Local Government Funding

Debate between Baroness Bray of Coln and Neil Carmichael

Monday 6th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

Hon. Members will be pleased to know that I will keep my remarks short.

Given where the country finds itself financially, it would have been strange if local government had been immune to the tough choices that the coalition Government have been forced to take to cut the deficit and to get the country back on track. Decisions on local government spending are indeed tough, with a 7.5% cut in spending each year between now and 2014. However, as many colleagues have said, the cut may well be lower due to other revenue streams.

Although the impact is painful, the coalition has taken decisions to make it as fair as possible. Councils up and down the land will be supported in freezing council tax in 2011-12 through additional funding equivalent to the revenue from a 2.5% rise in council tax. That honours a coalition agreement promise to freeze council tax, even in the face of the worst debt crisis since the second world war. It is also an essential ingredient of the coalition’s policy on fairness, because it helps the lower-paid and pensioners in particular, who have seen their council tax double since 1997. The average band D council tax bill is now nearly £1,500, which frankly beggars belief.

As with so many issues, we still do not have a clue how the Labour party would approach this difficult funding issue. It has to get over its denial about the financial problems that face this country. It continues simply to complain and scaremonger, yet it never tells us how it would deal with the problem, except to imply that somehow it would be able to do so without having to take any difficult decisions. More likely, it is not coming clean with us about the plans that we know it had, because it does not want to talk about them any longer. We are where we are because of years of overspending without a care in the world by the Labour party. Now the pain starts as we rebuild our finances. At least Government Members know what we have to do.

The most important reform that the coalition is introducing in local government is more localism. One way in which the Government are trying to alleviate the difficult measures is to free funding from being overly ring-fenced. That will allow local councils to use their revenue with much more flexibility, so that they can meet local needs in the way that they know best.

[Neil Carmichael (Stroud) (Con)]

The debate has focused on two issues. Obviously, the cuts are the primary issue, but there is a secondary one. Does my hon. Friend agree that the opportunities that the coalition Government are giving local authorities to be imaginative and even radical in reforming their services and their approach to local government will pave the way for exciting, diversified and genuinely local authorities?

[Angie Bray]

I thank my hon. Friend for that contribution. Of course, I agree that it is a great thing to get local authorities back to doing what they do best, which is to work closely with their local residents to ensure that they give them what they need.

As hon. Members have said, many local authorities across the country are considering how they can take out costs in their back rooms by working together to run services. My hon. Friend the Member for Halesowen and Rowley Regis (James Morris) mentioned Kensington and Chelsea borough council getting together with Westminster city council and Hammersmith and Fulham council to do just that. Those boroughs happen to make up my previous London assembly seat and they are all, I should add, Conservative-run. They are doing what local councils should be doing—making efficiency savings in bureaucracy where possible, rather than hitting front-line services.

My local, Labour-led council, Ealing, has been quick to announce plans for a range of cuts, including cutting day care centres, a child protection officer and more than 50% of park rangers. Enviro-crime officers are also to be cut, from 23 to 12, yet it is happy to find £3 million for new computers at the town hall and, quite disgracefully, it is to continue funding full-time trade union officials to the tune of £250,000 a year.

Anti-Slavery Day

Debate between Baroness Bray of Coln and Neil Carmichael

Thursday 14th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Neil Carmichael (Stroud) (Con)]

I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern), who made an important point about the anger and determination of people 200 years ago to do something about slavery, and about how we need a similar fury now about the outrages we are aware of here. Funnily enough, my constituency played a major part in the abolition of slavery in so far as one of my predecessors promoted legislation to abolish it in the 1830s, and an archway was erected to celebrate the end of slavery—it is one of the few such archways still remaining. The sad thing is that it celebrates the end of something that has not quite ended, and we need to bear that in mind in this very important debate. We need to excite that sense of fury and anger about slavery.

I want to make several points. The first is that we have to get a measure of the problem, and my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) did exactly that. The fact that 27 million people across the globe are in slavery is simply outrageous. We cannot tolerate it.

My second point is about the importance of border control. I hope that the Minister will highlight how that will be strengthened. It is critical that we tackle border control issues, and it is very important that we deliver meaningful results.

The Chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee, the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), put his finger on an important point. It is not just that they have come here that matters; where they came from and how they got here also matter. That international dimension needs a focus too, because we cannot just sit here on an island and say, “We’re doing okay. How about the rest of you?” We need to take an international attitude. At the end of the day, as recipients of the problem, even if we deal with specific cases more satisfactorily, a threat will still remain, because people will still be trafficking from other places. We therefore need to use our influence to tackle the source of the problem and those who traffic.

That brings me to the EU directive against trafficking mentioned by several people today. As I understand it, we will be reviewing our position once that directive is confirmed. Furthermore, of course, we are signatories to the Council of Europe convention on action against trafficking, which is robust in its attitude. However, I hope that the Minister will look carefully at the EU directive, because if we are serious about taking action, we need to consider its impact.

I want to talk about the rule of law. A lot of people have talked about the legislation and measures already in place. Yes, they probably are in place, and we may need to strengthen some of them, but in this case the rule of law is being flagrantly abused by many. It is, therefore, a question of enforcement as well. We have to get the question of enforcement right, because, at the end of the day, a country such as ours should be able to pack a punch in that respect.

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that we should applaud an initiative by the Metropolitan police to press for legislation that would allow editors who continue to publish sex adverts that can then be linked to trafficking to be arrested and tried in court? Does he agree with the words of the deputy Mayor for London responsible for policing? He said:

“We don’t allow drug dealers to advertise in newspapers so why should we allow traffickers to advertise prostitution?”