Lords
Proceedings
15 June 2026
Mental Health Conditions: Diagnoses
My Lords, I am extremely grateful to the House for allowing time for this debate and to all noble Lords who will be speaking.
Something has gone wrong when more than one in five adults in England now live with a common mental health condition such as anxiety and depression, with diagnoses of ADHD a…
Lords
Proceedings
8 June 2026
Health-related Benefits Assessments
I thank the Minister for her Answer. She will know that the number of young people on health-related benefits has risen by more than 50% over the last five years and that four out of five of them are claiming for mental health or neurodiversity conditions. Yet these assessments, I understand, are la…
Lords
Oral Questions
15 April 2026
2 contributions
NHS Adult Gender Identity Clinics
My Lords, 5,624 patients under 25 were referred to adult gender dysphoria clinics in 2023-24, 6,355 were referred in 2024-25 and initial figures show that 6,167 were referred in 2025-26. There are strong safeguards within the existing service provision and specification that was agreed following pub…
My Lords, we are indeed committed to developing services for 17 to 25 year-olds, and I certainly recognise that this is a potentially very vulnerable time in a young person’s journey, as was clearly outlined in the report by the noble Baroness, Lady Cass. I can say to the noble Baroness that we reco…
Lords
Debate
2 March 2026
3 contributions
Crime and Policing Bill
My Lords, I will speak briefly to Amendment 307 in my name. I spoke to it in Committee and have brought it back because it is an important issue. The amendment would simply ban any convicted sex offender from obtaining a gender recognition certificate. I remind your Lordships that a gender recogniti…
I thank the Minister for his comments. Just to be very clear and direct, it would be one less individual for the MAPPA arrangements to worry about, because that individual would not have changed their gender. They would still be living in their previous gender and there would be a very straightforwa…
+1 more contribution in this session
Lords
Debate
27 February 2026
Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill
My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 145 and 439 standing in my name. It is good that I previously gave way to the noble Baroness, Lady O’Loan, who is no longer in her place, because she covered a lot of the points that I was going to make about care homes.
This is the first time I have spoken in C…
Lords
Proceedings
24 February 2026
Schools White Paper: Every Child Achieving and Thriving
My Lords, I know from my work as an MP how sensitive this issue is and how important it is to families. I used to represent a constituency that the Minister will know very well.
There are concerns that we should not ignore. A number of eminent clinicians and psychiatrists are now raising concerns t…
Lords
Debate
4 February 2026
National Insurance Contributions (Employer Pensions Contributions) Bill
My Lords, it is not just a capitalist economy that runs on incentives; it is human nature to calibrate actions through the lens of what is in it for us. Encouraging people to work hard, succeed, earn their place in the world, and deliver safety and security for themselves and their families, while g…
Lords
Oral Questions
3 February 2026
2 contributions
Two-child Benefit Cap: Foreign-born Children
My Lords, children should not grow up in poverty. It is bad for them, bad for their aspirations and, ultimately, bad for the country. Experts agree that the most cost-effective way to reduce child poverty is to end the two-child limit, and that is what we are doing. There are strict rules that gover…
My Lords, removing the two-child limit is very well targeted: it is targeted on children. Over half—some 59%—of households affected by the two-child limit are in work, and almost half of households affected by this policy did not have any of their children while they were receiving universal credit.…
Lords
Debate
2 February 2026
Crime and Policing Bill
My Lords, I am speaking late in the debate and others have made many points. I just want to speak to the amendments in my name in this group and say a few brief words about the stand part notice from the noble Baroness, Lady Monckton, to which I am a signatory. I also support the amendments in the n…
Lords
Debate
16 December 2025
Victims and Courts Bill
My Lords, I will say a few words in the gap; I have notified the clerk. I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, because I spoke in the gap very recently just before he was about to speak. I ask for his tolerance.
I did not put my name down for this debate, because I thought o…
Lords
Debate
15 December 2025
2 contributions
Crime and Policing Bill
My Lords, the Gender Recognition Act 2004 was designed for a world with low demand for gender recognition certificates and did not anticipate modern safeguarding realities. I believe that that context has fundamentally changed, and that creates a serious gap that my amendment seeks to close. The sys…
May I press the Minister on one specific point? I understand what he is saying about management of risk, but would it be possible for a convicted sex offender—a serious sex offender or rapist—to be prevented, on the basis of risk, from obtaining a gender recognition certificate, should they wish to …
Lords
Debate
9 December 2025
Crime and Policing Bill
My Lords, I add my voice to the support for my noble friend Lady Owen from across the Committee. She has done a great service to victims of these crimes all across the country, most of whom we know are women and girls, but men and boys can be affected too.
I will focus on Amendment 334 which, as my…
Lords
Oral Questions
24 November 2025
2 contributions
Non-Crime Hate Incidents
The College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council are currently undertaking a review of non-crime hate incidents, working closely with the Home Office. The Government look forward to receiving the review’s final recommendations shortly and will decide future policy following considerat…
As I have indicated to the noble Baroness, we are awaiting the report, and it is fair, if we have commissioned a report, that we wait to see its recommendations. However, an interim report in October of this year said that non-crime hate incidents were not fit for purpose. Her noble friend Lord Herb…
Lords
Debate
12 November 2025
Sentencing Bill
My Lords, I declare my interests as the founder and vice-president of Catch22, the largest community preventive agency for those young potential offenders. Before that, I was the chairman and founder of Crime Concern, which I served for 21 years before creating Catch22. As the Minister knows, becaus…
Lords
Debate
11 November 2025
5 contributions
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill
My Lords, these amendments are tabled after I tried and failed to obtain information that I believe is in the public interest from the Government, from Written Questions and research, including detailed briefings from the Library. Amendment 79C, on modern slavery, would require the Government to pub…
My Lords, it is my understanding that he is an Anglican bishop, but I will let him speak for himself on this matter. I beg to move.
+3 more contributions in this session
Lords
Debate
11 November 2025
2 contributions
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill
My Lords, I strongly support the amendments in this group and will briefly speak to mine, which would strengthen the amendments laid by my noble friends on the Front Bench. They have the objective of restoring public confidence in our asylum system. Amendment 65A would ensure that no modern slavery …
I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
Lords
Debate
5 November 2025
2 contributions
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill
My Lords, my Amendment 71A is an amendment to Amendment 71 in the names of my noble friends on the Front Bench. It should be seen in the context of my comments about modern slavery in the debate on Monday. This modern slavery system now supports more foreign citizens than it does British citizens—so…
My Lords, I will speak to the two amendments tabled in my name in this group, but, before doing so, I will say that I strongly support the comments made by my noble friend Lord Murray and the noble Lord, Lord Faulks. My amendments are to Amendments 47 and 68, and would ensure that modern slavery cla…
Lords
Debate
3 November 2025
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill
My Lords, to follow on from what the noble Baroness has just said, my Amendments 29A and 31A would in fact reintroduce and commence the modern slavery clauses and provisions in the Illegal Migration Act 2023. The net effect of them would mean that individuals who have entered illegally would not be …
Lords
Debate
29 October 2025
Planning and Infrastructure Bill
My Lords, I want to make a few remarks on Amendment 121G in the name of my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe. I also support Amendment 117 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, on gambling premises. I am a former MP who represented a town centre, Redditch, where we often saw these challe…
Lords
Debate
27 October 2025
Planning and Infrastructure Bill
My Lords, my Amendment 121 is a vital step towards bringing clarity and scrutiny to the Government’s grey-belt policy. This amendment asks the Secretary of State to publish a clear framework for grey-belt designation within six months of Royal Assent and to lay it before both Houses. Its purpose is …
Lords
Committee Stage
14 October 2025
National Policy Statement for Ports
My Lords, I rise to speak briefly in the gap. Unlike many noble Lords, I very much welcome this document. The Government have done pretty well in getting this far, because it is incredibly complicated, but I have a few questions, which I hope my noble friend the Minister will be able to answer.
The…
Lords
Oral Questions
13 October 2025
2 contributions
Asylum Claims: Religious Conversion
The Government do not publish statistics on asylum claims based on religious conversion. All claims, including those based on religious conversion, are carefully assessed individually in accordance with our international obligations and in line with our published guidance. Claims based on religious …
As the noble Baroness will know, more than 111,000 people claimed asylum in the UK in the year ending June 2025. Almost half of the initial decisions—48%—were grants, which means that 52% were not. We do not keep statistics on individual religious conversion aspects. We take that into account and wi…
Lords
Debate
12 September 2025
Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill
My Lords, the strength of feeling on this issue is understandable. Rarely do we get to debate such a truly momentous issue. But in the end, this is a question of personal choice. No one is suggesting that assisted dying should be mandatory, nor even that it should be widely available. In fact, under…
Lords
Oral Questions
10 September 2025
Sickness Benefits: In-person Interviews
The noble Baroness is absolutely right: there is no doubt that there has been a growth in people claiming support and not being in work as a result of mental health conditions, but also because of other conditions as well. There are other clear patterns, such as musculoskeletal conditions and a rang…
Lords
Oral Questions
8 September 2025
2 contributions
Planning Delivery: Acceleration
The Government are delivering a set of pro-supply, pro-growth planning reforms. We have updated the National Planning Policy Framework, introducing bold new growth focus measures to underpin the delivery of 1.5 million safe and decent homes. We are also reforming the nationally significant infrastru…
On the delivery of previous Housing Secretaries, it did not help having 17 different Housing Ministers over the last 14 years. We want to get moving on this. I was very pleased to welcome our new Secretary of State this morning, and I know that Secretary of State Reed is just as keen as the rest of …