Luke Taylor MP: speeches

Speeches

• 27 Feb 2025 · Grassroots Sport Clubs and Facilities · Hansard source

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  My fantastic local football club, Sutton United, provides excellent opportunities in grassroots sports through its junior, women and disabled teams, and it even has a walking football club for those of us, Mr Speaker, who need a gentler pace of play. However, it tells me that it desperately needs access to more training facilities to ensure there is year-round football for all players. The training pitch the club uses in the local park is often waterlogged and unusable. Will the Minister support Sutton United in securing a new all-weather pitch? Will she meet me and the club to discuss potential sources of funding to make that a reality?

• 27 Feb 2025 · Grassroots Sport Clubs and Facilities · Hansard source

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  12. What steps her Department is taking to help support grassroots sports clubs in London.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Grenfell Tower Inquiry: Phase 2 Report · Hansard source

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  First, may I thank the Deputy Prime Minister for bringing the report forward and the Government for accepting all its recommendations? I echo the points from around the Chamber that our thoughts today are with the survivors and the families of the victims. As is often said, justice delayed is justice denied. Will the Deputy Prime Minister please give a timeline for when the companies mentioned—Arconic, Kingspan and Saint-Gobain or Celotex—and the testing firms, which covered up these failed results, will face justice for their dishonesty and mis-selling, which so tragically contributed to the deaths of 72 innocent residents?

• 25 Feb 2025 · Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (Transfer of Functions etc) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  I want to amplify the valuable skills that our colleges are teaching in renewable technologies. I recently visited South Thames college in Wandsworth, where I saw the labs it has set up to teach the installation of heat pumps and other renewable technologies. The main challenge that the college faces is finding staff to teach the classes and to take on the apprentices and all the other learners. What support will the Government give to colleges to ensure that they can recruit experienced individuals to pass on those skills to the apprentices, so that we can provide the workforces that we dearly need?

• 25 Feb 2025 · Warm Home Discount · Hansard source

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  I welcome many of the measures in the statement, although I echo the request from my hon. Friend the Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) that we consider decoupling electricity and gas prices; that would make such a difference. In 2023, Sutton council was blocked by the opposition Conservative group from partaking of an EU grant to help upgrade some of our council houses to energy performance certificate rating C. I welcome the warm homes social housing fund, but I encourage the Minister and the rest of the Government to increase the amounts available in these funds, so that we reward as often as possible councils that are ambitious to provide better, warmer homes for their residents.

• 12 Feb 2025 · Knife Crime in London · Hansard source

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  I fully agree. The community-based approaches that I will come to later in my speech recognise that point. I intend today to state the case that a false premise has been advanced; that successive Governments have failed to invest enough in a whole-of-society approach to reducing knife crime and young people are dying as a result; and that if we are to have any hope of getting a grip on the crisis, we must get serious about a public health approach and the restoration of true, old-fashioned community policing. The pillars of such an approach are threefold. First, we must reinvigorate visible policing by restoring police budgets and get more beats, not just more bobbies. Secondly, we must rescue the early intervention space, protect it from short-termism and ensure that it has the resource it needs. Thirdly, we must get serious about incorporating a public health approach, with greater cohesion between civil society institutions, and willingness to try community and victim-led solutions such as restorative justice. Let us start with restoring community policing. The data shows that the number of police community support officers in the Metropolitan police force declined from 4,247 in 2008 to a mere 1,215 in 2023. That failure, which occurred on the watch of consecutive mayors from both main parties, highlights the scale of the crisis.

• 12 Feb 2025 · Knife Crime in London · Hansard source

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  Introducing blunted knives is a very good example of thinking differently about this crime. The tabloid approach of looking for popular, big and visible solutions, such as banning zombie knives, while important, often ignores the statistics of how crimes are most often committed. The hon. Gentleman makes a good point, so I thank him. The public health approach sees the problem of knife crime in three dimensions and recognises that violence begets violence like an illness. Returning to my argument that violent crime is like a virus, I remind hon. Members that when a contagious, dangerous virus broke out in this country half a decade ago, we rallied every aspect of civil society to fight it. Public services, the police and the third sector were all brought together to work as partners rather than in silos. Implicitly, we recognise that this is the right way to tackle an emergency that threatens life and limb, so why do we fail so consistently to bring that approach to bear in dealing with knife crime in the capital? A hallmark of this approach is the creation of violence reduction units and the provision of serious financial support by Government to make them the hubs of proactive action they need to be. In London, we have done the first part by creating a violence reduction unit in 2018, but its potential remains woefully unrealised. The Centre for Crime and Justice Studies told me that it fears that the unit remains limited in its ability to engage with wider civil society and is still entangled in the paradigm of enforcement rather than engagement. Funding for the VRUs, including the one in London, is just too low to make this strategy a reality, so it should surprise none of us that it has not borne fruit. There is a wider problem in that politicians of all stripes have paid lip service to the idea of a public health approach, but have utterly failed to implement it. The last Conservative Government, keen to be seen to do something, embraced the language of public health and crime reduction, but we have seen none of this effectively put into practice. Instead, they piloted controversial new powers that increased suspicionless stop and search, which evidently did little to stop knife crime, although the findings from the pilots have yet to be brought before Parliament. It just is not good enough—not for mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters all over London whose lives have been ripped apart by knife crime. They deserve a public health approach. We must join up public bodies, the police and the third sector so that young people are supported before they slip through the cracks. We have to consider the principles of restorative practice, too, because they underlie and echo everything that is good about the public health approach. Earlier this week, I met with Ray and Vi Donovan, who lost their son in a violent attack in 2001. In his memory, they created and have for many years run the award-winning Chris Donovan Trust, which works with police, public bodies and charities across the board to highlight the value of restorative justice in preventing reoffending. They told me that their work takes the restorative principles not just into prisons but schools. That approach, which is grounded in embedding empathy and victim awareness in young people, is like a light in the dark in London It awakens in young people on the cusp of gang life, and even in young people already drowning silently within it, an awareness that carrying a knife will inevitably one day ruin their life and the lives of others. Restorative practice is too often overlooked, even as part of the wider package of public health reforms to tackle crime, yet it is vital to winning the war for the hearts and minds of young people at risk of picking up a knife. Will the Minister consider putting victim awareness on the curriculum? I encourage the Government to publish all the findings from the serious violence reduction orders that were trialled by the last Government, as well as detailed conclusions about the impact of suspicionless stop and search trials under the knife crime prevention orders. If these punitive and controversial methods worked, surely this information would have already been shared; none the less, Parliament deserves to see the findings in writing, so that we can hasten the end of this troubled approach and speed up the saving of young lives through a better approach, grounded in public health. Too many young people are being failed before they even set foot into adulthood, and Londoners have had enough of senseless stabbing after senseless stabbing, but the truth at the heart of this crisis is that people carry knives because they fear becoming a victim themselves. The only way to combat that climate of fear is with a public health approach that actually gets results. I reminded the House earlier this month, and I do so again now, that success in this area is measured in something more important than profit or efficiency; it is measured in lives saved, lives nourished and lives reinvigorated.

• 12 Feb 2025 · Knife Crime in London · Hansard source

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  I could not agree more. I was interested to hear the hon. Member’s speech the other day about including council enforcement officers in these hubs, too. Having them present in the community and accessible to residents is incredibly important. I am keen to have a conversation with him about the measures that he has achieved. To follow exactly the point the hon. Member just made, at the time when we should be getting more police embedded in communities to halt knife crime, we have instead let numbers crater. We know that research consistently shows violent crime dropping significantly in areas where the police are present, visible and proactive. In December 2023, when, tragically, a knife cut short the life of a young man in my constituency, Ilyas Habibi, who was just 17, he was just minutes away from a local police station. Just as worrying is that the fact that in my constituency and across London, we see safer neighbourhood officers being abstracted from their beats—a quirk of the Met police set-up that results in vital officers who should be on our streets, making our neighbourhoods safer, being pulled away for major police operational events, typically in central London. It is, in effect, robbing outer London to pay inner London and it has to stop. These officers want to be doing great work in the community, but the failure to recruit across the Met is letting them and, by extension, us down. There can be no doubt that recruiting into the Met is challenging. The Casey report outlined the scale of the failures that have occurred in recent years far better than any of us can—the failures to get a grip on damaging internal cultures, to protect the victims of crime, and overall to carry the confidence of the very communities they serve. I have met Commissioner Rowley and I acknowledge his undertakings to reform the Met. Nobody in this place can pretend that his role is easy; we must recognise that he needs the full backing of Government to reinvigorate the force and repair its image. As yesterday’s ruling on vetting clearance and dismissals shows, the hurdles in front of these reforms are immense, and the single greatest tool to smash through those hurdles is the powers that the Secretary of State holds. To bolster a new Met for London and drive knife crime down, it should be a priority of this Government to expedite the reforms we all know the Met needs. Without these reforms, how can we expect recruitment to bounce back? I urge the Minister to today outline what steps the Government are taking to get back to proper community policing, to work with the Metropolitan police to reduce abstraction rates, and to support Commissioner Rowley as he embarks on his package of reforms. We cannot look to policing alone, though. The whole-of-society approach that is so desperately needed will require an “it takes a village” attitude, and requires a Government committed to supporting early intervention initiatives. A key first step is diversionary programmes, which we know can cut out knife crime before it can metastasise across our streets. The targeted early help and integrated support teams at Sutton borough council do excellent work with young people in my constituency. Their approach is targeted; once a potential young offender reprimanded by the police is brought to their attention, they work tirelessly to build positive relationships with the child to stop the otherwise steady and depressing downward spiral into criminality. It is vital to remember that these schemes offer opportunities to young people who are often not afforded the luxury of such attention elsewhere in their lives. In London, these intervention programmes rely heavily on grants from the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime, the Ministry of Justice and the violence reduction unit, but youth services across London often face uncertainty about how and when these grants will be allocated. The team we spoke to at Sutton council is still waiting to see if its grant will be approved for March, which is only a few weeks’ time. In addition, these grants are typically only allocated for 18-month to two-year periods, leaving little space for local authorities to plan ahead. All the evidence shows that young people susceptible to committing this form of violence require sustained relationships with skilled youth workers to help them to choose safer paths. Such a relationship can take months to form, but it acts as a critical antidote to the peer pressure and social circumstances that are otherwise weighing on the child. It is therefore utterly misguided to continue with this short-termism. Skilled youth workers are deterred from engaging in local authority work due to temporary contract conditions and the lingering threat of grant termination, which could see the shattering of crucial relationships between London’s youth workers and young people at risk of committing knife-related offences. I am therefore keen to hear from the Minister whether she will consider ringfencing funding for local authority early intervention services in London. Without multi-year funding to improve planning and put these services on a more stable footing, this vital first step in preventing knife crime will fall by the wayside. Backing early intervention is just one of the arrows in the quiver of a wider approach that we must shift to. Young people will continue to die if we do not take heed of our Scottish counterparts and finally embrace a public health approach. Famously, Glasgow took thousands of knives off the streets, and rallied organisations at every level to intervene before a crime was committed. That approach breaks down the silo walls between bodies, putting teachers, A&E doctors, social workers, sports clubs and many more stakeholders in partnership with law enforcement.

• 12 Feb 2025 · Knife Crime in London · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House has considered knife crime in London. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Efford. Violence behaves like a virus. It spreads among a community and wreaks havoc not just on our streets but on our lives. There is a particularly virulent strain in London: knife crime. It was once said by a Prime Minister-in-waiting that real action on this issue means being “tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime.” Three decades on from those famous words, talking about violent crime as a social issue has fallen out of political fashion, as though sociologists and social workers on the ground are too misguided, too soft and even too woke to address it, but the notion that we have all been too soft on crime has a dangerous implication: that the surging knife crime on London’s streets can be punished away with tougher sentences and stronger deterrents.

• 5 Feb 2025 · Police Grant Report · Hansard source

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  There is much talk lately of a crisis of trust in our institutions. Well, there is no greater way to tackle that crisis head-on than by delivering on the basic function of the state itself, which is to keep people safe. Everyone deserves to feel safe in their own home and walking down their own street, but that is simply not the reality for far too many people in the UK today. Knife crime continues to plague our cities; scammers, fraudsters and burglars are too often allowed to act with impunity; and rural crime, which the provisional police grant report fails to mention even once, continues to fly under the radar. The net result is that trust is shaken and victims are left picking up the pieces of their lives, devastated by crimes that should have been prevented in the first place. I, along with my Liberal Democrat colleagues, recognise that the situation that the Government have inherited is awful. Years of failure by the previous Conservative Government decimated neighbourhood policing. Real-terms cuts were made at precisely the time when greater investment was needed. In the context of policing, it should be abundantly clear to Members across the House that failing to keep pace with inflation is akin to failing to keep pace with crime itself. If that is not clear, then allow me to highlight the following: 6,000 cases are closed each day in England and Wales without a suspect being identified; 75% of car thefts and burglaries are going unsolved; and PCSO numbers are down by nearly 5,000 compared with nine years ago. There is a sense on the doorsteps of my constituency, and across London, that crime is being allowed to pay, and that the days of effective community policing have been consigned to the past. It is vital that the House now gives police forces the resources they need to do their job properly. The measures the Government have outlined are noble in ambition, but flawed in execution. As the London spokesperson for the Liberal Democrats, it would be remiss of me not to highlight three things. First, hiring more PCSOs in the capital will not in itself address the frustrating situation whereby far too often the officers doing the nitty-gritty of neighbourhood policing—the safer neighbourhoods teams—are pulled away from their local beats to assist with major events in central London. That issue would not be immediately solved with the greater capacity the new support officers would provide. It requires a structural shift within the Metropolitan police towards keeping those operations separate, as far as possible, so that local policing and national security policing are no longer put in tension. The Met itself has sounded the alarm and said that despite the Government’s proposals, it will still be facing a budget shortfall of between £130 million and £450 million. Instead of benefiting from new blood, the Met will have to decimate the force, cutting one in every 10 officers. When I met my borough detective superintendent a few weeks ago, as we went through his staff list, he regularly mentioned positions that will soon be subject to “tough decisions”. That is the brutal reality that the figures announced today will not fix: officers working in preventive community roles, who stop kids turning to crime or being sucked into gangs and antisocial behaviour, will be lost to “tough decisions”. Secondly, the ambitious number of 13,000 new PCSOs nationally will seem foolish if in urban areas, like London, the thinning out of trust in the police and uncompetitive salaries mean that those recruitment drives flounder. It is vital that the Government support the Met commissioner in his attempts to reform the police and win back the trust of London’s diverse communities. Finally, the Government must recognise that the funding mechanism built into their proposals is deeply unfair, and amounts to passing the buck on to local taxpayers through the fatally flawed and regressive council tax system. Increasing policing precepts simply drives council tax up. We are under no illusions: the police need that money, but it should be funded through Government investment, not increasing the burden on working people. Indeed, the £230 million in this package simply to offset the rise in national insurance contributions is unfortunate. The Government could have reduced the cost of the package by not introducing that foolish tax hike in the first place. I hope the Government listen to the concerns outlined in the House today and work across parties to improve their plan. No expense should be spared in keeping our constituents safe, and the Government ought to reconsider and find more sensible ways to make the investments our forces need. Big banks ought to contribute to the safer high streets we need, not cut and run from them. Social media companies profit from the sharing of graphic, violent videos of crime. Only today, while preparing my speech, I saw on my news feed a video of a violent stabbing in Carshalton that occurred last week, flanked above and below by adverts for local companies. That website was not promoting the crime, but it was profiting from the sharing and viewing of those videos. Those companies, which have failed to do enough to remove such content and to prevent online crime, ought to contribute to a safer, more reliable online space. The Government must focus the burden of taxation on them, rather than passing the buck on to the council tax payer to fund greater policing, because those companies have a stake in a safer society too. If the Government are so committed to fixing the foundations, they must understand that such half measures will mean crime will continue to undercut the very notion of Britain as a safe place to raise a family and do business. It disheartens the shopkeepers across London who feel powerless in the face of shoplifting, and the tradesmen I met on Monday who were robbed of their tools and, with them, their livelihood. It unsettles new parents looking for homes and schools or pensioners fearing ever more sophisticated scammers. It encourages and even vindicates those who would seek to undermine Britain’s stability.

• 5 Feb 2025 · Local Government Finance · Hansard source

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  I echo the call for a replacement for the council tax system. We on the Liberal Democrat Benches have called for that for years. Please will the Minister and the Government consider bringing forward plans that retain the power for local councils to decide levels of taxation, but make it a much more progressive model of taxation?

• 3 Feb 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Marie Curie research has found that 15% of the three quarters of a million end-of-life carers are living below the poverty line, rising to 22% a year after bereavement. Given these statistics, will the Minister consider extending the time that carers can claim carer’s allowance from two months to six months after bereavement?

• 28 Jan 2025 · Airport Expansion · Hansard source

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  I thank the Minister for his very full answers to questions, which mean I am now on the seventh or eighth version of my question. [ Laughter. ] There are two points I would like to explore. First, on emissions, SAF will only ever be a transitionary fuel. What effort are the Government making to engage with industry to develop truly zero-carbon power plants, and harness our incredible industry and our companies that can take advantage of the opportunity to lead the real zero-carbon hydrogen electric power plants? Secondly, on noise, the Minister mentions airspace modernisation, which will mean some residents facing greater noise frequency and impacts. Does he agree that the answer to the first question, on next generation power plants, is actually the answer to the second question on noise? Please, will he give us a proper answer on what the Government are doing to take advantage?

• 24 Jan 2025 · Climate and Nature Bill · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Gentleman reflect on the words “as rapidly as possible”? It is that language, and the measures and pressures included in the Bill, that will provide the incentive to British industry and to great British minds—the inventors, researchers and developers—to create the technologies and produce them at scale. It will also resolve the issue that the hon. Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) spoke about: the bottlenecks that mean we do not produce and only assemble. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the wording of the Bill is deliberately intended to spur that innovation and take advantage of the opportunities?

• 24 Jan 2025 · Climate and Nature Bill · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman mentioned the number of Liberal Democrats in this place; I think that we were a very effective method of de-fossilisation on 4 July. On the point about synthetic fuels, does he agree that the measures in the Bill, particularly the ones to encourage sustainable aviation fuels and alternatives for internal combustion engines, will spur investment in those technologies exactly as he wants to see?

• 22 Jan 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q2. The Prime Minister recently visited Epsom hospital, where he committed to not just papering over the cracks in the NHS after years of Conservative lies. However, on Monday, his Government confirmed that St Helier hospital will be allowed to develop further wounds, and that the hospital will crumble. St Helier will not survive the delay the Government have announced; people will die, and NHS staff will break. Will the Prime Minister apologise to my constituents, as they wait years for a new hospital building, and will he visit St Helier with me to witness at first hand the dire situation our residents face?

• 21 Jan 2025 · Knife Crime: West Midlands · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship for the first time, Sir John. I thank the hon. Member for West Bromwich (Sarah Coombes) for securing this important debate and for her passionate speech. It has been deeply moving to hear from Members across the House about the horrific experiences their constituents have had to endure. It is tragic that the names of so many victims of knife crime have been read out today. As the House knows, the tragedy caused by the knife crime epidemic is, unfortunately, not confined to the west midlands. Although I represent a constituency in a different metropolitan area, it is key to highlight that these issues blight cities and towns across the country. There is something uniquely challenging and disturbing about the vicious cycle of collapsing communities, poverty and gang violence in our cities. That should unite us across this House in a new-found resolve to tackle the issue head-on. As a Liberal Democrat spokesperson for London, I am acutely aware of the scale of this epidemic of violence across our capital city. Just two weeks ago, 14-year-old Kelyan Bokassa was murdered on the 472 bus in Woolwich. In my own community, in December 2023, we were devastated by the senseless loss of 17-year-old Ilyas Habibi, who was tragically murdered outside Sutton station. Ilyas was a young man with his entire future ahead of him. He had aspirations, potential and opportunities that a blade cruelly stole from him on that cold winter’s day. My heartfelt thoughts are with his family and friends as they continue to cope with such a heartbreaking loss. It is particularly painful that the alleged killer remains free overseas. Knife crime in our capital has risen year on year, with more than 14,588 offences recorded in 2023 alone. We have all seen tragic stories of teenagers stabbed to death on buses, in their local highstreets, and outside their schools. No young person in this country should have to live in fear of such violent crime when they leave their home. Parents should not have to worry each day about sending their children into the world, and dread the threat that they may fall victim to a senseless stabbing that would tragically cut short their burgeoning life. The crisis was not properly addressed by the previous Government, or by the current or past Mayor of London, and must be urgently addressed today. It is encouraging to see the Government take new steps to clamp down on the sale of ninja and samurai swords, and to give the police greater powers to seize and destroy weapons, but there is much more to do and a whole-of-society approach is desperately needed. One huge step forward, on which the Labour Government need to focus, would be a return to proper neighbourhood policing, where officers are visible and known in their local communities. In my constituency and across London, we are increasingly seeing safer neighbourhood officers being abstracted from their areas to other forces and other parts of London, leading to a significant reduction in the capacity for ongoing proactive policing in our communities. Although the level of abstractions has dropped in my constituency and across Sutton in recent months, they are still a problem. We have also seen a massive reduction in the number of police community support officers. The number of PCSOs in the Metropolitan police declined by 32% from 2015 to 2023. The data shows that in 2015 there were 1,787 PCSOs, but that number dropped by 572 to only 1,215 in 2023. Although that is a startling statistic, more dramatic were the cuts made under Mayor Johnson. Between 2008 and 2016, PCSO numbers dropped from 4,247 to only 1,626, so under the last Conservative mayor, PCSO numbers were cut to 38% of the level that they were at when he took office. That means that fewer than two in five PCSOs remained after his eight years running the capital. The failure to protect proper community policing, under both Labour and Conservative administrations in London, is deeply concerning because it undermines the important role that visible policing plays in creating a sense of security and, of course, in deterrence. Research consistently shows that having officers on the beat serves as a powerful deterrent to violent crime, including stabbings, with criminal activity dropping significantly in areas where police are actively engaged and present. The surge in violent crime only highlights the dangers of reduced police presence in our neighbourhoods. It is extremely concerning to think that the tragic murder of Ilyas occurred just minutes from a police station, outside a busy train station and a packed bus stop—an area where policing should have been as visible and as proactive as possible. That tragic incident, among many others, should be a wake-up call for the Government to get the Metropolitan police to take seriously the scale of the problem of repeated abstractions, and should underscore the importance of maintaining dedicated officers in our communities. We need to ensure that all areas are adequately staffed with officers, who can prevent crime before it happens and respond quickly when needed. Only then will we see a reduction in knife crime. On the community side, we must not forget that the previous Conservative Government made the problem worse by savagely cutting youth services. Those services are often on the frontline in the war for young people’s hearts and minds; they stand as a buffer between a life of violence and a life of opportunity. Too often those services are derided as a waste of money, or belittled as merely another community project. That is utterly misguided. As Members on both sides of the Chamber have already made clear in this debate, youth services should be recognised for offering a vital public service: early intervention. When they are well funded, such services are able to fulfil a vital role, alongside the police, schools and other third sector organisations, in developing what we really need: a public health approach to knife crime. That approach—which Liberal Democrats, in London and across the country, have long called for—is the right one. It would mirror the approach that Glasgow took, which has been shown to yield results. Let us be clear: results in this area are measured in something more important than profit or efficiency; results in this area mean lives saved, lives nourished and lives reinvigorated. A society that stands by and watches youth services wither away is not one that is truly committed to delivering for young people and preventing knife crime. Let us move forward with the renewed conviction that the measure of a civilised society is how it treats its most vulnerable, as we must also remember in the context of young people.

• 17 Jan 2025 · New Homes (Solar Generation) Bill · Hansard source

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  I may only speculate what it was that attracted my hon. Friend to discuss a Bill regarding the promotion of shiny surfaces atop well-built structures—we can only guess. Does he agree that as this Bill moves forward, it is absolutely essential that the Government work across parties to build a consensus, including all those experts and those passionate in this subject, and to work together to ensure that it is successfully delivered for the betterment of all our residents?

• 17 Jan 2025 · New Homes (Solar Generation) Bill · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend speaks about precisely the jobs that the Bill would generate. I declare an interest in that between speeches I have been emailing to arrange the installation of a solar array on my home in the next couple of weeks. Although I will not benefit from the reduction in the cost of installation and of the panels themselves that the Bill would provide by boosting the market and demand for those skills, does she agree that the economic benefit and the skills brought to our residents are another incredibly positive reason why we should back the measures in the Bill and ensure they are implemented as soon as possible?

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

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  I begin by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Mr Kohler) for bringing forward this incredibly important debate. Anyone who has been paying attention to my contributions in this place will not be surprised that I am once again expressing my deepest possible concerns about St Raphael’s hospice in my constituency. Its case is emblematic of the problems across this undervalued and dramatically important sector. One of my first visits after being elected as the MP in July was to St Raph’s hospice, where I saw the incredible care that it offers to residents in my constituency and beyond. I have met people from the hospice several times since then, including just this morning, and it is clear that while the Secretary of State’s £100 million announcement is welcome, it simply does not go far enough. The funding is restricted to capital expenditure fractions, such as refurbishments and digital services. While undoubtedly important to modernise and update the capability of our hospices, the funding does not address their immediate financial hardship, especially in the context of the Chancellor’s Budget. St Raph’s is set to face an estimated £140,000 increase in staff costs this coming year due to the rise in employer national insurance contributions. This burden only adds to the significant strain on the hospice, which is currently funded by the NHS for just 28% of its budget. It is therefore reliant on the generosity of charitable donations for the remainder. If the Government fail to see sense and exempt hospices from this hike, structural deficits will only continue to grow in the sector, pushing many over the cliff edge altogether and forcing those who remain open to cut their services to the bone. While the announcement of additional funding is appreciated, it does not address the root of the problem. The Government’s approach is dangerously akin to tackling a leaking roof with a mop and bucket. The Secretary of State spoke last week about the need to shift the focus of healthcare from the hospital to the community, yet I fear their treatment of the hospice sector has done exactly the opposite. Due to the limited funding that St Raph’s receives, it has been forced to cut its hospice at home scheme, a vital service where staff directly attend to patients in their own homes in the local community. Those on the Government Front Bench say they want community-based palliative care like that under the hospice at home scheme, but the scheme has been cut further due to their actions. These issues show why they must bring forward a long-term funding arrangement for hospices, if the Government intend to keep their promise. My Hospices and Health Care (Report on Funding) Bill, presented last year and due for Second Reading in July, sets out ways for the Government to consider those options to deliver a long-term funding deal. However, I sincerely hope that by July the Government will have listened and the Bill will not need to be debated at all. I urge them to please make my Bill completely redundant.

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

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  On the point about the postcode lottery—an oft-used cliché by politicians—I have heard from Hospice UK that, on one occasion, a single gift from a legacy covered the running costs for a hospice in the UK for five years. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is one of the starkest and most extreme illustrations of how the current system is so unbalanced and, from one street to the next, leaves people with such disparities of access to such an important element of healthcare?

• 9 Jan 2025 · Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

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  At a recent constituency surgery, the lack of care and oversight of dating apps towards their women users was mentioned. Does the hon. Member agree that dating apps, and the operators that profit from them, should be held to account for protecting the women and men who use them, in the same way that social media companies should be held to account?

• 9 Jan 2025 · Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

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  I congratulate the hon. Member for Birmingham Yardley (Jess Phillips) on all the work she has done over the years standing up for women and girls and fighting violence against them. Violence against women and girls by men is a societal epidemic, and it is right that we in this place and the Government treat it as such. The Liberal Democrats welcome the Government’s pledge to halve violence against women and girls over this Parliament, and we are keen to reform the law as soon as possible, and to accelerate what should be a national mission to stamp out this awful violence. I particularly welcome the roll-out of the domestic abuse protection notices and orders pilot in Sutton borough, which covers my constituency of Sutton and Cheam. The orders will allow the police to take stronger, more immediate action in domestic abuse cases, and are a significant step forward, providing greater protections for victims and helping to ensure that abusers face the consequences of their actions without delay. In my borough of Sutton last month, we were tragically reminded of how urgent those protections are. The brutal murder of Gemma Devonish was a devastating blow to our community. Her death underscores the dire consequences of not providing all women with the critical support that they need. It is a dark reminder that those protections are not just necessary, but a matter of life and death. As with any kind of epidemic, we must recognise the warning signs, early indicators and normalised precursors that lead to this awful kind of violence. Stalking is not just a crime against someone’s safety; it is a violent psychological attack on their very sense of self. It chips away at their emotional wellbeing, their sense of security and their right to simply exist without fear. For far too many women and girls, this crime is a daily reality, yet despite previous legislative reforms, the system still is not properly protecting victims of this crime. Data shared with me via a freedom of information request shows that in London, more than one in three stalking cases ends with the victim withdrawing from the process. That is a shockingly high number, and it should concern us all. In some cases, that is because victims disagree with the proposed action, but many have told me that it is also because they feel unable to provide enough evidence, as the burden of proof to achieve a section 4A conviction is set unfathomably high. When the law places such an onerous burden on victims who are so clearly suffering torment, it is our job in this House to home in on it as a flawed piece of legislation. The current law is inconsistent and confusing, and is failing victims as a result. The current division of stalking offences into sections 2A and 4A just is not working, and the confusion allows perpetrators to buy time and continue tormenting their victims with little consequence. I fear that victims, who are overwhelmingly women and girls, are essentially being told that they need to be the perfect victim to ensure that the police get a conviction. They repeatedly have to expose their pain and humiliation to the system just to secure fundamental protection from the police. I draw the House’s attention to a report published in September by the chief inspector of constabulary, the Independent Office for Police Conduct and the College of Policing. The report, driven by a super-complaint from the Suzy Lamplugh Trust, has forced us to face the uncomfortable truth that many of us already knew: the system is failing women and girls. The report explores creating a single clear offence for stalking, rather than splitting it between sections 2A and 4A. The London Victims’ Commissioner has echoed those calls, and I strongly encourage the Government to do the same. The Minister for Safeguarding has promised a review of the current stalking legislation, so I ask again for the timeline for that review. More importantly, when will we see real changes to the law to protect victims and hold stalkers to account?

• 7 Jan 2025 · Pro-democracy Campaigners: Arrests · Hansard source

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  Hongkonger residents I represent in Sutton and Cheam are regularly in touch with me to outline their fears and uncertainty, living under the threat of the transnational repression operated by China. The news that China is now issuing arrest warrants and bounties for the identification of pro-democracy campaigners in the UK is another step in that fear and repression. They often wonder, will they be next? May I ask the Minister again to make it clear to China that these bounties are illegal and that any individuals who engage in the practice will be prosecuted? More broadly, will she start to stand up to China and its unacceptable persecution of British residents by applying Magnitsky sanctions to the Hong Kong officials responsible?

• 6 Jan 2025 · NHS Backlog · Hansard source

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  The Epsom and St Helier hospitals trust covers my constituency as well, and many of our residents rely on those hospitals for their care. Does my hon. Friend agree that it was previous Conservative Government’s absolute failure to deliver one of the 40 new hospitals promised in 2019 that led to the degradation in care for residents across both our constituencies? In addition, does she agree that the Government must come forward with the funding that residents in both constituencies need, to reassure them that their healthcare needs will be met into the future?