Baroness Fox of Buckley — Hansard

Lords Debate 8 July 2025

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

My Lords, every time I speak after the noble Lord, Lord Deben, I feel as though I have taken on the headmaster. Having been admonished, I tread carefully. I have wanted to comment on this group of amendments from the beginning. The fact that the debate has become quite fractious and animated in some…

Lords Debate 4 July 2025 4 contributions

Imprisonment for Public Protection (Re-sentencing) Bill [HL]

My Lords, I apologise that I was unable to be with your Lordships at Second Reading, but I read the excellent contributions in Hansard . That, as well as listening today, confirmed that, like everyone else, I want to commend the noble Lord, Lord Woodley, for this Private Member’s Bill. It has done a…

I am sorry. The status quo position is that, when Mr Thomas becomes well and stable in hospital, he will be returned to the prison as an IPP-er. That seems unconscionable. All this amendment does is suggest that people are referred when they are mentally ill to a hospital and that the hospital then …

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Lords Statutory Instrument 3 July 2025 4 contributions

Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) Order 2025

The noble Lord had little choice then. First, I think it is entirely inappropriate in this discussion, which is fraught enough, to assume you know which side people are on around the Israel-Gaza situation. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, and I disagree wholeheartedly, but I agree with her that ther…

I am grateful to the noble Lord. The noble Baroness, Lady Fox, said I was making assumptions about what views people have about Israel or Palestine. I do not think I made any assumptions about that at all. I just happen to think that, in a debate, it is helpful if people take questions and listen t…

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Lords Debate 3 July 2025

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

My Lords, at this stage, at the beginning of the many amendments on home-schooling stretching ahead, I would like to thank the Minister for her opening remarks. They were very helpful and, as a consequence, I will not speak on all the amendments to which I have put my name, even though a lot of scru…

Lords Debate 2 July 2025 2 contributions

House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill

My Lords, I have long thought that the problem with the Bill is that we all become rather high-handed in talking about the hereditary Peers, as though they are the epitome of anti-democracy in this House. To be honest, we have all been appointed; none of us was elected. Therefore, it seems to me tha…

I am just pointing it out. They are apparently independent, but not that independent. There is a group of us who are sort of maverick; we are called non-affiliated—God knows what it means. It is very important that we defend the right to be political, to be partisan and to say, “I’m not an expert, …

Lords Debate 2 July 2025

House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill

My Lords, I am very torn on this. I favour a unicameral approach and a lot of the arguments against the elected second Chamber have been made very well, even though I want a more democratic way of making decisions. There is a crisis of democracy at present that expands far beyond this debate. What …

Lords Oral Questions 30 June 2025

School Libraries

The noble Baroness consistently argues for freedom of speech and the opportunity for people to engage with a whole range of different arguments and views. It is important that that is represented in our school libraries. On the point about whether or not books in libraries are age appropriate, the p…

Lords Debate 26 June 2025

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

My Lords, I apologise that I was unable to attend Second Reading. I have put my name to a number of later amendments, but I wanted to say how much I support the spirit of this group. On the issue of boat crossings, there is a feeling in relation to smashing the gangs that there is a huge amount of s…

Lords Committee Stage 25 June 2025 3 contributions

Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill

My Lords, I too rise very briefly. A number of us have raised this scandal throughout Committee and the Minister has rightly said, “Well, there’s an independent review, I really can’t comment until we get the findings”. I say, “If we can’t comment until we get the findings of the independent review,…

My Lords, as we approach the end of Committee, it has been refreshing, even though we are not in the main Chamber, that there has been so much general consensual, constructive discussion. We have had a lot of interesting, erudite, probing amendments—erudite inasmuch as they have been thoughtful and …

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Lords Debate 24 June 2025 3 contributions

Employment Rights Bill

My Lords, unusually, I completely agree with the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Deben; he and I are both surprised by that. That is not because I am a business owner—that has never been my shtick—but because I am worried about the unintended consequences of the Bill. I too simply want an opportunit…

There is no doubt that people who are happy at work are likely to contribute positively to the workplace. Nobody, I think, is arguing against that and wants miserable workers with no rights. However, what we are trying to explore is not whether people will have job satisfaction but whether they will…

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Lords Proceedings 18 June 2025

Child Sexual Exploitation: Casey Report

My Lords, I urge more humility and a little less complacent gaslighting. No parties have clean hands. Too many people, including the victims, were smeared as racists for even raising the issue—and that includes in this House, as an aside. Will the 2020 Home Office paper on group-based child sexual e…

Lords Committee Stage 18 June 2025 7 contributions

Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill

My Lords, I warmly welcome these amendments in the name of the noble Viscount, Lord Younger. I appreciated the detail that he went into because it is important that we remember that these direct deduction orders are real instruments of power. I am interested in how they will be used differentially, …

My Lords, in moving Amendment 102, I shall speak also to Amendment 122. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Palmer of Childs Hill, for putting his name to these amendments. These amendments are similar to those that I tabled in an earlier group in relation to Part 1. In this instance, they focus on removi…

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Lords Committee Stage 16 June 2025 6 contributions

Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill

My Lords, we have heard some important and powerful speeches. I broadly support all the amendments in this group. There is concern outside the House around these eligibility verification notices—people are genuinely worried about them and they are, I think, right to be—but I want to ask the Minister…

The Minister has been very helpful. There are obviously disagreements philosophically, but what is confusing is that the financial service representatives have suggested that this is a trawling exercise—the quote given was of a “fishing exercise”. The Minister has stressed, “Don’t worry: when we go …

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Lords Debate 11 June 2025

Holocaust Memorial Bill

My Lords, I want very briefly to take on a couple of inferences in what was said by the noble Lords, Lord Evans and Lord Harper. The sentiment was that we must show courage and face down terrorist supporters. Some of us have been arguing that for some time and, to be honest, there has been an almigh…

Lords Oral Questions 11 June 2025

Disorder in Ballymena

My Lords, it is very important that we understand exactly what has happened in Northern Ireland. While I cannot comment on specific cases, the original vigil was not specifically about immigration but a much wider issue, about something that had happened. With regard to the issue of immigration, I …

Lords Committee Stage 11 June 2025 5 contributions

Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill

My Lords, I wanted to reiterate my particular support of Amendments 62A and 62B, even though they do not go as far as my amendment in relation to suspended orders. The sense of a sword of Damocles hanging over people is something that we could do with getting rid of. That would be an easy thing for …

My Lords, I will be very brief. I have a lot of sympathy with most of the amendments in this group, apart from Amendment 63A, which fills me with dread. Fraud facilitation sounds as though it is a new crime, but I do not think this is the right place to bring it in. I appreciate that it does not nec…

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Lords Debate 10 June 2025 3 contributions

Employment Rights Bill

My Lords, I oppose the question that Clause 62 should stand part of the Bill, with the intention of removing provisions which compel employers to allow time off for trade union equality reps. To note, I am not opposed to trade union facilities time per se, and I am actually not objecting to Clause 6…

My Lords, as the Minister asked a direct question, I might as well answer it now. I gave individual examples. I am sorry if the personalised examples made it sound as though they are one-off cases. I was simply trying to bring alive trends, not say, “Nurse Peggie”. There are loads of them, but I onl…

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Lords Debate 10 June 2025

Employment Rights Bill

My Lords, very briefly, I support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Burns. I want to emphasise that, in a period of mass disillusion with mainstream parties, opt-in was actually a very important way of putting those parties on their guard that they had to inspire people to want to op…

Lords Committee Stage 9 June 2025 7 contributions

Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill

My Lords, in moving Amendment 27, I will speak also to Amendments 29, 62 and 75, which relate to debt recovery and concerns about the proportionality, even constitutionality, of the Bill’s use of direct deduction orders. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Palmer of Childs Hill, for his support in this end…

My Lords, I have a number of points. It was very interesting that the Minister concluded in relation to one of these amendments that “people’s lives can be messy”. It is precisely for that reason that in saying that DDOs will be issued only due to a lack of engagement, without any consideration of w…

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Lords Committee Stage 4 June 2025

Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill

My Lords, I feel rather inadequate after hearing the last few speeches, which were excellent in their expertise and in making me think about the issues, and after the earlier discussion led by the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, on whistleblowers. I feel as though I am going to learn a lot from these d…

Lords Debate 3 June 2025 3 contributions

Employment Rights Bill

My Lords, I am proposing that we remove Clause 31 from the Bill. That would remove the power of the Secretary of State to require largely private sector employers with more than 250 staff to develop and publish equality action plans showing what steps they are taking in relation to the gender pay ga…

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who spoke, some of whom were more sympathetic than others to what I was trying to raise. The noble Lord, Lord Palmer of Childs Hill, made an important point when he talked about the importance of accurate data. I agree, but data and statistics are not flat lines; t…

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Lords Debate 21 May 2025 2 contributions

Employment Rights Bill

My Lords, I rise with some trepidation to raise some problems with these amendments. I have to say that the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Llanfaes, made an absolutely brilliant, compelling case for her amendments and has been amply backed up by others. However, I still think that, if you look at wha…

My Lords, I put my name down on Amendments 101B and 141A, tackling employment discrimination on the basis of political opinions, because I wanted to probe whether the Government can see that it is a real, contemporary issue that needs to be tackled, however they do it. We know from the history of th…

Lords Debate 19 May 2025 2 contributions

Employment Rights Bill

My Lords, I, too, have my name on Amendment 97, which would introduce yet another impact assessment. I know that so many impact assessments have been proposed in relation to the Bill that it has become a bit of a cliché, but I am especially concerned that this one is taken seriously because the thir…

I am all for enhancing in any way the free speech duties required by the law, and I am happy to talk to the noble Baroness in a moment about how we can do that. Earlier, the Minister said that the Government were on the side of workers and not the abusers, and she got a lot of, “Hear, hears!”. I wo…

Lords Debate 19 May 2025 2 contributions

Employment Rights Bill

My Lords, the whole of Clause 20 should not stand part and should be dropped from the Bill. The amendments that I have put my name to are mitigating, in case this very dangerous clause is not dropped, but I remain hopeful that the Government will realise—despite what the noble Baroness, Lady Carberr…

I would like some clarity. There is some confusion over what the definition of harassment is in law. If you asked whether I was for the harassment of employees and workers, I would of course reply that I am not, but we have to look at the way the law defines harassment, particularly indirect harassm…

Lords Debate 19 May 2025

Data (Use and Access) Bill [HL]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her engagement and for defining what genuine scientific research is. I hope very much that the AI companies, when using this extraordinary exemption, will listen to the Government, and that the Government will ensure that the policy is enforced. The trust of the pe…