Speeches by Robertson.

“Q So do the changes in the Bill reduce diversity in the criminal justice system? Dame Vera Baird: Not in the slightest. I assume you know that 73% of people who are entitled to a jury trial do not elect it and choose to stay in the magistrates court. That is men, women and black people. Black people and women dispropor…”

“Q As a former family solicitor, I want to focus my questions on the proposal to remove the presumption that involvement by a parent in a child’s life is in the child’s best interest or good for the child’s welfare. Given that, in children’s proceedings, it is already the law that the child’s welfare shall be paramount,…”

“Q But we do agree that people with more diverse backgrounds elect jury trials and that option is being removed for them. Dame Vera Baird: Seventy-three per cent of people offered jury trials do not take the offer up. Are you sure that the term “elect” is correct? Is it not “demand”?”

“I am asking the questions.”

“Q May I ask for a clarification? Is Charlotte on her own in her views? Is she the only person who holds the views she has expressed? Dame Vera Baird: Of course not, and I did not intend to say that. I have been trying to think, since we discussed it, about how I would feel if my experience were being used for a politic…”

“Q Given that there is no one here representing children, as a children’s lawyer, can you help the Committee understand what a presumption of a parent’s involvement in a child’s life is, as compared with the overriding concern for a child’s welfare that must be uppermost in the court’s mind? Can you help the Committee u…”

“But the Government want to remove that.”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Efford. I congratulate the hon. Member for Peterborough (Andrew Pakes) on securing this important debate. Across the United Kingdom, public baths and lidos play an essential role in encouraging people of all ages to keep fit and healthy, as well as teaching them a v…”

“Q Thank you very much for sharing these very powerful experiences to help all of us here make better decisions. I would like to direct my questions not to the criminal court changes, but the family court changes. I should say that I was a practising family law solicitor and represented mothers who wanted to stop abusiv…”

“Let me ask the hon. Member a question, because his party is in government, he has power and he can change things. Does he think the system is fair? No, he does not, because he has already told this House that it is not. Is he not bitterly disappointed that his own Government have not got a plan to change it? If he does…”

“Labour is failing young people. Youth unemployment is up since Labour took office—it is now higher than in the eurozone. There are more people not in education, employment or training since Labour took office—now nearly 1 million. There is a midlife crisis in our economy, too. More than 2 million people aged between 50…”

“I am sure that the hon. Lady’s son’s degree is an excellent degree and that, hopefully, he will gain an excellent job, but that is not the case for every student. Too many students in this country are saddled with tens of thousands of pounds of debt. They do not know their repayment terms because they change, and some …”

“My hon. Friend is right to point out that there are only two Labour Members of Parliament sitting on the Government Benches for this debate on the increase in fuel duty. Does he think that the other 400 Labour MPs are right now in a huddle, in a darkened room with the Chancellor, lobbying her to reduce that tax and to …”

“My hon. Friend is giving a characteristically well-informed speech. Might she reflect on the cost of moving around by car for the Prime Minister in his Holborn and St Pancras constituency and the necessity to move around by car for his constituents compared with mine in the Isle of Wight and hers in Gordon and Buchan?”

“But you could still improve your corridor care data by leaving people in ambulances. It may make the ambulance data worse, but it would improve your corridor care data. That is my issue: keeping someone in an ambulance rather than a cupboard is not a solution.”

“Will someone waiting in an ambulance count as waiting in a corridor care setting? If they do not, a hospital or a Government that is looking to improve the corridor care figures will simply leave people in ambulances, thereby creating another massive problem.”

“Is there not an issue here that we all know what inappropriate care looks like? We all know what an inappropriate waiting time is, and we all know what an inappropriate area for someone to wait from a clinical perspective is. If we just start measuring it now, does it not just become the benchmark on which to measure a…”

“When I visited my nearest hospital, St Mary’s on the Isle of Wight, I saw people being cared for in corridors, in reception areas, in a cupboard—not one person, but two people sharing a cupboard— and people still waiting in ambulances. Will those waiting in ambulances count as being cared for in a corridor care setting…”

“Do you think the Government’s new definition of corridor care—spending 45 minutes or more in a clinically inappropriate area—is the right one?”

“Will the hon. Member give way?”