Building Societies Act 1986 (Amendment) Bill

Jo Gideon Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 19th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Sunderland Central (Julie Elliott) on bringing forward this important Bill. As has been said, she has support across the House. It is with some trepidation that I follow my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman): he has taken the debate into a much wider context, as I also intended to do, although from an urban and community banking perspective. He is absolutely right about the importance of civic activity and community-based financial services, and the Bill goes a little way towards triggering that by bringing about a level playing field between building societies and banks so that they can compete more fairly.

The Bill will support building societies to do more lending in a safe and secure way, and it is welcomed by many, as the hon. Member for Sunderland Central said, including the Building Societies Association. It is a great starting point, but the economic landscape continues to change and building societies need the opportunity to remain competitive, so secondary legislation will be required to ensure that changes to regulations for other financial service providers are matched by updating the framework for building societies. The Government consulted on similar changes in 2022, and the Bill largely mirrors the proposals from the consultation, which were welcomed by the industry.

There are some modest but fundamental changes in the Bill that are really important. Building societies were founded to help working people to own a home of their own, and their mutual status means that their sole purpose is to serve their customers. They direct a greater proportion of their lending to first-time buyers than banks do, but they are constrained by archaic legislation unfit for today’s economy. Without this small but important piece of legislation, the competitive playing field in lending is not as level as it could or should be.

Under the Building Societies Act 1986, building societies are subject to funding limits that their high street banking competitors are not. Those limits require at least half their funding to come from savings deposits made by retail savers. In areas such as Stoke-on-Trent, both the average savings and the number of savers are lower than in more affluent areas, and consequently smaller local building societies are restricted in the numbers of mortgages they can offer, even though they are needed.

The proposed changes to the 1986 Act will not alter the funding limit but, as the hon. Lady outlined, they will remove certain key impediments, thereby enabling building societies to lend more and ensuring that more mortgage loans are available to UK homebuyers at competitive rates, and, crucially, to first-time buyers, who are the lifeblood of the housing market, as well as those further up the ladder.

Indeed, the Bill seeks to unlock billions of pounds of extra lending for first-time buyers and homeowners. It is estimated that for every £10 billion of new lending capacity that is unlocked there is the potential to support an additional 20,000 average first-time buyers. Risk needs to be managed, but smaller building societies in particular should not be tarred with the same brush as high street banks. Regulation needs to be simplified and made easier for them, because within their customer base they cater for a group of people who are on the edge of mainstream banking.

If local building societies did not exist, some people would be entirely disenfranchised by banking, so their mission is a social one as much as a financial one. The banking sector has essentially become a risk management business. As building societies grow, they manage more risk and the regulators are not keen to take that on. Although the inertia that creates is understandable, it makes it incredibly difficult to change the system. One particular issue on which I have campaigned for some time is the one-size-fits-all regulation that burdens smaller lenders and stifles innovation in the banking and non-banking financial sector.

The Netflix movie “Bank of Dave”, which tells the story of Dave Fishwick’s journey trying to open a community bank in Burnley, hit the top 10 in America four days after its release and captured the imagination of the British public last year. Dave’s innovative ideas make sense to the nation, but the existing regulatory framework does not seem able to adapt and respond to them. I have been working with Dave Fishwick and forward-thinking organisations in the financial services sector to push for a simpler regulatory framework and to enable a model that can provide the template for the creation of community banks throughout the country.

We do not have enough regional banks or facilities such as building societies, where those who serve local people understand their needs. People do not want to be faced with a computer that simply says no. If anywhere needs a healthy local banking system in which local people feel included, it is Stoke-on-Trent—as well as Norfolk, of course. We need small businesses to be able to access loans and homebuyers to be able to secure mortgages from those who understand the people they are serving, and whose bottom line is helping their community, rather than maximum profit.

In our quest for economic growth, we know that the biggest growth sector is small businesses, which represent more than 95% of all business, yet high street banks are not lending to them because they represent the highest risk levels. Many small businesses need to borrow to grow, and the current options are not adequate, so let us enable the smaller challenger banks and community development finance institutions to flourish, and make it easier for building societies to lend more to first-time buyers.

Building societies offer a huge opportunity. They are communities paying for the community, which matters hugely in places like Stoke-on-Trent where there is a great sense of place and pride and people want to help each other. Building societies can offer more to the community than high street banks because they have a social mission. I recently spoke to Hanley Economic building society in my constituency, and it shared its plans to use funds from dormant accounts to invest in local projects. It still protects the dormant account holder 100%, but in the meantime wants to use the business to make a difference in Stoke-on-Trent. It makes sense, because it uses local people’s money to invest in local projects.

Modernising the legislation on building societies is long overdue. Building societies were founded to help working people to own a home of their own and are an essential part of our communities. In order to be sustainable, building societies need to be allowed to grow, at least at the pace of the rest of the sector. In order to do that, they need to lend, but without the retail funding that the Bill would allow, they cannot do so effectively. Other sectors, whether that be mutuals or friendly societies, have had similar updates to bring their regulation in line with competition in the sector, so this is a crucial opportunity to enable building societies to do the same.

The Bill is an important starting point, and primary legislation is needed, but as the economic landscape changes building societies need the opportunity to remain competitive, so secondary legislation will be necessary to ensure that the legal framework is up to date. That includes measures to tidy up anomalies in the 1986 Act. One long overdue piece of legal housekeeping is to make the directors’ retirement age provisions in the Act explicitly consistent with the Equalities Act 2010. Section 60(8) of the 1986 Act states that the normal retirement age for a director of a building society is 70. A retirement age for plcs used to be set out in the Companies Act, but after the Equality Act 2010 outlawed age discrimination, the provision was deleted from the Companies Act. Nevertheless, the statutory normal retirement age has not been removed from the 1986 Act.

It may seem like a silly example, but it currently means that there are two contradictory statutory provisions. It would be much better if the retirement-age provisions of the 1986 Act were removed, as has happened for plcs. Simply because a director has just had their 70th birthday—I feel this personally—does not mean they are no longer competent. They have huge amounts of experience, they understand the market, and firing them would be demonstrably wrong for the business.

The Bill will support building societies to better weather periods of financial stress and help to minimise risk in the banking sector. Building societies have around 1,300 branches. As we heard earlier, that is down by around a fifth compared with 2015, but the number of bank branches has declined even faster, more than halving since 2015, so there is a real need for more locally based lending in communities throughout the country, as well as more encouragement of savings that stay in the community to support lending.

The changes in the Bill will help to level the playing field for building societies to compete more fairly with banks, and will support them to do more lending. Crucially, as the building society sector directs a greater proportion of lending to first-time buyers compared with banks, that will benefit more people looking to get on to the housing ladder. Increased lending is essential to the UK’s future prosperity and economic growth.

In 2021, the Bank of England launched a project called “Strong and Simple”, the aim of which was simplification and which goes to the heart of what I was saying earlier. Smaller building societies, and smaller banks and other lending institutions, spend far too much of their time having to comply with regulations that were written for high street banks and large global billion-pound or billion-dollar businesses. If things were made less onerous for them, they could innovate more and proliferate throughout the country.

“A strong and simple prudential framework for non-systemic banks and building societies”, published by the Prudential Regulation Authority, set out a vision for simplifying the prudential requirements for smaller, domestic-focused banks and building societies while maintaining those firms’ resilience. The invitation to comment seems to have met with resistance from the risk-averse industry, which in my view is based on penalising the minnows while protecting the giants, so inertia reigns and progress is slow.

I hope that small changes such as those proposed today to make for fairer competition will be the forerunner of larger reforms, such as a new framework for small domestic deposit takers that will enable the financial services sector to embrace change for the benefit of the most marginalised and under-served communities and businesses.

Energy Trilemma

Jo Gideon Excerpts

Thursday 23rd March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)]

First, I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire (Dame Andrea Leadsom) for securing this debate and for being a fantastic chair of the 1922 Back-Bench business committee. It has been an honour to be her vice-chair. As she mentioned, the committee has looked in detail at the challenges of the energy trilemma over the past year. Like her, I am delighted that the Government have agreed with our analysis that energy issues have moved up the agenda so far that they merit a stand-alone Department.

The trilemma of the cost of energy, energy security and achieving our net zero ambitions affects every household and every business in every corner of the globe. Policy changes have emerged in reaction to the impact on energy costs of Russia’s war on Ukraine. The price of gas and electricity has spiralled, and much of our thinking has been dominated by the challenges of cost and energy security. Renewable energy created here in the UK, as a domestic source of energy, will not only reduce our reliance on international fossil fuel markets that can be influenced by bad faith actors, but offer great opportunities for green jobs and growth right across the UK. There is potential to revitalise UK manufacturing to support the growing supply chain in pursuing energy sovereignty.

Offshore wind will be the backbone of the UK’s future electricity system. In 2020, solar and wind produced nearly 30% of the UK’s electricity, which represents a nearly tenfold increase on the level in 2010. However, we know the wind does not always blow and the sun does not always shine. As renewables become a bigger share of the market, this intermittency problem will become a bigger issue, particularly when we are trying to get above 80% to 90% low-carbon generation. In part, onshore wind and solar have a role to play in this. Despite it being one of the cheapest sources of power, onshore wind still faces barriers to development. Therefore, it is a welcome shift in Government policy to consult on devolving planning decisions on new onshore wind in England to local authorities, to enable onshore wind to be installed where communities want it and with their benefiting.

Intermittency can also be mitigated by changing the design of the UK’s electricity market. Today, there is a single national price for electricity across the whole of the UK. Moving to a system of local pricing in the electricity market would also incentivise building production capacity closer to demand, thus reducing the overall amount of infrastructure. Other solutions to intermittency exist. We can do more to encourage investment in short- term storage such as batteries, and long-term, inter-seasonal storage, for instance, hydrogen storage and hydropower.

The recent inquiry by the 1922 Back-Bench business committee heard from witnesses on barriers to deploying energy projects in the UK, which include the planning system and delays in connecting to the electricity grid. Members will forgive me, but being from Stoke-on-Trent I have to give the ceramics industry as an example here. Many UK ceramics businesses could make the switch from gas to electricity for the firing of the kilns, but several hurdles block that, one being that the cost and time delays for connection through distribution network operators make it prohibitive. Whether the energy is gas, electricity or perhaps, in future, hydrogen, security of supply is critical. Kilns are designed to slowly warm up and cool down. If the energy is suddenly cut off, the damage to the kilns can be irreparable. That means that a method of storing renewably generated energy must be found that enables us to deliver a consistent and continuous supply.

To address the energy trilemma, we also need to think seriously about how to transition effectively to clean energy, and about sustainability and our net zero goals. To achieve net zero, the UK needs to decarbonise its power sector by 2035. While emissions from electricity generation have fallen by 69% since 2010, we still have a long way to go to achieve that goal. That is why the first part of our Back-Bench report looked at ways to unblock renewables. My neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Dr Mullan), mentioned deep geothermal, which uses the high temperatures and pressure deep inside the Earth. There are no fully operational deep geothermal plants in the United Kingdom, but there are two close to completion in Cornwall, and I am delighted that my constituency of Stoke-on-Trent Central is also destined to be an early adopter. As the city of pits and pots, we have a long history of energy-intensive industries, which also means a history of innovation in energy efficiency. Just as our potteries will move from being coal-fired to gas-fired, so we must be at the forefront of the next energy revolution and embrace geothermal energy, which has great potential.

Another recent project in which I have been involved is the Commission for Carbon Competitiveness, an effort to explore how the UK can reach net zero without undermining the competitiveness of British industry. Our industries can play a key role in the transition to net zero by investing in new technologies that are vital to decarbonisation. However, we are not operating on a level playing field; they face international rivals who can dominate supply chains without having to worry about net zero regulations or environmental targets. It is important that the challenge be addressed, so that we can transform our energy-intensive industries and industrial communities, and so that they become the nexus for green growth, and not the victims of an inevitable decline.

My final issue is the cost of energy. I have lobbied the Government on behalf of local energy-intensive industries in Stoke-on-Trent Central, and on behalf of small businesses and charities that are struggling with their bills, and I welcomed Government support for families faced with a choice between heating and eating. However, the need to choose between energy and food extends to food production, too. Horticulture businesses decided to postpone early crop production where the cost of heating the growing environment was unaffordable. That, combined with crop failure due to extreme weather conditions in continental Europe and north Africa, led to UK supermarkets having gaps in their fruit and vegetable sections. Given that we are looking to reduce the air miles in our food system in support of our ambitions to decarbonise and move towards net zero, we need to produce more in the UK, and British farmers need support with energy costs. We need to rebalance our food production and accept that the UK’s cheap food culture is unsustainable.

As a result of the rise in the cost of production, the percentage of household income spent on food and non-alcoholic drinks has risen from 10% in 2021 to 16% this year. Before the cost of living increases, Britain spent less on food and non-alcoholic drinks than any other country in Europe, and our diet has remained the highest in fat, salt and sugar. We need a fundamental recalibration of the value that we place on a healthy diet, and we need to accept that growth in local food production comes at a price worth paying.

If we get it right, the energy trilemma will create new opportunities to grow the economy, achieve our net zero ambitions, and guarantee affordable, reliable and sustainable energy for the future. This is the moment to embrace a green industrial revolution.

Co-operatives, Mutuals and Friendly Societies Bill

Jo Gideon Excerpts

3rd reading
Friday 24th February 2023 Commons Chamber

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)]

I, too, commend the hon. Member for Preston (Sir Mark Hendrick) on his strong advocacy for co-operatives and mutuals, and on the progress that he has made with the legislation. I am delighted that the Bill has been supported by hon. Members on both sides of the House at all stages.

Mutuals and co-operative societies are distinctive organisations in that they are owned by and run for the benefit of their members. Whether employees, suppliers or the community and consumers that it serves, those who are actively involved in the business control decisions, rather than outside investors. Mutual ownership therefore helps to ensure that decisions are focused on the long-term sustainability of the business. Profits are not distributed among members but returned to the community, so such organisations provide a legal structure designed for social enterprise.

Indeed, co-operatives spring from local communities. They are bottom-up, grassroots organisations that are set up to provide goods and services for those who need them. Clearly, mutuals play a hugely important role in our local areas for education, engagement, charity and, fundamentally, the financial services that they offer. They provide a way for communities to come together to solve problems.

I have always been a strong advocate for the social enterprise movement in this country. Social businesses, including those that are community owned, are responsible for job creation in areas of deprivation—jobs that last and provide the crucial spirit of enterprise and innovation that our left-behind areas need. That makes the growth of co-operatives in the UK an integral part of the levelling-up agenda.

In 2021, co-operatives were five times less likely to permanently close than other UK businesses, and they were significantly more likely to tackle other important projects, such as decarbonisation, technology and the current cost of living challenges. Co-operatives have been incredibly resilient in the face of the pandemic, with the sector growing by an impressive £1.1 billion in 2020, despite the economic challenges resulting from national lockdowns.

On Second Reading, it was good to hear hon. Members acknowledging the start of the co-operative movement, so it would be remiss of me not to mention its history in Stoke-on-Trent. One of the earliest co-op traders was a potter called James Colclough, who opened Stoke-on-Trent’s first co-operative store, and the Birsle Co-operative Society was founded in north Stoke-on-Trent in 1901. It became one of the most successful mutual commercial enterprises that Stoke-on-Trent has known.

Originally, there were 200 members who each subscribed four shillings and promised to make those four shillings into £1 as soon as convenient. In the first balance sheet issued by the society in 1901, the amount of share capital plus interest was £175. By 1932, the amount of share, loan and bank capital of the Burslem and District Industrial Co-operative Society was £1,209, and it had 50,000 members and 112 shops.

This Bill is important to ensure that co-operatives and mutuals continue in the modern era. The increase in legal certainty that wealth built up over time will not be squandered by future members for short-term personal gain will encourage confidence, reassuring investors. This legislation is needed to help UK mutuals preserve their legacy for the purpose for which they were intended, which is making sure that additional available capital surplus can then be re-invested in economically, environmentally and socially productive enterprises. We should not allow capital to be blown at the whim of speculators and investors. It is important to lock capital in the places where it belongs for the benefit of the people it was invested for.

In the UK, the sector is relatively small compared with some European economies. Less than 1% of businesses in the UK are co-operatives. Germany’s co-operative economy is four times larger than the UK’s, and France’s is six times larger. Clearly there is some work to be done here, but this Bill provides an opportunity to rediscover and promote the co-operative model. I do not know if Members have seen the film “Bank of Dave”, but it is the very inspirational story of a gentleman from Burnley who set up a bank for the benefit of the community. I have been campaigning for this sort of thing in Stoke-on-Trent, because I think that a financial model enabling people to lend to each other, but also for them and community charities to benefit from the profits, is one we should all be looking at.

I just want to thank the hon. Member for Preston for giving us the opportunity to discuss these issues today. There is clearly a significant appetite for reforms of the mutuals sector, and I look forward to hearing about its success following his Bill.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jo Gideon Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Rishi Sunak]

I actually did engage with representatives from local authorities in the run-up to the spending review. Last week’s spending review outlined an additional £1.6 billion a year of cash grant for local authorities, which will ensure that local government core spending power will rise at about 3% a year in real terms over the spending review period; that is historically high. It has been warmly welcomed by local councils up and down the country, and will ensure that council tax increases can be kept at more moderate levels.

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)]

T8. I, too, thank my right hon. Friend for the £56 million for three innovative levelling-up bids in my home city of Stoke-on-Trent. We warmly welcome this as the biggest investment in Stoke-on-Trent for 50 years. However, investing in our social fabric and growing our local social infrastructure must be community-led to achieve the best results. Will he update this House on whether the shared prosperity fund will target grassroots community capacity-building investment in developing our social infrastructure rather than capital funding?

Stoke-Leek Line: Reopening

Jo Gideon Excerpts

Tuesday 20th July 2021 Westminster Hall

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley) on securing this debate. Members may think that, having pulled the graveyard slot, there would not be anything to add—quite frankly, I think we have named every village along the line, every tea room and every pub— but I do have a few things to say.

Reopening the Stoke-Leek line is a key need in a series of public transport projects that will level up opportunity for deprived communities across central Stoke-on-Trent. Like my colleagues today, I want to see the reopening of the stations that were lost when the line closed to passenger traffic in 1956. In the area of the old Bucknall and Northwood station, an interchange is possible with the existing bus routes westwards into Hanley for the city centre and eastwards to Bentilee, Townsend and the full length of Werrington Road.

In addition, I want to see a new station convenient for Abbey Hulton and Birches Head and their significant residential estates that were never served by the old line. Such a station could serve Birches Head Academy, Abbey Hulton medical centre, Abbey Hulton football club and the remains of Abbey Hulton itself. Getting the location right needs investigation and the Restoring Your Railway fund is an excellent means of exploring the necessary detail—so long as we win the bid. Reopening the Stoke-Leek line is entirely complementary to reopening Etruria station, too. If we are to reach a critical rail mass for Stoke-on-Trent, we need to win both bids and share commissioning efficiencies for the necessary research.

The current public transport journey time from Leek to Etruria would easily be halved from an hour-plus to perhaps as little as 25 minutes. In a city with chronic congestion and ministerial directions on air quality at both Etruria and Fenton, as my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) said, we simply cannot afford to leave the Stoke-Leek line mothballed. It needs to be open to passenger use.

A third of households are carless, buses struggle to be reliable in congestion, and our growing economy is being held back. Stoke-on-Trent is on the up, but the opportunities that brings must be accessible to many more communities across the city, including those who suffer from the urban splintering caused by what we know locally as the D road.

Reopening the Stoke-Leek line, along with Etruria, will create a U-shape around the city centre. The Transforming Cities fund is already establishing a fast corridor from Stoke station to the south of the city centre. Etruria would establish one from the west and a Stoke-Leek line station at Bucknall Park would establish one to the east. When we look at the map, the Stoke-Leek line joining the Stoke-Crewe line around the city centre looks strikingly like the wires around a bullseye on a dartboard.

Staffordshire University and Staffordshire sixth form college are both solid supporters of reopening the line for pupil and staff use. I know from the vice-chancellor that some university students had to drop out because of transport difficulties, which is an unnecessary tragedy, given that the university is pretty much right next to Stoke-on-Trent railway station. Given the increasing importance of the university and the apprenticeship training centre for local businesses, connectivity to the university quarter is vital to many more young people than the traditional academic student. I very much hope that Stoke College and the Goodwin engineering training school will also be more accessible to left-behind communities.

We struggle with the current inadequate public transport system. The Transforming Cities fund is a great start, but it cannot be the end. I do understand that there are some local concerns about noise from services and the loss of what might be seen as a green corridor—the walking route. But the line is a mothballed rail line, not a pedestrian link. It is so dangerous at Abbey Hulton that the bridge over Leek Road is completely fenced off. We are establishing a new green corridor through the city, with the rewilding of the River Trent, that is accessible to pedestrians, which we must continue to pursue. There is no alternative train or light rail route to Leek, but there are alternatives for better cycling and pedestrian routes.

For far too long, Stoke-on-Trent has had a public transport system in decline. It was not just Beeching; in fact, Etruria was closed by the last Labour Government. What we have now is a real chance to look properly at how to reverse that. It will level up life chances and make Stoke-on-Trent an even better place to live, visit, study and work.

Finance (No. 2) Bill

Jo Gideon Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 13th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)]

The Bill recognises both the short-term demands of the covid crisis and the long-term needs of global Britain’s economic future, and I am delighted to support it. I shall keep my comments brief.

As we emerge from lockdown in a cautious and gradual way, it is right that provisions are made to extend furlough, reduce VAT for tourism, maintain the increased universal credit payments, support grants for the self-employed and so on. It will be some time yet before the economy is back to pre-covid levels of activity, although it may not be as far away as we had feared just six months ago. Those who have managed to save money over lockdown are keen to put their cash back into our national economy.

Stoke-on-Trent city centre business improvement district has ensured that we will play our local part in the resumption of consumer spending. Operation Sparkle is making our city centre smarter, cleaner and more inviting, but there is only so much that even the most dedicated local groups and bodies can do to fight against litter, so I welcome part 2 of the Bill for its potential to gear the tax system ever more against plastic waste.

There is a real problem with litter, particularly along Stoke-on-Trent’s beautiful watercourses and green spaces, made much worse by the thoughtlessness of those who fear no consequence from dropping bottles and wrappers that will not immediately biodegrade. It makes responsible residents across my constituency rightly angry. The tax system should not be neutral on litter. We have all seen the dramatic impact of the plastic bag tax. I hope that the plastic packaging tax is another step towards a tax system that increasingly targets problem litter and incentivises the reuse, return and recycling of packaging.

The Office for Budget Responsibility predicts that the pre-covid level of GDP will be reached only one year from now. It further predicts that unemployment will be in its second quarter of decline by then, having peaked at 6.5% by the end of this year. That means that UK unemployment will still be 1.4 percentage points lower than when the Labour party left office in 2010. It is an extraordinary achievement. The balance of measures has been more or less right, just as the balance of measures is right in the Bill.

We were never going to escape a global pandemic unscathed. Now we must face the reality of once again looking for measures to bring the books back into balance in the medium and longer term. However, that should not mean reductions in productive investment. I particularly welcome the super deductions for new plant and machinery in clauses 9 to 14, together with the provision in clause 15 for an extension of the £1 million annual investment allowance. We are enabling the private sector to build back better.

It is often said that Chancellors are conjurors, pulling rabbits out of hats, but today’s Chancellor is more of a tightrope walker, trying to maintain a very delicate balance indeed. He is admirably succeeding. We are emerging from the international crisis with renewed national confidence in a long-term future of better days ahead.

Economic Update

Jo Gideon Excerpts

Monday 11th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Rishi Sunak]

What this deal ensures is that all those businesses that the right hon. Gentleman mentioned have tariff-free access to European markets. Otherwise, there would have been significant tariffs on those exports. He is right that there are changes to our trading relationship. That has always been the case, and the Prime Minister and the Government have been clear about that. I know that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor for the Duchy of Lancaster is working through individual issues as we look over time to streamline and improve all our processes. The right hon. Gentleman will also know that we have invested a huge amount of resource in the IT systems at DEFRA and in providing support for those businesses that need help to fill out various customs forms and meet new procedures.

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con) [V]]

I welcome the £4.6 billion in grants announced last week for the retail, hospitality and leisure sectors. As my right hon. Friend will be aware, businesses in the hospitality industry have been subject to restrictions since the beginning of the pandemic, leaving the sector as one of the hardest hit financially. I have spoken to many affected business owners and workers in Stoke-on-Trent Central. As we approach the end of this financial year, with the possibility of restrictions now extending beyond it, will my right hon. Friend reassure me and businesses in my constituency that the Government will extend the existing package of measures, including the current business rates relief and VAT reduction, which act as an important lifeline for many in the sector?

[Rishi Sunak]

I know from visiting my hon. Friend’s local area how important hospitality businesses are to her. While I obviously cannot comment on future Budget decisions, I can give her the assurance that I remain very committed to supporting our fantastic hospitality businesses through this crisis, so that they can recover strongly on the other side.

UK-EU Future Relationship Negotiations and Transition Period

Jo Gideon Excerpts

Monday 7th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)]

In light of the Opposition’s recent refusal to make any decision—as their constituents sent them to this place to do—in support of or opposition to the tier restrictions, what assessment has my right hon. Friend made of demands from some parts of the House for the Government to reach any deal with the European Union, while simultaneously considering voting against or not at all if any such deal is brought before this House?

[Penny Mordaunt]

I agree with my hon. Friend that it only makes sense to keep one’s powder dry if one is prepared to accept no deal, but the position of the Opposition is a matter for them—I just hope they get one in the next few days.

Public Health Restrictions: Government Economic Support

Jo Gideon Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

I have always found the hon. Gentleman constructive, and I welcome the fact that he is looking at the fiscal position we face as a country and how we may address that. It would be remiss of me, given my responsibilities, to stray into the terrain of the next Budget and tax-raising measures; I will leave that for my right hon. Friend the Chancellor.

The hon. Gentleman is right to highlight the very serious issue of youth unemployment. I think it is an issue that concerns us all in this House. The sectors that are most hit have concentrations of young people, particularly in the hospitality sector. It is really at the heart of the winter plan that my right hon. Friend brought forward in doubling the number of work coaches, in tripling the number of traineeships and with the £2,000 for apprenticeships. We have been looking at and learning from not just the Thatcher era, but actually from the previous Labour Government with some of the packages we discussed with the TUC and others. One of the great challenges we face is how we address not just the number of people who are unemployed, but the length of time they are unemployed. That is an absolutely key issue, and that is why the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions is so focused on doubling the number of work coaches. The hon. Gentleman is quite right to highlight that issue.

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)]

Stoke-on-Trent is currently in medium risk tier 1, but we all know that any area can see an increase in infection rates. With the introduction of the tier system, many workers in the highest tier will once again be unable to go to work and make a living for themselves and their families. Will my right hon. Friend please reassure me that those who are unable to attend their place of work will continue to be supported by this Government, particularly those from low-income households with rents to pay?

[Steve Barclay]

My right hon. Friend the Chancellor has sought to do that throughout this crisis. In the interests of brevity—as requested from the Chair—I would point to the example we had with the shielding programme. I think it was a very proud record, which indicates that intent.

Areas with Additional Public Health Restrictions: Economic Support

Jo Gideon Excerpts

Tuesday 6th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

First, all businesses are able to benefit from the universal elements of the support package put in place by the Chancellor, whether that means loans, tax referrals or schemes such as the furlough. However, the hon. Gentleman is right that the nightclub sector is affected acutely, among all businesses affected. That is not just because it has been shut down from the start of the lockdown, but because it is very unclear when the end will be in sight, in terms of that sector and our ability to reopen. That is why the Chancellor has said, extremely reluctantly, that we are not in a position to save every single job. I think that around a third of nightclubs have repurposed by becoming pubs or reshaping their offer, but I absolutely accept that not all nightclubs will be able to do that. We are trying to target the very comprehensive measures of support on areas where jobs can be saved, but we recognise that not every single job will be saved.

[Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)]

In my constituency of Stoke-on-Trent Central, more than 11,600 jobs have been protected so far through the furlough scheme and more than £50 million has been made available to businesses to bounce back through various loans and grants. Recently, Stoke-on-Trent was removed from the watchlist and avoided a local lockdown, thanks to prompt local action; however, we are geographically close to many local lockdown areas. I ask my right hon. Friend for reassurance that those businesses in Stoke-on-Trent most economically vulnerable to any local lockdown will continue to be able to access financial support.

[Steve Barclay]

I am very happy to reassure my hon. Friend that the package of support that the Chancellor set out in his winter plan will assist businesses in Stoke and elsewhere, bringing back jobs that are viable and supporting them in terms of their cash flow. Furlough has already seen more than half the jobs—from a peak of 8.9 million—come back, so it has served a key part of its purpose. I know that my hon. Friend is also a keen champion of the wider levelling up agenda, so as those businesses bounce back, it will also be important that we work together on that agenda, which I know areas such as Stoke should benefit from very strongly.