Extracts from Commons proceedings - June 18

Friday, 19 June 2020 08:21

Extract from International Trade questions Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab) [V]: Complacency from the Government, and indeed from the international community as a whole, over human rights violations in Kashmir has contributed to the crisis that is unfolding at the line of actual control. The Indian and Chinese armies are now toe to toe, and there has been a Mexican stand-off between Pakistan and Indiasince last August. I do not need to remind anybody that these are three...Request free trial

Extract from International Trade questions

Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab) [V]: Complacency from the Government, and indeed from the international community as a whole, over human rights violations in Kashmir has contributed to the crisis that is unfolding at the line of actual control. The Indian and Chinese armies are now toe to toe, and there has been a Mexican stand-off between Pakistan and Indiasince last August. I do not need to remind anybody that these are three nuclear powers. What economic and other levers is the Secretary of State using to resolve this crisis? Will she urge the Prime Minister to call for a UN Security Council meeting to avert a global disaster? [903495]

The Minister for Trade Policy (Greg Hands): Obviously the whole of government is extremely concerned by the situation in Kashmir. It is primarily of course a matter for the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. However, I can tell the hon. Lady that trade assists dialogue and assists countries and peoples to come together. In reference to India we are having a JETCO—India-UK Joint Economic and Trade Committee—shortly to talk about trade between the UK and India. In relation to Pakistan, as I said earlier, we are rolling over the GSP-plus arrangements that the EU currently has with Pakistan, which also include a key human rights element. Making sure that dialogue continues and that trade continues will assist in that.

Extracts from Commons debate on Covid-19: BAME Communities

Dawn Butler (Brent Central) (Lab):...The death rate for covid-19 has exposed and amplified what has been going on in society for decades. The concentration of deaths in areas where people are just about managing should worry us all. As a country, we are better than this. According to the Office for National Statistics, the burden of covid-19 has been felt more strongly in regions with greater deprivation. In those areas, people are dying from the virus at double the rate of those in more affluent areas. According to the ONS, adjusting for age, black people are more than four times as likely to die from covid as white people. Pakistanis and Bangladeshis are more than three times as likely and Indians more than twice as likely...

...More than two in 10 black African women are employed in health and social care roles, Indian men are 150% more likely to work in health or social care roles, and 14% of doctors in England and Wales are Indians. Covid-19 does not prefer one person’s lungs to those of other ethnicities. It is not the pandemic that discriminates—it is society. It is almost as though being black is a pre-existing condition that results in worse outcomes for health, employment and education. That does not for one moment mean that it cannot be overcome. It is not a victim mentality that has put us in this situation, any more than it was indolence that put British citizens on planes and deported them during the Windrush scandal or bad sportsmanship that subjects our players to abuse on the field. We must call it what it is, because if we do not call it what it is, how can we identify it, how can we cure it, how can we stop it? It is racism, and it has become more structural and systemic. It is not just about individuals. Structural and systemic racism can exist without individual acts of racism, but it is an unfair, unequal discriminatory system—and it is literally killing us...

...As a member of the Science and Technology Committee, I have listened to many scientists talk about covid-19, and it is not genetics that have resulted in a higher death rate. It is not internal, and that means it is external. To back up the findings of the PHE report—the one that the Government tried to hide—it is noted that covid-19 potentially has had a less severe impact in the Caribbean, Africa and the Indian subcontinent. That raises questions as to why BAME communities in England are so severely affected. It is suggested that issues such as structural racism and discrimination and a failure to adequately protect key workers may have contributed disproportionately...

Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con):...It was particularly concerning for me when I was approached by individuals in my constituency from different sectors of my thriving and vibrant BAME community about their fears and about what this meant to them. It struck me that the information available was so vague and general that it was difficult for me to respond to their questions. One particular individual from my Indian community asked, “Does this mean I’m more at risk?” I could not answer that, so I looked carefully at the research from Public Health England when it came out. I will come on to that in a moment...

Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab):...Back in April, we saw BAME people being disproportionately affected by covid-19 as data came in from emergency admissions to hospital from more than three months ago. On 22 May, King’s College London research showed that patients from BAME groups admitted to hospital with covid-19 are, on average, a decade younger than white patients. In May, the Office for National Statistics reported that black people were more than four times more likely to die from covid-19 than their white counterparts; that Bangladeshi and Pakistani people were more than one and a half times more likely to die from covid-19; and that the situation was similar for people with an Indian heritage. That was published more than a month ago...

...Figures released last week by the NHS Confederation show that the number of ethnic minority chairs and non-executive directors of NHS trusts in England has almost halved from 15% in 2010 to a mere 8% in 2018. Quoted in the Eastern Eye newspaper, Dr Ramesh Mehta, the president of the British Association of Physicians of Indian Origin, said that this was down to “rampant discrimination” and a “club culture” within NHS professions...

Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab):...I will not speak for too long, but the impact of covid-19 on black and minority ethnic communities has been so shocking that I feel I must put on record my concerns, and add my voice to those calling for urgent and decisive action. We have known for months, as the hon. Member for Wealden (Ms Ghani) has just said, that BAME people are being hit very hard by this pandemic. Last month, the Office for National Statistics found that black men and women are four times more likely to die from covid-19 than white men and women, and that people from Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Indian and mixed ethnic groups also had a raised risk...

Tracy Brabin (Batley and Spen) (Lab/Co-op):...This debate is rightly focused on the impact of coronavirus on black, Asian and minority ethnic communities—a point extremely pertinent to my constituency. In her maiden speech, my predecessor, Jo Cox, said of Batley and Spen:

“Our communities have been deeply enhanced by immigration, be it of Irish Catholics across the constituency, or of Muslims from Gujarat in India or from Pakistan, principally from Kashmir.”—[Official Report, 3 June 2015; Vol. 596, c. 674.]

Claudia Webbe (Leicester East) (Lab):...The Office for National Statistics has found that black people are 1.9 times more likely to die of covid-19 than white people, people of Bangladeshi and Pakistani descent are 1.8 times more likely to die, and people of Indiandescent are about 1.5 times more likely to die. Those figures reflect the severe racial disparities in our economy.

We already know from a Resolution Foundation think-tank estimate that black, Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi employees experience an annual pay penalty of £3.2 billion. Analysis from Public Health England shows that once in hospital, people from African, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds are also more likely to require intensive care. Those communities accounted for 11% of those hospitalised with covid-19, but 36% of those admitted to critical care...

Sam Tarry (Ilford South) (Lab):...Actually, in many BAME communities, the proportion of people who work in frontline services, whether it be bus drivers or people working in the NHS, is incredibly high and people are fearful, and they are angry that they and their communities have not been prioritised by the Government in the way that they should have been. These are rational fears. In my Bangladeshi community —my own friends—the risk of death has been double that of people of white British ethnicity. In other communities—Indian, Pakistani, other Asian, Caribbean, black communities—the risks have been 10% to 50% higher than for white British people, and yet many of those people were the first to be put on furlough, the first to lose their jobs, and have had the greatest burden in terms of how many they have seen die from their own community...

Ms Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab):...We know that deprivation doubles the risk from covid, and Newham is deprived—of that, there is no doubt. Like many of my friends’ areas, we have beautifully diverse communities, which means that they have been hurt massively by the pandemic. Those from our Bangladeshi community have twice the risk of death, and that is more than 12% of my constituents. Those from the Pakistani community have a 44% higher risk, which is 10% of us in Newham. Those from the Indian community have a 22% higher risk, which is 15% of us in Newham. Those from the black Caribbean and black African communities have a 10% and 6% higher risk, which is 4% and 11% of us in Newham...

Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab):...Finally, I want to pay tribute to organisations in my constituency that have been helping, including the Bonny Downs Baptist church and the Bonny Downs Community Association, a long-standing food bank that has had a massive increase in demand; the Masjid Ibrahim mosque; the Malayalee Association of the UK, representing people from south India; the London Tamil Sangam; and my friend and colleague Councillor Lakmini Shah, who has been supporting—single-handedly, I think—several dozen families in this position. The no recourse to public funds restriction must be suspended for the duration of this crisis...

Zarah Sultana (Coventry South) (Lab):...The evidence is clear that people with Bangladeshi backgrounds face double the risk of dying from covid-19 compared with white people, while people from Chinese, Indian, Pakistani, Caribbean and other black ethnicity backgrounds face a 10% to 50% higher risk of death. This is not some innate vulnerability of black and brown people. It is not something natural—it is social. It is because black and brown people are disproportionately poor and that makes them more likely to have ill health. They are disproportionately in overcrowded housing and are therefore more likely to spread this deadly disease, and disproportionately in jobs exposed to the virus, from being over-represented in the NHS, to being in the low-paid, often precarious, frontline key worker roles. Again, what we see is a system that neglects black and brown people, exploits black and brown people, and all too tragically discards black and brown people...

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