Jo White MP: speeches

Speeches

• 29 Nov 2024 · Men’s Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

  More

  I thank my hon. Friend for securing this debate. This is so important for how we behave both as a society and in this House. I have tabled an early-day motion calling for Disclosure and Barring Service checks for all Members of both Houses, as I think this would lead to greater transparency and openness. It would hopefully make us all feel safer in the corridors of power but, more importantly, it would give the institutions we visit, such as care homes and schools, much greater confidence in who they are letting through their doors. Would my hon. Friend support such a proposal?

• 25 Nov 2024 · Non-Domestic Rating (Multipliers and Private Schools) Bill · Hansard source

  More

  Charitable tax relief is meant to be for organisations that do something for the good of society. They get tax breaks because they are supposed to benefit the public, especially those who need it most. But when we look at private schools, we start to see a problem. These schools are not serving the wider public. They charge eye-watering fees, and the vast majority of people simply cannot afford to send their kids there. Here is the real issue: private schools are benefiting from a process that should be supporting the whole of society. They get tax breaks worth millions of pounds every year, and what do we get in return? An education system that reinforces and upholds structural inequalities. Meanwhile, state schools—the ones that serve the vast majority of kids—are left to scrape by, struggling with overcrowded classrooms, outdated resources and ever-decreasing funding. The Bill is redistributive, and it means that the moneys going into private schools will be far better spent improving the chances of all children. I want fairness, as do my constituents, and an equal chance for all our children. Those on the Opposition Benches say, “Private schools give scholarships, do charity work and help kids in need.” But let us be honest: that is a drop in the ocean. Here is the kicker: private schools are not even charities in the true sense of the word. They might not make a profit, but many of them are run by private companies that make money off investments and land. We all know that the largest private schools in the country have no shortage of cash, yet they still get subsidies that could be used to fix the mess left by the previous Government in our state schools. They do not provide a benefit for the public good; they just prop up inequality and drain resources from the schools that serve the vast majority of children. I welcome the fact that we are taking a good, hard look at the way education works, and we are putting our money where it does the most good: raising aspirations and opportunities for all our children, no matter their background. That has to be our focus.

• 20 Nov 2024 · Asylum Seekers: Hotel Accommodation · Hansard source

  More

  I welcome the Minister’s informing the House that return figures are now at nearly 10,000, which is up 1,000 from last week. May I ask on behalf of my constituents how we can make returns even faster?

• 13 Nov 2024 · Engagements · Hansard source

  More

  I welcome the Prime Minister’s leadership on an international scale to smash the criminal gangs that smuggle people across the border. This Labour Government have returned more than 9,000 people with no right to be in the UK, which is 20% more than the Conservatives did. Will the Prime Minister confirm that he will continue this trend, and smash the gangs that profit from people’s misery?

• 12 Nov 2024 · Fusion Power Plants · Hansard source

  More

  5. Whether he plans to support the development of fusion power plants connected to the grid.

• 12 Nov 2024 · Fusion Power Plants · Hansard source

  More

  Two weeks ago, the Budget announcement that the first fusion power plant will be built in Bassetlaw was welcome news. Can the Minister provide greater detail on this commitment, alongside the funding support being made available for the next financial year?

• 6 Nov 2024 · Budget Resolutions · Hansard source

  More

  Let me welcome the first Labour Budget in 14 years, and the first ever delivered by a woman. The Budget’s positive interventions for Bassetlaw have the vibe of the late, great, Ian Dury’s song, “Reasons to be Cheerful”. The song has wonderful lyrics listing the joys in life; it was written in response to his band mate surviving a brutal electric shock. Well, this Budget is Labour’s response to the shock of the Truss mini-Budget, and 14 years of neglect and no economic plan. In Bassetlaw, we now have significant support for UK fusion energy research to build on the UK’s position as global leader in sustainable energy. Building the first fusion power plant in Bassetlaw will take us to the next generation of carbon-neutral energy creation, providing huge opportunities to develop talent, skills, local jobs and wealth, and to build on business. The massive injection of funds into the NHS means that the waiting lists at Bassetlaw hospital will be tackled head-on, with a crack team from London hospitals going in to get our operating theatres open seven days a week, and driving those waiting times down. People are waiting too long for the operations that they desperately need. They want to be in work and bringing home a wage. That is central to rebuilding our economy and lifting people out of poverty. This is our Government putting joined-up thinking into action. I welcome the fact that in Bassetlaw, 2,500 retired mineworkers will see their pensions go up by £30 a week, as we deliver on our manifesto commitment, but it does not end there: our Government will continue to review surplus sharing arrangements, and I call for this to include those retired miners in my area who are in the scheme for supervisors and overseers. They cannot be ignored. They paid into an identical scheme and they deserve equal treatment. When Bassetlaw people told me that they were too scared to go into our town centres, I promised that I would take action. I welcome the funding to crack down on the organised gangs that target retailers. I welcome, too, the Government scrapping the law that gives immunity for low-value shoplifting—an immunity granted by the Conservative Government in 2014. The Tories talked the talk, but they did not walk the walk. They were all hot air, promises and no delivery. Whether it is the challenge of getting a GP or a dentist appointment, the challenge of sorting out the funding for flood alleviation schemes in Retford and Worksop, or the failure to stop Doncaster airport closing, the Tories have left it to Labour to pick up the pieces, to sort out their mess and to get Britain back on course.

• 6 Nov 2024 · Small Boat Crossings · Hansard source

  More

  When I stood for election on 4 July this year, my commitment to my voters was that we would smash the criminal gangs and stop the small boats. At that point, the number of small boat crossings was 6% higher than in the worst ever year, 2022. Does the Minister welcome the data that shows that the number is now 9,000 lower than in 2022?

• 4 Nov 2024 · Budget: Implications for Farming Communities · Hansard source

  More

  Many farms in my constituency were under water for months after the floods last year. What is the Minister doing to support those farms as they recover from last year’s horrific storms?

• 23 Oct 2024 · Fusion Energy · Hansard source

  More

  The focus has to be getting fusion working at West Burton. Should it be successful, it has to be rolled out over the whole of the UK, and Northern Ireland must be a key element of that. STEP is a Government-funded industry partnership to develop the most advanced tokamak fusion reactor in the world. The outline business case for the STEP programme was approved in 2023, with a full business case to be submitted next year. In November, we will see the launch of the procurement process for whole-plant partners—the major engineering and construction partners that will get the project moving. The intention is to get formal approval for the next four-year phase of development in March, when the proposal passes on to the major projects review group and then the Chief Secretary. Fusion has been defined as “last energy”—the recreation of the energy generated by the sun and all other stars, in which atomic nuclei collide and release energy. The goal is to produce an inexhaustible source of low-carbon energy and heat, with the objective of supplying electricity into the national grid by the 2040s. We as a Government need to be thinking already about our 2030 ambitions, with fusion taking us into the next and crucial phase of carbon-neutral energy production. That is not just my view: industry experts say that fusion is the solution to meeting the growing long-term global demand for clean energy and holds the potential to be the baseload energy source. The key is that it will be developed by UK industries and then distributed across the world. I welcome our mission to rebuild wealth through investing in Great British Energy, which is being kicked off across the country—that is game changing, rebuilding our economy and creating wealth through investment in carbon-neutral energy production—but we also need to think about where these ambitions need to take us. The development of fusion power plants will see the creation of new technologies and an energy capacity that will go further than energy generation, including the production of superconducting magnets, hydrogen and a new generation of medical advances for cancer treatment. We are the world leaders in the development of fusion, but the race is on, with the US and China rapidly developing competing technologies and key supply chain industries. Can the Minister confirm that it is the Government’s intention to ensure that the UK and British industry lead the world on fusion? For the sake of our industrial prospects, job creation and wealth generation, we cannot afford to take our eye off the ball and come in second, third or fourth. Our fusion ambitions cannot be put on the back burner for an undetermined future Government agenda. Fusion power offers the prospect of an almost inexhaustible source of energy for future generations, and we have a responsibility to pursue that agenda today, not tomorrow. It is no use being today’s world leader on fusion if the skills gap widens over the next decade and the best and brightest young minds head to other countries to develop fusion, or if we as a Government dither and prevaricate about making the investment now. We need to encourage our pupils, students and those already in work to choose a career in fusion and to do so in the UK. We need the Government, the fusion sector, its supply chain and academia to work together to understand the skills and disciplines needed in fusion and to communicate the opportunities. I want to see laboratory technicians and researchers, the best brains from across the country and the world, in our UK labs, and I want the Government to make fusion a No. 1 priority to attract the best global talent.

• 23 Oct 2024 · Fusion Energy · Hansard source

  More

  I very much agree. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East has already been, and I would love for the Under-Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, my hon. Friend the Member for Rutherglen (Michael Shanks), to go too. I want to see what we have at Culham reproduced at West Burton. It is the first step, and it gives us the vision for what could come next. When we founded the first industrial revolution, it was our red wall areas that led the way, and history is now repeating itself. Do we have the confidence to lead the world on fusion? Do we have the laser focus to make it happen now? Will we have the vision to create the silicon valley of green energy in Nottinghamshire? Although I know the Minister cannot prejudice the outcome of the spending review, will we get the finance from Government to make this whole thing viable? Leaders lead from the front. We have the opportunity—we have the lead. Do we have what it takes to win the gold medal? We need a coherent training programme and strategy for fusion skills, and a strategic foundation established for UK sector leadership in the decades to come. As the new MP for Bassetlaw, I already have a legacy plan for my constituency. I want to see my young people find routes into fusion, through the supply chains, through the development of new technologies, or through leading the world at the West Burton plant itself. I want to use this unique opportunity to change life outcomes for future generations in Bassetlaw. I want them to be enabled to take all of the advantages through fusion becoming part of the school curriculum and go on to be able to enter the field via vocational or academic training. I want my local businesses to have the opportunities to change their production techniques and provision. They must become key elements of the supply chain. In terms of immediate infrastructure asks, we need commitments for a railway station on site and local road improvements so that we can begin to unlock the full potential of West Burton. My ambitions are shared by our county council and our new Mayor of the East Midlands, Claire Ward, who sees the potential for the future. We have a shared vision to create a Trent clean energy supercluster, with the West Burton site aligning with three other decommissioned coal-fired power station sites to become the heart of carbon-neutral energy production on a regional scale, with hydrogen, small modular reactors, solar and wind, with 6,000 new construction jobs, 15,500 operational jobs, and a net gross value added gain of £930 million. The opportunities are cross-regional, stretching into Lincolnshire, Yorkshire and nationwide. I look forward to the continued support and commitment of the Government, and to our stepping up to become the international leaders for fusion and ensuring that fusion is integral to our Great British Energy ambitions. I invite the Minister to visit Bassetlaw to see the groundbreaking opportunities, and to cut the ribbon at our new fusion café, built by the UKAEA with the precise intent to inform and attract our young and inquisitive minds for the big challenges ahead. I am working in partnership with my community, my council, our elected mayor, the UKAEA, my neighbouring MPs, local businesses, the fusion industry, international partners and the Government to deliver STEP, to ensure that we are the clean energy superpower of the future. We will lead the world in the development of fusion.

• 23 Oct 2024 · Fusion Energy · Hansard source

  More

  I beg to move, That this House has considered the future of fusion energy. I want to begin by thanking the Under-Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy), for meeting me last week to discuss this priority issue. When I stood to be Member of Parliament for Bassetlaw, my commitment to my constituents was to work with others to raise aspirations and generate new opportunities for our young people, so that they no longer have to move away to get a highly skilled job or one that gives them a strong financial future. The STEP—spherical tokamak for energy production—programme provides such an opportunity, and it is my responsibility to do whatever it takes to support the process and ensure a strong economic future for an area that is now consistently described as post-industrial. Bassetlaw first made international history when the Mayflower pilgrims set foot on the Plymouth Rock and signed what became the American constitution. Four hundred years on, Bassetlaw will make headlines again, after the UK Atomic Energy Authority determined that West Burton, a coal-burning power station currently being decommissioned, will be the site of the first fusion energy prototype plant. This historic decision very much aligns with Bassetlaw’s coalmining heritage. We had seven pits producing coal, taken by local train drivers to power stations including Cottam, West Burton and High Marnham, built alongside the River Trent. We had a workforce proudly geared towards powering the country. A heritage that was in decline is now providing new opportunities for green energy production. We have good local infrastructure, with railway lines holding the potential to be the preferred route on to the site for goods, construction traffic and workers. Existing licences for water extraction on the River Trent and, most significantly, the connection to the national grid were core factors in the decision-making process for the preferred site. Even more important was the local public support for a fusion plant. At consultation events run by the local ward councillor, my hon. Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (James Naish), we were told in the no-nonsense way of north Nottinghamshire that it is common sense to retain an energy generation site for future green energy production. The public went further, calling for the other decommissioned power plants to be reused in similar ways. Those positive factors all contributed to the UKAEA’s decision making, and in December 2020 West Burton was selected as the future home of the spherical tokamak for energy production.

• 9 Oct 2024 · Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

  More

  I, like many mothers, had to bring up my daughters to be cautious of men and their motives, language and behaviour. Sadly, many of our daughters still have to learn the hard way, with one of mine taking years to recover from the assault she experienced as a schoolchild. Misogynistic attitudes and behaviours are often learned, tolerated and reinforced while in school. In recent times, social media influencers are driving that, embedding women hatred into our culture. How are the Government tackling this rising challenge in schools, and will that be embedded into the curriculum across all ages?

• 9 Oct 2024 · Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

  More

  2. What steps she is taking with Cabinet colleagues to help tackle violence against women and girls.

• 12 Sept 2024 · NHS: Independent Investigation · Hansard source

  More

  I very much welcome Lord Darzi’s report, which exposes how our country was let down by the previous Government. In my Bassetlaw constituency, I will be asked when people who need a GP appointment will get one, and when the 2,000-person dental waiting list will come to an end. I am listening to my GPs and my dentists so that I can work with them to tackle this crisis. I will be meeting them shortly. What is the Secretary of State’s message to them all?

• 5 Sept 2024 · Business of the House · Hansard source

  More

  Like my right hon. Friend, my constituent spent hours on Saturday queuing to purchase Oasis tickets. He got two at the hyper-inflated price of £800, tickets that were originally on sale for £150 each. Lengthy queuing puts people under significant pressure to purchase tickets and potentially make rash financial decisions that they may later regret. The insurance industry is required to provide a 14-day cool-off period to give people space for reflection. Will the Minister consider widening the forthcoming consumer protection Bill to include such a clause dealing with dynamic pricing ticket sales?

• 2 Sept 2024 · Violent Disorder · Hansard source

  More

  I am grateful to the Home Secretary for her statement. I agree with her point that it is perfectly possible to have a debate in our country about immigration and many other issues without resorting to looting shops, attacking minority groups and throwing bricks at police. In my constituency, I regularly have conversations with local people who feel that net migration is too high, and who worry about the cost of asylum hotels and the number of people entering our country illegally. In electing me, they have elected an MP who is prepared to raise those issues in Parliament and work with the Government to address them. Does the Home Secretary agree that that is how a democratic country like ours should operate, rather than a bunch of hooligans using those subjects as an excuse to smash up shops, burn cars and attack the police?

• 30 Jul 2024 · Building Homes · Hansard source

  More

  My local authority agreed its local plan during the general election campaign, and it was the first authority in the country to commit section 106 funds to our local hospital. As its deputy leader, I was very proud to lead on that. I see section 106 funding as the most effective method of mitigating the impacts of development and bringing in much-needed funding for infrastructure. How does the Deputy Prime Minister envision section 106 funding being reformed to make it a far more effective method of bringing in infrastructure spending?

• 25 Jul 2024 · Business of the House · Hansard source

  More

  Will the Leader of the House allow time for a debate on the failure of Conservative-controlled Nottinghamshire county council to build the desperately needed expansion of Outwood academy Portland, a secondary school in Worksop, despite the £4.5 million of community infrastructure levy money I received in April last year when I was Bassetlaw district council’s deputy leader?

• 23 Jul 2024 · Immigration and Home Affairs · Hansard source

  More

  I begin by thanking the people of Bassetlaw for putting me here. My commitment is to serve all residents to the best of my ability. I thank the hon. Member for Boston and Skegness (Richard Tice) for his contribution, and I look forward to debating with him in this place. Today’s debate has a direct link to the ongoing discussions on poverty. Having seen the last Government shut all three Bassetlaw police stations and both courthouses, I will have much to say on the issue in this Parliament. Crime and poverty have a clear connection. I need no lessons on how a lack of money impacts on children growing up—I lived it—but that experience taught me something far more valuable in understanding the impact of poverty and inequality, because what my family lacked in money, we more than made up for in love and in hopes and dreams. I was brought up to believe in me and what I could achieve. My mother got herself out of poverty because of the Open University, and my father made a choice all too familiar today. He gave up his engineering job to be a Sainsbury’s warehouseman to guarantee cheaper food, and of course he served as a shop steward for USDAW. I remain proud of both my parents for what they did for me. I was a free school meal kid—separate queue, of course—and a free school uniform kid, with clothes from the jumble sale and no new, smart, bright white socks for me, but I had no poverty of aspiration, no holding back, no shutting down of my dreams. That is good parenting, backed by their hard work. I commuted six hours every day to complete my own studies, taking my newborn baby in a carrycot with me. That is what learning to aspire results in. I get the little me’s so common in Bassetlaw and elsewhere: they are my people, my responsibility. Money is often a problem, but poverty of aspiration is much a bigger one to overcome. You are told that you cannot do that, that this door is not for you, that you stink, that you are thick, that your hopes are only ever dreams and can never be realised; well, this kid never stopped dreaming. Today’s little me’s—the ones who do without the flashy trainers, who play outside but never go inside the big sports stadiums or the posh restaurants and the cafés, who do not fly on aeroplanes or get taken to museums or theatres, who have never seen the King or his palace or Big Ben—in my area, in my constituency of Bassetlaw, are too often expected by this place to celebrate a rapidly changing world by getting to the back of the queue and behaving themselves. I am not having that. I drove trucks across the channel—the only woman in the drivers’ section on the ferries. Small boats—new problem? The flight cases I drove were huge, with ventilation and a false bottom. The border sniffer dogs were an infrequent luxury. I regularly ran the gauntlet of organised crime and desperate people. My predecessor had the biggest swing in 2019. I broke the record again but then quickly lost it to even more historic big swings to Labour. I know he likes his beer and I applaud his regular support for our local pubs, where he can drown his sorrows every time his beloved Notts County football club fails to deliver. I do not know whether he is planning on taking up golf, but Bassetlaw is the centre of British golf with seven serious golf courses, Ryder cup hosts and star players, and a magnificent municipal golf course. We regularly provide more of the Ryder cup team than entire golfing countries and Joe Dean of College Pines golf club showed the potential to reach these heights at the Open this weekend. From Danny Willett to Matt Fitzpatrick, we continue to grow international golfers—Lee Westwood, our freedom of the borough champion, continues to inspire our young boys and girls. He learned his trade on the council-run golf course, which is open and affordable to all. Nobody stopped me dreaming big and that is the Bassetlaw I intend to deliver. My style of being an MP will be outcomes-based. If I can do it, then so can you. Look not only at where you are, but at where you are going. This kid made it here and I put you all on warning: I will be knocking on the doors that kids in my area do not go through, and they will be coming with me, and I can assure you that I will channel my inner Michael Caine for those of you who choose to ignore my knock. The biggest single crime would be to get here, where people like me are not supposed to be, and merely sit here and make up the numbers. This kid has only just begun and there is no time to waste.