Mrs Moon:
The Ministry of Defence commissioned a study by Dr Nav Kapur of Manchester university on suicide in the armed forces. He found that the largest number of suicides were by young people leaving the armed forces, usually without having completed their basic training or shortly after they had passed it. Further research is needed to confirm this, but the indications were that there was a feeling of hopelessness with regard to attempts to build a family in the armed forces,
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that a sense of success and of identity had been lost, and that that was perhaps one of the motivations towards suicide. Additional funding is needed for that research to be completed, but that was the outcome of the best study that I have seen so far of suicide in the armed forces.
The all-party group has discussed how coroners record suicide and the importance of accurate suicide reporting. I cannot stress that enough. One of the problems is narrative verdicts, which were introduced as an addition to a statutory verdict. If someone died in the custody of the Crown, for example, they allowed for a narrative of that death to teach lessons about how it had happened. Instead, however, they have replaced the verdict and become a verdict in their own right. Often, the death of someone who takes their own life by tying a ligature around their neck is not recorded as a suicide, because the appropriate word has not been used. The Ministry of Justice needs to work on this area. I know that it is doing so and I hope to meet the chief coroner soon to see how we can make progress.
Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP): Will my hon. Friend give way?
Mrs Moon: I will certainly give way to the hon. Gentleman, who regularly attends the all-party group, for which I thank him.
Mark Durkan: I thank my hon. Friend for giving way. The number of narrative verdicts in England is growing. One of the ways in which they are avoided in Northern Ireland is the decision taken five years ago by the coroners service not to hold inquests on suicides, but to just record them and not put the families through an inquest unless the public interest or another family requirement demands it. That means that there has been more sensitivity than the false sensitivity accorded to narrative verdicts, which then lead to flawed statistics.
Mrs Moon: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I was not aware of that development in Northern Ireland, and I would like to spend some time examining it. The root trauma for many families who have experienced such a death is sometimes renewed, along with the publicity, up to a year later, which makes it very difficult for them to cope and which sets them back in the progress that they have made in grieving. Many have found it extremely difficult, so I will look at the information he provides, for which I thank him.
The all-party group has looked at the cross-Government strategy to prevent suicide in England. I will come back to that later, because it is a most important issue. We have also looked at suicide and bereavement. We talked to a number of families who have been bereaved by suicide and every one of them mentioned the importance of a Department of Health document called, “Help is at Hand”. Sadly, many Members do not know about this fantastic resource; it is not appropriately distributed and many families never get access to it. We have to find a way of getting that booklet out to people. The Welsh Assembly is looking to translate it and produce a Welsh language edition for Wales. We are also considering whether coroners and the police force would be appropriate groups to distribute that information.
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We have also looked at the impact of police investigations. As Members will be aware, when a sudden death is reported, the police investigate initially under the murder manual. Families are therefore further traumatised by the feeling that they are under suspicion for the death. Once it is decided that it is a suicide, the police sometimes walk away and the family are left with no help or support and no sense of where they are supposed to go.
A suicide death is a lonely death because people stay away; they do not know what to say or how to approach the family. Often, the support that families desperately need is not there. That isolation and lack of information add to the risk of further suicides. It is important that people have ongoing support from within their community and from statutory services to see them through the grieving process.
We have also looked at the use of sport to reach out to young men. This point refers back to the question asked by the hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) about the deaths of young men. It is important to give young men role models who have had difficulties in their life and who have contemplated suicide, despite success. Sports personalities have been particularly effective. We spoke with Ernie Benbow from State of Mind Rugby and Greg Burgess, the Choose Life co-ordinator for north Lancashire. They demonstrated how successful the use of sportsmen had been.
Mrs Moon: I am sure that I can see a hand gesturing at me. I will give way.
Jim Shannon: The hon. Lady’s eyesight is better than she thinks. Does she agree that TV soaps can play a key role in highlighting the issue of suicide and prevent viewers from committing suicide?
Mrs Moon: I thank the hon. Gentleman. There is a risk in how suicide scenes are written in soaps. There have been incidents in which a death by suicide in a soap opera has led to copycats and social contagion. The writing must be extremely careful. I know that many soap opera writers take their responsibility extremely seriously because they are aware of that risk.
There has been much talk about recipe websites. This week is internet safety week. It is extremely important that every Member of this House goes into schools in their area and talks to young people about staying safe on the internet. I went to Bryntirion junior school in my constituency last week and I asked a group of youngsters how many of them had ever received offensive material on the internet and how many of them had felt frightened, bullied or scared by what they saw. Every hand in the class went up. That is a world that we all escaped, but it is our duty to build awareness and protection in that world.
The work of the Samaritans is second to none. I want to highlight the work that it has done with British Transport police and Network Rail on the prevention of suicide on the railways. They have identified areas that have particular problems and trained their staff to be highly vigilant. They now provide support to people who enter their railway stations if they feel that there is a risk. That is a fantastic move forward.
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I want to consider briefly the impact that the health and social care changes will have on the new suicide prevention plan for England. The all-party group carried out an inquiry into that. We issued a call for evidence that went out to all local authorities and directors of public health, via primary care trusts, local authorities and PCT clusters. That was followed by four evidence sessions in which we took evidence from representatives of the devolved nations, six areas of England and the voluntary sector.
The report concluded that the future of local suicide prevention plans in England depends on leadership and local champions, the identification of suicide prevention as a priority, availability of resources, and the long-term survival of suicide prevention groups already in place. The future of local suicide prevention plans in England is fragile and often relies on committed and dedicated individuals. That such plans are not a statutory requirement of the new national suicide prevention strategy is a major barrier to their survival, and that is particularly true when entering a time of restricted spending within local authorities. If something is not a statutory responsibility, often it will be bypassed or shelved.
There is no guarantee that health and wellbeing boards will address suicide prevention, or that existing plans will survive or be replaced. What will happen in areas where there is no suicide prevention plan and no history of taking an interest in the issue? In areas with no local champion, suicide prevention might be overlooked completely. We are talking about a suicide prevention postcode lottery, which is, in part, reflected in figures that show increases in suicide, differentiated across the United Kingdom.
There is no formal mechanism in the suicide prevention plan for England for suicide prevention groups to report directly to health and wellbeing boards. Without such a link, suicide prevention might not reach the agencies, and groups will be working in isolation, undermining their value and jeopardising their future. Engagement with the police, GPs and coroners is vital, yet in many areas such engagement is poor, patchy and inconsistent. Self-harm prevention and specialist bereavement services remain poor in many areas of the country.
Evidence from Northern Ireland demonstrates the importance of involving community organisations and the voluntary sector in suicide prevention. The existence of suicide prevention implementation groups in every locality was critical to Northern Ireland’s success and ensures that suicide prevention is not left to chance. The leadership at Government level highlighted by the hon. Member for South Antrim is also critical. Northern Ireland is making a difference.
In Wales, sadly, ministerial statements allocating responsibility for suicide planning were not published, and mandates were passed to local authorities but not implemented. That highlights the importance of national leadership, which comes up time and again in ensuring consistent implementation and showing what can result where no suicide prevention plan is in place. My local authority in Bridgend, however, is an exemplar of best practice and best planning. It learned a salutary lesson of the importance of such planning, which it now does excellently.
Evidence from Scotland highlighted the strength of a co-ordinated national approach to implementation—the Choose Life strategy—with the appointment of a
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co-ordinator in every local authority together with national funding and national leadership. The Minister of State, Department of Health, kindly gave an address at the launch of the report by the all-party group on suicide and self-harm prevention, and has agreed to respond to that on behalf of the Government.
Health and wellbeing boards need direction because otherwise we will end up with a hotchpotch of disorganised and unconnected policies, many of which have no evidence base. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence is commissioning guidance for commissioners of self-harm services, and perhaps the Department of Health could look at doing the same for suicide prevention.
Workers in the field of suicide prevention are dedicated and committed, but isolated. Our inquiries showed the need to share best practice nationally, and in the near future we hope to hold a conference in the House of Commons to facilitate networking so best practice can be shared and so that we do not constantly expect people to reinvent the wheel. We will go back and look later at the effect of the suicide prevention plan for England and the impact of the reorganisation in England.
I mentioned briefly the importance of not linking suicide just to mental health services. The Appleby report of 1999 suggested that 75% of those who commit suicide are not known to services. That is important. We must not always look for a mental health link. If we do so, we will neglect to provide services that address a large number of people who take their own lives.
The debate is important. Suicide reflects on society as a whole. It can affect any hon. Member and any family. As the hon. Member for South Antrim has said, it can affect people whether they are rich, poor, successful, young or old. The sad tragedy that unites them all is that they are lives wasted, and lives we should set out to save.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans): Order. The debate will finish at 5.55 pm and the two Front Benchers still have their winding-up speeches to make. Will hon. Members therefore be mindful when they are making their contributions so we can get everybody in?
4.26 pm
Stuart Andrew (Pudsey) (Con): I am grateful for the opportunity to take part in the debate. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) and all Democratic Unionist party Members for bringing this important debate to the Floor of the House. I am sure they were tempted to debate many other issues, but it is important that we discuss suicide prevention, which is a crucial but difficult issue.
Yesterday, I spoke of some of the most difficult times in my life. I was lucky to have the support of a loving family and great friends, but many unfortunately do not have that. Before being elected, I worked in the hospice movement. In that time, I got to know a lot of the patients well, and, sadly, death became a norm—I did not want to use that word, but I am sure hon. Members understand what I am getting at. Bereavement is always difficult, but suicide bereavement is a different type of bereavement altogether.
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Sadly, I say that from personal experience. When I was in the sixth form, I remember vividly walking in and a friend saying to me, “Have you heard about that boy?”—I will not mention his name. He had taken his own life because he had been bullied at school. I remember all the students sitting in the common room in complete and utter shock. All I could think about were the questions going around in my head. What could I have done? Why did I not spot that he was in that difficult place? If I am honest, those questions still haunt me today. In more recent times—since I have been elected as a Member of Parliament—there was the very sad case in my constituency of a father who killed his entire family and then himself.
The suicides I have seen and experienced have had a tremendous effect on the people who are left behind. That is why the debate is important, but more importantly we should act and not just talk about suicide. We must also start right at the beginning and change people’s attitudes. How many times have hon. Members been on a train that has been delayed because somebody has taken their life, and the instinct of some passengers is to moan about the delay, forgetting that somebody has lost their life?
Hon. Members have spoken a lot about attitudes to mental health. I am very proud of the fact that a lot of work has been done in the Chamber to address that. It is a good start to try and take away that stigma. I pay particular tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Mr Walker) and the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones), who have spoken openly about their own personal battles. As hon. Members have said, however, suicide is a much wider subject than just mental health; it can be about finance, careers or family breakdown. It is important that we address all those issues, which is why I welcome the fact that the suicide prevention strategy is in place. It is important that the strategy is not just a piece of paper; it has to be backed up by action, and it is good to see that happening. Crucially, it is partly about identifying the risks.
Andrew Stephenson (Pendle) (Con): I agree with what my hon. Friend is saying. In January, suicide-proof fencing was installed at a multi-storey car park in Nelson in my constituency, from which eight people have died in the past 10 years and a further 18 people have had to be talked down by police. I raised this issue on the Floor of the House in October 2010 in an Adjournment debate led by the hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon), yet it still took the car park owners years to act. In addition to what my hon. Friend is saying, does he agree that businesses have a key role to play in identifying risks?
Stuart Andrew: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. He is absolutely right: we need to do everything we can—talking to individuals themselves or lessening the risks—to identify those areas. A lot of work has been done in the prison system to try to improve cells to reduce risks. Businesses also have an important role to play.
It is important that the strategy targets specific groups who we know may be vulnerable. Targeting young people will be important, because we want to change attitudes
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in the future. We also have to look at why so many young men are committing suicide. We have been talking about mental health, but let us face it: men are not very good at talking, and that is part of the problem. As we move into the digital age and we all spend so much time on our computers, being used to talking with others will lessen over time. I fear that we will have a generation who will be even worse than the current one in talking about their problems.
Improving access to “talking therapies”, the strategy’s four-year plan, and expanding it to all ages and different groups, is important. From my own experience, I know that we need to ensure that there is as much work on school intervention as possible to deal with bullying and violence. We must allow people to talk about the threats they feel, whether they are sexual abuse or bullying at home. We also have to remove barriers for people who are disabled, or who have mental health or other long-term conditions. We want to make them feel that they can play a full role in our society and do not become isolated.
Areas that require emphasis have been highlighted by a constituent of mine. I pay tribute to Mike Bush. He and I are unlikely friends. He describes himself as “red socialist”, but he and I have become very good friends and I have a huge amount of respect for him. He has done tremendous work in this field and is an active member of the all-party parliamentary group on suicide and self-harm prevention. On many occasions, he has highlighted the importance of working with bereaved families. I welcome the fact that the strategy gives greater prominence to measures that support those families; being there and helping them to cope with a family member whom they are worried might commit suicide, and helping them cope with the aftermath of someone who has committed suicide.
Getting better information through the research that is being offered can only be a good thing, but the emphasis must be on support, and I completely agree with the hon. Member for Bridgend that we need to ensure good national provision. We need to ensure that suicide prevention measures are available in every part of our country. In particular, bereavement support needs a suicide angle to it, because it really is very different. In my time at the hospice, I saw how fragmented bereavement services were around the country, but specific suicide bereavement support is even more fragmented.
I hope that as the strategy develops we will continue to work with the many wonderful organisations we have in this country, many of which have been mentioned today, such as the Samaritans. The APPG is a great start, bringing together a coalition of organisations with a wealth of experience, but it is also important that we listen to family groups that have been through this dreadful experience. What makes Martin House children’s hospice such a wonderful organisation is that it is parent-led. The parents describe the care they need, and that is why it can offer such wonderful support. In the same way, the best strategy for dealing with suicide will come from those families who have experienced it.
We need action on cyber-bullying. Bullying has existed in schools for many years, but it has taken on a different form now. People can be bullied at school, but when they get home it continues through the social networking sites and the computers in their bedrooms. In a sense, these children and young people are suffering
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from a silent bully. The suicide websites have been touched on. We must do more to close them down completely.
I hope that we can offer further training for organisations and—perhaps—the police in helping them to deliver that bad news. I have had several constituents tell me that they almost felt sorry for the police officer delivering the news because it was so difficult. It is important that these organisations be aware of the wealth of information out there. I am glad that the “Help is at Hand” document has been mentioned, because it is not used enough.
In conclusion, suicide is tragic in every sense: the loneliness of the person doing it, the long bereavement for those left behind, the guilt they suffer for years after and the great risk that they themselves might go on to commit suicide. It is crucial that we face this risk. This debate is just the start: let us now address and act on it.
4.37 pm
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP): I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew), who spoke about the impact that suicide can have. He mentioned a memory of his school days. In preparing for this debate, I, too, reflected on my first acquaintance with suicide. At school one day, we discovered that a chap in my class in the third year had died by suicide. I experienced feelings of absolute bewilderment and shock that someone who had been with us only the previous day—playing a normal role in school and taking part in normal activities—was gone from us. I remember racking my brains and feeling totally bewildered. What had caused it? Were we missing something? That vivid memory, which will never leave me, had an enormous impact on me.
Just today, a friend of mine related to me the sad news of the death by suicide overnight of a mutual acquaintance, and again those feelings of shock and bewilderment came back. I am sure that every hon. Member can relate to this issue in some shape or form. I know that some have experienced personal loss through death by suicide. It is very painful, but it is right that we talk about it, so I am glad of this opportunity to say a few words. Only by highlighting this issue of suicide and talking about its causes and what prompts people to take their own lives can we in some way help others not to go down this path. We need to talk about what we can do in government and society and through working with voluntary community groups to help these vulnerable people.
I want to talk from my perspective as the Member for Belfast North, which has been mentioned a number of times. It has one of the highest suicide rates of any part of the United Kingdom, with 25.2 deaths per 100,000 in the period 2006 to 2011. In the last five-year period for which we have figures, from 2007, that figure crept up to 25.9 per 100,000. As has been said, only the constituency of Belfast West has a higher rate. Those rates are high for Northern Ireland, which has high rates compared with the rest of the United Kingdom. I therefore know about this issue from my constituency surgeries, as well as from meetings with the Minister of Health in Northern Ireland, Edwin Poots, from delegations that I have led of families bereaved by suicide and from my work with groups such as PIPS, which my hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) mentioned—I commend
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him on his excellent speech in introducing this debate—and others that do such tremendous work in Belfast North. They include Lighthouse, FASA—the Forum for Action on Substance Abuse—and many other charities and Churches.
Those working in such organisations do enormously dedicated work in difficult circumstances, often volunteering and bearing a great emotional burden every day, as they cope with young people, middle-aged people and older people who are going through difficult times, as well as counselling and helping in a practical way families who have been bereaved. This work takes a great toll on the volunteers and others working in such organisations. I commend them publicly for the work they do on behalf of us all.
Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab): I have similar organisations in my constituency doing the kind of work the right hon. Gentleman describes. One of the questions they are asked by many relatives is: “What did we do wrong?”, which is a very difficult issue to deal with.
Mr Dodds: The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. When I speak to people working in those organisations, I am told that this issue comes up time and time again. It is very difficult to give answers to families who are struggling to cope with the nature of the passing of their loved one. Often it is hard to find any answer that can satisfy—it is just not possible to do that—but in the long run, the work these organisations do provides enormous consolation, help and support. The work of the Samaritans has been mentioned. The right hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) mentioned Papyrus, and there are many, many others. It is right to put on record our tremendous debt to such organisations and the people who do such tremendous work.
The new suicide prevention strategy, which was launched in September 2012 here in England and Wales, is excellent. The chair of the advisory group, Professor Appleby, who has been mentioned, has said:
“Suicide does not have one cause—many factors combine to produce an individual tragedy.”
“Prevention too must be broad—communities, families and front-line services all have a vital role.”
That is absolutely right, and that is why our motion today talks about government, community and society—all of us—working together to try to prevent suicide. The Samaritans chief executive, Catherine Johnstone, has made an important point—I suppose this sums up what we are trying to get at today—which is that
“suicide can be prevented by making sure people get support when they need it, how they need it and where they need it.”
We know that that is very difficult and complicated to put into practice, because as has been said—the hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) mentioned this and the Minister reiterated it—75% of those who die by suicide were not known by, or in contact with, social services. This is not just a simple matter of saying that it is about people who are having mental health problems and who are known to the various agencies; that is often not the case at all.
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As I have said, we have a particular problem in Northern Ireland, where death by suicide has gone up by 100% in less than 15 years. Some 300 people each year are dying by suicide in the Province, with men three times more likely to die in that way than females. I shall discuss some of the reasons for men being more prone to taking their lives and for their reticence in coming forward.
The hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon) asked the Minister a question about the amount of money that was being spent. I am glad to say that the Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety in Northern Ireland has spent £32 million over the past six years on suicide prevention under the Protect Life strategy. That money has been extremely helpful, and it has been well spent on helping some of the groups that I have mentioned.
Of course, money can do only so much, because of the broad range of reasons that lie behind suicide. I will not go over all the issues that have been mentioned, but I will deal with one or two of them. As well as social isolation, there is the problem of drug misuse, which my hon. Friend the Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) mentioned. In Rathcool and elsewhere in my constituency, good work is being done to try to reach young people with drug problems and to counter those problems. We are finding that a lot of young men—again, it is particularly young men—who get themselves into that situation end up attempting to commit suicide or actually dying by suicide. Problems with alcohol abuse are also a factor.
I also want to draw attention to a piece of research recently carried out by Mike Tomlinson of the school of sociology at Queen’s university. The key finding of his study entitled “War, peace and suicide: the case of Northern Ireland” was that
“the cohort of children and young people who grew up in the worst years of violence…have the highest and most rapidly increasing suicide rates”.
Those generations were the most acculturated to division and conflict, and to externalised expressions of aggression. The report continues:
“The transition to peace means that externalized aggression is no longer socially approved. It becomes internalized instead.”
My constituency of Belfast North probably suffered more than any other constituency in Northern Ireland—that could be true of Belfast West as well, but I can speak only for my constituency—during the period euphemistically known as the troubles. That was a heinous, horrible period of our history, with its violence, blood-letting, murder and mayhem. Today in Belfast North, and in Belfast West, we are still paying the price for that period of violence and bloodshed. Young men and women are still dying, as are middle-aged men and women, as a result of the troubles in Northern Ireland. Nowadays, they are dying not as a result of murders committed by paramilitaries, but as a direct result of the troubles because, having been brought up in a culture of violence, they cannot cope in this period of relative peace.
Bob Stewart:
Is the despair of some of those people accelerated by the fact that they are lonely? Does the fact that they are away from their families and from
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society, for example, act as a catalyst? Does their loneliness gear up the despair that makes them take their own lives?
Mr Dodds: It is difficult to be too specific, as every individual’s case is different. Undoubtedly, however, one of the biggest factors, particularly in my constituency, is loneliness and isolation, along with drugs and alcohol. That combination, together with the context in which people have grown up, can often become a too powerful and overwhelming set of circumstances with which to cope.
Particular issues, then, arise in Northern Ireland and my constituency, and they might be different from many cases in England, Wales and Scotland. We have this added problem and pressure of coming out of the period of awful violence that we suffered. Only today, as we look back at the research and work done, do people realise that that period was so awful that we are still living with the consequences. Indeed, people are still dying, even today, as a result of what happened in that period. The hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) talked about the experience of soldiers—he was right to highlight that—and it applies to people who served in the security forces, too.
On the issue of how this affects family members, I am thinking particularly of a dear lady who had lost a number of her family members, including two children, to suicide. She told me that she feared for other members of her family because of the increasing prevalence of family members copying what other family members or their close friends had done. The problem is exacerbated not only by sites on the web that encourage suicide but even by Facebook, when an insidious form of peer pressure can be applied.
Mrs Moon: One big problem is when anniversaries are marked. We must do some work to highlight the risk of anniversaries and the fact that they are not best marked by further deaths. That key piece of work must be undertaken.
Mr Dodds: The hon. Lady is absolutely right, and some families have told me that they dread an anniversary coming up. They sometimes sit up for days on end watching over their loved one in case something happens. They are very aware of this problem as anniversaries are approached.
I want to mention the excellent work done by the integrated services for children and young people programme on the Shankill road in my constituency. The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland visited that project just last week, and the shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker), who I am pleased to see in his place on the Front Bench, has also visited the Spectrum centre in the Shankill, and is aware of the great work done by Nicola Verner and others. Immensely important work is being done trying to help families that have all sorts of problems and needs. Intervention at an early stage is carried out, helping and supporting families as youngsters go through school and into the teenage years. Excellent work is being done by many organisations, much of it helped by Government. We just want to see that work consolidated and, if possible, increased.
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I am conscious that other Members want to contribute, so I shall make my last point. A number of families raised with me the point that when young people go to an accident or emergency centre or to their GP and are concerned about their state of mind and vulnerability, it would be a good idea for them to have somewhere like a place of safety—somewhere they can go to and be put in contact with others who understand what they are going through. They should not just be given a piece of paper as a prescription and told to come back in a week’s time. They need somewhere to go to where they can talk to people; that is vital. I commend the Minister from the Northern Ireland Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety for taking this issue on board.
Mrs Moon: One of the most helpful developments has been the engagement of the Samaritans in A and E departments. That has really made a difference, especially in self-harm cases. Where the nursing staff might be too busy to give up time, the Samaritans might be able to provide that time and support, which would be an excellent move forward.
Mr Dodds: I agree. That shows the importance of the excellent work the hon. Lady does as part of the all-party suicide prevention group to share best practice, as there are bound to be lessons we can learn from each other.
I commend the work that is being done. The Health Minister in Northern Ireland, Edwin Poots, has taken a close personal interest in the issue. He recently held a workshop for workers in the community and voluntary sector, and he has also met a number of family support groups. He has tried hard to raise the profile of this issue. It is now taken very seriously across the board in Northern Ireland—by all the political parties, and in the community and voluntary sector—and I think it important for Members to take the opportunity to highlight it here as well. It is one of the biggest problems that we face, certainly in my constituency.
I commend and thank everyone who has taken part in the debate, and all those, in my constituency and elsewhere, who are dedicated to trying to prevent suicide.
4.55 pm
Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab): I congratulate the hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) on opening the debate so ably. As we have heard, suicide is a particular problem in Northern Ireland, but the problem exists throughout the British Isles. I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon), the hon. Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew) and the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) on their extremely thoughtful contributions.
It is easy to blanket a debate on suicide in sociology jargon, but the truth is that, while any death in a family is tragic, there is something about suicide that is uniquely tragic. I say that as a mother. It must always leave family members asking themselves, “Is there something that I could have done? Were there signs that I could have noticed?” If suicide is a cry for help, family members must be left asking themselves until the end of their lives, “Why did I not hear that cry in the first place?” There is certainly something peculiarly tragic about suicide.
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Of course, the individual causes of any particular suicide are never straightforward, and they are certainly not amenable to any top-down, one-size-fits-all, command-and-control solution, but I think it is agreed across the House that positive changes in society can make a difference to individual lives, and that we can offer even better support to bereaved families.
We know that suicide is not just a matter of mental health; however, it is related to mental health issues. I stress that Labour is committed to tackling the stigma attached to mental illness. One in four of us will suffer a mental illness at some point in our lives, and, as has been said by my right hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband), the leader of my party, mental illness
“is the biggest unaddressed health challenge of our age.”
I should be grateful if Ministers could give me some assurances about mental health spending. According to some indicators, it has been cut in real terms. It is difficult to develop an effective suicide prevention strategy unless the basic spending is there.
I think that, once we have cut through the sociological jargon, it is clear that the recently rising levels of suicide must be related to the fragmentation of families and societies. Once upon a time, a generation ago, young people could reasonably expect to live in the same street as their mothers and other relatives, or around the corner from them. Young men growing up could reasonably expect a secure job, probably the same as that done by their fathers, and perhaps, in some parts of the country, in the place where many members of their community worked. That increasing fragmentation of families and societies—which is not the fault of any political party or any Government, but is partly due to the nature of the society we live in and to globalisation—must lead to less resilience in families and communities, and must make the issue of suicide more pressing.
As Members will have heard, the latest suicide figures issued by the Office for National Statistics for England and Wales show an increase in the number of people who have taken their own lives. In particular, there appears to have been a significant increase between 2010 and 2011. As we heard in a number of contributions, historically more men complete suicide attempts. We have also heard interesting contributions about the rise of cyber-bullying triggering suicide. There was a very sad case here in London a few weeks ago. A girl committed suicide because she was very upset about the pictures of herself in a compromising position that were going around via mobile phones and on the internet. We have also heard about the particular problems of suicide in prisons and young offenders institutions.
Some Members tentatively tried to explore why men are three times more likely than women to take their own lives. In England, for men under 35 suicide is the second most common cause of death, and that is clearly a particular issue in Northern Ireland. In the 1990s, suicide rates for young men aged 15 to 24 reached an all-time high. They were at the highest levels since the 1920s. Research by both the British Medical Journal and Mind found that during times of recession the mental health of men is put at particular risk. Mind’s YouGov survey found that almost 40% of men are worried or low at present, and the top three issues playing on their minds are job security, work and money. The report identifies unemployment as increasing the
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risk of suicide among men under 35; young men who took their own lives often did so in their period of worklessness. The chief executive of Mind, Paul Farmer, has said:
“The recession is clearly having a detrimental impact on the nation’s mental health but men in particular are struggling with the emotional impact. Being a breadwinner is something that is still crucial to the male psyche so if a man loses his job he loses a large part of his identity putting his mental wellbeing in jeopardy. The problem is that too many men wrongly believe that admitting mental distress makes them weak and this kind of self stigma can cost lives.”
The reasons for committing suicide are complex and often very individual, but the tough economic climate and social factors such as insecurities around work and housing, social isolation and substance misuse are felt particularly strongly by young and middle-aged men. For many middle-aged men, financial problems or redundancy can cause feelings of shame and hopelessness, and can feel impossible to overcome.
Young men and women of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community have not yet been mentioned in our debate. The Stonewall survey found that 50% of LGBT young men and women had attempted self-harm. We need to look at the particular needs of that group, both in relation to mental health and suicide and self-harm.
The Government have published a strategy called “Preventing suicide in England—a cross-government outcomes strategy to save lives”. It has two key aims: to reduce the suicide rate in England, and to support people better who have been bereaved or affected by suicide. However, the strategy does not make specific recommendations, so in the reorganised system it will be up to clinical commissioning groups and local directors of public health to take action in local areas. I hope this debate will serve to flag up the widespread concern that is felt about this. There is also an issue to do with spending.
Let me say a few words about Labour’s record on mental health. We made important progress on mental health, with the national service framework early on and then the improving access to psychological therapies programme towards the end of our time in office. Along with cancer and coronary heart disease, we made mental health one of our top three clinical priorities, and by 2007 we were spending more than £1 billion more on mental health services than in 2001, which is a real-terms increase of 25%. However, we believe there was more we could have done, which is why my right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) has taken up this issue strongly. There is no question but that if we have an impact on mental health issues, we also have an impact on the problem of suicide.
Labour would like to see more work done on internet safety, to bear down both on internet bullying and on sites that, tragically, help young people to find out about suicide and may well encourage copycat suicides. We want to rewrite the NHS constitution to give patients the same legal rights to therapies for treating mental illnesses as they already have for drug treatment and treatments for physical illness. We want to ensure that training for all professional staff in the NHS includes dealing with mental health issues. If we are to meet the mental health challenge, and so meet the challenge of
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dealing with increasing levels of suicide, we have to realise that it is not just an issue for the NHS; we have to bring together public services, such as education and the police, to work with business and employers. That is why my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition has announced the formation of a taskforce to draw up a strategic plan for mental health, which will be chaired by Stephen O’Brien, a good friend of mine and the chairman of Barts and the London NHS Trust.
We have heard about the particular problem in Northern Ireland, and it is sad to think that a generation are living almost with a traumatic disorder in the aftermath of the troubles. Again, I congratulate my friends from the Democratic Unionist party on bringing this issue to the Floor of the House in the British Parliament so that we can put it in the wider context and understand the tragedy.
Every suicide is an individual tragedy. Every person who commits suicide is not amenable to anything that government might do; we will always find that two people—two men or two young women—may be almost exactly the same but when faced with precisely the same circumstances they will choose a different path. There is nothing government can do about that, but we can do something about the therapies and mental health services available. We can do something to support and sustain families. When I say “families”, I do not just mean a man and a woman with a certificate and 2.2 children; I mean the many varied patterns of family we find in our society. We can do more to support families and communities. In particular, we can do more to support grieving families, and we can do our best as a House to ensure that, day by day, year by year, fewer people in the British isles feel that they have nothing worth living for.
5.7 pm
David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP): It is good to follow the excellent speech by the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott). A number of points have been raised by right hon. and hon. Members about the whole issue of suicide. The overall figures are a startling reminder of just how serious that subject is in society today. In the whole of the United Kingdom—England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—6,045 people died from suicide in 2011. In Northern Ireland, the level of suicide has increased, with about 4,000 people having committed suicide between 2000 and the end of 2012. It is estimated that the final figure for 2012 will show that close to 300 people died last year in Northern Ireland through suicide. In the first nine months, the figure was 223 and it is estimated that it will reach 300 when the final analysis has been done. Those are startling figures.
The awful impact of suicide on families has been mentioned numerous times, and we cannot mention it enough. It is horrific when we, as elected Members, have to go to homes and give our sympathy to those who have lost loved ones—a child or an older person—through suicide. We mean well as we go to pay our respects, but we can walk out of the house again and go back to spend time with our families whereas those people must live with the impact day in, day out. People ask questions, as we heard earlier, such as, “Why did it happen? Why did we not see something that would have shown us that there were problems or that there was an
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issue that we could have dealt with?” Those questions linger for years; they never leave those people, who think that there must surely have been something they could have done to prevent the suicide. Nothing in life is too serious for us not to sit down and talk about it and not to try to resolve it. The individual who died through suicide might have found that the issues were not as big as they originally thought if they had only sat down and talked to someone about them.
In my constituency of Upper Bann, we have had our share of deaths of younger and older people through suicide. From memory, I would say that the youngest person to die through suicide in my constituency was 12 years of age. That was a very difficult home to go to and we must ask what would make a 12-year-old do that. There must have been something traumatic in that child’s life to make them do what they did, and the mark left on the family has been horrific.
Many organisations across the United Kingdom deal with the issue and offer a lot of counselling. We have a number of them in my constituency. One that I deal with a lot is Yellow Ribbon, run by Dr Arthur Cassidy and a group of fantastic volunteers. I spoke to him earlier this week and over the past two years the organisation has counselled almost 400 people in my area. Its office is in the town of Portadown and many of those who have gone through its doors were referred by their GPs. The organisation has done a lot of work with young people and older people; it has a great passion for the people in the area and it has tried to help to the best of its ability.
As I said, Dr Cassidy is helped by a group of volunteers, and finance is very hard for them. The organisation is run mostly on donations from families, churches and other such organisations. My right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) mentioned that some £30 million has been given to organisations that deal with the issues surrounding suicide, and although a large amount of money has been poured in, the situation is worsening in Northern Ireland. That is very, very worrying. Reference has been made to the legacy of the troubles and the difficulties in the Province. Another generation is emerging that is living with what has happened in the past. Perhaps their parents died in the same way, and it is a copycat: people are trying to copy what has happened. That is an awful blight on society.
Dr Cassidy’s organisation counsels many people, and he does not believe that counselling is working as it ought to work. Perhaps we have to think outside the box and come up with more innovative ways of trying to help people and identify the issues that they face. When he talks to those people, he finds that they have very low self-esteem. Men who have worked for 25 or 30 years in one job are paid off and feel that they are not worth anything. They feel that the family would be better off without them, then tragedy strikes. That is the way it happens. When it does, they believe that it will solve an issue for them, but unfortunately it leaves a major problem for the families who are left to pick up the pieces.
The economic crisis that we are going through is a difficult time. Only at the weekend, I spoke to families who are finding it so hard to make ends meet that in the week at the end of the month when they have to pay their mortgage—if they do not, they could go into
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arrears and lose their home—they do not buy groceries or food to feed the family. In society as a whole, life has become more difficult. Those of us who are in jobs and enjoy the benefits of work may not see it as much, but people who are out of work and who have lost benefits and so on are going through a difficult time.
We need more innovative thinking, and we need to see whether we can help young people and get them into work projects and youth clubs, and help them to meet other young people. We have a lot of work ahead of us to do.
5.17 pm
Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP): Like other hon. Members, I congratulate the hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) and his colleagues on giving the House the opportunity to discuss this very important issue, which, as we have heard, touches many people in many ways, and in ways that they find hard to express or represent. For all the reasons that we understand, it is important that we in the House—again, in our own inadequate and inarticulate way—not only try to express our feelings and represent the feelings of those who have lost people through suicide, but try to feel our way towards some sort of policy answer and structural response to a very serious problem that is growing in many ways.
It is not just because the statistics are better collated that we can say that the problem is growing. There are issues, and people can analyse and compare the different statistical bases over the years. It is a problem that has gradually been able to express itself a bit more. Reference has been made to the fact that it has been a taboo subject. The first time that I heard of suicide was when I was in primary school in the late 1960s, and a family friend committed suicide. She was a great friend of my mother—she was great to all my brothers and sisters whenever we were in her fruit and vegetable shop—and I remember that my mother’s distress as a friend was based not only on all the usual questions that arise from suicide and the loss of a lovely friend. It was also based on the fact that her friend was denied a Christian burial and denied the rites of her own Church. That is what taboo meant then. Luckily, Churches have become more enlightened and many people have helped them to become more enlightened. So we can celebrate the fact that spiritual enlightenment can inform Churches in different ways, and their response to something that they class as a sin can change and develop. That has been very positive and has helped all of us as a community in many ways.
I have found the debate hard. I agreed with many of the points, and I also felt many of the points. I have experienced suicide in my family more than once. I also have experience of suicide by people whom I regard as close—good friends, family friends and so on. All the things that all the right hon. and hon. Members have said are so, so true. We are stuck with that—the questions that will never leave, and the answers that will never come. There are people finding and developing answers, however. Maybe they are not answers to the particular suicide that has grieved me or grieves other members of my family and extended family, but answers as to how we may be able to get on top of the problem and as to how we can avert such tragedy and prevent it from afflicting other people as well.
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In many cases some of those answers are being driven by the families and the very people who have experienced suicide, and by the professionals who have witnessed that, provided support and said, “There has to be a better way. There has to be more that we can do. There has to be more that we can do together.” The hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) referred to the work of the all-party group and the report. I do not speak often at the all-party group, for reasons that people will understand; I find it hard to contain my emotions on these things. One thing struck me as I was listening to people give evidence to the group—people who did not know which area I represented. A few times when people from parts of England were giving evidence about their experience and the things that they were trying to do in their area with their trusts and well-being boards, they referred to what they called the Derry model, which they wanted to see in their area.
That is because in my constituency, in my city of Derry, as other hon. Members have said, we have grave levels of suicide, but there has been a strong community response and the local Western Health and Social Care Trust has tried to engage strongly on it. The trust has a suicide liaison officer, Barry McGail, who does not just work well locally, but is globally active and is part of progressive policy-pushing networks on the subject. When people spoke about the Derry model, part of what they meant was that suicide liaison service.
The service is notified of a suicide by the police within 24 hours and its staff make family contact. They are there at the wakes, able to talk to the family and friends. They are able to bring leaflets and draw attention to other services in a sensitive way, so the issues are immediately picked up and the people who might be most emotionally affected or vulnerable after the suicide—other family members, friends, classmates and so on—can be identified and supported. That has worked well and has helped families through and has helped them feel that they are helping others, which is so important.
More widely in Northern Ireland, we have a self-harm register, another positive development. It is run now by the Public Health Agency and is co-ordinated on a north-south basis. The register provides up-to-date information on people who may have attempted suicide or have self-harmed, so that the right services can be in touch with them or they can at least know that services such as counselling and other opportunities are available for them. Again, that is important in prevention. It is also important to learn the lessons of experiences and making sure that things that are known to one service are not lost to the knowledge and intelligence of another service that may be the right one to provide help.
Some hon. Members have referred to the media in this regard. Of course, the media have particular responsibilities. They need to be very careful and sensitive in how they present any film or TV storylines depicting suicide. If they make suicide simply the natural conclusion to a narrative, that is completely wrong. Unfortunately, too often in the media it seems as though the suicide itself makes the statement, and that is very dangerous. Equally, the media, whether the print media or any other kind, need to be very sensitive in how they cover deaths by suicide. If they treat speculation about clusters—the hon. Member for Bridgend, who is unfortunately no
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longer here, has experienced this directly in her constituency—in an insensitive, invasive, exploitative and sensational way, that can add to the problems. It can not only add to the suffering and stress of families, but put more families at risk of loss and distress.
Over a dozen years ago—this is not a new problem in Northern Ireland—people like Barry McGail worked on developing guidelines for the local media to use. One of the guidelines in circumstances where a suicide took place was for the media not to treat it in a way that linked it to a single dramatic event. I found myself in a situation where there was a suicide in another family that followed a death in my own family. With the support of education professionals, people like Barry McGail, and other people in the Western health board, I tried to prevail on the media not to treat the young man’s suicide as a “Romeo and Juliet”-type story. It was a struggle to get the media to comply with guidelines that had been drawn up sensitively with their own co-operation, and unfortunately we did not succeed in all instances. The media do have responsibilities in this regard.
Then there is the new media, with the digital age and all the opportunities that are there. In relation to the sites that offer methods and techniques of suicide and appear to be encouraging it, Barry McGail says that although most young people will engage in social media, most of them will want to do so positively. As well as trying to police and shut down all the negative, dark sites, we need to think of more ways of making sure that there are far more positive connections and real pathways of assistance and communication. We need to develop new things such as apps that will be suitable for young people, in particular, who could be at risk.
That is not to say that only young people are at risk of suicide. In my constituency and elsewhere, it affects the old and the young—mothers, fathers, and children. However, one of the things that gives me heart is that people who have been through these dark difficulties, and who are still not out of all that darkness, are desperately trying to remedy the situation through different networks, charities and support groups. In my town, they are supported by people such as those at Foyle Search and Rescue, who do such a good job in helping families who suffer following suicide in the river. When we were building the new iconic peace bridge in Derry, they worked with us to prevail on the architects to understand that it needed to be designed in a particular way with rails shaped so as not to lend themselves readily to suicide attempts.
Foyle Search and Rescue houses and accommodates various groups of families who have come together. We also have groups such as Zest for Life, which work so well to counsel people who are suffering from problems, and HURT (Have Your Tomorrows), which particularly helps people who have been suffering from addiction or dependency and have specific vulnerabilities. These groups are succeeding in helping to reduce and to solve the problems, but they constantly come up against funding difficulties. There is also the issue of making sure that all the policies and services can mesh together.
Finally, another positive feature in Northern Ireland is the ASIST—applied suicide intervention skills training— model, which has been borrowed from Canada and is working well where people engage with it. The big problem, however, is getting GPs to engage with it—they
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are not—because they are the vital cog and the key people. The issue has come up in the work of the all-party group on suicide and self-harm prevention. As the hon. Member for Bridgend will know, one of the questions that constantly comes up is: how do we get GPs involved in and engaged with this? Their input is vital and they are vital channels, but in their absence, people’s sense of purpose starts to wane and get weaker.
I am not blaming GPs. Obviously, there are a lot of pressures and demands on them, so they need time out of their practice to do this. We need to see what locum support and other things are available to allow them to play their part in the very good efforts that are being made and to make good the investment being provided by the Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety. Other Members have been right to acknowledge the work of that Department, including that of the current Minister, Edwin Poots, and his permanent secretary, Andrew McCormick. We should also acknowledge the work of the previous devolved Ministers. It is a pity that the ministerial group did not meet for about 18 months, but that does not mean that other good work was not going on. For that work to be done, it needs to be supported, and I hope that today’s debate will help to support and encourage those people who deserve it in their important work on such a huge issue.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans): To resume his seat no later than 5.35 pm, I call Kevan Jones.
5.31 pm
Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab): I congratulate the Democratic Unionist party on securing this debate. It is a privilege to follow a very moving speech by the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan).
The right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) is right to say that the reasons for suicide are complex. The question that most families usually ask is: why? My constituency has a great organisation called If U Care Share, which was set up by Shirley Smith, whose 19-year-old son, Daniel, hanged himself a few years ago, having not showed any of the signs referred to by the right hon. Gentleman. He was, the family thought, a perfectly happy, contented teenager. The family then wondered what they could do. They set up If U Care Share, and Shirley, her husband, Dean, and their children, Ben and Matthew, go into schools to talk to young people about suicide and people’s feelings. People should not be ashamed to open up and talk about their feelings. They also work with youth clubs and the Football Association to get their message across.
The hon. Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew) noted how the highest number of suicides seem to be among men, and the hon. Member for Upper Bann (David Simpson) mentioned the figure of 6,000. I have just looked up the figure and it is about 4,500 who are actually men. As the hon. Member for Pudsey has said, mental health is not an issue that we talk about. I might sound like a broken record, but we need to keep talking about mental health.
Today’s debate is good because, as the hon. Member for Foyle has said, we are talking about one of the great last taboos. The more we talk about mental health and the effect of suicide—not just on the individual and the lost opportunities for them and their family, but on society—the better we can draw up the systems to help.
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There is nothing wrong about talking about mental health, or about people admitting that they need help. As the right hon. Member for Belfast North has said, that is the big step that needs to be taken in most cases. We need to get the message across, not only to young people, but to everyone, that if they are in distress they need to ask for help. In my area, the statistics show that an older generation of men in their 30s and 40s are committing suicide. A reason for that might be the issue of the economic role of men in society, which has been mentioned. Unless we talk about it and put it on the national agenda, we will continue to come up against these issues.
I have just one point to make. We need to join up the services, because the roles of the voluntary sector and the NHS are vital. GP commissioning could have great benefits, but it also brings great risks. I fear that when GPs commission services, mental health services might again be seen as the poor relation. We need a joined-up approach if we are to prevent the tragic losses that are now at a level which most people would say is unacceptable.
I will finish by saying—again, I will sound like a broken record—that the more we speak about these issues, the better it is, because it will help young people and others who are in distress to take the major step of getting the help that is there if they only ask for it.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans): To resume his seat no later than 5.45, I call Mr Jim Shannon.
5.35 pm
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP): I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) on bringing this matter to the House. I also congratulate my hon. Friends and everyone else who has spoken. It is a pleasure to have the opportunity to sum up.
Today is an example of this House working at its best. All Members and all parties have come together and issued a joint call from the Floor of the House for better services. The contributions that Members have made have shown that the House is an immense fount of knowledge. In the short time I have, I intend to highlight the main issues that have been raised.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim introduced the subject very well. He referred to the bereavement caused by suicide. That is an interesting point, because people have to come to terms with what has happened and how it affects them. I had not thought about that until my hon. Friend made the point and I realise that he was right. Other Members have talked about how suicide affects a person’s entire family and their friends. The hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) spoke about anniversaries in particular. I will return to that point in a moment. Those issues have been raised over and over again.
My hon. Friend spoke about the vulnerability of people on coming out of prison. He spoke about the drug and alcohol culture among young men. That is not only an urban problem, but a rural problem. My hon. Friend’s constituency covers both types of area.
Members have said that this must not be a taboo subject and that it is time that we faced up to it. Hopefully we have faced up to it in this debate. The contributions have been immense. We have all met people who hide their depression and anxiety. Members
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have raised the fact that the suicide rate is higher in Northern Ireland than in other parts of the United Kingdom.
Prevention was a key theme in what my hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim said. He referred to the impact that computers and websites can have on children. He challenged us to address these issues. That set the scene clearly for me.
The Minister referred to the steps that are being taken to reduce suicide in England. He referred to the figures for the past year. His commitment to working with regional Assemblies is good news because it means that all parts of the United Kingdom, which are represented here today, are working together.
Some 75% of those who take their lives are not known to Government agencies. I did not know that before this debate started. We can look for the signs in people, such as whether they have depression. Like all hon. Members, I have met people over the years who unfortunately fall into that category.
The hon. Member for Bridgend gave a detailed, decisive and, I would say, masterful contribution to the debate and I thank her for that. She displayed great knowledge about the rates of suicide among 30 to 40-year-olds and among females.
The question that everybody asks themselves—I have asked myself this question when friends of mine have died—is, “What could I have done to prevent it?” You search your heart, you search your soul and you almost put yourself into the grave worrying about what more you could have done. Every Member who has spoken has mentioned that. Behind that question there is perhaps a bit of guilt as well.
The right hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) spoke about the vital importance of support groups and Papyrus in particular. I am conscious that I am summing up and not making a contribution, but I just want to say that the LINK group in Newtownards does a magnificent job to help people who are considering suicide and those who have depression.
The hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon) spoke about suicide prevention and the moneys available in Northern Ireland, which gives that leadership, as well as the moneys that are set aside. The hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) spoke on behalf of soldiers who leave the service and feel vulnerable, and as Members of Parliament we have all heard such cases.
In an intervention, the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) mentioned the sensitivity surrounding the coroner’s report, and there is a lesson there for other parts of the United Kingdom after what has happened in Northern Ireland. The hon. Member for Bridgend spoke about the use of sport for young people and the importance of correct wording in dramas and soaps, and that valid point was also made by the hon. Member for Foyle in a passionate and real way. A “suicide champion” was referred to, and the need to extend that across the United Kingdom, and the comments and points of view expressed contain lessons for all regions in the United Kingdom.
Mark Durkan:
I am entirely comfortable with everything the hon. Gentleman is saying about how we need better to co-ordinate and mesh this work across the UK and
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use all means to do that. Of course, the problem is wider in these islands. Recently, Shane McEntee, a Government Minister in the south of Ireland, took his own life, and there are serious problems that need to be addressed even at school level. Does the hon. Gentleman recognise that this issue should perhaps be prioritised at the level of the British-Irish Council? Perhaps a debate such as this could take place at the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly so that we gather all the experiences and good practice that has come out of the bad experiences in all parts of these islands?
Jim Shannon: I agree, and I think all Members of this House feel the same. I commend the hon. Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew), who referred to bullying at school and the importance of family when he was working in a hospice. He mentioned the difference between death and death from suicide—both very tragic and real issues—and spoke about the red socialist and the blue Tory working together. That is good and the way it should be in this House, doing the best we can.
My right hon. Friend and colleague the Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) gave a detailed account of what happens in north Belfast which, along with west Belfast, unfortunately has a reputation for the highest suicide rates in Northern Ireland. He referred to the hard work done by many people in the PIPS group—the Public Initiative for Prevention of Suicide and Self-Harm—FASA, churches and many other groups that do tremendous work. Queen’s university has made a study of north Belfast, and if my right hon. Friend ever needs facts or evidence of what is wrong and how to address it, those are issues we must consider.
I have in my notes, “Coping with peace after years of violence”, and unfortunately in north Belfast, and perhaps west Belfast, that is one of the issues, and my right hon. Friend clearly addressed that point. He and other Members referred to copycat suicides, and the hon. Member for Bridgend mentioned anniversaries. The work done by the Samaritans in A and E was mentioned, and, as my right hon. Friend said, there are lessons to be learned for us all.
The shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott), said that although any death is tragic, suicide is the worst as it poses many questions for the family left behind, and she spoke about the issue very clearly and honestly. She referred to the good work done by Labour when it was in power. I know that to be the case and I look forward to more such work.
My hon. Friend the Member for Upper Bann (David Simpson) referred to the increased number of suicides in Northern Ireland—300—and mentioned Yellow Ribbon and the 400 people helped by that organisation in one year. Four hundred people sought help, and volunteers and groups were there to help.
I thank the hon. Member for Foyle for his passionate, powerful and revealing speech that moved us all, and he put forward a number of ideas. The Maiden City has a suicide awareness day; perhaps it could be a model for the rest of the United Kingdom. He also referred to a self-harm register. Although not many people mentioned that issue in Northern Ireland, the British Medical Association referred to the fact that a third of those who self harm commit suicide, so that issue is important. He mentioned the relationship between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.
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Last but not least, I remember when the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) spoke about mental health in the Chamber some time ago—I have never forgotten that speech. He spoke again today with passion and belief, and with the inner knowledge that comes from his experience. He has been able to describe that for all hon. Members in the Chamber.
We should be clear that we need the voluntary services and the Government to work together. I thank everyone for their valuable and sensitive contributions in the Chamber today. The debate has been excellent.
5.44 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Mr Edward Timpson): I have a short 10 minutes to close the debate. I thank all hon. Members who have spoken—they have made well informed, serious contributions to this excellent and deeply insightful debate on this hugely important subject. As the Prime Minister said today at Prime Minister’s questions in commending DUP Members for tabling the motion, we, as a society, do not talk enough about suicide and the impact it has on families. By being up-front about its often complex causes, we can be better at recognising the signs that lead to suicide and at preventing more lives from being taken in future.
As my hon. Friend the Minister of State, Department for Health, said on behalf of the Government, every life taken by suicide is one too many. When that person is a child, the tragedy is merely multiplied. I am speaking as the Minister with responsibility for children and families as well as a co-chair of the UK Council for Child Internet Safety. I shall briefly explain what the Department for Education is doing to help children as part of a cross-government outcomes strategy to prevent suicide, but before I do so I wanted to mention one or two of the contributions to the debate that have been thought-provoking not just for me, but I am sure for many of the people watching and listening.
I acknowledge the brave and touching speech made by the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan), who said that suicide has deeply affected not only his community, but his family. I know it was a difficult speech for him to make, but those suicides have left a lot of unanswered questions for him and many others. It leads to the conclusion that we must do more. We must acknowledge that we need to place huge importance on ensuring that the support made available to families who are grieving the loss of someone in such circumstances is at the heart of the services and support we offer in our communities.
The hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) made a powerful and compassionate speech to open the debate. He said we should not sweep suicide under the carpet—that we cannot run away from it and must face up to it. The situation in Northern Ireland is particularly concerning. He highlighted the fact that 289 people took their own lives in 2011. As he said, it is a personal tragedy for anyone who comes to that decision. We must bear in mind that it can often be triggered by what can seem like a minor or innocuous event. This is a complex issue, and there is very rarely a single factor, although mental health is often a central feature of suicide cases. We need to understand and be better aware of all the different events and pressures on people’s lives that can contribute to them coming to that state of mind.
6 Feb 2013 : Column 364
The hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon), the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on suicide and self-harm prevention, made, as usual, a highly knowledgeable speech and asked the question we should all ask ourselves: what causes suicide and self-harm to feature in people’s lives in the first place? Her point about raising awareness across agencies—she mentioned the Department for Work and Pensions as one such agency—was absolutely right. I will take it away and ensure that other Departments think carefully about how they train their staff so they understand the signs they need to look for and can point people in the direction of the support that we know is out there.
On the hon. Lady’s point about the coroner’s narrative verdicts, the Ministry of Justice is, as she said, looking into the matter. I understand that the Office for National Statistics and the chief coroner will attend the next meeting of the Government’s national suicide prevention strategy advisory group—narrative verdicts are on the agenda—which is coming up next month. Hopefully, therefore, progress can be made.
She also mentioned the “Help is at Hand” resource for people bereaved by suicide and other sudden traumatic deaths. It is an excellent piece of work that is clear and accessible for those who want support. We are distributing it, and it is on the Department of Health website. I think that approximately 1,000 copies are going out each month, but we need to do better and improve distribution. We are working with coroners’ offices to make sure we achieve that.
My hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew) talked about the moving memory he has of someone he lost at school through suicide. He also talked about his work with the hospice movement. We need to ensure we understand that attitudes to suicide sometimes impact more deeply than we realise. Cyber-bullying is a particularly new phenomenon and it is more and more difficult for young people to escape its awful bearing on their own lives. To understand it better, we need to work closely with young people, and to listen to them and their experiences, rather than assuming that we know the answers ourselves.
In the five minutes I have left, I want to touch on what the Department for Education is doing to try to raise awareness and improve our response, particularly with regard to child internet safety. The new suicide prevention strategy for England, which was published last September, has already been referred to. It is right that children and young people have an important place in that strategy. We should all be extremely concerned about the suicide rate among teenagers, even though it is below that of the general population.
To help young people get the support they need and to be able to talk through their problems, we continue to support, to the tune of £11.2 million between 2011 and 2015, the valuable work done by ChildLine in providing children with free and confidential support in conjunction with the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children helpline.
The strategy recognises—a point raised by a number of hon. Members—that the media have a significant influence on behaviour and attitudes, particularly for teenagers. In 2009—the hon. Member for Bridgend will be acutely aware of this—the Press Complaints Commission highlighted the impact of insensitive and inappropriate reporting of suicides. We all have to take children’s
6 Feb 2013 : Column 365
safety extremely seriously, particularly to protect them from any harmful or inappropriate online content. We are clear that we favour a self-regulatory model for the internet industry, but that is as much a pragmatic response as a philosophical response. We have heard today that the law makes it clear that people who intentionally encourage suicide via websites hosted in the UK are at risk of prosecution, and, to be absolutely clear, what is illegal offline is illegal online.
We need to do more, and through the UK Council for Child Internet Safety board we are trying to make sure that all internet service providers step up to the plate and realise their responsibility. They need to ensure that these types of sites are kept away from young people, and that young people’s ability to have direct contact with them is removed altogether—they are truly horrible sites to have anywhere near one’s home.
As the Minister with responsibility for UKCCIS, I am leading the work looking at how ISPs, filtering companies, device manufacturers and public wi-fi, which we find in our local coffee shops and retailers—all the information and communications technology industries—can work together to make sure harmful content is filtered out wherever our children are. With nine out of 10 children having access to the internet in their own home and with children aged between 12 and 15 proportionately more likely to own a smartphone than their parents, this issue is only going to get bigger rather than smaller.
There are good examples of the internet industry working with the charitable sector, and that will be a key element as we go forward. As the hon. Member for South Antrim said, Google searches on the word “suicide” will return details of the Samaritans at the top of the results—a real step forward—and Facebook has teamed up with the Samaritans to make it easier to report concerns about a friend who might be considering self-harm or suicide. We must do more, however. As the hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) mentioned, yesterday was the 10th safer internet day. I met a group of young people who were discussing the excellent “Have Your Say” survey. Some 24,000 school-aged children contributed to the largest ever survey about what they expect online. The thing they wanted most was to be safe. That is something we need to deliver for young people, because they are the ones exposed to what adults provide for them.
In conclusion, this has been an excellent debate. I am sure that many people will be encouraged that the House takes the issue extremely seriously and can work together to keep people as safe as possible from the ravages that suicide can bring to families.
That this House recognises that the number of suicides in the UK, particularly amongst young people, represents a major challenge for government and society; acknowledges the work that is taking place to address the issue; calls for even more urgency to be shown in seeking to reduce the rate of suicides; notes the danger posed in particular by websites which promote or give information about harmful behaviours such as suicide; and calls upon the Government to adequately resource and promote child and adolescent digital safety.
6 Feb 2013 : Column 366
Canterbury City Council Bill
Further consideration of Lords amendments
5.55 pm
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle): I remind the House of the fact that we are debating the Lords amendments to four different private Bills simultaneously, because they are close to identical, as are the amendments made in another place. Although we will debate the amendments together, the questions to dispose of the Lords amendments will be put on each Bill in turn.
Interpretation
Amendment proposed (31 January): C6, page 2, leave out lines 17 to 27.—(Stuart Andrew.)
Question again proposed, That this House agrees with Lords amendment C6.
Mr Deputy Speaker: When the debate was adjourned last Thursday, we were considering the second group of Lords amendments and the amendments to them. Mr Chope was speaking on Lords amendment C6 to the Canterbury City Council Bill. With this amendment, we were also considering the following:
Lords amendments C7 and C8, and C9 and amendments (a) to (h) thereto to the Canterbury City Council Bill.
Lords amendments L3 and L4, and L5 and amendments (a) to (h) thereto to the Leeds City Council Bill.
Lords amendments N3 to N5, and N6 and amendments (a) to (i) thereto to the Nottingham City Council Bill.
Lords amendments R4 to R7, and R8 and amendments (a) to (i) thereto to the Reading Borough Council Bill.
Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con): When we adjourned proceedings at 3.27 pm last Thursday, we were less than an hour into the debate on these amendments.
Mr Deputy Speaker: Order. Perhaps I can help the hon. Gentleman. He had just said:
“I do not need to speak any longer on this group of amendments”.—[Official Report, 31 January 2013; Vol. 557, c. 1120.]
Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con): He’s got a second wind.
Mr Deputy Speaker: I can assure him he hasn’t.
Mr Chope: I have no intention, Mr Deputy Speaker, of trying your patience. Given, however, that a few parliamentary colleagues are still hanging around, I thought that I would put on the record an exchange between my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) and the deputy Chief Whip during Monday’s proceedings, when it was made clear that, although it was possible this debate might start at 4 o’clock and continue until 7 o’clock, if it ran late, it would not be of any significance, because there would be a one-line Whip and no interference in our affairs, whether from the Government or anybody else. I want to make it clear to anybody who thinks that they have to still hang around in the Chamber because this is whipped business, that it is not.
6 Feb 2013 : Column 367
Philip Davies: To clarify that point, a message has gone out from the Whip’s Office to all colleagues saying that we are officially on a one-line Whip.
Mr Chope: I am pleased to have that confirmation. It means that our attendance is voluntary.
Since we have a new Minister, I hope that she will take the opportunity to expand on what her ministerial colleague said briefly in an intervention in the previous debate. In other words, will she explain the full implications of the Government’s consultation paper, in which the Government said they had no choice but to abolish the Pedlars Act 1871 to comply with the European services directive? I hope that she will explain how, if that is correct, the Government can support amendment C9 passed in their lordships House.
In conclusion, I hope that I will be able to move formally amendment (g) to Lords amendment C9, because it is the most telling amendment down in my name in this group of amendments. Amendment (g) would remove the provision allowing designation in order to prevent obstruction of the highway. That is such a wide provision that it effectively reintroduces by the back door the touting provisions in clause 11, which Lords amendment 15 would remove. Anybody could be thought to be able potentially to obstruct the highway; therefore, the local authorities concerned would be able to designate areas where no activity could take place whatever, which would be a total abuse. That is why I would like the opportunity in due course to test the will of the House on amendment (g).
6 pm
Mr Deputy Speaker: The Question is, That this House agrees with the Lords in their amendment C6 to the Canterbury City Council—
Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con) rose—
Mr Deputy Speaker: Mr Nuttall, I was waiting, but you did not jump up as quickly as you normally do. I do not want to stop you from having at least a minute.
Mr Chope: We want the Minister to speak as well.
Mr Nuttall: Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I hope we have a chance to hear from the Minister on the points that have been raised. I am sure she will have read what my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) said in opening the debate last Thursday.
I rise to speak to this group of Lords amendments and the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend for debate in the House last Thursday. I thank him for the comprehensive way he set out the amendments in that debate and in his concluding remarks today. Let me also say how grateful I am for the work undertaken in the other place by the noble Lords. They have thoroughly and efficiently considered all the issues involved in these Bills. Their noble lordships were not prepared simply to nod these Bills through, as some might have feared, including—I have to say, with much regret—myself. One could well have forgiven their lordships for thinking that as these Bills had been trundling along the parliamentary legislative pathway for some time—albeit
6 Feb 2013 : Column 368
at the pace of a rather arthritic snail—there could not possibly be any purpose in subjecting them to further detailed scrutiny.
As it is, their noble lordships recognised the importance of pedlars in our society, as those of us who take an interest in these matters in this place do too. The place of pedlars in the life of our nation dates back to the time of Chaucer. Their noble lordships considered the general principles behind the introduction of these Bills and how the detail of the new proposed laws would operate in practice. Pedlars are the ultimate in micro-businesses. The ability for someone with a relatively small amount of capital to start a business travelling from place to place buying and selling goods has been the starting point for many of our great businesses, including some household names.
It would seem that the local authorities promoting the four private Bills before us today were at least partly motivated by a wish to protect the revenue they received from licensed street traders. As right hon. and hon. Members will be aware, it was suggested in the other place that these Bills were seeking to achieve the “total eradication of pedlars” from the streets of the cities of Canterbury, Leeds and Nottingham and the borough of Reading. As hon. Members will be aware, there is a great deal of difference between a pedlar and a street trader. It was submitted that the reason why it was thought necessary to try to remove pedlars from those three cities and one borough was to prevent the streets from being obstructed by pedlars as they stopped to sell their wares. Their lordships did not accept that it was appropriate to remove pedlars completely, but they did think it appropriate that the size of the trolley used by pedlars should be limited. Amendment C9 seeks to do just that. It is worth noting the words used by Baroness Knight of Collingtree, who chaired the Select Committee established in the other place to consider the Bills, to justify amendment C9. Referring to the fact that counsel for the local authorities promoting the Bills had produced photographs supporting their contention that the pedlars were causing unacceptable congestion, she said:
“The members of the committee asked for evidence and they produced photographs of their streets, which of course were very crowded. We scrutinised them carefully and asked questions.”
“We concluded that nothing we had been shown, or told, proved the case that the local authorities were making.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 3 December 2012; Vol. 741, c. 445.]
That is a most telling statement. I submit that it provides proof to the House of what my hon. Friends and I have been trying to establish from the outset—namely, that the Bills are far from straightforward. It should not be taken for granted that the case for the legislation has been proven, or that the Bills should simply be nodded through the House without detailed scrutiny. What has happened in the other place has largely justified the stance taken by my hon. Friends when the Bills were previously considered in this House.
We have already seen how, as a result of the first group of amendments, clauses 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10, which deal with seizure, forfeiture and the payment of compensation, were all taken out of the Bill completely. They were not amended, or even slightly modified; they were removed in their entirety. In this group, amendment C8 deletes clause 4 completely and amendment C9
6 Feb 2013 : Column 369
deletes clause 5 altogether and replaces it with an entirely new clause whose purpose is completely different from the original one.
It is worth noting the details of the proposed new clause. It sets out in great detail the nature of the trolley that a pedlar would be permitted to use. It gives overall dimensions for the trolley when it is being used, but it also—rather unnecessarily, in my opinion—gives details of the size of the trolley when empty. I am not sure what the relevance of that could be. Surely the overall dimensions set out in proposed new paragraph (2C) would be sufficient. Provided the trolley did not exceed a width of 0.88 metres, a depth of 0.83 metres or a height of 1.63 metres, I fail to see how it could be prejudicial to the council or to the users of the highway. I also fail to see how it would prevent an obstruction from being caused if the trolley were of a different size from that set out in proposed new paragraph (2B), which specifically states that it should not exceed a width of 0.75 metres, a depth of 0.5 metres and a height of 1.25 metres.
There is no explanation of why those precise, detailed figures have been chosen. What is the special significance of a width of 0.88 metres? Why not a width of—
Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con) claimed to move the closure (Standing Order No. 36)
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle): Shame it may be, but I think the time has come. I enjoy hearing the hon. Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall), but I do not think there is anything new in what he says, so I will accept the closure.
Question put forthwith, That the Question be now put.
The House proceeded to a Division.
Mr Deputy Speaker: I ask the Serjeant at Arms to investigate the delay in the No Lobby. I am worried that we have lost four Members. Will she try to retrieve them to get the vote through?
The House having divided:
Ayes 258, Noes 7.
Division No. 155]
[
6.9 pm
AYES
Abbott, Ms Diane
Adams, Nigel
Aldous, Peter
Alexander, Heidi
Allen, Mr Graham
Amess, Mr David
Ashworth, Jonathan
Bacon, Mr Richard
Bailey, Mr Adrian
Bain, Mr William
Baldwin, Harriett
Barker, rh Gregory
Barwell, Gavin
Bayley, Hugh
Benn, rh Hilary
Berger, Luciana
Betts, Mr Clive
Bingham, Andrew
Blackman, Bob
Blenkinsop, Tom
Blomfield, Paul
Blunkett, rh Mr David
Boles, Nick
Bottomley, Sir Peter
Bradley, Karen
Brady, Mr Graham
Brake, rh Tom
Brazier, Mr Julian
Brennan, Kevin
Bridgen, Andrew
Brine, Steve
Brokenshire, James
Brooke, Annette
Brown, Lyn
Brown, rh Mr Nicholas
Bruce, Fiona
Buck, Ms Karen
Buckland, Mr Robert
Burns, Conor
Burt, Alistair
Burt, Lorely
Cable, rh Vince
Campbell, Mr Alan
Campbell, Mr Ronnie
Clappison, Mr James
Clark, rh Greg
Clarke, rh Mr Kenneth
Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey
Coaker, Vernon
Coffey, Dr Thérèse
Colvile, Oliver
Connarty, Michael
Crabb, Stephen
Crausby, Mr David
Creagh, Mary
Creasy, Stella
Crouch, Tracey
Cryer, John
Cunningham, Sir Tony
Dakin, Nic
David, Wayne
Davidson, Mr Ian
Davies, Geraint
Davis, rh Mr David
Docherty, Thomas
Doughty, Stephen
Doyle-Price, Jackie
Drax, Richard
Dugher, Michael
Duncan, rh Mr Alan
Eagle, Ms Angela
Edwards, Jonathan
Ellis, Michael
Ellwood, Mr Tobias
Evans, Chris
Evans, Graham
Evennett, Mr David
Fabricant, Michael
Fallon, rh Michael
Field, Mark
Flynn, Paul
Foster, rh Mr Don
Francois, rh Mr Mark
Freer, Mike
Garnier, Sir Edward
Gauke, Mr David
Gilbert, Stephen
Glen, John
Goodwill, Mr Robert
Graham, Richard
Grant, Mrs Helen
Greatrex, Tom
Greening, rh Justine
Griffith, Nia
Gummer, Ben
Gwynne, Andrew
Hain, rh Mr Peter
Hames, Duncan
Hamilton, Mr David
Hancock, Matthew
Hands, Greg
Hanson, rh Mr David
Harper, Mr Mark
Harris, Rebecca
Haselhurst, rh Sir Alan
Hayes, Mr John
Heald, Oliver
Heaton-Harris, Chris
Hemming, John
Hendrick, Mark
Hilling, Julie
Hoban, Mr Mark
Hodge, rh Margaret
Hollingbery, George
Hopkins, Kelvin
Hopkins, Kris
Howell, John
Hunt, Tristram
Hurd, Mr Nick
Irranca-Davies, Huw
Jackson, Mr Stewart
James, Margot
Javid, Sajid
Jenkin, Mr Bernard
Johnson, Diana
Johnson, Joseph
Jones, rh Mr David
Jones, Graham
Jones, Mr Kevan
Joyce, Eric
Kawczynski, Daniel
Kirby, Simon
Knight, rh Mr Greg
Lancaster, Mark
Lansley, rh Mr Andrew
Latham, Pauline
Laws, rh Mr David
Lazarowicz, Mark
Leadsom, Andrea
Lee, Jessica
Leech, Mr John
Lefroy, Jeremy
Leslie, Chris
Lewis, Brandon
Lidington, rh Mr David
Lilley, rh Mr Peter
Lloyd, Stephen
Long, Naomi
Lord, Jonathan
Loughton, Tim
Mactaggart, Fiona
Mann, John
McCann, Mr Michael
McCarthy, Kerry
McCartney, Jason
McClymont, Gregg
McDonnell, John
Menzies, Mark
Miller, rh Maria
Milton, Anne
Mitchell, rh Mr Andrew
Morden, Jessica
Morgan, Nicky
Morris, David
Morris, Grahame M.
(Easington)
Mosley, Stephen
Mudie, Mr George
Mulholland, Greg
Mundell, rh David
Munt, Tessa
Murray, Ian
Murrison, Dr Andrew
Newmark, Mr Brooks
Nokes, Caroline
Ollerenshaw, Eric
Onwurah, Chi
Opperman, Guy
Ottaway, Richard
Owen, Albert
Parish, Neil
Patel, Priti
Percy, Andrew
Pincher, Christopher
Poulter, Dr Daniel
Prisk, Mr Mark
Pritchard, Mark
Pugh, John
Randall, rh Mr John
Reckless, Mark
Redwood, rh Mr John
Reid, Mr Alan
Reynolds, Jonathan
Robathan, rh Mr Andrew
Ruffley, Mr David
Russell, Sir Bob
Rutley, David
Sanders, Mr Adrian
Sandys, Laura
Sawford, Andy
Scott, Mr Lee
Shannon, Jim
Shapps, rh Grant
Sheerman, Mr Barry
Sheridan, Jim
Shuker, Gavin
Simpson, Mr Keith
Skidmore, Chris
Skinner, Mr Dennis
Smith, Miss Chloe
Smith, Sir Robert
Soubry, Anna
Spellar, rh Mr John
Spencer, Mr Mark
Stephenson, Andrew
Stewart, Iain
Stewart, Rory
Stride, Mel
Stunell, rh Andrew
Sturdy, Julian
Swayne, rh Mr Desmond
Swinson, Jo
Swire, rh Mr Hugo
Syms, Mr Robert
Tami, Mark
Tapsell, rh Sir Peter
Thornberry, Emily
Thurso, John
Timms, rh Stephen
Timpson, Mr Edward
Tomlinson, Justin
Tredinnick, David
Turner, Karl
Twigg, Derek
Uppal, Paul
Vaizey, Mr Edward
Vara, Mr Shailesh
Vaz, Valerie
Vickers, Martin
Walker, Mr Charles
Wallace, Mr Ben
Watts, Mr Dave
Weatherley, Mike
Webb, Steve
Wharton, James
White, Chris
Whittaker, Craig
Whittingdale, Mr John
Wiggin, Bill
Williams, Mr Mark
Williamson, Chris
Williamson, Gavin
Wilson, Phil
Winterton, rh Ms Rosie
Wollaston, Dr Sarah
Wright, David
Wright, Mr Iain
Wright, Simon
Young, rh Sir George
Tellers for the Ayes:
Stuart Andrew
and
Andrew Jones
NOES
Bone, Mr Peter
Davies, Philip
Dodds, rh Mr Nigel
Donaldson, rh Mr Jeffrey M.
Hollobone, Mr Philip
Mills, Nigel
Rees-Mogg, Jacob
Tellers for the Noes:
Mr Christopher Chope
and
Mr David Nuttall
Question accordingly agreed to.
6 Feb 2013 : Column 370
6 Feb 2013 : Column 371
Question put accordingly, That this House agrees with Lords amendment C6.
Provision of services
Motion made, and Question put, That this House agrees with Lords amendment C8.—(Mr Brazier.)
The House divided:
Ayes 255, Noes 4.
Division No. 156]
[
6.25 pm
AYES
Adams, Nigel
Aldous, Peter
Alexander, Heidi
Allen, Mr Graham
Amess, Mr David
Ashworth, Jonathan
Bacon, Mr Richard
Bailey, Mr Adrian
Bain, Mr William
Baker, Steve
Barker, rh Gregory
Barwell, Gavin
Bayley, Hugh
Benn, rh Hilary
Benyon, Richard
Betts, Mr Clive
Bingham, Andrew
Blackman, Bob
Blenkinsop, Tom
Blomfield, Paul
Blunkett, rh Mr David
Boles, Nick
Bone, Mr Peter
Bottomley, Sir Peter
Bradley, Karen
Brady, Mr Graham
Brake, rh Tom
Brazier, Mr Julian
Brennan, Kevin
Bridgen, Andrew
Brine, Steve
Brokenshire, James
Brooke, Annette
Brown, Lyn
Brown, rh Mr Nicholas
Brown, Mr Russell
Browne, Mr Jeremy
Bruce, Fiona
Buckland, Mr Robert
Burns, Conor
Burt, Alistair
Burt, Lorely
Cable, rh Vince
Campbell, Mr Alan
Campbell, Mr Ronnie
Clappison, Mr James
Clark, rh Greg
Clarke, rh Mr Kenneth
Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey
Coaker, Vernon
Coffey, Dr Thérèse
Colvile, Oliver
Connarty, Michael
Crabb, Stephen
Crausby, Mr David
Creagh, Mary
Creasy, Stella
Crouch, Tracey
Cryer, John
Cunningham, Sir Tony
Dakin, Nic
David, Wayne
Davidson, Mr Ian
Davies, David T. C.
(Monmouth)
Davies, Geraint
Davis, rh Mr David
Djanogly, Mr Jonathan
Docherty, Thomas
Dodds, rh Mr Nigel
Doughty, Stephen
Doyle-Price, Jackie
Drax, Richard
Dugher, Michael
Duncan, rh Mr Alan
Eagle, Ms Angela
Edwards, Jonathan
Ellis, Michael
Ellwood, Mr Tobias
Evans, Chris
Evans, Graham
Evennett, Mr David
Fabricant, Michael
Fallon, rh Michael
Field, Mark
Foster, rh Mr Don
Francois, rh Mr Mark
Freer, Mike
Fuller, Richard
Garnier, Sir Edward
Gauke, Mr David
Gilbert, Stephen
Glen, John
Goodwill, Mr Robert
Graham, Richard
Grant, Mrs Helen
Greatrex, Tom
Green, rh Damian
Greening, rh Justine
Griffith, Nia
Gwynne, Andrew
Hain, rh Mr Peter
Hames, Duncan
Hamilton, Mr David
Hands, Greg
Hanson, rh Mr David
Harper, Mr Mark
Harris, Rebecca
Hayes, Mr John
Heald, Oliver
Healey, rh John
Heaton-Harris, Chris
Hemming, John
Hendrick, Mark
Hilling, Julie
Hollingbery, George
Hopkins, Kelvin
Hopkins, Kris
Howarth, rh Mr George
Howell, John
Hurd, Mr Nick
Jackson, Mr Stewart
James, Margot
Jamieson, Cathy
Javid, Sajid
Jenkin, Mr Bernard
Johnson, Diana
Johnson, Joseph
Jones, rh Mr David
Jones, Graham
Jones, Mr Kevan
Joyce, Eric
Kawczynski, Daniel
Kirby, Simon
Knight, rh Mr Greg
Lancaster, Mark
Lansley, rh Mr Andrew
Latham, Pauline
Laws, rh Mr David
Lazarowicz, Mark
Leadsom, Andrea
Lee, Jessica
Leech, Mr John
Leigh, Mr Edward
Leslie, Chris
Lewis, Brandon
Lidington, rh Mr David
Long, Naomi
Lord, Jonathan
Loughton, Tim
Mactaggart, Fiona
Mann, John
Marsden, Mr Gordon
McCann, Mr Michael
McCarthy, Kerry
McCartney, Jason
McClymont, Gregg
McDonnell, John
Meale, Sir Alan
Menzies, Mark
Miller, rh Maria
Mills, Nigel
Milton, Anne
Mitchell, rh Mr Andrew
Morden, Jessica
Morgan, Nicky
Morris, David
Morris, Grahame M.
(Easington)
Mosley, Stephen
Mudie, Mr George
Mulholland, Greg
Mundell, rh David
Munt, Tessa
Murray, Ian
Murrison, Dr Andrew
Newmark, Mr Brooks
Nokes, Caroline
Ollerenshaw, Eric
Onwurah, Chi
Opperman, Guy
Ottaway, Richard
Owen, Albert
Parish, Neil
Patel, Priti
Percy, Andrew
Pincher, Christopher
Poulter, Dr Daniel
Pound, Stephen
Prisk, Mr Mark
Pritchard, Mark
Pugh, John
Randall, rh Mr John
Reckless, Mark
Redwood, rh Mr John
Rees-Mogg, Jacob
Reid, Mr Alan
Reynolds, Jonathan
Robathan, rh Mr Andrew
Ruffley, Mr David
Russell, Sir Bob
Rutley, David
Sanders, Mr Adrian
Sandys, Laura
Sawford, Andy
Scott, Mr Lee
Shannon, Jim
Shapps, rh Grant
Sheerman, Mr Barry
Sheridan, Jim
Simpson, Mr Keith
Skidmore, Chris
Skinner, Mr Dennis
Smith, Miss Chloe
Smith, Sir Robert
Soubry, Anna
Spellar, rh Mr John
Spencer, Mr Mark
Stephenson, Andrew
Stewart, Iain
Stewart, Rory
Stride, Mel
Stunell, rh Andrew
Sturdy, Julian
Swayne, rh Mr Desmond
Swinson, Jo
Syms, Mr Robert
Tami, Mark
Tapsell, rh Sir Peter
Thurso, John
Timms, rh Stephen
Timpson, Mr Edward
Tomlinson, Justin
Turner, Karl
Twigg, Derek
Uppal, Paul
Vaizey, Mr Edward
Vickers, Martin
Walker, Mr Charles
Wallace, Mr Ben
Watts, Mr Dave
Weatherley, Mike
Webb, Steve
Wharton, James
White, Chris
Whittaker, Craig
Wiggin, Bill
Williams, Mr Mark
Williamson, Chris
Williamson, Gavin
Wilson, Phil
Winterton, rh Ms Rosie
Wollaston, Dr Sarah
Wright, David
Wright, Mr Iain
Wright, Simon
Young, rh Sir George
Tellers for the Ayes:
Stuart Andrew
and
Andrew Jones
NOES
Davies, Philip
Donaldson, rh Mr Jeffrey M.
Flynn, Paul
Hollobone, Mr Philip
Tellers for the Noes:
Mr Christopher Chope
and
Mr David Nuttall
Question accordingly agreed to.
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Pedlars
Amendment (g) proposed to Lords amendment C9.—(Mr Chope.)
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Question put, That the amendment be made.
Mr Deputy Speaker stated that he thought that the Noes had it; and, on his decision being challenged, it appeared to him that the Division was unnecessarily claimed, and he accordingly called upon the Members who challenged and who supported his decision successively to rise in their places, (Standing Order No.40).
The Deputy Speaker declared that the Noes had it, five Members only who challenged his decision having stood up.
Question accordingly negatived.
Lords amendments C9 to C14 agreed to.
Touting
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House agrees with Lords amendment C15.—(Mr Brazier.)
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle): With this it will be convenient to take Lords amendments C16, C17, C19, C28, C31, C2 and C1.
6.45 pm
Mr Chope: I would like to speak to this group of Lords amendments. I find it very surprising that we have not had an introductory speech to explain why it is thought that the amendments should be accepted by this House and to give some background to them.
Mr Brazier: Will my hon. Friend give way?
Hon. Members: Is it a point of order?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle): Order. It is a point of order, and the answer is that it is up to the Member in charge whether he wishes to speak to the amendments or not, and obviously he did not. Does anybody wish to speak to them?
Mr Chope: I wish to speak to them.
Mr Deputy Speaker: Well, Mr Chope, I am desperate to hear from you.
Mr Chope: This Lords amendment deals with touting. A whole lot of other consequential amendments are included in the group. Mr Deputy Speaker, you in your wisdom—[Interruption.]
Mr Deputy Speaker: Order. Can we have a little silence? As we wish to hear Mr Chope, will Members be quiet if they are leaving the Chamber?
Mr Chope: Mr Deputy Speaker, you in your wisdom accepted that these Lords amendments, which relate to touting, should be dealt with in a separate group, and that is what we are discussing. The lead amendment would remove clause 11, and the subsequent amendments deal with consequential matters relating to the touting provision. When we discussed this previously, I cannot remember how many years ago, a lot of concern was expressed.
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Mr Brazier: I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way; he is always courteous in debate. He will recall that these amendments were promised by me in the Commons because he asked for them, and introduced in the Lords exactly as we promised, so I am very surprised that he wants to debate them again.
Mr Chope: We now have, after a bit of pressure, an admission from my hon. Friend that he has done exactly what he said he would do by ensuring that the amendments would be moved successfully in their lordships House. I and my parliamentary colleagues who have fought so valiantly to remove the most pernicious parts of these Bills can now say that, because of the work that we have been doing in this House over many years, the Bills are much improved as a result of these Lords amendments.
As my hon. Friend has said, he promised Lords amendment C15 to this House when these Bills were given their Third Reading. He has honoured that undertaking by ensuring that it was tabled in the other place. It is fair to say that we both think that the other place’s debate took a lot longer than expected. On the basis of the proposed amendments, we had expected the Bills to go through the other place relatively quickly but they did not because their lordships decided to look at them in a lot more detail. As a result, we received a series of Lords amendments, some of which we discussed earlier, that made a significant difference to the Bills—not just to the touting provision, but to the definition of pedlars. Therefore, when I seek the indulgence of the House, it is in order to ensure that my hon. and right hon. Friends and the Opposition realise that this has been a very worthwhile exercise. Although a lot of colleagues have consistently voted against the ideas that I and a number of my hon. Friends have suggested—[Interruption.]
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle): Order. I think it is very interesting to hear Mr Chope and I hope that other Members will take notice, because a lot of conversations are going on and we are struggling to hear.
Mr Chope: On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. If there is going to be a Division on any of the amendments in this group, will you give Members notice of it so that if they do not wish to participate in this debate and want to carry on their conversations outside they can do so, and that, in due course, if there is a Division the Division bell will ring in the usual way? Could you make that clear, Mr Deputy Speaker?
Mr Deputy Speaker: I just did make it clear that we do not want any more private conversations. We will stick to the business in hand. I and other Members obviously wish to hear you, so please continue.
Mr Chope: I am grateful for that clarification, Mr Deputy Speaker.
Sometimes during the course of discussing these pedlars Bills, we who have been on the side of the pedlars have, in a sense, been given an insight into what it must be like to be a pedlar, against whom there is a lot of prejudice among ordinary members of the public. Similarly, quite a lot of prejudice has been generated against those Members of this House who have stood
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up for the interests of pedlars. It is helpful for us to reflect on the real changes that we in this House, collectively, have made to the Bills.
Philip Davies: Does my hon. Friend note the irony that, previously, Members stayed behind to vote against the amendments that he and I tabled on touting, yet now they are staying behind to vote for them because the Lords tabled them? It is ironic that Members want to stay behind so late in order to vote differently from how they voted last time.
Mr Chope: I fear that, on too many occasions, parliamentary colleagues do not actually look at what they are voting on. I cannot think of any other explanation of why Members would wish to vote in a completely different way from how they voted earlier.
Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con): The obvious reason why this House is so full is that hon. Members wish to listen to my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope), who is always illuminating.
Mr Chope: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, as always, for his intervention, but on this occasion he is absolutely wrong.
This is the last group of amendments that we will debate on this Bill. In fact, the amendments relate not only to the Canterbury City Council Bill, but to all the Bills that we are discussing. It is right at this stage to pay tribute to everybody who has participated in these debates.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con): I have had the pleasure of listening to my hon. Friend on these subjects for a number of years. When I was the Opposition spokesman, I advocated looking at these issues on a national basis so that individual councils did not have to come forward with different Bills. Would that not be a much more sensible approach?
Mr Chope: Absolutely. We have made progress in that regard. When these Bills were first debated, the Labour Government were reluctant to do anything about it, but under the present Government we have had a new consultation paper on the whole subject. That paper makes it clear that the Government’s view is that there may be a strong case for national legislation instead of piecemeal legislation.
The Government have said that if they have to change the legislation to ensure that all the local Acts and the Bills that we are discussing today comply with the EU services directive, they will include the provisions that are put forward by each local authority before the end of the consultation period later this month in collective legislation to ensure that the provisions relating to the rights and responsibilities of pedlars are common throughout the land.
One benefit of this debate having been extended over almost a six-year period is that we have had the chance to consider the impact of the services directive, which, among other things, applies to touting for services, which is the subject of this group of Lords amendments. As my hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) will remember, when we raised the issue of the services directive initially, there was
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much scepticism among Government Members and people like my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr Brazier) who have sponsored these Bills. They said that we were raising the services directive as a red herring in order to waste time.
We have now found out that the Government are taking the matter so seriously that they have realised that all the pedlars Acts may have to be repealed to facilitate compliance with the services directive. That implies that when the former Government first thought about the impact of the services directive on the United Kingdom, they and their advisers got it completely wrong. They should surely have understood the implications of the directive when it was being negotiated in Brussels. That is just another example of how we have lost control over our own affairs through the loss of sovereignty, which is being passed to the European Union.
All’s well that ends well in the sense that the Government now recognise that many of the services provisions in these Bills are wholly inappropriate. I suspect that even if my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury had not offered, when the Canterbury City Council Bill was before the House on Third Reading, to withdraw the touting provisions in the other place, it would have been necessary to take them out anyway because of their lack of compliance with the services directive.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: Is there not something ironic about the European Union coming to the rescue of my hon. Friend to sort this matter out?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle): Order. We have had a good round-up of the Bill and I know that the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) is now desperate to get back to discussing the amendments.
Mr Chope: I detect that all good things must come to an end, and in the light of the way that my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury has behaved, and in tribute to work done by their lordships in the other place and their thorough examination of the Bill, it would be churlish of me to say that I will vote against the amendments in this group. I must, however, have a caveat to that, so I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) will catch your eye, Mr Deputy Speaker. He may persuade me that I am incorrect. Subject to anything that he says, I am—to use an expression from the other place—“content” to allow the Lords amendments to proceed.
7 pm
Philip Davies:
As has been said, we are discussing the last group of amendments and I start by paying tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope). Colleagues who have shown a belated interest in this Bill may think that they have in effect been thwarting my hon. Friend over the past few minutes. Instead, they have been voting to rubber-stamp amendments to the Bill for which he argued many years ago but which the Government of the time, and elements of the Opposition—the Conservative party was sitting on the other side of the House then—resisted. It is a measure of my hon. Friend’s success that he has gone from leading a few of us into the Lobby to support his
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amendment to this red letter day on which 250 people have supported that amendment. He should be very proud of that.
Ben Gummer (Ipswich) (Con): I wish to place on the record that my first intervention in this House was during a discussion on this matter, probably in May or June 2010. Before we conclude our proceedings, it is important to say that I, too, pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) for his ability to cover a range of subjects. That evening we discussed the monastic rights of the city of Canterbury, and a creature called the Pedlar of Swaffham that was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman). At each turn my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch was able to discourse on those obtuse matters with eloquence and in great detail, and I pay tribute to him for that. As he says, however, all good things come to an end and perhaps it is good at this moment to draw a line under this varied subject.
Philip Davies: I am grateful to my hon. Friend and he is right to pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch and make it clear to the House that he knows so much more about matters than I do; his expertise spreads far and wide. I have certainly learned a lot over the years, and I am pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Ben Gummer) is also learning a great deal from him.
Given that so many people have shown a belated interest in this Bill, it seems only right that before they vote on the Lords amendments they understand what they have been invited to vote on. In previous discussions on this matter—as my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch said, we have been debating these Bills for around six years—we were, to be perfectly frank, talking to a small audience. We could therefore, through various nods and winks, understand each other’s arguments, and the Bill could rapidly progress and rush to a Division because we all knew what we were talking about. Tonight we are in a unique position where lots of people who want to participate in the voting do not know the Bill’s six years of history as I and my hon. Friend do. We must lay out exactly what people will be voting for in this group of amendments because I would not want anyone to vote inadvertently for something in which they do not believe.
The amendments relate to clause 11 of the Canterbury City Council Bill, and this is the right time to pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr Brazier). During the passage of the Bill, he has probably felt a great deal of frustration on occasion, as have other Members who have sponsored the Bills. In all fairness to him, he did not sit there in frustration without listening to the arguments and taking on board what was said. He was good enough to listen to the force of the argument. We had a long debate on touting in relation to the Canterbury City Council Bill, and he was good enough to listen to the arguments. As he made clear in an intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch—I did not hear all of it because of the hoo-hah going on at the time—the amendment results from the promise given by my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury at previous stages. He said it would be a fair deal to get rid of clause 11.
Hon. Members know that my hon. Friend is one of the most honourable people, if not the most honourable
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person, in the House. As ever, he has been as good as his word. However, we cannot leave it at that—the Scrap Metal Dealers Bill is a precedent—because assurances given in the House on how legislation will be dealt with in the other place have not always been kept. We cannot therefore take it as read that their lordships decided to accept the amendment on the word of my hon. Friend, because they have decided to ignore the words of other hon. Members in the past. We must therefore presume not only that their lordships wished to keep to my hon. Friend’s word, but that they were persuaded by the case.
It is striking that, whereas the Lords have decided to delete clause 11 from the Canterbury City Council Bill—that is the amendment we are debating—they chose not to delete clause 11 from the Reading Borough Council Bill, which is virtually identical. Clause 11(1)(b) in both Bills lists the places to which the provisions will apply. However, whereas the Reading Borough Council Bill refers only to “a street”, the Canterbury City Council Bill refers to
“a street or esplanade, parade, promenade or way to which the public commonly have access, whether or not as of right.”
That is the only difference in the clauses in the two Bills.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch said in his opening remarks, it is perhaps a shame that we have not had a great explanation of what their lordships were thinking when they made the amendment to delete clause 11 from the Canterbury Bill. Is the difference in the wording of the two Bills a matter of principle on touting or a matter of practicality? In essence, the measures are the same.
Mr Chope: Does this not present a perfect opportunity for the Minister to make her maiden contribution to our discussions on the Bills?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle): Order. It might help if I say that the Minister will come in when Mr Davies sits down. If he wants to give way now, there will be no more, but I would sooner hear a little more.
Philip Davies: I am very grateful, Mr Deputy Speaker. That is the first time any hon. Member in my seven or eight years in the House has ever said or indicated that they want to hear a little more from me. It certainly has been a red letter day for me, too. I am flattered, Mr Deputy Speaker.
My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch makes a good point. It would be helpful to hear from the Minister exactly what is in the Government’s mind. Perhaps she will explain why the amendment should be supported and why the wording should apply to the Canterbury City Council Bill but not to the Reading Borough Council Bill.
Perhaps the Minister will also tell us what the Government’s view is of the principle of touting tickets and so on. The Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport published a report on ticket touting in 2008. I am lucky enough to serve on that Committee, so it is a subject close to my heart. People will have spotted that what is striking about that report is the date—it came out in the middle of the discussions on the Bill. I do not know whether their lordships were influenced in any way by the recommendations of the Committee—I very much hope they were; it was an excellent report, so that may well be the case—or whether they were influenced
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by the Bill’s principles, but hon. Members may wish to bear in mind the fact that this is a very strange clause in the sense that it is called “Touting”, and that is what is referred to throughout the clause.
The first recommendation of the Select Committee’s report—of course, I will not go through all the recommendations, but it is wise to highlight some of the pertinent ones—states:
“It is important to bear in mind that the term ‘touting’ has very different meanings to different people”.
When we have a Bill that refers to “touting” as if we all know what touting is, hon. Members should bear in mind that comment by the Committee.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: I had always understood that the term “touting” usually related to tickets for sporting events. Could my hon. Friend explain how the word covers that use, as well as the use in the Bill?
Philip Davies: I am grateful to my hon. Friend and I will just say in passing that I very much agreed with his earlier intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch when he said that these matters are best dealt with at a national level. We are either in favour of ticket touting or we are not, and the same rules should apply across the country. Like my hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown), I think that many people will believe that touting relates mainly to sporting events, or perhaps even big music events, which is maybe one of the reasons why it is in, for example, the Reading Bill in the first place, as it has a big music festival.
My hon. Friend will be interested to know that clause 11(2) talks about affecting
“Any person who, in a place designated under this section”—
I mentioned briefly about the areas that apply—
“importunes any person by touting for a hotel, lodging house, restaurant or other place of refreshment, for a shop, for a theatre or nightclub or other place of amusement or recreation, or for a boat or other conveyance shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale.”
Straight away, my hon. Friend will appreciate that this goes far beyond what he and many other people might think of it.
Jacob Rees-Mogg: I am troubled about this definition of “touting”, because it includes all forms of entertainment. If one were to give out a leaflet asking people to join the local Conservative party, which is always a source of the greatest entertainment, would that potentially count as touting and be illegal in Reading but legal in Canterbury?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle): Order. I do not think that we need to go down that path; I do not think it would be illegal anywhere.
Philip Davies: I am grateful for that guidance. It has saved me from having to deal with that particular intervention
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: Does my hon. Friend think that Mr Deputy Speaker’s ruling applies only to Conservative leaflets, or will it apply to Labour leaflets as well?
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Mr Deputy Speaker: I can assure the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) that there is no need to reply to that either.
Philip Davies: I am very grateful for your protection, Mr Deputy Speaker, because I fear I am being troubled by questions that I am unable to answer.
Jacob Rees-Mogg: In the interests of impartiality, may I inquire about the Liberal Democrats?
Mr Deputy Speaker: Just to show that I am impartial, absolutely not.
Philip Davies: I am grateful to you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I am sure you want me to get back to the matter in hand.
Ben Gummer: This is an issue of concern. One feature of Brick lane, which I live near, are the many people touting for their restaurants. I suppose that a natural consequence of the proposal is that touting for a restaurant in London will be entirely legal, but in Reading it will not. That inconsistency bears out precisely the point that my hon. Friend made earlier.