It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I start by thanking my right hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith) for securing this debate; for her ongoing passion and leadership on this issue; and for her determination to deliver this landmark legislation, working with Rosie Cooper. She takes a close interest in the Government’s performance on this issue, and in wider issues affecting the deaf community. She wants us to take further steps to ensure that BSL is used more widely in society, and that more people can communicate through it.
Interestingly, one of the key assurances that my right hon. Friend gave during the passage of the legislation was to the hon. Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood), Chair of the APPG. She assured her, in Committee, that the Government would be open to scrutiny of the BSL Act, and that the first BSL report would be published on 31 July this year. That has happened, and today’s debate flows from that. I was heartened to hear that BSL will be a subject of interest to my right hon. Friend beyond her time in the House, and is something that she will campaign on passionately. Her advocacy on this issue, and that of Members from across the House—not just those who are here—is something of which Parliament can be proud. All of us, cross party, want to do our best to ensure accessible communication for everybody in society. It is to the Government’s credit that they got behind the Bill, and worked intensively with Rosie Cooper and the coalition, as was touched on, to shape and craft the legislation and ensure that we got it right.
The British Sign Language Act 2022 was the first private Member’s Bill drawn 20th in the ballot to become law in more than 20 years; that was a bit of parliamentary trivia for everybody this afternoon. That is not an insignificant achievement. It speaks to the cross-party support for the Act. Everybody came together from across the House to support that legislation, here as well as in the other place.
Many good, pertinent questions were raised in the debate, and I want to touch on them. As I say, the British Sign Language Act 2022 was warmly welcomed by the deaf community, and particularly by the BSL Act Now! campaign. Its members worked so hard, and in such a determined way, to put the issue firmly on the agenda. Arguably, that passion was reflected at BSL Fest in Guildford at the weekend. I was delighted to hear that my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Angela Richardson) was in attendance, was part of the celebrations and part of that important community in
her area. We see those celebrations reflected in community initiatives up and down the country, which is heartening. They give ever greater prominence to the issue. All of us parliamentarians, and those of us in government, should place real emphasis on working in partnership with communities, charities and representative bodies to continue to evolve our work on this issue, and make sure that we live up to the ambition out there in our society for BSL.
It is a privilege to report today on the progress that we are making on the BSL Act, and to discuss the findings of the first BSL report, but candidly, there is more to do. The first BSL report is an important baseline to help us understand how the Government communicate vital information to a group of people with specific, distinct communication needs, and to encourage us to go further.
There are a couple of points that I want to touch on early in my remarks. One is the judicial review of BSL interpretation of the covid briefings during the pandemic. The judicial review found that the Government were meeting their obligations under the Equality Act 2010 with regard to BSL interpretation during the covid 19 briefings, and were compliant with the public sector equality duty. The court ruled that our policy of using on-screen British Sign Language interpreters during the pandemic was lawful. The judge ruled that it is not a legal requirement to provide an in-person BSL interpreter. There had been over 175 covid briefings by the date of the judgment, and in only two instances were they found to be unlawful because BSL was not provided on screen. Our priority has always been to reach the largest possible audience with important public information, and we will continue to ensure that BSL interpretation is made available where appropriate.
On No. 10, the BSL Act places a duty on the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to collate and publish a report on BSL use in the ministerial Departments listed in the schedule to the Act. The intention behind the five-year plans mentioned in the BSL report is to build on the work already being done across the Departments that are placed under that reporting duty. No. 10 and the parliamentary estate are not ministerial Departments, and there is no statutory requirement on them to report on their use of BSL. However, guidance was recently published by the Government Communication Service that covers all of Government. I am assured that it will help communicators across Government to determine what public information should be produced in BSL, so that we meet the obligations set out in the public sector equality duty and the Equality Act 2010. I am very happy to explore that area further.
As for the parliamentary estate, I would be delighted to work cross-party with colleagues on engaging with the House authorities to see what they might be able to do. It is welcome that there is BSL interpretation of our proceedings this afternoon, but we should always strive to go further. I am very willing to engage constructively with others to achieve that.