Queen's Speech

Baroness Andrews Excerpts

Thursday 3rd June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Andrews]

My Lords, it is my great pleasure to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Kakkar, on an excellent maiden speech and in particular on his passionate advocacy of the NHS and patients; that is most welcome in this House. He knows that he joins a galaxy of talent among our noble medics, but we have never before had a specialist on thrombosis. He spoke about leadership, and I understand that he leads the only multidisciplinary programme in the area of cancer-oriented thrombosis.

I made the mistake of printing out the noble Lord’s list of publications. Several hours and reams of paper later, I can vouch for his industry as well as his expertise. In addition, thrombosis affects us all, and he will be listened to most attentively in this House—particularly, I suspect, from the Front Bench, which spends hours sitting still. We look forward to his expertise.

The noble Lord is also clearly a man of action as well as a tremendous, internationally renowned expert, a deadly combination that puts fear into Ministers. I am sure that we will welcome whatever contribution he has to make in the future.

I also welcome the Minister for Education to the Dispatch Box, and all the maiden speakers who have spoken so eloquently today. Not wishing to be left out, I will claim that I, too, am a maiden speaker. I am speaking from the Back Benches after a long period of exile to the Front Benches; I am speaking in opposition, which is an interesting angle; and I am speaking on a topic on which I have never spoken before but shall return to. It is a sort of cygnet song. I refer to the historic environment and the buildings and places which frame our lives, experiences and memories.

As one of the quartet of policies that we are discussing today, it is a useful and beautiful link between them all. It makes us feel better; it creates jobs and skills, and nurtures experience; and it opens doors to our history. Both the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Guildford in his terrific speech and the noble Lord, Lord Baker, spoke about the importance of history—of knowing ourselves and knowing our country. I think here also of how we frame so much of our cultural activity in our great buildings. For example, in Belsay Hall at the moment there is a magnificent exhibition of contemporary art. This is one of English Heritage’s properties. I must declare an interest as chair of English Heritage.

I want to focus on this area of policy for serious reasons. At a time when we face one of the greatest tests as a country—to rebuild our economy and protect our communities—we must realise, simply, that we must exploit all our resources: our knowledge, our skills and our wealth. In adversity nothing could serve us better than to make more of our historic assets. Sadly, those assets now face significant and new risks. If we are to maximise the possibilities of our historic environment, we need to understand the scope, source and scale of this wealth. Heritage is the main stream of our tourism industry. Four out of 10 people who come here say that they do so because of our heritage. Accounting for £2.6 billion from international tourism and a further £5 billion from domestic tourism, as an economic asset it is just below agriculture and well above motor manufacture. It creates jobs. Between them, the private and public sectors of heritage provide 270,000 jobs and they are not just in the south-east. They are also in those remote and rural areas of the country where options are so few. It has the capacity to grow and become an even greater source of national reputation and wealth.

In short, we are looking at what could become part of the national recovery programme. That is why I am delighted that we now have a dedicated Minister who will combine his responsibilities for heritage with those for tourism. Improving our world heritage site at Stonehenge, which is of global significance and requires a setting which is worthy of that, will form part of the Olympic celebration. We also welcome the Secretary of State’s assurances that the National Lottery will be reformed and funds returned to the four original good causes, including the Heritage Lottery Fund. That means more strategic support for heritage, which is very welcome.

The Government have also made it clear that they want local communities and local authorities to take more control of future services and assets. In some ways they are building on what the previous Government did by putting local assets into the hands of local people to use for community benefit. There is nothing more potent, more local and more important to people than the place where they live. It does not matter whether it is the Sussex Weald or Victorian terraces. This is a Government who want us all to get involved and this is how people do so. Nothing is more evident than this in the big society. Organisations such as the Heritage Alliance and the new Civic Voice will give every encouragement to that.

I hope that, in the decentralisation and localism Bill, a presumption for sustainable development will not turn into a short cut to development at all costs. That would be simply a recipe for disaster. A third asset is the fact that our historic places are, by definition, sustainable resources—far better to invest in them than to let them decay. It is far better that the parish church of which the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Guildford spoke so eloquently becomes a post office or shop than for it to be redundant and unused. I firmly support his appeal for the Government to maintain the VAT exemption on church buildings, which is incredibly important.

The Government need to be alert to this and to the cost benefit. Some of the best and most sustainable examples of social and economic regeneration and success in recent years—places such as Weymouth and Blackpool—have been successful because they are built around their heritage. That must continue. I would suggest that it is a good argument for why a regional funding capacity should continue, so that it can step in where national and local authorities can fail.

The case that I am making must be made now in the context where the risks to this extraordinary heritage have been increasing in recent years. The recession has had a major impact on our ability to protect historic places. Investors are more risk-averse, and owners and developers find it difficult to borrow money. Decay leads to dereliction and disaster. Once you have lost a building—think of the Euston Arch—you cannot recover it. It is not like shutting the door on a room in an art gallery. That risk is accelerating, particularly in relation to our industrial and cultural heritage. Local authorities are losing skilled staff, including conservation officers and planners—the people who guarantee that the places where we live are the best they can possibly be. That context—the financially challenging times that we live in and the accelerating risks—reinforces the case for greater heritage protection and the need for the Government now to provide time for a heritage Bill which will reduce red tape, simplify the system and increase our ability to protect buildings and places at risk. The cost of not doing that will be the huge bills of dereliction and social diminution in the next few years.

I end with this thought: this country leads the world in the care and protection we give the historic environment. People from Moscow, Naples and all over the world come to see how we have done it and to learn from us. Other countries are waking up to what they have already lost. If we do not send the signal that this matters to us, we will lose not only culturally but economically. We will also lose our leadership, which is so important to the rest of the world. Nothing could be further from the truth than that this does not matter. Failure will carry an extremely high price.