Becky Gittins MP: speeches

Speeches

• 2 Jul 2025 · EU Trade Agreement: Economic Impact · Hansard source

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  10. What assessment he has made of the potential impact of the UK-EU trade agreement announced on 19 May 2025 on the economy in Northern Ireland.

• 2 Jul 2025 · EU Trade Agreement: Economic Impact · Hansard source

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  I am pleased to say that the proposed SPS agreement has been welcomed by the Welsh farming community, including those in my constituency of Clwyd East. That is alongside the Ulster Farmers Union, the Federation of Small Businesses, the CBI, the Horticultural Trades Association, supermarkets including Asda, M&S and Iceland, and many others. Does the Secretary of State agree with me and with them that an SPS agreement would bring huge benefits for Wales, Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK?

• 19 Jun 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Arts and culture are booming in north Wales, and I am delighted to say that next month, we will see both the formal reopening of Theatr Clwyd in Mold and also Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod in my constituency of Clwyd East. Will the Leader of the House join me in recognising the contribution of both to our economy and our arts sector, and will she make time for a debate in this House about how we can further grow opportunities for the arts and culture sector?

• 10 Jun 2025 · Clean Power Industries: Jobs · Hansard source

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  The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero’s clean power action plan is accelerating the transition to renewable energy sources and creating quality jobs in areas like mine in north Wales. A major expansion at the port of Mostyn will create 300 new jobs, as it prepares to increase its support for the offshore wind farm sector. Does the Minister agree that this is not the time to hold back, and that we should invest in green energy to tackle climate change, secure our energy supply and provide skilled jobs for my constituents in Clwyd East?

• 10 Jun 2025 · Clean Power Industries: Jobs · Hansard source

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  5. What estimate he has made of the number of additional jobs in clean power industries since July 2024.

• 12 May 2025 · Immigration System · Hansard source

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  Last year, the now Home Secretary visited the Betty Berkins café in my constituency to discuss the very matter of the massive increase in overseas recruitment while the investment in our domestic workforce was falling drastically, contributing to the quadrupling of the net migration figures between 2019 and 2023. Does she agree that the best way in which to address soaring migration specifically for work purposes is to train and upskill our domestic workforce properly through measures that already exist in our groundbreaking Employment Rights Bill? How will the measures proposed today contribute to that work, and to the achievement of the overall aim?

• 12 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

• 12 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  I think that everyone should be on board with the national minimum wage and the living wage. I hope that we can encourage all Members of all parties to get on board. I am very pleased to hear that commitment and concern from the Reform party. It is unexpected, but I respect it. On Second Reading, I welcomed this legislation as a central tenet of this Government’s policy of putting working people at the heart of our economy and making work pay. I am delighted to see the Bill return to the Chamber, and I pay tribute to those who served on the Public Bill Committee. The Bill modernises the UK’s outdated employment laws, bringing in more than 30 much-needed and welcome reforms, including: day one rights of employment, banning exploitative zero-hours contracts, abolishing fire and rehire, establishing bereavement leave, increasing protections from sexual harassment, introducing equality menopause action plans, strengthening rights for pregnant workers and establishing the Fair Work Agency. I am pleased that, during the scrutiny process, the Government have tabled amendments to strengthen protections for low-paid workers, including those relating to statutory sick pay. In real terms, 1 million people on zero-hours contracts will benefit from the guaranteed hours policy. Nine million people who have been with their employer for less than two years will benefit from day-one rights relating to the unfair dismissal policy. Because of the Fair Work Agency, holiday pay rights will be enforced for the very first time. The measures before us strengthen the Fair Work Agency. New clause 57 will enable it to bring proceedings against a non-compliant employer in an employment tribunal, in place of the worker. New clause 58 enables the provision of legal advice or representation for those who have become a party to civil proceedings related to employment or trade union law. Although the vast majority of employers across the country, including hundreds in Clwyd East, will certainly obey the law, there are still those that sadly do not. A Citizens Advice report states that higher-paid workers are 50% more likely than lower-paid individuals to bring an employment tribunal claim, despite the fact that lower-paid individuals are more likely to have their rights violated. As Unison points out, leaving the burden of challenging workplace injustice to individual workers seeking redress at tribunal compounds inequalities of power in the UK labour market. The Low Pay Commission figures highlight key reasons to implement these important measures. We know, for instance, that 20% of workers were paid less than minimum wage in 2023, and that nearly 1 million workers did not get any holiday pay. The agency will bring together existing state enforcement functions, and will be a single place to which workers and employers can turn for help. I am pleased that the agency will aim to resolve issues upstream by supporting employers that want to comply. I understand from evidence gathered by the Bill Committee that there was considerable support for a single enforcement body in place of what is currently quite a fractured system. On accountability, the Bill requires an annual report on the Fair Work Agency’s enforcement actions, and will allow Parliament to monitor progress in protecting workers’ rights. I am encouraged to hear that, to produce its strategy, the Fair Work Agency will consult an advisory board made up of trade unions, businesses and independent experts. It is vital that we continue our collaborative approach in developing employment legislation and policy that is pro-business, pro-worker and, ultimately, pro-growth. I welcome the new clauses and the Bill as a whole. It is an important part of the Government’s strategy to move our economy forward, improve work security and ensure greater productivity.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  The hon. Member is working incredibly hard to try to make a case for vested interests in relation to this Bill. Those vested interests are in the working people of this country. Nevertheless, I appreciate his efforts, and he certainly has earned his afternoon snack today. This precedes my time in this Chamber, and my hon. Friends may be able to help me, but was he as vociferous during the pandemic—a time of national crisis—when close relationships with senior Government figures secured contracts that produced no personal protective equipment when the country was in such desperate need?

• 12 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  I rise in support of Government new clauses 57 and 58. I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests and my proud trade union membership. I ask the Opposition to consider their comments today in what has proved to be a very ideologically driven debate on their part. I feel somewhat as if I have been transported back in time to a previous reforming Labour Government’s last upgrade to employment rights—the minimum wage debate. This afternoon’s fearmongering about productivity, growth and unemployment is reminiscent of it. We also have seen some crossover in the personnel who were part of the Conservative opposition. The then shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith), said that the minimum wage would “negatively affect…not hundreds of thousands but millions of people.” —[ Official Report , 4 July 2017; Vol. 297, c. 526.]

• 12 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  Given the hon. Gentleman’s comments about a small number of militant trade unionists taking industrial action if this Bill becomes law, it is worth noting that over the last 10 years, a small and militant group of Conservative party members have managed to choose successive Prime Ministers with fewer requirements than those applied to members of trade unions when they vote to take industrial action in their workplaces. Does he think that is fair?

• 12 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  Some comments from Opposition Members today have made it very clear to the public what the Opposition think about people’s rights at work.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

• 27 Feb 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Second sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q Thank you to the panel for your spirited contributions so far. We know that the processing of asylum claims ground to a halt under the previous Government, which was due in part to the Rwanda scheme and to the Illegal Migration Act 2023—that being the route through which, other than the four who went to Rwanda, people were either granted asylum or returned to the country from which they came. We also know about the impact on our communities of the asylum system grinding to a halt; about the massive influx of people being placed, for indefinite periods, in asylum hotels; and about the impact that that had on our local authorities and their ability to provide services to the rest of our communities. Given that the Bill clearly provides a deterrent to smugglers, to the people-smuggling business and to the criminal gangs in the channel by disrupting their activity, and by making it a greater expense, why do you still think it is a mistake—I think two or three of you said it outright, but you all seem broadly supportive of the Rwanda scheme—to be repealing those Acts with the Bill? Tony Smith: There is the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, and there is the Illegal Migration Act 2023. I said earlier that I was not a great fan of the IMA, for the very reasons that you have stated: it brought in the ban too early, and people were being banned from re-entering this country before we had even removed them. That was impacting on port cases. It was a hugely difficult time, because that law put all of the eggs in the Rwanda basket. As you say, that left increasing numbers of boat people being served with a notice that they were going to Rwanda, when they were never going to go to Rwanda; they were going into the system that you described. I do not think that that was a very good idea. If we had put the IMA to one side, with the duty to remove, we could have stuck with NABA. Then we had SORA, the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Act, which would have turbocharged NABA. It would have given you a triage option: either to accept people into the asylum system quickly and process them, as you are doing now, or—for others, where you wanted to make a point that it is not okay to come across in a small boat and get to stay in the UK—to send some of them to Rwanda. That is what we could have done under NABA and SORA, and my view is that the IMA disrupted that. Karl Williams: I suppose the asylum backlog of inadmissible people is a function of the disjunction whereby different parts of the legislation are being implemented at different speeds. Obviously the intention at the beginning was that we would have the flights going off in January or February 2023. When the ECHR injunction stopped the first flight, that derailed it. You could conceivably have had a situation in which a combination of some offshoring and the deterrent effect of that meant that the backlog of inadmissible cases did not grow. The fact that Rwanda was stalled in the courts for a couple of years, and then just did not happen at all, meant that that amount was inevitably going to increase. That was then locked in.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Family Businesses · Hansard source

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  I will not. The UK Government have prioritised investment in Wales’s future. The result of last year’s Budget is the largest funding boost that Wales has received since devolution—£21 billion of new money—and people in Wales will see the benefits through the Barnett formula, but also through direct spending. The Budget provides a record £1.7 billion spending boost for the Welsh Government to support public services such as our NHS. The investment in our public services means more neighbourhood policing, which again is something our constituents and our local business communities desperately want. More funding will be available to support the delivery of 13,000 more police officers, police community support officers and special constables in our communities, keeping our streets safe and protecting small retail businesses from the shoplifting that was allowed to run rife under the previous Government’s £200 rule. This is what my constituents want, and they want a Government on their side. The Opposition are more than happy to take all the benefits that this additional investment will provide, but I politely suggest that, by not outlining how they will pay for it all, their position lacks real credibility. I note that the Shadow Cabinet has already racked up about £7 billion in unfunded spending commitments, which again is not serious enough. I am heartened that the Government are taking concrete steps to protect the smallest businesses and charities. The employment allowance will double to £10,500, meaning that some 250,000 employers will gain, and an additional 820,000 will see no change at all. I know that organisations such as the Federation of Small Businesses have welcomed these changes, as do the many small businesses in Clwyd East that gain from the uplift in the employment allowance. In north Wales, we have already seen the benefits of two Governments working together, in Wales and at Westminster, with both being utterly focused on investment and growth. We have already seen investments in Airbus, Kellogg’s, Shotton Mill and more in our little corner of north Wales, with the same business confidence as was exemplified by the £63 billion raised at this Government’s investment summit. Green jobs will be critical in north Wales’s future. Last week, the port of Mostyn in my constituency paved the way for some 300 new jobs helping support the offshore wind industry. When I go out to speak to businesses in my constituency—family businesses such as Jones Brothers and Clawdd Offa Farm—they simply do not make representations like those we have heard from the Opposition. They share the Government’s passion on the skills agenda and apprenticeships, reforming our restrictive planning regime and the need for investment in our NHS, which this Government are already prioritising. This Government are continuing to promote entrepreneurship, attracting billions of pounds of investment and providing the certainty that our businesses need, not least as part of the Flintshire and Wrexham investment zone. Businesses in Clwyd East deserve better than the faux outrage from the Conservatives, and this Government will not allow them to pretend to be the champions of British business, rather than the Conservative Government who sold our farmers down the river through detrimental trade deals, and the Conservative Government who ran down our economy with Liz Truss’s mini-Budget, short-term thinking and decimated business confidence. It is the Labour Government who are committed to providing our economy with the stability and investment it needs to grow, laying the foundations for thriving businesses at the heart of prosperous communities.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Family Businesses · Hansard source

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  I thank the right hon. Member for giving way. Were the wellbeing and mental health of our farming communities and the security of our food, which have just been raised by those on the Opposition Benches, a concern of yours when the Conservative Government sold our farmers down the river with dodgy trade deals with Australia and New Zealand? Was that your concern then?

• 26 Feb 2025 · Family Businesses · Hansard source

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  The economy that this Labour Government inherited was a total mess. We had a Conservative Government who, for so long, ignored the problems that were building up. Instead of looking for the solutions, they obfuscated and kicked problems into the long grass. When they did make decisions—such as Liz Truss’s mini-Budget—they led to catastrophic outcomes for our economy, many of which our constituents are still paying off in their mortgages, today and for some time to come. Whether it was for a failed Rwanda scheme or for dodgy covid contracts, the Conservatives wasted money by making bad decisions, and the public paid the price. Inevitably, inheriting an economy in such a perilous state meant that there were difficult decisions to make: decisions that could not have been anticipated until the true extent of the previous Government’s economic incompetence had been exposed in the summer of last year. What the Budget did last autumn was set out clearly our path to recovery, fixing the foundations, focusing on growth and ensuring that we are giving our economy the stability, the investment and the reform that are required to get us away from the doom loop of the Tories and back to growth. Yes, there have been tough choices. We on the Labour Benches do not shy away from that. However, these choices mean that we can invest in our public services, including our NHS, driving down waiting lists.

• 10 Dec 2024 · Storm Darragh · Hansard source

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  As the Minister and Members from across the House have done, I commend our local authorities and our emergency services for the hard work that they did to make people safe. The storm caused so much damage; communities in my constituency, such as Northop, were without power for several days. Sadly, many of us had to change our plan to go out on Small Business Saturday and support our local high streets, which are struggling. There is a palpable commitment in this Chamber to preparedness. What conversations were had with the Welsh Government prior to the storm to ensure that we were ready to tackle it?

• 4 Dec 2024 · Farming and Inheritance Tax · Hansard source

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  Despite attempts by the Opposition to hijack this debate, I can honestly say— [ Interruption. ] If they want to champion our agricultural communities, they might have started around 14 years ago. The conversations that I have had with farmers in my constituency have been balanced and productive in their scope, with an understanding of why the provisions have been brought in. Given that two thirds of the land bought in England in 2023 was bought by non-farmers, does the Minister agree that it is right that this Government are taking the opportunity to close what is essentially a tax loophole for non-farmers?

• 5 Nov 2024 · Income Tax (Charge) · Hansard source

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  I begin by welcoming the Tobacco and Vapes Bill, particularly the part about smoke-free spaces. For those of us with anaphylactic allergies, vapes represent a higher risk, because clouds of vape smoke contain allergens. We have seen the first report of anaphylactic reactions to second-hand vape smoke, so I very much welcome the prevention included in the Bill. I will move on to the Budget. There is a reason why people across Wales overwhelmingly rejected the Conservatism that crashed our economy, failed to fund our public services and oversaw economic decline. Furthermore, the Conservative Government were not honest about the challenges that we faced. They were not honest with farmers in Clwyd East, small business owners, public servants or potential investors. They spent money that was not budgeted for—the height of irresponsibility. To say that they overpromised and underdelivered would be a colossal understatement. Last week, however, this Labour Government delivered an honest Budget that gave hope to the people of Wales, with the largest funding boost that Wales has received since devolution: £21 billion, with a £1.7 billion Barnett formula uplift for the Welsh Government to support the vital public services on which my constituents rely. That includes £250 million for capital investment. It is the biggest Budget settlement for Wales since devolution. We are working with the Welsh Government to invest in our NHS and increasing the national minimum wage, benefiting more than 70,000 workers across Wales. Some £2.3 billion has been provided for prison expansion, to sort out the mess that the previous Government made of our criminal justice system. We have provided £5 billion for the farming budget, to accompany a new veterinary agreement that this Government are seeking in order to cut the red tape and get Welsh food exports moving. We have provided £100 million to support steel communities, and £25 million to make coal tips safe. Importantly, we are ending the injustice of the mineworkers’ pension scheme. As someone who grew up in a coalfield community and whose family worked at the Point of Ayr colliery, I was proud to stand on a manifesto pledge to return the investment reserve—over £1 billion—to those who need and deserve it: the former miners themselves. That means a huge amount to the nearly 300 former mineworkers in Clwyd East. We owe them this, and we delivered it. While the Budget makes difficult choices, it sets us on a path to growth and provides vital investment for Wales. It has my full support.

• 31 Oct 2024 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T6. Business owners in Clwyd East, in north Wales, want a Government who are serious about getting long-term, sustainable jobs into our economy—a process that we started yesterday. Our unique geography sees us lead on wind power and carbon capture, and we have a proud manufacturing base, which is already benefiting from our two Governments working together, and from a long-term sustainable plan for the future. Will the Minister work with me to ensure that businesses are well placed to invest in north Wales, both now and in the future?

• 21 Oct 2024 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  Madam Deputy Speaker, I refer you to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, where you will see that I have worked for a trade union that is not affiliated to the Labour party and that did not donate to my campaign. You will also see a number of other trade unions listed, not because of any campaign donations or vested interests —I can see why Opposition Members were led there; that is far more familiar to them—but because of the fantastic trade union representatives who have supported me and, I am sure, many Members on the Labour Benches. For me, that was Jim, my Unite rep in my very first job when training as a finance management trainee, all the way through to Laura, Trudy and Claire, the GMB reps who looked after me and supported me in my job before I was elected to this place. I rise in support of the Bill, which is a central tenet of the Government’s policy to put working people at the heart of our economy and make work pay. As I said, I am a proud trade unionist, and I am proud to stand alongside millions of working people across the country who we depend on to drive our economy and provide the services we all need. I wish to call out some claims that I have heard from Opposition Members throughout this debate—and before; they are quite tired claims—that supporting the advancement of people’s rights at work is in some ways a vested interest. When were the working people of this country ever just a vested interest? It is in the interests of the working people of this country that we should be governing. As a former trade union industrial officer, I know that finding a way forward in collaboration with those on both the employee and employer side is not always the easiest thing to do, but it is always the right and most productive way forward, so I am pleased that within their first 100 days, as promised, this Labour Government have presented this excellent Bill, and in doing so have ripped up many of the provisions in the Trade Union Act 2016. Rather than ameliorate industrial relations, that legislation was symptomatic of an aimlessly combative approach in that area that the previous Government drove forward. The effect, as we sadly know, was some of the worst disruption in decades. The public responded in July; they had had enough of that toxic and self-defeating approach. I am delighted that measures in the Bill will modernise employment laws, with much of the Trade Union Act 2016 dismantled and, quite rightly, thrown in the bin. This upgrade for workers’ rights establishes day one rights for parental and bereavement leave for millions of workers, and statutory sick pay will be strengthened. The Bill is part of the platform for that approach. I welcome its content and the commitment to work with all stakeholders to ensure that it is implemented in such a way that benefits all my hard-working constituents of Clwyd East.

• 9 Oct 2024 · Women in the Workplace · Hansard source

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  Does the Minister agree that, unlike some of the incredibly worrying comments we have heard from Opposition leadership contenders this week, in order to grow our economy we need to create the conditions to encourage and support more women back into the workplace?

• 5 Sept 2024 · UK-EU Trade · Hansard source

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  Farmers in Clwyd East continue to raise concerns with me about trading barriers with the EU. They feel that the current arrangements disadvantage them, and that not enough has been done since we left the EU to facilitate trade between British farmers and EU countries. Will the Minister outline what steps his Department is taking to remove those barriers and get a better deal for the farming community of Clwyd East?

• 5 Sept 2024 · UK-EU Trade · Hansard source

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  13. What steps his Department is taking to improve the UK’s trading relationship with the EU.