UKPOL.CO.UK

Tag: Speeches

  • Chris Loder – 2022 Speech on Levelling Up Rural Britain

    Chris Loder – 2022 Speech on Levelling Up Rural Britain

    The speech made by Chris Loder, the Conservative MP for West Dorset, in the House of Commons on 9 November 2022.

    It is a pleasure to follow my constituency neighbours, my hon. Friends the Members for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) and for South Dorset (Richard Drax). I hope that the House will allow me to make some comments, although I am at risk of repeating what they said. I congratulate and thank my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Selaine Saxby), whose quest to hold this important debate we all thoroughly backed.

    It is clear to me that this House does not give enough time to debate and discuss the rural issues of the day. We have some important questions to ask ourselves. Why is levelling up not focused on rural areas in the same way it is on urban areas? Why does rural hardship not seem to matter in the same way as urban poverty? Why do rural jobs attract less pay than those in urban areas? Why does Transport for London get £1.7 billion of Government money to bail it out yet Dorset Council gets hardly anything—especially when we have the worst frequency rail line in the country? I just wanted to let the Minister know that.

    I do not want the Treasury Green Book to prioritise rural areas; I want it to be fair to all parts of the United Kingdom, including rural Dorset. Why do sixth-formers— 16 and 17-year-olds—in rural Dorset have to pay to get on the school bus, when those youngsters do not have to do so in urban areas? In certain pockets of West Dorset and, indeed, the wider Dorset area, social mobility is among the worst in the country. The real levelling up required in this country is in rural Britain, which is why I am so delighted to contribute to the debate.

    My hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset clearly articulated some good statistics. I also have them in my speech—he has pinched them—but let me focus on a couple. It is totally unacceptable to me and my constituents —and, I think, to my constituency neighbours—that we have one of the highest council taxes in the country but zero revenue support grant, yet in places such as inner London there are boroughs with the lowest council tax in the country that receive some £24 million in revenue support grant.

    Simon Hoare

    Does my hon. Friend agree that we also have hanging over us the spectre of negative revenue support grant, whereby the Government might actually tell Dorset Council that it needs to pay some money back? Where that money would come from I have no idea. Does he agree that that would just add, for want of a better phrase, insult to injury?

    Chris Loder

    I wholly agree with my hon. Friend and want to relay that message to the Minister as well: I hope we do not get into the territory of negative RSG as there would be mass rebellions from the Dorset MPs if that were the case.

    Covid was hugely damaging to the economy of West Dorset; we are not starting from a level playing field. I lost 18% of my businesses in West Dorset during the covid period: some 1,200 businesses shut. So we are already starting from a lower place, but it is very difficult to make the case on this because it feels as though we are always starting from behind the line.

    My hon. Friends and constituency neighbours have talked about adult social care and I want to reiterate the point. Dorset County Hospital, in Dorchester in my constituency, is very challenged: to put the problem into perspective, the number of patients discharged into social care, at the expense of the council, has risen threefold over the last three years. The situation with police funding, fire funding and other areas is equally difficult, yet it is still hard to get any real understanding of that from the Government.

    Huge reform is required in housing in rural areas. My hon. Friend the Member for North Devon articulated very well in her speech some of the difficulties she faces with second homes and properties set aside often for full-time Airbnb lettings, and that has caused enormous difficulty in parts of West Dorset, too. Visitors could walk through some villages on a winter evening and almost think they are in a ghost town because so few properties are occupied. We cannot go on in that way and expect doctors, nurses, teachers and police officers to be able to live and work in the community.

    We have gone on for too long without real action and progress in this area. Parts of rural Britain are being held economically hostage by unfair bureaucracies, and not just Government Departments. I have mentioned the Treasury Green Book and fairness between rural Britain and urban areas in the assessment of infrastructure investment, but I could also mention the Environment Agency, the Rural Payments Agency—I could keep going. Rural Britain finds the level of bureaucracy very difficult. That constrains our ability to make real economic progress and contribute to the wider economic growth of the country. I ask the Minister to take due note of that.

    I understand that at next week’s Prime Minister’s questions I will have the opportunity to speak to the Prime Minister, and I tell the Minister in advance that I will ask the Prime Minister to set up a rural taskforce so that we do not need to continually share, in debates of this nature, the difficulties that we face. I want rural Britain to get turbocharged and to lead the way. We are very fortunate in rural Britain today: some of the most entrepreneurial, creative, innovative solutions are found in this country’s rural areas. We need those solutions to help the wider country—indeed, some urban areas would do well to take them.

    In addition to the rural taskforce that I will ask the Prime Minister to set up, the suggestion from my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset that there should be a rural tsar is well made. I hope the Minister will consider those points in winding up the debate.

  • Simon Hoare – 2022 Speech on Levelling Up Rural Britain

    Simon Hoare – 2022 Speech on Levelling Up Rural Britain

    The speech made by Simon Hoare, the Conservative MP for North Dorset, in the House of Commons on 9 November 2022.

    It is a pleasure to follow my friend and neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax), and I congratulate and thank my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Selaine Saxby) on instigating this welcome debate. As several hon. Members have noted—I do not mean this as knocking copy—the only Labour voice that we will hear is from the Front Bench, although I have no doubt it will be able and articulate. I gently make the point to the Minister—hon. Members will recognise this—that Conservative Members and our party cannot forever take for granted the support of our rural communities. We need to pay back their support.

    Levelling up is of course welcome, but it needs to be broken into digestible chunks. We need a set of levelling-up initiatives for post-industrial urban areas and a set that features the coastal areas that my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset mentioned and the rural areas that are clearly the kernel of the debate. I also strongly echo the cri de coeur of my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon that it is time the Minister’s Department put in place regulations whereby town and parish councillors can be removed from office if they are not doing their job. I have a case in my constituency that is a perpetual headache and the council can do nothing about it.

    As hon. Members have said, many people visiting rural areas across our country would be forgiven for thinking that all is well. We do have deprivation and need but it is not located in one area or ward, and because we cannot do that—we cannot take people to one place—it makes the delivery of improvements harder. We need some sort of rural tsar, or perhaps a rural squire might be better, to co-ordinate cross-Government rural proofing.

    On the funding formula, this is not a rob-Peter-to-pay-Paul debate. It was Mr Blair’s Government who took money away from the county shires and gave it to the urban areas. We need additional funds, a fairer formula or a rural proof formula to ensure that my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset gets the slice of chocolate cake that he desires; I must say that seed cake is my favourite and I would like a large slice. We need a review of the funding rubric and of the assessment of rural deprivation. We must strive for parity or equality—who could be against that? A child educated in my constituency requires as much money to be spent on their primary or secondary education as one in central Manchester, Bristol, Birmingham or Southampton, because education is a UK plc initiative.

    I turn briefly to the Dorset Council area. Some 29.4% of its population is over 65, compared with 18.5% across England. One in 12 of the population are over 80 and that is due to increase by 10% by 2032. Being rural, as many hon. Members have mentioned, the cost of delivering services, such as school and care travel, is higher than in urban areas. Some 46% of its residents live in the most-deprived areas for access to services in England.

    Despite all that, Dorset Council receives only £2.5 million a year in the rural services delivery grant. Some 85% of the council’s expenditure is generated directly by council tax, compared with the average unitary authority, which has to find only 65%. It receives no revenue support grant where others get 4%. In 2019, the adult social care costs of hospital discharges were £4.1 million; this year, they are £15 million with no concomitant increase.

    It is not just in local government that we need to take rurality more into account; the rubrics for the Environment Agency, road funding, the police and, as I have mentioned, schools also need to be refreshed. To take the Environment Agency, it is easy to make the business case stand up for spending £200,000 on a flood relief project that will benefit 10,000 people in the community. A scheme that has the same costs and delivers the same qualitative benefits for a community, albeit a much smaller or more sparsely populated and further flung one, however, will never pass the rubric assessment because it has been written in Whitehall by people who—dare I say?—have experience of living only in and around central London.

    Many have mentioned that rural plc needs broadband and phone signal. We also need grid capacity. If anything is holding up development, it is the grid. It is a sad indictment that there is not a single consented business park in the Dorset Council area that could be fully developed out today, only because there is not capacity in the grid to provide electricity. Sturminster Newton in my constituency would like some sustainable new housing, but it cannot be delivered because of an absence of electricity.

    Finally, probably the thorniest issue—I do not touch on it now because I am in my last few seconds and no one can intervene—is access to workforce. I have already said that we have an older workforce. We have virtually zero unemployment in North Dorset; fortunately, that has been the case for many years. Will the Minister make sure that, when the Home Office is sculpting immigration policy, over which we perfectly properly have control in this place, it has a focus on the needs of the rural economy, to ensure that farming, innovation and the entrepreneurs of our rural areas can create investment, make jobs, pay into the Exchequer, create the opportunity of aspiration, and therefore level up rural Britain?

  • Rishi Sunak – 2022 Speech on the Government’s Economic Action Plan for the G20

    Rishi Sunak – 2022 Speech on the Government’s Economic Action Plan for the G20

    The speech made by Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister, on 14 November 2022.

    Leaders take responsibility. They show up. Yet, at the G20 summit in Indonesia this week, one seat will remain vacant.

    The man who is responsible for so much bloodshed in Ukraine and economic strife around the world will not be there to face his peers. He won’t even attempt to explain his actions. Instead, he will stay at home and the rest of us will get on with the task at hand.

    Last week, we saw the Ukrainian flag raised once again over Kherson only weeks after Putin declared that the city would be part of Russia forever. It is an historic milestone in Ukraine’s fight to take back what’s theirs. They are standing up for fundamental principles that matter to us all – the principles of sovereignty and self-determination, which are the very foundations of a stable international order.

    But we know the Ukrainian people are still suffering terribly under the continued Russian bombardment and prolonged power blackouts in near-freezing temperatures.

    That’s why when I spoke to Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, last Thursday, I made clear that Britain will never back down when it comes to supporting the Ukrainian people in the face of this brutality.

    We will continue training Ukrainian troops and providing vital defensive military equipment, like the additional 1,000 air defence missiles and more than 25,000 extreme cold winter kits that I pledged last week. We remain the largest European military donor to Ukraine, delivering £2.3 billion of support this year.

    There is no doubt that the war in Ukraine is fuelling the challenges facing countries across the world. That’s why as I hold my first meetings with Joe Biden, the US president, and other leaders during the summit, we will be clear that discussions about how we can continue to back Ukraine are inseparable from those on how we can strengthen our collective economic security.

    As we recover from a pandemic that almost broke the world economy, every household on the planet is feeling the fallout from the war in Ukraine. Global food prices have been hit by Vladimir Putin’s attempts to choke off Ukrainian grain exports – two-thirds of which go to developing countries. Energy bills have skyrocketed thanks to Russia turning off the gas taps.

    The result is that two-thirds of G20 members are now experiencing inflation rates above seven per cent and the IMF predicts that a third of the world’s economy will be in recession next year.

    I know that people are struggling. Across the UK, families are feeling the squeeze. The weekly shop costs more than ever, and people are anxious about the next bill to land on their doormat.

    So we will continue to deliver help at home, but we also need to see coordinated global action like we saw in response to the financial crisis in 2008.

    Russia is trying to asphyxiate the global economy. We must join together to stop them in their tracks and restore economic stability. There are five points where we need to see action.

    First and foremost, we must keep delivering urgent support where it’s needed most in the winter ahead. We are helping the people of Ukraine as their national infrastructure is attacked by drones and missiles – just as we are supporting people with their rising energy bills back in Britain and taking action to prevent famine in the most vulnerable parts of the world.

    Second, we must put an end to Russia’s appalling weaponisation of food. I am supporting the UN secretary-general to keep grain shipments moving in the Black Sea and urging all those countries who can produce more food or release stockpiles to do so, in order to help increase supply.

    Third, we must take urgent action to protect our economic security and bolster our resilience against malign actors. This means securing our supply chains and rapidly transitioning from dependence on energy from countries like Russia, who seek to use it against us. We must show authoritarian aggressors that we are in it for the long haul.

    Fourth, we must remain utterly committed to the promotion of free markets and an open global economy in which enterprise drives growth – and the UK will continue leading the way, utilising our Brexit freedoms to pursue free trade agreements around the world. Our prosperity and our security go hand in hand.

    Finally, we must work together with our partners – governments, the private sector and intentional financial institutions – to provide the financial stability and probity that the international economic situation demands. That means calling out those who exploit their lending power to create debt traps in emerging economies and also tackling the causes of rising inflation head on.

    We will not let our economic future be held hostage by the actions of a rogue state – and nor will our allies. Instead, we will stand with Ukraine and we will work to deliver on each element of this five-point plan, promoting free markets and a global economy that is stronger, more stable and more resilient, and that delivers a faster return to growth.

    This is what the world expects from the responsible members of the G20 – and I know that the UK will emerge the other side of this crisis stronger than before.

  • Colm Gildernew – 2022 Comments on Decision of Nurses to Strike

    Colm Gildernew – 2022 Comments on Decision of Nurses to Strike

    The comments made by Colm Gildernew, the MLA for Fermanagh and South Tyrone, on 9 November 2022.

    Nurses shouldn’t have been forced onto the streets to take strike action.

    They should have fair pay and conditions for the amazing work that they do, particularly as the cost of living continues to rise.

    Without fair pay and safe working conditions, it becomes much tougher to retain skilled health and social workers. That needs to be addressed.

    I am writing to the British Chancellor telling him to get on with delivering a fair pay award for our nurses now. They shouldn’t have to wait.

  • James Cleverly – 2022 Comments on Continued Support for Ukraine

    James Cleverly – 2022 Comments on Continued Support for Ukraine

    The comments made by James Cleverly, the Foreign Secretary, on 14 November 2022.

    Russia’s attacks on vital infrastructure show that Putin is resorting to desperate measures. But even in the face of missile attacks and blackouts, the resolve of the Ukrainian people remains unbroken.

    The Government of Ukraine said it needed specialised energy equipment to repair critical national infrastructure, and the UK is delivering on their request.

    The UK has made the largest donation to date to this Fund. We need all partners to step up their support and show Putin that his attempts to destroy Ukraine will be met with fierce resistance.

  • Rishi Sunak – 2017 Speech on the Armed Forces Covenant

    Rishi Sunak – 2017 Speech on the Armed Forces Covenant

    The speech made by Rishi Sunak, the Conservative MP for Richmond, in the House of Commons on 2 February 2017.

    It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Blackpool South (Gordon Marsden). I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mrs Trevelyan) not just for securing the debate but for the tireless work that she does for the armed forces in this House and beyond.

    From the long winter of the Crimean war to the bloody waters of Gallipoli, the history of my constituency’s Green Howards Regiment is a shining reminder that the story of British liberty is inseparable from that of our military. It is an enormous privilege to represent the almost 1,500 veterans, service personnel and their families based around Catterick Garrison and RAF Leeming, yet for many years, despite their heroism, my constituents have too often found themselves at the back of the queue for public services. There will always be more that we can do, but in housing, education and employment, I am proud to say that the armed forces covenant and the work of this Government have moved us closer than ever to ensuring that the world’s finest armed forces are never penalised for their service.

    Let me begin briefly with housing. Before the covenant’s introduction, retiring service personnel in my constituency often found that they did not meet the residency requirement to be considered for council housing. As a direct consequence of this Government’s action, I am pleased to report that that is now largely a thing of the past. I pay enormous tribute to Richmondshire District Council for its tireless work in this regard. However, although military families are used to having their lives uprooted when orders of a new posting come in, they are too often also used to finding inadequate housing when they get there.

    In the most recent armed forces attitude survey, only 29% of military families said that they were satisfied with the quality of maintenance in service family accommodation. CarillionAmey’s failures to live up to the standards set out by the MOD have been mentioned before, and they are a betrayal of both the taxpayer and our armed forces. I very much welcome the action that the Government have already taken in condemning that failure. With the future accommodation model on the horizon, I am mindful that it will be a great comfort for my military constituents to know that the lessons of CarillionAmey’s shortcomings have been learned so that they will not be repeated. I also echo the concerns raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Sir Julian Brazier) about the FAM.

    Let me turn next to education, a crucial area. With frequent school changes and parents left to manage alone during tours of duty, the sacrifices made by members of our armed forces are often felt hardest by their children. The Government have taken real action by introducing the service pupil premium—as we speak, that funding is helping schools across my constituency to meet the unique needs of military children. I also commend the Government for creating the education support trust, which funds North Yorkshire County Council’s excellent service pupils champions scheme. Thanks to the hard work of council leader Carl Les and Neil Irving, that has been an enormous success. I urge the Government to maintain the funding for that programme. My constituents welcome plans to expand Catterick to a super-garrison, but I urge the Minister to ensure that discussions with the local council begin as soon as possible so that we can ensure that adequate school places are made available when the additional soldiers and their families arrive.

    My final point is about spousal employment. Fifty per cent of military personnel already cite the impact on their partner’s career as making them more likely to leave the services. The reason is that the husbands and wives of Britain’s servicemen and women represent a deep reservoir of talent that all too often goes untapped. That is a problem not only for families but for our economy, which is missing out on some of our nation’s most able and resourceful citizens. The work done by charities such as Recruit for Spouses, and the Government’s ongoing spouse employment support trial, is crucial to rectifying the situation. I hope very much that such work continues, and that it will remain at the heart of our thinking about the armed forces covenant.

    The soldiers, sailors and airmen of north Yorkshire do not expect the path that they have chosen to be an easy one. All they want to know is that when they take on that burden, their Government will do what they can to make it just a little lighter. The annual covenant report makes it clear that we still have work to do, but with six years of success behind us, it is equally clear to me that it is this Government who can make that a reality.

  • Rishi Sunak – 2017 Speech on a Coast to Coast National Trail Walk

    Rishi Sunak – 2017 Speech on a Coast to Coast National Trail Walk

    The speech made by Rishi Sunak, the Conservative MP for Richmond, in the House of Commons on 7 March 2017.

    I thank the hon. Gentleman for informing us of that wonderful link between the ironstone mines in his constituency and Big Ben. I did not know about that museum, and I would be delighted to visit it with him. I agree wholeheartedly that promoting the walk would have many knock-on benefits and bring people to our areas to enjoy all the things that we know about and take for granted, and which we would like to open up to the rest of the country and the world. I hope that will be the case.

    VisitEngland estimates that those who go on walking holidays spend about £2 billion annually. For businesses in our constituencies, that makes the iconic status of the Coast to Coast a vital source of custom. During the election campaign I called into one such business—a local pub like only Yorkshire makes—in the village of Danby Wiske near Northallerton. The landlord told me just how important the walk is to the prosperity of his business. The hundreds of walkers who stop by for a well earned pork pie and a cold pint of Yorkshire bitter in the summer months are the difference between a loss and a profit for his business. He is not alone. Coast to Coast Packhorse in Kirkby Stephen is a successful local start-up that transports walkers’ luggage to their next stop. Businesses along the Coast to Coast, perhaps including the museum that the hon. Gentleman mentioned, tell the same story.

    When we talk about infrastructure investment in this House, as the Government rightly do, we all have a similar image in our minds—gigantic bridges, high-speed railway and motorways—but for rural areas, infrastructure such as the Coast to Coast can be just as vital because it allows communities to capitalise effectively on their national assets. I know public money is tight, but national trail funding is an investment that would be repaid many times over, both in the long-term economic benefits it would generate and in the communities it would help to sustain—communities whose hands repair our dry stone walls, tend our forests and keep our fields green and lush. If they were to disappear because of a lack of jobs of investment, every one of us would be poorer.

    Natural England is currently focused on its coastal path project, due to open in 2020—an ambitious national trail that showcases the best of our coastal areas. As that programme moves towards completion over the coming years, I urge Natural England to look closely at finally giving the Coast to Coast the recognition it deserves. For now, a feasibility study would reflect the widespread support that the campaign has received and support the message of so many businesses from St Bees to Robin Hood’s Bay. Officially promoting and protecting the route would do so much for their prosperity.

    The Coast to Coast route is part of the legacy of a unique man whose contribution to the natural world is unparalleled. Across mountains and fells, wandering through valleys and villages, it is an inspirational crossing of the north of England. In the words of Alf Wainwright himself:

    “Surely there cannot be a finer itinerary for a long-distance walk!”

    I hope the Minister will consider the case that the “Make it National” campaign has put forward and do all he can to encourage Natural England to launch a feasibility study as soon as possible. The Coast to Coast is already a national treasure. It is time to recognise it as a national trail.

  • Rishi Sunak – 2017 Speech on the Budget

    Rishi Sunak – 2017 Speech on the Budget

    The speech made by Rishi Sunak, the Conservative MP for Richmond, in the House of Commons on 9 March 2017.

    It is a privilege to speak in this debate. In all the excitement from Fleet Street, it would be easy to forget who yesterday’s Budget is really about, so I will share with the House how many of my constituents will feel about it. Whether it is the schoolboy with a first-rate technical education who will now have the chance of a better job and a solid wage, the small business owner who knows that when she speaks up her Government listen, or the mother who knows there is a Conservative Chancellor at the helm making the difficult decisions so that her children have well-funded public services and a country that lives within its means, for the hard-working people of North Yorkshire this is a Budget that delivers where they need it most.

    Norman Lamb

    How does that schoolboy or schoolgirl feel about an 8% cut in funding per student by 2020 under this Government?

    Rishi Sunak

    I am not sure that I recognise the right hon. Gentleman’s figure. The schools budget has been protected, and the Government are rightly consulting on the iniquity in the current funding system which means that constituents in my rural area are worse off to the tune of hundreds of pounds per pupil compared with very similar pupils in other parts of the country. I am delighted that the Government are addressing those iniquities in their consultation.

    Seema Malhotra

    Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

    Rishi Sunak

    If the hon. Lady does not mind, I will make some progress and come back to her.

    I begin with small businesses. My predecessor, Lord Hague, has a well-documented enthusiasm for beer, so it will come as no surprise to Members that pubs are a cornerstone of my rural constituency’s economy. Following in his footsteps is difficult enough, but it is impossible for me to visit a pub in my constituency without seeing a picture on the wall of William pulling a pint with the landlord. Not only is my constituency home to more than 200 pubs, but I am proud to say that it hosts the Campaign for Real Ale’s 2017 pub of the year: the community-owned George & Dragon in Hudswell. I was delighted to be in Hudswell just last Friday when the landlord Stu Miller, his family and team received their award in the loud company of everybody from the village.

    In recent months I, like many other hon. Members, raised concerns that the revaluation of business rates risks penalising such small, enterprising businesses. I am delighted to say that this was the Budget of a Chancellor who, like any good barman, listens to our concerns. For the landlords who run them, the jobs that depend on them and the communities that enjoy them, this Budget’s £1,000 business rate discount will make a real difference to many pubs at a time when money is still tight.

    But pubs are not the only rural businesses that the Budget will help. Auction marts and livery yards across North Yorkshire have seen particularly steep rises in their business rates because the idiosyncrasies of such companies are not well understood by officials and because the last revaluation coincided with the disastrous foot and mouth epidemic. Such idiosyncrasies are more than even the most ingenious civil servant could be expected to foresee. Auction marts, livery yards and riding schools are particularly important to the fabric of our rural community, so I thank the Chancellor for the extremely welcome creation of the new £300 million discretionary business rates fund, which will put decision making back in the hands of communities and allow businesses in constituencies such as mine to benefit from the local knowledge of councils in ensuring a smooth transition to the new schedule.

    Stephen Doughty

    The hon. Gentleman was talking about pubs, and he will know that I am a keen pub goer. Indeed, I was in a pub in his constituency the other day, enjoying a pint with my cousins. What does he have to say to customers in pubs, who are going to face a 3% increase in the price of a pint?

    Rishi Sunak

    What I say to customers and to the hon. Gentleman is that I am sure that the Minister doing the wind-up will be able to say how much better off customers are from having benefited from several years of freezes in beer duty that would otherwise have been put in place. I am sure they would also like to hear that this Government will be consulting on new duty rates for white cider and still wine to see what more could be done to help customers who drink those alcoholic beverages. Lastly, let me say that I would welcome him back to my constituency any time and will be happy to share a pint with him next time he is there.

    Seema Malhotra

    I have not yet been to a pub in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, but I recognise the benefits for pubs in my constituency. May I extend the question about customers in pubs, many of whom may be self-employed? Have they reflected with him on their concerns about the proposed rise in national insurance?

    Rishi Sunak

    I thank the hon. Lady for raising that issue. If she will allow me, I will deal with that exact point later in my speech.

    The last measure in support of local businesses that I wish to highlight is the £690 million fund available for local authorities to address urban congestion. Congestion is not something one would ordinarily associate with the rural idyll of North Yorkshire’s villages and market towns, but the residents and community of Northallerton are relentlessly frustrated by the level crossing near our vibrant and diverse high street, as its impact on local business is substantial. I have convened meetings of local authorities and Network Rail to discuss plans to alleviate the congestion, and I very much hope the Chancellor’s new fund can help us.

    As the Chancellor so rightly pointed out in his Budget speech, supporting our businesses is a means to an end, not an end in itself. If our children are to benefit from the more than 2 million new jobs created since 2010, they will need the right skills. The 2.4 million apprenticeships created in the last Parliament are a momentous achievement, but we must also recognise that although most of us think of apprentices as young people, 16 to 19-year-olds—school leavers—account for less than 10% of the increase in new apprentices. That means that too many school leavers are still sticking with an inappropriate classroom education rather than a first-class technical one. The Chancellor’s announcement of new T-levels is a crucial step in redressing the balance and closing for good the gap between the classroom and the factory floor, for which our economy has paid a high price for too long. I therefore welcome the new half a billion pound investment in increasing training hours, the streamlining of technical qualifications, the provision of high-quality work placements and the introduction of maintenance loans. Taken together, that is a powerful package to help to ensure parity of esteem between technical and academic education.

    Yet I also urge Ministers to continue to look carefully at my campaign, supported in the recent industrial strategy, to create a UCAS-style system for apprenticeships. This branded, one-stop-shop portal would not only end the classroom divide between those applying to university and those applying for apprenticeships, but, by bringing everything together in one place, help businesses to connect more easily with young apprentices in schools.

    Turning to national insurance, I, like many Conservative Members, have always believed in low taxes as a spur to economic growth, but when a Government inherit a deficit of £100 billion the greatest priority must be returning to sound finances and doing so in a way that is fair. I believe it is right that those who benefit from public services make an appropriate contribution to paying for them, and that is what this Budget’s changes to national insurance will ensure. Sixty per cent. of self-employed workers—those earning less than £16,000—will see a decrease in their national insurance contributions as a result of the removal of the regressive class 2 band. Workers earning up to almost £33,000 will be no worse off when these changes are taken together with the increases to the personal allowance, and for those earning more the average increase in contributions will be a few hundred pounds. It is right to ask: is this fair? I believe that it is.

    Historically, different rates of national insurance for the self-employed and the employed reflected significantly different benefits and access to public benefits, but that difference is no longer there. Indeed, changes to the state pension, which is partly funded by national insurance, mean that self-employed workers now benefit from an extra £1,800 annually in pension—this is something they would need to save up to £50,000 for to receive in the private sector. Similarly, self-employed couples starting a family can now benefit from almost £5,000 in tax-free childcare support.

    In this House, I always hear calls for investment in public services, such as this Budget has provided for in social care, but those investments need to be paid for. Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs has estimated that it is losing about £5 billion a year from the increasing trend of self-employment, so it is right that we make small changes to ensure that everybody contributes to the public services and benefits we value. It is important to recognise that even after these changes the tax system will still recognise the particular issues faced by self-employed workers and will favour them in its tax rates and treatment. They will benefit from a lower rate of national insurance than employees; they will still not bear the cost of employers’ national insurance, which is levied at a substantial 13.8%; they will still have the ability to offset losses and gains over years; and they will still benefit from a more generous treatment of tax-deductable expenses. I am also encouraged that in the longer term the Government are committed to looking at the whole issue of the increasing trend towards self-employment, and to ensuring that we reflect those changes in the economy in our tax system and ensure that everybody is treated fairly. This small change is thus necessary to protect the things we value, and it is fair and proportionate.

    In conclusion, we have all learned to be a little cautious of economic forecasts, but if the Office for Budget Responsibility is right, the first students to sit their T-levels will do so in a country with 1 million new jobs, double today’s productivity growth and, for the first time in two decades, national debt falling as a percentage of GDP. This Budget, like the ones that came before it, is building a country where our businesses will not have to pay for the profligacy of the past and our children can look forward to a bright future. Nothing could be more important than that, so I commend this Budget to the House.

  • Rishi Sunak – 2017 Speech on the Finance Bill

    Rishi Sunak – 2017 Speech on the Finance Bill

    The speech made by Rishi Sunak, the Conservative MP for Richmond, in the House of Commons on 18 April 2017.

    From the discovery of Australia to the invention of the cat’s eye, the history of Yorkshire’s people is nothing if not entrepreneurial. That spirit is alive and well in my constituency in particular. From Heck sausages to Tennants auction house and the Wensleydale Creamery, ambitious SMEs are at the heart of our community and economy. Before I arrived in this place, I spent my career investing, backing businesses like those with the capital they needed to grow. I am delighted that this Finance Bill recognises what my years in the investment industry taught me—that ready access to finance is the fuel of success for ambitious SMEs, just as successful SMEs are the fuel of a prosperous economy. Yet, as I have said in the House before, the UK funding landscape for growth businesses presents challenges.

    Just 3% of British companies manage to expand beyond 10 employees—half the success rate of businesses in America. The UK has a relatively shallow bond market for early stage businesses, and a venture capital sector that is just a seventh the size of America’s. British entrepreneurs often face an uphill struggle to attract equity risk capital. That is why the Government have enhanced the enterprise investment scheme and created the seed enterprise investment scheme. Since their inception, these programmes have together helped more than 3,000 companies to raise more than £15 billion in early stage finance. The Finance Bill builds on that success to ensure that these schemes help even more small businesses to access investment, grow and create jobs.

    Under the current regulations, shares with a right to future conversion are unfortunately regarded as a pre-arranged exit, making them ineligible for EIS and SEIS. But that goes against the reality of conversion arrangements. Far from opening the door to tax avoiders, conversions are often a crucial mechanism for facilitating an initial public offering. If an SME has the ambition to accelerate its growth through accessing the public markets, the Government should not stand in the way. I am pleased to say that the Bill addresses that anomaly. However, there is more we can do.

    Many lawyers, accountants, investors and entrepreneurs say that the EIS process is often too complicated and takes too long. The Government’s recent consultation on the advance assurance service, which lets HMRC assess a firm’s EIS eligibility before it seeks funding was welcome, and provoked ideas about what we can do to speed things up. First, I can see the logic for introducing some form of fee for advance assurance. This would help to raise the resources necessary for HMRC to provide a smoother service with greater transparency around processing times and specific dates for document review. Secondly, we could look at the use of standardised documentation, which would save time and money for all participants, enabling HMRC to speed up its approvals.

    Thirdly, we must look at how to simplify the EIS rules and their interpretation. Of course, provisions must be made to stop tax avoidance, but the widespread view of practitioners is that the pendulum has swung too far the other way. In the words of one leading venture capital lawyer, there are now “too many gotchas” in the current set of rules. In general, it is the view of the EIS Association, admirably chaired by Lord Flight, that a large part of the reason for this complexity is the need for our laws to comply with EU state aid rules. I hope that when we leave the European Union, the Government will have the opportunity to look at simplifying the EIS rules and ensure that our SMEs get the capital they need to flourish.

    I will briefly touch on two other points in the Bill: tax reliefs for sports clubs and companies donating to them; and museums and touring exhibitions. The internet enables us to be so much closer, but we cannot replicate the presence of being close to a Barbara Hepworth sculpture or looking at Shakespeare’s first folio. The Government’s incentives to take exhibitions around the country will enable us all to share in our cultural history and heritage.

    When it comes to backing small businesses, this Finance Bill—like the others that came before it—shows wholeheartedly why this Government’s record is unmatched. As the British voters decide in the next few weeks who can best steward Britain’s economy, I commend this Bill to the House.

  • Rishi Sunak – 2017 Speech on Universal Credit Roll-Out

    Rishi Sunak – 2017 Speech on Universal Credit Roll-Out

    The speech made by Rishi Sunak, the Conservative MP for Richmond, in the House of Commons on 18 October 2017.

    I believe our welfare system should do three simple things. It must be compassionate to those who need our help, it must be effective in getting them the help they need, and it needs to be fair to those who pay for it. Simply put, universal credit is a rare example of a policy that delivers on all three counts.

    To start with compassion, rather than recipients having to make calls to up to three different agencies when something in their life changes, universal credit simplifies the system and ensures that nobody misses out on a benefit that they are entitled to because of a bureaucracy that is simply too complicated to navigate.

    Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)

    Is the hon. Gentleman aware that people trying to claim universal credit have reported being on the phone for an hour trying to get their case dealt with? At 55p a minute, that cost is astronomical.

    Rishi Sunak

    I am sure that the hon. Lady was here and heard the Secretary of State make the point that the calls that have been made were all to local rate numbers. It is not right to say that they were premium rate numbers. As of today, those calls have been made free for all claimants, although they were offered the opportunity to be called back for free if the call charge was difficult. I am aware that the average wait time is two minutes, and of course a wait time of an hour is unacceptable. I am sure Ministers have heard that and will be doing everything they can to ensure that everyone across the country benefits from a prompt and cheap response.

    At the same time as simplifying the system, universal credit humanises our bureaucracy by recognising that those who need our help do not have exactly the same needs. Instead of a faceless homogeneity, for the first time personalised work coaches can compassionately take into account the specific needs of each individual and their specific circumstances, tailoring the approach to them and ensuring that they get the specific help that they need.

    Neil Coyle

    How simplified, fair and supportive does the hon. Gentleman think it is for the 116,000 working disabled parents who are set to lose £40 a week from the disability income guarantee?

    Rishi Sunak

    I cannot say that I recognise that figure, because £700 million more was made available in the last set of universal credit reforms, all of which was directed at the most vulnerable in our society.

    Neil Coyle

    Will the hon. Gentleman give way again?

    Rishi Sunak

    No, I will carry on, given the number of people who want to speak.

    Compassion alone is not enough. The effectiveness of our welfare system should be properly judged by the number of lives that it transforms, and that transformation comes from well-paid work. Universal credit ends the well-documented problem of single parents effectively working for free if they want to work for more than 16 hours. Universal credit ensures that all work truly pays, and it is working. Compared with the system that it replaces, claimants spend twice as much time actively looking for work and, for every 100 claimants who found employment under the old system, 113 will find employment under universal credit. In reality, the lives of more than 250,000 people will be transformed over the course of the roll-out through having a decent job and the opportunity to build a stake in our society.

    Finally, universal credit is fair to the people who pay for it. In Britain today, we spend around twice as much on working-age welfare as we do on education. To put it another way, for every £1 that the taxpayer sends to the NHS, they also send £1 to the working-age welfare bill. Given the sums involved, I make no apology for speaking up for those who ask me, “Is this money well spent?”

    Sarah Jones (Croydon Central) (Lab)

    The hon. Gentleman talks of the transformational impact of universal credit, so will he please comment on the transformation for my constituents? In Croydon, two thirds of families in local authority housing are now in rent arrears and face eviction, compared with less than a third before universal credit was introduced.

    Rishi Sunak

    I obviously cannot comment specifically on what is going on in Croydon, but the reasons for rent arrears are complicated. The evidence shows that the level of rent arrears after three months of universal credit is exactly the same, if not lower, than under the old system.

    Returning to the sums involved, universal credit ensures a responsible and sustainable system by putting in place a sensible regime of conditionality. That gives hard-working taxpayers the confidence that when they contribute to the system, not only will that help somebody to get back on their feet, but that the person will also have a responsibility to do their bit. That is fair.

    Universal credit is not perfect—no system so large and complex can be—and we should make improvements where we can, but it is significantly better than what it replaces, and the fundamentals of what it is trying to achieve are sound. It has been implemented slowly and methodically. It is insane to argue that it has been rushed when the full roll-out will have taken almost a decade from start to finish. This is welfare reform in action: making things simpler, ensuring work pays, and transforming lives. I urge the Government to carry on with their plan.