Draft Dorset (Structural Changes) (Modification Of The Local Government And Public Involvement In Health Act 2007) Regulations 2018 Draft Bournemouth, Dorset And Poole (Structural Changes) Order 2018

Debate between Simon Hoare and Richard Drax

Wednesday 16th May 2018 General Committees

[Richard Drax]

My hon. Friend mentions south Dorset and Weymouth, so may I pay tribute to our chief executive, Matt Prosser, who is the leader of our tri-councillors and a superb chief executive? As I think colleagues have mentioned, this move will see a lot of people lose their jobs.

[Simon Hoare]

My hon. Friend is right, and I too pay tribute to Matt Prosser, and to the leaders of councils that cover my constituency—Councillor Graham Carr-Jones is the leader of North Dorset District Council, and Councillor Spencer Flower leads East Dorset District Council. Councillor Rebecca Knox is leader of the county council. They came together—this has been a salutary lesson for us all, and I firmly believe that that was one of the lead motivators for seven of the eight Members of Parliament representing constituencies in the county to support them. They have tried all those efficiency savings and had some signal success.

My right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset is right. I have been in post for just three years, but in that time I have noticed—as has my caseworker, Diana Mogg, who served my predecessor for 18 years—an absolute peak in people contacting us, and coming to advice surgeries with questions about children’s services, special educational needs and statementing, rural transport, and the provision of adult services. There has been a spike, and the hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton was right to point out the indisputable fact that local government has shouldered a heavy burden as we try to get the national finances back to some semblance of normality. Colleagues, irrespective of where we stand on these proposals, have argued with previous Secretaries of State and with the Treasury to get a better funding settlement for our county.

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[Simon Hoare]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. “Magnanimous in victory and gracious in defeat”, I think is the old phrase—I forget the order; it may be the other way around. That is the test. We have been convinced of the merits. Rather like my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset, I am not known for my radical tendencies. I am not a great thrower-up of all the balls into the air to see how they will come down.

This has been a forensic exercise and the case has been made to the vast majority of us who have the great privilege of representing communities in Dorset. However, my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch is absolutely right that local identity matters, so whether it is a mace or gown, a tricorn or bicorn hat, or a town’s ancient ritual—I see the mace bearer in Blandford and the clerk, who wears her black gown and her legal wig, on civic occasions—these are important things for communities. They are what defines us as English—I think I can just about say that, as a Welshman—and British.

[Richard Drax]

My hon. Friend is making a wonderful speech, as have other colleagues. To pick up on an earlier point, I entirely concur with what my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley said: I have the highest respect for our hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch, and yes, he has stood up for his constituents. He has done all he possibly could, and any other MP in that seat would have done the same. I pay tribute to him; we all do. But when we have all voted, when this has been forensically looked at and when the evidence is there, bearing in mind all the facts that we have to take into account, surely there comes a point when a decision has to be made for the benefit of us all, and at that point I think an MP has to stand down.

[Simon Hoare]

My hon. Friend—who is, dare I say it, the epitome of Englishness—is absolutely right. We need to convince our friends and colleagues who reside in the Christchurch constituency or within the boundaries of the Christchurch borough that this is the right thing to do. It is the right thing to do for public service, the right thing for good, sensible, conservative, prudent financial management and the right thing to guarantee the future of local government in our county.

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[Simon Hoare]

My hon. Friend is right. It depends from which end of the telescope one looks at this, which just goes to show the compelling validity and veracity of the proposal that colleagues in local government across the county submitted for ministerial decision. They looked at a number of options with officials in London, officers in their relevant jurisdictions, and their councillors. Clearly, the proposal addresses the conundrum that I posed from the rural end of the telescope, and which my hon. Friend has posed from the urban end. One could describe it as a win-win situation.

If hon. Members will allow me to purloin a phrase, it will allow councillors within the conurbation, and councillors in the rural area, to take back control. [Interruption.] The Labour Whip very kindly chortles at my observation—chortles, perhaps, to the point of expiration. This is an important point, because it will allow people with the most granular knowledge of their geographies to deliver in a way that their constituents and voters want. After the savings have been made, the money will allow them to provide the services that our local residents most need.

As public servants, we often talk about hard-to-reach communities. Very often, the people who are the most dependent upon our public sector services are the least likely to engage in this progress. Why? Because, frankly, they are just too damn busy getting on with the daily grind of life and trying to make ends meet, trying to keep a roof over their head or trying to get the council to sort something out—the free school meals, the bus pass, the school place, whatever it happens to be. That is a really important point. In this process, we will ensure that rural services are delivered in rural areas, and conurbation services are delivered in conurbations.

[Richard Drax]

While I have the Minister’s attention, I want to say that we hope the rural unitary will be as important as the urban unitary and will receive equal investment.

[Simon Hoare]

My hon. Friend strikes a very telling point, which he, I and my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset have made to organisations such as the Dorset Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Dorset local enterprise partnership. Dorset’s economy does not end halfway up Wimborne high street. It is in our former milking parlours, our little industrial units, our small starter units in Sturminster Newton or Blandford Forum, in our hubs and hives of enterprise, job creation and innovation, wherever they happen to be.

Just last Friday, I visited a business in Blandford that operates over a two-storey floor space that I would suggest is no larger than this room, but has just signed a £10.5 million export deal with Nigeria to provide LED lighting. That strong contract was cited by the Minister for Trade Policy in departmental press releases during the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting. Little Blandford Forum—such a hub of innovation!

The complexity—the confusing mosaic; the fit-inducing kaleidoscope—of the geography of local government that we have at the moment has allowed larger bodies to concentrate their attention unduly on the conurbation, almost allowing one side to be played off against the other. In this new regime, that cannot be the case. In my assessment, the economies of the whole of the county will benefit.

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[Richard Drax]

I agree entirely that there is going to be greater scope for town councils. When the Minister sums up, he might just allude to that and reassure us that town and parish councils will indeed have a role in the future.

[Simon Hoare]

I concur with my hon. Friend. If my hon. Friend the Minister cannot do that, I will be performing the greatest volte-face in Dorset’s political history and joining my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch.