Queen’s Speech 2021

Boris Johnson has laid out his plans to “create a stronger, healthier and more prosperous nation” after the coronavirus pandemic with more than 30 new pieces on legislation unveiled in today’s Queen’s Speech. As part of a strong focus on enacting the Prime Minister’s manifesto commitment to “level up” the country, there are a number of bills on improving skills and education, as well as around housing and the environment.

But crucially there is once again no concrete plan on how to reform social care, despite Johnson pledging to make it priority when he entered Downing Street almost two years ago.

Reading out the government’s legislative programme in the House of Lords this morning, the Queen simply said: “Proposals on social care reform will be brought forward.”

Explaining the bills included in the speech, the PM said with the help of the vaccination programme allowing the country to exit lockdown, "we cannot simply return to the way things were".

Johnson said as the UK gets back on its feet “we will turbo-charge our economic recovery in every part of our country, increasing and spreading opportunity” with the publication of a Levelling up White Paper.

He promised to “make the most of our new found Brexit freedoms”, as well as “turn Britain into a science superpower”, protect the union and strengthen democracy and free speech.

The PM added that the pandemic "has shown – if there was any doubt – that deep wells of talent, kindness, ingenuity and resourcefulness exist in every village, town and city of the United Kingdom”, and his government’s task is now to mobilise that and unleashing the country’s full potential.

Here are the bills included in the Queen’s Speech:

Health and Care Bill

The bill will “lay the foundations for a more integrated and efficient health and care system”, which the government says will enable staff to “focus on delivering the best possible treatment and care for their patients and giving the NHS and local authorities the tools to level up health and care across England so people can live healthier, longer and more independent lives”. It will also put the Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch on a statutory footing to deliver a fully independent national body to investigate healthcare incidents, and will form part of the wider NHS Catch-up and Recovery Plan.

Social care

Despite repeated claims there would be a plan to enact longterm reform to adult social care since Johnson became PM in 2019 (and several governments before that), there is once again no concrete legislation on the issue. The government simply says: “We will bring forward proposals for social care reform in 2021 to ensure that every person receives care that provides the dignity and security they deserve.”

Prevention

The creation of a new Office for Health Promotion will work across government to improve health with an increased focus on delivering greater action on prevention, as well as tackling obesity, air quality, smoking and drug misuse.

Mental Health Act Reform

Following the White Paper on reforming the Mental Health Act published in January, the government plans to give people greater control over their treatment “and receive the dignity and respect they deserve”, as well as reforming the process for detention, change the law around how people with a learning disability or autistic people are treated under the act and make key improvements to how offenders with acute mental disorders are managed. The government adds that “these reforms also seek to address the disproportionate number of people from black and minority ethnic groups detained under the act”.

Levelling Up White Paper

A key plank of this government’s election campaign, there are again no firm legislative proposals to back it up, and the MP Neil O’Brien has recently been appointed as an advisor to oversee this process. The white paper will “set out bold new policy interventions to improve livelihoods and opportunity in all parts of the UK as we recover from the pandemic, grasping the opportunities of Brexit”, with a focus on improving public services, giving more access to skills, and increasing infrastructure spending.

Advanced Research and Invention Agency Bill

The brainchild of Johnson’s former adviser Dominic Cummings, the new ARIA agency will fund “high-risk, high-reward research”, to enhance the UK’s research and development offer and “help cement the UK’s position as a global science superpower”.

National Infrastructure Plan

The Spending Review 2020 committed £100billion of capital investment in 2021-22, and the new UK Infrastructure Bank will launch later in the spring to help deliver these ambitions. Headquartered in Leeds, it will be able to deploy £12billion of equity and debt capital and £10billion of guarantees, and is expected to support more than £40billion of infrastructure investment overall.

Skills and Post-16 Education Bill

The government says this legislation will “transform access to skills across the country to ensure that people can train and retrain at any stage in their lives”, as part of a plan to get people into higher quality, higher-skilled jobs. It will enable people to access flexible funding for Higher or Further Education, deliver the PM’s new Lifetime Skills Guarantee and strengthen the powers of the Office for Students.

Turing Scheme

The replacement for the Erasmus programme, which allows students to spend a year studying abroad, the government says this new international educational exchange scheme will have a worldwide reach, unlike its EU-focused predecessor, and “will give young people across the UK, particularly from disadvantaged backgrounds, the opportunity to work and study globally”.

Subsidy Control Bill

This will implement a domestic subsidy control regime to “reflect our strategic interests and particular national circumstances”, to provide a legal framework within which public authorities make subsidy decisions now the UK is out of the European Union.

Procurement Bill

This will consolidate and streamline the 350+ EU-derived regulations and make the UK’s procurement regime “quicker, simpler and easier to use, allowing more freedom for suppliers and the public sector to innovate and work in partnership with the private sector”.

Professional Qualifications Bill

This will create a new “bespoke framework for the UK to recognise professional qualifications from across the world” which will make sure employers can access the right professionals where there are shortages in particular industries.

National Insurance Contributions Bill

This will provide a relief for employers of veterans and for the self-employed who receive NHS Test and Trace Payments, as well as help deliver the government’s commitment to establish a number of Freeports in England.

Planning Bill

The bill will create a “simpler, faster and more modern planning system” to replace the current one that dates back to 1947, as part of plans to build more homes and deliver infrastructure projects more quickly. The government says it “will bring forward reforms to deliver a fairer and more effective private rental market in England”, but the Renters' Reform Bill from the last Queen’s Speech appears to have been quietly dropped.

Rail and Bus Reform

The government will publish a White Paper containing proposals to transform the railways with “new contracts that will get trains running on time”, as well as introduce modern ways to pay and “end the complicated franchising model”. The government will also table a High Speed Rail (Crewe – Manchester) Bill to provide the powers to build and operate the next stage of HS2. The National Bus Strategy for England “will deliver better bus services for passengers across England outside London”, and £120million will be spent this financial year on the commitment to introduce 4,000 zero-emission buses.

Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Bill

The bill will support the installation, maintenance, upgrading and sharing of apparatus that enables better telecommunications coverage and connectivity, such as extending 5G mobile coverage and gigabit-capable broadband. It will also ensure that “smart consumer products, including smartphones and televisions, are more secure against cyber attacks”, by requiring manufacturers to meet minimum security standards and create powers to investigate cases of non-compliance.

Draft Downstream Oil Resilience Bill

This will address threats to the security of the UK’s fuel supply by providing the government with tools to build resilience in the downstream oil sector, identify risks of disruption to the market and implement effective and proportionate contingency plans, as well as ensure if a key asset is sold, the “new owners are financially and operationally capable of keeping fuel supplies flowing”.

Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

The controversial legislation introduced earlier this year is being carried over, with measures including tougher sentences by ending the automatic release at the halfway point for serious sexual and violent offenders. But it will also include proposals “balancing the rights of protesters with the rights of others to go about their business unhindered”, which led to widespread protests of their own. The government says it will also refresh the Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy to “better protect women and improve outcomes for rape cases”.

Draft Victims Bill

This will place the “simplified and stronger set of rights for victims” set out in the new Victims’ Code on a statutory footing, and set expectations for the standard and availability of support for victims of domestic abuse and sexual violence.

New Plan for Immigration Legislation

The government says this will “increase the fairness and efficacy of our system” to better protect and support those in genuine need of asylum, while deterring illegal entry into the UK, breaking the business model of criminal trafficking networks, and enabling “those with no right to be here to be removed more easily from the UK”.

Counter-State Threats Bill

This will give the security services and law enforcement agencies the tools to tackle the evolving threat from hostile activity by foreign states and foreign actors, and will see the Official Secrets Acts of 1911, 1920 and 1939 reformed to keep pace with modern threats. The UK will have a Foreign Influence Registration Scheme to help combat espionage, and the government is considering updating treason laws to criminalise other harmful activity conducted by and on behalf of states.