Water and Sewage Companies: Directors’ Remuneration

Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe Excerpts

Thursday 22nd February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, I am glad to be able to make a brief contribution in the gap. All the contributions have confirmed the relevance and timeliness of my noble friend’s debate, and I congratulate him. I want to reiterate the urgent need for action. Our sewage crisis has become a scandal: negligence, complacency and paying dividends to shareholders, rather than investing in infrastructure, have allowed our rivers, lakes and the seas around our coastal areas to become open sewers. My party is determined that evidence of continued sewage pollution should lead to a criminal offence.

Tuesday’s Channel 4 documentary on the subject alerted the whole country to the repugnant truth that deliberate discharging of raw sewage has been allowed to continue, and has even been encouraged, while 10 water bosses last year received bonuses totalling £2.5 million. I welcome the recent announcement in the other place that water bosses are set to be banned from receiving bonuses if the company has committed serious criminal breaches. As my party has said, it is high time that we made the polluter, not the public, pay.

Instead of asking customers to pay more for their water during a cost of living crisis, we should compel water bosses to count the cost. Senior executives should face personal criminal liability for extreme and persistent law-breaking. Furthermore, my party wants to introduce automatic fines for illegal discharges of a size that water bosses cannot ignore. I would like to see Ofwat have the power to force all companies to monitor every single water outlet.

After years of appalling spills—although I take issue with the word, as it somehow implies accidental leakages—firmer action is desperately overdue. Ofwat announced measures to ban future bonuses for bosses of companies that were found to have harmed the environment last year. Given that Ofwat is still to consult on whether the plan would actually go ahead, can the Minister assure us that the Government’s recently announced proposals will be enough to clean up our polluted waters? What steps will they be taking to reduce reliance on water companies’ self-monitoring?

Queen’s Speech

Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Bristol on her engaging and thoughtful maiden speech. She spoke of her passion to confront injustice, inequality and homelessness and, looking ahead, I am sure she will make an important contribution to our debates. I am also looking forward to the maiden speech of my friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, shortly.

I welcome the opportunity to take part in this debate on the humble Address. I gave prior notice to the Minister that I would talk about housing—not part of the theme of today’s debate—because I cannot speak on Monday. I declare my interest as chair of the National Housing Federation, the trade body for housing associations in England.

The Queen’s Speech was a missed opportunity. This House knows that the country faces an enormous housing challenge. High house prices and rents, poor-quality homes and the shortage of new homes of a range of tenures are all contributing to 8 million men, women and children being unable to live in a home suitable for them or their family. I am disappointed that this Queen’s Speech did not feature a comprehensive plan to tackle the housing crisis. From helping rough sleepers off the streets to helping families across the country on to the housing ladder, the Government have missed the opportunity to present an ambitious programme of legislation to fix the broken housing market. I urge the Government to restore the public’s faith that they will invest in the affordable homes we need and use the forthcoming Budget to make ambitious commitments to do so.

Last week Channel 4 News showed Mohammed, Wajidah and their four children who live, eat and sleep in one room in a hostel for the homeless. Mohammed started to go blind six years ago and his wife Wajidah has given up work to be his full-time carer. Their children struggle with doing homework, do not have anywhere to play and have to take two buses and walk just to get to school. It has affected their mental health, their marriage and their children’s educational prospects. The family are on housing benefit, cannot find anywhere to rent privately and have been on council waiting lists for months.

Last year, 726 people died while homeless. One of them was Gyula Remes, who died on the doorsteps of Parliament after sleeping in Westminster Tube station. This is the real picture of the housing crisis in Britain today. The benefit freeze is pushing low-income families to the brink, with more than nine in 10 homes for private rent too expensive for those on housing benefit. It is a sobering fact that two-thirds of these families are in work.

What is the solution? Housing associations share the Government’s commitment to help more families into home ownership. Over the next five years, they will support record numbers into shared ownership, working in partnership with local and national government. But a shift by this Administration towards further emphasis on home ownership would be a mistake, if it comes at the expense of social housing. That is where most progress is needed. Research from the National Housing Federation reveals that we should be building 145,000 affordable homes each year for the next 10 years to fix the broken housing market. The NHS, Shelter, Crisis, the CPRE and the CIH have made a united call for investment of £12.8 billion a year, for 10 years, to do this. Imagine the political return from that. We last made a commitment on that scale under a hero of the current Prime Minister, Sir Winston Churchill.

I know the ask is ambitious, but it is worth bearing in mind that we currently spend £20 billion a year on housing benefit. Investment now in social and affordable housing would help save money for future generations. For comparison, we spend a similar amount on roads. As the Government put the finishing touches to their national infrastructure strategy, mentioned by Her Majesty, I hope housing will be included.

I have a plea for the Minister to speak to his Treasury colleagues and consider a generation-defining commitment in the upcoming Budget. Will the Government confirm the next affordable housing programme? Without it, we are likely to face a sharp fall in the new supply of homes, as uncertainty persists. Will the Minister confirm to the House whether a new long-term affordable homes programme from April 2021 will be part of the Budget on 6 November and, if not, when?

I must say something about building safety. Two years on, we must not forget the tragedy of the Grenfell Tower fire. There are still tens of thousands of people going to sleep every night without the certainty that they are living in a safe home. I welcome the Government’s commitment to building safety, with the inclusion of a building safety Bill in this week’s Queen’s Speech. Ministers must guarantee that everyone has the basic right to live in a safe home.

This progress should not end with a new regulator; the Government need to make sure that funding is available for local councils and housing associations to carry out safety remediation, when the regulations have failed in the past. They must also provide clarity and co-ordination on how these works will be carried out to enable housing associations to complete them as quickly as possible, and continue their other important work building new social housing. The testing process—of fire doors, insulation and cladding—must be more transparent. Where regulation has failed, it is imperative that the Government restore trust. A large factor in rebuilding trust is making sure that tenants have a real voice.

There is not a one-size-fits-all approach. As the Housing Minister in the other place said, we must be “tenure-blind” and build homes to meet people’s needs at every step of their housing journey—from supported housing to council or association social rent, and from the PRS to a private home. Fixing the housing crisis must be a priority for this Government, not only because it is the right thing to do but because the majority of the public are calling for a solution to this national emergency. As the British Social Attitudes survey has shown, building homes for social rent and housing that are affordable to people on average and lower incomes are priorities for the public.

I end by going back to Mohammed and Wajidah. If they had a suitable home to live in, their lives would improve dramatically. Their children would have somewhere suitable to complete their homework each evening, they would not have such a long journey to school and there would be an immediate impact on their mental health. I have outlined some of the ways in which we could fix the housing emergency in our country today. It is a great shame that the Government did not choose to use this Queen’s Speech to make more progress.

Rural Economy (Rural Economy Committee Report)

Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe Excerpts

Tuesday 8th October 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, I commend the Rural Economy Committee on the strength of this report, and the noble Lord, Lord Foster, for calling this debate. However, I am also disappointed, not with the report, but with its finding that,

“successive governments have underrated the contribution rural economies can make to the nation’s prosperity and wellbeing”.

The Government’s recent response to this report reinforced my disappointment, in that it rejected a key recommendation of the report that a comprehensive rural strategy is needed. I hope that, in his reply to the debate, the Minister will set out more clearly the Government’s strategy and vision.

There have been a number of recent reports on the rural economy, from this House and the other place, to say nothing of the many interest groups and scholars who regularly conduct and publish research on issues relating to rural life. These reports all reinforce the analysis in the noble Lord’s report of the importance of the rural economy, the challenges it faces and its vast potential. None of these three things can be in doubt. The overwhelming majority—over 90%—of land in England is rural. Nearly 10 million people live in rural areas, and they contribute £246 billion to the economy. The noble Lord, Lord Foster, reminded us that the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy said, only recently, that,

“some of the biggest economic opportunities are in the rural parts of the United Kingdom”.

For many, to think of England is to think of rural land. It is vital that we in this House keep our rural communities front and centre in our deliberations, to support them in overcoming the challenges they face. They certainly do face a set of challenges, distinct from our urban communities. The committee’s report describes many of these. They face problems of physical connectivity, in the form of poor and irregular public transport. They face problems of digital connectivity, with slow broadband speeds making it frustratingly difficult to take an active role in the digital world. Of particular interest to me, they face a shortage of affordable housing. I declare an interest as the chair of the National Housing Federation.

Housing affordability, or lack of it, is not unique to rural areas. Many of the root causes are the same as those being experienced by all our communities: the high price of land; underresourced local authorities navigating a planning system in need of reform; and the need for greater funding for social housing. These are all issues which, in the long run, it is in the Government’s gift to resolve. It is vital for smaller towns and villages across England that the Government do resolve them. While the root causes may be the same, their impact is felt more acutely by our rural communities, and particularly by younger generations. Young people struggle to afford to live in these areas and choose instead to move to more affordable urban communities. The knock-on effects on our rural communities are made clear in the report. Rural businesses lose potential workers and customers of the future; public services become less sustainable; and our buses have fewer passengers as our schools and hospitals face recruitment crises. The community as a whole loses some of the vibrancy associated with different generations living side by side.

The lack of affordable housing is driving these issues at just the time when our rural communities should be experiencing a renaissance. Modern technology presents a fantastic opportunity for towns and villages across England, as a greater number of companies embrace new ways of working. The flexibility given by virtual working gives us a unique opportunity to create a sustainable environment in which geography is no barrier to achievement. Soon it will be the norm for workers to have a real choice about where they live and build their lives, unconstrained by physical proximity to a workplace. Rural economies should be beneficiaries as these new practices become standard, but the growing unaffordability of housing risks squandering the opportunity that technology presents.

Our rural communities are already valuable contributors to the national economy, but they want to do more. They seek to overcome the challenges imposed on them by lack of affordable housing. Housing associations are at the forefront of this activity, working with communities and residents to make rural communities more sustainable. Through such partnerships, we now have such organisations as the Rural Housing Alliance—a coalition of rural housing associations sharing innovation, good practice and ideas. Its rural housing pledge presents a set of commitments to work with rural communities delivering good quality, well-designed homes that prioritise local people in housing need. But as this report finds, there is more to be done if we are to unlock the true potential of rural economies.

We need to ensure that we have the right skills, now and in the future, to build the homes we need. We need to support emerging technologies relating to construction and design, not least modern methods of construction. We need greater levels of funding to deliver homes for affordable and social rent. In particular, we need a planning system that supports the delivery of suitable affordable housing, and local authorities with the resources to facilitate it. By their very nature, many rural schemes are small, and this can lead to them not getting the priority and attention of larger schemes. This is a mistake, because a small number does not mean a small impact when it comes to rural affordable housing. I give the example of west Dorset and the village of Toller Porcorum, where residents have lost their local pub and shop. In 2015, their post office was similarly under threat. Residents worked with the housing association Aster to build six new homes for affordable rent and in the process provided a new, sustainable site for the post office. A vital community hub was kept open thanks to a development of six homes.

That is just one of many examples demonstrating how tackling the issue of affordable housing in our communities can empower the rural economy and make villages and towns sustainable, but so much more could be done with the right government support. So does the Minister agree that we have a duty to support our rural economies? Does he agree that the Government must take action to support the delivery of affordable homes, whether in rural or urban areas? Like others, I urge the Minister to reconsider the need for a strategy. I hope, perhaps above all, that he will re-energise the rural-proofing process, to ensure that all domestic policies take account of rural circumstances and that the needs of the 9.5 million people in rural communities are reflected in government policy and legislation.

Kew Gardens (Leases) (No. 3) Bill [HL]

Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe Excerpts

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 21st May 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Kramer]

My Lords, perhaps I may suggest to the Minister a fairly straightforward way out of this. If I understand the House correctly—of course, I may not—and look at my own view, I do not think anyone has a problem with granting 150-year leases to the seven properties on Kew Green. As the Minister said, six are listed; the seventh is still within a conservation area. No matter what its political colour, the local council will not allow any kind of abuse of those properties through its planning committees. I am sure that being able to lease them for a larger sum of money to ensure that they are restored—I think some are close to falling on someone—would not be opposed by this House. The problem is that the Bill uses a much wider sweep to cover, as the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, said, a great deal more property than those seven houses.

Personally, I do not think the part of the botanic gardens that is so clearly the botanic gardens will be at risk but I want to raise the issue of the parking area. Probably just a few of us here are so familiar with the gardens that we understand the parking area; for those who do not, that area is quite peculiar. It is right on the river, so that some of the best river views in probably all the country are enjoyed by the cars. Part of the parking area is a sort of casual gravel and the rest is a mix of grass and trees, with people trying to park their cars between the trees. There are just a couple of parking meters. I cannot remember what one puts in now—I think it is around £7—but whether you park for five minutes or the whole day, that is it. It is not even supervised.

I know developers have looked at that site and cannot believe that it is put to such a use. The obvious answer for them is to make an offer to Kew to provide some form of alternate parking—there is great pressure not to allow people to bring cars to Kew at all—and use the site for some form of luxury housing. Your Lordships can see why that would be desirable. I think the community would have huge concerns about all this. It would be different if the property was developed to create new buildings for science and the core work—the collection and activities at Kew. But the fear that it could be used for housing or a couple of cafes, or whatever else, comes to mind when you know the area well.

Because that is a completely separate discussion, I suggest to the Minister that since Kew Gardens needs to be able to deal with those seven properties on Kew Green, why not narrow the Bill? Frankly, we could name the seven properties since there is only that small number of them. I am sure this House would then be able to deal with that legislation directly. Meanwhile, the constraint of a 31-year lease continues to apply, which means that if new development of the kind I have just described is to be explored, the Government would have to come back to the House and raise the question around the specific character of that development.

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, as this debate has gone on I have become more and more concerned. When I supported the Bill at Second Reading, it was very much on the basis of emphasising Kew’s world excellence in its particular fields of science. The emphasis on raising the extra money from new sources of private income was entirely based on an understanding that this was what the additional resource might be used for, so I am really anxious.

While I do not want to repeat all the arguments made so far, it seems that unless we specifically indicate or reinforce the original objectives of Kew in the Bill and establish why this change is being introduced, as my noble friends Lord Whitty and Lady Jones seek to do here, there is clear potential for reputational damage to Kew. It is not just among the public that there would be huge reputational impact; it would have an impact on Kew’s ability to raise further funds subsequently because its reputation will have been harmed. Even if the form of words is not right, given the aim of reasserting Kew’s main objectives—I was grateful to the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, for reinforcing the point that the scientific excellence of Kew and its scientific interrogations are its prime focus—I hope the Minister will reconsider.

[Lord Campbell-Savours]

My Lords, I shall intervene only briefly. I sense that the Minister has difficulty in mouthing the words that residential property development could be considered on that site, not now but perhaps in 20 or 30 years’ time when there is a lot of pressure. I understand that, under residential development for flats, that land would probably fetch in the region of £1,500 per square foot. That provides some fairly expensive property. There will be people who, under pressure and needing funds, might take a chance and put in for a development, perhaps on the car park that was just referred to. I support the amendment suggested by my noble friend. In the event that it is rejected at this stage, I might come back at a later stage to see how the legislation, whose subtext is residential development in the long term, can be interfered with and greater restraints than currently exist introduced.

Kew Gardens (Leases) (No. 3) Bill [HL]

Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 7th May 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, some time ago I had the privilege of visiting Kew under the auspices of the all-party parliamentary group. We heard from some of Kew’s senior team and scientists about the amazing work they do by using plant and fungi knowledge to help to solve some of the most critical challenges facing humanity. As well as meeting the scientists, we reviewed their extraordinary and beautiful book collection. I had not realised just how substantial and influential the work at Kew has become, with more than 350 scientists working across six research departments. They draw in the best scholars in their fields from around the world as well as from the UK. Kew’s corporate strategy, Unlocking Why Plants and Fungi Matter, sets out some really exciting plans for the future. For example, I was delighted to hear about its collaboration with Queen Mary University of London on an MSc course. In 2017, Kew won a gold medal at the Chelsea Flower Show for its “State of the World’s Plants” exhibit, bringing its science to new audiences. It is not at all surprising that Kew was awarded UNESCO world heritage site status in 2003. I certainly felt that this was a jewel in the crown of the UK’s scientific excellence to be nurtured and celebrated.

I was therefore very concerned when the then coalition Government planned to cut the state grant in 2016-17, with a potential consequence being the loss of 125 scientific staff. Kew’s funding relies heavily on state grant, although it has been increasingly successful in raising external funds. At the time there was a major public outcry. An inquiry held by the Science and Technology Committee in another place reported that the Government’s management of funding had exacerbated budget reductions and,

“forced a more rapid change in scientific personnel than may otherwise have been necessary”.

In response, the then Deputy Prime Minister accepted that damage would be done if grant was withheld or reduced. Fortunately, the Government announced measures aimed at easing Kew’s difficult position and 2017 saw the start of a positive and very welcome four-year funding settlement from Defra and a capital funding package.

Kew is not the only research establishment to experience the uncertainty and dangers inherent in having to rely substantially on government funding, which can be subject to numerous political uncertainties and changes in policy. Expanding flexibility of resourcing goes some way to protecting major centres of excellence in science such as Kew. Alternative sources of funding will help to ensure that its reputation as a leading research institution can be maintained. That is why I want to support the Bill and wish it a fair wind through this House.

The proposals in the Bill have been in limbo since 2017, which must have been frustrating for all concerned. The Bill’s aim seems quite modest in that it extends the leases already available to Kew for residential and commercial use—thus generating income—from a very limiting 31 years to an expanded 150 years. But although modest, as the Minister said, its effect could have a substantial beneficial impact on the income Kew can generate over time through having longer leases to offer and including, importantly, a reduction in maintenance costs.

I have not said anything about how marvellous Kew is as a garden and special leisure space that we all know and love to visit. I cannot tell your Lordships just what a pleasure it was to be one of the first visitors to the newly renovated Temperate House last year. Anyone who has visited the Hive cannot fail to be impressed. It is a 14 metre-high cube, raised on columns, providing an immersive experience connecting you to real bees. Bees communicate through vibrations, and these vibrations are picked up by a sensor called an accelerometer. The bees’ vibrations are sent in real time to the Hive. Adults as well as children are transfixed. I was thrilled to discover that this amazing experience was made possible through the work of physicist Dr Martin Bencsik of Nottingham Trent University, and I must declare an interest as a board member at Nottingham Trent. It is a great example of how Kew harnesses university science and art together to create awareness of the natural world.

Your Lordships will gather that I am a great fan of Kew, but today I want to focus very specifically on Kew’s world excellence in the fields of science. Without that science, the garden at Kew would lose one of its key purposes, which is to engage the visitor in learning about the natural world and to develop, particularly for children, imaginative ways of understanding why plants and fungi matter.

In proposing the Bill, the Government have said that their aim is to help Kew support its scientific research, as well as to retain its UNESCO world heritage status. I of course support that, but my one anxiety is that the Government will see this as possible substitute funding and use it as a mask for reducing government grant in the future. I hope that in replying the Minister will reassure the House and commit to this additional resource being indeed additional, which will enable Kew to reinforce even further its reputation as a world centre of excellence in sciences.

Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act 2006 Committee Report

Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe Excerpts

Monday 2nd July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, I welcome this debate and commend the report of the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, and his committee and the attention the report brings to the needs of our rural communities. This is Rural Housing Week and this debate is a great opportunity to recognise that our countryside faces huge challenges. It is at a crossroads and we will not set out on the right path unless we recognise the vital role of genuinely affordable housing in creating thriving rural communities. An understanding of this, together with the report’s recommendation for adequate rural proofing of our housing and planning policies, is critical to the future survival of rural communities. I declare an interest as the chair of the National Housing Federation, the trade body representing England’s housing associations.

I concur with the committee’s report that current government policy does not take enough account of either the specific needs of rural communities or the challenges facing them. For too long, these issues have been sidelined and not considered in the context of wider policy-making. We can feel this perhaps most bitterly in the housing crisis, which is too often focused on and dealt with as a solely urban issue. Our rural towns and villages are home to 9 million people. Rural life offers a sense of community and the opportunity to live surrounded by some of our most beautiful scenery, but the housing crisis is damaging our rural areas and threatening this way of life. People are not always familiar with this picture of the countryside but our rural communities are feeling the pressures of the broken housing market as much as the cities are.

A quality, affordable home feels out of reach for many. The most affordable homes cost 8.3 times average wages in rural areas. As local people struggle to remain in their communities, we are seeing the loss of vital services. Schools in rural areas are closing at an average rate of 11 per year and we are losing post offices in rural communities at an average of three per month. It must be a real concern that the average minimum travel time to a hospital in rural areas is 60 minutes, nearly double that in urban areas. The services that people need are not where they need them. It would be very easy to be disheartened but this can be fixed.

The report is exactly right that rural affairs should be linked more closely to the work of the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, recognising the close link between the survival of our rural communities and access to housing. The National Housing Federation and housing associations believe that genuinely affordable homes are the key to supporting rural communities to thrive. The federation’s Rural Life Monitor showed in 2017 that when housing associations work in partnership with local people, including local government, to build even a small number of affordable homes, vital community services stay open.

By building just four affordable homes on Holy Island, Bernicia Homes was able to help keep the island’s sole primary school open. The local post office in Toller Porcorum in West Dorset would have closed when it reached the end of its lease without the intervention of Aster Group and a team of residents living in the village. The community and the housing association worked together to build six affordable homes and a new building for the post office. These are services that add value to rural life, offer opportunities and often employment for families and young people and can really make the difference between a community being viable or not.

Access to affordable homes can enable generations to stay in close proximity, keeping families together and tackling the other scourge of rural living, isolation and loneliness. These homes provide critical support for the rural economy, including the farming and food economy. DAMHA, the Durham Aged Mineworkers’ Homes Association, an extraordinary and historic association, owns and manages 1,700 properties on 130 sites in 80 villages in the former County Durham coalfield, one of the most challenging areas in the north-east with huge regeneration challenges. Part of its mission is to assist in the regeneration of coalfield communities.

These housing associations are anchor organisations in their communities. They act as both landlord and employer and provide a whole host of lifeline services for local people. They are already building the quality homes our rural communities need, but they want to go even further. They have an ambition to deliver, but how can they, when current planning and land policy is not adequately rural proofed? The revised national policy planning framework gives us an immediate opportunity to do just that and to implement the report’s recommendation to rural proof policy. Many of the draft proposals for the revised NPPF should be welcomed for their ambition to make real change to deliver bigger and better.

Will the Minister say whether the impact of these policies on rural communities has been measured at all? There are instances where proposals have clearly not considered the specific complexities facing rural communities. I shall give one example. The proposed entry-level exception sites policy risks undermining the existing and successful rural exception sites model. The proposed model does not involve the community, the homes are not solely for local people and it does not safeguard the affordability of homes for the future. These less stringent criteria are, very unhelpfully, likely to raise land values and could damage the provision of affordable rented homes in rural areas. Unless they are revised, there are potentially very damaging implications for a model that has been successful in delivering for those most in housing need. The proposed standardised approach for measuring housing need is another example. It will not work in a rural setting where population projections are low and housing stock is less flexible. If the revised NPPF is going to meet the needs of rural communities, it must go further. It must emphasise the importance of implementing proper local plans, and it must encourage affordable housing contributions on sites smaller than 10.

As the Government consider the consultation responses for the draft NPPF, can the Minister assure us that they will listen to the concerns of rural housing associations and follow the recommendation of the committee’s report to rural proof this critical policy to ensure it does not leave rural communities behind? During this rural housing week, housing associations will be setting out the sector’s manifesto for rural housing. It states what they will do to boost rural housing supply through working in partnership with local communities, but it is also a call to action for parliamentarians. We need policies in place that can unlock the potential of rural housing associations to build the genuinely affordable rural homes we need. As we stand at a crossroads, the survival of our rural communities depends on it.

Fulbright Scholarship Programme: Funding

Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe Excerpts

Monday 22nd November 2010 Lords Chamber

Asked By

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have for the funding of the Fulbright scholarship programme in the light of the United States’ commitment to maintain its level of funding.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Henley)]

My Lords, we are still working our way through the detail of the spending review and cannot yet confirm the level of funding for the Fulbright scholarship programme from 2011. We recognise the importance of the Fulbright scholarship programme. Officials will continue to engage with the commissioners on these issues. We will communicate the outcome of the funding settlement as soon as we can.

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe]

I thank the Minister for that reply, but I hope that he can give me just a little more comfort. He will know the huge added value that the UK Government grant can leverage in the numbers of scholarships. The grant is modest, but it is crucial to increasing the number of awards. Does he agree that if the Government do not maintain their grant, it may affect that leverage? Is there not a danger that potential donors will think that the UK Government are not paying their rightful share?

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I want to make it clear that the United Kingdom Government are fully committed to the Fulbright scholarship programme and that we will provide the best possible settlement. However, we are not in a position to make that clear at the moment. The noble Baroness is right to stress that there are other funds that can come in, and I pay tribute to the Fulbright Commission for bringing in significant new funds from university partners, donations and research charities. I hope that that will continue. Nevertheless, as I made clear in my original Answer, we cannot make any commitment at this stage.