May 2025 Monthly Newsletter

This report is a brief account of my work during May at Westminster and in the Constituency. I have also included other developments in and around Parliament that will be of interest in a month when, amid many events at home and abroad, we paused to remember the 80th anniversary of VE Day.

As ever, if you want to remain in regular touch in ‘real time’ with my Home Office, Parliamentary and Constituency work, please see https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/home-office and https://members.parliament.uk/member/1533/contributions; and follow me on social media.

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Fitting the Bill

In my two previous reports, I reported on my work taking the Government’s flagship Crime and Policing Bill through its Committee Stage in the House of Commons – see https://www.dianajohnson.co.uk/post/monthly-newsletter and https://www.dianajohnson.co.uk/post/april-monthly-newsletter.

May saw the final two days of the Bill Committee, going line-by-line through more clauses in the Bill. I set out a number of these below.

Age Verification for Online Purchases of Offensive Weapons

We debated plans for age verification checks on offensive weapons, such as knives and crossbows, purchased online. Too often, offenders under the age of 18 have been able to easily order weapons via the internet or have them delivered to another address without appropriate checks. This Bill will require those wishing to buy a weapon online to provide ID both at the point of purchase and at delivery. It will be illegal to hand the weapon to anyone other than the buyer.

These reforms have been widely supported by groups including the Knife Crime Coalition, who are working alongside the Government to tackle the alarming rise in knife crime and violence among young people.

Police Powers and Protests

We also discussed strengthening police powers in relation to the right to peaceful protest. Last summer, we witnessed unacceptable violence and disorder, including in Hull, where protests led to violence against police officers and other crimes such as looting and theft.

Whilst acknowledging the important democratic right to peaceful protest, the Bill will grant police new powers in certain circumstances where there are concerns about crimes being committed at protests. It will introduce measures to prevent protesters from concealing their identities, for example by wearing face coverings such as balaclavas that are often used by those engaging in violent activity at protests. 

Places of worship will also receive better protection during protests, to prevent them from being targeted by protestors seeking to intimidate worshippers.

Pornographic Content

The Committee also examined measures in the Bill aimed at regulating intimate image abuse, particularly online and using Artificial Intelligence (AI). The Bill introduces new offences for the taking of intimate images without consent and the installation of equipment with intent to enable the taking of intimate images without consent.

Next stages

After the completion of the Commons Committee Stage on 13 May, the Crime and Policing Bill will now return to the Commons this Summer for its Report Stage and Third Reading. Among amendments that, subject to selection by the Speaker, might be considered in coming weeks are ones looking at modernising our abortion laws. This was an issue upon which I campaigned while in Opposition.

The stages that we have gone through in the Commons in recent months will then be repeated in the Lords. I am expecting the Bill to then finally become law in the later months of 2025 with the new laws being enacted in the months after into 2026.

The Bill’s progress can be followed at https://bills.parliament.uk/bills/3938 and the recent Bill Committee sessions watched at https://www.parliamentlive.tv/Commons.

Other ministerial duties

Apart from the above work on the Crime and Policing Bill, my diary as Policing Minister was as busy as ever during May.

It included joining a ‘Stop the Bleed’ training session with CitizenAID, who train people to give emergency care for  those suffering  a major bleed, perhaps through stab wounds. It is tragic that this service is needed - but vital. It is a Government objective to halve knife crime over the next decade and as part of Knife Crime Awareness Week I visited Coventry to see work aimed at getting dangerous weapons off the streets and then attended a reception with the anti-knife crime charity the Ben Kinsella Trust.

As part of the ongoing campaign on shop crime, I joined policing and industry stakeholders at the Retail Crime Forum to support a new strategy to tackle shop theft and to discuss our Summer initiative to keep town centres safe ahead of the new powers being introduced in the Crime and Policing Bill.

Progress on several fronts

May saw a number of major Labour Government Bill’s becoming law or moving forward in Parliament.

Great British Energy Bill

In May, we saw the Labour Government’s flagship Great British Energy Act became law. This Act is a landmark piece of legislation that will bring a new publicly owned green energy company to the UK. Great British Energy will create jobs, boost energy self-sufficiency and ensure that UK taxpayers, billpayers and communities can reap the benefits of clean, secure, homegrown energy – of Britain becoming a Clean Energy Superpower.

To welcome this news, the Secretary of State for Energy Ed Miliband visited a solar farm near Castle Hill Hospital in Cottingham. Castle Hill is one of the first hospitals in the country to be fully powered by solar energy. This has allowed the hospital to save around £200,000 a month on bills, enabling it to reinvest this money into key frontline services.

As part of one of its first major projects, Great British Energy will invest in schemes being rolled out across the country in public buildings such as hospitals, schools, community centres, care homes, museums and libraries. £6m has also been allocated to Hull Royal Infirmary and Hull History Centre has received over £2m to install solar panels and vital upgrades across their sites.

Border Security and Asylum Bill

The Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill also recently completed all stages in the House of Commons. This Bill seeks to strengthen our immigration and asylum system and enhance the powers to improve the UK’s border security.  This Bill will clamp down on the people smuggling gangs and those who profit from organised immigration crime.

This Bill introduces a Border Force command which will investigate, detect and disrupt organised immigration crime and serious and organised crime.  It will also improve intelligence sharing, meaning that Border Security are able to obtain data on people smugglers and their movements.

Mental Health Bill

Another Bill discussed in the House during May was the Mental Health Bill. This coincided with Mental Health Week and delivers on the Government’s manifesto commitment to modernise mental health services. The Bill would strengthen the voices of patients detained under the Mental Health Act - a process often described as “woefully outdated”.

It would allow patients to be involved in planning their care and in choices around treatment. There would be increased scrutiny of the use of detention and the use of mental health laws to detain autistic people and those with learning disabilities.

Alongside this, the Government has announced the roll-out of mental health support within schools, reaching 900,000 pupils this year and six in ten pupils by October 2026. This is also part of the Labour Government’s Plan for Change, with plans for all children to have mental health support in school by 2029/30.

Victims and Courts Bill

The Commons has also debated the Victims and Courts Bill. This introduces new powers for Judges to make sure offenders aged over the age of 18 attend their sentencing hearing, with the possibility of extending the sentences of those who refuse and allowing for reasonable force to be used when proportionate and necessary.

This Bill follows several high-profile cases where murderers have refused to attend their sentencing hearings, causing further distress to families of victims and meaning that the offender has not heard the Judge’s remarks or the victim’s family’s impact statements. This means that offenders were not confronted with the full impact of their crimes. The Government included a commitment to legislate to require offenders to attend their sentencing hearings in the King’s Speech in July 2024 and these measures are now included in this Bill.

Assisted Dying

On 16 May, the House met to discuss some of the amendments to Kim Leadbeater MP’s Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill. This Bill has recently been going through intense scrutiny in Committee and is now at Report Stage in the Commons. Although generally supportive of the need for reform, I have been voting for amendments to strengthen safeguards.  The Bill will return to the House in June. Should the Bill clear its Third Reading in the Commons it will then have to go through a similar process in the Lords.

Gaza Conflict

As May ended, the continuing and worsening humanitarian disaster in Gaza was the subject of much discussion at Westminster.

On 20 May, in his Statement to the House, Foreign Secretary David Lammy said: “We are now entering a dark new phase in this conflict. Netanyahu’s Government plan to drive Gazans from their homes into a corner of the strip to the south and permit them a fraction of the aid that they need. Yesterday, Minister Smotrich even spoke of Israeli forces “cleansing” Gaza, of “destroying what’s left” and of resident Palestinians being “relocated to third countries”. We must call this what it is: it is extremism, it is dangerous, it is repellent, it is monstrous and I condemn it in the strongest possible terms”.

The UK Government continues to use our influence to press for a sustainable ceasefire on both sides, for humanitarian aid to be allowed into Gaza and for the release of all hostages as the first steps towards a meaningful peace.

Public Inquiry resumes on Infected Blood scandal

As mentioned in many previous reports, I have been heavily involved since 2010 in working to secure justice for those infected and affected in the Infected Blood scandal of the 1970s and 1980s.

This included pressuring Theresa May’s government to agree to a Public Inquiry in July 2017 and then defeating Rishi Sunak’s government in the House of Commons in December 2023 to end delays in setting up a compensation scheme.

20 May saw the first anniversary of the main report of that public inquiry being published in 2024 – two days before the General Election was called – and infected blood campaigners were in Westminster and Downing Street lobbying for greater progress on compensation and on other recommendations from the Public Inquiry.

Among those attending the lobby was Glenn Wilkinson, the Hull North and Cottingham constituent who had received infected blood as a teenager and who first approached me about the scandal in 2010. As ever, I was pleased to meet Glenn and his fellow campaigners.

As it turns out, 20 May 2024 will be only the main but not the final report of Sir Brian Langstaff’s Inquiry. In May the Inquiry reconvened for two days of further hearings to hear evidence from the current Government’s Paymaster General, Nick Thomas-Symonds; officials from the new Infected Blood Compensation Authority (IBCA) and the Cabinet Office; and infected blood victims who expressed frustration at the slow pace of compensation payments from IBCA.

I remain actively engaged in the issue on behalf of Glenn and all those who have battled for several decades to uncover the biggest treatment disaster in NHS history that became a national scandal due to a cover-up on an industrial scale.

Out and About

May was another busy month of visits in and around the Constituency and meeting constituents visiting Westminster.

Swift Caravans

I have championed the cause of our area’s caravan industry over the years on issues such as the Coalition’s Government’s plan for a Caravan Tax in the 2012 omnishambles Budget.

It was therefore a pleasure to visit Swift Group in Cottingham and meet Chairman Peter Smith and his team. Swift is a major local employer and the caravan sector generates over £3bn annually to the UK economy.

We discussed important issues including unregulated motorhome conversions, the challenges around abnormal load movements and the need for a police escort in certain parts of the country.

Independent Hospitality Week

As part of Independent Hospitality Week during May, I visited Norah’s Café in Cottingham to meet the fantastic team behind this local gem. Independent hospitality businesses like Norah’s are vital to our communities, creating jobs and supporting local suppliers. I’m proud to support local independent businesses in the constituency.

Humberside Fire and Rescue

During May I visited Humberside Fire and Rescue to meet Chief Fire Officer Phil Shillito and his dedicated team. As always, it was good to see important work of the firefighters in protecting our communities.

The Government has committed an additional £320m to fire and rescue services across England. This investment supports training, equipment upgrades and community safety programmes.

St Charles Academy visit Parliament

I was delighted to welcome students from St Charles Academy to Parliament’s Education Centre. I enjoyed their enthusiasm and questions. Visits like this to Westminster help young people from the constituency connect with the democratic process.

A North East Coastal Town

With the national marking the 80th anniversary of VE Day during May, I have been pursuing the issue of Hull’s suffering in the Blitz and the longstanding perception by many in Hull that there has been lack of national recognition over the decades for the destruction by Nazi bombing. I was keen to explore why this might be.

Following a recent meeting at Hull History Centre with archivists and the University of Hull’s Professor David Atkinson, during May I wrote to National Archives at Kew about the existence of research from 1942 into Hull’s experience in the Blitz and the effects of bombing on the civilian population – see my letter at https://x.com/DianaJohnsonMP/status/1920078750013665745.

The issue has attracted some media interest – see https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/mp-demands-blitz-report-on-forgotten-city-is-published-after-83-years-5117213, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckg1gkx180ko, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4grxy9pqpdo and https://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/news/hull-east-yorkshire-news/mp-calls-greater-recognition-hulls-10161843. 

I subsequently heard back from National Archives that the material I had requested access to apparently has a 100-year embargo on it - until 2042. This seems somewhat extreme. Professor Atkinson is currently trying to retrieve as much information as possible about these documents and the similarly intriguing possibility that the embargo, apparently not originally intended to last 100 years, was only extended until 2042 several years ago. When this is done, it is likely that I will be contacting the National Archives again during June.