European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between James Heappey and Baroness Hayman of Ullock

3rd reading: House of Commons & Committee: 3rd sitting: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Wednesday 8th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sue Hayman]

I would like to speak to new clause 192, to which I have added my name, about Euratom. A number of Conservative Members have spoken with great knowledge about the nuclear industry today, and as chair of the all-party group on nuclear energy I invite them all to join us and to come to our meetings to share their knowledge.

The nuclear industry is critical to my constituency in west Cumbria. Because of that, I have probably had an unusual inbox compared with most hon. Members, in that I have had a large number of direct emails from concerned constituents about the proposed withdrawal from the Euratom treaty. Those constituents are particularly concerned because of the significant negative impact that withdrawal could have on the nuclear industry in the UK. They believe it unnecessary and ill-considered, and are concerned that it will create great disruption in the nuclear industry at a time when we really need to be pressing forward with our nuclear new build programme.

Euratom has had a significant role in establishing its members’ credibility and acceptability in the wider global nuclear community. A constituent has contacted me to say that he believes that exiting will have a significant impact on the cost and the duration of decommissioning, which is of course very important in west Cumbria because of Sellafield. They also believe that the nuclear new build programme at Moorside will be impacted. EDF Energy, which is building the Hinkley Point C project, has said that it believes that ideally the UK should stay in the treaty, as it provides a framework for complying with international standards for handling nuclear materials.

On the issue of safety and materials, another constituent, who worked for very many years as a radiation protection adviser, has been in touch to share his concerns. He has wide experience of applying regulatory controls in workplaces including hospitals, the oil and gas industry, paper and plastics manufacturing, radiography, and the nuclear industry. He says that every one of these is considerably safer today as a result of Euratom—so this is not just about the nuclear industry directly. He goes on to say that he believes it is extremely short-sighted to remove the wealth of information and expertise that has resulted from our membership of Euratom.

[James Heappey]

The hon. Lady and I share a real enthusiasm for the nuclear industry and host it in or near our constituencies. How, specifically, will our withdrawal from Euratom lead to a diminishment of our expertise in how to regulate the nuclear industry?

[Sue Hayman]

I am talking about what constituents who actually work in the industry are telling me. To be honest, I would trust the judgment of my own constituents. In an intervention, I mentioned a constituent who works at the National Nuclear Laboratory, who says that leaving will impair his ability to collaborate with leading scientists and engineers across Europe, to the detriment of science and technology in this country. This is what my constituents are telling me. The hon. Gentleman can choose to disbelieve them—I do not. I trust my constituents.

I do not understand why, when we have conflicting legal opinion on why we have to leave, the Government are insisting so much that we have to. We need to make sure that a rapid exit does not do serious harm to our nuclear industry. We have so much to lose, with so little to gain. I therefore ask Members to support new clause 192.

Local Government Funding: Rural Areas

Debate between James Heappey and Baroness Hayman of Ullock

Monday 11th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Heappey (Wells) (Con)]

I would like to start by introducing a bit of balance, to make the Minister aware that we are not all entirely against him, and welcome the commitment the Government have made to equalise spending on schools. My hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness (Graham Stuart) secured an excellent debate in Westminster Hall at the end of last year in which we were able to advance our views. We had some very encouraging responses from the Minister’s colleague, the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Mr Gyimah).

We very much welcome the investment the Government are making to tackle poor broadband connections in rural areas, their commitment to encourage the mobile phone industry to tackle “not spots”, their welcome commitment—this is particularly important in Somerset —to improve flood defences in our county, and some very important improvements to our road and rail network, so it is not all bad. While imperfect, these Government funding commitments are very welcome and will be an important development to our local economies. It would just be great if they could be accelerated.

That said, Somerset is among the worst-funded local authorities in the country. Currently, those in Hackney receive well over three times the amount per head than residents in Somerset. I do not doubt there are plenty of challenges in Hackney, but it is important that the House recognises that there are plenty of challenges in rural areas too, many of which have been articulated well this evening. I will come on to talk about some of those challenges in my area, but it is important to realise the real deprivation in rural areas too. Some of the most deprived wards in the south-west of England are in my constituency, yet they are in towns and villages that, if I were to list them, would make people picture something very different from the reality of some of the lives of their residents. There is digital exclusion, too, and an isolation that is not felt in urban areas. Lower average earnings, a deteriorating demographic, and poor road, rail and bus connections add to the deprivation I have just mentioned.

Given the challenges we face in Somerset—and in Dorset, Devon, Cornwall and all the other places represented here this evening—one would imagine that the funding formula would be set to close the gap. Sadly, that is not the case. Urban areas will lose about 21% of their funding in the next five years, but in Somerset we will lose 26%. There will be Members in the Chamber whose counties will be losing even more than that. As a proportion, the gap is widening not closing.

It is important to place it on record that our local authorities in Somerset are guilty of good behaviour. They have already been riding to the instructions the Government have set. Sedgemoor District Council recently announced a co-operative working arrangement with South Somerset District Council, which crosses the partisan divide. There is a sharing of chief executive and there are greater synergies in the back office. Mendip District Council has a fantastic hub in its council offices, which brings together police and other local services so they can all take advantage of that council building and achieve a saving. Indeed, it has been outsourcing many of its functions to achieve greater cost-effectiveness.

Somerset County Council, too, is guilty of good behaviour, having worked incredibly hard to tackle the enormous debt left by the previous Liberal Democrat administration—no matter how much the latter try to forget it when criticising the council. It is heavily involved in joint working with Devon, North Somerset, and Bath and North East Somerset, and is considering the smarter use of buildings. Particularly successful is how it is trying to use libraries: Glastonbury library will soon be overhauled and be a place not only for books and the internet but to see the police, the citizens advice bureau and local council and public health representatives —all sorts of things delivered under one roof, achieving a welcome saving for local government.

This evening, we have heard many examples of the challenges of rural life and the expense, both public and private, to our constituents. On a particularly pressing issue, Glastonbury, which Members might consider to be a significant place, has recently discovered that all three of its remaining banks are to close within 12 weeks of each other. It is an extraordinary thing to happen in a place as important and internationally famous as Glastonbury, yet it is going to happen. All those who walk to the bank in Glastonbury, many of whom are elderly or less mobile, will now have to get the bus to Street or elsewhere. The banks will say, “You can do all this online”, but these are the people, even if they have the connectivity, who are least comfortable online. They will travel on the bus, requiring a public service they would not have needed if at least one of the banks had stayed.

We in rural areas pay the same for our mobile phones and internet connections as those who live in urban areas, yet we get so much less, and we travel further for our healthcare. Some appointments are inaccessible for those who rely on public transport. There are parts of my constituency from which one cannot reach Taunton, Yeovil, Bath or Bristol for an out-patient appointment, or from which it is extraordinarily difficult to reach a GP surgery or health clinic. I have met constituents who allowed minor conditions to fester because they put off making the journey until it became sufficiently urgent that they needed an ambulance to hospital. That cannot be right.

I have met young people in my constituency who allow the cost of public transport, or their inability to access a council-funded bus pass, to influence their decisions about the qualifications and education they seek post-16. It is ridiculous that they should limit their life chances because they cannot afford a bus pass to get to college to complete their A-levels, apprenticeship or something else.

My hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray) spoke eloquently about carparks. Free parking is very important to the rejuvenation of our high streets, yet local authorities are over a barrel because parking has become an essential part of their revenue generation, meaning they cannot free up free parking because they would risk no longer being able to balance their books. That is a real challenge.

Adult social care, which we have spoken about already, is a huge and growing expense. The south-west, and Somerset in particular, is a popular place for retirement. I welcome that and think we should celebrate it—it is because it is simply the most beautiful region in the UK—but that growth in the retired population comes at an extraordinary cost. I met a carer before Christmas who told me that her clients for a day were spread over 300 square miles. That means that that carer can see fewer people than her counterpart in an urban area, which means that the cost of adult social care is so much greater in our part of the world.

[Sue Hayman]

Very briefly on vulnerable older people, I was shocked to discover that nearly 300 elderly people died in Cumbria last winter because they did not have proper heating or were not able to look after themselves properly. If the cuts to rural authorities continue, I am concerned that carers will not spot these vulnerable people as they have in the past and the problem will be exacerbated. Does the hon. Gentleman agree?

[James Heappey]

I very much agree with the hon. Lady. I, too, have been struck by what I have heard when I have met social care providers in my constituency. While I trust absolutely that they would deliver first-rate care on their visits, they have been imploring me to get permission for them to visit people just once a day for 30 minutes, rather than twice for 15 or 20 minutes. That might make sense, in that ultimately the person will be getting one, better quality visit, but it would reduce the contact that these vulnerable people have with the outside world and extend the length of time they go without seeing anybody who is supposed to be keeping an eye on them. That is a challenge we face, and we may have to go for what the care providers are suggesting, but it would come at considerable risk.

That is an example of just how expensive it is to do these things in our parts of the world, and the Government need to recognise that in the way they fund local authorities. We understand well—certainly those of us on the Conservative Benches—the Government’s need to balance the nation’s finances. I have been struck by the sentiment expressed this evening, which is very much not that we expect more from the Government but that we expect fairer spending in what they have already committed to spend. I implore the Government please to implement the rural services delivery grant not in part but in full, and as early as possible; to incentivise our councils by confirming that they can keep all that they raise in rates; and to commit to ending the inequality between urban and rural funding, albeit not by asking rural residents to bridge the gap by paying higher taxes, when, as I have said, they are already enduring a higher cost of living, and on lower wages too.

Above all else, let us certainly commit to ensuring that the gap will not widen on this Government’s watch. Sparsity ensures that the cost of doing things in places such as my constituency is more expensive than doing them elsewhere. As I have said, carers spend longer in their cars. School buses are required to carry more pupils over longer distances, which requires more fuel, and the same goes for rubbish and recycling trucks. Less can be done online because there simply is not the connectivity. We pay more in tax and receive less in Government spending, and all to achieve the minimum in local authority service provision. We are asking Somerset County Council to achieve something akin to alchemy. While I applaud it for doing a very good job indeed, it is little wonder that things such as bus services, libraries, road improvements and myriad things besides—things that we would think of as essential to providing the grease for rural life—are coming to be seen as discretionary.

In rural areas we face deprivation, isolation, higher taxes and a contraction of the local services that are so valued and needed by our constituents, and we risk making that worse, not better, under this Conservative Government. I urge the Government to find another way. We must spend our money more fairly and bridge the gap between rural and urban.