Liam Conlon MP: speeches

Speeches

• 28 Mar 2025 · Water Bill · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) for introducing the Bill. I know that my constituents in Beckenham and Penge will want to thank him for raising the issues addressed in the debate today. I will begin by talking about the recent five-day water ordeal that my constituents were subjected to by Thames Water. On the evening of Tuesday 11 February, a mains water pipe burst up the road from me, in Dulwich, south London. Overnight, thousands of homes, hundreds of businesses, 11 care homes and 29 schools all lost access to their water. Six London postcodes were affected in all, including two in my constituency. The next day, residents in Anerley, Crystal Palace and Penge, in my constituency, woke up without any water. In response, Thames Water established a bottled water centre at the Sainsbury’s in Bell Green. For those unfamiliar with the geography of south-east London, while it is located in a lovely part of the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham East (Janet Daby), ironically adjacent to the River Pool and the Waterlink Way, it is also up to an hour’s walk away for some of the people in my constituency who were left without water. It was an unacceptable solution that could easily have been avoided. Later that evening, Thames Water managed to make things even worse. The sole water bottle station was closed due to a security incident, leaving residents reliant on local supermarket stocks. Unsurprisingly, those ran dry pretty quickly. While the water bottle station later reopened, despite my offer of support and the offer of support from other hon. Members, Thames Water refused to open an alternative site closer to the outage. Some constituents still did not have any water by the start of the weekend, having been left without water since the Tuesday evening. Those residents included vulnerable customers who could not be expected to leave their homes, never mind walk for an hour. Those residents are entitled to sign up to what is called the priority services register. Residents on the PRS should receive deliveries of bottled water, as well as additional support and communications from Thames Water, yet throughout the outage I was contacted by residents on the PRS who were not receiving any of that help on time—some were receiving no help at all. Along with local volunteers, my team and I knocked on hundreds of doors across the local area, including on the evening of Valentine’s day—which, as someone pointed out, might be the reason I am still single. We identified those who might need additional help and delivered bottled water to them all over the weekend. This included residents who were pregnant, those who were disabled, and some who were terminally ill. One constituent’s story particularly sticks in my mind: a disabled single mum of two, reliant on oxygen, was left without water for days, without any support or emergency deliveries from Thames Water. The compensation she received for that failure was a £40 good-will payment. While I thank every volunteer who helped with that effort, it should never have been necessary. It was Thames Water that had a responsibility to safeguard vulnerable customers and provide alternative sources of water. This week, my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham West and East Dulwich (Ellie Reeves) and I met representatives of Thames Water to talk to them about that water outage and some of the lessons they could learn from it. One of the points I made to them was that this is not like covid, which sprung up without any warning; burst water pipes happen all the time, and frequent and consistent communication is a pretty standard thing that constituents and customers are entitled to expect. However, I do not mention this ordeal just to highlight the unjust plight of my constituents. Their experience embodies the failure of the water system highlighted by the Bill that my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich South has introduced. The previous Government failed to drive investment in the system and abdicated their responsibility to regulate. A failure to maintain, invest and build has led to an aching system, one in which over 50% of Thames Water’s sewage treatment plants have inadequate capacity and where, in 2024 alone, Thames Water discharged raw sewage into rivers for nearly 300,000 hours. All the while, that failure was rewarded. In 2023-24, Thames Water paid executive bonuses worth over £1.3 million—a reward for failed management, aided and abetted by the previous Conservative Government, that has left an investment shortfall of £24 billion. It is our constituents who pick up the tab for that shortfall, left to pay the price of failure, with some quite literally seeing their bills double. I do not dispute that investment is needed, but this must never be allowed to happen again. I am pleased that this Government have taken immediate action, including bringing criminal charges against persistent lawbreakers, giving regulators the power to ban executive bonuses, introducing severe and automatic fines for offences, and ringfencing money for vital infrastructure investment. I also want to talk about a lesser-known reform that relates to compensation, which is the guaranteed standards scheme. Admittedly, it is not a document I had familiarised myself with before constituents were left without water, but it lays out the minimum compensation rates for water outages. Last month, my constituents were entitled to a measly £30 for each 12-hour period when they were left without water, or a one-off payment of just £25 for low pressure. The reason why those rates are so low is that they were last updated in the year 2000, so I am glad that this Government have acted to finally reassess them. New plans mean that low pressure incidents could see payments of up to £250—a 1,000% increase—and payments for water outages will rise to £50, plus an additional £50 for every 12 hours that the incident remains unresolved. I am pleased that our new Government are acting quickly to fairly compensate those who suffer from water outages in the future. Reforms to our water system and today’s debate are not just about security of supply, but are also about protecting our waterways and coasts. That is something my constituents deeply value, as do I. During my campaign to come to this place, I invited Feargal Sharkey—the prominent water campaigner and one-time frontman of the Undertones—to visit Cator Park and the small stream of Chaffinch brook in my constituency. We visited the Friends of Cator Park and Alexandra Recreation Ground, which does so much for the park. That organisation and all the environmental campaigners I have met in my constituency understand that our waterways are a crucial part of our environment and play an irreplaceable role in sustaining our biodiversity. I will just finish on this point: I have been most impressed in my constituency by so many of the young people I have met on school visits. From engaging with young people across Beckenham and Penge, I know how much this issue matters to the next generation. I will give two examples. I was contacted recently by Daniel, a year 12 student and a member of the Langley Park school for boys environmental society. He and others took the initiative to contact me for help exploring funding opportunities for their biodiversity scheme. The society’s members are determined to support wildlife around the school and across our constituency. They had already organised a clothes swap and bake sale to raise funds to do so, and I look forward to meeting them soon. I also recently met members of the fabulous eco council at Stewart Fleming primary school, who displayed real care for the environment—for preserving it not just for themselves, but for the generation after them. They are working closely with the Friends of Betts Park, helping to ensure that it, and the short section of the Croydon canal in it, remain an attractive place for people to visit. I thank and commend so many other schools across Beckenham and Penge that have active eco councils. They often sit alongside school councils, which every primary school has—schools including Clare House, Churchfields, Balgowan, St Mark’s, Shortlands and many others. On Wednesday evening this week, I visited Beckenham scouts, who are a fantastic group of young people. We played a game where they set their own Budget and said what they would spend and prioritise, as if they were Chancellor, and the environment always came out as one of the top priorities. I hope that Members have learned that we have fantastic waterways in south-east London. The reforms to our water system that my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich South has been pivotal in pushing for are crucial to protect not just consumers and constituents, but our national heritage and environment, which I know are held dear by every generation in Beckenham and Penge.

• 28 Mar 2025 · Looked After Children (Distance Placements) Bill · Hansard source

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  Does my hon. Friend welcome the Government’s important changes, including the support from local authorities, for kinship carers, such as those I met in Beckenham and Penge?

• 27 Mar 2025 · St Patrick’s Day and Northern Irish Affairs · Hansard source

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  I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Adam Jogee) on securing the debate, and on all his efforts and leadership in championing the Irish in Britain and advocating for co-operative relationships with Northern Ireland for many years. Lá fhéile Pádraig sona daoibh—happy St Patrick’s day. St Patrick’s day is no longer a day but a season. It starts sometime in early March, around the time of my birthday, and carries on for a full month. I think today’s debate marks the end of it. I have “green fatigue” at this stage of the month, where I do not want to see any more St Patrick’s paraphernalia, and certainly no Guinness, for quite a while. However, it has once again been a fantastic season, celebrating the best of the Irish community in Britain. I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I am the proud chair of the Labour Party Irish Society, and have been for the past five years. We represent the Irish community in Britain and champion strong co-operative relationships between Ireland and Britain, and Northern Ireland as well. Someone touched on the Good Friday agreement, and two years ago I was proud to open the Mo Mowlam film studio for cinematic arts at Ulster University in Derry. She was one of many great figures from our party who contributed to that peace agreement, which is in the DNA of the Labour party and I am very proud of that. Many hon. Members have had a lot to say about Guinness as the sponsor of choice for St Patrick’s day refreshments, but Jameson is also available and Tayto crisps are worth noting. Tayto are more than a crisp: they are a way of educating people about Ireland and Irish politics. A lot of people do not know that there are two types of Tayto, one from Northern Ireland and one from the Republic of Ireland—or, as I call them, the Nordie Tayto and the Free Stayto. That is always a good way of explaining things to people. As I said in my maiden speech, I am proud to be London-Irish. That is the community that I grew up in and the community I want to pay tribute to today. I am also proud to represent Beckenham and Penge, the only constituency in London with a Gaelic place name, as “penge” means “edge of the woods”. We have a fantastic Irish community. All four of my grandparents are from Ireland: two grannies from the south and two grandads from the north. One granny was particularly proud and I was wondering what she would have done if she had still been alive when I was elected. I know for a fact that she would have gone to 9 am mass and then to 10.30 am mass, to make sure that everyone knew that her grandson had been elected as an MP. A couple of years ago there was an exhibition at the London Irish Centre curated by the national charity, Irish in Britain, that for the first time that I can remember really told the story of the London-Irish community over several generations. The London Irish did as much as any community to build this great city. Irish navvies dug the underground, and Irish construction workers rebuilt our city after the war. I know that we have a fantastic construction industry in London, with so many Irish people involved, and today we have the founder of and members from the London Irish Construction Network, including Sean Daly and Frank O’Hare, here to watch the debate. As was touched on by my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme, waves of thousands of young Irish women came to staff our hospitals at the birth of the NHS in this country. Those women, known as the Angels of Mercy, were often overlooked but essential to the NHS. I spent a lot of time in NHS hospitals as a teenager, especially the Royal London hospital and the Royal National orthopaedic hospital. My Irish dad would often look after me, and we would often encounter an Irish nurse. Before I could get treated, they had to establish how they knew each other. It would begin with, “What county are you from?”, then, “What town are you from? Do you know so and so?” Once they had made that connection, we were free to get on with our day. The Irish in Britain have maintained that relationship with the NHS ever since, and I am really proud that there are more Irish staff in the NHS today than staff from any other European country. Even if we think back more recently to the global health emergency of covid, it was an Irish woman, Professor Teresa Lambe, who co-developed the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine. It was then Margaret Keenan, an Irish woman from Enniskillen living in Coventry and a former NHS nurse, who became the first person in the world to have the vaccine. The Irish connection to the NHS is really deep and strong, and our community is incredibly proud of it. However, the exhibition also charted the history of how the Irish community was received here, which, as has been touched on, was not always easy. Alongside the Windrush generation and the West Indian community —it is important to remember that there has been a lot of solidarity between those communities—it was often treated with suspicion and subjected to discrimination, including through signs that read “No blacks, no dogs, no Irish”. However, the London Irish community and the Irish community across Britain today is a community transformed. It is confident in the contributions it makes to every aspect of life in Britain—economic, political, social and cultural. The Irish community help to make our country the great place it is to live. I extend that beyond London to the home counties as well. My hon. Friend the Member for Reading Central (Matt Rodda), who is here today but cannot take part in the debate, has long been a champion of Irish contributions to Reading football club and to the Reading Irish Centre, which I have been to and which does incredible work to support the Irish community in Reading. As well as celebrating the contributions of the Irish community in Britain, I will touch on a campaign I started in the last few weeks to secure justice for 13,000 survivors of Ireland’s mother and baby homes living in Britain. We often need to remember the reason why lots of people left Ireland and decided to come to Britain. For some, it was for work or to be with friends and family, but in the case of thousands of women who were sent to those homes for the perceived sin of becoming pregnant outside marriage, it was to escape those institutions and the stigma that often came with having been in one. More than 13,000 survivors live in Britain today, both women and the children who were born into the institutions. They were subjected to some of the most horrific mistreatment and abuse in those homes. Women were used as unpaid labour, and their children were often forcibly adopted. I have named my Bill “Philomena’s law”, after Philomena Lee, who I felt brought that story to a global audience in the film “Philomena”, in which she is portrayed by Dame Judi Dench. We had an event on an evening two nights ago in a packed room in Parliament to which survivors came and told their stories. It was incredibly powerful to hear from them about the impact that that has on them many years later. I hope the Government will listen to the proposals we are putting forward. At the moment, if the survivors accept the compensation payment they have been awarded by the Irish Government, but are in receipt of means-tested benefits, they will lose that compensation. I heard from survivors this week, and that has actually become an additional burden for many of these women, who are now often in their 80s or 90s, and some of them are very vulnerable. I will go back to the Irish in Britain. We see the pride of the second-generation Irish community, of which I am part, and the growth of Irish culture and its importance right across Britain in the growth of the Gaelic Athletic Association. It is not just people of Irish heritage who get involved, but people from all communities and backgrounds who participate in GAA. There is also the Irish language; people are adopting Irish names. My cousin Jordan and his partner Annie had a baby a couple of weeks ago—a little girl—and I congratulate them. They have named her Fiadh, which is Irish for “wild” —I think she will take after her dad. It is common that people are very proud of their heritage often several generations back. We have seen that in Irish music and culture, where for years the Irish community was subjected to discrimination. We are now in a period where we can turn on the TV on a Friday night and watch Graham Norton on BBC One and “Derry Girls” on Channel 4, which is a representation of how far the Irish community has come. We see it in trade unions and in the labour movement as well: there was a period a year or two ago when the general secretary of every single major trade union in this country was either first- generation or second-generation Irish. There is no more visible transformation in the confidence of the London Irish community over time than in the growth of the Mayor of London’s St Patrick’s day parade. I was very proud to take part in that this month with our mayor, Sir Sadiq Khan. More than 50,000 people joined and participated in that parade, and London was awash with green. To sum up, what makes the Irish community so special for me is that it is an inclusive and welcoming community. At the entrance to the exhibition at the London Irish Centre two years ago, there was a plaque that read: “Ar scáth a chéile a mhaireann na daoine”, which means “In the shelter of each other, the people live”. It is an Irish proverb that sums up what makes our community in Britain so special and sums up neatly the Irish contribution to making our country the great place it is to live. I again thank my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme for securing this debate, and I thank everyone who has taken part in it.

• 27 Mar 2025 · PIP Changes: Impact on Carer’s Allowance · Hansard source

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  I am potentially one of the few Members of this House who has been a recipient of the higher rates of living allowance. I was a recipient of the higher rate of mobility allowance, and I relied on a Motability car for many years, too. On the flipside, I remember, after my second hip replacement in my early 30s, having to try to navigate the Access to Work scheme, which was pretty impossible. In fact, it locks people out of work, rather than letting them in. There are many good things in the Green Paper that has been brought forward that address some of those points. When I think back to what I had to go through from age 13 to 17, I am also pleased that those benefits will be protected for people in that situation. PIP is also what we call a passporting benefit. Such things as access to the blue badge scheme and carer’s allowance are often dependent on PIP, so one potential implication is that people could be locked out. Will the Minister consider carrying these things forward and meet me to discuss access to the blue badge scheme and carer’s allowance for people who might lose PIP, but would still be entitled to those benefits?

• 27 Mar 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  I recently had the pleasure of meeting Lucas de Gouveia from Beckenham, who, at 14 years old, already represents GB at wheelchair tennis. Lucas contacted me to ask for help in raising money for equipment and travel, so that he can participate in competitions, which are more expensive for disability sports. I have written to a range of companies on Lucas’s behalf and hope to meet them soon, with Lucas. Will the Leader of the House join me in congratulating Lucas on his incredible achievement so far, and wish us well as we try to secure sponsorship for him?

• 26 Mar 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T3. Beckenham and Penge is where local lad David Bowie launched his music career, and today it is home to a vibrant, talented community of creatives whose work is increasingly sought after by AI companies. Our creatives deserve a just deal to provide fair pay for my constituents and the legal certainty required to encourage Ai investment. What steps is the Minister taking to deliver that?

• 18 Mar 2025 · St Patrick’s Day: UK Bank Holiday · Hansard source

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  Lá fhéile Pádraig sona daoibh go léir—happy St Patrick’s day. St Patrick’s day is a time to bring people together, often in our local pubs. Will the Minister join me in thanking Irish pub landlords up and down the country, including Michael Duffy and Joe Duffy, who run the Chancery and the Jolly Woodman in Beckenham?

• 18 Mar 2025 · St Patrick’s Day: UK Bank Holiday · Hansard source

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  A few weeks ago, Beckenham was hit by the tragic loss of Graham Murray. A proud Irishman of Cork, Graham was a stalwart of Beckenham rugby club. He was a larger-than-life character and a leader on and off the pitch. He leaves behind a four-year-old son, Tadgh, and wife, Aisling, who I met recently and who is pregnant with their second child. Will the hon. Member join me in sending condolences to Graham’s family and friends in both Beckenham and Ireland, and also pay tribute to John and everyone at Beckenham rugby club, who have rallied round the family and shown the best of our community in recent weeks?

• 12 Mar 2025 · Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme (Report) · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to require the Secretary of State to report to Parliament on the potential merits of disregarding payments received under the Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme operated by the government of Ireland for the purposes of taxation, means-tested social security payments and social care capital limits; and for connected purposes. Philomena Lee was 18 years old when she became pregnant in 1952 and was sent to the Sean Ross Abbey mother and baby home in Roscrea, County Tipperary, in Ireland. There Philomena gave birth to her son Anthony, and there they both lived until Anthony reached the age of three and Philomena was cruelly forced to give him up for adoption. Anthony was sold to a couple in the United States. Philomena would never see him again. Almost 60 years on, Philomena’s story reached a global audience when it was made into the Oscar-nominated film “Philomena”, starring Dame Judi Dench and Steve Coogan. The film chronicled the time Philomena spent in Sean Ross Abbey and her painstaking search for her long-lost son decades later, with the help of author Martin Sixsmith. I wish Philomena’s story was an isolated one. Sadly, it is not. Philomena is one of tens of thousands of women and their infant children who spent time in mother and baby homes across Ireland for the perceived sin of becoming pregnant outside of marriage. The women were regularly used as unpaid labour, and infant mortality was alarmingly high. They experienced harsh conditions, mistreatment and abuse, both physical and psychological. In certain homes, women were routinely separated from their children, with some being adopted against the wishes or even without the knowledge of their mothers, as happened to Philomena Lee and her son Anthony. As a direct result of the abuse and trauma they experienced, many mother and baby home survivors moved to England. In some cases, they came here because they thought that disappearing from their home country was the only way to protect their family’s reputations, and so for decades thousands of survivors lived in secrecy and shame, including here in Britain. It was not until 2021 that they finally received an apology from the then Taoiseach, Micheál Martin, for what he described as a “profound generational wrong visited upon Irish mothers and their children”. That was followed by the mother and baby institutions payment scheme, which opened to applications last March. The scheme represents a measure of accountability for what happened, recognising the lifelong impact that time spent in those institutions will have had. The impact will be felt in all corners of a survivor’s life, from earning potential and financial security to physical and mental health and wellbeing. Ultimately, the scheme aims to acknowledge the suffering and improve the circumstances of former residents of mother and baby homes, which is why it is wrong that up to 13,000 survivors living here in Britain today risk losing their benefits if they accept this compensation. Under our current rules, any money accepted through this payment scheme would be considered savings and could see them lose means-tested benefits and financial support for social care. For some, it is deterring them from making any application at all. It is one of the reasons that only 5% of survivors in Britain have applied so far. For others, having received a compensation offer, they are now having to weigh up whether it is worth accepting the money, or whether to do so would sink them into a worse financial situation overall. Among them is a survivor from the north of England who has shared her story with me. This woman, who experienced harrowing abuse over several years, applied to the payment scheme in September last year and received an offer soon after. She told me: “When I first heard about the payment scheme, I thought that it was marvellous and I was excited. I couldn’t take it in—I had never had money at any point in my life. I was going to use this money to visit a half-brother in America—he had been born less than 16 miles away, but I did not know that him or his brother and sister existed until we did some family tracing. It would have been lovely to meet him, but I do not feel that I can use the money for this as my benefits would be affected.” The whole point of the payment scheme was to recognise the suffering that survivors experienced while resident, but for many it has become an additional burden, a process that has forced them to revisit their most traumatic experiences, seemingly to no avail. Fortunately, there is a solution and it is a relatively simple one. The introduction of an indefinite capital disregard, which my Bill proposes, would remove any risk to an applicant’s benefits. There is strong precedent for such a disregard; the same arrangements have been applied to similar special compensation schemes in the recent past, including those introduced for the victims of the 7/7 London bombings and for payments made under the Windrush compensation scheme. I want to pay tribute to some of the many incredible organisations in Britain that continue to support mother and baby home survivors. They include: Rosa and the team at Irish in Britain; Séan and the team at the London Irish Centre in Camden; the Irish Cultural Centre in Hammersmith; the Fréa network supporting the Irish community in Leeds, Manchester, Merseyside and beyond; Coventry Irish Society; Luton Irish Forum; Irish Network Stevenage; and many more. I would also like to pay tribute to the mother and baby home survivors here in Britain, in Ireland and elsewhere, who summoned the courage to share their personal experiences and to recount their most traumatic years in the name of justice. Their bravery not only secured the apology from the Irish Government and subsequently brought about the payment scheme, but perhaps more importantly contributed enormously to the hard and crucial work of dismantling the stigma and secrecy that has long been associated with time spent in mother and baby homes. That, of course, includes Philomena Lee, whose own story brought this injustice to a global audience. I am delighted that Philomena’s daughter Jane and her grandson Joshua are here in the Gallery with us today. Ireland’s mother and baby homes were cruel institutions. Over seven decades, tens of thousands of Irish women were sent there for the perceived sin of becoming pregnant outside of marriage. They were subjected to the most horrific mistreatment and abuse, physical and psychological. Women were used as unpaid labour. They had their children forcibly adopted, sometimes overseas, never to be seen again. The women and children fortunate enough to leave the institutions often came here to Britain. They came here to escape the stigma and shame and build a new life, and there are more than 13,000 survivors living here today. Last year, the Irish Government opened a long-awaited compensation scheme for those survivors. It is a small but important mark of accountability and redress for what happened to them, but thousands of survivors in Britain today cannot access this compensation without being penalised for it. If they access it, they lose any means-tested benefits or financial support for social care. Just as we did for the Windrush families, we must now change the law to ensure that compensation payments for victims and survivors are ringfenced. This Bill, Philomena’s law, named after the inspirational and courageous Philomena Lee, will achieve that. I am proud to bring it to the House today, and I hope in the months ahead we will see a change in the law so that we can deliver justice for survivors and show them the kindness and respect they have so often been denied in life. Question put and agreed to. Ordered, That Liam Conlon, Claire Hanna, Colum Eastwood, Deirdre Costigan, Lola McEvoy, Damien Egan, Uma Kumaran, Sarah Coombes, Helena Dollimore, Florence Eshalomi, Rachel Hopkins and Tom Rutland present the Bill. Liam Conlon accordingly presented the Bill. Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 28 March, and to be printed (Bill 198).

• 10 Mar 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T5. A new report by London Councils predicts a collective decline in demand for reception and year 7 places over the next five years, causing concern about the impact on school standards and pupil attainment. Will the Minister meet me to discuss this important issue?

• 7 Mar 2025 · Protection of Children (Digital Safety and Data Protection) Bill · Hansard source

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  I begin by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Whitehaven and Workington (Josh MacAlister), who I have now started calling the patron saint of the smartphone-free childhood campaign. He often comes up on the doorsteps in Beckenham and Penge when I speak to parents. This topic has prompted a huge response both in my own constituency and across the country. I welcome Elizabeth, Sarah and other constituents who are here to watch this debate. I also pay tribute to Crispin, Raj and all the brilliant local parents and campaigners I have been working with on this. I will spend some time exploring the wealth of feedback I have had from my constituents before talking about the type of change we need to see across the country. That change needs to be cultural, to put children and parents first and to place the onus on social media companies and manufacturers to prove that their products are safe while ensuring that we do not miss out on the many benefits of technology. Ahead of this debate, I engaged extensively with three key groups in Beckenham and Penge: young people, parents and school leaders. Despite being the reason we are here today, young people are the group that we most risk excluding from the conversation, which is why I held a focus group at a local secondary school, Harris academy Beckenham, and spoke to students from a range of year groups about their views on how smartphones are changing childhood. In that focus group, half of the students said that smartphones and social media overall have a negative impact on their mental health. The majority of students told me that they would feel panicked without their mobile phone, and some spoke to me with quiet self-awareness about how they knew their mobile phone had acted as a barrier to interaction with their family. This is time that they are not spending building meaningful relationships through face-to-face conversation and developing the social and communication skills that they will need in life. The second group, teachers, offered another perspective. On Monday, I was delighted to bring together a group of 12 primary and secondary school headteachers from right across my constituency. We discussed the impact of their students’ smartphone use in and out of schools. What stood out the most from that conversation was the sheer amount of time that they as school leaders have to spend week after week dealing with issues that have taken place on their students’ phones—cyber-bulling, sexting, the sharing of graphic videos or explicit photos, often of the students themselves. All those and more are crossing our teachers’ desks and demanding hours of their time every day, pulling them away from their core and crucial job of educating. Finally, there are the parents. In Beckenham and Penge, concerns about smartphone and social media use easily fall into the top five issues that constituents have contacted me about since my election to this House last July. Last Friday, I put out a survey asking parents in my constituency for their views; within a week, I have received well over 500 responses. Some 89% of respondents agree that smartphones and social media have a negative impact on their children’s mental health, but what makes that figure more shocking is that 70% of those who agreed with that statement are parents of primary-aged children—that is children under the age of 12. More than three-quarters of parents agreed that the negatives of their child having a smartphone outweighed the positives. Digging into that, I asked parents if they would have any concerns were their child not to have a smartphone. Understandably, the ability for a child to call home in an emergency, or for parents to track them on their journey to and from school came up a fair amount, but we know that other phones and options on the market have those features. The damage is undeniable and is reflected in statistics across the country. Since smartphones became prominent in 2012, we have seen a 27% increase in speech and language challenges, a 65% rise in mental health admissions to hospital, and a 640% increase in eating disorders. The average teenager today gets 337 notifications in a day, which averages out at one every six minutes. Once they receive a notification, it takes 23 minutes for them to refocus on what they are doing. Finally—I had not heard this until this week—one in three parents admit to crying over their child’s smartphone use. Those figures chime with what parents have fed back to me across the constituency. One constituent, Gemma, who has worked in the smartphone industry for 15 years, says: “My child is seven, so is not yet exposed to smartphones in a significant way. But when he plays games on his phone his behaviour is noticeably different—he’s hyperactive, gets emotional quickly and easily, and is devastated when we say that time to play is up.” Another constituent, Megan, is a therapist by profession. She said: “I regularly hear adult clients sharing how smartphones negatively impact their mental health, from raised anxiety to hours lost doom-scrolling, to more serious harms. If we as adults sometimes struggle to manage our own smartphone use, how are we expecting our children and teenagers to be able to moderate theirs?”

• 7 Mar 2025 · Protection of Children (Digital Safety and Data Protection) Bill · Hansard source

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  Absolutely. A key provision of the Bill will provide the evidence base on which to take the best action moving forward. Another parent, Georgia, simply said to me: “My children are two and four, and smartphones are my greatest fear in raising them.” Many other constituents have written in, and I thank everyone across the constituency who responded to my survey and shared their thoughts. The case for change is undeniable and, to sum up, we need collective action and cultural change. Many contributions have been made across the House to that effect. We must put children and parents first by moving the onus from them on to social media companies and manufacturers to prove that their products are safe, as well as recognising the potential benefits of technology. Before I came to this place, I worked in tech for nearly a decade, including at Discovery Education UK, and I saw the many benefits of technology in unlocking the potential of our young people. I believe that balance is possible and must be found, and again I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Whitehaven and Workington for bringing forward this Bill.

• 27 Feb 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Recently, a burst Thames Water pipe left thousands of my constituents in Anerley, Crystal Palace and Penge without water for up to five days. The response from Thames Water has been completely unacceptable: it put in only one bottled water station, which was an hour away for some residents; it failed to deliver water to people on the priority services register; and its complete lack of communication has left my constituents in the dark. To make matters worse, the only thing it communicated effectively to residents that week was an increase in water bills. I have called on Thames Water to give me clear answers on the compensation it will pay my constituents. Will the Leader of the House join me in urging Thames Water to provide clarity on that, and agree to a debate on changes to the compensation scheme?

• 24 Feb 2025 · Social Media Use: Minimum Age · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. This issue has been raised by parents across Beckenham and Penge. More than 600 of my constituents have signed the recent petition, making Beckenham and Penge one of the top constituencies nationally for signatures. We have also had one of the largest sign-ups for the Smartphone Free Childhood campaign. That includes an active local group that I have been working with, which is led by Crispin Eccleston, Elizabeth Eastham and Raj Gandhi. Hundreds of people have emailed me. The issue has come up on the doorstep and has been raised through local schools and local groups such as the Scouts and Girl Guides, so I really welcome the opportunity to speak in today’s debate, and I thank my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Tony Vaughan) for securing it. We know that a growing number of children use smartphones daily. Technological advancements are a fact of life and are here to stay. Smartphones and new media applications are a means of communication and come with many benefits. Before I became an MP, I worked in the tech sector for seven years, including as head of international operations for the global edtech firm Discovery Education, which teaches children coding and digital curriculum subjects. We want our children to be digitally native, confident in using technology and able to harness it for their own benefit. We also want them to be happy, healthy, safe and aware of and resilient to the risks of social media and the world online. We hope to find that balance in what is relatively new territory for all of us. There is a growing body of concerning evidence about the amount of time that children and young people are spending online. A study published earlier this month by the University of Birmingham found that 12 to 15-year-olds in the UK now spend an average of 35 hours a week on their smartphone. That is the equivalent of a full-time job, and all that time spent online is time not spent interacting with family and friends face to face, playing outside and building the social and emotional skills needed to form deep and meaningful relationships. It is also time when parents have very little idea what their children are viewing or who they are speaking to. Increasingly, we are coming to understand that giving our children unfettered access to the internet is a safeguarding risk. We should think about it not only as giving our children access to the internet, but as giving the internet access to our children. Over the weekend, I listened to a brilliant podcast on the BBC about Greystones, a small town in County Wicklow, Ireland, where a group of headteachers came together to work with parents who signed a voluntary pledge to delay buying phones for their children until at least age 11. One of the headteachers said: “You wouldn’t let your child open the door to a room full of strangers and leave them in that room on their own. And unfortunately, that is what is happening when they have a smart device.” The need for action, with solutions that are practical, proportionate and can be implemented, is clear. One thing we risk doing is excluding children and young people from that conversation. That is why I recently held a student focus group at Harris Academy Beckenham and spoke to young people from every year group about the impact that smartphones are having on their everyday lives. I thank students including Arek, Sara and Rose for organising it, alongside one of their fantastic teachers, Leila Hussein. While the majority felt that the benefits of having a smartphone outweighed the downsides, over half of the students present said that smartphones and social media overall had a negative impact on their mental health. The same number admitted that they could not survive a week without a smartphone. When I asked the students what they rely on their phones for, the top things on their list were schoolwork, chatting with friends and filling the time. When I asked what they would be most excited for if they had a phone-free day, their responses included going to the park, walking the dog, spending time with family, playing music and making art—all things that we would eagerly encourage our children to do more of. Overall, the students gave a balanced view. While they were all clued up on the risks and agreed that social media needed properly enforced age limits, they also saw the positive role that it can play if used in moderation and with the right protections. Listening to different perspectives is important in this debate, and we should respect the idea that, in the large, parents know what is best for their children. I strongly believe that the best approach will be community-focused. Working as a community and creating voluntary codes and pacts means that we can support parents and schools and bring them with us. I believe it is clear to parents that this is coming from a place of concern, rather than judgment, that we share their fears and that we need to work together to address them. I pay tribute to the work of Smartphone Free Childhood, which has secured recent wins in Barnet, Southwark, Ealing and many more areas across London and the rest of the country. I hope to learn from the examples in Beckenham and Penge as I continue to work with parents’ groups, local schools and students to find a way forward that will mean children and young people can lead happy, healthy and carefree childhoods while obtaining all the benefits that the digital world offers. That includes a meeting next week at Harris Academy Beckenham on Monday to bring stakeholders together. I look forward to continuing to push social media companies to take greater responsibility in a range of areas including on age verification and the sort of content that children and young people are being exposed to daily. I strongly believe in the principle of reverse burden, which was explained really well by the right hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) when he said that we would not take such an approach to children’s toys or food. I again thank my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe for securing the debate and the Minister for his time.

• 13 Jan 2025 · Hospice and Palliative Care · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Mr Kohler) for securing today’s debate. I am incredibly proud of many things in Beckenham and Penge, but particularly St Christopher’s hospice. It was founded in 1967 by Dame Cicely Saunders, the founder of the global hospice movement. The movement came about because Dame Cicely, a nurse who was researching pain control, believed that more could be done to help people at the end of their life. That included dealing with physical symptoms and tackling the stigma around painkillers, but also the idea that people should be able to achieve emotional closure through individualised care and support. The assisted dying debate has been mentioned today by Members from across the House. I had over 2,000 constituents contact me about that debate, and there was roughly a 50:50 split between those who supported and opposed the Bill, but every single one of them was united by compassion, and they relayed their experiences of seeing people at the end of their life. I pay tribute this evening to a woman I was incredibly fortunate to work for in this place, Dame Tessa Jowell. Tessa was a very good friend, a mentor and an amazing boss. Six years ago next week, she made her final speech in Parliament. Tessa was diagnosed with a terminal brain tumour. I was with her from her diagnosis through to writing the press release on the night she died. She finished her speech in the other place by saying: “In the end, what gives a life meaning is not only how it is lived, but how it draws to a close.” —[ Official Report, House of Lords, 25 January 2018; Vol. 788, c. 1170.] I sincerely believe that. St Christopher’s hospice gives meaning to life as it draws to a close. It does so by taking a holistic approach; it cares for a patient’s physical, spiritual and psychological wellbeing. I have seen at first hand the intimate bonds and relationships established between staff, volunteers, patients and families. The hospice is one of the largest providers of palliative care education in the world. For all those reasons, we in Beckenham and Penge all support St Christopher’s hospice, which is a huge part of our community. I was fundraising for the hospice long before I became an MP, and I continue to do so. People help in lots of different ways, and I want to give a special mention to Penge Fest, which is south-east London’s answer to Oktoberfest. Local businesses such as Brewery, the Three Hounds and Designer Drapes, organisations including Friends of Cator Park and Penge business improvement district, and many more came together with local residents for a day of fun and fundraising that included an oompah band. The event brought Penge high street to a standstill last summer. We will continue to fundraise for St Christopher’s hospice, but we should not have to do so to pay for the basics. Supporting our hospices benefits everyone, from the NHS to patients, and that is why I welcome the Government’s announcement, just before Christmas, of an extra £100 million in hospice funding, as well as the extension of the children’s hospice grants. That will ease the strain on hospices and benefit patients, as well as the wider health and care systems. However, hospices still face pressures, including increased demand for services, the rising cost of provision and discrepancies in funding across the country, which many Members have mentioned this evening. That is why, as the Minister recognises, hospices must be a key part of the Government’s plan to shift care into the community, including through the provision of at-home care services. That can ease the acute pressures on the NHS. I invite the Minister to visit St Christopher’s to see its fantastic work for himself, and to discuss the role of hospices in the Government’s commitment to ensuring that every person has access to high-quality end of life care. I thank the hon. Member for Wimbledon again for securing today’s debate, and the Government for the vital work that they are undertaking on this important issue.

• 16 Dec 2024 · “Get Britain Working” White Paper: Long-term Health Conditions · Hansard source

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  14. What assessment she has made of the potential impact of the “Get Britain Working” White Paper on people with a long-term health condition or disability.

• 16 Dec 2024 · “Get Britain Working” White Paper: Long-term Health Conditions · Hansard source

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  A core objective of the “Get Britain Working” White Paper is to support disabled people into employment. As the Secretary of State knows, the blue badge scheme is an important provision in enabling people to get to work, but data released this month shows a sharp rise in blue badge theft, with badges being sold on by criminals for upwards of £500 to people who use them to avoid parking charges. Will the Minister back my campaign to tackle this injustice?

• 4 Dec 2024 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  I echo the words of Members across the House about Mandy Damari, who I also met this week, and who is from Beckenham. Yesterday marked International Day of Persons with Disabilities, and I am proud to be one of the disabled MPs in this House. As a sixth-former, I became one of the youngest people in Britain to have a hip replacement, and I relied on a blue badge. Data released yesterday shows that blue badge theft has more than quadrupled in the past 10 years. Will the Prime Minister back my campaign to tackle blue badge theft and ensure that millions of disabled people can work, socialise and live an independent life?

• 6 Nov 2024 · Budget Resolutions · Hansard source

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  Let me start by congratulating the Members who have made their maiden speech this afternoon: my hon. Friends the Members for North Ayrshire and Arran (Irene Campbell), for Stoke-on-Trent North (David Williams), for Sherwood Forest (Michelle Welsh), and for Ely and East Cambridgeshire (Charlotte Cane) made the first of many brilliant, I am sure, contributions to this House. It is a pleasure to speak in today’s debate in support of the Budget presented last week. It was historic: the first delivered by a Labour Chancellor in 14 years; the first delivered by a female Chancellor, and, just as importantly, the first delivered by a Chancellor who went to school in Beckenham and Penge. On behalf of everyone in Beckenham and Penge, I congratulate the Chancellor, and I look forward to taking a signed copy of the Budget to her old school in Penge very soon. Two fun facts about my constituency are that we have the second biggest percentage of rail commuters in Britain, and the most train stations of any constituency. We are a constituency of commuters, and the vast majority who board trains every morning go to work in private sector jobs across London. I know that life well, as it is exactly what I did before I was elected as the MP for my constituency this year. A criticism levelled by Opposition Members is that Labour Members do not understand business. That is simply not true. For the decade before being elected, I worked in the private sector, first at PwC on the graduate scheme and later for two big tech firms. The private sector adds so much value to our country, and I am a passionate advocate of it. Private sector companies are an engine for innovation. They contribute to the economy, help us pay for vital public services and provide high-skilled, well-paid jobs—the sort of jobs that thousands of people in my constituency do, and want their children to do in the future. In order for business to plan and invest, economic and political stability is vital, and businesses have been starved of that in recent years. We have had six Chancellors in just over three years, and sharp cuts followed by serious increases, and then further planned cuts. Corporation tax went from 28% to 19%, and then to 25%. They said that they were going to build key infrastructure; then they paused it, renamed it, announced it again, but could not tell us how they were going to fund it. They told us that Brexit would solve all our problems, but made a disaster of that too. This Budget—like this Government, in sharp contrast to the one before—is serious about providing the economic and political stability that businesses in our country need to invest and grow. I am delighted to see investment in vital infrastructure, including Transport for London infrastructure, and a new, co-operative approach to working between my good friend the Transport Secretary and our excellent Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan. I have no doubt that that will be of great benefit to my constituents, including the thousands who commute across London each day and the businesses for which they work, and I look forward to supporting it later.

• 24 Oct 2024 · Black History Month · Hansard source

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  I congratulate the Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Erith and Thamesmead (Ms Oppong-Asare), who has been a friend of mine for many years, on securing the debate. This is the first time we have had a Black History Month debate in Government time. We are incredibly proud of her and everything that she is doing. I thank those who have spoken so far—my hon. Friend the Member for Brent East (Dawn Butler), the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Josh Babarinde), my hon. Friend the Member for Luton North (Sarah Owen) and the hon. Member for Huntingdon (Ben Obese-Jecty)—for their brilliant contributions. It is an honour to make my maiden speech in Black History Month, and I know that this debate will be welcomed by many of my constituents in Beckenham and Penge. We are proud of notable locals such as former children’s TV presenter Baroness Benjamin of Beckenham, Windrush lawyer and campaigner Jacqueline McKenzie, and my friend Michelle De Leon, the CEO and founder of World Afro Day. Beckenham and Penge is a new constituency, so I have two predecessors I would like to thank. Colonel Bob Stewart served Beckenham for 14 years. He also served our country as the commander of UN forces in Bosnia, where he was deservedly awarded the distinguished service order. I would like to extend my very best wishes to Bob and his family. I would also like to thank my good friend the Minister without Portfolio, my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham West and East Dulwich (Ellie Reeves). She has served our communities in Penge, Clock House and Crystal Palace with an unrivalled dedication for the past seven years, and she leaves a strong legacy that I will strive to build on. It would be remiss of me to mention one of the Reeves sisters without paying tribute to our new Chancellor, who is the first female Chancellor. The Chancellor and the Minister without Portfolio both attended Cator Park School for Girls in Penge. When I visit local schools, I always talk about them—they are an inspiration to so many girls and young women in my constituency, and we are incredibly proud of them. When Colonel Bob Stewart made his maiden speech, he described Beckenham by saying: “Politically, it is a fabulous place. It has been a Tory hotbed for ever.” —[ Official Report , 26 May 2010; Vol. 510, c. 215.] Once upon a time that was true—we count John Major among our former residents—but 14 years on, I am delighted to update the House: today it is in fact the Labour party that has the strongest connections to my constituency. Beckenham and Penge is home to not one but two former general secretaries of the Labour party, who oversaw two of our greatest victories, in 1997 and 2024 respectively: Lord Tom Sawyer and the mighty David Evans. We also have the longest serving chair of the parliamentary Labour party, Lord Cryer, and a former general secretary of the Trades Union Congress, my good friend Lord Monks. I can tell hon. Members that knowing that all those people were watching me as a candidate was one way to keep me out campaigning in all weathers. Beckenham and Penge is a rich tapestry of distinct and diverse communities. It stretches from the SE20 postcode in Crystal Palace, where no fewer than 19 world records have been set—it is the spiritual home of UK Athletics—and where there is a historic park, grade 1 listed dinosaurs, and Crystal Palace Bowl, in which Bob Marley played his largest ever UK gig, all the way through to the beautiful BR postcodes of Shortlands, West Wickham and Beckenham, where former resident David Bowie launched his music career. I am incredibly proud of my London Irish identity, so it is special to represent the only place in London with a Gaelic place name—Penge, meaning “edge of the woods”. Coming back to the subject of today’s debate, I should say that there has always been a lot of solidarity between the Irish and Caribbean and African communities in London, who encountered a shared experience of discrimination. As has been mentioned, they were invited to this country to staff our NHS, build our roads and help make our country the great place it is to live. They were often met with discrimination, including signs on windows that read “No dogs, no blacks, no Irish”. That shared experience of living on the edge of society caused trauma but brought about solidarity between those communities. That solidarity is important, and it represents the best of Labour values, too. Each place and community in Beckenham and Penge has its own history and story to tell. Although our communities are diverse and distinct, we are also connected and united by shared values of solidarity and care, and the belief that everyone should be able to fulfil their potential and that we are stronger together than alone. Those are the values that shape my political outlook, too. They come from an understanding of society rooted in my experience of the NHS as a teenager, and of disability ever since. Let me tell you what happened to me. When I was 13, the day after we broke up for the summer holidays in year 8, I had an accident in which I shattered my right hip. That led to irreversible damage to my knee and spine. From that point onwards, I was unable to walk for four years. I was taken to the Royal London hospital and later to the Royal National Orthopaedic hospital. At the Royal London, I was incredibly fortunate to be placed in the care of Dr Mark Paterson, one of the best orthopaedic paediatric consultants in the country. Mark performed nearly 10 major surgeries on me as a teenager. I was then transferred to the Royal National Orthopaedic hospital where, as a sixth former, I became one of the youngest people in Britain to have a hip replacement. Throughout those years, I spent nearly as much time on NHS children’s wards as I did in the school classroom —so much so that I had to drop most of my GCSEs to focus on my core subjects. I was then forced to go back a year at school. Every year, hundreds of children in Britain are admitted to long-term care in NHS hospitals, just as I was, but although it is in many ways a grim reality, my experience of NHS children’s wards, especially the Grosvenor B ward at the Royal London hospital, was that they are also places of great hope, deep compassion and world-class care. Today I want to say thank you to the countless NHS staff and volunteers who helped me throughout those years. They quite literally got me back on my feet, and paved the way for me to become the first in my family to go to university. To the consultants, surgeons, physios, junior doctors, nurses, receptionists and hospital cleaning staff: thank you. I will pay my gratitude to you forward by using my voice in this place to fight for the NHS, just as the NHS fought for me. But my experiences on leaving hospital also shaped my understanding of the world around me. I realised at first hand, at a young age, the million different challenges that disabled people face every day, and how invisible they are to anyone else. Today, disabled people are among the most marginalised in Britain. There is a disability employment gap in this country of 29%. Only one in four disabled children has access to sport at school, and millions of disabled people in this country face the indignity of not being able to access public spaces, or even board a train. I do not need to read a briefing to know what that feels like. It is why representation matters, and why I am determined to make my voice heard, as one of the disabled MPs in this Parliament. I hope that when my successor comes to make their maiden speech, Beckenham and Penge will be an even better place to live; that our NHS and public services will be available to everyone, whenever they need them; and that we will be living in a society that is fairer and more inclusive of disabled people, and in a country that recognises its diversity as a strength to be celebrated and championed. I will work hard to make those things happen, for as long as I am lucky enough to represent my community in this place.