Alison Bennett MP: speeches

Speeches

• 13 Nov 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Hon. Members who watched “Newsnight” last night will doubtless have been moved by Sir Michael Palin’s interview about his wife Helen’s final days and passing in a hospice. The package reveals what is known to many Members: the hospice crisis of funding, cuts and beds being closed. In the light of that, will the Leader of the House make time for Members to debate the crisis in our hospices, including the urgent need to reverse the Government’s increases in national insurance contributions and to ensure that hospices are finally fairly funded?

• 11 Nov 2025 · Rural Railway Stations: Step Free Access · Hansard source

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  Wivelsfield station in my constituency was also promised money in January 2024 under the Access for All scheme, and to date no more information has been forthcoming. Does my hon. Friend agree that what the Conservatives did in 2024 was nothing more than pork barrel politics?

• 11 Nov 2025 · Alcohol Duty: UK Wine Sector · Hansard source

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  Like the hon. Lady, as a south-east MP, I have some amazing vineyards in my constituency, such as Bolney Wine Estate and Albourne Estate. They have told me about the challenges of the 8.5% cap that the hon. Lady has so articulately set out. It strikes me, however, that the previous Conservative Government brought in that cap. Does the hon. Lady think that current members of the Conservative party regret that decision from 2022?

• 5 Nov 2025 · STEM Industries: Female Workforce · Hansard source

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  Does the Minister seriously believe that cutting funding for the international baccalaureate, a qualification that is proven to keep more girls studying STEM subjects, will help increase the number of women entering STEM industries?

• 29 Oct 2025 · International Baccalaureate: Funding in State Schools · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Didcot and Wantage (Olly Glover) on securing this debate on what we have heard from Members across the Chamber is a really important subject. Varndean sixth-form college in Brighton is the only state-funded provider of the international baccalaureate in the whole of Sussex. I was lucky enough to visit earlier in the year. It is a remarkable institution that gives young people from across the region, including many of my Mid Sussex constituents, the chance to pursue a truly world-class qualification, as other hon. Members have set out. I am pleased that Varndean’s principal, Donna-Marie Janson, joins us in Westminster Hall today. The opportunity that Varndean offers is under serious threat. Varndean has warned that, without the large programme uplift, the IB will simply become financially unviable. The IB could—and, by the looks of it, will—disappear entirely from state education in our region, and potentially across the country. Let us be clear: that would be a tragedy for young people from Brighton and for those who travel to Varndean from places such as Burgess Hill, Haywards Heath and Hassocks to take the IB and go on to study engineering, medicine and mathematics at some of our leading universities. Claude from Hurstpierpoint told me that his decision to study the IB was “One of the best choices I’ve ever made”. The IB is recognised across the world for its quality. It encourages breadth, critical thinking and an international outlook, developing well-rounded students who go on to thrive. Most IB schools are independent, although as we have already heard, Varndean is one of the few state schools keeping this opportunity open for every student, irrespective of their family’s financial situation. If the Government allow these cuts to go ahead, it risks entrenching a two-tier education system, where access to this globally respected qualification is reserved for the wealthy. That cannot be right.

• 29 Oct 2025 · International Baccalaureate: Funding in State Schools · Hansard source

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  A-levels are undoubtedly brilliant, but does the Minister agree that they are more narrow than the international baccalaureate?

• 29 Oct 2025 · International Baccalaureate: Funding in State Schools · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I wholeheartedly agree with her. The Government say they want to widen participation in higher education and to boost skills, but cutting funding for the IB does the opposite; it narrows opportunity and stifles aspiration. Therefore, I again urge the Minister to reconsider this decision, to ensure that schools such as Varndean can continue to offer this world-class qualification in the future. Last Monday, during Education questions, I asked the Minister whether he would consider meeting students from Varndean. Given that Donna-Marie Janson, the school’s principal, is sitting behind me in the Public Gallery, I am sure that his officials could swap numbers with her and set up such a meeting, so will he arrange that meeting? The IB is a symbol of what education should be— ambitious, inclusive and world class. We must not let it become the preserve of the few.

• 28 Oct 2025 · Hong Kong: Human Rights Violations · Hansard source

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  8. What assessment she has made of recent trends in the level of human rights violations in Hong Kong.

• 28 Oct 2025 · Hong Kong: Human Rights Violations · Hansard source

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  A constituent of mine, who now lives in Haywards Heath, came to the UK from Hong Kong under the British national overseas visa route after the deterioration of human rights there left her and her daughter with no choice but to seek safety. She is now deeply anxious about reports that the qualifying period for settlement and citizenship may be extended. I think the whole House can agree that the human rights violations in Hong Kong are abhorrent, so what representations has the Minister made to her Chinese counterparts, and can she explain how she will protect BNO visa holders who have made their home in the UK?

• 21 Oct 2025 · NHS Menopause Treatment · Hansard source

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  It is being reported in the press this week that women are being exploited by a menopause “gold rush”, enabled by tech giants such as Instagram. What steps can be taken to ensure that women have access to the very best of information and that misinformation on the internet is brought under control?

• 20 Oct 2025 · Post-16 Education and Skills Strategy · Hansard source

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  The Secretary of State praises the fantastic FE staff and describes FE colleges as “no longer a Cinderella service, but rather a system of high esteem”. How does she propose to do that while still maintaining the pay gap for FE staff compared with teachers in other educational settings?

• 20 Oct 2025 · International Baccalaureate · Hansard source

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  1. What steps she is taking to ensure the provision of adequate funding for pupils to study the International Baccalaureate.

• 20 Oct 2025 · International Baccalaureate · Hansard source

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  Varndean sixth-form college in Brighton is the only state-funded IB provider in Sussex. It has warned that, without the large programme uplift, the IB will become financially unviable. Many Mid Sussex students have gone on from Varndean to study engineering, medicine and maths at leading universities. Does the Minister think it right that this world-class qualification becomes available only in the private sector, entrenching a two-tier education system? Will he meet me and Varndean students to discuss the benefits of the IB for state-educated pupils and why this decision must be reversed?

• 16 Oct 2025 · Children’s Hospices: South-east England · Hansard source

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  I agree that increasing the time period covered by this grant to children’s hospices to three years will really help. Can the Minister comment on whether there are plans to do the same for the adult hospice sector?

• 16 Oct 2025 · Children’s Hospices: South-east England · Hansard source

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  I wholeheartedly welcome the Government’s announcement this morning, in anticipation of this afternoon’s debate, of £80 million of support for children’s hospices over three years. I thank the Minister for listening to the calls of the children’s hospice sector and the Liberal Democrats. The three-year settlement will enable hospices to plan and deliver services over a longer period. Above all, it will ensure that seriously ill children and their families can continue to access hospice care. However, providers tell me that this level of funding does not solve the children’s hospice funding crisis, nor does it put children’s hospices on a genuinely long-term, sustainable financial footing. Bluntly, this funding will only slow the rate at which children’s hospice services are being cut. Across the south-east—indeed, across the whole of England—children’s hospices support thousands of seriously ill babies, children and young people, and the families who love and care for them. One such organisation is Shooting Star Children’s Hospices. A parent recent said: “Without the support of the team at Shooting Star I believe our family would be under enormous strain and feel unable to know where to turn.” They are places of compassion, expert medical care and human dignity. They provide everything from end-of-life care to vital symptom management and psychological support, but our children’s hospices are in crisis. Unless urgent action is taken, many may disappear. Since 2019, the number of children and young people needing end-of-life care has doubled. The demand for symptom management has surged by 108%. Hospices are having to provide more care and support than ever before, yet they are struggling to keep their doors open. At the same time, inflation and rising costs, particularly in recruiting and retaining highly skilled staff, has driven hospice expenditure up by an average of 15% in the past year alone. The Government’s disastrous national insurance hike has only exacerbated the existing pressures. For example, Southern Hospice Group is a local charity made up of three Sussex hospices: Chestnut Tree House children’s hospice near Arundel, Martlets in Hove and St Barnabas House in Worthing. The national insurance rise has collectively cost them £500,000. Yes, the Government have increased funding in cash terms, but it is simply not enough. Local NHS funding from integrated care boards remains 18% lower than it was three years ago, even as hospices stretch to meet rising demand. Children’s hospices are now dipping into their reserves to stay open. In 2024-25, 59% of them ended the year in deficit. In 2025-26, that figure is expected to rise to a staggering 91%. This is clearly not sustainable. Meanwhile, a postcode lottery in funding continues. Recent freedom of information requests conducted by the charity Together for Short Lives showed that some integrated care boards in London spent over £400 per child needing palliative care, while others spent less than £25. We see that too in the south-east: one ICB spent over £260 per child, while another spent just over £100. Only 32% of ICBs could even say how many children accessed hospice care in their region. This gap in data must be filled. The announcement this morning suggested that funding being distributed via ICBs would tackle the postcode lottery issue, but the results of these FOI requests suggest that there is an awfully long way to go. How will the Minister ensure that ICBs commission children’s hospice services equitably? What guidance will they be given to ensure that these vast variations in support are eliminated? If I can emphasise one thing, it is that people are the beating heart of the hospice movement. Highly qualified specialists, passionate volunteers and generous donors all make the seemingly impossible happen, but the work- force is in crisis. Incredibly, there are only 24 full-time equivalent paediatric palliative medicine specialists serving the entire UK, when we know the need is for at least 40 to 60. If we followed the guidelines of the Royal College of Nursing, we would have nearly 5,000 community children’s nurses; right now, we have under 1,000. The professionals who care for our sickest children are being stretched to breaking point. I urge the Minister and the Government to build on today’s announcement by first fixing the broken commissioning system. We must instruct NHS England and the Department to model what each local NHS body should be spending on palliative care and to hold them accountable. We must commission services at regional and national levels, where appropriate, to create economies of scale, and we must use the new pan-ICB commissioning offices to ensure consistent and equitable access to care across England. Secondly, we must tackle workforce shortages and invest an additional £2.4 million per year in GRID and SPIN training for paediatric palliative medicine. We must fund and implement safe staffing ratios for nurses and aim to employ the 4,960 community nurses that England truly needs.

• 16 Oct 2025 · Children’s Hospices: South-east England · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for celebrating the work of Queen’s nurses and fabulous Fia for what she has done in writing a book—I am not sure that I could do that. It is truly impressive, and I am happy to encourage the Minister to buy the book; it sounds like I had better buy it too. This is about real children like fabulous Fia. It is about real families and real suffering that could be eased. Children’s hospices provide £3.32 of care for every £1 invested by the state, which is extraordinary value, so they deserve more support. These children deserve dignity, comfort and skilled care, and their families deserve the support that only children’s hospices can offer.

• 16 Oct 2025 · Children’s Hospices: South-east England · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for the campaigning she is doing with her colleagues on Arthur Rank hospice in Cambridgeshire, and she is right. When I went to visit Chestnut Tree House in Sussex last week, I saw that it is talking to adult hospices in the area about where that more strategic view can happen. These children deserve dignity, comfort and skilled care, and their families deserve the support that only children’s hospices can offer. Will this Government truly support the vision laid out in the NHS 10-year plan in which neighbourhood health centres, hospitals and hospices work together to deliver high-quality end-of-life care in the community, or will we continue to let these vital services be ignored, underfunded and unconnected? There is an opportunity for more action than that in this morning’s announcement and for a longer-term commitment. I urge the Minister to do what is necessary and right and ensure that no child is left without the care and dignity that they deserve.

• 14 Oct 2025 · Mental Health Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  Will the Minister give way?

• 13 Oct 2025 · Baby Loss · Hansard source

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  The hon. Members for Rossendale and Darwen (Andy MacNae) and for Sherwood Forest (Michelle Welsh) and the right hon. Member for Godalming and Ash (Sir Jeremy Hunt) must be thanked, not just for securing this debate to mark Baby Loss Awareness Week, but for their tireless advocacy to improve maternity services across the United Kingdom—work that they have been carrying out for many years. The pain of baby loss is multifaceted. It involves not only the unimaginable grief that accompanies losing a baby, but the emotional and psychological suffering that comes with facing the prospect of a life without your child—a future completely different from the one you had hoped for. Losing a baby can be loud, fast and chaotic, but it can also happen quietly—almost unnoticeably. Some parents arrive home from the hospital to a wardrobe full of baby clothes and piles of newborn toys, but an empty cot. Other expectant mothers may wake up in the morning excited to be another day closer to their baby’s arrival, only to find out that it was not meant to be. Half of adults in the UK said that they or someone they know had experienced pregnancy or baby loss. According to Sands, every day in the UK 13 babies die shortly before, during or soon after birth. These families, as we have heard tonight, have to try to pick up the pieces, maintain their relationships, work and continue with daily commitments, all while tackling the emotional and often physical trauma of their experiences. They often walk that path alone, feeling like there is nobody they can speak to about their indescribable grief, or that they should not speak about it, as though they themselves have somehow failed. That is not the case, and no woman should have to suffer in silence. In the case of my constituents, Hannah and Simon, not only did they have to come to terms with the fact that they would not be taking their baby boy, Austin, home from the hospital, but they had to face the reality that this tragedy was avoidable and that their baby would have survived, had the trust recognised and responded to concerns identified in the foetal and maternal monitoring. Hannah and Simon are not the only ones. Connecting with other parents in Sussex resulted in them hearing stories from other families whose experiences were concerningly similar to their own. Between 2019 and 2023, the University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust paid £58 million in compensation for 60 medical negligence claims related to maternity and obstetric care. That is the second-highest amount of compensation and the third-highest number of claims across all NHS trusts in England. That, and Hannah and Simon’s story, points to a larger systemic problem at the heart of maternity care. It was clear then, as it is now, that successive Governments have been asleep at the wheel on maternity care, and it is the families at the heart of it who pay the price—families such as Hannah and Simon’s. Their baby Austin would have been starting school next year if things had been different, and their daughter, just three when her little brother died, “should not have to continually ask us why her friends got to bring their siblings home, and she had to say goodbye instead.” That family, like too many across the country, deserved better. Now, they themselves are calling for change so that no one else misses out on a lifetime of memories with their child as a result of avoidable mistakes. As part of her inquiry into maternity care, Donna Ockenden provided a blueprint—a starting point from which we could put an end to this scandal, make maternity care fit for purpose and put an end to these unnecessary deaths. However, not only have the nationally applicable, immediate and essential actions of the Ockenden report not all been implemented, but the Government have dropped the requirement for every ICB to have a women’s health hub, and they have announced cuts to the national service development funding for maternity services from £95 million in 2024-25 to just £2 million the following year. Is it any wonder, therefore, that the UK is underperforming compared with other OECD countries on infant and newborn mortality, or that, according to a Care Quality Commission report in September 2024, 65% of units are not safe for women to give birth in? We want our country to become the safest place in the world to have a baby, but that can only be achieved if accountability is taken for these failings, lessons are learned, and concrete steps are taken by the Government to put an end to this national scandal. We have heard from a number of Members this evening about the impacts of deprivation and ethnicity on outcomes for maternity and for babies. The colour of someone’s skin, their bank balance or where they live should not be deciding factors in whether they and their baby live or die. Quite simply, maternity care should not be a lottery. I very much welcome the Secretary of State’s presence this evening, and I endorse the comments made by the right hon. Member for Melton and Syston (Edward Argar) and my hon. Friends the Members for Horsham (John Milne) and for Chichester (Jess Brown-Fuller), who said that families who have lost babies through medical negligence need to be taken with the Government on this journey towards reviews. I think that the Sussex families would be furious with me this evening if I did not say to the Secretary of State that they are not happy with the way in which the reviews announced in July are going so far, so I urge him to do everything in his power to listen to the families and take them on that journey together. Let me pose a question to the Secretary of State on behalf of Hannah and Simon. These Sussex families have waited over a year for the Government to appoint Donna Ockenden, the one person with a proven record of exposing failings and driving improvement. Thus far, their patience has been repaid with delay, confusion and avoidance. When will the Government act to stop these preventable deaths by appointing Donna Ockenden to lead the Sussex review, and by confronting what has become a national shame for our country’s children with a full public inquiry? My hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Bobby Dean) spoke movingly about his and his wife’s experience of miscarriage, and I endorse his call for mental health support following every miscarriage, not just after three.

• 13 Oct 2025 · Baby Loss · Hansard source

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  The theme of this year’s Baby Loss Awareness Week is “Together, we care”, and we do care. We care about all kinds of baby loss, and we care about babies like Austin. Hannah told me: “We lost an entire lifetime. Our son never had the chance to grow up, to take his first steps, to speak his first words, to make friends”—

• 16 Sept 2025 · Police: Professional Standards · Hansard source

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  I am an MP from Sussex. We are about to go through local government reorganisation and see the creation of a Sussex mayor, and as part of that process, the role of the police and crime commissioner is going to become redundant. How does the Minister think that new mayoral responsibility is going to work in practice? Is it going to be exactly the same as it currently stands with PCCs, or will it be different?

• 15 Sept 2025 · Children with SEND: Assessments and Support · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Huq. Parents do everything for their children, especially when they have special needs. That is why I am fed up with the demonisation of parents. They are blamed for gaming the system, for having failed as parents, for being too soft, for not putting in boundaries, for bothering overstretched teachers; they are blamed for going private, but also for costing the state too much money. The crisis in SEND is not the fault of parents. As Catherine, a Mid Sussex parent, said to me: “They need to see what it is like for parents twenty-four hours a day whose children are at a mainstream school that does not have the SEND facilities and teachers that it needs to meet the demands of its pupils. Teachers have enough to do. Why would any parent try to play the system for SEND, when it’s so much paperwork and time? You just would not do it.” Please let us listen to the voices of the parents who gathered outside earlier today. They know their children, they know what they need, and they know that the current system is failing not only their children but society at large.

• 10 Sept 2025 · Qatar: Israeli Strike · Hansard source

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  Can the Minister confirm whether the Attorney General will publish any advice that he or the Government have received on whether there have been breaches of international law during the conflict in Gaza?

• 9 Sept 2025 · Better Futures Fund · Hansard source

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  The better futures fund rightly targets the needs of vulnerable children, and one such group are those who are subject to adoption or kinship arrangements. Last week the Department for Education announced that it would renew the adoption and special guardianship support fund for one year, but did not say that it would reverse the 40% cuts in per-child funding that were announced in the spring. Does the Minister agree that reversing those cuts is vital for protecting families and keeping children in adoption arrangements, and will he meet adoptive families from Mid Sussex so that he can better understand the benefits to the Treasury that investing in adoptive families will bring?

• 4 Sept 2025 · Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for her kind words. She is absolutely right. I will address her point in due course. When I saw Rachel this morning and told her about the one-year renewal of the fund, she told me that she had come out in goosebumps as a result. That is how much this fund matters to adoptive families. I have seen for myself the difference that the fund makes. One parent told me that her gratitude for the ASGSF was immeasurable, and that she would never have been able to be an adoptive parent today without it. She spoke about two professionals whose “deep understanding, profound compassion and reflective empathy” had supported her and her children through multiple crises and out the other side. Such stories are not rare. Every year, Adoption UK’s adoption barometer shows consistent results: 85% of families who access the fund say that it makes a positive impact; 94% say that they would use it again. So, yes, it was a relief in April when my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson) secured a commitment from the Minister that the fund would continue, but that relief came only after weeks of absolutely unnecessary anxiety. Families were left in limbo, and providers unsure if they could keep going. Even now, huge problems and unanswered questions remain. The profound concern that I am hearing from families, therapists and charities working with adoptive and kinship families is about whether the Government are going to learn from the shambles of the spring and not repeat those mistakes.