Speeches by Cooper.

“With the Bill as it is at the moment, in what circumstances do you think shared owners alone should exercise votes in a commonhold association? When do you think the vote should sit with the registered provider?”

“It sounds like you do not think the Bill is anywhere near where it needs to be at the moment.”

“Sue, you are correct: we are indeed turning to questions of shared ownership. Currently, all shared ownership homes are leasehold, and they are not able to benefit from the current commonhold legal framework, because of the nature of how it is set up. I think the intention in the draft Bill is that, although shared own…”

“The Courts and Tribunals Bill seeks to increase the transparency of court proceedings in several important respects, but conducting empirical research into how real juries make decisions will remain illegal in England and Wales. Researchers have had to rely on mock juries in their research, which has shown a link betwe…”

“7. What steps he is taking to improve transparency in court proceedings.”

“This International Women’s Day I commend the work in my constituency of the Her-Place charitable trust, which supports women’s wellbeing and creates spaces to facilitate conversations about health and other challenges. Her-Place says that many women, especially in deprived areas, visit their GP with poor mental health,…”

“4. What steps she is taking with Cabinet colleagues to mark International Women’s Day.”

“If Parliament legislates to ban ground rent, which is what it will effectively be doing if the draft Bill becomes a Bill and is passed, Parliament is expressing the view that ground rent ought not to happen. Regardless of what we may think about that, Parliament is saying, “Ground rent shouldn’t happen.” What we are ar…”

“I am Andrew Cooper, Member of Parliament for Mid Cheshire.”

“A foundational principle of our constitution is that everyone is bound by and entitled to the benefit of the law, but the long-running crisis in our justice system has stretched that principle to breaking point. Other right hon. and hon. Members have covered in depth the disastrous decisions by the previous Government …”

“Will he give way?”

“In Europe today, it is possible to have a prescription issued in Tallinn, Estonia, and have it fulfilled in Lisbon, Portugal, but in my constituency, my local hospital cannot even send a prescription to a local pharmacy. May I urge my right hon. Friend to look carefully at what works in Europe, avoid reinventing the wh…”

“Will the hon. Gentleman give way?”

“Mark, do you want to add anything to that? You looked like you did.”

“Do you think you will by the time the Act is passed? Emily d'Albuquerque: By the time the Act is passed? Potentially. We do have ambitions to be much more digital in the future. It is in our current strategy. I do not know yet exactly what that will look like.”

“You want to, but do you have plans in place to do it? Emily d'Albuquerque: We do not have a detailed plan at this stage.”

“That is completely fair, but it will be ordinary people living in commonhold blocks who may want to refer back to their commonhold community statement at a glance. Emily d'Albuquerque: We do not yet have detailed plans, but we are aware that we need to make the commonhold community statements readily accessible. As you…”

“What work are you doing to prepare your online services for this? Currently, I think it is possible to do a straightforward Land Registry search, but for virtually every other kind of document, you have to fill in a form and send it off to the Land Registry. That really is not good enough in the 21st century, is it? Wh…”

“So you are not anticipating capacity problems right now, but it is too early to say. Emily d'Albuquerque: Yes.”

“Indeed, and the Land Registry has been criticised in recent years for the extent of the backlogs, hasn’t it? I understand that you have made some significant progress on getting the backlog down for new applications, but the Committee has received evidence that significant delays still exist for non-urgent applications…”