Commons
Petition
8 July 2026
Tenant Management Organisations and the Right to Manage
I rise to present a petition on behalf of residents of the Loughborough Estate in my constituency, I wish to say that the conditions in which the residents there are currently forced to live are shocking. The lack of a straightforward remedy to those conditions is completely unacceptable, and the ne…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
2 July 2026
Historical Forced Adoption
The evidence that the Education Committee heard from mothers and adult adoptees was utterly devastating. I thank Diana Defries, Ann Lloyd Keen, Sally Ells and Debbie Iromlou for courageously reliving their trauma so that we could shine a light on the extent of the injustice they suffered and the urg…
Commons
Debate
25 June 2026
2 contributions
Windrush Day
I beg to move,
That this House has considered Windrush Day 2026.
I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for allocating time for this debate. Windrush Day is on 22 June, the anniversary of the arrival of HMT Empire Windrush at Tilbury docks. The Windrush has become a symbol of a period i…
I thank all Members who have contributed to the debate. I received many messages from others who would have loved dearly to contribute but were unable to come—for reasons to do either with fleeing the weather in London or with the by-elections taking place here—so the relatively small number of spee…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
15 June 2026
Social Media Ban for Under-16s
I thank the Secretary of State for her statement, and warmly welcome the decisive action that she has set out. She has agreed with the evidence-based conclusions of the Education Committee: that social media harms currently outweigh the benefits for children, that technology companies cannot be trus…
Commons
Oral Questions
Housing, Communities and Local Government
15 June 2026
2 contributions
Tenant and Resident Management Organisations: Regulation
14. What steps his Department is taking to improve the regulation of tenant and resident management organisations.
Residents on the Loughborough estate in my constituency have suffered years of appalling service from their resident management organisation, the Loughborough Estate Management Board. It has a failing repair service; dangerous chemicals were being stored in the community centre; there were allegatio…
Commons
Proceedings
8 June 2026
Digital Safety: Children
I welcome the announcement today. The Education Committee recently took evidence from social media and gaming companies, which left every member of the Committee profoundly concerned. They downplayed the issues, denied the scale of harm and overplayed the magnitude and effectiveness of their own res…
Commons
Proceedings
8 June 2026
Water Companies
My constituents have been profoundly failed by Thames Water for many years, with frequent leaks and bursts, inadequate investment in our infrastructure, clogged up roads and, to add insult to injury, skyrocketing bills. Thames Water is a failing organisation. Will the Minister confirm that the Gover…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
4 June 2026
Children’s Social Care: Enduring Relationships Strategy
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Minister on his commitment to making a difference for children in the care system and for care leavers. It is a shocking reality that our care system has, over a long period of time, become so far removed from putting the essential needs of children and young peop…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
18 May 2026
Youth Justice
I thank the Secretary of State for his statement and welcome the publication of the White Paper. Education has a vital role to play in reducing youth offending. There is a strong link between the offences committed by young people and educational disengagement earlier in their lives. What is the Sec…
Commons
Debate
22 April 2026
5 contributions
Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill
First, I welcome the Government’s decision to introduce a statutory ban on mobile phones in schools. I appreciate that the guidance previously proposed was clear and that schools must take account of Government guidance, but where an issue is unequivocal—and I think the need for mobile phones to be …
I agree with the hon. Member—and, indeed, with the Opposition Front Bencher, the right hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Laura Trott)—that the ban must be on the basis that phones are not in bags during the school day, but are removed from children while they are at school. The point I was making was reall…
+3 more contributions in this session
Commons
Oral Questions
Education
20 April 2026
Apprenticeships
I recently met a young constituent who is hoping to start a legal apprenticeship. He told me that he has had to research each apprenticeship opportunity himself and, unlike his peers who are applying to university, he is having to apply in the crucial weeks before his A-levels, when he needs to be r…
Commons
Debate
15 April 2026
4 contributions
Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill
I warmly welcome Government amendment 17B, which strengthens obligations to support sibling contact for children who are looked after. As the Minister knows, this is often the most important relationship that those children have. I pay tribute to the Family Rights Group and Become, as well as the ca…
Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
+2 more contributions in this session
Commons
Proceedings
14 April 2026
Point of Order
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I was told by a journalist today that the members of the shadow Cabinet had visited my constituency this morning. I understand that they may have gone there to clean some graffiti off a privately owned wall, but while I am grateful for their efforts, I beli…
Commons
Ministerial Statement
14 April 2026
Knife Crime
I welcome the publication of this strategy, and I pay tribute to the Minister for her strong commitment over many years to this area of policy and the depth of her thinking on it. In my constituency, we have seen far too many horrific tragedies. Out of those tragedies, however, has come some truly e…
Commons
Debate
13 April 2026
4 contributions
SEND Provision and Reform
I congratulate the hon. Member for Farnham and Bordon (Gregory Stafford) on securing this important debate, and I thank the Backbench Business Committee for allocating the time for it.
The support for children with special educational needs and disabilities is an area in which my Committee has take…
Accountability is one of the areas that our Committee highlighted in our report last year, which I will speak about in a moment.
Last year we published our inquiry report “Solving the SEND crisis”. The report was based on 900 pieces of written evidence, seven oral evidence sessions, and visits to O…
+2 more contributions in this session
Commons
Debate
13 April 2026
Southport Inquiry
All of our thoughts today are with the families of Alice, Bebe and Elsie. They have already suffered the most horrific loss, and to have confirmation today from Sir Adrian Fulford that their loss was preventable is utterly unbearable. Sir Adrian’s report highlights the failure of the multi-agency sa…
Commons
Debate
26 March 2026
Business of the House
The right of tenants and residents in social housing to manage their own estate is an important one. Many tenant management organisations deliver excellent services for their residents. However, that is not the case for residents of the Loughborough estate in my constituency, who have been badly fai…
Commons
Oral Questions
26 March 2026
2 contributions
Road Safety
6. What steps she is taking to improve road safety.
The Tulse Hill gyratory in my constituency is very dangerous. We see frequent accidents, near misses and, tragically, lives lost. We urgently need to see the transformation of the gyratory to make it safe for all road users, yet we are struggling because the availability of Transport for London fund…
Commons
Westminster Hall
25 March 2026
2 contributions
Public Baths and Lidos
My hon. Friend is making a heartfelt and moving speech in support of somebody who was clearly very dear to her, for which I commend her. I hope I have given her a little breathing space.
It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Efford. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Andrew Pakes) for securing this fantastic debate about lidos.
I am proud that my constituency is home to Brockwell lido in the magnificent setting of Brockwell Park. Brockwell lido is an unheate…
Commons
Oral Questions
11 March 2026
Royal Mail: Universal Service Obligation
My constituents in Dulwich and West Norwood, particularly in the SE22 and SE24 postcodes, have been suffering the consequences of Royal Mail’s failings for years. Residents in SE24 recently had no mail for four weeks. A key problem in holding Royal Mail to account is that it is required to report pe…
Commons
Debate
9 March 2026
3 contributions
Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill
I rise to speak to the Lords amendments to the Bill that are of most interest to the Education Committee, following our scrutiny work on the Bill and in relation to a number of other subsequent and ongoing inquiries.
I welcome the decision to place the expansion of the entitlement to free school me…
I agree with my hon. Friend entirely. So often we hear from teachers that they recognise a drop in a student’s engagement or performance, but without understanding why.
I welcome the introduction of the new requirements on allergy safety in schools. As the parent of a child who had unexplained alle…
+1 more contribution in this session
Commons
Westminster Hall
5 March 2026
4 contributions
World Book Day
I beg to move,
That this House has considered World Book Day.
It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mrs Hobhouse. I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for allocating time for this debate. I am tempted to dedicate this debate to every parent or carer whose child has ever announced …
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. World Book Day is a collaboration between lots of different organisations across our communities, and libraries are central to that.
This year, we mark the 30th anniversary of World Book Day, which was first celebrated in 1996. Although it was founded by UNESCO, …
+2 more contributions in this session
Commons
Debate
2 March 2026
2 contributions
Small Religious Organisations: Safeguarding
I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. On reasonable suspicion, does he agree with me that in any closed community, including religious organisations, it is a characteristic of abuse that people have suspicions, but often nobody feels able to speak up? Bringing reasonable suspicion in…
My constituent is a survivor of abuse within a religious organisation, and she represents a larger group of survivors at the same organisation. She has found the Charity Commission to be utterly ineffectual and far too slow in dealing with her complaint. When I wrote to the Minister about this issue…
Commons
Oral Questions
Education
2 March 2026
Student Loan System
Concerns raised in recent weeks about plan 2 student loans, including unilateral and unexpected change in the repayment terms and repayments based on the consumer prices index, are about the promise of higher education: whether working hard for an undergraduate degree really does result in a good qu…
Commons
Debate
25 February 2026
Ukraine
The exhibition in the Upper Waiting Hall this week is called “Voices from Ukraine”. It is a collaboration between my constituent, the sculptor Stephen Duncan, and celebrated Ukrainian sculptors Oles Sydoruk, who is serving on the frontline in Ukraine, and Borys Krylov. It is an extremely moving set …