Business of the House

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Thursday 26th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to raise the importance of ensuring that local authorities do all they can to facilitate new house building. He will be aware that the Government are looking into how we can facilitate exactly that. I encourage him to raise it with Ministers at every opportunity.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

I was bitterly disappointed that the Leader of the House did not announce a debate around the NHS. We have heard cries from across the House about the state of the NHS. In York, our health service will run out of money within the month. Can we have an urgent debate, ahead of the Budget, on NHS funding, so that we can ensure that the money goes to the right place? We are having real-term cuts in York.

Business of the House

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Thursday 12th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

I think we can all agree that football has a really good part to play in providing a role model for young people, where it seeks to do that—it can also be a bit of a problem on occasion. However, the example the hon. Gentleman gives of football being used as a means to motivate and inspire young people in schools is very valuable, and if he wanted to apply for an Adjournment debate, I am sure you would look very favourably on the matter, Mr Speaker.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

I do not know what the Government have against the children of York, but we are going to experience real funding cuts to all the schools across the city—in fact we are going to move from being the seventh worst funded authority to the very worst funded authority. When will the Government have a debate in their time to discuss the new funding formula?

[Andrea Leadsom]

The hon. Lady might like to share in the genuine happiness and pleasure at the fact that 1.8 million more children are in good and outstanding schools than in 2010. Unfortunately, the Opposition always equate achievement with more money. It is just not clear to me from what the hon. Lady said that she is concerned about standards in her schools—she just talked about money in her schools. If she wants to raise the issue of standards and achievement, that would be different, but, unfortunately, the Opposition always focus on just providing more money. This Government’s achievement in education has been superb. There are more children in good and outstanding schools—1.8 million of them—than ever before. It would be great if the Opposition recognised and celebrated that.

Business of the House

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Thursday 7th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

My hon. Friend, as ever, makes a really important point, which is that this House will scrutinise all legislation relating to EU withdrawal and to our future policies post EU in the usual way, and that that democratic oversight will be continued for the duration of this period.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

Despite serious underfunding and rationing in Vale of York clinical commissioning group and the acute trust, it has been placed in the capped expenditure process. Over the summer, it emerged that this process seems to be changing day by day. May we have a statement from the Secretary of State for Health to say exactly what the process is and to ensure that our health service is properly funded to meet local demand?

[Andrea Leadsom]

As the hon. Lady will be aware, NHS funding will be over half a trillion pounds from 2015 to 2020, and we have protected and increased health funding. As regards local sustainability and transformation partnerships, where work is under way to change processes locally, there is broad consultation under reconfiguration tests, where there must be support from clinical commissioners, clinical evidence, patient and public engagement, and support for patient choice.

Business of the House

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Thursday 13th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

This has been an issue right across the UK. The Post Office has really stepped up to the plate and I believe it now offers basic banking services for all the main UK banks and certainly for Barclays. The flexibility of post office opening hours means that many constituents can get better banking services. I am pleased that the hon. Gentleman raises this issue, because one of the biggest challenges is making people aware of that fact. He knows that the banks have an agreed consultation process before they decide to close. Nevertheless, I urge him to look at the prospects for post offices stepping into the gap.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

By September, we will not have had an Opposition day debate for a staggering seven and a half months. In the interim, may we have a debate in Government time, because I, for one, want to debate the capped expenditure process, which will lead to massive cuts in York’s already underfunded NHS?

Business of the House

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Thursday 6th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

I totally agree that the contaminated blood situation over several decades, which has affected people in so many different ways, was a terrible thing to happen. The hon. Lady will appreciate that successive Governments have, over decades, reviewed the situation and made compensation available to all those victims. I am aware that the last review, in 2015, made further recommendations and that there are concerns about the possibility that there was some cover-up. I encourage her to seek an opportunity for a debate, to try to air that issue further.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

As we have heard, the broken business rates system is very detrimental to business. Frankly, it is a shambles—that view is echoed in businesses right across York, including those trading in the Shambles. May we, as we heard in the Budget, have the consultation brought to this House, because we were promised this in February and it has not seen the light of day? I would therefore like an urgent statement on why it has not been.

[Andrea Leadsom]

The hon. Lady will know that rateable values are set independently by the Valuation Office Agency and reflect open market rental value. The Government do not intervene in that independent exercise, but I do understand that if the market rent for the area has changed, rateable values change with that. She will be aware that the Chancellor announced a £300 million discretionary fund over four years, from 2017-18, to deal with issues of business rates changing for particular businesses. That has been made available to local authorities so that, at their discretion, they can support individual businesses in dealing with their issues.

Business of the House

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Thursday 29th June 2017 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

Yes, the hon. Gentleman is right. Several colleagues have raised concerns about education, which the Secretary of State will have heard. I will certainly discuss that with her. She is of course looking closely at some of the issues, and the Government are determined to ensure that more children have the opportunity of a good school and a decent education. She is looking closely at the funding formula not only to make it fairer, but to try to ease the burdens on schools. I am sure that she will be making statements on all those issues in due course.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Vale of York clinical commissioning group has been continually underfunded. As a result, it has fallen into deficit and is now being punished further by being put into the capped expenditure process, meaning that it will have to make further service cuts. May we have an urgent statement from the Secretary of State for Health on the capped expenditure process?

Business of the House

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Thursday 22nd June 2017 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

The hon. Lady raises an incredibly important point. All I can say is that the Government will be looking very carefully at the judgment and deciding on their position.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

Following seven years of delay and four court cases that found the Government wanting, the Government published the draft air quality plan on 5 May. This was after Parliament had risen, and the consultation ended before Parliament met. The final air quality plan needs to be in place on 31 July. May we therefore have an urgent debate in Government time on this issue, which really does impact on my constituents who die prematurely because of poor air quality?

[Andrea Leadsom]

The hon. Lady is right to raise this very significant and serious public health issue. As Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs until recently, I was very closely involved in the enormous amount of work that has gone into producing the air quality consultation. She is right that the plans will be published at the end of July. The Government are firmly committed to improving the UK’s air quality. That is why we have committed more than £2 billion since 2011 to increase the uptake of ultra-low emission vehicles and committed to support greener transport schemes with a further £200 million in the 2016 autumn statement. There is a lot that needs to be done, and it is a complex scenario, as she, too, knows very well, but I do believe that we will be able to make strong progress very soon.