents’ eligibility in real time by interfacing with the other government IT systems. The vast majority of parents will receive an instant eligibility response. However, there will be a delay for some parents whose eligibility is not immediately clear, for example some self-employed people. The service has also experienced technical issues, which has meant that it has been unavailable to parents on a small number of occasions. HMRC, which developed the service, has been working hard to resolve these issues and as a result the customer experience has improved. The application has been open to parents of under-fours since 21 April and today my Treasury colleagues will make a Written Ministerial Statement informing the House that the service has been further rolled out to parents of under-fives. Parents whose application is successful receive a 30-hours eligibility code to take to their provider to claim their childcare place. As of today, more than 145,000 codes have been generated from successful applications. This is an increase of almost 5,000 codes since Friday 14 July and an increase of almost 25,000 since Friday 7 July. Increasing numbers of parents are successfully applying. It is great news that so many families will benefit from 30 hours in September because, as we have seen from our early implementer and early rollout areas, this support can make a real positive difference to the lives of hard-working families".
Free Childcare Hours — House of Lords, 2017-07-18
Topic: Social Welfare
John Nash (Conservative, Centre-right): I think this is good news. There are some very moving stories around the country and a lot of happy parents emerging from our early implementers. There are examples of couples who are both factory workers who were previously working shifts that did not coincide now managing to coincide those shifts. In answer to the specific points made by the noble Lord, Lord Watson, he is quite right that providers can charge parents for meals, consumables, such as nappies and sun cream, and additional activities, such as trips or yoga, but parents must not be required to pay any fee as a condition of taking up a free entitlement place. We have done a great deal since 2010 for disadvantaged families. In additional to the pupil premium we have 15 hours of free childcare for disadvantaged two year-olds, tax-free childcare and many other offers. I am not the most computer-literate person on this planet, but I had officials take me through the process earlier today and I could not see any step in it that was unnecessary. It takes about 20 minutes, and the steps seem absolutely necessary to make sure that the system is secure and that only those who are truly eligible are qualifying.
Free Childcare Hours — House of Lords, 2017-07-18
Topic: Labor
John Nash (Conservative, Centre-right): As the noble Baroness knows, we did a great deal of work in our review on ensuring that the pay for this was adequate. Indeed, that has been borne out by a number of independent parties. Some 145,000 people have now received a code. They then have to go to the provider and the provider has to come back to us to verify; 32% of them have done so already, which is well in advance of the September date—if they start in September. As I say, all the indications are that there will be adequate provision.
Free Childcare Hours — House of Lords, 2017-07-18
Topic: Education
John Nash (Conservative, Centre-right): I entirely agree with the noble Baroness. The evidence is clear: although we have had a dramatic increase in the quality of early years provision—it has risen from 69% to 93% rated good or outstanding by Ofsted since 2010—those attached to schools are the best. That is why we have been encouraging primary schools to open nurseries, and we will continue to do so through our free school process. She makes a very good point about bilingual nursery staff. Through our recruitment drive for teachers, we are working with the Spanish Government to recruit teachers from Spain. We are looking at whether we can work with France and Germany, and I will certainly take her point back to the teams.
Free Childcare Hours — House of Lords, 2017-07-18
Topic: Education
John Nash (Conservative, Centre-right): Generally, well. It was only a few rounds ago that we allowed primary free school applications to include nurseries, and a considerable proportion of them have now come with nurseries. As I said, that is something that we are keen to encourage: any opening of primary schools should come with nurseries attached.
Brexit: Trade in Goods (EUC Report) — House of Lords, 2017-07-18
Topic: International Affairs
Sandip Verma (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I take this opportunity to thank all noble Lords for their fantastic contributions and I thank my noble friend the Minister for her response. I would like to pick up two or three points very quickly due to the time constraints. My noble friend said that this has been a wide-ranging debate. I urge her to read Hansard tomorrow and to draw some conclusions. There were two or three key areas that noble Lords across the House concentrated on, and we hope that the Government will take them very seriously. We as a committee want to be sure that we are assisting the Government in posing the questions that need to be asked I understand that my noble friend has been in post for only a month. However, we had the referendum last year, and for a year there has been engagement between Ministers and businesses. I am pretty certain that Ministers and businesses have been saying exactly the same things to each other—that is, businesses have been asking for security and certainty in the transitional arrangements, and the Government have been saying very clearly that they do not want to show their hand for the purposes of the negotiation I put on the record my thanks to the members of my committee for their hard work on the report. I hope that the Government look at the recommendations and conclusions, which have been cited across the House today. We want to make sure that, if we are to have a Brexit, it is a successful Brexit.
Justice and Security (Northern Ireland) Act 2007 (Extension of duration of non-jury trial provisions) Order 2017 — House of Lords, 2017-07-18
Topic: Law and Crime
Robin Bridgeman (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, together with the noble Lord, Lord Bew, and the noble Baroness, Lady Blood, who was recently in her place, I have just returned today from a meeting with the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly. Our colleagues both in Northern Ireland and in the Republic expressed their serious concerns about the rise of paramilitaries—in particular the IRA, but of course it is not the only paramilitary group. I would just say that, collectively, that body has some pretty high intelligence about the activities and the danger posed by the serious rise of these paramilitary groups. In that case, I support these measures, with all the safeguards that Her Majesty’s Government are putting in place.
Damages (Personal Injury) Order 2017 — House of Lords, 2017-07-18
Topic: Law and Crime
Robin Granville Hodgson (Conservative, Centre-right): That this House regrets that the Damages (Personal Injury) Order 2017 makes a substantial change to the Ogden rate, the first change since 2001, just before the completion of a further consultation on how to set that rate more effectively in the future (SI 2017/206) Relevant document: 29th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, Session 2016–17
Sky and 21st Century Fox: Proposed Merger — House of Lords, 2017-06-29
Topic: Technology
Michael Ian Grade (Conservative, Centre-right): My apologies to the House. That is the first occasion in my career when I have been ahead of my time I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement. I have 30 or 40 years’ experience of these issues, arguing with different Governments and different regulators as they have changed their badge over the years. I am also a veteran of many skirmishes with the Murdoch empire and carry many, many scars. He once asked my Uncle Lew, the late Lord Grade of Elstree, to have a word with me about my antagonism towards the Murdoch empire. So I am not an apologist The common theme throughout all broadcasting legislation, broadcasting rows and ownership rows is to keep politics out of broadcasting. That is absolutely essential. We are now at a point where we have a regulator, Ofcom, which has proved itself to be incredibly effective, incredibly competent, incredibly independent and very much evidence-based, as it has to be as a statutory regulator. I hope the Minister will agree that the processes that have led to today’s Statement deserve to be seen as a ringing endorsement of Ofcom’s competence and independence I do not believe that the laws and rules governing media independence, plurality, mergers and so on are deficient at all, and I think the Statement proves that the system is working extremely well. I caution those who would argue for more political intervention in matters of media ownership and media plurality. We should also bear in mind that you have to have a very good reason indeed, other than a dislike of Murdoch and all his works, to interfere in the wishes of shareholders in a major transaction of this kind. This is a ringing endorsement of the process and of confidence in Ofcom, and we await the outcome.
Sky and 21st Century Fox: Proposed Merger — House of Lords, 2017-06-29
Topic: Government Operations
Richard Keen (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am obliged to my noble friend Lord Grade. I heartily endorse his observation that it is so important to keep the politicians out of these issues—that they should not become politicised. I endorse his observations about the independence of Ofcom in the context of this process. At the end of the day, fitness is for an independent regulator to determine. It would be a poor turn of events if we found that that was simply a political or ministerial decision.
Sky and 21st Century Fox: Proposed Merger — House of Lords, 2017-06-29
Topic: Law and Crime
Richard Keen (Conservative, Centre-right): I have sometimes inadvertently made that observation with regard to a solicitor. At the end of the day Ofcom is satisfied that it has been able to reach a decision on that point and it has done so in a number of different contexts and for a number of years without the requirement for Leveson 2. But ultimately that is a matter for Ofcom. If it felt it was not able to arrive at a conclusion without Leveson 2, I have no doubt it would have said so.
Sky and 21st Century Fox: Proposed Merger — House of Lords, 2017-06-29
Topic: Technology
Anne McIntosh (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I took an initial interest in Ofcom when, as shadow Minister, I scrutinised the original Bill setting up Ofcom, and I commend its decision and its role in this regard. In its report, Ofcom states that it has identified, "the risk of increased influence by members of the Murdoch family trust over the UK news agenda and the political process, with its unique presence on radio, television, in print and online" I commend the Statement that my noble and learned friend the Minister has repeated to the House. I understand that this is a preliminary decision and does not reflect the Secretary of State’s final decision, but could he elaborate a little on Sky’s increased concentration of power in its online presence were this sale to go ahead? In this digital age, the BBC has a very strong online presence, Sky News has a very strong online presence and newspapers accept that their online presence is going to increase rather than decrease in relation to the printed media. We have already seen one newspaper go online completely. Would my noble and learned friend care to comment on what the Secretary of State’s thinking will be with regard to a potential diminution of competition and an increased concentration of power in the hands of one family, were this sale to go ahead, and the impact that that would have on the online media?
Sky and 21st Century Fox: Proposed Merger — House of Lords, 2017-06-29
Topic: Technology
Richard Keen (Conservative, Centre-right): I am obliged to my noble friend. Clearly, at this stage, the Secretary of State has made only a "minded to" decision and it would not be appropriate for me to anticipate how she will then proceed in light of further representations between now and 14 July. Ofcom recognised the materiality of Sky and Fox’s presence online. Indeed, that is an increasing issue in the context of news media. Of course, an online presence can take a number of forms. It can be aggregation or it can be the establishment of an independent online body of news. Very often, when one is talking about online, one is talking about Facebook or other forms of media that are simply passing on news that is available offline as well. At this stage I cannot elaborate much further, except to notice that Ofcom took account of Sky’s presence online as well as its presence in terrestrial television broadcasting and newsprint.
Sky and 21st Century Fox: Proposed Merger — House of Lords, 2017-06-29
Topic: Government Operations
Richard Keen (Conservative, Centre-right): I am obliged to the noble Lord. As regards the process, let us see how it works its way through in the context of the present proposed merger. As regards plurality in general, clearly that may properly be judged once we see the outcome of the present process.
Financial Guidance and Claims Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2017-09-13
Topic: Technology
David James Fletcher Hunt (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I accept the offer of a further discussion. I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, my noble friend, Lord Trenchard, and the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie of Luton. I am intrigued by the idea of my noble and learned friend Lord Mackay of Clashfern that perhaps we ought to go a step further and find out ways to stop all this happening in the first place by making it impossible to bring such claims. No doubt we will be delving further into how we control what I have described as this insidious, nasty part of the marketplace when we come to the civil liability Bill and through various other opportunities. I know my noble friend has said that this Bill is on a separate flight path, but I am dealing with drones, and these drones are criss-crossing all the flight paths and creating new flight paths. With that acceptance of the offer of a further meeting, I have no hesitation in saying this problem will not go away and that we have to sort it out. But in the meantime I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.