Joe Robertson MP: speeches

Speeches

• 19 Mar 2025 · Winter Fuel Payment · Hansard source

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  I am sorry, but in the time remaining I cannot take another intervention from the hon. Gentleman. Without the winter fuel payment, over the winter we have seen a 5% increase in the number of people aged over 65 attending A&E, and of those who have attended A&E, there has been a 9% increase in hospital admission. The motion seeks a proper impact assessment and analysis by the Government of the effects of winter fuel payments being withdrawn. This was not a one-off winter, and it was a warmer winter than average. The same will happen next winter, the following winter and the winter after that, unless the Government bring back the fuel payment.

• 19 Mar 2025 · National Insurance Contributions (Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Lady give way?

• 19 Mar 2025 · National Insurance Contributions (Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend talks passionately about hospices. Does she agree that taxing hospices but providing tax relief to hospitals through the relief to the NHS actually disincentivises moving people out of hospitals, which the Secretary of State for Health says is his intention?

• 19 Mar 2025 · National Insurance Contributions (Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill · Hansard source

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  It seems to me that the hon. Member’s issue is not with some of the amendments, but with all of them taken together. Why does not he not back some of the amendments?

• 19 Mar 2025 · National Insurance Contributions (Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill · Hansard source

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  Perhaps I may suggest an easy decision, rather than a difficult one? The Government, instead of giving £9 billion away to Mauritius, should use some of that to support social care and charities.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill · Hansard source

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  My right hon. Friend has referred not only to the previous Government, but to the new Labour Government before that. Does he share my concern, and perhaps my confusion? I thought there was consensus on the huge benefits of academies, which were brought in by new Labour and advanced by the previous Conservative Government, but this Government seem to be ripping up that consensus through this Bill.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  Does my hon. Friend agree that the Bill is also badly drafted? Even if Members support the content, it is a badly drafted Bill that was brought before the House far too quickly. Such a huge Bill of this nature should have had time. It is hardly surprising that the Government are tabling so many amendments, because they are still writing it.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  I invite the hon. Lady to acknowledge the £5 billion cost to businesses that the Government’s own analysis says will be caused by the Bill.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Welsh Tourism Industry · Hansard source

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  5. What discussions she has had with the Welsh Government on steps to support the Welsh tourism industry.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Welsh Tourism Industry · Hansard source

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  The tourism and hospitality sector in the UK is one of the most heavily taxed in Europe. Will the Secretary of State press the Chancellor to reduce the tax burden in this area to help drive local economies that rely on tourism in Wales and in constituencies such as mine on the Isle of Wight?

• 11 Mar 2025 · Data (Use and Access) Bill [ Lords ] (Third sitting) · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to speak under your chairship, Mr Turner. I have some sympathy with what the hon. Lady is trying to do with new clause 21. I invite the Minister to address, as I am sure he will, her very specific point that it is not about restricting access to social media for people aged between 13 and 16, but about further restricting how social media is targeted at those age groups. After visiting schools in my constituency, I am minded to support her argument. At Ryde academy, I heard the reaction of young people to their school restricting access to their phones, which a school can only do during the school day. I am interested to hear the Minister’s response to the quite reasonable proposition on how to restrict social media companies from targeting children aged 13 to 16. Restricting the way they collect their data sounds like a small, but meaningful, step that the Government could take.

• 11 Mar 2025 · Independent Sentencing Review: Interim Report · Hansard source

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  The Government will consider alternatives to prison and early release, but how are the public to have any confidence whatsoever when the Government released prisoners early and left them to roam the streets for eight weeks before fixing tags?

• 11 Mar 2025 · Independent Sentencing Review: Interim Report · Hansard source

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  13. What assessment she has made of the potential implications for her policies of the independent sentencing review’s interim report, published on 18 February 2025.

• 11 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  I have been rather unsuccessful this afternoon in finding someone on the Government Benches who has concerns about the £5 billion cost to businesses that this Bill will bring. Will the hon. Member express concern over the £5 billion cost and the downward pressure on growth that this Bill brings, according to the Government’s own assessment?

• 11 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

• 11 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman talks about the Bill being good for growth, but is he concerned that the Government’s own assessment says it will cost businesses £5 billion? Does he have any concerns at all about the downward impact on growth of that cost?

• 11 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  The hon. Member is talking about the benefits of her new clause to fathers, but does she accept that the effect of the Bill will be negative and harmful to everyone and to the economy, by stripping £5 billion away from businesses? It is no good that her new clause would be helpful for fathers if the net effect of the Bill is bad for everyone, through the damage done to the economy.

• 11 Mar 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  Does my right hon. Friend think that some of the problems that he is identifying are a result of the Bill’s being rushed through this Chamber?

• 6 Mar 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  To great fanfare the Government cancelled the previous Government’s contract for ministerial travel by helicopter, describing £40 million as “grossly wasteful”. We now learn that the Government have signed their own contract for ministerial helicopter travel, but it is a secret contract—so secret that we do not know how much it will cost. Will the Minister confirm whether it will cost more or less than £40 million?

• 5 Mar 2025 · Department of Health and Social Care · Hansard source

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  I commend my hon. Friend the Member for North Cotswolds (Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) for his introduction to the debate. I agree with the majority of what I have heard so far. We must understand the context of the large figures announced by the Government. In particular, the £10 billion for the NHS next year sounds like a big figure, but as my colleague and Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee, the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran), was right to inform us, the vast majority of that money—around £8 billion to £9 billion—will be taken up by union pay deals, the national insurance increases brought about by the Chancellor, and inflation. When all the essential costs that the NHS must meet are taken into account, the £10 billion represents a shortfall. The NHS will be able to deliver only if it produces productivity gains. We must understand that £10 billion will not even meet the required costs of the NHS.

• 5 Mar 2025 · Department of Health and Social Care · Hansard source

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  I remember that clearly. I would like the Minister to spell out how she will deliver those productivity gains through reform. We want to hear more detail so that we can be confident that the NHS is secure. Let me turn to one area that the Minister might like to reflect on: the use of technology. Penny Dash, the candidate to take over as chair of NHS England, told the Health and Care Committee clearly that she would like technology to deliver and that she sees lots of opportunities. She herself remarked that basic technology in the NHS is not working. I recall that she used the example of nurses taking half an hour to turn on a computer system and having to use five passwords to access it. I said to her that it is hardly sensible to try delivering technology gains around artificial intelligence and all the opportunities that it might bring if we cannot deal with very basic, low-tech problems throughout the NHS. She agreed and accepted that is a challenge. I would like to see how the Secretary of State will, through the Minister, support NHS England in delivering that. I would also like to see the dementia diagnosis target brought back into the planning guidance document for NHS England. It was taken out this year, in consultation with the Secretary of State—so he allowed that. Diagnosing dementia is the most important thing we can do for people living with dementia and their families. Taking that diagnosis rate target out is inexcusable. I accept the wider point that if everything is a target and a priority, then nothing is a priority, but I think we can all agree that dementia—the biggest killer in this country—must be a priority for the NHS. That target for diagnosis rates must come back into the planning guidance next year. Indeed, the word “dementia” does not even feature in the guidance, which is shameful, frankly. Let me finish by talking about where the money is spent. We can have disagreements about how much is needed, but Lord Darzi was very clear that it is not being spent in the right places. Too much money in the NHS is being spent on hospitals, and not enough is being spent in the community. The Secretary of State will have to take some tough decisions, which he accepts, and one of them will have to be to reduce the proportion of money spent on hospitals. That is politically difficult, but across the House we are prepared to back him, if it is part of a plan to deliver meaningful change and to move more people out of hospitals and into communities, which is where they most want to be treated. Nobody wants to be in hospital if they have no medical reason to be there. Finally, the Chancellor must understand that every decision she takes must be coherent and consistent with delivering the three shifts. When she came to the Dispatch Box to deliver the Budget in October, she recognised that national insurance increases were going to be crippling for healthcare. That is why she exempted the NHS from those increases. However, she failed to exempt other key providers of healthcare, particularly in primary care, such as GPs, so it is no good now saying that the GP pay deal is a record deal, because the money that they must pay in national insurance contributions represents more than 50% of the money that the Government have given them. The Chancellor must back up the left shift with the fiscal decisions she announced at the Dispatch Box.

• 5 Mar 2025 · Department of Health and Social Care · Hansard source

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  I agree with all those things, and I am happy that the hon. Lady and I agree with each other. I hope that she acknowledges that £10 billion does not cover the basic requirements of the NHS. It delivers nothing more; in fact, it delivers less. The NHS will be able to continue to grow only if it delivers productivity gains, and it should.

• 4 Mar 2025 · Data (Use and Access) Bill [ Lords ] (First sitting) · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Turner. Further to the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge, does the Minister at least accept that the Bill poses a risk of entrenching inaccurate data relating to sex through public bodies using DVS systems? Notwithstanding his views on the Lords amendments, could he address that point? What steps will the Government take to ensure the reliability of sex data to ensure protection, such as of women using female-only spaces? What will the Minister do to ensure that inaccurate data entrenched by the Bill will not pose a risk to people in those situations and others? I am thinking, of course, of services available in healthcare, but that is by no means the only example.

• 3 Mar 2025 · Finance Bill · Hansard source

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  Does the hon. Member agree that the national insurance contribution rise for small and medium-sized businesses is not only passed on to the consumer but is damaging for the economy as a whole, because it stifles growth? Growth, not increasing tax rates, is the way to increase the tax take for the Treasury.

• 3 Mar 2025 · Finance Bill · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way and for his assessment of the Finance Bill. Does he agree that the best way the Government can raise revenue is not to raise taxes but to grow the economy and increase the money taken through taxes in that way? Does he also agree that the national insurance contribution increases will deliver the very opposite of what the Government say? They will not grow the economy at all; they will stifle it, which is likely to lead to an increase in taxes in the future.