Park Home Residents: Legal Protection

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Tuesday 1st October 2019 Westminster Hall

[Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. I am aware that this is a sector you are interested in through your chairmanship of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee. I welcome the new Ministers to their places and congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope) on securing the debate.

In the past four years, there has been quite a lot of work done to assess the impact and effectiveness of the Mobile Homes Act 2013, much of which has been instigated by the Government. However, much of this activity has been taking place beneath the radar, elbowed out of the spotlight by the Brexit debate. It is therefore good news that we are using this unexpected opportunity to review the situation and to consider whether we are on the right course to ensure the sector is fit for purpose, that the rights and welfare of residents are properly and fully protected, that local authorities have the powers and resources to enforce legislation, and that site owners who play by the rules can earn a realistic return on their investment and are incentivised to carry out further improvements to their sites.

Generally, I believe we are moving in the right direction—though we should be moving quicker and there are some significant obstacles to overcome. The 2013 Act has been a qualified success. In saying that, I do not wish to damn it with faint praise; indeed, many would say I have a vested interest in not doing so. The Park Homes Working Group 2015 has come up with some welcome recommendations and the Government’s response to the 2017 review identified the issues that need to be addressed. The challenge will lie in securing their effective implementation.

In the remaining time, I shall briefly highlight the significant problems that need to be tackled and the potential pitfalls that need to be avoided. First, we have the rogue site owners. As we have heard, they still exist and are finding ways of circumnavigating the legislation that was intended to put an end to their intimidating and sharp practices.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I know the hon. Gentleman has done significant work on this through the all-party group and he is making an excellent speech. On that point, is it not true that people have been jailed for breaking the law while owning park homes and, after their release, have been able to purchase new park homes because we do not have a fit and proper person test and a proper legislative framework to prevent that?

[Peter Aldous]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. He is correct and we need to address those particular issues, but we need to make sure we do so in an effective way, with the desired consequences. The introduction of the fit and proper person test was provided for in the 2013 Act and is intended to eliminate these rogues. However, the feedback from Wales is that it has not done that and that a dispersed system with a tickbox approach, which has been pursued there, has not led to one application being refused. If introduced—I have no particular problem with that—the test must be properly co-ordinated and consistent across the whole country and it must plug the loopholes whereby a rogue site owner either puts forward a manager for licensing purposes yet continues to direct business themselves or pursues the type of dubious practices highlighted by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch.

Secondly, more needs to be done to ensure that local authorities have the necessary expertise and resources to enforce the legislation. From my own experience, I know that East Suffolk Council is very good and proactive in addressing a problem when it arises. However, there is more work to be done on day-to-day management and the guidance and advice given to both home and site owners. Such pre-emptive work will nip potential problems in the bud and ensure they do not develop into the major incidents that cause people so much distress and turmoil. I take the view that, if seen through, the recommendations of the working group and the Government’s response to the review will address many of the concerns.

Thirdly, we have heard a great deal today about the sharp practices that are blighting many people’s lives, but it is important not to lose sight of the fact that many site owners behave responsibly, fulfil their obligations and build good working relationships with the homeowners on their sites. It is vital that we do not create a system that forces them out of the sector to be replaced by the rogues who circumnavigate the arrangements and exploit the loopholes about which we have heard so much. In my experience, some good site owners are already deciding to leave the sector.

Fourthly, it is important to continue to distinguish between park homes and holiday homes and to guard against holiday parks morphing into park home sites, as my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch highlighted. The two sectors are completely different, with two different systems of protection against mis-selling and misuse. It is important that they remain as such and that we enforce the two systems fully and effectively.

Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government

Alex Sobel Excerpts

1st reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 2nd July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Layla Moran]

I hope today’s debate will be a clarion call to them and others about the importance of local government in delivering key services.

The resilience of local councils across the country is a focus of the National Audit Office’s work, and it has real cause for concern. The message I have received from my friends at today’s LGA conference is twofold. First, we must remember that councils are multi-million pound companies, yet they do not know where their funding is coming from past next year. How on earth are they expected to plan without any sense of the medium term, let alone the long term?

Secondly, if we are to shift the burden from central Government to local government, income generation needs to be made easier. Across the country, I am not aware of a single council that has successfully used the referendum mechanism to raise council tax. This is not working. We need another way to make sure councils are properly funded.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Between 2011 and 2015, according to the NAO, 25% of the central Government grant to councils was cut. Does the hon. Lady regret the role of the Liberal Democrat coalition Government in such a heavy level of cuts?

[Layla Moran]

When I was a candidate, I, too, fought against these cuts, particularly those to children’s services. As the hon. Gentleman knows, I am a teacher, and I was seeing the effect the cuts would have. Interestingly, the data show that some of that was fat that could be trimmed off. [Interruption.] Let me finish. [Interruption.] Just look at the transcripts from the Select Committee on Housing, Communities and Local Government. In 2012-13, there was an increase in efficiency, but I will concede that after that point the cuts should have stopped. The point of today’s debate is to move forwards. Having been elected in 2017, I hope the hon. Gentleman will join me in looking forwards and not backwards.

EU Structural Funds: Least Developed Regions

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Wednesday 26th June 2019 Westminster Hall

[Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McDonagh. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) on securing this important debate. I am pleased to see Members here from all parties and from every corner of the United Kingdom, especially from communities in our least developed regions, such as those in South Yorkshire, where I am proud to serve as Mayor and MP. Such communities are among the hardest hit by austerity, by stalled economic growth, and by the failure of successive Governments to address widening regional inequalities.

The stark truth is that, from 2020 onwards, funding allocated to regions by the EU will come to an end, and 2021 marks the end of the Government’s local growth fund programme. Taken together, those funds have been the glue holding together many of our communities. What replaces those funds must replace them on the basis of what would have been received had the referendum result been different. The creation of a shared prosperity fund provides a vital opportunity to do things differently. To heal the divisions in our country and to turn the dial in those least developed regions, we must think and do differently.

The UK has one of the most centralised political systems in the world, with the inevitable consequence that some of the decisions taken by Westminster and Whitehall, however well-intentioned, do not reflect the needs or opportunities of local areas. Those living in the UK’s least developed regions are feeling the impact of the equality gap, which grows ever wider. I am hugely positive about our collective ability in the north of England to make real progress, provided that we have the right powers underpinned by the right resources. My hon. Friend the Member for Redcar (Anna Turley) mentioned the Power Up The North campaign, and increasingly there seems to be a growing recognition that the answers to the many challenges that we face do not lie in Westminster or Whitehall.

In the final minute that I have available to me, I will rattle through the four principles that I have set out for the shared prosperity fund.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Dan Jarvis]

I will not; I have very little time.

First, the annual budget for the shared prosperity fund should be no less in real terms than both the EU and local growth funding streams that it replaces. Secondly, there should be no competitive bidding element. Thirdly, the fund must be fully devolved to the areas that have in place robust, democratically accountable governance models. Finally, the funding must be stretched over multiple years, beyond the vagaries of spending reviews and parliamentary cycles.

If we want to create a country that works for everybody, let us take the opportunity to be bold, and let us make sure that the shared prosperity fund does what it says on the tin and enables all of our communities to share and prosper in our country’s economic growth.

House Building Targets

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Tuesday 11th June 2019 Westminster Hall

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

In my hon. Friend’s constituency, Goodwin Community Housing is a great example of brownfield sites being used to build modern, modular, low-carbon housing. Does she agree that we need to see that model of housing develop if we are to meet our housing targets using brownfield sites?

[Emma Hardy]

I completely agree, and I look forward to going to see those properties on Friday.

We have a problem with landlords not implementing their permissions in full, and with one landowner in particular. The problem is not just that sites are not being developed, but that landlords are failing to manage their responsibilities for them. There are patches of land across the city—I will talk about the details in a moment—that are being left to go to ruin, and landlords are not taking full responsibly for health and safety.

The Lord Line building is a site of personal significance to the people of Hull, as it is one of the last buildings relating to Hull’s fishing heritage. It is the site of the dock where the fishing boats used to come in and out of when we were the capital city of the UK for the fishing trade, but it has been left to go to ruin. Youths go in there for reasons that I do not want to elaborate on here. We can see from the discarded needles, the bricks thrown from the top of the building, and the fire engines that attend the site regularly that it is not being properly safeguarded or protected. There will end up being a tragedy there, because people keep going to that building and it is not being looked after.

The owner of that land also owned the former Rank Hovis Clarence Mill on St Peter Street. They pledged to clear the building and promised a Radisson Blu hotel in its place. The demolition and clearing work still had not started by 2015, and in 2017 the permission expired and was not renewed. They bought the Heaven & Hell nightclub in March 2011. They said that they were going to put a £15 million development called Manor Cube on the site, and stated that the building work on the hotel would be completed by July 2013, but by that time no work had been completed.

The Lord Line building has been left to go to rack and ruin, causing great upset in the fishing community in Hull. The company—Manor Properties—seems to have a habit of promising pie-in-the-sky, wonderful, big dreams to the people of Hull, while letting the areas go to ruin.

There are a few points where I feel the Minister can tighten up the existing legislation to prevent this from happening again. We could have enhanced compulsory purchase orders where a site is allocated and consent is not implemented in full. Those powers could enable the local authority to acquire the site at 50% of its market value, provided that it commences development within 12 months of acquisition and at least 50% of the development is completed within three years. I know that the council would develop that land, but it does not have the power to purchase it. If a section 15 notice has to be served due to a lack of maintenance and dereliction on a site, allowing it to be acquired at 40% of its market value could also help the development.

The Minister should also focus public sector funding on unlocking those sites by providing additional grants and loans. The rules are set up to prevent the council from being able to compulsorily purchase the sites, but when people come into my city on the A63, they see this abandoned building on the way in. That is not the advertisement that I want for my city. People walking around the centre see patches of land that have been left or underdeveloped. The Minister could change that by just tightening up a few bits of legislation.

Removing VAT for any conversion works undertaken to properties’ heritage action zones would also help us. The Minister should change the rules about what constitutes a material start, to prevent landowners from undertaking minor works.

Permitted Development and Shale Gas Exploration

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Thursday 28th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Nick Herbert (Arundel and South Downs) (Con)]

As the House will know, my constituency of Arundel and South Downs is the most beautiful in England— 250 square miles of Sussex countryside, with no large towns but only small villages and small market towns. Half of it is in the protected landscape of the South Downs national park.

Nevertheless, there is oil extraction in my constituency, and it is entirely uncontroversial. There are small oil wells, and I have never received any complaint about them. I assume that oil tankers visit regularly to take the oil off site, but because the wells are located sensibly the public do not get excited about them. My neighbour’s constituency of Chichester has an oil well in the national park itself. It is similarly uncontroversial because it is near a main road, not a community.

Public interest in the proposed fracking in West Sussex takes two forms. There is concern about below-the-ground activity: will it have an impact on local water sources, for instance? Then there is concern about the above-the-ground activity: what will the exploratory drilling and then any potential further drilling mean for future traffic movements that will affect neighbourhoods? My experience is that communities get particularly exercised about proposals when they fear that the countryside in which they live is about to become industrialised and that there will suddenly be significant lorry movements through otherwise quiet country lanes and villages—not just during the exploratory period, but potentially afterwards, if large sources are discovered.

It fell to West Sussex County Council, as the responsible local authority, to assess whether one proposal for exploratory drilling, near Wisborough Green, a beautiful village in my constituency, was appropriate. The council looked at the proposed traffic movements down very narrow lanes and was very unhappy about the impact. Ultimately, the council, taking no view on the merits of fracking or drilling otherwise and not having a policy of animus against the extraction of the mineral, nevertheless thought that the lorry movements were inappropriate. It rightly reflected the concerns of the local community.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

The right hon. Gentleman is making an excellent speech. Traffic is a concern not only at drilling sites: the Knostrop treatment works in Leeds is one of only three places licensed to treat fracking waste water, which would discharge into the River Aire. There is concern there about not only traffic movement, but discharge into local rivers. There is an issue not just at drilling sites but also at treatment works.

[Nick Herbert]

The hon. Gentleman makes an interesting point. There are, of course, wider environmental objections; those might be addressed separately by suitable, strong regulation. My concern is whether it is appropriate for exploratory drilling and potential subsequent extraction of shale gas to be allowed by permitted development. I do not oppose permitted development rights in principle; it is sometimes appropriate for such rights to be applied. I support the application of those rights for the conversion of office buildings to residential premises because that has produced a large amount of housing that would not have been available otherwise.

Holocaust Memorial Day

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Thursday 24th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

I hope we are not just “considering” Holocaust Memorial Day, with our antiquated practices in this place, but endorsing it.

I pay tribute to my team of Danny Stone, Amy Wagner and Ally Routledge, who put together the Sara conference in November—“Sara” after the Nazi name forced on Jewish women in 1938 to show that they were Jewish. That conference looked at misogyny and anti- semitism; I bring to the House just one nugget from it. In this country, in the past year, there were 170,000 anti- semitic internet searches. Since last year’s Holocaust Memorial Day, searches on “Holocaust hoax” are up 30,000. We have talked in previous debates about holocaust denial. Let me put another term on the record, because it is the pertinent one in this country for some at the moment—holocaust revisionism. Some people want to twist and turn what happened for their own ends; they would like to give some lip service, but only some, while twisting the facts and minimising the consequences and the implications.

We have seen it in the past few days, with the TV personality, Rachel Riley, and the abuse that she has received from many for standing up to antisemitism, in this week. Well, I stand, and I hope we all stand, with Rachel Riley, recognising the bravery of that young woman—one amongst many, one of the better known, and therefore the more abused—for standing up against modern antisemitism.

My parents died very young, but I only ever saw them both angry once. That was in 1972, seeing the television footage of Israeli athletes being murdered in Munich. That meant so much, in terms of understanding the realities of the Jewish people at the time. That was the only time I ever saw my parents angry together in their lives but, if they were alive today, that would not have been the only time that they were angry. Holocaust revisionism is the current-day plague that we have to challenge and fight, rather than the ignorant and thick holocaust deniers of the past, who were quite easy to challenge. There are far too many around.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[John Mann]

If I may, I will continue.

The problem is not just a British one, and we do not like talking about some of these things, but I am quite hard-nosed about some things now. When I went around Majdanek, I observed it in detail. In an hour, at every major exhibit and in the gas chambers, one could go around without even realising that the Jewish people were the target of the Nazis in the holocaust. I went to the cathedral, up the tower, and I did not need binoculars—one can see Majdanek from the centre of Lublin now, as people could at the time. Yet there is still not a single reference in the exhibitions to the fact that the target there—the mass murders—were primarily the local and Polish Jewish population.

Holocaust revisionism—it is a problem all over Europe, it is a problem in my political party, it is a problem in this country and it is a problem that we are not facing up to sufficiently robustly or successfully. That is why Rachel Riley gets all the crap that she gets at the moment. Holocaust revisionism is not understanding the realities of what happened and what that means today. That is why I am angry. I endorse, as I am sure we all endorse, Holocaust Memorial Day today.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to take part in this debate today in advance of Holocaust Memorial Day on Sunday. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley North (Ian Austin) for securing the debate, with others, and for his extremely moving opening speech.

The theme this year is Torn from Home, providing the chance to think about the impact that the holocaust and genocide has on those wrenched from the place they call home for fear of threat and persecution, and I wanted, in this year in which we are urged to be louder in the face of the rise in antisemitism, to use my contribution to pay tribute to my constituent Renate Collins. I am hugely privileged to have Renate as a constituent; she is an amazing woman who works tirelessly with groups and schools and at events to share her family’s story to ensure that such things never happen again. I am very grateful to her for the work she does and would like to put her story on the record today.

Renate was one of the last children to be put on the Kindertransport which brought some 10,000 young Jewish children to Britain from Germany, Austria, the former Czechoslovakia, Poland and elsewhere. On 30 June 1939 her train was the last to leave Prague before the Nazi invasion. She was just five years old when her mother and family doctor put her on the train, her mother and father not knowing if they would see her again. Renate had a high temperature and chicken pox so her mother was reluctant to put her on the train, but the doctor said, “If you don’t put Renate on this train, she will never go.”

Renate, at just five and with her hair in pigtails, had no idea where she was going, thinking that she might have been going on holiday. Yet her two-day journey through Holland and London brought her to Porth and the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). Here she lived with Reverend Fred Coppleston and his wife Arianwen and was brought up as their own. She arrived in Britain with her visa bearing a Third Reich stamp with swastika and spoke just two words of English: “yes” and “no.”

Before going, her mother helped her write letters to the family she was travelling to. With the innocence only a child could have in such grave circumstances, she had written to the Welsh family:

“I hope there is no spinach in England. But I do hope there are many ice creams over there as I am terribly fond of it, and can be, throughout a whole day, the best girl in the world if I get plenty of it...I am thanking you for all you are going to do for me, and I will be a very good child to you.”

In a letter Renate still has that her mother sent to the reverend and his wife she had written:

“I’m thanking you for your beautiful and helpful letter. I would call myself happy to know my little one in a surrounding of so much affection and love.”

Tragically, both her mother and father were killed by the Nazis. In total, Renate lost 64 family members in the holocaust, Renate surviving because of the decisions her parents made 79 years ago. Over the last year Renate has discovered new information about the deaths of some of her closest relatives, coldly murdered in the open air by guards when their train to Treblinka was held up in bad weather.

I really wanted to get Renate’s story on record today because it is so important that we remember the families, the homes and lives torn apart, the children who never saw their family again, and the dangers and devastating consequences of racism, xenophobia, and antisemitism.

Renate is an absolutely brilliant woman and she keeps going because, as she has always told me, this extreme hatred and intolerance can always “raise its ugly head again.” The importance of Holocaust Memorial Day is that we learn these lessons and act to never see it repeated.

[Alex Sobel]

My hon. Friend is making a brilliant speech, and I would like to pay tribute to somebody who used to sit here on these Benches who has a similar story: Lord Dubs. He also came here on the Kindertransport, and this year’s theme of Torn from Home is very apt, because he has done so much work for modern-day refugees and to bring modern-day children to this country. We should recognise his work and all he has done.

[Jessica Morden]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right.

I join other hon. Members in paying tribute to the Holocaust Educational Trust and the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust. I also pay tribute to Renate and her family and to her continued commitment to educating and informing people about what she and millions of others went through within our lifetimes, as nothing can compare to the testimony of survivors.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

It is a privilege to speak in this debate, and I thank the Backbench Business Committee for securing it and my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley North (Ian Austin) for his opening speech. In Newcastle, we will mark Holocaust Memorial Day this year, as we did last year, by honouring the memory of the victims of the holocaust and subsequent genocides, celebrating and listening to survivors, and remembering the acts of kindness, such as our city’s welcoming of Jewish children from Germany.

We will also remember that much of the antisemitic hatred that preceded the holocaust was directed against poor Jewish immigrants from Russia, Poland and the other countries of eastern Europe and that that hatred was present not only in Germany, but in France and here in the United Kingdom. We must remember that at the core of so much of the hatred that prepared the ground for the holocaust was the idea that Jews were alien and could never truly be German, French or English. We must commit to fighting that invidious and corrupting lie wherever it raises its head.

[Alex Sobel]

On that point, I spoke in last year’s Holocaust Memorial Day debate and the footage was put on Channel 4’s Facebook page, where I was accused of all those things that my hon. Friend mentions. People said that I was a fifth columnist, that I was not fit to sit in the British Parliament and that I was not properly British. That is exactly what my hon. Friend is talking about, and we need to fight against it.

[Chi Onwurah]

I agree with my hon. Friend that such lies must be called out whenever they are heard.

As my Jewish constituents have made clear, the terror of the holocaust does not fade for our Jewish communities. Incidents that may seem marginal and inconsequential to some are experienced from the point of view of survivors and their children and grandchildren as harbingers of horrors too awful to think about. Fear echoes down the generations while many of us go about our business feeling safe and secure. Recent studies have revealed the degree to which the first antisemitic legislation passed by the Nazi party was modelled on the racist laws of the American south and of British colonies such as South Africa. Remembrance must mean eternal vigilance against the politics of hatred and dehumanisation and the recognition that they do not make their first appearance as mass murder, but as a climate of religious or racial intolerance and political expediency.

Nowhere is that recognition more important than in discussions about the middle east. Those of us who support the cause of Palestinian rights must recognise that we see antisemitic ideas surface time and again in debates over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There must be zero tolerance of antisemitism in such debates, just as there must be space for an honest appraisal of the actual issues and behaviours of those involved in the conflict.

There must be zero tolerance within the Labour party, too. I am sad to report that Jewish constituents have told me that they no longer feel welcome in our party. I have written to and met both our leader and our general secretary to discuss the matter, and I have also met representatives of Jewish groups in Newcastle and nationally. I have been assured that the party is developing policies and allocating appropriate resources that will provide demonstrable evidence that we are committed to rooting out antisemitism. Antisemitism cases will be heard more quickly and the backlog cleared, and anyone using antisemitic tropes must be called out and subject to appropriate sanction.

However, we also need appropriate educational resources to help Members understand the history of antisemitism and antisemitic tropes, ensuring that we can express a wide range of views, particularly on Palestine and Israel, without implying any antisemitic views, either directly or indirectly. I have been assured that that will be developed and delivered soon.

In the party, in Newcastle and in the country, the holocaust must be remembered in words and in deeds.

Section 21 Evictions

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Thursday 6th December 2018 Westminster Hall

[Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the use of Section 21 evictions in the private rented sector.

It is a pleasure to open this debate under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, and to do so in the presence of the Minister. I know that she is responding to a debate on the private rented sector for the second time in two weeks. I apologise for that, but I think it reflects the extent of concern about some of the issues in this rapidly growing housing sector.

This debate is the culmination of a campaign that has been run on behalf of a number of organisations working with private tenants, including Generation Rent most specifically, the London Renters Union, the New Economics Foundation and ACORN, which run the End Unfair Evictions campaign and have encouraged people to speak up about their experiences. The social media presence on the issue demonstrated some quite extraordinary experiences that tenants have had with homelessness and insecurity as a result of the use of a section 21 notice.

The campaign has also received backing from Children England, Independent Age, Age UK London, Crisis, the Salvation Army, Mind, Z2K and Shelter, which gave us a very good briefing on the issue. More than 50,000 people signed a petition calling on the Government to give renters more stability and certainty in their homes by abolishing section 21, which gave us the opportunity to have the debate. The petition ran for 10 weeks and was handed to the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government at the end of August.

What is section 21, and why are we specifically concerned about it? Most private and some social tenants now live in assured shorthold tenancies. In order to bring those tenancies to an end, landlords have two options: section 8, which enables a landlord to regain possession before the end of a tenancy on one or more of several different grounds, or section 21, for which the landlord must give two months’ notice of the intention to seek possession. On the expiry of that notice period, the tenancy is not ended, but the landlord can bring accelerated possession proceedings based on the section 21 notice. Unless there is a defence, which can only be that the notice is not valid, the courts must then grant a possession order. If the tenant does not leave, the landlord can seek a warrant of possession and a bailiff’s appointment for eviction.

Section 21 notices cannot be served under specified circumstances, such as when a deposit has not been protected, if the landlord does not have a required licence, after the issuing of a council improvement notice or if the landlord has failed to provide a valid energy certificate, gas safety certificate or a “How to Rent” guide.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. I have many private renters in my constituency and one issue that they bring up with me about section 21 is revenge evictions. Is that also a concern of hers?

East Coast Main Line Investment

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Wednesday 17th October 2018 Westminster Hall

[Martin Vickers]

I am very disappointed to hear that. I put three alternatives that the Minister could consider in my notes, and one of them was to extend one or two of those new services to Lincoln through to Grimsby and Cleethorpes. Given what the hon. Lady is saying, it might not be possible.

The Minister will be aware that an open-access operator has shown an interest and has previously been in negotiations with the Office of Road and Rail about direct services. That is yet again on hold. I understand that a review is taking place on access charges for open-access operators. I can understand the logic of that, but it creates further delay. Earlier this year, Grand Central was intending to put an application in to run four direct services from King’s Cross through to Cleethorpes via Doncaster and Scunthorpe, but that is now on hold.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Although the hon. Gentleman is outlining some of the difficulties he has in getting direct services to his constituency, I am pleased that the new publicly run LNER has just announced that it will extend direct services to Harrogate, which would increase the number of trains stopping in my constituency from one a day to six a day. That clearly shows that publicly run rail can deliver.

[Martin Vickers]

I was not intending to embark on a pro or anti-nationalisation debate, but I remind the hon. Gentleman that since privatisation—I cannot remember, and the Minister can probably give the exact figure—hundreds of millions of pounds from the private sector has been invested in the rail network. The simple reality is that if we nationalise the rail network, which I sincerely hope we do not, British Rail or whatever we choose to call it would be very low down on the list of demands on the Treasury. Do we want money for the health service, schools and 1,001 other things? The simple fact is that there would be a spiralling down, just as there was in the 1970s and 1980s.

To conclude, I urge the Minister to meet me to discuss further how we can get over the immediate problems and look forward to a direct service along the east coast main line serving my constituency and the neighbouring constituency of Grimsby. I ask him not to say, as many other Ministers have over the past few years, “When we get HS2, there will be more capacity on the east coast main line, so you will be able to get a service through to Cleethorpes.” I am afraid that that timescale is simply not acceptable, even if it is 2033 or thereabouts when HS2 comes along. If a week is a long time in politics, 15 years must be generations. I urge the Minister to look again at the economic arguments for the regeneration of an area that has just been granted a unique town deal status by the Government. We need improved road and rail networks. I am fully supportive of improvements to the east coast main line, but only if they can in addition provide direct services to Cleethorpes.

Open Access Rail Services

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Tuesday 10th July 2018 Westminster Hall

[Martin Vickers]

I thoroughly agree. My hon. Friend’s experience as a former Minister makes that a particularly relevant point.

We are currently experiencing record private investment in UK rail. In 2016-17, that investment totalled £925 million—the highest since records began. The vast majority—£767 million—was spent on rolling stock. Some of that went to Hull Trains.

Given the other demands on the Budget, the idea that more taxpayer investment would go towards the railways was a myth. I know the Opposition’s policy is to renationalise the railways, but those of us who remember the nationalised system know that, in fact, it spiralled down because of a lack of investment. The reality is that there are so many calls on Government investment that transport does not get what it deserves. If the Government have a choice between investing in the health service and improving the rail services to Cleethorpes, I rather suspect that the rail services to Cleethorpes would suffer.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

On that point, I am a Labour and Co-operative Member of Parliament, and there are proposals for the co-operatisation of the railways. An open access operator—Go-Op—is developing a route in the south-west. Diversifying rail ownership is a big priority for the Co-operative party and for me as a Member of Parliament. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that we need diversity of ownership in the system?

[Martin Vickers]

I am perfectly happy to have diversity of ownership—that is what the free market would most likely deliver. Sadly, the history of British Rail did nothing to encourage my enthusiasm for a nationalised system. Indeed, British Rail ended the direct service to Cleethorpes in 1992.

There has been record investment and record numbers of journeys in recent years. Passenger numbers fell under British Rail but, since privatisation in 1994, the numbers swelled to 1.65 billion in 2015—almost triple the low point of 1982. Although there have been clear failings by Virgin Trains, it is vital to look beyond the headlines. Thanks to the Transport Secretary’s efforts, rail efficiency has been improved, ensuring that passengers and taxpayers get maximum value. On average, 97% of every pound of passengers’ fares goes back into the railway, which is very welcome.

Since Virgin took over its franchise in 2015, it has contributed more to the taxpayer than when the service was publicly run. Refurbished trains, additional services and improved ticketed access are just a few of the benefits that passengers have experienced. Of course, Virgin is not blameless in the debacle, but it is not alone. Network Rail, the publicly owned element of the railways, failed to deliver the promised improvements on which Virgin based its final projections.

I have been reassured by the Transport Secretary’s commitment to a new approach from 2020, with the first regional public-private partnership on the route. The partnership will have one brand, one management team and one leader, which will ensure that it is transparent and accountable to both Parliament and passengers.

A privatised franchise system on the east coast is preferable to the publicly owned system that preceded it. It has also been improved dramatically by the advent of open access operators, which provide constant competition to drive up standards and outcomes for passengers. The main problem is that the rail industry has been reformed to an unsatisfactory halfway house between nationalisation and privatisation. The solution, contrary to what many in the Opposition would argue, is not to nationalise the whole system—the experience of British Rail shows where that will take us—but to push ahead with privatisation and extend the market by allowing open access on other lines which could benefit so greatly from it. The hard left so often tell us that true communism has not been tried, but in actual fact true competition has not been tried on our rail network.

Open access could be a logical component of the Prime Minister’s mission, which she set out at the party conference last year, saying of free markets that she was

“prepared to reform them when they don’t work.”

The rail service is a prime example of a market underperforming. The solution, rather than to take the market out of the picture altogether and reverse all the progress made over the past few decades, is to reform the market, taking on the monopolies so as to expand it and allow it to flourish.

Competition must extend beyond the bidding stage to avoid the winner being granted a complete monopoly. The message to existing franchise operators and bidders should be clear: expect competition in future.

Anti-Semitism

Alex Sobel Excerpts

Tuesday 17th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

This has been an emotional debate, and an emotional debate for me—I came into politics to fight racism and I have never resiled from that position. For me, it has always been the case that racism includes anti-Semitism. Jew hatred is race hatred, and one anti-Semite in the Labour party is one too many.

I begin by congratulating my colleagues—

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Ms Abbott]

I need to make some progress. I congratulate my hon. Friends the Members for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger), for Bassetlaw (John Mann), for Stoke-on-Trent North (Ruth Smeeth), for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Mike Kane), for Bury South (Mr Lewis), for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman) and for Dudley North (Ian Austin) on their very powerful speeches, but I think—

--- Later in debate ---

[Ms Abbott]

The Charedi community has asked me to make these points.

[Alex Sobel]

Will my right hon. Friend give way now?

[Ms Abbott]

There has been—[Interruption.]

--- Later in debate ---

[Ms Abbott]

indicated assent.

[Alex Sobel]

I thank my right hon. Friend for giving way. Perhaps she was not aware that I was the only Jewish parliamentarian who was not called to speak in the debate.

After the holocaust memorial debate, I was subjected to quite horrific abuse. I shall give one example. Mr Leonard said on Channel 4’s Facebook page, “Why is this Jewish Zionazi speaking in the English Parliament?” Does she agree that we need to tackle this not just on social media —we need to take more action there—but right across the political spectrum in our own party?

[Ms Abbott]

I am grateful that Members have allowed me to speak on behalf of the Charedi community. I want to go on, in the few minutes available—[Interruption.]