Tom Hayes

Today, we have seen lots of colleagues taking interventions from each other. When I stand up to speak, particularly about poverty, I take interventions from another source—my mum. She will be sitting at home, watching the TV, and she will text me, because she knows that I am going to talk about my upbringing—about growing up in poverty, caring for her and my father, who were disabled and were forced out of work because the NHS and the social security system were nowhere to be seen when my mum and dad needed them. She is going to text me, as she always does, to say, “I’m sorry. I did my best.” She does not always realise that poverty is systemic—that it is about society and the structures we build. She internalises the shame and the guilt, and feels like she did not do enough. Given what has been said today, I also fear that my mum will ask me a further question: “Why are some of those MPs suggesting, or saying, that I am a scrounger, as a person dependent on the welfare system?” I do not think that Members of Parliament intend to create that impression, but they should know that what they say perpetuates the shame and stigma of poverty, which is impossible to eradicate in one lifetime, and is passed on from one generation to the next. That is why I stood for Parliament. I am in this place to try to tackle child poverty, so that the people of Bournemouth East—the constituency I represent—do not have the same kind of childhood I had, living without very much, and relying on the love of a mum and dad who will sacrifice everything to get you to where they think you need to be, when they should be able to depend on a wider social security system. I ask Members speaking in today’s debate to reflect on the language they use, because the outside world is watching.