Post Offices: Cash Withdrawal Services

Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd October 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Duncan of Springbank]

The noble Viscount is right: a consultation matters only if its results are taken forward. I will reflect carefully on what he has said. I believe there is an obligation that should fall on banks to respect their customers and treat them with the decency they deserve.

[Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate (Con)]

My Lords, while we can deprecate the actions of certain banks in this sense, should we not also congratulate those commercial and retail outlets, such as petrol stations and others, that are installing ATMs and providing these services in rural areas as well as in urban ones? I think particularly of the Co-op and other owners of garages around the country, which are doing just that.

[Lord Duncan of Springbank]

My noble friend is correct. Banking is changing and we need to reflect on how our future banking needs will be met: perhaps not through the traditional means of marble-fronted buildings but in a much more diverse way, both in reality and online. We need to consider how banking will look in five, 10, 15 and 20 years’ time.

Spending Round 2019

Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate Excerpts

Wednesday 25th September 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate (Con)]

My Lords, this is a slightly anticlimactic situation after the business that has gone on in the middle of this debate. I want to concentrate on two areas, neither of which are given much space in the spending round, but which, to me, are of great importance. My arguments will be more to do with realignment of resources rather than suggesting any increase in public spending per se. I am not an economist and do not have my noble friend’s qualifications, although I note that he was at one stage an economic adviser to the Post Office Corporation—I think that was just before it started to increase the cost of stamps, but I will not hold that against him.

I want to talk first of all about mental health. I had the honour of being one of the founder members of the Mental Health Commission, which was set up in 1983 under the chairmanship of my noble friend Lord Glenarthur. We were formed primarily to improve standards in mental health care and in particular to protect the interests of mental patients, especially those who were detained within closed establishments. Even then, over 30 years ago, it became obvious that facilities were inadequate and improvements were needed, but our work highlighted the particular need for greater co-operation between the health authorities and the providers of social care in the community to manage those who were released or encouraged to rejoin the community, particularly those from special hospitals. There was a key move by that commission to try to make sure that facilities nevertheless continued to be provided for those who needed to be protected within a secure environment. Sadly, I am afraid that some of the policies of government were to move people out into the community even though they did not have adequate resources available in the community from other providers, particularly local authorities and those in social care, to look after them. That was 30-odd years ago.

The five-year plan produced in 2016 by the independent Mental Health Taskforce again recommended improvements, all those years later, in community resources, as currently 90% of adults with mental health problems are supported in primary care at one point or another in their needs. The so-called care programme still has many deficiencies, and I am therefore rather disappointed to see that within the spending round, although the health service resources are referred to, there is no understanding that one in four people in this country will in their lifetime suffer from some mental illness which needs to be dealt with. I believe we should therefore be looking specifically at mental health care, rather than simply allotting up to 10% of spending on it. That is one thing I wanted to press very hard on my noble friend the Minister.

For my second point, which follows almost on from that of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham, I want to talk about devolution for a second. We find the only direct reference to resources for devolved powers on page 16 of the spending round, under the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. It talks of,

“continued funding for the Midlands Engine and Northern Powerhouse”.

I happen to be currently the co-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for One Yorkshire, which is very strongly supporting devolution from the centre to our regions, particularly to Yorkshire. I am getting more and more concerned about the rather confusing number of organisations, and the financial support for them, which are supposedly looking at the issue of devolution.

In a recent Institute for Government paper on devolution, most of the discussion, needless to say, is on Scotland and Wales, but it also acknowledges the less cohesive and successful attempts in England to bring about devolution. I remind my noble friends that, in 2004, 80% of voters rejected in the north-east of England a proposed assembly, which virtually killed off proposals for assemblies across the whole of England, which were at that time at least in the Government’s mind. Eight metro mayors have been created since 2015, with very mixed outcomes and not always adequate resources to do the things they have been asked to do. The criterion has been that “functional economic areas” must be the basis on which devolution is allowed, leaving the door open for new ideas and new designs. There is little clarity on funding or responsibilities.

We have the northern powerhouse covering the north-east, Yorkshire, the Humber and the north-west. Under that umbrella sits Transport for the North, advocating better infrastructure—which is needed in that part of the country—and a northern powerhouse investment fund. That fund is currently benefiting not only from the British Business Bank but from the EU, through European funds. I hope my noble friend will confirm that in this case, as the Government have attempted to do in other cases, the funds that will be lost to these organisations and to our local enterprise partnerships will actually be provided by central government in the event of our leaving the EU. There is considerable concern about that.

There is a lot of confusion about future devolution and the relationships between different organisations. The people of Britain outside London have shown interest in this but, even if there is a will by the Government to proceed, the funding is certainly unclear and should be better defined. I find it disappointing that it is not specifically located within the spending round, and I hope that to some extent my noble friend and his colleagues are going to rectify that situation soon.

Yorkshire: Devolution

Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate Excerpts

Monday 16th October 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

It is somewhat different. In relation to the existing position, it is absolutely clear, as the noble Lord indicated, that not all Yorkshire authorities will wish to progress with a deal that includes Sheffield. Sheffield City Region is split. The two larger authorities wish to progress with it; in the other two authorities, there is dissent as the noble Lord indicated. We encourage them to go ahead. The deal has been done, and people there have an expectation that it will be carried forward, and that is what we wish to see. If the other authorities want to come forward with a Yorkshire deal excluding Sheffield, we will look seriously at it.

[Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate (Con)]

My Lords, I have been involved for some time with the discussions about devolution for Yorkshire. I congratulate my noble friend and his ministerial colleagues on their patience and on their hard work with the local authorities and other interests to try to bring this about. Is it not correct that until there is consensus and a broad spread of support from cities and rural areas throughout Yorkshire, which we all know is a very fine brand, progress cannot be made? Is the Minister of the view that progress can be made if the greater Yorkshire model, which now appears to be subscribed to by most people, is progressed?

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

I am grateful to my noble friend, who knows what he is talking about in the context of Yorkshire as he has great experience. If a deal is to go forward, it will be on the basis that the existing deal, which the four constituent parts of the Sheffield City Region have subscribed to on many occasions, goes forward independently. If the other authorities—and it is for them to come together to determine this—wish to progress a greater Yorkshire deal, they can do so. If the authorities wished to combine thereafter—and that would be a matter for them—it would be possible for that to be discussed further down the line, but we have an existing deal, on which a great deal of time and energy has been expended locally and in both Houses of Parliament.