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Tag: Eric Pickles

  • Eric Pickles – 2024 Speech at the 80th Anniversary of the Genocide of the Roma Ceremony at Auschwitz

    Eric Pickles – 2024 Speech at the 80th Anniversary of the Genocide of the Roma Ceremony at Auschwitz

    The speech made by Eric Pickles in Auschwitz, Poland on 2 August 2024.

    Dear survivors, your excellencies, friends,

    Here, we stand at the epicentre of evil, remembering the murdered and the lost. Remembering those that suffered and survived the murder factory of Auschwitz-Birkenau and the other death camps of Europe run by the Nazis and their collaborators.

    The Holocaust and the genocide of the Roma are well documented. There are plenty of photographs that burn into the retina, leaving indelible images impossible to forget.

    For me, this uniquely depraved time is symbolised by two haunting photographs, both of children. Symbolising the waste and the loss of young life cut short and its unfulfilled promise.

    Firstly, the photograph of a frightened and confused seven-year-old Tsvi Nussbaum, with his hands raised over his head, surrounded by heavily armed German soldiers at the end of the Warsaw Uprising—a child victim surrounded by adult bullies. Tsvi may have survived; I hope he did.

    Secondly, “The Girl with the Headscarf” is a nine-year-old Dutch Romani girl looking out of a railway truck. In this case too, we have a name: Anna Maria ‘Settela’ Steinbach. The terror and hopelessness in that young girl’s face will stay with me forever. Sadly, Settela did not survive. She is a vivid symbol of a lost generation, of what could have been.

    Today, we remember people like Krystyna Gil—whom many of you knew personally—and places like Szczurowa.

    The village of Szczurowa had been home to Polish Roma families for centuries.

    But on July 3rd, 1943, a German police unit used local farmers to round up the Roma of the village and take them to the local churchyard on carts.

    They were murdered and buried in a mass grave. Afterwards, the Nazis and their collaborators burned the Roma homes.

    Krystyna survived because her mother managed, unnoticed, to pass her into the hands of her Polish grandmother.

    Krystyna’s mother, ten-year-old brother, two-year-old sister, three aunts, and four cousins were murdered.

    Krystyna survived in hiding with her non-Roma family for the remainder of the war.

    The murder of the ninety-three Szczurowa Roma was not an isolated incident.

    We know of over one-hundred-and-eighty sites in Poland alone where Roma were executed in large groups, sometimes together with Jewish people.

    So, the Polish Roma were killed in extermination camps, died in ghettos and murdered by the Nazi’s murder squads.

    There are differences depending on when and where you look.

    But one thing remains constant: none of this could have happened without deep-rooted prejudice against Roma. This prejudice continued after 1945, and Krystyna dedicated her life to fighting it.

    She was a major advocate for a memorial to mark the Szczurowa massacre, which was inaugurated in May 1966.

    In 1993, a large wooden cross was placed beside the monument, which pupils of the local school tend to this day.

    Krystyna continued to fight for the victims’ names to be specified on the memorial plaque. Eventually, in 2014, these names – which included those of her mother, siblings, aunts and cousins – were added.

    Throughout the 1990s she was active in the Association of Roma in Poland. In 2000 she founded the first organization for Roma women in Poland.

    She worked tirelessly to educate young people about what she had experienced and everything she had lost. To make them aware of what can happen when antigypsyism is ignored, when history is neglected.

    We are here because we refuse to neglect this history.

    We are here because of people like Krystyna.

    We are here to carry on her work.

    In 2020, the Member Countries of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, the IHRA, pledged their political commitment to remember this history, to honour the victims and the survivors.

    That same year, we adopted the IHRA working definition of antigypsyism/anti-Roma discrimination, which provides a starting point for raising awareness and for taking action.

    In 2018, the Czech government closed down the industrial pig farm at Lety on the site of a former concentration camp for Roma. In March this year, I attended the moving ceremony which saw the opening of the Lety Memorial.

    Remembrance triumphed over neglect and a government took ownership of their duty to history.

    Earlier this year the groundbreaking online Encyclopaedia of the Nazi Genocide of the Sinti and Roma in Europe was launched.

    It marks the first comprehensive overview of the existing knowledge on the persecution and murder of the Sinti and Roma under National Socialism.

    And as you heard yesterday, the IHRA is now finalising a set of recommendations to help policy makers include this history in education curricula.

    It will sit alongside the materials to help educators teach about the broader history of Roma in Europe developed by the Council of Europe.

    These milestones are the result of the work of activists and survivors like Krystyna, who, sadly, passed away in 2021.

    Krystyna’s message to young people was simple. And it remains a reminder to us all:

    “Respect each other, love one another. Do not hate one another, because it does not lead to anything good, only bad.”

    We remember, because the neglect of this history plays into anti-Roma discrimination today.

    We remember, to ensure governments and society reflect openly and honestly on our pasts.

    Democratic values can only be built on truth and the truth can never harm us.

    Krystyna and other survivors and activists laid the groundwork. Now it’s up to us to truly embed education, commemoration, and research of this history into our institutions.

    It’s up to us to remember the truth.

  • Eric Pickles – 2023 Speech at Holocaust Memorial Day

    Eric Pickles – 2023 Speech at Holocaust Memorial Day

    The speech made by Eric Pickles on 27 January 2023.

    A chilling fact about the Holocaust is that it could never have taken place without the willing participation of many millions of ‘ordinary people’.

    In Germany, many individuals who were not ardent Nazis nonetheless participated in varying degrees in the persecution and murder of Jews, the Roma, the disabled, homosexuals and political prisoners.

    There is no better example than the ordinary men of the Reserve Police Battalion 101. Five hundred policemen, most from Hamburg, most in their 30s and 40s – too old for conscription into the army.

    Men who, before the war, had been professional policemen, as well as businessmen, dockworkers, truck drivers, construction workers, machine operators, waiters, pharmacists, and teachers. Only a minority were members of the Nazi Party and only a few belonged to the SS.

    During their stay in Poland, these ordinary men participated in the shootings, or the transport to the Treblinka gas chambers, of at least 83,000 Jews.

    Ordinary people were witnesses; many cheered on the active participants in persecution and violence.

    Sadly, most, ordinary people remained silent.

    Responsibility for the Holocaust does not rest with the Nazi leadership alone.

    Responsibility for later genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Srebrenica, and Darfur does not rest solely on the leaders who incited hatred and violence.

    Ordinary people bear responsibility too. For some, that has meant responsibility for the most appalling crimes. For others, the responsibility of failing to act.

    Thankfully, there have also been ordinary men and women willing to stand against hatred.

    Ordinary men and women who often showed extraordinary bravery to save Jews.

    Their selfless acts demonstrate the best of us.

    The Holocaust and subsequent genocides show that ordinary people have choices. It is up to all of us to ensure that the choices we make today and tomorrow ensure a world without genocide.

  • Eric Pickles – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

    Eric Pickles – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Eric Pickles on 2015-11-19.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, if he will support the inclusion of a specific exemption for Holocaust research in the forthcoming European General Data Protection Regulation.

    Mr Edward Vaizey

    I agree that it is vital that the General Data Protection Regulation, currently being negotiated, provides safeguards to enable historical researchers and archivists to continue with important work.

  • Eric Pickles – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    Eric Pickles – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Eric Pickles on 2016-01-13.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what discussions he has had with representatives of the Iranian government on the effect on regional relations of the international competition for cartoons and caricatures on the Holocaust organised by the House of Cartoons, under the auspices of the municipality of Tehran.

    Mr Tobias Ellwood

    Our officials in Tehran have raised our opposition to the proposed Holocaust cartoon competition with their counterparts at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

  • Eric Pickles – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Eric Pickles – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Eric Pickles on 2016-09-13.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if he will assess the additional costs to the NHS if Israeli-owned or Israeli-based companies were banned from supplying generic medicines to the NHS.

    David Mowat

    We do not routinely collect information on where pharmaceutical manufacturers are based, or whether they have connections with particular countries. Any company with the necessary regulatory authorisations can supply medicines to the National Health Service. However, some 100 million prescription items for medicines used in the community in England are estimated to come from companies based in Israel. This includes some medicines where one of these companies will be the main supplier. Banning these supplies would most likely cause significant shortages of some medicines important for patient health and have a significant impact on competition and in all likelihood increase prices paid by the NHS.

  • Eric Pickles – 2022 Tribute to HM Queen Elizabeth II (Lord Pickles)

    Eric Pickles – 2022 Tribute to HM Queen Elizabeth II (Lord Pickles)

    The tribute made by Eric Pickles, Lord Pickles, in the House of Lords on 10 September 2022.

    My Lords, as a schoolboy, I read The Queens and the Hive by Dame Edith Sitwell. The book describes the court of Queen Elizabeth I. There is a description of her Privy Council, towards the end of her reign, facing fear and confusion over what a change of sovereign would mean. Even the oldest counsellor on the Privy Council had known only one monarch. The Privy Council of Good Queen Bess was much smaller than the one I joined in 2010, but I can sympathise with the dilemma. I have just celebrated my 70th birthday but on the day I was born, the Queen was already on the Throne. She is the only monarch I have ever known; my grandparents’ generation would live through six different sovereigns.

    The late Queen was born into a turbulent world. Britain was recovering from the First World War, the Russian civil war was barely over, European royal families were dropping like ninepins and revolution was everywhere. We know that this story ends happily, but it was not preordained. Our country could easily have slipped into becoming a republic. It did not because of the way the monarchy adapted to the modern world. Admittedly, the modern monarchy was built on her grandfather’s good sense and her father’s example of public service, but the modern monarchy is now built around her late Majesty’s sense of duty and service; it is in her image.

    Her late Majesty led by example and was keen to push good causes along. I have had personal experience of this latter point. In 2005 she became the patron of the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust and stayed for a full 10 years. His Majesty King Charles III replaced her as patron when he was the Prince of Wales. He has proved to be equally enthusiastic and generous with his time. I should declare I am the vice-president of the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust.

    Her late Majesty learned about the horrors of the Nazis as a teenager. She had a deep appreciation of the importance of survivors. In 2015, 70 years after the liberation of Auschwitz, she reminded us:

    “Many refugees and survivors of the camps and ghettoes found a home in the United Kingdom and have given us their energy and commitment.”

    To the surprise of many at a Holocaust memorial event in 2005 at St James’s Palace, she broke with royal protocol to mingle with survivors. We have a description of what happened from a friend of many in this Chamber, the late Rabbi Lord Sacks:

    “One of her attendants said that he had never known her to linger so long after her scheduled departure. She gave each survivor—it was a large group—her focused, unhurried attention. She stood with each until they had finished telling their personal story.”

    At this reception, the Roma and Sinti were included for the first time; two Romany survivors were presented to Her Majesty.

    In 2015, Her late Majesty visited Bergen-Belsen, where 50,000 prisoners were murdered by violence and neglect. She was accompanied by her beloved husband the Duke of Edinburgh. They walked together among the mounds of the mass graves. There was no pomp or ceremony of any kind. The BBC movingly described them as

    “just a couple from the wartime generation taking their time to reflect and to pay their respects.”

    On the visit, the royal pair met one of the liberators of the camp, the former pilot Captain Eric Brown. The Queen asked him what sorts of scenes greeted the British troops when he arrived. He said:

    “I told her this was just a field of corpses … She was listening very carefully. I would say she was quite affected by the atmosphere here.”

    For many survivors, the Queen and the Royal Family are synonymous with the welcome they received in the UK. Let one of them speak for them all. Joan Salter MBE said:

    “I came to the UK as a child survivor of the Holocaust in 1947 and I remember the excitement surrounding the Queen’s coronation. For someone who came from so much upheaval and trauma, the Queen has been an important symbol of wisdom and stability for me.”

    Many of us could say the same thing.

    Our late Queen now rests in the arms of the Almighty. She may do so with the certainty that her legacy of duty and service is safe and secure. God save the King.

  • Eric Pickles – 2002 Speech to Conservative Spring Forum

    Eric Pickles – 2002 Speech to Conservative Spring Forum

    The speech made by Eric Pickles to Conservative Spring Forum on 24 March 2002.

    Stephen Byers is a misunderstood man.

    Some think that stands for whatever is perceived to be fashionable in left wing politics, that he has betrayed his Marxist past. This is to misunderstand the man completely. I have known him a good many years and I can say he is utterly consistent in his devotion to Marxism.

    Of course it is not Karl Marx his principles are based on. It is Groucho Marx.

    Specifically Groucho’s attitude to ethics: ‘These are my principles. If you don’t like them I’ve got some others.’

    That is why Mr Byers can move from 80’s rabble-rouser, to 90’s smoothy-moderniser, from millennium-man advocate of the third way, to pronouncing the death of the third way, with the ease and the speed that the Department of Transport change their press officers.
    As Secretary of State, if your idea of long term planning is to survive the censure motion after next, it is little wonder that the Government’s transport policy is so directionless.

    I was recently asked what enthusiasm I had for the Government’s ten-year transport plan. I replied that I was so enthusiastic I was seriously thinking of ways I could enter year three onwards for the Whitbread prize for fiction.

    Labour had the opportunity to consolidate the gains made from the privatisation of Railtrack under the Conservatives. We reversed the long-standing decline in passenger numbers, investment poured in and our railways had a better safety record. Instead Byers blew it with a botched renationalisation. That will cost the travelling public dear.

    Remember a third of the promised railway investment is meant to come from private sector funding. It is frankly ridiculous for the Government to argue that that the private sector investment has not been affected following their decision to confiscate a company from its legal owners.

    Any lingering doubts remaining over future relations between private finance and Government were dispelled by the letter to the Chancellor written by over twenty top fund managers saying that Labour’s handling of Railtrack has damaged relations between the Government and the City, increased the cost to the taxpayer of public private partnerships and discouraged people from saving.

    In other words on every length of road, stretch of track, new hospital or school building – anything that needs private finance there will be a Byers premium. We will all pay more to get less

    Anybody who cares about our Railways will tell you what we need to do to make life better: get Railtrack out of administration, stop dithering over the approval of rail franchise renewal, because if you don’t there will be no new trains after 2004. Do that and we can deal with the number one problem facing our railways a lack of capacity to meet any significant increase in demand.

    Transport is full of acronyms: SPV’s, Infroco’s, NATS and, of course, PPP. Rarely does the acronym meet the reality. This is true with the PPP for the Tube. Forget Public-Private Partnership, in London PPP stands for Poor Prospects for Passengers.

    Poor prospects of seeing a new train in ten years. There are only 12 new trains in service on Tube by 2008.

    Poor prospects for projects due to start ten years into the thirty year project, with the Government offering no stability for funding.
    Poor prospects for the taxpayer: despite promises we still don’t know whether the PPP is value for money, and we still don’t know when things go wrong who will pick up the tab.

    Poor prospects for overcrowding: the PPP will make no significant improvement.

    If over Easter you decide to visit London and decide to join Londoners on a sweaty, smelly overstuffed tube carriage, ten years from now were you to repeat the journey chances are it will be the same. Chances are it is likely to be the same carriage; the only difference will be the carriage will be ten years older.

    We will inherit a terrible mess on the London Underground. To make life better we will seek to develop a series of quality contracts with Transport for London on: punctuality, reliability, cleanliness and safety (personal and public). We will ensure a no strike agreement operates on the tube. The closing down of the network has no place in the resolving of industrial and sometimes petty disputes in modern Britain.

    We are now rapidly approaching an important milestone to judge this Labour Government, laid down by no less a person than the gentle and serene Deputy Prime Minister.

    After the 1997 general election, John Prescott said, ‘I will have failed if in five years time there are not … far fewer journeys by car. It’s a tall order but I urge you to hold me to it.’

    Since 1997 traffic on all roads has consistently increased. Estimated traffic levels rose by 3% between the fourth quarter of 2000 and the same quarter of 2001 alone – according to official DTLR figures.

    We will be looking for volunteers to break this news to Mr Prescott. A fast car and an ability to duck will be an asset

    Labour and their “me too” lackeys the Liberal Democrats see the car driver as the enemy. Someone to be despised pilloried and above all taxed.

    Fuel tax is still the highest in Europe. At the last count the average UK retail price of diesel was over 20 pence per litre more expensive than any other EU country. It is worth re-emphasising that the pre-tax price of both fuels was among the cheapest in Europe, but the total amount of tax per litre was the highest of these countries

    New taxes are introduced on company cars, but ministerial cars are of course exempt. Nothing must disturb the air conditioned splendour of the New Labour elite, free from the care of the day to day bustle the rest of us face.

    Recently in a debate, I asked a Minister when was the last time he travelled on the tube during peak time and whether he enjoyed it? The question was so unexpected in its impertinence that I got the shocked response that he ” could not remember.” That would be a sad admission from any Minister, but from the Minister of Transport it was shameful.

    Much needed relief roads lie abandoned. Motorways that would take traffic away from chocked towns are neglected. The number of miles of motorway opened each year has significantly declined under the Labour Government. In 1997, the last year Conservatives were in government, Britain’s motorway network increased by 42.3 miles. In 2001, it increased by a paltry 6.1 miles.

    Talk to any of New Labour’s advocates of congestion charging after a few polite pleasantries about inter-model shift from car to public transport and they go onto the real agenda. For the truth is this: if there was even a modest shift away from the car towards buses or trains, our public transport system could not cope. There is not sufficient capacity.

    No, what Labour’s transport gurus want is a reduction of journeys, principally by people on low incomes. According to them poor people can’t have cars.

    To make life better on our roads there needs to be a bigger dose of reality and recognition that the car and the lorry are a help, and not a hindrance, to an integrated transport policy. Indeed they are vital to many people in rural areas, many elderly, disabled and parents with young children.

    Over the coming months we will look at getting the best out of our road space. At getting the best out of better lane management, better repair management, better use of technology. We will look at innovative ways of providing public transport with some of the flexibility that private transport has.

    We understand that people will not leave their car at home until personal safety is improve on buses and trains, pupils will not return to school transport until better supervision and safety provided.

    Above all we understand that we have to integrate our transport policy into the way people live their life, rather than how some cloistered transport boffin thinks they should. Our policy will be firmly grounded in reality, with a determination to repair the damage inflicted by Byers and to make our transport system better.

  • Eric Pickles – 2002 Speech to the Chartered Institute of Housing

    Eric Pickles – 2002 Speech to the Chartered Institute of Housing

    The speech made by Eric Pickles to the Chartered Institute of Housing on 12 June 2002.

    Ten years ago this month, I made my maiden speech to the House of Commons as the newly elected MP for the constituency of Brentwood & Ongar.

    My contribution was made during a housing debate sponsored by the then Conservative Government. The debate was entitled Tenants’ Rights.

    What you have to understand is that a maiden speech is an intensely personal thing to an MP. It sets out what motivates the Member of Parliament, it lays down what he or she wants to achieve, puts markers down to the Party Whips office about areas of interest.

    What you have to understand about the Whips office of all parties is that it is run with the cold efficiency of the armed forces during a period of national conscription. So that professional cooks will find themselves assigned to transport, and painters and decorators to the kitchen.

    So you will understand my emotion in making my second public speech on housing in ten years, and my first speech as the new Shadow Secretary of State for Local Government and the Regions.

    Much as I have enjoyed the past few months chasing Stephen Byers, I am pleased now to be given the opportunity to focus on serious issues such as housing, which concern real people every day.

    Looking back over what I said ten years ago in the House of Commons, I recognise that much of it is just as relevant here today.

    If you will forgive a politician the ultimate vanity of quoting himself, in 1992 I said: ‘Any reasonable housing policy must be based on quality, diversity and choice’. The same is true today.

    But now I am acutely aware – perhaps more than in many other areas – the boundaries and the language of the debate have moved on.

    The old arguments about public versus private provision have largely been won. Today, there is some unity about providing good quality, affordable housing and reversing the migration from our inner cities, and about building stronger communities

    So I hope today, to outline to you my approach to housing policy and to try and explain what we will be considering in our policy review process, which is currently underway.

    In my speech in the House of Commons, I explained how public housing was largely responsible for forming my political views.

    As I looked around me on the council estate in West Riding in Yorkshire where my parents ran a small corner shop, I began to despair at some of the conditions in which my friends and neighbours lived. I realised that the fundamental problem was that they deserved a better landlord than they had.

    Many of them lived in properties owned and managed by the local authority. As a former councillor, I know that even when they are trying their hardest, they do not necessarily make good landlords.

    There never was a golden age of public housing. The fact is that most people wanted to own their own homes. This is what the Conservative Governments of the 80s and 90s recognised – and I’m pleased to say that so successful was the policy, that even most Labour politicians accept today.

    Conservatives believe in home-ownership. The importance of property ownership is marked out throughout the history of political thought. You may even say that it is at the heart of Conservatism.

    We are rightly proud of policies such as right-to-buy which empowered a new range of people.

    We are pleased to have introduced the notion of stock transfer.

    We were right to break down the barriers between the public and the private sectors.

    The principles that drove those policies will drive our future policies also. They are the principles I was elected on in 1992, and I hold true to them today.

    But I also recognise the new challenges and priorities we now face. Too often in the past, we have allowed ourselves to be portrayed as only caring about property and money.

    Conservatives may have been the party of property, but we recognised the obligations to the community that property brought with it.

    The priorities now must be to encourage more people to live in our cities to stop them from becoming lifeless ghettos and to look into ways of providing more affordable housing, particularly to young people.

    And we need too, to give greater focus to the war on homelessness.

    I was David Willetts’ deputy at social security for a couple of years; I have talked to him about his experience of seeing for himself the plight of people living on the streets. Something neglected by politicians for far too long.

    Remember what the Prime Minister promised? He said his Government would: ‘do everything in our power to end the scandal of homelessness’. But as we know, homelessness in England has soared since 1997.

    Worse still, the number of children who are living on the streets is rising. What chance does the child without a home have?

    And the number of people living in bed and breakfast accommodation has risen dramatically under this Government – up by as much as 200 per cent in London.

    I don’t pretend that things were perfect under Conservative Governments. We all need to give much greater thought to how we help these people out of their dire situation to give them a greater chance in life.

    It is not as if we have to look far to see the problem.

    David told me of visiting people sleeping in doorways and people seeking warmth in homeless shelters; he came across one group huddled by the side of Westminster Cathedral – less than a mile from the House of Commons and directly opposite the offices of the Government’s Rough Sleeper Unit.

    From where they lie they can see a sign that should mean something to them, but as often is the way: politicians try to help but it is remote and useless.

    Part of the problem is that we always look at the short-term. We just want to get people off the streets. We don’t think enough about them as individuals and families – we only think about them as statistics.

    And it’s not a problem that can be solved simply by throwing more money at it.

    We need to be more innovative in how we address the problem.

    I am sure you understand better than me why some homeless people reject the offer of a one-bedroom flat. On the streets sometimes the only family you have are those who sleep next to you.

    It may seem hard for us to comprehend, but some people would rather stay where they are instead of being sent off on their own to a flat somewhere.

    There is a social dimension to homelessness, and we cannot ignore it. We must address the street culture that exists, and consider making greater use of things like communal housing, so that groups of homeless people can be housed together.

    Successive governments have failed to grasp this nettle, but we are now in a position to do so because we are listening, learning and taking our time to get our policies right.

    But I also spoke earlier about the need to reverse the migration from our inner cities that is leading to increasing degrees of deprivation in urban areas.

    People are the lifeblood of cities, and encouraging people to live in urban areas is both a social necessity and also common sense.

    It is a social necessity because if we are to build communities in inner city areas we need to provide stability.

    It is common sense because if we are to improve the way we run our public services we need to build communities.

    The teacher, doctor or policeman who lives in the community they serve is naturally better able to deal with the needs of the area. When local residents witness the evening flight of influential people it reduces the sense of community. It signals that success lies elsewhere, and stigmatises those that remain.

    All areas need constancy, commitment and stability. Building communities will be the priority of the next Conservative Government.

    So housing policies, which force people to leave inner city areas, are simply wrong.

    The decrease in the amount of social housing constructed under this Government is a problem of Labour’s own making.

    So there are fewer houses to live in.

    But the houses that do exist are also less affordable.

    The decision to cut the right-to-buy discounts has resulted in many young people being unable to take their first step on the housing ladder.

    Labour has also made home ownership less affordable by increasing taxes on homeowners.

    And of course the huge increases in council tax we have seen under this Government – an additional £212 for a Band D property over four years – are hitting households on lower incomes the most. Particularly those just above entitlement to some form of income support in its general sense

    In my own constituency, I have seen the problems this last issue causes. An example of the law of unintended consequences

    In one area where people are living in social housing they have seen the value of their property rise. What would be a band A or B in West Yorkshire is much higher in the South East. The increased valuation with the higher Council Tax is the margin between being able to afford to live locally or not.

    The result of these policies is that the average deposit needed for a first time buyer in the UK has risen by £6,700 to £13,300 – and the average age of a first time buyer is now 34.

    So the Conservative Party’s policy review is considering how to address these problems. The answers are not easy, but by taking our time and talking to the people who matter – people such as your good selves – we aim to bring forward policies which answer these difficult questions, and which help to build strong communities

    And Conservatives know that good quality, affordable housing is inextricably linked to good public services.

    This is where the title of this session – ‘Is the Government delivering better public services’ – comes in.

    The evidence is clear. There is a clear linkage between the home environment and the reliance on public services.

    But of course there are more basic issues to consider.

    We simply can’t talk about improving the health service if we are not simultaneously considering what to do about housing. If we acknowledge that one of the major problems in the NHS today is the issue of so-called bed-blocking we have to realise that it is also linked to the need to provide good quality, warm and comfortable housing for elderly people.

    And if I may be so bold as to agree with a former Labour Health Minister, ‘anyone with a shred of common sense knows that housing affects people’s health’.

    Housing policy cannot exist in isolation. It is inter-connected with our policies on improving public services. And nowhere more so than when we think about who works in the public services.

    The Government has announced many new targets on teacher, nurse and police recruitment. They hope that throwing more money at the public services will help them to be achieved. But these people all need somewhere to live.

    Labour’s ‘Starter Homes Initiative’, while perhaps laudable in its intention, seems to be having little effect – no matter how many times the department re-announces it. Restricting it to ‘key’ workers hasn’t helped. Who decides what is and isn’t a ‘key’ worker? It seems that if you exist on some whimsical government target then you are ‘key’, but if not, you are on your own.
    And of course, subsidised loans do nothing to tackle the lack of available affordable housing.

    These are the issues I have to consider, and events such as this will help me in my task. But I hope also to be able to discuss them at greater length over the coming years on a more individual basis. No doubt, there will be things I have not mentioned today, but I hope you appreciate that for me and for my Party, the important thing is to develop our policies properly rather than quickly. Don’t be under any doubt that this is a serious undertaking.

    I am quite conscious that housing policy is complex and challenging. I know that you are calling on the Government to provide more money to housing in the forthcoming spending review. I watch with interest as to whether, to quote David Butler ‘John Prescott will add his voice to the increased case for increase housing investment’.

    But more than that, we need to think radically about the social aspects of housing policy – not just the economic aspects.

    I said at the start that the housing debate has moved on since my maiden speech in 1992. Certainly it has. Today we are not arguing about public or private provision. But this unfortunately does not mean that we have answered all the important questions.

    We are faced with new challenges. My Party’s focus is changing. We recognise those challenges and we plan to offer solutions to them.

    But our principles have not changed. In the debate ten years ago, the Minister wound up the exchanges by emphasising the Conservative watchwords: quality, diversity, choice, freedom, opportunity and empowerment.

    Now as we are engaged in our policy review, they continue to be at the forefront of our minds.

    I am grateful to have the opportunity to put them into practice, and I hope in the years ahead to return to you and outline precisely how Conservatives will apply them to today’s problems to make stronger communities.

  • Eric Pickles – 2003 Speech to the National Association of Local Councils

    Eric Pickles – 2003 Speech to the National Association of Local Councils

    The speech made by Eric Pickles, the then Shadow Minister for Local Government, on 4 October 2003.

    In addressing you today I wish to make two points:

    The first is that Conservatives strongly support parish and town councils.

    We support you on the basis of your mandate and advocacy for your local community.

    We will do all in our power to make your community service easier.

    We will wind back Labour’s overbearing command state from parish and town councils – but more about this later.

    We do not see you as the Government’s branch office

    Secondly, there is a need to achieve more in large towns and cities – we wish to see an expansion of Town and Parish councils in urban and inner city areas, because rejuvenation must come from within and have a strong element of local accountability. I believe the National Association of Local Councils has a vital role to play in this aim.

    True localism: Parish and town councils shaping and guiding local communities

    Before there was new Labour and new localism there were town and parish councils.

    And when New Labour is but a distant memory there were town and parish councils

    True localism is local advocates for a local community.

    You entered public service not because it would end in Downing Street, or be part of some great ideological struggle, but because you wanted to put something into your community.

    The driving forces behind local communities are not edicts and diktats from Whitehall but the sheer energy and commitment and innovation displayed by local councillors.

    Like all generations before us, we have the ability to shape and render the society we wish to hand over to the next generation.

    Parish and town councils have a particularly important role shaping the growth of their local community.

    Yet in 2003 many of this shaping comes under what the Government allows councils to do under Labour’s freedoms. Freedoms that fit in with the other Blair’s concept of language in double-speak

    Eric Blair (George Orwell) would recognise that these are not true freedoms at all.

    In truth. The Government imprisons councils.

    You are told you are free.

    When in reality those freedoms are your prison warden. Ensuring you stay within boundaries set by the Government. Innovation is restricted. Councils are prisoners on licence of central government.

    I want to see central government retreat from its command state.

    · Retreat from telling you what local councils can and cannot do.

    · Retreat from the burdens, the targets, the statutory plans, the tick-a-box culture.

    · Retreat from the clutter of centralism.

    Labour cannot be trusted

    I have a confession to make. I had listened to what Labour had to say about local government when they were in opposition. I agreed we quite a lot of it. I was prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt.

    But after six years it turned out to be “sound and fury signifying nothing”

    The process has been good for me, because it has given me some empathy with Labour Backbenchers – For I too know what it feels like to be betrayed by New Labour

    You cannot believe a word they say. Especially when it comes to local government.

    And I will give you an example. Indeed, a saga.

    It relates to local government finance and obviously impacts upon you.

    Capping and council taxes.

    In November last year Minister Nick Raynsford announced that councils graded as excellent by the comprehensive performance assessment will not be subject to reserve capping powers.

    In December, Nick Raynsford announced the provisional local government finance settlement.

    I could see that council tax bills for Band D homes were going to hit the £1000 bill mark. Hitting families and pensioners and those on fixed incomes.

    And I said so in the House of Commons.

    It was and is quite clear to the impartial observer that the fiddled funding saw money transferred from Tory councils to Labour councils.

    Council tax, especially in the south was going to skyrocket as councillors tried to protect public services. The ultimate stealth tax. Fiddled by Whitehall for local councillors to take the blame.

    The Government pooh-poohed Conservative claims as scare mongering.

    We continued to warn that the result of the government’s fiddled funding, combined with Labour’s ethos of burdens and targets – council tax was going to not only hit the roof. It was to put a large hole there.

    And you know what happened…

    Council tax bills went out in April.

    Band D council bills hit over £1000. Council tax went up 12.9 per cent – three times the rate of inflation.

    As councils and councillors struggle to keep up with Labour’s spending demands council tax has gone up nearly 70 per cent since 1997.

    The Government did nothing.

    Seven months later in October – only when we have the sight of pensioners preparing for jail and Chief Police Officers warning of the break down in law and order has the government stirred.

    Not acted to restore the funding to councils. Not acted to remove burdens and targets and the grime of centralism.

    They feared they had been rumbled.

    And in a moment of crisis they turned to their greatest ally – spin.

    They blamed the councils. They blamed councillors. They blamed us. We are apparently part of a conspiracy to undermine values. Councils putting up local taxes to undermined the Government. If you like, role reversal to Labour Councils in the Thatcher years. But if that was the case, Ministers would be able to cite examples of Conservative Councils giving donations to right wing causes or flooding our school libraries with Michael and John go hunting and shooting,.

    So they blamed everyone else.

    And now they will shift the blame further by renouncing their promise on no more capping and have reverted to the cap council tax.

    I don’t trust or believe Labour anymore when it comes to local councils. And frankly, nor should you.

    You don’t fit in with their project. You are an inconvenience.

    Whether it is the code of conduct, best value, the audit regime – Labour finds parish and town councils a nuisance

    The Government’s aim is to mould and shape parish and town councils into little boxes to fit neatly within Labour’s project.

    Little cubes that are the same in Devon as they are in Lancashire. Little Whitehall franchises up and down the country.

    The same size, delivering the same services regardless of local need or want.

    Little boxes that only exist because the centre grants them life.

    Little boxes all full of ticky-tacky that all look the same

    It is more subtle Labour’s last attacks on parish councils. But just as deadly

    In 1999 Labour called for parish councils to be replaced with ‘neighbourhood forums’.

    Labour then said that parish councils should include ‘neighbourhood managers’ – rather than elected representatives.

    In 2000 Labour’s Environment Minister said he was worried about the ability of parish councils to represent rural people.

    Last year former Labour Cabinet Minister, Mo Mowlam called for parish councils to be abolished to make way for regional assemblies.

    Just recently in March this year was forced to Labour revealed secret plans to eradicate parish boundaries from Ordnance Survey maps. Winston Smith would have been proud

    The Conservative Approach – A Fair Deal

    These plans and plots are to be compared and contrasted with the Conservative approach. Conservatives who will deliver a fair deal for you.

    Conservatives who value the work of parish and town councillors.

    But we fear Labour’s regulations, interference and red-tape will restrict the role of parish councils and result in a large-scale reduction in the number of people willing to be involved.

    We will deliver a fair deal for parish and town councils. We will deliver a fair deal for the thousands of parish and town councillors.

    What we will do? Put it simply – it is a question of trust

    Trust the people to make their own decisions on standards of conduct

    Trust the people to ensure that their parish and town councils operate to accepted standards.

    Trust the people to run their own villages and towns.

    So what policy commitments will we make to you?

    For the local government sector we will abolish comprehensive performance assessment.

    We will abolish Best Value. Under Conservatives, parish and town councils will not be subjected to the introduction of Best Value.

    Statutory plans…

    Most will go to the dustbin. Where they belong.

    For town and parish councils we will remove the code of conduct.

    On this point I will suggest that if the National Association for Local Councils was to recommend a voluntary code of conduct for the larger councils then that, is a matter entirely for you to decide.

    But I will not allow good people to be forced out of voluntary roles because of bad laws.

    We will have a giant bonfire of the Quangos

    I am drawing up a list that will see on average at least one Quango abolished for every week of the first Conservative Government.

    They will not be re-named or replaced with Conservative versions.

    Their powers will revert to councils and local communities.

    Conservatives want to see a power shift of function not form.

    And this real revolution involves you. It involves all of you in this room and your colleagues back home.

    While Labour are effectively imposing a blueprint of rigid conformity on parish councils Conservatives believe in diversity.

    All town and parish councils should be given freedoms automatically. It is insulting for Labour to suggest that the freedoms should be ‘earned’ through compliance with central government. Your actual existence should guarantee such rights.

    Accountability and responsibility

    And if you or your town or parish council make mistakes then like the rest of us, you learn and move on and bear the consequences

    And if you keep on making mistakes then it should not be the fear of some distant bureaucrat in Whitehall that should concern you.

    The best system of accountability will be the wrath of your community. The people you live and work with.

    I can think of no better system of accountability.

    · Responsibility by association,
    · and accountability by the ballot box

    Only at the last resort. When governance is dissolved and responsibility absolved should there be intervention from Whitehall.

    The best remedy will be to ensure that you don’t the mistakes in the first place. Conservatives support training and continuous improvement. Public perception of standards and expectations of service continue to rise. And councils must meet that challenge.

    But any system must be voluntary and must not be seen as a burden on service.

    Why should clerks with many years of sound service be obliged to undertake courses?

    Surely their attendance should be voluntary and should not reflect upon the funding status of any parish council.

    Enhanced role of town and parish councils

    I genuinely believe in the vibrance all tiers of local government.

    For too long, local councils have been treated as an extension of Whitehall – bodies through which centrally decided policies are administered rather than local communities being able to use powers and resources to decide policies of their own.

    Tied up in so much red-tape, the talent of local councils is wasted as they are turned into the agents of Whitehall rather than the strong local voice wanted by local people.

    The next Conservative Government will not be characterised by the power wielded but the power yielded.

    Conservatives will not only wind back Labour’s command state from your daily operations but also want additional reforms.

    Conservatives not only want to see power and responsibility transferred from Whitehall to county, district and metropolitan councils but even further. Where councils and communities agree and were it is practicable I envisage a devolution of power from district and county councils to parish and town councils.

    We do see a greater role for parish and town councils.

    But only if the councillors and their community want a greater role.

    Town and parish councils can be so much more. You can do so much more as advocates for your local community.

    Growth of Parish and Town Councils

    Conservatives not only want an enhanced role for existing town and parish councils we want to see new parish councils not just in rural areas – but also in urban areas, both in towns and cities.

    We want to make it easier for new parish and town councils to be established.

    In recent years our televisions have been throwing towards us lifestyle programmes concentrating on the retreat from urban life.

    Families and stressed out city types are shown to escape to the sanctuary of small towns and villages.

    Part of this is a retreat from a crumbling urban society. Failing schools, rising crime, deteriorating hospitals, inner cities in decay. Communities not just breaking down but dissipating.

    One of the main attractions for this urban flight is wanting to belong to, or feel part of a community.

    We need to do more in our cities and large towns to encourage the sense of community that we find so strong in the country and towns. A sense of community that comes through your work. A community supported by parish and town councils.

    Labour will establish a taskforce. Recommendations will precede John Prescott’s intervention. He will throw taxpayer’s money like confetti at various schemes. Schemes will fail. Followed by a Government review. Conducted by another taskforce.

    I think we could use parish and town councils as good basis to start urban regeneration. By getting the individual members of the community involved in the community we will help to develop a sense of ownership.

    Damian Green, our Shadow Education Secretary of State has already announced Conservative policies that will allow communities to take over failing state schools and establish independent schools.

    Establishing town and parish council models in inner cities will help those communities regenerate.

    Conclusion

    But we do need to do much more.

    The Conservative Party is currently undertaking a major review of all of our policies dealing with local government.

    In the next few months I will bring forward to you further proposals that build upon themes outlined in this speech.

    I would welcome any written contributions that you as councillors and guardians of your community that you may wish to make. This offer is made regardless of your political affiliation or lack of affiliation.

    · If you want a fair deal for parish and town councils.
    · If you want a massive reduction in the clutter and grime of centralism.
    · If you want parish and town councils to be trusted and respected
    · And you want your councils to be unshackled but empowered then come with me as we tear down John Prescott’s rambling and unstable empire.

  • Eric Pickles – 1992 Maiden Speech in the House of Commons

    Below is the text of the speech made by Eric Pickles, the then Conservative MP for Brentwood and Ongar, in the House of Commons on 5 June 1992.

    thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for this opportunity to address the House for the first time. It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Greenwich (Mr. Raynsford). I have read many of his articles, always with pleasure. However, having reached the end of an article, I have often, regretfully, had to disagree with him.

    I pay tribute to my predecessor, Sir Robert McCrindle, who served with great distinction the people of Brentwood and Ongar, and its predecessor constituencies, in the House. He was rightly regarded by his constituents with great affection. He spoke with great authority in many debates, particularly those on financial services and aviation. His first speech was typically a battle on behalf of his constituents with regard to compulsory purchase. His last speech was, again typically, a battle on behalf of Brentwood and Ongar. He told the Government in no uncertain terms that the people of Brentwood and Ongar do not want the M12, which is blighting my constituency. As you may know, Madam Deputy Speaker, Sir Robert did not enjoy the best of health during his last few years as a Member of Parliament. Therefore, I am sure that the whole House will be pleased to know that Sir Robert is now in very good health. I am confident that both he and his wife Myra will enjoy many happy and healthy years of retirement from politics.

    Brentwood and Ongar is situated about 20 miles to the north-east of this House, in the county of Essex. Since my adoption of Essex, it has become clear to me that the people of the country are divided into two—those who come from Essex and those who wish they came from Essex. For a Yorkshireman to say that is true praise indeed.

    My constituency straddles the two main conurbations of Abridge and West Horndon. It has played a curious and significant part in the nation’s history. According to Robert Graves, it was the scene where a singular battle over sovereignty was fought—not over the treaty of Rome but over the treaty of the Roman legions. It was the place where the Emperor Claudius met the ancient Britons. The residents of Brentwood and Ongar were the first to see elephants on these shores. Our association with elephants continued for 2,000 years. The East India Company decided to set up its training school for elephants in Brentwood. It was there that the first, second or even third sons of the landed gentry met those huge quadrupeds for the first time. Stories still abound among my constituents about these bewildered members of the aristocracy losing themselves in Brentwood and Ongar.

    The site of that elephant training school is now the headquarters of Ford UK and Ford Europe. Many international and national companies are to be found in my constituency. Rhone Poulenc, a French pharmaceutical company, has based its research facility in Brentwood and Ongar. It is also the headquarters of Amstrad, the computer company which has done so much to ensure that ordinary people have the opportunity to own personal computers. While retaining its traditions, therefore, Brentwood and Ongar is a constituency which looks to the future. I am proud to represent it here.

    About 80 per cent. of Brentwood and Ongar’s housing stock is now in owner-occupation. The two district councils are the largest providers of rented housing for the remaining 20 per cent. In Brentwood there has been a decline of about 3 per cent. a year in the public rented sector, largely as a result of right-to-buy. There have been more than 2,000 sales since the scheme began. That is a remarkable achievement.

    Public housing was largely responsible for the forming of my own political views, contrary to the political tradition of my family. I was brought up on a council estate in the West Riding of Yorkshire where my parents ran a small corner shop. As I looked at the style and condition of the houses occupied by my friends and neighbours, my conviction grew that they deserved a better landlord. I served for many years on a local authority and do not want to paint all local authorities black, but, even when they are at their most benign, they do not make good landlords. They are cumbersome and bureaucratic. Pavements remain cracked for want of inspection; window frames remain unpainted for want of a form. Brave is a tenant who decides to take matters into his own hands. To me, there is no such thing as a golden age of public housing.

    Any reasonable housing policy must be based on quality, diversity and choice. Above all, it must be based on what people want. People simply want to own their own homes. According to the Council of Mortgage Lenders and a recent BBC survey, 77 per cent. of the population believe that to own their own homes is the ideal tenure. I have heard hon. Members on both sides of the Chamber argue that the British obsession with wanting to own one’s home is wrong. That message is particularly hard to swallow when it is given by people who come from families who are second, third or even fourth generation owner-occupiers. Perhaps my socialist ancestors would approve of what I think about those sentiments: what is good enough for the toffs is good enough for the workers. People have the right to own their own homes. We have an obligation to ensure that they can do so.

    I welcome the Minister’s reference to the rents-to-mortgages scheme. I understand and fully appreciate that it will not have the same impact as right-to-buy, but it will enable people, just one or two steps down the housing ladder, to own their own homes. I expect more people thereby to achieve their goal of home ownership. Nevertheless, I recognise that, for reasons of mobility and disposable income, some people may not want to buy. To offer diversity and choice represents a great challenge to both the Government and local government. It is a reflection of the greater challenge that faces the Government, which is to ensure that choice, freedom and opportunity are taken further down the social and economic ladder.

    I am especially pleased that my hon. Friend the Minister mentioned the concept of empowerment, which is the key to tenants’ rights. We need to ensure that there are methods other than purchase by which tenants can exercise choice and enjoy freedom.

    The more tenants are involved in the running of estates, the better those estates will be. And the more officials are removed from their air-conditioned towers and work and manage from estates, the better the estates will be. When I talk to housing officials, I sometimes feel that they regard estates as distant colonies—that there is a new form of colonialism, with the inspector going round once a month. If people have to drive past graffiti, cracked paving stones and holes in the road, those problems suddenly assume the importance that they should and suddenly the council gets round to doing something about them. I believe that the area management of estates is vital—just as important as the tenants charter.

    I welcome the promise that, in the autumn, the right to repair will be improved, because at present the provisions are a little cumbersome and difficult to understand. Will my hon. Friend the Minister give his attention to, and perhaps also give us some further details on, the right of improvement? If people are to have the opportunity to use their own homes as their own homes, we must ensure that, when they decide to leave them, they are financially compensated for the improvements that they have made. If anything, the present right of improvement poses more difficulties than the right of repair and I should welcome a commitment to improve that right in the legislation.

    I believe that council housing is now moving into a different age. Too much energy has been wasted on trying to find ways round regulations, on trying to prevent tenants from buying their own homes and on trying to stop housing action trusts coming into being. If just a quarter of that effort and vitality had been put into ensuring that tenants had a better deal and more opportunity to decide the way in which their homes, environment and estates were managed, the stock of public housing would be materially better than it is today.