Rachael Maskell MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 3 Feb 2025 · School Accountability and Intervention · Hansard source

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  I appreciate all the work that my hon. Friend is doing, but the governance structures of multi-academy trusts lack transparency, not least to the local community. In some areas, their executive boards are choosing members and trustees, without the rigour of accountability. Will my hon. Friend ensure that mechanisms are available to allow far more robust scrutiny of multi-academy trusts, as well as the option to return those schools to the local authority?

• 3 Feb 2025 · Pension Credit Take-up · Hansard source

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  Government figures show that an additional 42,500 households have claimed pension credit, yet that is only about 5% of all those eligible who were not claiming it. As constituency MPs, we are having to support people who are really struggling with the cold and their financial balances. Will the Minister think about setting up a pensioner poverty taskforce, so we can really get underneath the issues facing older people?

• 27 Jan 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Ensuring sensory and motor integration is crucial for a child’s development and learning, yet many services that do so are available only in the private sector. Will the Minister meet me to discuss how we can ensure that parents can access those crucial services?

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

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  I pay tribute to the hon. Member for South Cotswolds (Dr Savage) for bringing forward the Bill, and to all the academics and campaigners behind it. Listening to the debate, I think the one point we need to draw out is that we need robust scrutiny, and we need to be able to hold Government to account through tighter mechanisms. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is crucial that the mechanisms in the Bill are expedited, to ensure that Government get on with achieving the targets that we have all been talking about?

• 22 Jan 2025 · Child Arrangements: Presumption of Parental Involvement · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is making the most powerful of speeches. We need joining up with the police service. My constituent fears every day that her children are in contact with their father. It is really important that we look at the thresholds, particularly with the Crown Prosecution Service, for prosecuting cases.

• 22 Jan 2025 · Listed Places of Worship Scheme · Hansard source

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  I am delighted to see you in the Chair, Mr Western. Let me set the scene. There are around 80 places of worship in York, from York Minster through to a small Orthodox congregation who wrote to me this week and are seeking a new place—buildings young and old, including well-established places. The listed places of worship grant scheme is essential to their upkeep. I want to raise two matters that have not been mentioned yet. First, the Belfrey, which is adjacent to York Minster, is currently under tarpaulin. The windows have been removed, the walls have been stripped back to the stone, the roof is about to come off and scaffolding is holding everything together. The grant is central to the £8.5 million project continuing; I hope the Minister will explain what will happen to this gutted church and its community of 600 worshippers without it. The grant is worth £1.5 million to them. After a tumultuous fundraising effort by the church, they need the scheme to continue, and urge the Minister to at least confirm that existing projects will continue until their completion. This is about not just the church but the social infrastructure. Some £1.5 million is being invested in mental health support and children and youth services, as well as in making York a poverty-free city. The Belfrey is crucial for my community, as well as for the local economy, tourism and our fabulous heritage sector. It sits in the new cathedral precinct, which is part of the local neighbourhood plan. We must have the spec at the required standard, as 9 million visitors come to York, which is the second-most visited place in the UK, and to York Minster, which is the most visited place in the city. When it opens, it will be a place that not only explains the heritage but enables people to explore their faith. A 15% hole in the budget would stop the scheme. Secondly, York has developed its new international centre of excellence for heritage craft. From stonemasons to glaziers, it will preserve the traditions that many people in this debate will benefit from. In fact, people around the world are looking to the centre. It is unique in the crafts that it will maintain, and it will ensure that the traditions are preserved. Much of the centre’s demand will come from different projects funded by the listed places of worship grant scheme. I hope the Minister will help the centre to greater success as it embarks on this new journey by ensuring that the grant enables demand to be placed at the centre’s door. So many churches and other organisations have written to me saying that the scheme must continue.

• 20 Jan 2025 · New Hospital Programme Review · Hansard source

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  I am really glad that my right hon. Friend has a grip on the hospital building programme and has developed a pipeline for scheduling the new hospitals. York is not on the list, but given that it was one of the cheapest hospitals to build, it will certainly need to be there in 10 to 15 years. How will my right hon. Friend review hospitals that are not on the list and schedule them into future programmes?

• 20 Jan 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  It was freezing over the weekend in York. Despite working with North Yorkshire emergency accommodation services, I was unable to find accommodation for a very vulnerable constituent of mine. Will the Minister ensure that in the homelessness review we hold local authorities to account and that no resident’s case is put in the “too difficult to manage” box?

• 16 Jan 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  A tourism levy in York could raise £125,000 through a voluntary scheme, but if there were a comprehensive scheme, £1.7 million could go to my local community. Will the Minister not consider such a scheme so that we can raise that revenue for York?

• 16 Jan 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Next week, the commission for palliative care and end of life care will start taking oral and written evidence, and I really hope that Members will ask their specialists and their constituents to participate in that. Will the Leader of the House ensure that, when the commission reports, we have a debate on its findings so that we can optimise palliative and end-of-life care?

• 16 Jan 2025 · Middle East · Hansard source

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  After such unimaginable suffering, I welcome the Foreign Secretary’s statement. However, I recognise the fragility of this moment—not only the fragility of making a decision around this deal, but the fragility of lives in Gaza, where the suffering continues at this moment. Will he ensure that we provide the very best medical support, given that many specialties no longer exist in Gaza, and that we use the expertise in our country to send teams into the region and indeed into Gaza to ensure that people with diseases and infections and those who need urgent surgery have the very best services?

• 15 Jan 2025 · Health and Social Care: Winter Update · Hansard source

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  Triaging patients into virtual wards will not only protect the front door of the NHS, but be far better for patients. What is the Secretary of State doing to hold integrated care boards to account and ensure that they are putting money into primary care, as opposed to where everyone always looks, which is secondary care?

• 15 Jan 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q14. York is an incredible city, but demands on tourist destinations such as York, which receives over 9 million visitors and 1.7 million overnight stays, place significant pressure on local public services and housing used as short-term holiday lets. What steps will the Prime Minister take to equip local authorities to better balance the benefits of tourism against the additional costs to our communities?

• 9 Jan 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  York’s advanced digital and advanced rail cluster can really boost our economy with the innovations that it is bringing, as well as providing 5,500 jobs in York. Will the Secretary of State meet me to discuss how we can bring it into her strategy for developing the rail industry?

• 8 Jan 2025 · Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill · Hansard source

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  I am grateful for my right hon. Friend’s speech, and not least for the opportunity to raise standards for children with disability, children experiencing anxiety and children who have got care experience. Will she look at the role that local authorities can play in building collaboration and ensure that they have the funding they need? The last Government hollowed them out, yet they have a crucial role in raising standards and supporting schools.

• 7 Jan 2025 · Northern Gaza · Hansard source

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  I listened to what the Minister said about the recognition of a viable Palestine, as opposed to the recognition of Palestine. As that could happen in a number of steps, will he take the first step in recognising the state of Palestine, before moving to a full viable Palestine, as he describes?

• 7 Jan 2025 · Drug and Alcohol Addiction: Treatment · Hansard source

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  In 2022, there were more than 10,000 deaths from alcohol use. We know that more than 600,000 people have an alcohol dependency. We need to focus not just on treatment services and their funding, but on prevention. The last Government failed to bring forward a timely alcohol strategy. Will the Minister update the House on what he is doing to ensure that we are tackling this massive situation in our communities?

• 6 Jan 2025 · Flooding · Hansard source

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  I put on record my thanks to City of York council workers, as well as to the Environment Agency, for protecting our city over the new year period. Many businesses in my city flood periodically. Will the Minister think again about a review of the insurance system for businesses, so that they have resilience and confidence moving forward?

• 6 Jan 2025 · Health and Adult Social Care Reform · Hansard source

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  I thank NHS staff for working under severe duress over this winter. One way of ensuring better patient flows is to have better rehabilitation, so will my right hon. Friend say what he is doing to improve rehabilitation access not only in acute sectors but out in the community?