Speeches by Smith.

“So that we are absolutely clear on the shift-swapping provision—[Interruption.] I correct the Minister on the Weetabix; it was the Tea Room black pudding. If worker A and worker B consensually decide that they wish to switch, worker B being the one who will take the shift and worker A the one whose shift is now displac…”

“I understand the point that the hon. Gentleman makes. Actually, at no point have I said there should be no cost to the employer; I have said there needs to be flexibility, as opposed to a hard and fast rule. On Tuesday I had an exchange with the hon. Member for Birmingham Northfield on the point around, “Okay, what els…”

“I will give the hon. Gentleman one more go.”

“I understand the point that the hon. Gentleman makes, and I fundamentally agree with his point about bereavement leave and dependant leave. As we heard in the evidence sessions, I have an enormous amount of sympathy for extending certain elements of bereavement leave, including to pregnancy loss before 24 weeks, which …”

“I am tempted not to give way to the hon. Gentleman, since he seemed less than keen to take my interventions in the farming debate yesterday, but I will grant him an intervention today.”

“The hon. Gentleman makes a fundamentally good point about issues such as modern slavery. Actually, it was a former Conservative Prime Minister—I accept that we had a few in the last Government—my noble Friend Baroness May of Maidenhead, who did an enormous amount to tackle modern slavery in this country. Is it a case o…”

“I can assure the hon. Lady that I am intimately aware of the cost of childcare. It is something that challenges families—men and women, mums and dads, carers, grandparents and all sorts of people—on a daily basis. It is a very expensive reality of life. I do not want to get off topic, but the previous Government did a …”

“I will finish this point and then give way —the hon. Lady knows that I am up for the debate. There could be a pretty stark choice: go bust and no jobs, or some short-term undesirable pain that requires flexibility in order to get the business back on track to secure jobs. The last thing I want to see in this economy is…”

“I can think of businesses in recent times in my own constituency that are particularly affected by shipping delays, some as a result of the covid pandemic, which I accept was an exceptional period in our history, where we saw shipping delays of parts that businesses were waiting for to put their products together. Buck…”

“I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that intervention, because she underlines the fundamental point that I am making: most businesses do not want to turn people away. Convenience stores are a great example of that, and are actually some of the most flexible employers out there. My constituency, which is spread across 33…”

“I do not want to repeat the whole debate that we had the other day as we might not hit the clause that the hon. Gentleman’s colleagues are trying to get to today. I fully accept his point that the situation is not fair on the employee, but equally it is not fair on the employer, given that those circumstances, events o…”

“The hon. Gentleman makes a perfectly sensible point. We will come on to that issue shortly. The central point that I ask the Government to reflect on, before any consultation—post-legislation or during the passage of legislation—goes live, is that it is reasonable that those who are expected to put in meaningful and th…”

“I will just finish this point. As the hon. Gentleman knows, I am not shy of taking interventions. Government amendment 31 will cap the compensation an employee can receive if the employer does not give reasonable notice of cancellation or curtailment of a shift to the remuneration they would have gained if they had wor…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. I am grateful to the Minister for his explanation of Government amendment 30, but I gently suggest to him that starting by saying that he wished to be clear, and then going on to say that the Government will be consulting on it, possibly does not give busin…”

“Will the hon. Member give way?”

“Will the hon. Member give way?”

“Does my hon. Friend agree that, as part of Labour Members’ total failure to understand the countryside, they probably do not get that farmers are one of the very few sectors that have to buy retail but sell wholesale?”

“I have no doubt about the hon. Gentleman’s personal commitment, but do not the Liberal Democrats have a credibility problem? For all the rhetoric in this Chamber and outside, when they actually get their hands on power in local government, such as in Oxfordshire, they brutally attack their farmers by banning all meat a…”

“At Treasury questions yesterday, I raised with the hon. Gentleman the case of Upper Peppershill farm in Long Crendon, a small 380-acre arable farm in my constituency, which the shadow Secretary of State and the Leader of the Opposition visited a few weeks ago. The family have calculated that if they borrow the money to…”

“I agree.”