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  • Helen Morgan – 2024 Speech on Planning, the Green Belt and Rural Affairs

    Helen Morgan – 2024 Speech on Planning, the Green Belt and Rural Affairs

    The speech made by Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat MP for North Shropshire, in the House of Commons on 19 July 2024.

    I congratulate the Deputy Prime Minister and welcome her to her place, and I welcome the shadow Secretary of State as well. Because we are talking about local government today, I declare my interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

    The topic of today’s debate is planning, the greenbelt and rural affairs. We need to talk about planning and housing, and I will certainly do so, but we also need to talk about rural affairs, and I am slightly confused about why none of the speeches by Front Benchers has done that. I welcome the Government’s focus on house building and the reintroduction of housing targets. In England, the number of people left languishing on the social housing waiting list has reached 1.2 million, and there are 8.5 million people in this country with some form of unmet housing need. Last year, under the Conservative Government, 29,000 social homes were sold or demolished, and fewer than 7,000 were built, so we all know that we have an unprecedented need for new housing, particularly social housing.

    The Liberal Democrats’ ambitious commitment on social housing would be to build 150,000 social homes a year by the end of this Parliament—

    Mr Louie French (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)

    Just not in your seat.

    Helen Morgan

    The hon. Gentleman is muttering from a sedentary position. He may wish to know that my grandparents lived in social housing, and I have no particular prejudices against it whatsoever.

    We are committed not only to building the homes that are so important to easing the crisis throughout the housing market, but to ensuring that those new homes are of a high standard, that they are zero carbon and that they are built alongside proper infrastructure that provides communities with the services and amenities they need. Integrating public service delivery has to be part of the planning process, so in principle we welcome the Government’s plans to streamline the delivery of critical infrastructure, including in the housing sector, in the forthcoming planning and infrastructure Bill, but we need to be clear that the current system has benefited developers rather than communities. The Bill must take that into account.

    Crude targets alone have led to many developments being given permission, only for affordable and social housing elements to be watered down on the basis of viability once permission is granted. That must change. We know that local authorities are best placed to make the decisions about housing in their areas, so I urge the Government to ensure that their mandatory housing targets are built from the bottom up—by determining the type of housing and infrastructure communities need, and empowering local government to build social homes where they are most needed. We need the necessary infrastructure, including GPs, schools, bus stops and bus routes, while also ensuring that there is appropriate green space and access to the countryside, which is important for health and wellbeing. Our experience is that residents support good plans with good infrastructure.

    Now, I imagine that we will use the term “nimby” in this debate, and it has already been used about the Liberal Democrats, but it is not appropriate to approve housing in areas that are unsuitable—for example, where there is a high risk of flooding. It is not being a nimby to oppose poor planning; it is common sense. Local authorities are under enormous pressure and we know that their planning departments are overstretched. I welcome the Deputy Prime Minister’s comments on that point. They need proper funding to ensure that they make good and consistent decisions, and that their councillors are well advised.

    Alicia Kearns (Rutland and Stamford) (Con)

    The hon. Member is talking about infrastructure and about decisions being made in the best interests of our communities, so can I ask why Liberal Democrat-run Rutland county council this week turned down an application for a new day care centre for people with special educational needs without even taking it to the planning committee, meaning that we now have to rely on the council’s service, rather than providing choice to ensure that anyone with learning disabilities or other disabilities in our community gets the support they need?

    Helen Morgan

    I do not know the details of that individual case, but we need to ensure that planning departments are properly funded so that the decisions made by planning officers are appropriate. Without knowing the details, I do now know whether it is a good development or a poor one, but those departments need to be empowered to make decisions correctly.

    Some proposals for development are inappropriate and some are downright dangerous—we mentioned the building of houses on floodplains earlier. The only insurer to re-insure houses on floodplains is due to close its operations in 15 years’ time. We cannot build houses on floodplains. It will not be possible for them to be insured or sold; homeowners will be trapped.

    We should also not be building housing developments without additional schools or GP surgeries. Most importantly, we should not be building housing developments where the developers do not prepare the roads and green spaces to an acceptable standard and do not allow them to be adopted by the local authority, but set up a shared management company and leave the homeowners fleeced for the rest of their home ownership experience. I encourage the Deputy Prime Minister to consider that in the forthcoming legislation.

    Good councillors approve planning for good developments. That is why, on the days when the Conservatives are not accusing us of being nimbys, they are telling people that we are going to concrete over their countryside.

    Planning is not just about housing. We have many demands on our countryside: housing, renewable energy, nature restoration and, importantly, the growing of food. We need to simplify planning so that all those things can happen. Housing, renewable energy and job creation are incredibly important, but I urge the Government to ensure that when they go ahead, it is not at the expense of food production. The Liberal Democrats have called for the development of a land use strategy so that these important and competing demands can be balanced, and so that we use land in the optimal way, protecting the highest grade arable land for food production and putting the infrastructure of renewable energy and housing in less prime places. I therefore hope that the Government will consider a land use strategy as part of their planning reform.

    That brings me to another important area of the countryside: our waterways and our beaches. It is a scandal that raw sewage has been allowed to be dumped into our rivers and on to our beaches, while water company executives have taken home huge bonuses and their—often overseas—shareholders have taken huge dividends. The Liberal Democrats are proud to have led the campaign to end the sewage crisis. We welcome the water (special measures) Bill and will be watching closely to ensure that the water regulator is given the powers it needs to finally end this sewage outrage.

    I will move on to rural affairs. There was no mention in the King’s Speech of rural communities or priorities for the countryside, which I hope means that the new Government will be ensuring that every policy is rural-proofed and that the demands of delivering public services in rural areas, where the population is spread over a large area, are being considered.

    I also want to mention the English devolution bill. The Liberal Democrats are the proud voices of local communities and community-led politics, and we absolutely welcome steps to devolve power away from Westminster, but I ask the Secretary of State to confirm what that will look like for those councils without a devo deal, a metro mayor or a combined authority mayor. It is important that all local councils have the powers and funding to deliver for their communities. That funding must reflect the cost of delivering services in rural areas. Rural councils have been taken for granted for far too long. We need to ensure that people who live in rural areas, who also see increases in their council tax, are getting the public services that they deserve.

    Rurality affects the delivery of all types of services, but I want to touch on just a few key areas. Health is an important issue in my North Shropshire constituency, where we have seen huge problems with GP and dentistry access and a crisis in our A&E service. While I welcome the Government’s plans to tackle the crisis in mental health service provision, which is also a big problem in rural areas, we really want to see rural-focused policy to deal with the recruitment crisis in rural areas and the cost of delivering health services over large distances, and to ensure that people who live a long way from a hospital or diagnostic centre can travel to it more easily.

    That brings me to public transport, which is quite problematic in Shropshire. We have lost 63% of our bus miles since 2015, which makes it difficult for anybody to access work opportunities, social opportunities, educational opportunities and, indeed, health services. I am really pleased that the Government will allow local authorities to franchise their own bus services—the Liberal Democrats have long called for that—but I would like to see the detail of how that will work and how we will get the funding to kick-start those routes and get labour moving properly around our countryside.

    Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Edward Leigh)

    Order. Can the hon. Lady bring her remarks to a close, please?

    Helen Morgan

    Of course.

    I was briefly going to mention mobile signal, but I will rush over that because I have talked about it a reasonable amount in the House. I want to talk about farming and the rural economy, because that is the backbone of our economy and food production is extremely important. Farmers have faced a crisis over the last few years, with the botched introduction of the environmental land management scheme, the input costs they face and the fact that vast tracts of farmland are underwater and have been for the last 18 months. I must encourage the Government to look at trade deals to ensure that farmers are working on a level playing field, and to ensure that the sustainable farming incentive deals with the consistent problem of flooding following prolonged rainfall, given how our farmers are storing an enormous amount of water upstream.

    I will draw my remarks to a close because I am keen to hear the maiden speeches of all these new Members, who I welcome to this place. To reinforce the points I have made, community-led planning is so important, and we would love to see a land use strategy. We need to ensure that the cost of delivering public services in rural areas is properly considered and funded, and the infrastructure needs to be there. Finally, please do not forget about food security, which is so important to national renewal.

  • Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill

    Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill

    The speech made by Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat MP for North Shropshire, in the House of Commons on 13 December 2022.

    I rise to speak to new clauses 20 and 40 and amendment 5, in my name. We all recognise that the UK has a housing crisis, with shortages of social, private rented and affordable housing, leaving many people in an insecure position. One problem is that that need often conflicts with concerns that local residents have about their own stretched public services. Amendment 5 would help to address local concerns by ensuring that the infrastructure levy is paid upfront before the point of occupation. Councils would be able to ensure that a local community could cope with the additional people moving in before they were there taking up school places and nursery places, rather than trying to solve the problem of service provision once it is too late.

    The amendment would also enable councils to require financial bonds from developers to complete the basic infrastructure—roads, street lights and drainage—that is meant to be adopted, but often seems to be left undone. North Shropshire is plagued with unfinished road developments, and the amendment would allow those financial bonds to be put in place, which would avoid such situations.

    I fear that the Bill misses the opportunity to ensure that, when we build new homes, we protect the environment. The Conservatives have allowed around 1 million new homes to be built since 2015, which are not as efficient as they would have been had the standards put in place under the coalition Government been retained. This is a missed environmental opportunity, and it means that homeowners are paying far more to heat their homes than they might otherwise have done. New clause 20 would bring forward the date of the future homes standard to January, which may be unrealistic in the circumstances, but I hope that the Minister will consider bringing it forward to save homebuyers money and to work towards our climate objectives.

    New clause 40 would create a requirement to hold local referendums on fracking applications—to be paid for by the applicant—to protect communities from unwanted fossil fuel extraction. My constituents are unconvinced by the current moratorium given the flip-flopping this summer and the disastrous decision to give the go-ahead to a new coalmine last week.

    Finally, I wish to mention the critical importance of the affordability of housing. We know, as many Members have discussed, that it is worse in some parts of the country than in others. The building of executive homes in the countryside will not help us deal with the problem of affordable housing. New clause 20 also enables local authorities to require new housing to be affordable and to define affordability in their area. It would also allow them to provide additional bus services so that people did not become reliant on cars.

    In summary, I am worried about the things that are missing in the Bill, which we have discussed today, and I hope that the Minister will consider them. In my final few seconds, I apologise to the House for coughing and spluttering all the way through the debate.

  • Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on Voter ID at Elections

    Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on Voter ID at Elections

    The speech made by Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat MP for North Shropshire, in the House of Commons on 12 December 2022.

    In mid-October, the Chancellor of the Exchequer stood here and warned us that eye-wateringly difficult decisions would need to be made by the Government to stabilise public finances following the disastrous October mini-Budget, yet today we are being asked to pass regulations and put the final touches to a scheme that will cost £180 million over the next 10 years to solve the issue of just 33 allegations of voter fraud in 2019, with only one conviction and one caution. That might look like good value for money to the Conservatives, but the truth is that it is a staggering waste of money. In the midst of a cost of living crisis and a self-inflicted financial disaster, it beggars belief that this scheme is going ahead. Our councils are cutting critical services because of extreme financial pressure and we should not be burdening them with the additional cost of a scheme that is totally unnecessary. Whether it is for mirrors, privacy screens or ID cards, it is all a complete waste of their time.

    But is worse than that: not only is photo ID for voting not really needed, but the plan is not even expected to work particularly well. The chair of the Electoral Commission has told Ministers that the plans cannot be delivered in a way that is

    “fully secure, accessible, and workable”

    in time for next May’s local elections. The Conservative chair of the Local Government Association is calling for the implementation of voter ID to be delayed because the LGA simply does not have time to get the plans in place for May without access to votes being put at risk.

    The most worrying element, as colleagues have pointed out, is that the likely effect of all this will be selective voter suppression. Research has shown that there might be around 3.5 million people without the right ID and that those people are more likely to be the most vulnerable in society, such as those with limiting disabilities, as well as younger voters, black and ethnic minorities and the least well off in society. The Cabinet Office has already admitted that around 42% of those without photo ID are estimated to be unlikely to apply for a voter ID card. The proposed acceptable forms of ID include a 60+ Oyster card or bus pass, but not the young person’s equivalent. This will disproportionately disadvantage students and young people. The Government have shown no concern at all about the possibility of postal voter fraud, which will not require any form of ID; I fear that is down to the fact that postal voters are most likely to be older and to vote Conservative, while the young and the other groups I have mentioned are more likely to support an Opposition party.

    There is no need to go into any further detail. In summary, I urge the House to consider the facts: we do not need photo ID, we cannot afford to implement the scheme and the proposals will simply lead to voter suppression. This Government should be trying to give the next generation a reason to vote for them, not to suppress their view because they have offered them nothing. Scrapping this legislation is not an eye-wateringly difficult decision. It would be a common-sense course of action. The Liberal Democrats are determined to end this legislation and I therefore urge all Members to vote against it today.

  • Helen Morgan – 2022 Parliamentary Question on WASPI Women

    Helen Morgan – 2022 Parliamentary Question on WASPI Women

    The parliamentary question asked by Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat MP for North Shropshire, in the House of Commons on 5 December 2022.

    Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)

    If he will take steps to compensate women born on or after 6 April 1950 affected by changes to the state pension age.

    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Laura Trott)

    State pension age equalisation and subsequent increases have been the policy of successive Governments. The phasing in of state pension age increases was agreed to by the hon. Lady’s party in 2011 and 2014.

    Helen Morgan

    Last July the pensions ombudsman concluded that the Government had been too slow to inform many women that they would be affected by the rising state pension age. Along with the cost of living crisis, this means that many of the WASPI women—Women Against State Pension Inequality—are struggling to get by, and it is one of the concerns most frequently raised in my weekly surgeries. I wonder whether the Secretary of State will commit himself to an interim payment for the women affected by the change in pension age while they wait for the release of the ombudsman’s final report.

    Laura Trott

    As the hon. Lady knows, the investigation is ongoing, so it would not be appropriate to take any further steps at this stage.

  • Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on Levelling Up Rural Britain

    Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on Levelling Up Rural Britain

    The speech made by Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat MP for North Shropshire, in the House of Commons on 9 November 2022.

    North Shropshire is a lovely place to live, with beautiful countryside, historic market towns and warm, welcoming people. I encourage everybody to come and visit. But behind the bucolic scenes, North Shropshire and indeed large parts of the rest of rural Britain are beginning to fall behind their urban counterparts.

    Levelling up was the second most popular catchphrase of 2019. While it had not a lot of meaning for the northern towns that it was aimed at, it had virtually none at all for rural Britain. If we want our rural communities on a level playing field with the towns in the north, and indeed the south, we need to address the causes of the problems that have led to dysfunction in many sectors of the economy and society.

    We have young people leaving rural areas in search of work at the same time that local employers from all sectors are struggling to fill vacancies. Our hospitals are full to capacity, with ambulances queuing outside the front, while beds are taken up by people who could be cared for at home. We have pensioners and young people desperate to get out into the towns to spend their money, but they have no cars and no alternative way to get there.

    On Friday, I visited the excellent Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital in Gobowen near Oswestry. It is a good example of how dysfunction can affect a place. It is undoubtedly one of the best hospitals in the country, with a fantastic reputation, excellent patient satisfaction and some of the world’s finest surgeons. Most medics would be honoured to work there, and yet it has a vacancy rate of 14%. Two key reasons behind that are a lack of affordable housing and a lack of public transport to the hospital. The nurses who work there are unable to get home after a 12-hour shift because a hospital with world-class facilities is being let down by a fourth-class public transport system. If they make the move to work in that top-class hospital environment, they will struggle to find a flat to rent not because they are too expensive but simply because not enough furnished flats are available on the market.

    People of working age obviously need to be able to find a secure home in the area where they want to live and to be able to access all the public services that will give them a decent quality of life, but those services are being cut because local government budgets are taking the strain of the pandemic and of Conservative chaos. Our councils need to be properly funded, but the Local Government Association reports that local authorities face a funding gap of £3.4 billion next year and £4.5 billion in 2024-25 just to stand still, so improving services seems a distant prospect.

    Shropshire council is reportedly spending 84% of its budget on social care. As the population gets older, the pressure on services gets higher and more young people leave—and the cycle continues. If rural Britain is going to thrive, that cycle needs to be reversed. It should start with the industry that is already the success story of rural Britain: farming. However, the Conservatives have taken our farmers for granted by bargaining away their level trading field for one pitched firmly in favour of their Australian and New Zealand competitors.

    Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)

    I very much hope that the hon. Lady will talk about the three cases in Shropshire up for assessment for levelling-up funding. The one for modernising Shrewsbury town centre in my constituency is extremely important. Will she welcome that project? As she knows, a thriving county town is good for the whole of our county.

    Helen Morgan

    I supported a levelling-up bid in my own constituency as well, but I will come on to the nature of bidding for small pots of money.

    The Government have implemented a new subsidy scheme so complex and tedious to access that only 2,000 out of 83,000 farmers nationally have applied to join it, despite the aims of the scheme being good. Unable to plan ahead through the constant chaos, many farmers are leaving the industry, taking local jobs, and indeed food security, with them. Grand schemes and big infrastructure projects are all very well, and they benefit the towns that win them, but they are no use to the people who cannot get to those towns in the first place. I will come on to that shortly, but before I do I want to talk about digital infrastructure.

    It is not surprising that the UK is one of the least efficient countries in Europe when, in 2022, one in 10 of my constituents still cannot get internet speeds above 10 megabytes per second. It is not fair to expect rural businesses to compete with their urban counterparts when they cannot connect with their customers or suppliers. Connecting rural areas both digitally and physically is key to improving their futures.

    Last week, I heard from a pensioner near Market Drayton who was without a driving licence for 18 months —a Government failing for another day—and was therefore effectively under house arrest, only allowed out on day release once a week when the local charity bus passed by. He and his wife wanted to contribute to the local economy but were held back from doing so because they could not get to the high street. We live in a country where nearly £18 billion has been spent on a rail service in one of the best-connected cities in the world, but in Shropshire on a Sunday there is only one bus service running in the whole of the county, and Market Drayton is at risk of losing its one-hourly service on a Saturday as well. Boosting bus services will reconnect communities, enable young people to access work and social opportunities, and benefit healthcare, the economy and the environment.

    The reality is that the Conservatives have taken the votes of rural Britain for granted for so long they have just stopped listening to its needs. Take the cost of living crisis, which is undoubtedly worse in rural areas. Housing costs are higher, food costs are higher and transport costs are higher. Houses are often older and more expensive to heat and wages are lower, but if your home is off-grid the support available is a measly £100, to which access is the best-kept secret in Britain.

    We need to fund our councils fairly so they can provide not only the social care to free up our hospitals and ambulance services, but the other services taxpayers expect to improve the quality of life of all residents. We need to invest in our digital infrastructure for businesses, and to encourage young people to stay and work in the local area. We need to allow councils to develop and deliver housing plans that meet the specific requirements of their economies and communities. Councils bidding for small pots of money to spend on isolated projects that will go way over budget because of the economic chaos will not deliver that. Giving the power to our councils, properly funded to be able to deliver them, will deliver for our communities. We really need to address this point now.

  • Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on Unfinished Housing Developments

    Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on Unfinished Housing Developments

    The speech made by Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat MP for North Shropshire, in the House of Commons on 18 October 2022.

    I thank the Minister for his attendance and response this evening. I secured this debate following a number of instances in my constituency in which the buyers of new homes have been left to pick up the pieces when critical infrastructure is not completed by the developer.

    Let me tell the House first about The Brambles in Whitchurch. That is a development of 14 houses, built by developer Sherwood Homes Ltd in 2016 on land that had already been granted planning permission for development by Shropshire Council. It was a condition of the planning permission that the road, footpath and drainage should all be complete before the occupation of any houses occurred. However, despite those things never happening, building completion certificates were issued for all the properties and they were subsequently sold and inhabited. Unfortunately for the residents, the drainage system failed, leading on some days to raw sewage backing up in their gardens. Sherwood Homes Ltd had not taken out the section 104 agreement required in the planning permission, and not only was the arrangement dysfunctional, but the connection to the Welsh Water sewerage network was illegal, and neither were the road, lighting and footpath completed to an acceptable standard.

    In October 2019, a creditor of Sherwood Homes Ltd, which appears to have shared some of the same directors, petitioned for it to be wound up and an order for insolvency was made by the court in December 2019. As a result, Shropshire Council could not take planning enforcement action against Sherwood Homes Ltd, and the residents of The Brambles, who are the successors in title to the private company established to manage the development, have been the subject of the enforcement process. They have been required to accept five-figure charges on their properties in order to rectify the issue of connecting the drainage to Welsh Water’s network. Indeed, the saga has also cost the rest of Shropshire’s taxpayers a considerable amount of time, as council officers have expended time and effort to attempt to rectify the situation.

    Shropshire Council believes that the developer’s failure to complete the necessary works before the first house was occupied should have been established by conveyancing solicitors, and the lessons to be learned from this episode are, “buyer beware.” It may be right, but few residents have been able to establish that principle with their solicitors and would not have the resources to begin legal proceedings against them. I believe that some of the home buyers took up the offer of conveyancing services facilitated by the very developer who left them high and dry, raising serious concerns over a potential conflict of interest.

    Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)

    I commend the hon. Lady for securing the debate. Back home in Northern Ireland—I say this to inform the Minister as well—we have a very clear system whereby each developer must put a bond on the property. Therefore, should there be any difficulty in relation to the footpaths and roads not being finished, or if the streetlights are not done and the sewerage fails, that bond can be used for those repairs. Does the hon. Lady feel that the methodology used in Northern Ireland may settle the problems that she refers to, and that the Government and the Minister should look at that option?

    Helen Morgan

    I thank the hon. Gentleman for that sensible intervention; I will make a very similar suggestion in my speech.

    The leader of the council declined my request to undertake a case review of the sequence of events that led to the situation at The Brambles to understand whether the council could have prevented the situation at any point as it evolved. As the law stands, it would appear that she is right. The Building Safety Act 2022 does not cover issues relating beyond the house itself, and the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman declined to consider the case, arguing that:

    “Caselaw has established that where a council issues a completion certificate and the work is later found to be substandard, liability for any defects rests with those who commissioned the work and those who carried it out. We cannot therefore hold the Council responsible for substandard work by the developer and we could not achieve any worthwhile outcome for”—

    my constituent by investigating the complaint.

    This is a very serious case—the most serious case I have seen in North Shropshire—but there are numerous instances in which roads have not been completed to a standard suitable for adoption, streetlights are not installed, shared areas are not landscaped as per planning permission and, in some cases, even the plot sizes vary from the original plan.

    I can provide further examples. A development at Isherwoods Way in Wem has been without streetlights and a surfaced road for 10 years; although the situation is about to be resolved, it is not quite there yet. On the west side of my constituency, a site that I cannot name because legal proceedings are under way features an unadopted sewerage system that has not been completed to the required standard. A development in Ellesmere was left without an adopted road and open space when the developing company collapsed. The situation is only being resolved now that the development has been purchased by a major national house builder. The developer of another site in Wem has applied for insolvency despite the road being unadopted, the open spaces not having been landscaped and concerns having been expressed by residents about the water drainage system.

    The cost to residents of these sites is not only financial. Untold distress and emotional strain have been caused and an enormous amount of precious time has been spent on resolving the situation. At a recent constituency surgery, one resident told me, “I’m a truck driver. I don’t have time to become an expert on planning control.” His neighbour, a construction worker, described the strain of worrying about everything that could go wrong with the drainage system, and about the cost involved in digging up the road to rectify the faults.

    John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)

    I have a similar problem in Cranford Street in Smethwick. I find it utterly deplorable that Severn Trent, which is making hundreds of millions and whose chief executive is paid millions, will not take over any responsibility for the sewage that is backing up into people’s homes. People have bought the home of their dreams and are now finding that it has turned into a nightmare.

    Helen Morgan

    I thank the right hon. Member for his intervention. I have had some productive discussions with Severn Trent on the issue and am about to propose a solution that I hope will help to rectify the situation.

    It has become apparent that residents are tied into an impossible situation. They no longer want to live in their homes, but realistically they cannot sell them until the defects are rectified. There are also wider financial ramifications because if any resident defaults on their mortgage, a bank will not be able to sell the property to recover its investment.

    The other common theme emerging from all these developments is that homebuyers will be expected to contribute to the costs of maintaining shared areas via a management company to which the title for the shared areas has passed. These companies typically pass on the management cost to the residents at zero profit. However, the ones that I have investigated then subcontract the work to a profit-making company. I am sure that the House will not be surprised to learn that in many such arrangements the subcontractor is related in some way to the original developer.

    The companies can charge uncapped amounts indefinitely to the homebuyer, in what is known as a fleecehold—I am aware that several hon. Members have raised the plight of fleeceholders on previous occasions. The management company can be used not only to pass on to the homebuyer the financial responsibility for completing the development, but to extort money for years to come, often for substandard management services. I am aware that the Government have indicated that they will legislate to control such management charges. I urge the Minister not only to commit to a date for such legislation, but to ensure that protections are included to cover previously unfinished developments.

    To tackle the issue up front, however, I propose a different course of action. I believe that it is possible for a water company or a local council to obtain a financial bond when a section 104 or section 106 agreement is put in place, such that when critical infrastructure is not completed, funds are still available to complete the work. In addition, there are mechanisms such as section 38 agreements incorporating financial bonds that can be used to ensure that roads are of an adoptable standard. Having spoken to colleagues, I believe that some councils, such as Oxfordshire County Council, use financial bonds for that purpose and to avoid the distressing situations that I have described. I have not been able to establish why that is not standard practice for all councils.

    I urge the Minister to consider using the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill to require councils to take a step involving a financial bond before planning conditions are discharged, so that unsuspecting homebuyers are not left with unmanageable costs if their developer goes bust before the site is completed. The principle has already been established in the Government: National Highways requires a bond from local authorities if they propose works affecting the strategic road network, so that significant disruption is avoided if the works are not completed. I am concerned to learn that the changes proposed to the Bill would reduce councils’ ability to use section 106 agreements for smaller developments and would remove current powers to protect homeowners.

    The rationale for planning deregulation is that it will enable house building targets to be met by removing barriers to completion, but I would argue that, certainly in the case of North Shropshire, it is not necessary. The evidence does not show that planning regulations are behind slow rates of house building. Shropshire’s local plan contains a target of 30,500 new homes by 2038, but there are already 18,000 planning applications on which consideration has not yet commenced. The current build rate of just under 1,900 houses a year does not suggest that planning permission is the issue holding things up.

    I appreciate that requiring a financial bond from new house builders might deter smaller companies from entering the market, but first I question whether homebuyers and council tax payers should be taking on the risk posed by a financially unviable housebuilder; and secondly, it should be possible to find an alternative, such as an investment bond, to combat that risk.

    I am extremely concerned about the fact that councils lack the tools they need to ensure that the buyers of new-build homes do not fall victim to rogue developers, and the fact that the effectiveness of the tools they do have may be reduced by the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill. I hope that the Minister will agree to consider making the use of financial bonds as part of section 106 or similar agreements a required practice for councils and water companies, to protect both homebuyers and councils’ own taxpayers from high-risk housing developers.

    If the Minister rejects such a solution, however, will he agree to meet me and other stakeholders, such as the Local Government Association, to formulate a practical mechanism to prevent the distress and financial hardship caused by unfinished housing developments? Homebuyers, councils and the wider community need to be confident that they will not be left to the pick up the pieces when a developer fails to deliver. The owners of The Brambles are victims of a rogue developer, and we should act to ensure that their experience is not repeated elsewhere.

  • Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on the Energy Prices Bill

    Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on the Energy Prices Bill

    The speech made by Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat MP for North Shropshire, in the House of Commons on 17 October 2022.

    I am most concerned about what is missing from the Bill, particularly the lack of support for those in rural areas who are off the gas grid and rely on heating oil or liquefied petroleum gas. As an off-grid homeowner, I can verify that the cost of heating oil has almost doubled since this time last year, meaning that the average off-grid household is spending £1,200 more than last year to heat itself. I am afraid that £100 will not go near helping those families who are struggling to make ends meet in rural Britain. Beyond that, the scheme is confusing. It is unclear how consumers will be able to prove that they are eligible and submit a request for the grant to be applied to their electricity bills.

    However, it is not just rural off-grid households that are struggling, as I am sure a number of Members will testify this evening. Many on-grid users are also feeling the squeeze, given that £2,500 for an average household is still almost double what it was paying this time last year. Today Cornwall Energy predicted that next April bills would be more than £4,300, over 70% more than households are paying this year and more than 3.5 times more than they were paying last year. What will the Chancellor be saying to the millions of people who are worried about their energy bills next year, despite the Government’s promising them certainty. How will he help those who, while also dealing with spiralling mortgage costs, will struggle to make ends meet? The Government could have provided much more responsible assistance by extending the windfall tax on the oil and gas giants which continue to rake in extraordinary profits at the expense of British consumers, instead of botching a Budget and leaving taxpayers and mortgage holders to pay for this mess for years to come.

    The Government have also failed to take any steps to encourage reductions in energy use. Last week’s flip-flopping on the most simplest of options, a public information campaign on energy efficiency, highlights just how chaotic the plan for this winter is. The Conservatives have scrapped energy efficiency schemes, despite UK homes being the least efficient in Europe, and have reduced the standards for new homes, which means that 1 million homes have been built since 2015 to lower standards than before. Insulating homes is an important, practical step that would have helped people to help themselves. Also missing is the certainty that is needed for businesses to plan for the future. Six months of assistance is welcome, but, as with the rest of this Bill, it does not go nearly far enough. If the Prime Minister wants to promote economic growth, she must recognise that stability and certainty are vital preconditions for businesses to invest. This assistance is too little, too late: many businesses have already closed, and many more do not see how they can operate beyond the winter.

    The need for large-scale intervention to prevent many households from facing unimaginable difficulty this winter is beyond dispute, but the Government have made the choice—the wrong choice—to allow heating costs to double while refusing to properly tax the eye-watering profits of oil and gas companies.

  • Helen Morgan – 2022 Tribute to HM Queen Elizabeth II

    Helen Morgan – 2022 Tribute to HM Queen Elizabeth II

    The tribute made by Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat MP for North Shropshire, in the House of Commons on 9 September 2022.

    As one of the most recent MPs to swear allegiance to the Queen, I am saddened and humbled to have the honour of paying tribute to her now on behalf of my constituents, and on their behalf I offer my condolences to the King and to the rest of the royal family for their sad loss. Many constituents have been in touch over the last 24 hours to share their feelings of love, their sense of loss, but most of all their gratitude for the Queen’s devotion, her leadership and her warmth during her 70 years of public service.

    While the nation is united in sorrow, the anecdotes shared here today—and by my constituents—have shown me that we can celebrate the Queen’s life with joy as well as sorrow as we remember her on this occasion. I have smiled as some of my more senior neighbours have shared memories of the coronation back in 1953. Those memories are vivid, and are still fondly thought of seven decades on. Every television was wheeled out so that neighbours, friends and family members could huddle together for a glimpse of the gracious young Queen, and there was a whole programme of celebrations in the town of Wem. I was recently shown an original programme, in perfect condition.

    I am thankful that the platinum jubilee provided the chance for those communities to unite once again, and to show the Queen just how much she was still loved after 70 years. She was celebrated across North Shropshire, by the soldiers of the Royal Irish Regiment based at Tern Hill and by the helicopter pilots being trained at RAF Shawbury—who included her grandsons, the new Prince of Wales, and Prince Harry a decade ago. We were very grateful for the opportunity to welcome her to both sites. From Wem to Whitchurch and from Ellesmere to Oswestry and Market Drayton, we lit beacons across the countryside as a symbol of gratitude to our longest-serving monarch—and how appropriate that was, for Queen Elizabeth was a beacon of stability to us all throughout those seven decades. But now a new era begins. Christmas this year will be very different. We will gather round our televisions again, but this time it will be to hear a speech from King Charles III rather than our Queen. In North Shropshire, we will raise a glass to both of them.

    In 1957, the 31-year-old Queen promised to give “these old islands” her heart and devotion. She stayed true to her word for every minute of her 96 years, and for this we are all grateful. We hope that she rests in peace. God Save the King.

  • Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on Ambulance Response Times in Shropshire

    Helen Morgan – 2022 Speech on Ambulance Response Times in Shropshire

    The speech made by Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat MP for North Shropshire, in the House of Commons on 31 March 2022.

    I thank Mr Speaker for granting today’s Adjournment debate on a topic that is so important to my constituents in North Shropshire and to people across Shropshire and across the country. I start by making it clear that I am not here to criticise the hard-working NHS staff in our ambulance services and emergency departments. Indeed, I thank them for their incredibly hard and dedicated work in difficult and demotivating circumstances, but there is clearly a problem with the provision of emergency care in Shropshire, with complex causes, and I bring it before this House to urge the Government to take some action.

    It was clear throughout my election campaign, and has been clear from my inbox since then, that stories of excessive waits for an ambulance are not a rarity. I have since urged my constituents to contact me and share their experiences. Just since Monday, my office has been met with a tidal wave of correspondence, each story as saddening and frightening as the last. A care home reported a wait of 19 hours for an elderly resident with a broken hip. An elderly diabetic man fell and dislocated his shoulder. He was advised not to drink or eat anything in case surgery was required, and then waited 15 hours for an ambulance to arrive. A disabled man fell in his bathroom and waited for 21 hours for an ambulance. He was fortunately lifted from the floor after eight hours by a helpful neighbour. A man waited with a stranger experiencing heart attack symptoms on the side of the road for hours, only to give up and drive the gentleman to A&E himself.

    A man with a suspected stroke waited nine hours for an ambulance and a further five in the ambulance waiting to be transferred into hospital. A 92-year-old lady fell at 8.30 in the morning, suffering bleeding from the head and a broken leg. She was looked after by her 75-year-old neighbour for almost eight hours until the ambulance arrived, and then waited in the ambulance for transfer into the A&E department until 2.30 the next morning. She had not eaten since 6.30 the evening before her fall. An elderly woman fell down the stairs shortly after lunch. Her emergency carers—she has a red button to press for them—made her comfortable and called an ambulance, but they could not carry on waiting forever. After an 11-hour wait, she was alone with her front door open so that the ambulance crew could access her house. That was 3 o’clock in the morning.

    I could easily spend the next half hour relating heartbreaking stories, and I thank all my constituents who contacted me for taking the time to get in touch and explain the scale of the problem. One story in particular brought the issue home, and some Members may have read about it in the newspapers. It was the story of a young footballer who slipped on AstroTurf while playing football at school. He dislocated his knee and waited so long for an ambulance that by the time one finally arrived he had developed hypothermia. I do not know whether Members can imagine the distress of this young man, and the teaching staff who stayed on in the dark, long after the school day had ended, as his condition deteriorated out in the cold.

    What all these stories have in common is that they could have been much worse. I am sure everyone in the House would agree that nobody should have to suffer waiting an excessive amount of time for an ambulance, yet tragically in North Shropshire it is pretty common. I know this problem is not unique to Shropshire. I am sure that many colleagues have received similar emails describing similar events. In parts of Britain, an excessive wait for an ambulance has become normal.

    The problems surrounding this crisis are complex, and I am not here to propose a simple quick fix. However, there are consistent themes at the core of the issue. It is vital that we recognise them if we are to work out how to move on from here. The first is the problem of handing over patients at the emergency departments in Shrewsbury and Telford. West Midlands Ambulance Service has told me that, on the day the young footballer dislocated his knee, 868 hours were lost waiting to hand over patients, and that nearly 2,600 hours were lost in the month up to 29 March. Handover times in Shropshire are significantly worse than in the rest of the country, and there have been times when every ambulance based in Shropshire is waiting outside a hospital to discharge a patient.

    The hospital trust has declared a critical incident on no less than four separate occasions so far this year, and each of those incidents coincided with an increase in the number of heartbreaking stories coming into my inbox.

    Lucy Allan (Telford) (Con)

    I congratulate the hon. Lady on bringing this incredibly important issue to the House. Such heartbreaking stories are common to all Shropshire MPs. Does she agree that a combination of factors—I am sure she will go on to discuss some of them—including the transfer of patients on to wards, as well as the inaccessibility of general practitioners, is putting additional pressure on A&E?

    Helen Morgan

    I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention, and I entirely agree with her. I will stress some of those points later in my speech.

    The emergency departments of the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust report that they suffer from a shortage of space and staff, along with the additional challenges of separating covid patients—on Tuesday this week, the trust had more covid patients than at any previous point in the pandemic. The trust also reports delays in discharging patients who are well enough to leave hospital because it is struggling to find care packages or care home spaces.

    A number of care homes in Shropshire are currently closed because of the pandemic. Shropshire shares the national problem of a shortage of care workers and care homes, which is probably exacerbated by our high proportion of elderly patients. The inability to discharge patients who would doubtless be better off at home or in a care home setting reduces the flow of patients through the hospital.

    The impact of all this is that, because ambulances wait so long at hospitals, the vast majority of ambulance journeys across Shropshire begin in Shrewsbury or Telford. It is not possible to reach the most seriously ill patients towards the edge of the county within the target time if the ambulance sets out from one of those two towns. This, combined with the closure of community ambulance stations, means that very few ambulances are free in places such as Oswestry and Market Drayton when people become ill and require one.

    Another factor, as the hon. Member for Telford (Lucy Allan) alluded to, is the volume of patients accessing emergency departments, or being taken to one in an ambulance, because there is no other option locally, particularly in the evening or at the weekend. Shropshire has a worsening shortage of GPs, which is leading to patients attending emergency departments for relatively minor issues because they simply have no alternative. A key reason behind the problem of staff recruitment is the chronic lack of other services in Shropshire, but that is a debate for another day.

    The Government must deliver on their promise to recruit more GPs, and they must ensure that people with non-urgent healthcare needs are provided with adequate resources in the community. I am incredibly proud that my constituents Sian Tasker and Lawrence Chappel in Oswestry and, beyond my constituency, Darren Childs in Ludlow, and other campaigners, are working tirelessly to keep this issue in the public light and are campaigning to keep their community ambulance stations open. It is partly because of their hard work that we are finally discussing this issue in Parliament.

    I am afraid to say that, so far, the Government have refused to listen to the countless warnings by campaigners and those working on the frontline. The Care Quality Commission’s “State of health care and adult social care in England” report last year, gave a stark warning that overstretched ambulance services and emergency departments are putting patients at risk. The numbers speak for themselves. The Association of Ambulance Chief Executives has found that, nationally, 160,000 people a year are coming to harm because of delayed handovers to A&E. Of those, a shocking 12,000 experience severe harm.

    I have repeatedly asked the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care to meet me and the West Midlands Ambulance Service to discuss how we can tackle local issues together. I am deeply disappointed that, so far, he has refused my request. It seems to many people in Shropshire that the Department of Health and Social Care is burying its head in the sand and refusing to acknowledge the seriousness of the issue we face. I take this opportunity to urge the Minister to meet me and my colleagues across the county to discuss the crisis and to hear some first-hand accounts of those left waiting in distress so that we can come to some sort of solution together.

    I have no doubt that all hon. Members present, including those on the Government Benches, want to ensure that people at their most vulnerable are kept safe. I welcome the recently announced additional £55 million of support for ambulance services. I fear, however, that that money may not go far enough or may not be targeted in the areas of greatest need. The hopes of the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust are pinned on the Future Fit hospital transformation programme, which kicked off in 2013. It is reliant on £312 million of funding, the source of which may be an interest-bearing loan—I will happily correct the record if I am incorrect, but that is my understanding. Unfortunately, more than eight years later, a strategic outline case has still not been signed off. The estimated costs have spiralled by almost 70% and it is likely that they will not be covered by the Government.

    The initial promises of urgent care centres in more rural areas—for example, one was guaranteed for Oswestry—investment in community hospitals and local planned care centres were all quietly dropped in the summer of 2015. Promises of investment in public health and prevention, which is a good idea and would have been welcome in Shropshire, are also apparently no further forward. We are consistently told that there is no more money in the pot for faster, better-resourced ambulance services or urgent care staff, yet the Government wasted more than £10 billion on personal protective equipment that is not up to scratch. It is time that they listened to the warning signs that they have been ignoring and finally step up to provide proper support for ambulance services and accident and emergency departments.

    There are several steps that the Government could take right away to get to the bottom of the causes of the issue. The Secretary of State could commission the Care Quality Commission under powers laid out in section 48 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 to conduct an investigation into the causes and impacts of ambulance service delays. That is a fairly simple step and the law already allows for him to commission the CQC. Once the Government have a professional assessment of the complexity of the causes of the delays to ambulance service response, they can take the correct steps, targeted at the correct causes of the problems, to make some rapid improvements to the service. As I have outlined, the causes will most likely lie in a number of areas across emergency and social care, but until they are fully understood by the right people, they cannot be resolved.

    The Government could also pass the Ambulance Waiting Times (Local Reporting) Bill of my hon. Friend the Member for St Albans (Daisy Cooper), which would require accessible, localised reports of ambulance response times to be published. Once the data was available, it would enable central and devolved Governments to accurately understand where the delays are and how best to tackle them, because we should be following the data and the facts to provide the right solutions and the right resourcing in the areas that need them most. That Bill is already written, it has had its First Reading and it is ready to go.

    I brought this debate to Parliament to ensure that the Minister and the Secretary of State understand the scale of the problem in Shropshire and, crucially, the urgency in resolving it. How many more elderly citizens will have to wait for 10 hours, with their front door open, for an ambulance? How many more people will have to wait at the roadside with a stranger who they believe might be close to death? How many more young adults will develop hypothermia when they initially have a trivial injury, such as a dislocated knee? How many more cases of serious harm, or even avoidable death, will it take?

    I thank the Minister for being here this evening and responding to my speech. I also thank Mr Speaker for granting this Adjournment debate. I take the opportunity to thank everybody in the Chamber for coming along and to wish them a happy Easter and a restful break.