Public Service Pensions Bill

Debate between Lord Whitty and Baroness Harris of Richmond

Tuesday 23rd April 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Harris of Richmond]

My Lords, I had not necessarily intended to participate in this debate, knowing that the noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, had put down an amendment which I wholeheartedly approve and agree to. I am very pleased that the Government have decided to accept it, especially after all the work that was done in trying to persuade them about the Ministry of Defence fire service and the Ministry of Defence police. I emphasise this point because it is tantamount to having made them accept that this really must be looked at again, and I think it was the work that was done in Committee in this House that made this happen. Like the noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, I was surprised to find that financial privilege had been put forward as the reason not to accept something a little stronger. So I can assure my noble friend the Minister that during the year that this amendment will be looked at, mulled over and digested, we will be looking very carefully to see the progress that is made and to make sure, through questions and other means, that we keep the Government’s feet to the fire.

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, I join the noble Baroness in congratulating the Minister on his change of heart. He has in effect very graciously recognised not only the justice of the case that we on this side of the House, and the noble Baroness, Lady Harris, put in Committee, but that it is pretty absurd for the Government simply to claim financial privilege to resist an amendment that manifestly will bring justice and equity to an extremely special group of workers, putting them on the same basis as people who are doing almost exactly the same job but who are employed by other public sector employers.

I suspect the Minister had some difficulty with the Treasury and the Ministry of Defence in reaching this conclusion. I therefore doubly congratulate him on seeing it through and at least recognising the very difficult position we all find ourselves in. We cannot really resist the Commons claiming financial privilege, but we can ensure by my noble friend’s amendment that the Government think again about this and address the real issues.

I do hope, however, that the Government do not make a habit of using financial privilege to resist a principled amendment from this House that has a minimal cost even in the Government’s terms and, as my noble friend has said, that is probably actuarially inaccurate in any case. If the Government continue to do this, this House has some serious thinking to do about how seriously our amendments and our scrutiny are taken. However, I return to my congratulations to the Minister on seeing sense over this. I hope it is a precedent that will be followed by some of his other colleagues in future.

Public Bodies Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Whitty and Baroness Harris of Richmond

Monday 28th March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Whitty]

Are we on Amendment 25?

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Harris of Richmond)]

Amendment 22.

[Lord Whitty]

I beg your Lordships’ pardon.

Public Bodies Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Whitty and Baroness Harris of Richmond

Monday 28th February 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Whitty]

My aim is to speak to Amendment 56 which deals with the south-west region. It is not simply to convince the Committee that there are concerns on these Benches somewhat south of Watford, but as my noble friend Lord Knight spelt out before the break, the South-West Regional Development Agency has done a fantastic job in many respects, from projects such as the Eden project through to the Osprey Quay in his previous constituency where I was only a couple of weeks ago, through to the deals with the universities, science parks, and so forth. The majority of its interventions have been relatively small and, to respond to the noble Lord, Lord Empey, most of what the regional development agency has done has involved not large sums of money but soft policies, such as putting together patches of land, developing skills, getting people talking to each other who do not normally talk to each other, in the universities, professional associations, local government and small businesses.

The South-West Regional Development Agency may not have had the right geographical boundaries and it was probably not as universally loved as those in the north-east appear to be, but the prospect of its absence is causing deep and grave concern among small businesses and others within the region. Its replacement by the so-called LEPs is a shambles. It is a crazy situation. The Government who profess to want localism and to have industry-led alternatives to the agency have ended up with a situation where Whitehall is telling groups of business people and others who put their heads above the parapet what the basis to organise should be. On what basis is the man in Whitehall telling the putative LEPs in the M4 belt in Gloucester, Swindon and Wiltshire that that is not the appropriate sub-region? It seems a very appropriate sub-region to me and, more importantly, to them. Yet, they are being told that it is not the right region. People in Dorset—in Bournemouth and Poole—are being told to talk to Southampton and the Solent areas. Why? How is that allowing local businesses to decide on their own remits?

It is clear that the Government have set out on a process not on the basis of what is best for the regions or best individually for each of the English regions, but on the straightforward basis that they do not like RDAs and want to abolish them. What has happened in the south-west, which I suspect has happened in all regions, is that business men and women who some months ago were not particularly supportive of the RDA are now saying that with the abolition of the RDA in prospect, the government office for the region going and regional planning disappearing, they do not know who to talk to if they want to put together a deal, if they want to try to bring in public and private partnerships, if they want to make arrangements to develop the skills within the region that will achieve delivery of the ideas that they, as entrepreneurs, have. They are asking, “Who do we talk to?”.

At the same time, the big potential investors are asking precisely the same question. The areas that miss out are going to be the more peripheral ones in the north and the west of the country and maybe in parts of East Anglia and the Midlands as well. In London, there is always somebody to talk to. In Wales and Scotland you have government-backed organisations but in these other regions you have not. It is not just a question of the industrial heartlands; we are talking about rural counties in the south-west. Indeed, it is not a question of the Labour heartlands, in case Members opposite feel that we are parti pris to this—these are the heartlands of the Liberal Democrats and many Tories as well. As the consequences of the disappearance of the RDA and the regional offices of government become clear, I imagine that many of the MPs in their parties are going to have deputations from businesses and from local government asking how to deal with this.

What has happened in the south-west and what people now fear in the south-west is that there is no point at which small businesses can talk to Government about their problems and there is no point at which outside investors can talk on a regional or sub-regional basis with some authority behind those discussions. What will they do? They will go elsewhere. It is true, of course, as the noble Lord, Lord Empey, says, that the interventions will not be so much financial in the future, although there will be some money there and there will be money in things such as the European Regional Development Fund and money from the agricultural side of this dimension. However, they will say it is easier to do this in France or Germany or Spain. It may be slightly easier to do it in London or Scotland or Wales but with nobody to talk to in dispersed regions such as the south-west the absence of the RDA will come to be a dreadful brake on developments which were beginning to see fruition.

I do not think that is what the political representatives of the south-west would wish to see. I do not therefore think it is what the coalition Government would wish to see. But by their own universal decree that RDAs are bad, that is likely to be the consequence.

[Baroness Harris of Richmond]

My Lords, before we remove RDAs entirely from our lexicon, I would like to put on record the really excellent work done by Yorkshire Forward. I make no apology for being parochial. It has helped nearly 30,000 businesses a year to improve performance, which is one in 12 of the region’s business, with a typical turnover gain for each of those businesses of around £15,000 a year. About one in 30 people in the region’s workforce are in a job because of Yorkshire Forward’s work in the past five years. It has been one of the two most successful regional development agencies at turning investment into jobs.

Yorkshire Forward was created in 1999, and by 2000 it was already investing in business parks in small rural areas in my particular part of north Yorkshire, making a huge difference to those communities. Through its investment, it was to lever several millions of Objective 2 European funding into my local district, and transformational projects were initiated through the pilot Renaissance Market Towns programme. In my town of Richmond, money was granted to the award-winning Georgian Theatre Royal. One project that is dear to my heart and which we would have had great difficulty getting off the ground—I played a small fundraising role with our local MP—was the award-winning station development and the award-winning heritage partnership scheme. None of these would have taken place without the foresight and the funding of Yorkshire Forward.

Over the years, its investment helped to transform Richmond from an underperforming market town to Great Town of the Year in 2009. It is interesting to note that the Academy of Urbanism has awarded that national accolade to three Yorkshire towns—Richmond, Scarborough and Hebden Bridge—by a vote of its members over the five years for which it has been run. All those towns had strategic investment through Yorkshire Forward’s Renaissance Market Towns programme. Because of the speed at which Yorkshire Forward has been disbanded, funding contracted to complete the Richmond heritage partnership scheme had to be withdrawn. It would have brought redundant property back into economic use and, at the same time, restored the character of that beautiful Georgian market town. That is indeed a most terrible shame.