13/03/2017 House of Commons

Ensuring excellence in education as a teacher. We have already seen in

the terms and conditions of teachers in England under a Tory government.

Can they agreed that conditions such as maternity and sick pay will be

guaranteed? At least Scotland has a possibility of a new and brighter

future. This year's budget coincided with International Women's Day, with

this year's been being women in the changing world of work but after

nearly 100 years since women were granted the right to vote in the UK

there is still much to do in order to achieve gender equality here and

around the world. The last Labour government achieved so much for

women. We introduced the minimum wage, created tax credits, increased

maternity and paternity leave and pay, pension credits, expanding

childcare and Equality Act, all of which have made a massive difference

to women in this country. We know that gender equality means

delivering long-term, tangible change for women, including securing

women's economic freedom, supplying secure work and promoting women's

access to innovative technologies. This budget could have taken greater

steps to achieve these aims. Instead the Cory government in its seventh

year has failed to -- the Tory government in its seventh year has

failed. From cuts to tax credits to the crisis in social care, it is

women who have been consistently hit hardest by the policies of the

Tories. Because yet again this government have made no assessment

to show how their policies impact upon women in the UK. As of the 2017

spring budget, ?80 billion, over three quarters of all savings, have

come from women, with a disproportionate impact on women

from black and ethnic minorities and even the ?5 million for returning to

work mums works out at a pretty useless ?10 per month, what will

that buy? That is why I support the shadow secretary of state for women

and equality's recent announcement to bring forward the equality Bill

which will eliminate obstacles that present women from reaching their

economic potential and part of this will be providing more secure work

full stop those working without guaranteed hours are shut up I --

has shot up. I ask how is a working mother supposed to plan childcare

when they don't know the hours they will be working. Never mind the that

under this government only one third of local authorities believe there

will be enough childcare for families who are eligible. Women

still make up the majority of part-time and non-permanent

full-time and zero hours contracts. Of the 900,000 workers, nearly 1

million on zero hours contracts, 55% of those, are women. In almost any

labour market in the world social care work is performed by an integer

will and largely female workforce. In the UK care sector companies

providing social care for cash-strapped councils in a bid to

remain viable are offering more zero hours contracts and ever, which

means even less protection for these workers. Equality must take a higher

priority than is currently being afforded under this government and

one way to do this would be to provide a clear commitment from the

government to play a much more active role in promoting women's

access to innovative technologies, to help women to become successful

entrepreneurs and leaders in innovation by courage and women to

enter and thrive in the tech industry and at all levels to create

conditions this terrible change and encouraging women to enter typically

male dominated sectors. -- to create conditions that promote change.

Government used to talk about this but though they have gone

suspiciously quiet. We should also do much more than they innovate UK

initiative which seeks to invest 2000 as group 200000 pounds to help

women be leaders in innovation. One initiative offers the 12 men and the

women support of which only a few will receive a package of ?50,000.

That is not a ringing endorsement of That is not a ringing endorsement of

women from this government. This was supposed to be a new start with a

new Chancellor and yet we have ended up with the same shambles and same

post Budget followers. Yet again Scotland did not feature. It is

mentioned twice. Once to increase productivity and once on Bernard

consequential. The way this Budget process works, at no time as a UK

Government ever asked the Goddess government what they need is going

forward. All that happens is there is panic health, education

allegations in the budget and we are meant to be eternally grateful. That

is not a good Budget setting. As my honourable friend said, the tax

system is updated. Why should risk be tasked at 79%. White and not we

tax real goods and increased taxes on the wealthy there. If the concern

is alcohol harm why doesn't the Government look at minimum unit

pricing instead of crippling the Scottish whiskey industry? The

Chancellor may mention clamping down on tax avoidance but there is only

two additional new income streams in the budget and they are projected to

bring in ?200 million over five years with the paltry amount

compared to budget. Meanwhile tax credit and collection is projected

to bring in half ?1 billion in just over four years so we have to ask

ourselves is the Government clamping down on tax avoidance or is it

clamping down on hard-working families that go into tax credit

debt due to failures in the tax credit system goes back it is

another Concentrix waiting to happen. Also the Chancellor told us

he was to leave some gas in the tank yet he has that does with all the

tax giveaways and the slowing down under. ?22.5 billion in giveaways to

corporation tax. Inheritance tax relief 2.8 billion. By the time I

said tax, 3.7 billion. ?30 billion in tax giveaways in just a few lines

and at the very same Chancellor sees fit to take ?2 billion of National

Insurance contributions of the simple point. It is the

self-employed that are struggling, don't get holidays and many are

forced to go self-employed because of the Tory austerity measures.

These are held as the new entrepreneurs that are going to take

the country of the procession and yet they are getting hammered by

National Insurance got abused. Meanwhile the other hard-working

people ?1 billion be recouped from salary sacrifice schemes. ?1 billion

from the realignment in high rate second-rate National Insurance got

abused. ?1.7 billion from changes to termination payments when more

people are going to have to take voluntary redundancy before the ?4

billion from insurance premiums. That is ?10 billion coming from

those who are just about managing, those struggling. Then ?6 billion to

come from two child policies for tax credits. Not mentioned in this

Budget was 2016 measures which already kicked in. ?30 billion of

cuts have come because of benefits freeze and the welfare club. We have

already heard there is nothing in it for women, because the proportion of

the ?8 billion compared to tax giveaways is easily affordable. It

is quite clear that it is an open the back of those struggling.

Nothing for the Oil Gas UK nothing in renewables, investment will fall

by 95% by 2020 and one in six jobs at risk. Nothing on the

harmonisation in transport, nothing on Brexit, nothing for the farmers

in Scotland. This is a port Budget and it does a Brexit shambles. The

Chancellor made a number of errors in his Budget. Somehow he managed in

one of the thinnest read books for years, Abe Budget of so little

detail, so little in terms of action, the practical unite his

backbenchers with the opposition and the press to call for a U-turn on

his central announcement on National Insurance got regions within hours.

I will be slightly kinder to the Chancellor Dundee for a Prime

Minister was. I know what he was trying to do full stop I can

understand it. There is a growing and worrying trend of copies

outsourcing employees as self-employed contractors to save on

employer NICs costs. Self-employed is a good choice for so many workers

in the UK. But when the workers do not have the choice and it is the

employer that is driving the change, it tends not to be in the best

interests of the work. But raising employee NICs to tackle the problem

is not the way to solve it so I suspect the Chancellor may well have

to go back to one of his intimate spreadsheets soon. But his biggest

errors are people up and down our errors of omission and I'd planned

to talk about three of them, they squeezed family budgets. Nothing

from the Chancellor on ESA rag, in November I brought a motion to his

member was supported by MPs from nine parties in this House. It is

not often that this happen. It called on the UK Government to

support the allowance until the work and health green paper could be

existed. People receive DSA WRAG because they had been cited as unfit

for work. It slows their power to implement. It has always been

considered right that given the increased cost of finding work due

to the disability and health problems and the fact they need the

support for longer than those on jobseeker's allowance do they should

receive a higher weekly payment. On the 1st of April but extra ?30 a

week will be cut away. During that debate in November the honourable

member for Enfield Southgate is a very important in the Minister, that

financial mitigation and new regulations to help those falling in

and out of work would both be in place before the cut came in. We are

less than three weeks from DSA WRAG being cut and we have heard nothing

from the Government. The motion and debate I brought in November was the

three consents, a last ditch to the Government act. Honourable members

of all sides of the House are fast losing patient. Time is running out

and the Government needs to act now. There was nothing on Waspy, on

budget day I joined a huge rally to the Chancellor to act on the

injustice of thousands of women born in the nations of these and who had

seen the state pension increase at a faster rate than promised with

little or no warning. Three of the three and a half thousand women

affected were there and it was a pleasure to speak to Eileen, John

and Margaret. It is not sustainable for the UK Government to keep trying

to ignore these women, who have suffered workplace injustice. They

should do the right thing by these women and give them a proper

transitional relief. All of the women affected by these errors of

omission were a victim of this Brexit Budget is the Chancellor set

aside ?26 billion as a down payment for exiting the EU. And yet

ironically there was barely a passing mention to the greatest

economic, social and constitutional challenge facing this or any other

government for decades. Inflation is expected to rise further squeezing

households who are facing Social Security cuts and painfully slow

wage growth. Cuts to support for sick and disabled people, cuts to

women pensions, hundreds of thousands more are in child poverty,

slow wage growth and poor productivity. But so much

spreadsheet filled as the Dickensian Chancellor. Thank you for the

opportunity to contribute to this bait on the budget but the magpies

in the world. I want to speak about the budget proposals for education

and the risks they present for our children, in the con sexed up Brexit

and changes they will face an uncertain future. -- context of

Brexit. We need the best possible outcome per all our children and

young people to provide them with the skills and confidence to

navigate our uncertain route -- world. I am proud of the skills in

my constituency and everything they deliver for local children. The

transformation of the quality of education in London was one of the

powerless achievements of the last Labour government. In my

constituency alone we sought new secondary schools and this record of

is continued after the new secondary school that opened last year as a

result of strong campaigns by parents and local councillors.

Everyday teachers in our local schools are delivering brilliant

imaginative lessons helping our children to be the best that they

can beat and achieving excellent results. And yet, Mr Speaker, the

resources that the schools in Dulwich and West Norwood need to

continue their excellent work are under threat. The Government has

broken its manifesto commitment to protect per-pupil funding for our

schools, the national office of National Audit Office confirms that

the Government overall school budget is protected in real terms but does

not provide for funding per pupil to increase in line with inflation. In

addition the Government has loaded additional significant costs on to

other schools which are not funded through National Insurance

contributions, the National Minimum Wage and the apprenticeships levied.

Each of these costs, important in their own right, but it is entirely

unfair of the Government to impose them without also them. Schools in

my constituency are already reducing staffing numbers to cope with these

additional costs. And on top of these burdens the Government is

proposing to cut the funding for a London schools in order to deliver a

fair funding formula for schools across the country. I support the

objective of their funding for our schools, but there is nothing fair

about taking vital funds away from some schools. Mr Speaker, this will

have a direct impact on the quality of education or schools are able to

provide and it will affect the competitiveness of the UK economy.

The budget does nothing to address this. Instead of committing to

increase the education budget by just 1% to ensure that all schools

can access their funding without any school losing out, it commits

funding to open new grammar schools, which by any measure a definition

can deliver only for a small number of children. Mr Speaker, as we

contemplate the future of the United Kingdom outside the European Union

in a rapidly changing global economy, it is not a time from

nostalgia to be the defining force in education policy. It is a time to

be learning from the success story of London schools, investing in our

education system to ensure that it is that of purpose to equip our

children with the knowledge, skills and confidence to thrive in a

challenging and uncertain world. The Foreign Secretary would mean trivial

lies the challenge of global trade with boomerangs and Toblerone, I am

concerned that our schools can equip all our children with the values of

tolerance, diversity and internationalism and with the skills

and qualifications to provide careers in science and technology,

culture and the arts, green industries, Health and Social Care

Board, construction and many other fields, by cutting the funding for

our schools this government and the budget is failing them. Since the

Budget statement last week this government has been heckled by

headteachers, nobbled by National Insurance and slated by the

self-employed as it blatantly breaks manifesto promises. The Chancellor

appeared to have spent far too much time polishing his stand-up routine

and far too little on the finer details of what his party promised

in the 2015 manifesto. And the fact that the Prime Minister has now been

forced to announce that the increase in National Insurance contributions

for the self-employed will be pushed back to the autumn shows a

government in disarray and does nothing to give security and

certainty to working people. The Federation of Small Businesses are

scathing about the National Insurance rise and say it should be

seen for what it is, a ?1 billion tax hike on those who set themselves

up in business. The Chancellor claims that the economy grew more

than expected last year but this does not mean that everyone is

better off. Indeed the growth in the economy is on the back of a rise in

employment coupled with a shift towards lower paid jobs. With this

growth largely driven by rises in self-employment and part-time jobs.

And in fact, whilst in most other countries including France and

Germany of the economy and wages have grown, the UK is the only big

advanced economy in which wages contracted whilst the economy

expanded. And for the one in five public sector workers in the UK

whose average pay is now more than ?1000 lower in real terms than in

2010, the Chancellor's boast of growth in the economy is cold

comfort to those who are not just about managing but actually really

struggling to cope with a constant fall in living standards. And the

statement was remarkable more for what it didn't say rather than what

it did. Earlier mention of Brexit, nothing for Waspy woman and no

mention at all of the previous Chancellor's failure to deliver a

promised surplus by 2020. The right honourable member per patent now

seems to be devoting himself to creating his own personal surplus

having failed to deliver on his promises for the UK economy.

Subtitles will resume at 2300 on Monday in Parliament.