Rural Economy (Rural Economy Committee Report)

Lord Haselhurst Excerpts

Tuesday 8th October 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Haselhurst (Con)]

My Lords, I salute the noble Lord, Lord Foster, and his colleagues, for their work in producing this mammoth report. I was struck by the range of organisations that impinge on the rural economy and the host of funding bodies that have been created for particular reasons. That the acronyms occupy three and a half pages of the report gives an idea of the complexity involved.

However, defining a rural economy these days is becoming more difficult. The noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, referred to this. It seems to me that we are in a more mobile society, where the differences between certain urban and rural areas are starting to break down. There is an obvious division between the rural areas which are in the hinterland of our major cities and those which are not. To refer to the example of Uttlesford District Council, which I had the honour of representing in the other place for a number of years, if you fly over that district, you will see vistas of barley and wheat, and it is still designated as a hugely rural area. However, the operative word is “fly”, because most of the people who fly over Uttlesford are flying in and out of London’s third airport, which is situated in that district and has had a major impact.

Therefore, I am wary of having a single strategy for the rural economy. The Government must have an overall strategy for the country—notably to help cure the north-south divide, but also, I would also argue, the east-west divide that we have—but I favour the strategic plans being formed at a more local level. The question we have been thinking about for decades is just how local that should be. There is a danger that the units created could be too big or too small. I do not think we have got it right yet.

There is also an advantage in having some recognisable uniformity in the structure created. Otherwise, there is a patchwork quilt of authorities and not everybody recognises to whom to turn for their services and the advocates they need. A degree of uniformity in structure would help the transfer of best practice. We talk about that a lot, but we are not very good at doing it in this country. I may be sticking my neck out, but I have become attracted to the format of a mayor-led combined authority. These are early days, but there is some merit in the direction we are going in. The noble Earl, Lord Caithness, referred to coterminosity. I am glad I was not the first person to mention that word. It would be helpful if we could try to ensure that everything is contained within whatever unit of government we are looking at.

I am not sure whether the business input should come from LEPs. They are not coterminous to a great extent. Could we have a much more effective network of chambers of commerce, as they do notably in Germany? It would help if all other stakeholders could similarly be brought within the circle. This might help to bring in more private finance than at the moment, when businesses are uncertain whether to commit themselves. It might be argued that larger authorities, of the kind we have seen pioneered in certain parts of the country, are taking power from the people, but I do not accept that argument. You could perfectly well delegate day-to-day responsibilities to parish councils—either singly or combined—much more than at present.

We have to get away from a culture of resistance to change, which is enveloping more and more of our communities. Change has to be packaged in an attractive way. At the moment, it seems to have too many negatives in the eyes of the population. To use the example of Uttlesford District Council again, after nearly four decades of argument—I was part of it—it became the home of London’s third airport. For all that that has become the district’s biggest employer, since its inception there has still been no railway upgrade between the airport and the capital city or branching out more to the north and the east. The dualling of the A120 has not yet been completed, despite my being assured, in 1977, that it was one of the key arteries to bring transport from the east coast ports to the Midlands and the north. Yet we are now flirting with the idea of an Oxford-Cambridge link. We might be better off completing the A120 first, as our contribution to east-west healing, rather than embarking on that wholly new idea.

We are seeing redundant farm buildings occupied by high-tech companies. People are migrating into the area, because they want somewhere nicer to live and to fill the many jobs being created. There is an acute housing need, but this is resisted by the population who fear that the consequences will make matters worse than they are at present. There is sufficient evidence that that is the case.

Like everyone else, I cannot avoid using the word, “digital”. There is a growing anger over poor or non-existent digital connectivity. Fewer people may live in rural districts, but they have exactly the same needs as those who live in the towns and cities. There is no clarity on when fibre will come. When David Cameron was Prime Minister, he talked of it being made a universal service obligation. The fact is that in many parts of rural England there is no universal service obligation in the provision of mains drainage or private water supply. We have a long way to go in some areas.

A neutral person, coming upon this country’s situation, might conclude that we have somehow muddled along in the way we have approached local or devolved government. We have done it in a way that has created more anger and frustration than satisfaction. Fresh thinking and dynamic leadership are required if we are to unite communities behind bold action. I agree with the authors of the report that the time has surely come.

Rural Areas: Public Services

Lord Haselhurst Excerpts

Monday 9th July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Haselhurst (Con) (Maiden Speech)]

My Lords, in rising to make my maiden speech within a week of my introduction, I risk being thought very impulsive, but the subject put forward for debate by my noble friend Lady McIntosh was too tempting. She and I share something of the same approach to what life is like in the rural parts of our country. I can but seek encouragement from the words of the late Lord Butler of Saffron Walden, who at the outset of his maiden speech in 1965 said:

“I have been singularly well trained in parliamentary manners and etiquette, having been for some considerable time a Member of another place”.—[Official Report, 15/11/1965; col. 258.]


I pray that my similar but not nearly so distinguished background will protect me from any lapses of courtesy and custom in your Lordships’ House.

I also learned very early in my parliamentary life that we are well supported by attentive staff and officials. That has been amply evidenced to me once again since the start of my pre-introduction period. I wish to record my very grateful thanks to those who have already helped me so much, not least my mentor and my whip.

On 10 December 1966, a young man rose in the Royal Festival Hall to make a keynote speech at a crowded gathering of Conservative youth. A political star was born. His public life and mine have been intertwined in friendship, and just occasionally rivalry, since that time, so I am especially grateful to my noble friend Lord Hunt of Wirral for acting as my senior supporter. In his maiden speech he expressed his concern for the careers and well-being of young people. But just before the end he added:

“We must also ensure we make greater use of older people”.—[Official Report, 1/4/1998; col. 296.]


I draw some comfort from that sentiment.

A very high proportion of my previous service at the other end benefited from the tutelage of the noble Lord, Lord Lisvane. Our respective roles connected at many points: the European legislation Committee, the Deputy Speakership, the Administration Committee, the Estimate Audit Committee, the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association and restoration and renewal. In his maiden speech, the noble Lord spoke feelingly about,

“the condition of this wonderful building”.—[Official Report, 1/6/15; col. 217.]

I share his passion. Above all, the service paid to me by the noble Lord, Lord Lisvane, was the fact that he was the person who revealed the value of a smartphone in providing full ball-by-ball updates for all first class cricket matches. I feel greatly honoured that the noble Lord agreed to be my second supporter.

In 1970 I became the Member of Parliament for Middleton and Prestwich in Greater Manchester. I was a Yorkshireman representing a Lancashire seat; perhaps that was at least a nod in the direction of diversity in those days. In that Parliament I had the opportunity to introduce the Youth and Community Bill. It had its Second Reading on 1 February 1974 and the Dissolution of Parliament took place one week later. There has been controversy lately about blocking Private Members’ Bills, but it seems to me that dissolving Parliament is taking it a bit far. Some 44 years on, I note that the honourable Member for Brighton Kemptown is trying to introduce a youth services Bill—which rather suggests that time has stood still on that subject.

When I was chosen for Saffron Walden, I was already persuaded from both a northern and an environmental perspective that a third London airport should not be in a rural inland site. On election, I have to say, partly at the expense of the noble Lord, Lord Stoneham of Droxford, that I found myself campaigning against major development at Stansted. Up to that point, I had thought that marching up Whitehall and orating in Trafalgar Square was for others and not for me, but circumstances forced that extreme action. The battle was lost and I have accepted the reality, but what I have not accepted so easily is the lack of connectivity that has occurred in its wake. In some bigger countries airports may be seen as welcome for the benefits they can bring, but in this country the opposite happens. Roads become more congested: junction 8 on the M11 is notorious. Who, after all, would decide to put a motorway services area there after making it the point of access to a major airport? And rail travel gets worse, because the decision taken in the wake of Dr Beeching’s report in the 1960s, leading to two rail tracks being ripped up, means that we have a totally inadequate railway from Liverpool Street to Cambridge when an airport has to be served, as well as many other extremely important businesses that are vital to the future of this country. So we get to a state where even the principal beneficiaries—the owners, the airlines and the employees—of a major development such as an airport, needed no doubt in the national interest, gradually become just as upset as the local communities in which they have been implanted by the absence of adequate infrastructure.

It is inevitable that the costs of providing the same range of public services to people are higher in rural areas than in towns and cities. But we are now in an era when technology can help us to bridge the gap. Distance can be made less of a problem by mobile telephony and broadband providing information, combating loneliness and dealing, as we now know, with health needs—and there will be other means, too. We ought therefore to recognise and espouse the principle of equality of entitlement. If you do business in the countryside, if you study in your rural home or if you farm, you need broadband and mobile telephony in order to function. The distinction between town and country has blurred to the extent where a great deal of business and industry now takes place in country areas. It is a growing political issue and it can be dealt with at a cheaper cost than many other projects which are seen as necessary—and, frankly, there is no downside.

I welcome what the Government have done to date so far as the spread of broadband is concerned, but I would urge them to look at two things in particular. One is the delays caused by companies taking on bespoke territory and then not moving fast to provide the service for which they get locals to sign up. That creates an enormous amount of ill will—and still communities wait for connection. There is also now the possibility of self-build, as we have learned from a community in Wales. If people can build the network for themselves, perhaps we should think of giving them incentives to do so. I believe that new technology can go a long way to help us bridge the gap between town and country.

The late Lord Butler in his maiden speech, albeit on a major issue that had prompted an emergency debate, spoke for 21 minutes. I have always felt that brevity rarely offends, and I hope that today it has not.

Rural Payments Agency: Basic Payment Scheme

Lord Haselhurst Excerpts

Tuesday 24th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[George Eustice]

As my hon. Friend says, we have acted swiftly to ensure that we can send maps and paper applications to ensure that all farmers can get their applications in on time. We have a network of 50 digital support centres to help farmers with the registration process, because we still want them to register with the online system.

[Sir Alan Haselhurst (Saffron Walden) (Con)]

Amid all the arguments, is it not simply vital to recognise that the important thing is that farmers get the money that is due to them when they need it? Echoing the words of my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh), there is the consolatory thought that that will allow broadband roll-out to catch up.