Caroline Johnson MP: speeches

Speeches

• 29 Apr 2025 · Black Maternal Health Awareness Week · Hansard source

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  I think we can both agree that any examples of racism are reprehensible and should be rooted out and that, in the examples given, people are speaking truthfully of their perceptions and what they have experienced. No one is denying the experiences of individuals or groups who have experienced poor care and that that poor care should stop. I just do not think that that suggests the NHS itself is a racist organisation, because I do not believe that it is. That is our point of difference. I think the staff who work in the NHS are overwhelmingly not racist. They want to care for people on the basis of clinical need to the very best of their ability, regardless of any ethnic minority status.

• 23 Apr 2025 · Hospitals · Hansard source

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  We can all agree that we want a world-class NHS, and that includes having the very best hospitals, technology and staff. I have been delighted to see the brilliant facilities created in my area, including a new A&E in Boston, new mental health wards at Lincoln county hospital, and new operating theatres at Grantham and District hospital. These upgrades mean that patients can receive the best possible care in appropriate settings, and staff can go to work each day proud of their workplace environment. However, we must be alive to the challenges that face the NHS. We live in an ageing society where people have more complex comorbidities. We also have a growing population, so there is more demand for services. In fact, the NHS treats 25% more patients every single day than it did back in 2010. New treatments, technologies and procedures have been developed, saving and improving lives, but they come at an ever more expensive price. We also had the covid pandemic, which I noticed the Minister did not mention. According to the King’s Fund, in 2023 prices, spending on capital in Labour’s last year in office, 2009-10, was £6.9 billion. In 2023-24, that had nearly doubled to £11.4 billion. Even before the pandemic, capital spending was nearly £1 billion higher than when Labour left government. That helped us to open 160 community diagnostic centres and more than 100 surgical hubs, and to invest more in scanners, beds and operating theatres to deliver a million more checks, scans and procedures closer to home. We were committed to delivering the new hospital programme in full. There was more to do. The challenges were evolving, the demand for care was growing and the pressure on the NHS was ever increasing. It now falls to the Labour Government to address those problems. I want them to succeed—that is in all our constituents’ interests—but what we have seen so far does not fill me with hope. One of the Health Secretary’s first choices on entering government was to pause the new hospital programme and put its future at risk. That was despite the fact that he and the Chancellor travelled the country throughout the election period, meeting candidates and promising a new hospital in their area. Just like the Government’s promises to the farmers, the pensioners and businesses, those were hollow words.

• 23 Apr 2025 · Hospitals · Hansard source

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  I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman is not correct. The previous Government, and the previous Chancellor, made a clear commitment to providing the money, and to the hospital building project, but the current Government have not chosen to meet that commitment. These are choices that are being made. For now, patients and staff are being denied the quality facilities that they have deserved for decades. For some hospitals, construction work will not even begin until 2039. Will the Minister write to me, giving the date on which each hospital will be completed? We can see the Labour Government’s lack of ambition. There are 40 hospitals in waves 1 to 3 of their programme—40 hospitals over 15 years—but there are 515 acute, specialist and community hospitals in England. At this pace, the replacement of the NHS estate will require a cycle of nearly 200 years. That is the equivalent of a hospital built in 1825 not being replaced until this year. That is Labour’s ambitious programme. We can all see the pressures facing the Chancellor as her economic mismanagement hits the country. We cannot tax our way to growth. Perhaps that is yet another reason why growth forecasts have been cut yet again. How do we know that Labour will not come for those already delayed new hospitals in a year or two, and that there will not be further delays or cancellations? The Government have made it clear that the new hospitals are not their priority. Will the Minister give us that guarantee?

• 23 Apr 2025 · Hospitals · Hansard source

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  I must confess to not being terribly au fait with the position of Charing Cross hospital in 2012, which was before I was elected. It is not a hospital in which I have worked as a doctor, but I am advised that it was my right hon. Friend the Member for Godalming and Ash (Sir Jeremy Hunt), when he was Health Secretary, who kept it open, and I am sure that local residents will be disappointed that this Labour Government have chosen not to rebuild it until 2035. Will Labour—in an attempt to fill the black holes of their creation—return to private finance initiative contracts, to bridge the gap between the spending that they want and the fiscal situation that they have created? I saw at first hand the disastrous agreements that were reached, which led to extortionate costs and ridiculous inflexibility. Let me give just one example. I remember being very pleased to have an office of my own for the first time when, as a doctor, I was promoted. I was given a desk, a computer and a large whiteboard. When I asked, “How do I get this put up on the wall?”, I was told, “You can’t have it put up on the wall, because it would cost £800.” That was more than a decade ago. I thought, “Why is it costing £800?” and I said, “I can go and buy some ‘no nails’ from the local hardware store and put it up myself!” I was then told, “You can’t do that, because a deal was negotiated, and it would be against the contract.” In total, there are about 700 PFI contracts with a capital value of £57 billion, and there is about £160 billion still to be paid for them and their maintenance. During covid, in 2020-21, analysis from The Guardian found that nearly half a billion pounds was being spent purely on interest charges. That is money that is not being spent on patient care, and it is a long-lasting legacy from the last time a Labour Government were in power and trying to get around their fiscal rules. These were fundamentally bad deals. Yet again, we see that when Labour negotiates, the taxpayer loses. Despite 14 years in opposition, Labour came to office without a plan for what it actually wanted to do for the NHS. Instead, we have seen review after review and consultation after consultation, with very little action or delivery in return for what this means for patients and the taxpayer. The Labour Government hiked taxes on general practices, community pharmacies and even children’s hospices, only to give them some of that money back and expect them to be grateful for it. They cut the winter fuel payment for millions of the most vulnerable people in the country, and then sat back and watched as the number of pensioners attending A&E this winter soared. They caved in to the trade union demands with an inflation-busting pay rise in return for no modernisation or productivity reforms, and the threats to strike again are already back. They scrapped our productivity plan, which we had already fully funded and which would have unlocked billions in savings by the end of the decade.

• 23 Apr 2025 · Hospitals · Hansard source

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  Actually, we use the definition of “new hospitals” that Tony Blair used when he was Prime Minister. Let us turn to where we are now. We welcome the capital funding to continue the programmes that we started in government for new surgical hubs and diagnostics, but how much of the additional capital funding allocated in the last Budget will be used to carry out repairs in hospitals that should be rebuilt? Let me repeat the question asked by the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan). Will those delays cost more money, both because work that would otherwise be unnecessary will have to be done to keep hospitals open and because of inflation, which is rising under this Government? How much extra will the national insurance jobs tax cost the contractors building the new hospitals and undertaking maintenance and repairs? Those additional costs will be passed on to the NHS. Will that mean less repair work being undertaken, or will the Government make cuts elsewhere—and if they do, where will those cuts fall? The Chancellor has already hiked taxes on working people and businesses, and today we saw that borrowing has also increased by £30 billion a year, with debt piling up and inflation on the rise. How does the Minister intend future repairs and builds to be funded—through yet more tax rises, more borrowing, bringing back PFI, or cutting other areas of spending? Ultimately, these are decisions for Governments. To govern is to choose. This Government must own their choices, but sadly it is the public who will have to pay for them.

• 23 Apr 2025 · Hospitals · Hansard source

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  The previous Secretary of State made it clear that the hospital was fully funded and would be built. What has changed since then is that we have a new Government who made the choice not to build it. These are choices that the new Government must own. When the Government came to power, the Secretary of State commissioned the Darzi review, which highlighted the need for more capital investment in the NHS, but decided not to prioritise the delivery of the new hospitals. To govern is to choose, and the Secretary of State has chosen not to deliver the hospitals. We set out our commitment to delivering them on time, with the agreement of the then Chancellor. Of course, spending decisions cannot be made for a future Parliament, but the Secretary of State has chosen not to make the same commitment.

• 23 Apr 2025 · Hospitals · Hansard source

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  I absolutely agree that the Labour Government should do that, but unfortunately, we have learned that their promises do not mean much at all.

• 23 Apr 2025 · Draft Medical Devices (Amendment) (Great Britain) Regulations 2025 · Hansard source

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  My understanding is that the US Government are reviewing whether the tariffs will affect medical pharmaceutical products. However, some manufactures of medical devices, as per this SI, are concerned that the tariffs that have already been announced affect medical devices. Can the Minister please give more clarity on that?

• 23 Apr 2025 · Draft Medical Devices (Amendment) (Great Britain) Regulations 2025 · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. We can all agree that we want safety. We want the equipment that doctors such as me use to be safe, reliable and regulated to the highest standards. We also want strong support for the science and technology sector, and patients in the UK to have early access to the best and most innovative medical devices. The instrument removes the revocation dates currently attached to four pieces of assimilated EU law, currently enshrined in the Medical Devices Regulations 2002. By doing so, it keeps those EU regulations in force until new, bespoke UK regulations are introduced. There was significant concern that allowing that assimilated EU law to expire under the sunset clause would disrupt the UK medical devices regulatory framework and could negatively impact patient safety. In response, the MHRA conducted a public consultation involving device manufacturers, healthcare professionals, patient groups and businesses. Based on the results of that consultation, the MHRA proposed removing the revocation date for those four pieces of EU law. That proposal was welcomed, with 83% of respondents favouring maintaining the status quo. Opposition Members support these pragmatic measures, and we welcome any legislation that protects patient safety. However, it is essential that the new UK regulatory framework is delivered in a timely manner to provide clarity for industry stakeholders. In that spirit, I would be grateful if the Minister could provide clarity on a few points. First, the retention of these laws is intended as a temporary transitional measure, with the first phase of the new UK regime—the pre-market regulations—expected in 2026. Is that information up to date, and when can we expect further details on the timeline, publications and upcoming consultations? Looking ahead to the new UK regulations, particularly those on post-market surveillance of medical devices, are the new UK replacements for assimilated EU regulations expected to diverge significantly from the current EU frameworks when they take effect, or will they remain broadly aligned with them? Although the amendment regulations extend across the UK, in practice they apply only to England, Wales and Scotland. Northern Ireland remains subject to the 2017 EU medical device regulation and the 2017 in vitro diagnostic medical device regulation. If these frameworks impose additional regulatory or administrative burdens on manufacturers and distributors in Northern Ireland, what steps will the Government take to support those businesses and help protect their competitiveness? Finally, will the Minister comment on how she expects US tariffs to affect medical devices, including their manufacturers and their availability, in the UK?

• 22 Apr 2025 · Sentencing Guidelines (Pre-sentence Reports) Bill · Hansard source

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  The right hon. Lady is making the important point that the Sentencing Council is comprised of senior and learned individuals. Given that, what circumstances does she think conspired to let it get the guidelines so very wrong? It is clearly felt on both sides of the House that they are wrong.

• 22 Apr 2025 · Sentencing Guidelines (Pre-sentence Reports) Bill · Hansard source

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  Can the right hon. Lady clarify whether the guidelines proposed under the previous Government were the same as those with which she is dealing now, or did they differ—and if they differed, how did they differ?

• 22 Apr 2025 · Sentencing Guidelines (Pre-sentence Reports) Bill · Hansard source

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  The right hon. Lady is making a point about the wider justice system and the importance of equality before the law. What has she done to assure herself and the House that, in all aspects of her Department’s work, people are being treated equally under the law—whether in relation to parole, how they are treated in prison, bail conditions and so on?

• 22 Apr 2025 · Sentencing Guidelines (Pre-sentence Reports) Bill · Hansard source

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• 22 Apr 2025 · “For Women Scotland” Supreme Court Ruling · Hansard source

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  I am pleased to get the clarity from the Supreme Court judgment. Those of us on the Conservative Benches have always known what a woman is. The right hon. Lady says the Government will ensure that public services are fully compliant with the legislation, which is good. She talked about NHS single-sex wards and the provision for biological females and biological males. Can she confirm whether that means trans women will be cared for on male wards?

• 12 Apr 2025 · Steel Industry (Special Measures) Bill · Hansard source

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  The right hon. Gentleman said that steel production is strategically important, and I agree. He said that we should be avoiding having to be reliant on imports, and I agree. However, his Government blocked production of the raw material metallurgical coalmine in the north-west. Will he now go back to his colleagues in Government and the company to encourage them to reapply so we can have security not just of steelmaking, but of the raw materials that are needed to make it?

• 8 Apr 2025 · Tackling Child Sexual Abuse · Hansard source

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  The shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Weald of Kent (Katie Lam), gave very graphic and disturbing examples of horrific abuse suffered by just a couple of the young ladies affected by these grooming gangs. She asked important questions about the gangs, and I was disappointed that instead of answering her questions, the Minister talked about the number of meetings that her predecessors have had, and about the fact that many girls are abused by people who are not in grooming gangs. Of course that is true, but both are important. The Minister, in answer to an earlier question, invited another Member “to push for more, as I would do if I were not in my current ministerial position.” Why are the inquiries limited to only five areas? What about those in the other areas? Does she not recognise that giving people a choice on whether their area is investigated or not is an incentive for those who wish to cover up either to not bid or to not bid well for those inquiries? Above all, who or what is preventing her from delivering the more that she would push for if she was sitting here?

• 27 Mar 2025 · Prevention of Drug Deaths · Hansard source

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  I completely agree that we need evidence-based policy, and that, in whatever policy area we are looking at, we should challenge and probe policies to ensure we are doing things in the right way. Drugs should not be available in our prisons. People should receive treatment if they have gone into prison due to a drug-related offence, or if it is a non-drug-related offence but they are a drug user, but they should not have access to drugs. Prisons are controlled environments, so we should be able to prevent that. The Minister might be able to update us on what the Government will do to reduce the amount of drugs available in prisons. We must also look at the effects on the local area around drug consumption rooms. What effect does allowing people to use drugs have on the numbers for violent gang crime, acquisitive crime and drug use? The evidence needs to be looked at closely. There are other contexts in which drug use causes problems. Media coverage in recent years has highlighted the problem of so-called middle-class drug taking in family homes or at dinner parties. That is a different pattern of use, with different problems, and may risk setting precedents and norms, particularly for young children who may witness it, that might have damaging effects in years to come. Such drug use may be occurring in middle-class homes, but it still fuels organised crime and violence elsewhere. What are the Government doing to address the nuances in different habits and social contexts of drug use, and how do those figure in policy development? We should also think about the prevalence of drug use in contexts such as workplaces. Some workplaces, such as the police, use intermittent drug testing. Police can use stop and search powers to investigate misuse, but there are other opportunities to interrupt harmful behaviour. What is the Government’s position on random drug testing in employment settings? Regarding people in communities blighted by the effects of drug use, it is important to enforce the law as it is. In 2021, only 20% of drug-related offences recorded in Home Office data resulted in the user being charged or summonsed, and 34% of those offences resulted in an out of court or informal settlement. Some today have seemed to suggest that treatment and law enforcement are an either/or, but both are very important. Minimising the criminal offence could increase drug use, derisk the first trying of drugs among young people, embolden drug dealers and further harm neighbours who suffer drug-related harm. According to ONS data for 2024, 39.2% of respondents to the crime survey for England and Wales said it would be very or fairly easy to obtain illegal drugs within 24 hours. How do the Government intend to reduce the availability of illegal substances? The last Government implemented a 10-year drug strategy following the publication of the independent review of drugs undertaken by Dame Carol Black in 2020, and they committed an additional £523 million up to 2025 to improve the capacity and quality of drug and alcohol treatment services. This strategy set out aspirations to prevent nearly 1,000 deaths and deliver a phased expansion of treatment capacity, with at least 54,500 new high-quality treatment places for sufferers of addiction. The present Government need to set out a coherent and viable plan for tackling the problems that the previous Government had begun to address. On 26 November last year, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State Baroness Merron noted that the Government “continue to fund research into wearable technology, virtual reality and artificial intelligence, all in a bid to support people with drug addictions.” —[ Official Report, House of Lords, 26 November 2024; Vol. 841, c. 594.] That cost £12 million in the period from the election to 26 November. Will the Minister update the House on the evidence for the effectiveness of those measures? How do they intend to measure the value of the outcomes of that £12 million investment, and does she have any results on how effective they were? Drug use continues to cause substantial harm to individuals and communities across the UK. The Government must commit to evidence-based interventions and plan the UK’s drugs strategy in a manner that limits the opportunities for individuals to distribute or consume drugs, reduces the likelihood that young people will develop an addiction, and prevents communities from suffering the impact of ineffective policing and sanctions.

• 27 Mar 2025 · Prevention of Drug Deaths · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure and a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. I pass my condolences to the family, friends and colleagues of Christina McKelvie. I know she meant a lot to many of the people in this room. Members on both sides will recognise the vital importance of the topic before us today in relation to our health and wellbeing as a nation. Let us be clear: deaths across the UK remain too high and in many cases, trends are moving in the wrong direction. Therefore, I congratulate the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) on bringing this important debate so we can talk about it further. The Office for National Statistics notes that 5,448 deaths related to drug poisoning were registered in 2023 across England and Wales—93 deaths per million people—but those headline figures tell only part of the story, of course, because behind each one is a tragedy for a family. There is a significant gender imbalance in drug deaths. Of the nearly 5,500 deaths in England and Wales, 3,645 were men and 1,803 were women. There is also an imbalance among the English regions, as the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame Morris) said. The north-east of England remains the region with the highest rate of deaths related to drugs—London has a third of that rate. What steps are the Government taking to understand the epidemiology of drug use? How are they using that information to develop policies to reduce drug use and drug deaths? Another key demographic trend relates to age. ONS survey data for 2024 shows that 16.5% of people aged 16 to 24 reported using at least one drug in the year to March 2024, and approximately 150,000 in the same age bracket considered themselves frequent drug users. Education will clearly be a vital element of any strategy designed to prevent people from becoming addicted to drugs and going on to cause harm to themselves and their community. Education needs to be clear about the damage that drug consumption does to individuals and society, through antisocial behaviour, environmental pollution and serious organised crime committed by gangs. What steps are the Government taking to ensure schools and colleges provide effective, targeted education to young people? What conversations has the Minister had with education Ministers about that? What are they doing to extend that education to those who are lost to the system—those who are not attending school and are therefore at greater risk of developing addictions and being exploited? As has been mentioned, we also need to understand the changing patterns of use around particular drugs. Fashions change, and we must confront today’s challenges proactively, rather than yesterday’s ones reactively. Deaths involving cocaine rose by 30% in a single year in 2023, and synthetic opioids such as fentanyl pose another emerging risk. We know that such substances have caused catastrophic harm in other countries, where they are already a fixture of the drug supply chain. What lessons have the Minister and the Government learned from other countries’ experiences with synthetic opioids? What steps are they taking to ensure the risk does not develop into the sort of crisis that we have seen in other countries? Behind the statistics, there are people who use drugs and people in our communities who suffer the impacts. We need to look at both, and at the patterns of drug use. Inner-city areas suffering multiple forms of deprivation may face greater problems with substances such as heroin. As Members said, the Scottish Government recently opened the UK’s first drug consumption room in Glasgow, with the intention to address that kind of drug use. Long-term evidence about the effectiveness of such rooms is not clear at this stage, so I am pleased that the UK Government’s position is not to implement the strategy more widely. Treatment must be evidence-based, compassionate and effective, and it must not be done in a way that undermines the law, risking more people thinking that drugs are safe or not risky.

• 26 Mar 2025 · Spring Statement · Hansard source

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  Schools face a huge rise in costs imminently due to the rise in national insurance contributions. Headteachers had been reassured by the Government that schools would be recompensed with money to cover these costs, yet Sir Robert Pattinson academy in my constituency—a great school—finds itself £33,000 short. Will the Chancellor commit to ensuring that Sir Robert Pattinson, and indeed all the schools in my constituency, is given enough money to cover her jobs tax?

• 26 Mar 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill · Hansard source

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  As is usually the case, I find myself agreeing with my right hon. Friend, and that is of course why we have tabled the amendment: it will give us the evidence that we and the enforcement authorities require to make sure that the black market is reduced.

• 26 Mar 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill · Hansard source

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  It is now a truth universally acknowledged that smoking is bad for one’s health. It is the leading cause of preventable death in this country, responsible for over 80,000 deaths every year. When we say that number, it is easy to allow it to trip off the tongue as another statistic without really realising just how many people it represents. For each of them—such as my Nana Burton, who was a smoker and who died of lung cancer—there is a personal story of damaged health and often an early and preventable death. The Conservative party introduced a Bill based on a similar premise to this one in the last Parliament, although the Government have made significant changes since to the legislation, including taking a power that could be used to ban smoking and vaping in pub gardens, as well as a licensing scheme for tobacco products. On amendment 85, while we have received repeated assurances that the Secretary of State intends to use the measures in the Bill only to improve public health, we must still examine whether the legislation is proportionate and reasonable. As far as I can see, it gives the Secretary of State enormous powers to extend the smokefree legislation to any place with minimal oversight and without needing to provide a reason. There were whispers last summer that the Government were considering banning smoking in pub gardens, before they hastily withdrew this provision in the face of public backlash. If only they would withdraw more of their policies in the face of public backlash, because perhaps then we would not be in the situation we are in now. The Bill empowers the Secretary of State to extend smokefree and vape-free regulations to more places—essentially, to any place—with the aim of reducing exposure to second-hand smoke and promoting public health. However, on Second Reading the Government did not accept our amendment that it should apply only to places that have a provable significant risk to public health to justify such a ban. For that reason, I commend amendment 85 once again, which would restrict the Secretary of State to being able to designate only open or unenclosed spaces outside a hospital, a children’s playground, a nursery school, a college or a higher education premises as a smokefree area. Those are the areas the Secretary of State has said he wants to target, and the amendment would prevent any targeting of other areas, such as pub gardens, by the back door. While he claims that that is not his intention now, that may not remain the case for the rest of this Government’s time in office, nor indeed for any future Government. That is the risk in allowing these measures to stand, and for those reasons I encourage the House to support amendment 85. 3.15 pm On new clause 18 and amendment 89, the new Bill also gives powers to the Secretary of State to introduce a new licensing scheme for retailers selling tobacco, vaping or nicotine products. However, we know that licensing schemes will come at a cost, to businesses and local authorities that will administer them, and in enforcement. That does not make it the wrong thing to do, but we would need to make sure that any licensing scheme is not excessively burdensome or expensive. New clause 18 and amendment 89 would therefore require the Government to consult on the new licensing scheme for tobacco sales before it came into force. That would mean that the views and impact on businesses including small businesses are heard, and ensure that councils and trading standards have the capacity to deliver such a scheme. Ultimately, there is a balance to strike between the requirements on business and public health, and a public consultation would ensure that the Government are more likely to get that balance right. On new clause 19, another concern we have heard from those who oppose the Bill is about the impact that the legislation would have on the black market. His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs estimates that the illicit market in tobacco duty and related VAT was £2.8 billion in 2021-22, with the tobacco duty tax gap remaining broadly unchanged since 2015, while in 2023 the Chartered Trading Standards Institute estimated that a staggering one in three vape products were non-compliant. Given warnings that increasing the age requirement for tobacco products and prohibiting more vaping could expand the black market economy further, it is sensible to take precautions to tackle the issue.

• 26 Mar 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill · Hansard source

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  That is certainly a significant possibility, and that is the reason for moving the amendment, as my hon. Friend will understand. Illegal products can include smuggled and counterfeit cigarettes, vapes with nicotine levels way above the legal limits, and products containing illegal and potentially dangerous ingredients. They can be more harmful and may not include the appropriate labelling requirements and health warnings that genuine products have to carry. Regardless of whether colleagues support or oppose this Bill as a whole, I am sure we all agree that a black market is unacceptable. We have therefore put forward an amendment that would require the Government to produce annual reports on the rate of sale and availability of illegal tobacco and vaping products and their impact on public health and safety.

• 26 Mar 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend makes a fair point. We know the black market exists, but the amendment would enable the Government to understand the scale of that black market and the changes in it, so that regulation could be enforced more robustly. On amendment 90, as currently drafted the legislation will ban all forms of advertising of nicotine and non-nicotine vapes, nicotine products and sponsorship that promotes those products. Adverts will no longer be permitted on posters, billboards or the sides of buses, and sports teams will be prevented from being sponsored by a vaping company. As a Member of Parliament and a children’s doctor, I have been very concerned by the sharp increase in children addicted to vaping and, more recently, the other nicotine products such as pouches that have begun to flood the market. Schoolteachers have reported that children are unable to concentrate or even to complete a whole lesson without visiting the bathroom to vape. Action to tackle the rise in vaping is welcome, and I support steps that restrict the appeal of vapes to young people, including through flavours and packaging. However, as the Minister mentioned in her opening speech, vaping can be a useful smoking cessation tool for adult smokers trying to quit; in my view, that should be their only purpose. Within the context of proposed advertising restrictions, amendment 90 would ensure that vapes that are targeted solely as a quit aid, to help adults stop smoking, can continue, in recognition of their role in bringing down smoking rates. Finally, new clause 20 would introduce a requirement on online vaping products to operate an age verification policy, as is currently the case in Scotland. Whether someone is buying vaping products online or in store, robust provisions must be in place to ensure that the purchaser is of legal age, and businesses must have a robust policy in place. As we have seen through recent tragedies, the age verification process for online sales on age-restricted products has not always been effective. The new clause would be an important step towards protecting children from accessing products online that they should not be able to buy. In closing, the Conservative party has a strong record of action on tobacco control. It was under a Conservative Government that plain packaging was introduced for all tobacco products and that minimum pack sizes for cigarettes and rolling tobacco were introduced—policies that have been demonstrably effective at reducing smoking rates. I have personally campaigned passionately on the issue of tobacco and vapes for over two years, and I am pleased that some of my original amendments to the Bill have made it beyond Committee stage and are with us today. I was also glad to see some of the new Government amendments introduced on Report that were born of debates we had in Committee, which have strengthened the Bill. Our amendments are designed to highlight some of the difficulties in the Bill. We oppose the Government’s power-grab—creating powers to ban smoking and vaping wherever they choose by regulation, but without consultation or enough notice. We have concerns about how the Bill will operate in practice, especially the burden on small businesses, and the potential for unintended consequences, such as a growth in the black market for tobacco products, so we ask that the Government seriously consider our amendments today.

• 25 Mar 2025 · Asylum Hotels and Illegal Channel Crossings · Hansard source

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  A directive from the Treasury reported in The Times appears to suggest that house building by the Government will help with the backlog of asylum seekers staying in hotels. Does the Minister believe that individuals who have arrived in the UK illegally should be given access to social housing ahead of British citizens?

• 25 Mar 2025 · Independent Review of Data, Statistics and Research on Sex and Gender · Hansard source

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  The UK Health Security Agency, for which the Secretary of State is responsible, publishes health statistics. This includes data on sexually transmitted infections, which is published by sexual orientation and sex. However, a footnote states that women are defined in the dataset as “women and trans women”, which does somewhat undermine the value of the data. What will the Secretary of State do to ensure that data is not just collected properly, but published and presented in a way that is most clinically useful?