Looking forward to this Parliamentary session it’s good to see the issues you raise with me regularly, being addressed by this government.
We are banning zero hour contracts – when they work well they work really well, however to not know from week to week what income one has is something most of us would struggle with.
We will ban fire and rehire – I was shadow Maritime minister for four years and am now Maritime minister and can testify to the distress caused to P&O workers when they were callously sacked.
We cannot have workers’ rights discarded again.
It was also good to see sick pay and protections for new parents being strengthened, many are not able to take time to recover from sickness so the Workers’ Rights Bill we are bringing to the House will go some way to protect those workers.
This government is also going to strengthen border security and crack down on organised criminal gangs who profit from this terrible trade.
Unfortunately, over the last 14 years a backlog has developed in our asylum system and we have seen the number of asylum seekers waiting for a decision on their claim rise from 19,000 to almost 119,000.
This has led to a situation where it has become necessary to use hotels to temporarily house asylum seekers.
I look forward to scrutinising the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill when it comes before the house.
Something else I am often contacted about is anti-social behaviour - so I am pleased to see us address this with the Crime and Policing Bill, a bill which will crackdown on ASB, will tackle knife crime and retail crime, and will set at the heart of it stronger protections against violence towards women and girls.
We will also reduce backlogs in the court system,
It’s unconscionable that people are waiting years in some cases for their cases to reach court – I have a resident who is still waiting for justice and has been for more than two years due to backlogs.
We have much to do and are setting out a clear legislative and economic framework in which to do it.
I feel confident the steps we are taking to address the key issues you contact me about.
As always I am happy to respond to residents questions on this or any other topic on email.
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