Alison McGovern: Arguably, the biggest barrier to growth in the UK and to turning around the Prime Minister’s recession is the supply of labour. Following the Chancellor’s “Back to work Budget” in the autumn and all the measures unveiled since then, some of which the Secretary of State has just reeled off, did the Office for Budget Responsibility upgrade or downgrade its forecast on employment growth...
Alison McGovern: What the Secretary of State cannot get away from is the fact that, as has already been said, our employment rate has not returned to the post-pandemic level. He cannot answer the question because the truth is that the OBR downgraded its forecast: the unemployment forecast is worse. The reason for that is a truth that the British people have known for a long time now: these Ministers sitting...
Alison McGovern: While I am pleased to have cheered the Minister up, I can assure him that I will certainly be giving the Government down the banks yet again. But that exact point is why I thought it would be helpful if we could have some sort of regular update out of this debate. Can the Minister feed that back to the Secretary of State, if necessary? I am sure it can be discussed whether that is a statement...
Alison McGovern: It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Charles. I thank all colleagues who have contributed, in particular the Chair of the Select Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Sir Stephen Timms), for bringing forward the debate. As we heard from all the serious questions asked, it is important. The Minister has quite a number of important questions to answer, so I...
Alison McGovern: Thank you, Sir Charles, and I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I will just say to him that not a single vote in an election has been cast yet.
Alison McGovern: The hon. Gentleman may have said “could”, but I am not the Minister and I would not be so arrogant as to assume that that will be certain to happen. My aim was to leave space for questions to be directed to the Minister, to assist colleagues. I simply say this to the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Dr Mullan): I could point to the record over the past 14 years and the number of...
Alison McGovern: Further to the Minister’s response, the Prime Minister has been asked similar questions about child poverty in recent Prime Minister’s questions. He usually responds that since 2010, the Conservatives have lifted 1.7 million people out of absolute poverty, which, as you know Mr Speaker, tracks living standards from a fixed point in time. Can the Minister tell me how many more people, on...
Alison McGovern: If the Minister can point to an occasion when I have said that work was not the Labour party’s priority, she ought to say when that was, or she should withdraw that remark. The answer to my question is that, on average, more than 350,000 more people left poverty in each year of the Labour Government. The Prime Minister’s claim is pathetic. Which of the following does the Minister think...
Alison McGovern: Hopefully, the House will be relieved to know that I do not intend to repeat the explanation of this order that the Minister has just given. As he said, the statutory instrument addresses the needs of a specific group of pensioners. We support the measure and will therefore obviously support the order. I will just take a very short amount of time to raise a few other related issues. Further...
Alison McGovern: I am not entirely sure whether that intervention was for me, so I will let the Minister respond when he winds up. However, on companies keeping their promises, that seems like one of the basics to me. As I said before, we support these measures and will not oppose the Government’s proposals, but I would very much welcome the Minister’s comments on the questions I have raised.
Alison McGovern: Do you want a round of applause?
Alison McGovern: I thank the Minister for clarifying the way we are taking these orders today. We welcome the social security uprating, because we want to see social security keep pace with prices, particularly at a time of spiking inflation and economic instability. However, it is worth pointing out that before 2010, uprating in the manner we are doing it today was the norm for both Labour and Conservative...
Alison McGovern: It is good to follow the hon. Member for Meon Valley (Mrs Drummond), and I commend her efforts in producing a private Member’s Bill on this important subject, but I am a bit confused: if we all agree that it is important, why do the Government not just vote for our motion? My hon. Friend the Member for Houghton and Sunderland South (Bridget Phillipson), the shadow Secretary of State,...
Alison McGovern: Further to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Sarah Edwards), it was disappointing that the Secretary of State did not mention mental health in her statement. Given the rising levels of destitution and chronic bad housing in our country, mental health services have winter crises too these days. What progress is she making in developing proper waiting times for people...
Alison McGovern: Whatever the rhetoric we still sometimes hear, I know the Minister will agree that there is absolutely nowhere in this conflict that is safe for children. Further to the answers he has already given to my right hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) and the hon. Member for Colchester (Will Quince), may I ask him to spell out how his humanitarian strategy, and the...
Alison McGovern: All we hear from the Secretary of State on employment is smoke and mirrors, but thankfully the OBR has published the numbers. We have just heard what he believes is happening with employment because of his policies, but when the OBR looked at his policies, did its forecast show the employment rate, compared with today, to be going up or down in 2024-25?
Alison McGovern: You can always tell the Conservatives are struggling to answer the questions, Mr Speaker, because they go back to those same old things about what happened under the last Labour Government. After 13 years, they have nothing to be proud of. If what the Secretary of State said was true, we might expect that after a little time some of his policies would work, but is it not true that it is not...
Alison McGovern: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I would like to seek your advice because, on 6 December 1923, the first three female Labour Members of Parliament were elected—Margaret Bondfield, Dorothy Jewson and Susan Lawrence—and these three women campaigned tirelessly for election against all odds. Between 1929 and 1931, Margaret Bondfield became the UK’s first woman Cabinet Minister...
Alison McGovern: I thank the Lord Chancellor for the manner in which he opened his statement, but it is really not good enough that it has taken so long to get to this point. I want to put on record my deep disappointment that we have waited this long for today. I also think that to get the change that has been described, what is being proposed is not good enough. To achieve what we want through the legal...
Alison McGovern: I am sorry, but I must press the Minister because I do not feel that he has answered the question on what the Government’s strategy is, particularly the political strategy. We all feel this so strongly: no child should ever be the target of a terrorist or in any conflict, so what is the Government’s political strategy to protect the lives of children?