John McDonnell MP: speeches

Speeches

• 3 Nov 2025 · Public Office (Accountability) Bill · Hansard source

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  I pay tribute to all the campaigners, but I want to pay special tribute to the Scouse MPs, who in the last few months put their foot down and said that they were having nothing but the Hillsborough Bill. I thank them on all our behalf. I want to raise a point about the duty of candour, transparency and frankness, and the duty to operate in the public interest. I would like someone to make it clear from the Dispatch Box that there is a duty to co-operate with the complainants or the victims in the pursuit of truth. I say that not about a historical event, but about an event that is happening today: the Mitting inquiry into the undercover operations carried out on a number of our campaigns. In that inquiry, the authorities, the police and the intelligence services are belligerently fighting not to tell the truth. I will explain briefly. Twenty-eight years ago almost to the day, my constituent, a young Asian lad named Ricky Reel, went on a night out with his mates in Kingston upon Thames. He went missing and never came home. We now know that he was racially abused. A week later, we found his body in the river. The police inquiry was appalling, and we begged for police resources to be applied. They were applied, but we discovered later that they were applied to surveil our campaign. We had undercover police officers surveilling our campaign, not investigating the case. We were told, “Don’t worry, we weren’t really surveilling you. You were collateral damage.” It was a collateral invasion of privacy, we were told. Then we met workers who were being blacklisted, so we set up the Blacklist Support Group. We discovered that the police and the intelligence services were surveilling those workers and providing information to employers. Some of those workers never worked again in their life. Then, of course, we worked with the Stephen Lawrence inquiry. We discovered a hero: a police officer called Peter Francis, who was part of the unit that undertook the surveillance. He said what actually went on, and he blew the whistle. He is now giving evidence to the Mitting inquiry. My constituent Mrs Reel is also giving evidence, as are the Lawrences and other campaigners, but the police are refusing to attend. They claim to be suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. They claim that they are so unwell that they cannot provide the evidence. As a result, we will not get to the truth unless there is an overpowering duty in this legislation that forces them to co-operate. People have said that this is about class, but it is also about race. The Lawrence family were surveilled. Why? So that information could be provided to the media to discredit them. In the Ricky Reel campaign, it became farcical. We went to visit the Metropolitan police and said, “You’ve now admitted that you were surveilling us. We would like to see the documents about that surveillance.” We were each given our own copy, but it was redacted to such an extent that there was maybe only a sentence or a word visible. To be frank, we fell about laughing. We got up to take the copies out, but we were told that we could not, and the reason why was that we might have put them all together and made sentences. That is how bad the situation was. We have still not got to the truth —to the full files—and we are still calling for another investigation, so this Bill is highly relevant. We want a duty that is not just about telling the truth, but about co-operating with those who are complaining and the victims. Until we get that spirit of co-operation, I do not think that we will ever get to the point at which we can hold officials and others to account. I am worried about the different way that the intelligence services will be treated. Surveilling the blacklisted workers involved a rare mixture of police, special branch and others. I would like to see the intelligence services held to account under this legislation. It almost gives them a private guarantee that even whistleblowers will never be heard in public in a way that allows us to expose what goes on. There will be a lot more to say about this legislation, and we will need to amend it. My final point has already been made by my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham and Chislehurst (Clive Efford). I remain angry about The Sun . I remain bitterly angry about its role and what it did. We were promised Leveson part 2, but we have dropped it, and I do not think there is any justification for that. If anything good comes out of today’s debate, maybe it will be the Government reconsidering introducing Leveson part 2 and legislation that prevents newspapers acting as The Sun did. I have to say, if social media had existed back then, can you imagine how horrendous it would have been?

• 29 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  I can only draw on the experience that my hon. Friend and I had when Serco was in charge, which was about profiteering and reducing costs, largely through a reduction in staff. He might recall that on occasion we had reports that community service volunteers were turning up, and the tools were not available for them to do their work. There was a lack of supervision, and in a few instances we discovered that some of the vehicles that they used had been forced into and were unsafe. We do not want to go back to that profiteering. That is why an assurance that this provision will be managed and orientated by the state, using non-profit-making voluntary organisations and charities, would reassure those professionals who have unfortunately experienced the privatisation that has taken place in the past, to the detriment of us all.

• 29 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  I have only a couple of sentences, Madam Deputy Speaker. To remind the Minister, in last week’s Committee, my new clause—which is effectively new clause 26 today—represented the views of a number of organisations, including the National Association of Probation Officers, recalling the problems that we faced with privatisation, particularly in relation to community service and unpaid work. In London in 2013, the supervision of unpaid work was privatised to Serco, and it was a catastrophic failure in providing both effective work and security for the community overall. It left a stain on the old process of managing community work. That was reflected when the previous Government totally privatised probation, which then had to be brought back in-house. New clause 26 simply asks for an assurance from the Government that, although we will want to engage with voluntary organisations, charities and non-profit bodies, we will not seek the privatisation of community service and unpaid work, in particular the placement of former prisoners in work in which they could be exploited.

• 29 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  That is why I tabled my new clause in Committee. I did not want to be a pain in the neck; I just wanted the Minister to acknowledge our understanding of the implications of the measures and the Probation Service’s overall concerns about these matters. I have re-tabled the new clause simply to get the Minister’s view and to hear the Government’s attitude on those issues. A range of amendments have come from the justice unions parliamentary group, which the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts) chairs. Let me be absolutely clear: community service has always been state-supervised work with charities and non-profit organisations. At no stage do we want to allow private sector organisations to profiteer in that area of service. No matter what attitude the Minister takes, I hope that he can give us an assurance on that. If there is a need for further discussion and dialogue, I am sure that the justice unions parliamentary group will be willing to meet him to go through those issues in more detail.

• 22 Oct 2025 · Heathrow: National Airports Review · Hansard source

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  I first of all express my sympathy for the Secretary of State: she knows from past experience that this is like watching a car crash in action, and it has been thrust upon her by the Chancellor. She knows that Heathrow has made the clear commitment that it will not pay for the infrastructure; that landing charges will go up, and passengers will pay for it; and that there is no way that we can meet our climate change targets if the expansion goes ahead. That is why I express my sympathy; she has been given an impossible task. I have a constituency interest, as the Secretary of State will know, because Heathrow is in my constituency. She mentioned that the stakeholder engagement process will be published shortly. Could she be a bit more precise on the timescale, and on what measures will be included in that? The House needs to know that in my constituency, 4,500 homes will be demolished or rendered unliveable; 15,000 people will lose their homes; we will lose three schools; and whole communities will go. My constituents want to ask: where are they going to live? Where will their children be educated, and what will their happen to their community? We just need some certainty now—and from my point of view, it is certain that this is a white elephant. It is almost like watching High Speed 2 all over again.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  Thank you, Ms Ghani; it is nice to be a substitute. Like others in the Chamber, I am a member of the justice unions parliamentary group, and I will speak very briefly to new clause 3. As many Members know, the justice unions group comprises the probation officers’ union, Napo, as well as the Prison Officers Association and the PCS. It acts as the voice of the frontline workers in Parliament from those particular unions. There is an overall welcoming of the Bill by the unions themselves, which is good, but a specific concern has been raised with us with regard to the development of unpaid work and community service, and how that is managed in the future. Many Members will also know about the history of community service; in fact, in the past we have had a few Members in this House who did a bit of community service—but that is another issue all together. Historically, it has been a way in which people have been able to avoid prison sentences: by working in the community and making reparation for the damage that they have often caused in it. I think we can report that it has been relatively successful in most of our constituencies. Unfortunately, though, there have been experiments with privatisation, including of the management of the service; and there has been debate about whether this could be unpaid labour for private companies. In London, in 2013, community service was privatised to Serco. It was an absolute disaster. There was a lack of supervision on site, a lack of workers, and a lack of tools being delivered. It was also exposed that offenders were sometimes being crammed into vehicles that were unsuitable and unsafe. As a result, that privatisation collapsed. The last Government then engaged in a wholesale privatisation of probation, under the title, “transformation of rehabilitation”. That included unpaid work and community service. Again, even the last Government had to accept that probation would have to be brought back in house because of a combination of incompetence and profiteering, alongside a failure to go for realistically effective rehabilitation.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  That is exactly in the tradition of community service as it was founded and developed over the years, but the experiments with privatisation have been a disaster. There is an argument that once a system starts using the private sector, as in America, offenders become economic units for exploitation and profiteering. The Justice Unions Parliamentary Group warns that we should not venture down that path, both as a result of historical failures, and given what has happened in other countries when the private sector has been able to use offenders in that way. The new clause is about returning to the traditional community service approach in this country. It was relatively effective, but in this new Sentencing Bill, which we welcome, it will be expanded on a scale perhaps not envisaged in the past. It is as simple as that.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  I declare an interest as an honorary life member of the Prison Officers Association. This is about the only time I have disagreed with it. I will not support that measure, although I understand where it is coming from, and I understand that there may well be a review of sentencing, and what is taken into account, when these actions tragically occur. To have a mandatory sentence like that would most probably not be appropriate, although the shadow Minister is right that the Prison Officers Association has argued strongly for the measure, and I respect that. My final point relates not to new clause 3, but to the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith and Chiswick (Andy Slaughter) on the naming and shaming of offenders and the idea that offenders’ photographs will be publicised locally. He suggests in his amendments that there should be much wider consultation on the issue, and probation officers are saying exactly the same thing. A lot of their role in rehabilitation is about ensuring that people have a connection with their families once again. They are concerned about the effect that naming and shaming has on the family, and in particular the children. Sometimes, the family serves the sentence alongside the offender, and we would not want any actions taken that increase the stigma for family members of offenders. If the Government are going down this path, there is a need for more detailed and widespread consultation and discussion.

• 14 Oct 2025 · Speaker’s Statement · Hansard source

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  Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. For those of us on all sides who were here during the debate on the Iraq war, I want to thank Ming for the legal advice that he provided and the way that he addressed that debate, because he did so without seeking any party advantage. He simply set out the legal principles on which he was making his decision, and he did so with compassion and with the recognition of the moral duty that we all had. Many of us agreed with him and voted with him, and many did not, but everybody respected his judgment as a result. I believe he was a model MP, always speaking and voting on the basis of his conscience and the interests of his constituency and the country overall. He will be greatly missed, but I think his lesson will remain with many of us throughout our own parliamentary careers.

• 14 Oct 2025 · Middle East · Hansard source

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  The Prime Minister mentioned his conversations with President Sisi, so may I take this opportunity to thank him for his conversations and interventions with President Sisi and his team to secure the release of Alaa Abd el-Fattah from an Egyptian prison? We are all elated at the release of the hostages and the detainees and prisoners, but there is some confusion about whether two prominent Gazan Palestinian doctors have been released. Dr Hussam Abu Safiya and Dr Marwan al-Hams were both detained and unfortunately ill-treated in Israeli prisons. It would be really helpful if the Prime Minister could confirm whether they have been released and, if they have not been, make further representations to the Israeli authorities.

• 16 Sept 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  To respond to the hon. Member for Runcorn and Helsby (Sarah Pochin), in 1997—I do not know if my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State was with us then—we were concerned that the prison population was 40,000; it is now 80,000 and it is predicted to go up to 112,000 if we continue on the current flightpath. I just say to the hon. Lady that we are all straining to do our best to make sure that all our constituents are safe and that there is a just and effective system in our society to deal with crime and injustices. However, based on what I heard of her understanding of the Bill, I suggest it would be worth her while to sit down with Justice Ministers so that they can take her through some of the detail of the Bill, because I genuinely think there are elements of it that she has completely misconstrued. I say that not in any party knockabout way; I just think that would be worth while, because we want, particularly with this Bill, to build as much consensus as possible to reassure people out there that this House cares about their concerns. I declare an interest in that I am an honorary life member of the Prison Officers Association. There is no financial relationship or nexus to that and, as I have said before, the POA has made it clear that there is no benefit to me whatsoever—I would not get a south-facing cell, an extra pillow or anything like that; it is a privilege. I want to make four or five points very briefly, because I know that others want to speak, and they will to a certain extent echo those of my hon. Friends the Members for Easington (Grahame Morris) and for Hammersmith and Chiswick (Andy Slaughter). On the sentence management process, all the advice we get from Napo, which represents probation officers, shows that there is a shortfall of about 10,000 staff, exactly as my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith and Chiswick said. The morale in the service itself—remember that probation officers have gone through privatisation, and then been brought back as a public service—is pretty low. They are very committed professionals, but having wages stagnate for a long period has had its effect, and recruitment and retention is a real issue that we need to address. I would not underestimate the stress they are under at the moment. We welcome the additional resource, but realistically there is a demand for more that we need to take on board. One issue with resettlement that has been raised with us by probation officers and others is that because of the cutbacks in local government and other funding regimes, a lot of the voluntary sector bodies that they relied on to refer their clients to are no longer operating or have been starved of resources for a long period. A lot of those voluntary sector bodies were specialists in their own way, in particular with regard to drug abuse. The second issue is about prison. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith and Chiswick that we need a lot more detail about earned progression, but prison officers tell us that the reality is that rehabilitation is almost impossible at the moment. Prisoners cannot access the courses that are needed. We do not even have the staff who will go to their cells to accompany them to rehabilitation and education courses. Again, the pressure staff are under is immense. One specific issue with the skilled worker visa system has been raised by the Prison Officers Association. It has had an impact on the number of staff working in our prisons. I was not aware of this to be honest, but there were recruitment campaigns in Africa and elsewhere. Staff have been brought here and now we are at risk of losing them because they fall foul of the new visa regime. It does not just affect prisons—it affects a whole range of services—but it needs to be looked at again. Another issue that has been discussed is the supervision of unpaid work. I am really worried that there are discussions about privatising that again. In London, we had the experience of Serco a number of years ago when it was privatised. To be frank, it was an absolute disaster. I am worried that it could be interpreted as simply exploiting prisoners for private profit in some instances. There is not much reference in the Bill to children and I wonder whether we will come back to that, because unless we look at the regime for children as well, we could be in a situation where children will be serving longer sentences than some adults. One other point in relation to children that has been raised by a number of organisations, such as the Howard League, is the publication of a prisoner’s or convicted person’s photo. I can understand the motivation behind that, but I believe the family often serves the sentence just as much as the prisoner. As a result, stigma is attached to the whole family. What we have found from our experience is that children have suffered because of crimes perpetrated by the parent. We need to be very careful about how we use the identification process. We need to do it wisely and look at the implications for the whole family. I will make two final points. On race, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has been goaded by the Opposition, but the work he did on an exploration of the justice system highlighted discrimination in the system—we have to admit that. It is not about two-tier justice; it is about trying to get fair justice for everybody. The reality is that all the statistics demonstrate that for the same crime, those who are black or Asian will get a harsher sentence and will almost certainly have a harsher regime when in prison than others. We need to follow up the work done by my right hon. Friend. We need to be open and transparent, and get all the information out there again and re-examine it on intersectionality and the implications for the justice system. Finally, I share the views of my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith and Chiswick on IPP. We have been at this for a number of years and the Select Committee made its recommendation on re-sentencing. The Government rejected it, because they were worried about being branded as releasing prisoners into the community and worried that there would be risks. The re-sentencing exercise was about how to manage and minimise those risks. Every time we have this debate and we do not move forward, what happens? We have had suicides of those IPP prisoners. I am worried that unless we speed up the resolution of this problem, we will have an injustice. Lord Blunkett, who introduced the system, has subsequently absolutely condemned it, saying it was one of the worst mistakes he ever made in politics. We will render those injustices continuing ones and do more harm to both the prisoners themselves and—as those who have had constituents who have endured this will know—their families. As I say, the families serve the sentence as much as the individuals concerned. Although there has been progress on this, I do think we need to revisit it in some legislative form in the near future.

• 10 Sept 2025 · Urgent Care Centres: Hillingdon · Hansard source

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  I will try to attend the meeting on Friday, but the Minister must appreciate that there is an element of scepticism about the future, in particular about what is happening with this unit. It confirms in my mind that if you stand still long enough, things will come around time and again. In our constituencies in Hillingdon, we have gone from cottage hospitals that provided immediate care for minor injuries, as well as having beds, which were closed, to being promised Darzi units, which we never saw, to looking forward to the hubs themselves. On Friday, I want to be able to convince people that there is a comprehensive plan that will be held to and properly invested in, because people will be very sceptical about the closure of a unit without the confidence that the architecture will be in place to meet the needs of our constituents. The petition has garnered such a large number of signatures because of that concern.

• 3 Sept 2025 · Duty of Candour for Public Authorities and Legal Representation for Bereaved Families · Hansard source

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  I should explain to my hon. Friend that I will have to leave the debate to attend a meeting about the violence meted out in a demonstration outside an asylum hotel in my constituency, but I want to make this point very clear. Labour is going to Liverpool for its conference in three weeks’ time. If this legislation is not sorted by then, it should not expect a welcome from the people in Liverpool, because we have waited too long.

• 3 Sept 2025 · Point of Order · Hansard source

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  On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I am chair of the Public and Commercial Services trade union group in Parliament. As Members will know, PCS members from the House’s security division are taking strike action today. These are professional, dedicated and committed staff, and it takes a lot to motivate them to take strike action: their sense of grievance. There is a clear difference of view between the management of the House and the union about how we have arrived at this situation. Could I use this mechanism to urge the senior management of the House to seek another meeting with the union to clarify the situation and to come up with a reasonable offer that will resolve this dispute? I do not wish to see our dedicated staff outside of work on this basis. They provide us with the security that we need.

• 21 Jul 2025 · Point of Order · Hansard source

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  On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. On 8 July, I wrote to the Home Secretary regarding the implementation of the proscription order against Palestine Action. I wrote to her asking whether any guidance is being issued to the police on the implementation of that proscription, and in particular whether or not the expression of opposition to the proscription falls foul of the proscription order itself. That includes both reporters reporting those who are opposed to the proscription or indeed any Member of Parliament expressing opposition to it. I asked whether that would be construed as support for Palestine Action, and would therefore be actionable. I have received no response, so through you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and maybe through those on the Treasury Bench, it would be helpful to urge the Home Secretary to reply or to issue a statement.

• 21 Jul 2025 · Middle East · Hansard source

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  I just want to be clear on the Government’s legal position. On 11 June last year, the Government reported that they saw “no serious risk of genocide” in Gaza. All this time on, and after the statements that the Foreign Secretary has made, can I be clear: is he saying tonight that the Government accept that there is a plausible risk of genocide? If he is not, will he instruct his officials to undertake an immediate review and report to Members as rapidly as possible? If there is a plausible risk of genocide, that would place legal duties on the Government—and all of us, I believe—to act accordingly. As we have seen in the past when we have had rogue states, like South Africa, the best form of bringing them to heel is financial sanctions. If the Foreign Secretary met the finance houses and banks in this country and they denied credit lines to Israeli banks, that would be probably the most effective thing we could do to bring the Israeli Government to their senses.

• 21 Jul 2025 · Independent Water Commission · Hansard source

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  Many people will find it incredible that Cunliffe was not even allowed to look at public ownership. I also say mildly to the Secretary of State that the £100 billion he cites has largely been refuted by independent bodies and economists. Way back in 2014, I raised the example of Northumbrian Water and its use of various complicated devices for tax avoidance. That became endemic within the industry. Can we have a report on the water companies’ role in tax avoidance on a massive scale, so that we can then look at what further action could be taken against them?

• 9 Jul 2025 · Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payment Bill · Hansard source

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  I will do my best, Sir Roger. I want to address new clause 8, tabled in my name. It is a procedural clause and I do not think it is particularly contentious. Before I address the new clause, I want to say that I am still getting emails and still being met on the bus and at community events by people who are extremely distressed about this legislation going through. I want to put on record for my constituents that, as always, I will not vote for any legislation that cuts benefits to some of the poorest people I represent. I just cannot do that and I want that underlined. Ironically, just to give some context, some Members may have listened today to an interview on the “Today” programme with George Osborne, who is now the chair of the British Museum, in which he was talking about the Bayeux tapestry coming to this country. I remember another tapestry, which was brought to this House when he introduced cuts to benefits for disabled people. It showed the names of the people who had committed suicide. Do hon. Members remember that? It was one of the most distressing things I have seen in my political life and I wept that day. I do not want that to happen again. Let us be honest, as sure as night follows day, if cuts go through on the scale proposed, people will lose their lives. People will suffer immense harm. Let us all understand that. Members talk pompously about “The House at its best”, but last week’s debate was a good day for the House. People on all sides expressed their views, the Government responded, although not as far as I wanted them to respond, and the House held the Government to account. It is not often that we see that, but it happened, and the reason it happened was that we were dealing with primary legislation that hon. Members could debate and amend. I have put this new clause forward because, if the Government do anything, they should do it through primary legislation and not delegated legislation, which goes on in Committee, where there is no chance to amend it and it is often rushed through on a vote with no debate. This matter is so important that that is not the way we should operate as a House. Last week, hon. Members on all sides of the debate showed how democracy should work in this Chamber. That is why my new clause says that the Government must bring forward primary legislation in draft form so that we can all see it—no bouncers any more—and it is not done as delegated legislation so that Members do not have the chance to amend it or properly discuss it. That is all I ask for, and to be frank, it is not contentious. I would expect the Government just to accept it, because it is the normal democratic process in this Chamber. I want to be able to go back to my constituents when the review comes forward, and say, “I argued your case, I tried to amend it, I won on some and lost on others—that’s democracy.” I support new clause 11 tabled by the hon. Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Dr Tidball). It is truly an excellent setting out of how co-production could work. The only element on which I disagree with her is when the process moves on and we become dependent on the Government making a statement, which we could reject so that they could not move on. The problem with that is exactly the same as with delegated legislation: we cannot amend a statement. I have been here so long that I know what Governments do. They bring forward a statement including some good stuff that we cannot vote against, but there is also some bad stuff that we disagree with. If we cannot amend it at that stage, it is all or nothing, and as a result, we get bad legislation. None the less, the part of new clause 11 that sets out who should be consulted, be involved and elect the chair is critical. I do not want to sound patronising, but the speech made by the hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge last week brought tears to my eyes, and it is not often a speech in this House does that. The justified anger that she expressed about what went on under the Tories moved me deeply, and I think it moved the whole House. I do not want a Member standing up in five years’ time equally angry about what we did in this legislation. I want us to be able to hold the Government to account, not aggressively but constructively, in a way that we can debate and amend, and hopefully we might even be able to build consensus. That is what my new clause is all about, and that is all I want to say.

• 4 Jul 2025 · Services for Adults with Learning Difficulties: Hillingdon · Hansard source

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  I congratulate the hon. Member on securing this debate. He will know that the garden centre also provides an essential service to my constituents. I have visited the place for either 20 or 30 years—I am not clear—and it was commended by the former Conservative leader of Hillingdon council, who called it a jewel in the crown. That is why it has come as such a shock that this Conservative administration is now willing to close it with such brutality. Does the hon. Member agree that the council should, even at this late stage, think again and consult properly—including all those volunteers and parents as well as the people who use the centre—to look at a wider range of options? This does not have to happen now: the council just needs to listen to us.

• 4 Jul 2025 · Services for Adults with Learning Difficulties: Hillingdon · Hansard source

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  I fully appreciate the point that the Minister makes, but will she take advice from colleagues in other Departments on the following specific point? My hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Danny Beales) and I have been working with different groups and we have sought to register, under relevant legislation, the Rural Activities Garden Centre as a community asset, which would force the local authority to properly consult with us and to engage with the wider community. The council is going ahead with the decision to sell or close in advance of even considering whether it should be a community asset. Will she help us by taking advice, from whichever Department is relevant, about whether or not there is anything we can do, as a Government, to ensure that Hillingdon council abides by the legislation that was passed to protect community assets such as this one?