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Tag: Speeches

  • Matt Western – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    Matt Western – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    The speech made by Matt Western, the Labour MP for Warwick and Leamington, in the House of Commons on 4 February 2021.

    I welcome the Government’s interest and their recognition of the importance of Royal Leamington Spa to be a recipient of potentially £10 million. As an important sub-regional shopping centre, it is a vital part of the region’s economy and quality of life, so let me praise the council officers at Warwick District Council for the quality of their original submission and the work they have done since in refining the proposals against a reduced contribution proposed by the Government. That said, £10 million is a sound amount for them to work with, and I hope it can do much to address the air quality in the town, highlighted by the World Health Organisation as an issue, while revitalising the commercial centre more widely.

    However, let me cut to the chase. Over the past decade the Government have cut £15 billion from local authorities across the UK, yet handed back just £3.6 billion to some towns which they invited to bid for moneys. Members will know that back in October I questioned the Prime Minister—did I have the guts, he asked me—about how it could be that the Secretary of State could approve tens of millions of pounds for his Minister and his constituency town of Darwen, while that Minister could return the favour and approve tens of millions of pounds for the Secretary of State’s constituency town of Newark—beyond belief. But how were the 101 towns selected in the first instance? Surely, if the Government were honest in their claim to level up, they would have allocated the moneys to the most deprived communities across England, but they have not. In the past year, we have heard many cases of the Government using algorithms, or more often malgorithms, but this is back-of-a-fag-packetithm. While Housing, Communities and Local Government officials may have recommended that the Government did one thing—namely, allocate funds to the most deserving communities—instead the Secretary of State and Ministers allocated moneys to towns in the lowest priority category.

    It is also worth noting that the Government chose to allocate by region, not need, so the north and the midlands were disadvantaged by their political ploys. How else could Bournemouth benefit but, shockingly, South Shields be left off? Both are seaside towns, but I think I know which is in greater need of the funding. It is something Harry Redknapp would have appreciated more than most. I will not even go into Cheadle. While Big Ben no longer bongs, this Government bung, and they are doing it on an industrial scale. A simple analysis of the towns that have received moneys underlines the political tactics laid bare. Certainly the timing of the announcement, in the last few weeks before the last general election, might give us a clue. It was carefully targeted at marginal seats. Interestingly, the impartial cross-party Public Accounts Committee concluded in its investigation that the selection process was not impartial. It took evidence from Christopher Hanretty, a professor of politics at Royal Holloway, who said that

    “the process by which towns were invited to bid for money from the Towns Fund was driven by party-political electoral advantage”,

    riding roughshod over any pretence to be levelling up this country. Any section 151 officer in a council would be sacked if they acted like this.

    Any impartial observer will see this for what it is, and certainly the public do. It is grubby government of the worst order.

  • Sarah Olney – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    Sarah Olney – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    The speech made by Sarah Olney, the Liberal Democrat MP for Richmond Park, in the House of Commons on 4 February 2021.

    Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, for giving me an opportunity to speak in this debate. It has been fantastic to hear the stories of how the towns fund has helped individual town centres, and I am pleased for those communities that have seen a boost from the fund. Members will know that the National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee, of which I am a member, have expressed doubts about the transparency of the decision making relating to the fund’s distribution. I do not want to reiterate these concerns, as they have been expanded on by various Members in this debate, but I note that the approach of selecting certain town centres for funding while excluding others is bound to lead to inequalities. Town centres that could have benefited from funding will miss out. The hon. Member for Ealing Central and Acton (Dr Huq) made an excellent point about London suburbs, and obviously I, too represent one. There are lots of opportunities in London’s suburbs for levelling up, not least now that we are seeing less commuting, and lots of town centres will be looking for funds to revive, to help those who are working from home more often.

    In the interim, our town centres have had to weather the unprecedented economic blow of the pandemic lockdown and a further decimation of the retail industry. Once the restrictions are lifted, there will be an urgent need to make a substantial economic offer to town centre businesses, not just to help revive them, but to provide jobs, and to deliver local goods and services, and, most importantly, public spaces, where local people can come together and meet each other. It is those informal meetings that we are all missing out on during lockdown. All our town centres will need assistance to bounce back from this crisis, so I call on the Government to take measures that will support all our communities, and abandon this winners and losers approach that we have seen with the allocation of funds from this towns fund.

    The need to review our approach to business rates has been aired many times in this Chamber, and I hope we will hear more on it in due course, in order to level the playing field between physical and digital businesses. Similarly, I would like to see a change in the way in which commercial leases are granted and an abolition of upward-only rent reviews. I have heard that ask from many, many businesses in the past year. We should also reform local authority funding to give all councils more money to spend on investing in their own town centres. There are great opportunities for our retail and hospitality sectors, and our cultural organisations, once the lockdown restrictions are lifted, and they will bring new employment to every part of the UK. I urge the Government to put the investment necessary into those sectors to help them all recover from the current downturn.

  • Charlotte Nichols – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    Charlotte Nichols – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    The speech made by Charlotte Nichols, the Labour MP for Warrington North, in the House of Commons on 4 February 2021.

    Every one of us in this House wants to see investment in our constituents and our communities, particularly after a decade of Tory-imposed austerity, so I welcome the £22 million that has been allocated to Warrington from the fund. As part of the town deal board, I pay special thanks to all the stakeholders and officers of Warrington Borough Council for drawing together this successful bid. But—you knew that there would be a “but”, Mr Deputy Speaker—this is not a sustainable alternative to proper, long-term funding of our towns and their needs, and cannot and should not be sold as such by the Government.

    As has already been mentioned, the past 10 years have seen core funding for local authorities cut by £15 billion, and our councils are struggling even more with the understandable impact of covid on their income streams and spending expectations, which the LGA estimates will be a further £2.6 billion. In comparison, the towns fund programme replaces only a fifth of the shortfall. We cannot expect our towns to thrive, as I would like to see, if our funding is stripped to the bone and sometimes the marrow, and we are left hoping for a special handout from Westminster once a decade. How does that assist long-term planning, or the development of sustainable local economies? We need a more holistic approach.

    In Warrington, I want the certainty of a long-overdue new hospital Bill. I want assurances that there will be funding for the restoration and redevelopment of local leisure and library facilities, including Culcheth Community Campus and Padgate library. Above all, I want a guarantee that Warrington Borough Council will be reimbursed for the moneys it has had to spend because of the pandemic, or else all the work that has gone into this bid will be fatally undermined. I want towns such as mine to be self-sustaining and able to offer opportunities for young people and well-paid jobs so that they become hubs of prosperity, rather than being emptied out. We in Warrington benefit greatly from the high-skilled and highly rewarded employment opportunities provided by the nuclear industry. I want the Government to do more to deliver the next generation of new nuclear, which will provide more such quality prospects in Warrington and elsewhere, and to commit to an industrial strategy that makes levelling up the north-west about deeds, not words.

    In his response to today’s debate, I hope the Minister will set out how he will judge the success of the towns fund, and how he will ensure that continuous financial support for towns is restored, rather than acting as though we should be grateful for a chance to bid for funding in a once-in-a-decade competition.

  • Philip Hammond – 2006 Speech to Conservative Party Conference

    Philip Hammond – 2006 Speech to Conservative Party Conference

    The speech made by Philip Hammond, the then Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, on 3 October 2006.

    I watched some of the Labour Conference last week. It was better than a soap opera.

    Tony Blair on his way out;

    Gordon Brown on his way up;

    And after that description of the Chancellor as “an effing disaster” – John Hutton probably on his way to JobCentrePlus.

    But during a gap in the beauty parade of leadership contenders, they did find a bit of time to talk about social justice.

    They obviously think they own that agenda.

    You know how it is with them: you can tell by the tone, by the arrogance; by the way they take people for granted.

    Now we are staking out our claim to that turf.

    So I want us to send a message to them today. And it is this: “the Tories have got their tanks on your lawn”.

    And I’ll tell you why: because Labour has failed. Failed the most disadvantaged in our society.

    In Labour’s Britain, means testing is up, social mobility is down and income inequality is entrenched.

    The poorest are paying a higher share of taxes, and receiving a smaller share of benefits than in 1997.

    And the proportion of children living in workless households is the highest in Europe.

    So much promised. So little delivered. And now they have run out of steam. Devoid of new ideas. Their top-down, centralised approach failing Britain’s most vulnerable people.

    As for fighting poverty – most of them are too busy fighting each other.

    So it falls to us to pick up the challenge of delivering social justice to the most disadvantaged.

    Those who have not shared in the growing prosperity of our society.

    Those who remain locked in a cycle of deprivation. Workless and without hope.

    The mistakes and failings of one generation repeated by the next.

    This is deep-rooted poverty – not just lack of money, but lack of aspiration, lack of self-esteem, lack of hope. It is a moral, as well as a material, poverty.

    And tackling this poverty is a moral, as well as an economic imperative for the next Conservative Government.

    It took the Labour Party almost the first hundred years of its existence to grasp that a competitive economy is the essential foundation for social justice.

    But we have always understood that.

    And we understand too that social justice is an essential foundation of a competitive, modern economy.

    Because in 21st Century Britain, our human capital is our principal natural resource.

    In the past our wealth was built on iron and coal, gas and oil.

    But in the knowledge-based economy of the future, our prosperity will be sustained by the skills and the talents of the people who live in these islands.

    So, we cannot stand by and watch children leave school without basic skills.

    We cannot allow drug addiction to destroy promising young lives.

    We cannot tolerate 5 million adults languishing on out-of-work benefits.

    And we will not.

    Social justice and economic competitiveness point us in the same direction: active support and investment to bring those excluded millions back into the mainstream of our society.

    Through education; Through training; Through healthcare; Through work- support and childcare.

    So that they can contribute to, and share in, our nation’s prosperity.

    For their benefit. For their children’s benefit. And for the benefit of our economy and our society as a whole.

    Delivering social justice and delivering the skills our economy needs.

    Of course, there is another way to meet the needs of the economy. The way that Labour has followed. To rely on an influx of migrant workers. Make no mistake, we welcome the contribution that generations of immigrants have made to our country and to our economy.

    But isn’t a continued dependence on uncontrolled migration a betrayal of the 5 million workless adults in Britain today?

    5 million adults who already have homes; 5 million adults who are already using the NHS; whose children already have school places.

    We owe it to them and, frankly, we owe it to ourselves, to make the effort and the investment that will allow them to fill the jobs that a growing economy will generate.

    In the 1980’s Margaret Thatcher tackled head on, and reversed, Britain’s long-term economic decline. And we should be proud of that success.

    But it left unfinished work: repairing the social consequences of radical economic change.

    Labour, with its state-led model has tried, and failed.

    So it’s down to us to finish the job. To tackle the deep-rooted social problems that still blight Britain today.

    With the same passion, the same commitment, the same single-mindedness, with which we tackled the economic problems of the 1980’s.

    Traditional trickle-down economics hasn’t done it. Labour’s centralised state model hasn’t done it either.

    So we need a new direction.

    A new direction that will succeed where Labour has failed.

    And I’ll tell you how – By trusting people and by sharing responsibility.

    By creating a genuinely level playing field for the private and voluntary sectors. So that they can share in the delivery of our social agenda.

    By devolving power and resources to communities. So that they can tailor local solutions to local problems.

    By creating a spirit of social responsibility, that will engage individuals, families, communities, businesses.

    And because we want to help millions more people into work – older people, carers, and people with disabilities – we must make work itself more flexible.

    Work tailored to the circumstances of the would-be workers, not workers squeezed into jobs that they don’t fit.

    So, we need change.

    But we also need continuity. Ideas and institutions that have stood the test of time.

    So the family will be at the heart of our social policy.

    Because the evidence that families provide the best environment for bringing up children is now so overwhelming that even the Labour Party has noticed it.

    But, as usual, they don’t quite get it.

    John Hutton said last week that the family is the bedrock of the welfare state.

    He was wrong. The family is much more than that.

    The family is the bedrock of our entire society.

    So, a Conservative Government will support and nurture the institution of the family and will never allow the State to supplant it.

    But, in modern Britain, families come in all shapes and sizes. We have to recognise that.

    Because we aspire to govern this country, made up of all those diverse families. And to earn that privilege, we have to show that we value them all.

    Of course, social justice isn’t only about children and families – it transcends generations, and pensioners are among the most vulnerable in our society.

    That hasn’t stopped Gordon Brown snatching £5bn a year from pension funds.

    Or extending means-testing to embrace nearly half of all pensioners.

    But he is failing the most vulnerable of them; 1.6million are not claiming the Pension Credit to which they are entitled.

    Why?

    Because it is too complicated;

    It is too intrusive;

    And because they are too proud.

    But their fuel bills and their council tax go on rising, just the same.

    We understand the needs and aspirations of older people and we will put them at the heart of our policy development process.

    Nobody should leave this hall today in any doubt that the commitment to social justice is at the very core of our new agenda for the Conservative Party. Both as an end in itself; and as a means to support a competitive modern economy.

    Economic stability.

    Growth and prosperity.

    The only long-term guarantees of social justice;

    Of jobs, for all those who can work;

    And of generous levels of support for those who genuinely cannot.

    Labour has had its chance – and failed.

    Now we must map out for the people of Britain our vision for society:

    A society where opportunity is open to all;

    And where all are genuinely able to benefit from it.

    Where there are no hidden barriers or glass ceilings.

    No sink estates written off as “no go” areas;

    No self-perpetuating underclass, left without help and without hope.

    Now is the time to take up that challenge.

    To highlight Labour’s failure.

    And to seize back the social justice agenda that they have tried, and failed, to make their own.

    Time to show the people of Britain, by our deeds as well as our words, that they can, again, trust us.

    Trust us to deliver social justice, and economic prosperity. Which together will form the foundation of the truly Great Britain that we aspire to build.

  • Andrew Mitchell – 2006 Speech at the Conservative Party Conference

    Andrew Mitchell – 2006 Speech at the Conservative Party Conference

    The speech made by Andrew Mitchell, the then Shadow Secretary of State for International Development, on 4 October 2006.

    I think David Cameron has given me the most exciting job in the Shadow Cabinet and one of the most worthwhile.

    A billion people- a sixth of the world’s population – exist each day on less than the price of a coffee from the foyer outside here.

    Tackling this is the great moral challenge of our time. We cannot, we will not, walk by on the other side.

    Making this difference is vital to our long-term security. If we can help Africa join the modern world their people won’t want to flee to Europe to find a better life.

    The Conservative Party is rightly insisting on firm but fair immigration controls, and an end to Labour’s chaotic mismanagement of the asylum system.

    But just ask yourself this: what possesses a young African man to get in an open boat, to pay all the money he has to the modern version of a slave trader, to risk his life on a journey of 1000 miles across the Atlantic, in the hope of stumbling ashore on a European beach?

    People who do that – in the kind of numbers we’re seeing today – these are pretty desperate people.

    If we help them, we not only do what is morally right, we also address problems we face here at home.

    You know, there are some who say this is a Labour issue.

    But I say that international development is not a Labour issue or a Conservative issue but a British issue.

    And our support makes the British contribution hugely stronger and more effective.

    And that’s not surprising because Labour have built on the foundations they inherited from the Conservatives. Chris Patten and Lynda Chalker – two excellent Tory Development Ministers – left a valuable legacy of strong policies on good government and on corruption.

    And it was Conservative ministers who negotiated the cancellation of £1.2 billion of debt owed by the world’s poorest countries.

    So just as we believe in social justice at home, we believe in social justice abroad.

    But the Conservative agenda for tackling global poverty is not the same as the agenda of the Left and today I want to talk about our approach on aid, on corruption and on conflict.

    Labour are obsessed with inputs, putting money on the table – how much we spend. But as Conservatives we are concerned with outputs – how many schools we build – and even more concerned with outcomes – how many kids get an education.

    Many on the Left believe that the cure for poverty is big plans conceived by visionaries and academics.

    But just as big government in Britain doesn’t necessarily mean big solutions, so big projects imposed on the developing world often don’t translate into real progress for those we should be helping.

    Money given in hand-outs to governments too often fails to reach the village at the end of the track where they have neither a school, nor a clinic, nor even clean water.

    And this is the lesson for the big planners like Gordon Brown – if they are minded to listen. Aid is not the same thing as development. Aid in itself has not and will not deliver long-term prosperity or an end to poverty.

    It is the small steps to development that make a lasting change to people’s lives: the village well that means women don’t have to walk five miles a day for water.

    The £4 malaria net that means a baby survives to reach the age of five.

    The village school that means families no longer have to chose between children working in the fields or learning how to read and write.

    Focussing on these steps is not as dramatic as declaring that we will end poverty tomorrow. But as I’ve seen in some of the poorest parts of the world, these are the steps that make a real difference to the poorest.

    Remember my story about Marjina Begum. Microfinance has helped millions of people like her. From a woman in Ghana who needs a second-hand sewing machine to start a clothes business, to a man in Mozambique who wants tools to repair shoes, or a beggar in Bangladesh who borrows to buy chickens who lay eggs he can sell.

    And incidentally, it also opens up societies to new ideas, such as equality for women and girls. Given microfinance and education, women are already the ones driving real change all over the developing world.

    We are committed to increasing our aid substantially to 0.7 percent of our national income by 2013.

    We will spend more because we know that well-spent aid can work miracles. Killer diseases like HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria condemn millions of people to a slow, painful death. Using our aid money effectively to prevent the spread of these awful diseases will save millions of lives in the years ahead.

    British aid has helped millions of children into school, and supported the provision of clean water and sanitation as I saw in Dhaka this summer.

    Earlier this year David Cameron suggested giving aid vouchers to poor people so that they could choose what sort of development service they want and who they want to provide it.

    That is the right way to advance this agenda.

    I want to see poor people as masters and owners of the international development system and not as passive recipients of it.

    Aid agencies – should be subject to independent evaluation, not merely self-evaluation as at present.

    And so I can tell Conference today that we have asked our Policy Group to consider setting up an International Aid Watchdog. Uncluttered by conflicts of interest, this would provide independent and objective evaluation of the effectiveness of British aid.

    Labour spends your money; Conservatives will get results.

    Corruption is the enemy of effective aid.

    When Paul Wolfowitz of the World Bank found that the President of the Republic of Congo had spent £ 50,000 on putting up himself, his butler, his personal photographer, his hairdresser and about 50 other members of his entourage at The Palace Hotel in New York, he was outraged.

    When he wasn’t satisfied with the audits of the state oil company, he suspended debt relief.

    Labour say that Paul Wolfowitz is being too harsh in tackling corruption. I say that Mr Wolfowitz is right. A Conservative Government will champion zero-tolerance of corruption.

    We owe it to hardworking British taxpayers to speak out and take action wherever and whenever corruption is exposed.

    But at the heart of everything we do in international development is conflict prevention and reconciliation. Because if you are one of the poor children and families that live in a camp in Darfur – one of those who William Hague and I met earlier this year – it doesn’t matter how much aid and trade you receive, you are going to remain poor and destitute, frightened and bitter, until the conflict and the shooting stop.

    Many of us are praying that the sinews of the international community are strong enough to protect the weak and desperate who are now waiting in fear and terror in Darfur.

    And Darfur is a real test for the international community.

    Will we stand by once again as we did over Rwanda?

    Will we watch helplessly as the will of the UN is flouted by a regime in Khartoum guilty of genocide and ethnic cleansing?

    Will we allow their helicopters to shoot innocent civilians – men women and children – and fail to enforce the no-fly-zone set up by the UN in 2004 but never implemented?

    We should hit the generals where it hurts by stopping their shopping trips to Paris, freezing their foreign bank accounts and closing down their network of overseas businesses.

    The international community must now ensure that the African Union are given the resources they need to carry out their mandate.

    And if the leaders in Khartoum are caught outside Sudan, we must send them to The Hague to face charges of crimes against humanity.

    As we end our debate today, we know that our approach to tackling global poverty is different from that of the Left. Conservatives believe in working with the grain of human nature and in giving poor people themselves the chance to get ahead and lift their families out of poverty.

    As your International Development team learn lessons from around the world, we are confident that Britain under a Conservative government will answer the moral call from developing countries for open markets and effective aid.

    Under the Conservatives British aid will make the greatest possible difference to health and education and to political stability.

    And we are convinced that our blend of idealism and practicality, our enthusiasm and our dedication, will commend itself to the British people at the next election.

  • David Lidington – 2006 Speech on a New Direction for Northern Ireland

    David Lidington – 2006 Speech on a New Direction for Northern Ireland

    The speech made by David Lidington on 12 October 2006.

    It’s been a good year for our party in Northern Ireland. Our membership is growing and we have regained our toehold in local government.

    We are the only political party that contests elections in every part of the United Kingdom.

    I look forward to the day when we can welcome to our conference not just Conservative councillors, but Conservative Assembly members and Conservative Members of Parliament from Northern Ireland as well.

    Northern Ireland is changing.

    Not everything’s good. Sectarian tensions run deep. Paramilitary groups still use intimidation to exert social control.

    But while serious problems remain, most people in Northern Ireland can at last lead their lives in the normal way that all of us here take for granted.

    The face of Belfast and other cities has been transformed, not by bombs, but by new shops, hotels, offices and homes.

    Even in places like Crossmaglen, for the first time in decades, the police can patrol on foot without routine Army support.

    Politicians of all parties can claim some credit for making this possible.

    But let us never forget, that the peace Northern Ireland has today was won through the courage and endurance of the Royal Ulster Constabulary and our Armed Forces. We shall always remember their bravery and we shall honour the sacrifice that they made.

    And of course the victims of terrorism will carry physical and mental scars for the rest of their lives. We have a duty to speak out for them.

    That’s why we opposed Labour’s amnesty for ‘on the run’ terrorists. It was unjust. It betrayed victims and their families and I am glad that we helped force the Government to abandon its plan.

    Whatever their religion or national identity, people in Northern Ireland have the same everyday hopes and aspirations as the rest of us. They want a prosperous economy, good schools, better health services, decent homes, effective policing.

    As Conservatives, we support the Union. And we also believe in trusting the people.

    An Assembly and stronger local councils would make politics more accessible and more accountable than it can ever be under Direct Rule.

    Giving politicians in Northern Ireland responsibility for practical decisions about jobs, local taxes and public services will force a welcome change in the content of political debate.

    That’s why I support devolution and why I hope that the current talks succeed.

    But devolution and power-sharing will only work if all parties play by the same democratic rules.

    In a democratic society, there is no place for paramilitary gangs. I don’t care whether they call themselves “republican” or “loyalist”; they should go out of business, permanently and completely.

    The tiny loyalist parties are too small to qualify for ministerial office under devolution. But Sinn Fein is different. Sinn Fein is now the second-biggest party in Northern Ireland.

    Its leaders say that they are now committed to pursue their political objectives by exclusively democratic and peaceful means. Certainly, the decommissioning of weapons and the clear statement that the IRA’s so-called ‘armed struggle’ is finally over were events of historic importance. The police and the army believe that there has indeed been a fundamental change in republican strategy.

    But after all that has happened in the last 40 years, we are justified in looking for clear evidence that this change is both permanent and irreversible.

    That means two things in particular.

    First, IRA involvement in crime has to stop for good.

    Second, republicans should support the police and the courts. A power-sharing Executive simply isn’t going to work unless every minister in it is committed to uphold the rule of law.

    Let’s hear Sinn Fein’s leaders ask their supporters to give evidence to help convict the killers of Robert McCartney and give justice to other victims of crime.

    That’s the way to encourage trust.

    Northern Ireland today can look towards a better future. But there are still huge challenges.

    Northern Ireland is over-governed, its economy lags way behind the Irish Republic, with some inner city areas blighted by long-term unemployment and deprivation.

    We need a new direction: smaller government; harnessing the energy of social enterprise and the voluntary sector to tackle poverty and rebuild broken communities; freeing business to create new jobs and investment.

    And Northern Ireland needs a fairer system of local taxation than the tax on homes that Labour is now imposing.

    Health spending is higher than the UK average. Yet the quality of treatment and the standards of public health can be amongst the worst. There’s too much waste and red tape, too little responsibility given to professionals at the sharp end. We need a new direction. People in Northern Ireland deserve better from the NHS than they get now.

    School results in Northern Ireland are better than in the rest of the country. But too many children from deprived areas still leave school unable to read or write. Vocational education and training aren’t good enough for the needs of a modern economy.

    We need to put that right – and can do so while keeping Ulster’s grammar schools. Those schools are successful and they have the support of the overwhelming majority of the people of Northern Ireland.

    Labour’s ban on academic selection is both vindictive and undemocratic. We were right to oppose them and we shall continue our campaign.

    Let me finish with this thought.

    As David reminded us on Sunday, politicians, governments don’t have all the answers. But we Conservatives pride ourselves on being a national party: one that speaks for men and women of every race, faith or social background.

    Let’s draw on that tradition to help the people, all the people of Northern Ireland to put the bitterness of the past behind them and build a shared future based on justice, reconciliation and trust.

  • Oliver Heald – 2007 Speech on Social Exclusion

    Oliver Heald – 2007 Speech on Social Exclusion

    The speech made by Oliver Heald on 12 February 2007.

    Let me start by welcoming the Government’s renewed emphasis on social exclusion. We share their concerns and welcome further efforts to help those on the edge of society. Although I promise not to refer to Polly Toynbee, it is only right to say that I agree that we should not let people fall too far behind the caravan of society.

    We clearly have problems of social exclusion; the proportion of children in workless households is the highest in Europe, more than half the children in inner London are still living below the poverty line, more than 1.2 million young people are not in work or full-time education despite a growing economy, and 2.7 million people of working age are claiming incapacity benefits—three times more than the number who claim jobseeker’s allowance.

    The Minister for Social Exclusion knows from her background in social work, as I do from helping many disadvantaged people as a lawyer. She laughs, but if she has ever been to a law surgery, she will know what I mean. The statistics do not convey the full misery and hopelessness in which some people find themselves. Family breakdown, financial problems, addictions, poor educational achievement and worklessness are key matters at the heart of social exclusion that lead to people being trapped in pockets of permanent poverty.

    As the Minister said, approximately 2.5 per cent. of every generation appears to be caught in a lifetime of disadvantage and harm. We argue that far more people are affected to some extent by the factors that I have mentioned. It is important to maintain a vision that is broad enough to help all those who are affected by social exclusion and does not simply concentrate on a tiny group that has particular problems. The Minister said that one of the core principles of the Government’s action is better identification and earlier intervention—I am happy to agree with that.

    The groups at the highest risk of social exclusion are those affected by the issues that I mentioned. The Leader of the Opposition has asked my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr. Duncan Smith)—He is in Birmingham. He had a prior commitment to do with the subject that we are discussing. He had hoped to be here today. It is important to bear in mind that his social justice policy group has just published “Breakdown Britain”, which examines family breakdown in great detail. My right hon. Friend treats family in his report in its wider, less restricted sense and breakdown as meaning dissolution and dysfunction. He also considers homes without fathers and single parenthood.

    Most people learn the fundamental skills for life in the family—physically, emotionally and socially—and the findings in the report are evidence based. I believe that they are important. The rate of marriage has declined but divorce rates are now stable. The continuing rise in family breakdown is driven by the dissolution of cohabiting partnerships. As the Minister said, there seems to be an intergenerational transmission of family breakdown, with high rates of teenage pregnancy. My right hon. Friend has been given the task of first producing a detailed analysis. He has published a detailed document. It runs to approximately 500 pages but it is very good.

    The process of making recommendations has not yet happened—my right hon. Friend will do that in the summer. The shadow Cabinet will then consider them.

    Survey evidence from YouGov based on a large sample showed a worrying correlation between those who experience family breakdown and other problems. It showed that those who are not brought up by both parents are more likely to experience educational problems, drug addiction, alcohol problems, serious debt or unemployment. On dysfunction, my right hon. Friend’s policy group identified a breakdown of nurture in many families that are unable to provide for core needs, such as secure attachment, protection, realistic limits to behaviour, freedom to express valid emotions, autonomy, competence and a sense of identity, which are gained from a nurturing family.

    The report also worryingly points out the link between family breakdown and youth crime. The reduction in committed relationships has also affected the amount of family care that is available to the elderly. The Local Government Association recently said that that is an expensive problem for the country.

    It seems harsh to mention public spending but there is a high cost in benefits—more than £20 billion on lone parent benefits. We all know about the increasing housing needs that family breakdown generates, and the extra care costs for councils due to changed demography are estimated to be £146 million. My right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green will report on his conclusions in the summer. At that point, we will consider our policy response.

    Recently published research shows that the poorest households in Britain are paying a higher share of tax and getting a lower share of benefits than they did before 1997. The figures show that if the poorest fifth of households were paid the same share of total taxes and got the same share of total benefits as in 1996-97, they would have £531 a year more; and the second poorest fifth of households would have £427 a year more. To add insult to injury, the poorest fifth of households pay a higher proportion of their income in taxes than any other group.

    The claim in the action plan mentioned by the Minister—that the steady rise in income inequality has been halted—is simply not the case. The fact is that levels of income inequality are now slightly higher than they were in the 1980s or 1990s. The Minister ended up saying that there has not been an increase, while acknowledging that the position has not improved. However, what the Institute for Fiscal Studies said in its report was that inequality was slightly higher. The Government wonder in the action plan why those on the very lowest incomes have seen the lowest rates of income growth, which I think is a valid question.

    “those on the very lowest incomes have seen the lowest rates of income growth”,

    comes from page 17 of “Reaching Out: An Action Plan on Social Exclusion”, published in September 2006. The Institute for Fiscal Studies said that there has been

    “little impact upon the slight upward trend in inequality that has been experienced over Labour’s term in government.”

    That is a straightforward quotation.

    Social mobility, which is so important, has been reduced since 1997. The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, who is well respected in the House, said in a speech to the Social Market Foundation on 13 September:

    “It is actually getting harder for people to escape poverty and leave the income group, professional banding or social circle of their parents. In fact, it’s currently harder to escape the shackles of a poor upbringing in Britain than anywhere else in Europe”.

    If your parents are poor, you are likely to be poor—and that is after 10 years of a Labour Government.

    It is not just that the rise in incomes—once one takes account of tax—has not been the success story one would hope for, as the cost of living for families is rising fast. The Leader of the Opposition recently highlighted the true levels of inflation on items affecting people on low incomes. He pointed particularly to energy prices, which are up 71 per cent. since 2003. Mortgage payments, which are also important to many, are up 78 per cent. and taxes are up 81 per cent. He has asked the Office of Fair Trading to investigate the rises in energy prices.

    The Minister and I would agree about the importance of education—she mentioned it—to reducing social exclusion. Unfortunately, success has proved elusive. Three quarters of 16-year-olds from low-income families in England and Wales failed to get five good GCSE passes at grades A to C. That is double the rate that applies to other students. The Public Accounts Committee recently highlighted the failure of 1,500 schools and only today we have learned—it is in the news—that 500 schools have failed to meet the 25 per cent. target for five good GCSE grades. If we look into some of the most excluded groups, such as children in care. About 89 per cent. of children in care failed to get five good GCSE passes—a poor record of dealing with the low achievement of children in care.

    The Government admit it. The Minister for Children and Families has said that despite the Government’s efforts—no one is denying that the Government are trying—the gap between the outcomes of looked-after children and others is “extremely wide” and “completely unacceptable”. The future for many children in care is very depressing. Almost half of young women in care become mothers within 18 to 24 months of leaving care; and between a quarter and a third of rough sleepers have been in care. I think that tackling the present level of under-achievement has to be a major priority.

    Schools can play an important role in the overall strategy to halve teenage pregnancy by 2010. If teenage parents are encouraged to increase their participation in education and training or employment, they may reduce their chances of long-term social exclusion. The likelihood of teenage pregnancies is far higher among those with low educational achievements, even after adjusting for the effects of deprivation. Nearly 40 per cent. of teenage mothers leave school with no qualifications at all. We need to give young people access to consistent help from professionals who understand them and can advise them—with proper assurances of anonymity, where appropriate. It is concerning that, despite the work of the teenage pregnancy unit, set up by the Government, pregnancies among under-14s are actually rising and the overall target for reduction has been missed.

    In terms of health, despite the Government target to reduce infant mortality by 10 per cent., the relative gap in the infant mortality rate between the general population and the poorest social classes has increased by 46 per cent. since 1997. Despite the clear link between mental health and social exclusion, the Government have had to reduce the percentage of funding for mental health in many parts of the country. Children are often the worst affected with 15 per cent. of those with mental health needs having to wait more than 26 weeks to see a specialist. Well, those are all Government figures.

    Aside from treatment, we need to provide people with mental health problems with better access to training and employment. Just 20 per cent. of those with severe mental health problems have jobs. Four out of 10 employers have said that they would not consider employing someone with a history of mental illness. If we are to move forward, we must tackle that stigma and discrimination.

    Concern is being expressed in the voluntary and not-for-profit sector that the Government are asking it to deliver a Government agenda, rather than allowing it to develop innovative services based on its knowledge and expertise. I hope that the Secretary, Cabinet Office, the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-East (Mr. McFadden) will give the House an assurance when he responds to the debate that the kind of measures that the Minister for Social Exclusion was describing—monitoring, ensuring standards and so on—will not involve cutting back on the innovation that some social enterprise voluntary bodies have been able to give us to tackle these deep-seated problems.

    There is a considerable body of evidence that good public health—particularly the encouragement of good practice and healthy living—can really improve health outcomes. This is an area in which the Government certainly took their eye off the ball during their first few years. For example, there was an epidemic of sexually transmitted diseases, particularly in London, before they took action. They also took a very long time to take action on the issue of tuberculosis, particularly among the Asian community. In public health terms, there are real concerns about how slow the Government have been to react to these major problems.

    It is well established that some of the cheapest and most successful health systems in the world are those that place a strong emphasis on public health, so that fewer people require treatment for the more expensive conditions. One of the problems with the Labour Government is that they have never really got down to implementing any solid reform in the public service sector in order to deliver on their intentions. Those intentions have often been very good, but the delivery has often been a bit of a shambles.

    I have visited many projects that help the socially excluded, and one lesson that I have learnt is that it is not possible to make sweeping decisions from on high. The socially excluded are, by their very nature, individuals with complex needs. Solutions to social exclusion must come from the bottom, from the people who know the individuals and their problems. This is not about abdicating responsibility; it is about giving the power to those who should have it. There is a role for national initiatives, but they only work if those delivering them on the front line accept them.

    We wish the new social exclusion taskforce well, and we hope that it will be more effective than previous attempts. We are concerned, however, that the new body does not appear to have the same direct backing of the Prime Minister as the original social exclusion unit, which was based at No. 10. We accept that tackling social exclusion is an enormous challenge that will involve efforts across many Government Departments, but this will require the full and energetic support of No. 10, simply because it crosses so many portfolios.

    Rather than relying on traditional thinking, and on the ideas that underpinned the last nine initiatives on social exclusion, is it not time to look for a new direction based on trusting people and on social responsibility? We need to trust the professionals, the social enterprises and the voluntary sector to tackle multiple deprivation through a combination of long-term funding, increased scope to innovate and a level playing field. We also need to trust local government, and to accept that civil servants and Ministers in Whitehall might not have all the answers. We need to move away from thinking that everything is the responsibility of the state, and towards a new spirit of social responsibility in which we work together to empower local people and local communities. We should not be so arrogant as to believe that politicians have all the answers. Our approach should not be solely about what the Government can do. It should be about what people can do, and what society can do, because we are all in this together.

  • Alex Cunningham – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    Alex Cunningham – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    The speech made by Alex Cunningham, the Labour MP for Stockton North, in the House of Commons on 4 February 2021.

    The towns fund might be a good idea, but the lack of transparency in decision making has led to understandable concerns about the impartiality of the process, and from what I have seen of it in the Tees valley, those concerns are well founded.

    In December, I wrote to the Secretary of State about Billingham, soon to be the home of Novavax vaccine manufacture. The town is home to 35,000 proud Teessiders as well as the Billingham Forum, which is a huge sports and theatre venue including pools, gyms and an ice rink. The town is a cultural hub, but it desperately needs help to further develop. As the singer of Maxïmo Park, Billingham-born Paul Smith, sings, it is

    “where industrial tunnels were our fairytale castles”.

    In short, it is a town bursting with potential.

    Stockton-on-Tees Borough Council approached the Government to request that Billingham be included in the cohort of towns eligible to bid for funds, but it was refused. Back in October, Billingham councillors wrote to the Secretary of State asking why other Tees towns such as Thornaby in Stockton South, with a Tory MP, were fortunate enough to have been included in the selection of the first 100 towns for the fund when Billingham was not, even though it clearly fits the criteria every bit as well, if not more so, than Thornaby—although rest assured that we celebrate with the people of Thornaby that they do have the investment that they need. The decision led to confusion and concern locally that could have easily been put to bed if Ministers had responded to the request from the Billingham councillors to explain why their town had been passed over. Instead, the Minister fobbed off the councillors’ request for information and did not even engage with their concerns.

    I followed up with my own letter, which was responded to, but with only slightly more information. It said that Billingham will get the chance to apply to the £300 million levelling-up fund, which has been designated for a towns fund competition. I personally find this quite astonishing. If the Government had sufficient information to select the first 100 towns that were eligible for a deal, why do we have to have more wasteful bidding processes that pit deprived communities against each other for scraps from the Government’s table? Why can the Government not use existing data and provide investment now—and cut out the middleman, saving our councils time and money in doing so?

    It does not matter what money is being dished out these days by the Government: whether it is to the NHS, to councils or for town centres—Ministers are quite happy, and not even embarrassed, to pass over some areas and favour their own. It is time for fairness in the system; time for real, true levelling up and proper resources; and time for towns like Billingham to get the support that they need.

  • Yvette Cooper – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    Yvette Cooper – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    The speech made by Yvette Cooper, the Labour MP for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford, in the House of Commons on 4 February 2021.

    Castleford has put in a bid to the towns fund, and I have been working with Wakefield Council, community organisations and local businesses to draw up plans for badly needed investment here in our town; to restore some of the cuts in investment and jobs we have had over the past 10 years; to regenerate our town centre and reconnect with our riverside; and to build on our community strengths and community pride.

    We want not only to restore our riverside—the River Aire runs straight past the mill here and we want people to be able to enjoy it again—but to boost Henry Moore Square in the town centre; support local jobs; restore Kingdom Hall, one of the oldest buildings in the town centre; and invest in Queen’s Mill, where the old Allinson’s flour mill has been taken over by the Castleford Heritage Trust, a local community organisation that has made it the community hub, not only supporting residents during the covid crisis but growing small businesses as well as new jobs and opportunities.

    We want to boost local skills, working with the Castleford Tigers Foundation to set up a new adult skills centre, because in our town the number of adults in training and education has halved over recent years as adult skills budgets have been cut. That is shocking when we need those skills to boost the jobs of the future. Too often, our industrial jobs and proud heritage have been hit and we have not had the investment for the new jobs of the future.

    I urge Ministers to support not only Castleford’s bid but all our towns, because the problem with the Government’s approach is that the towns fund simply does not go far enough. I have been calling for investment in our towns for many years, as part of the Labour towns campaign, because over the past 10 years the rate of jobs growth in our towns has been half the rate in our cites, the rate of business growth in our towns has been half the rate in our cities, and austerity has hit our towns much harder than our cities. We have lost more public services and seen more services shrink back under 10 years of Conservative Government austerity.

    In Yorkshire and the Humber, 16 towns were chosen for the towns fund. The first eight were those that ranked most strongly against independent criteria on skills need, investment need and deprivation. Rightly, Castleford was chosen in that top eight, but Knottingley was ninth on the list and was left out. Instead, the Government chose to invest in towns that did not have the same level of skills need or deprivation and that had not seen the same scale of cuts—Knottingley has been one of the hardest hit by austerity over the past 10 years, losing its library, sports centre and investment in our town. We need a chance for Knottingley to gets its share of investment, and for Normanton and Pontefract to get their share too. We need a comprehensive approach, not just a towns fund.

  • Robert Halfon – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    Robert Halfon – 2021 Speech on the Towns Fund

    The speech made by Robert Halfon, the Conservative MP for Harlow, in the House of Commons on 4 February 2021.

    I welcome this debate and thank my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Paul Bristow) and the Government for supporting the town fund and Harlow. Harlow has been my home for 20 years. It is a town of achievement, aspiration, community and opportunity. Although Harlow may not yet have enormous reserves of economic capital, it has enough social and cultural capital to fill any vault in any bank.

    I wish to take this opportunity to pay tribute to the Government for the recent investments in our town. Harlow has received £50 million for the M11 junction 7A, hundreds of millions for our new Harlow hospital, and major investment for our enterprise zone. I am proud to note that Harlow College is one of the finest colleges in the country, and Harlow is on its way to becoming the skills capital of the east of England, following a recent £3 million upgrade for T-level delivery and the construction of the £12 million advanced manufacturing centre. I welcome the fact that the Government have already committed £300 million to the creation of Public Health England’s science campus in Harlow, in anticipation of PHE’s expected move. I look forward to the Government confirming the funding for the project in the next spending statement.

    Despite all that, Harlow remains the second most-deprived area in Essex. It is essential that that is recognised in the Government’s levelling-up agenda. Part of the town centre is in a real state of disrepair, plagued by antisocial behaviour. Our neighbourhood centres are in desperate need of regeneration. Harlow’s towns fund bid sets out to remedy such problems and address the challenges posed by ageing infrastructure, through town centre improvements; the redevelopment of Staple Tye neighbourhood centre; measures to increase connectivity at the enterprise zone; and investment in a new institute of technology.

    Sadly, we lost out on £10.4 million from the future high streets fund because the Government procurement letter stated that Harlow Council’s bid

    “did not meet stringent criteria on value for money for the taxpayer”.

    The towns fund bid is a chance to make up for that loss. It will be the thread that ties together all the Government’s recent investments in Harlow. The town centre must be fit for purpose to support economic growth and social capital and make Harlow a place that offers community, security and prosperity for all our citizens—a town that aspirational people want to move to and live in.

    I give special thanks to the Minister, who is responsible for the towns fund, all members of the Harlow growth board, the chief executive of Harlow Council and the senior officers who are working day and night to make sure the bid succeeds. I hope that, this time, our bid will be a success and our town will get the much needed funding that it deserves.