The Economy

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Thursday 24th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

As I was saying, Gordon Brown, as Chancellor in 1997, boasted about deregulating the banks and the financial sector. At the time, he was warned by the then shadow Chancellor—the Conservative shadow Chancellor—Peter Lilley, that deregulation would

“cause regulators to take their eye off the ball”—[Official Report, 1 November 1997; Vol. 300, c. 731-2]—

and that it would be a field day for spivs and crooks everywhere. That is what he said, in this House, and during Labour’s term in office, bank leverage rocketed from an average of 20 before they came to office to an average of 50 times during their entire time in office. Labour was responsible for the biggest banking crash in global history, and they had better get used to it.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

rose—

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[Sajid Javid]

My hon. Friend is right. A Labour Chancellor deregulated banking and created a light-touch system, and we all paid the price.

I want to compare my approach to infrastructure with Labour’s. I am going to invest in new infrastructure that will grow the economy. Labour would borrow hundreds of billions to renationalise productive assets and then run them into the ground. I want to unleash all the talent and expertise of the private sector. Labour says—I quote the shadow Chancellor here—that business is the “enemy” and would tax it into submission. I will do all my work within a careful and credible fiscal framework; Labour would simply waste the money just like last time.

[Clive Efford]

There is a real credibility gap in what the Chancellor is saying, because if austerity was the right thing to do in 2010, why is it not still the right thing to do now, given that debt has doubled to £1.8 trillion or 80% of GDP? How can we believe that the Government intend to go on this huge spending spree when they have been doing quite the opposite to try to tackle the problem? The Chancellor is keen on quoting the Institute for Fiscal Studies, but it predicts that we will need another dose of austerity if he carries on. This economy needs investment, not the austerity that the Government are planning.

Arrest of Julian Assange

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

1st reading: House of Commons
Thursday 11th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

My hon. Friend, a distinguished former journalist himself, is right in what he says. Press freedom in this country is sacrosanct, but by and large people who work in the press in this country are responsible.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

I find it extraordinary that someone so rich and powerful—or powerful, anyway—can avoid an allegation of rape in the way that Julian Assange has for so many years, costing so much taxpayers’ money. Who is paying the £13.2 million bill that Julian Assange has cost us? Is it the people of London in cuts to their police service, or does it come from a central budget?

[Sajid Javid]

I understand very much the hon. Gentleman’s sentiment; he speaks for many people across the House. He asks who has paid the bill. I referred earlier to the £13.2 million up to 2015. It has come from various sources, but each one is the British taxpayers, and that is why they will welcome the justice that has been done today.

Windrush

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Wednesday 2nd May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

My hon. Friend, as always, makes a very important point. A compliant environment has been put in place, and quite rightly; there should be a compliant environment. That is something that all Governments have supported, including especially the previous Labour Government.

I referred earlier to the motion. This Government recognise the importance of transparency. Members of the Windrush generation and Members of the House need to have confidence that everything possible is being done. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister announced earlier a package of measures to bring greater transparency to Members of the House and to people in our community who have been affected. Let me set out those measures in a little bit more detail. First, I will be writing—

[Clive Efford]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker—and this is a genuine point of order. The hon. Member for St Albans (Mrs Main) just asked for the publication of documents that go back before 2010. If you were willing to accept a manuscript amendment to the motion, would the Government then support the motion?

Windrush

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Monday 30th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

Having worked with me in a previous Department, my hon. Friend will know that in every Department in which I have worked, I have almost certainly put my own stamp on it.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

There is no question but that the commitment to get net migration down to the tens of thousands led to the “hostile environment” that affected the Windrush people. The Prime Minister recommitted the Government to that policy on 8 May during the previous general election. It seems inconceivable that she would make such a policy statement and then pay no attention to how that policy was delivered. I do not expect the Secretary of State to have the details now, but can he write to me, and put a copy in the Library, of all the occasions when that has been on the agenda when his Department has met the Prime Minister to discuss how to deliver reducing net migration to the tens of thousands?

[Sajid Javid]

I would be happy to write to the hon. Gentleman.

Building Safety

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Thursday 15th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

We all in the House want to see justice for the victims of the Grenfell tragedy, which is why the live police investigation to which I referred earlier as well as the work of the public inquiry are so important. Both pieces of work have the Government’s full support.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

I do not find the Secretary of State’s statement at all reassuring. Nine months on, he has come to the House to say that we have just discovered that the fire doors were defective and only lasted 15 minutes in the case of a fire, not 30 minutes. My constituents are told to stay put on the basis that those doors give the fire service time to come and rescue people in tower blocks. He says that this is not a systemic problem, but just what does that mean? Were these defective doors fitted in the knowledge that they only lasted 15 minutes? Is the manufacturer to blame? How widespread is this? Are the doors in the blocks in my constituency defective? I really find this statement defective. Can we have another statement from the Secretary of State to update us with the real facts of the situation?

[Sajid Javid]

There is a live police investigation going on. The hon. Gentleman should appreciate that it is an independent criminal investigation by the police, and it would not be appropriate for me to talk about certain things publicly, unless he is suggesting that we should jeopardise a live police investigation.

The hon. Gentleman rightly asks about the investigation —not the police investigation, but the work being led by the expert panel—and I am happy to give him more information. There is a documentary investigation into the fire doors, led by the police, to see whether it is a whole set of fire doors or a certain batch and where they might be in the country. There is a fire testing investigation taking place, led by my Department, to test a whole number of other doors to see how widespread this problem may be. There is also a visual inspection and declassification investigation going on into the materials. I hope the hon. Gentleman will appreciate that there is a lot of work to do, and it is right that we do this thoroughly and take the time to get it right.

National Planning Policy Framework

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Monday 5th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

First, I have been very impressed by Rugby’s approach. In many ways, it leads the way in showing what can be done to get the most out of previously developed land. I can confirm that the new approach to how housing need is assessed will apply to local authorities as they continue to develop plans. In other words, if they already have a plan in place it will not make any difference to them.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

My constituency is plagued with rogue landlords who are buying up residential homes, turning them into homes for multiple occupation, often fuelled by milking the housing benefit budget, and pricing local people out of the market. The problem is a lack of ability to enforce planning regulations. As rogue landlords use permitted development, will the Secretary of State look at the resources that local authorities have to police planning applications and people who are developing under permitted development?

[Sajid Javid]

I can tell the hon. Gentleman two things that I think he might find helpful. First, we have given more money to local authorities to deal with the problem of rogue landlords. Secondly, new measures will come into place from April to give local authorities more powers to deal with rogue landlords. Local authorities will be able to keep the funding from the fines they impose and recycle it to help the victims of rogue landlords.

Grenfell Tower and Building Safety

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Monday 18th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

I hope that my hon. Friend will understand that I should not comment on which companies were or were not involved in the tragedy; that will be a decision for the public inquiry and the criminal inquiry. Although in principle I am happy, at the right time, to meet any company that is involved in building services, it is appropriate that I do so only once I am comfortable that any inquiries and reviews are over.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

Dame Judith Hackitt draws attention to how the privatisation of things such as fire inspections has denuded local authorities of essential expertise, and that is also true of building control. Can we bring such deregulation to an end, urgently, because people continue to be put at risk? Can we bring such matters back under the responsibility of local authorities, where they belong?

[Sajid Javid]

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman has in mind the 2002 deregulation of building regulations self-certification schemes, or perhaps the 2005 regulatory order on fire safety that the then Government claimed was cutting red tape. As I have said, successive Governments have been involved in building regulation, and I am glad that Dame Judith Hackitt is looking at all of that.

Budget Resolutions

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Thursday 23rd November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

I am glad that the hon. Gentleman raises the issue of council houses, because it gives me another opportunity to remind the House that in 13 years in office, Labour built fewer council houses than have been built since the return of a Conservative-led Government. Yesterday’s measures, which I will come to in a moment, are ambitious and will lead to more council houses, which we welcome.

[Clive Efford]

Can the Secretary of State explain how it is logical to cut stamp duty on houses worth less than £300,000, which will increase the price of properties, cut the tax coming in and benefit not first-time buyers but only those selling properties?

[Sajid Javid]

I think the hon. Gentleman should speak to the leader of his own party, who stood at the Dispatch Box yesterday claiming that it was his policy from his manifesto. The hon. Gentleman needs to go and do some homework.

When Labour came to power in 1997, the average home cost three and a half times the average wage. By the time it slunk out of office in 2010, it was nearly seven times the average wage. As for the neediest in society, Labour cut the number of social homes for rent by more than 420,000 units. That is its track record.

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[Sajid Javid]

This is a timely point at which to remind the hon. Gentleman that when a Government leave this country with the biggest budget deficit of any industrialised country, there are consequences, and Labour Members have not once—I repeat, not once—got up at the Opposition Dispatch Box to apologise for what they did to this country in their 13 years in office.

The Chancellor has also promised to provide additional funding for a future NHS pay settlement, so that our nurses are properly rewarded without taking money out of patient services. We are investing more in our schools: they will get £600 extra for every pupil who takes A-level or core maths; £27 million will help to improve how maths is taught in 3,000 schools; £49 million will go towards helping students resitting GCSE maths; and £350,000 of extra funding a year will be given to every specialist maths school that has been set up across the country. That is a massive investment in numeracy—sadly, it comes too late for the shadow Treasury team—that will help to ensure our young people have the skills they need to compete in the future high-tech jobs of the 21st century.

Not all public services are the responsibility of central Government; many are delivered by our brilliant local councils, whether parishes, districts, counties, metropolitans or unitary authorities. I am well aware of the pressure that local authority budgets are under, particularly with regard to social care. That is why this year’s spring Budget provided an extra £2 billion to help to meet the immediate needs in this vital area. I remain totally committed to delivering fair, effective funding for councils at all levels, and we will obviously return to this in next month’s local government finance settlement.

In the meantime, we are pushing ahead with our pilot schemes for 100% local business rate retention, including in London, and we are reforming business rates themselves. Revaluations will switch from every five years to every three years, avoiding the cliff edge that currently confronts many businesses, particularly smaller ones. We are changing the law so that businesses affected by the so-called staircase tax decision can have their original bills reinstated and backdated. We are bringing forward the change in uprating from RPI to CPI, which will now take effect from next April, saving businesses £2.3 billion over the next five years.

One council, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, has had to deal with an unprecedented tragedy this year. The fire at Grenfell Tower should not have happened, and it should not have been possible. Since the blaze, the people of north Kensington have shown themselves to be remarkably resilient, courageous and proactive, and they deserve the full support of this Government and this House. We have already provided financial support for the victims of this terrible tragedy. This Budget sets aside a further £28 million to pay for community mental health support and to provide regeneration support for the area around Grenfell Tower and a new space for the local community to come together.

[Clive Efford]

Will the Secretary of State clarify what the Chancellor said yesterday about funds for fire safety precautions? Did he say that, where local authorities are told by an independent fire safety officer that sprinklers should be retrofitted in tower blocks, the Government will assist with paying for that to happen?

[Sajid Javid]

I thought the Chancellor was clear, but I am happy to help the hon. Gentleman by providing clarification. The Chancellor said that all local authorities need to do whatever is essential to keep their residents safe, which includes fitting sprinklers and anything else. If they receive such professional advice, they should of course follow it. If in doing so, they need to approach the Government for financial support, they should do so, and we will provide support.

Grenfell Recovery Taskforce

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Monday 6th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

Yes, I can confirm that. Of course, those people must be listened to by the council and by any other providers of public services, including central Government —my Department and others. My hon. Friend the Minister for Policing and the Fire Service is the Minister for Grenfell victims and regularly meets victims in the wider community. My hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning also regularly meets community members and others on rehousing needs, and I regularly have such meetings myself.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

I welcome the Secretary of State saying, “as long as I am in public life, I will do all I can to ensure that the failures of the past are not repeated”, but had we learned the lessons from the Lakanal fire, we would have done so before this tragedy happened. One of the recommendations is that where fire safety officers recommend it, sprinklers should be retrofitted. We have the Budget coming up in a couple of weeks’ time. Will the Secretary of State make representations to the Chancellor to make funds available to local authorities to fit sprinklers in tower blocks?

[Sajid Javid]

I have already told the House that in terms of the fire safety work that is required for other social buildings, whatever work is deemed essential by the respective council or housing authority should be carried out, and the Government will provide support and flexibility to make sure that it is.

Grenfell Tower

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Thursday 19th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

My hon. Friend refers to the Green Paper on social housing that we are already working on. One of the key ways in which we will develop that paper is by listening to people who already live in social housing—not just those in one area. London is important, but we want to listen to people from across the country about the issues they face in terms of the quality and type of social housing. We want to hear about redress and how to ensure that we can have a better system, so that we can listen and take action when residents come up with issues.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

Can the Secretary of State imagine a situation in which so many thousands of people were in potential danger that would not be treated as a national issue for the Government? We have a Secretary of State who is trying to wash his hands of responsibility. The commissioner of the London fire brigade says that retrofitting sprinklers in tower blocks

“can’t be optional, it can’t be a nice-to-have”.

Does the Secretary of State agree with the commissioner, and will he work with local authorities to retrofit sprinklers in tower blocks?

[Sajid Javid]

With respect, I do not think the hon. Gentleman has been listening to my responses. As I have said, and I repeat it again for his benefit, it is for property owners—local councils and, in some cases, housing associations—to determine what is essential, after taking the advice of their local fire and rescue service, the local experts. Once they take that advice, we will listen to their determination.

Local Housing Need

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Thursday 14th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

My hon. Friend is right to highlight London. He will know from his experience and will have heard from his constituents that some of the greatest need in our country is in our great capital city. There is a need for greater co-operation, but the statement of common ground will help significantly by bringing greater transparency and more certainty, and it will force councils to co-operate much earlier in the process. One of the issues with the current duty to co-operate is that it tends to happen at the end of the process. This will ensure that that important dialogue begins right at the start.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

Following that answer, we are talking not just about the number of housing units, but about who needs them. If the Secretary of State relies only on private developers to build houses in areas of high land values, such as London, we will not build houses at affordable rents in which people can live while they save to become house buyers. The Government have to step in and start building social housing again at rents that people can afford in areas of high land values, so that we can really mend the broken housing ladder.

[Sajid Javid]

The hon. Gentleman might like to reflect on what I said earlier. When his party was last in power, social units declined by 420,000; I do not think many Members can remember him saying similar things then. If he really means what he says this time, he should agree with what he has heard today and what he has read in the housing White Paper published in February—I hope he has read it. We very much agree that there needs to be diversified supply in the market. It is not just about the private sector, although it has a hugely important role to play; we need more small and medium-sized builders in the market. We need to help housing associations, which currently account for almost a third of housing starts, to do even more. Where ambitious councils want to build more homes, we are ready to work with them.

Grenfell Tower

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Monday 3rd July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

As I said in my statement, I can confirm that hospitals, schools and other buildings in the public sector are being looked at. That work is being led, through the Government Property Unit, by the Cabinet Office. The process of testing is ongoing. Even before the cladding can be tested, we have made sure that local fire and rescue services have been informed and that any necessary mitigating measures have been taken.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State said that testing of the core of cladding had resulted in 181 failures and that that meant local authorities had breached building control regulations. Does that mean regulations at the time the cladding was put up, or regulations as they stand today?

[Sajid Javid]

The last time there was any significant change in building regulations guidance was in 2006 and much of the cladding was put up in the early 2000s. There has been no significant change in building regulations or building regulations guidance pertaining to fire safety for a number of years. I said in my statement that the samples had failed a limited combustibility test, and that test has been around for a number of years.

Grenfell Tower Fire/Fire Safety

Debate between Sajid Javid and Clive Efford

Monday 26th June 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

When the local fire and rescue service recommends sprinklers, they should be installed.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

Was the Secretary of State’s Department aware of the fire at the Lacrosse tower in Melbourne in 2014? It had cladding similar to that at Grenfell Tower. What lessons did the Department for Communities and Local Government learn from that fire? Should it not have prompted a review of the cladding of tower blocks in this country?

[Sajid Javid]

The important point that the hon. Gentleman highlights is that we can benefit from international experience, whether that comes from Australia, Europe or elsewhere. That is certainly one thing we should look at as we learn the lessons.