City and Town Centres: Regeneration

Alex Norris Excerpts

Wednesday 16th October 2024 Westminster Hall

[Vikki Slade]

I am delighted that Poole was one of the places to get its Wilko back a little while ago—that was a great celebration. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right: some town centre units are anchor spaces, and planning and financial levers such as allowing councils to keep their locally generated business rates could transform them by allowing them to work with businesses. Currently, councils have to back-fill those lost business rates sent to the Treasury; council tax payers fund that, which is a big ask for them.

As many Members have said, business rates must be an urgent priority from the Government—

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Alex Norris)]

indicated assent.

[Vikki Slade]

I am confident from the nodding I see that that they will be. In fact, that is what first got me interested in politics: I felt the unfairness of business rates when I had my own high street business. The Liberal Democrats want to replace business rates with a commercial land owner levy, alongside an increase in the digital services tax, which would boost investment and cut taxes for businesses in nine out of 10 English local authority areas. It would benefit retailers and other small businesses, and would reduce the burden on councils as there would be fewer land parcels to tax.

There is deep concern, not just from the Liberal Democrats but from the LGA, which represents the whole local government family, about the unfettered use of permitted development. Converted offices often provide poor living spaces, and using permitted development means that affordable housing and community infra- structure is not provided. That puts a greater burden on local people and services, and negatively impacts community cohesion.

City and town centres need the same careful plan-led development as suburban and rural areas, and community consent must be at the very heart of regeneration. If we do that, I am sure many of the 1.5 million new homes that the Government plan can be delivered, but that will only work alongside high-quality design and a substantial injection of grant funding. Housing development in urban areas is complex and expensive, and organisations such as Homes England and other funding will be needed to provide that support. Cranes in the sky are the best energiser of the local development market, and sometimes councils must blink first. Schemes such as Holes Bay in Poole need urgent support so that we do not miss the opportunity to thrive under this brand new Government.

Towns and cities need people to come in, so we must urgently reform transport. We must welcome the potential for councils to franchise bus services if it is right for them, but it is not just about buses: the national grid must be boosted so that electric vehicles can be turbo-charged, and we need a 5% reduction on VAT on public charging so that everyone has the right to drive EV.

We really need legislation on the use of e-scooters. We must improve our pavements, deal with delivery mopeds, which are making people’s lives an absolute misery, and tackle congestion on our streets.

A vibrant town centre needs arts and culture, reflecting our diverse populations. Events such as Wimborne folk festival and Wareham Wednesdays draw people in from surrounding towns and villages. Bigger events, such as Arts by the Sea in Bournemouth and Poole Oktoberfest, draw people in during seaside shoulder time and— I agree with the intervention made earlier—they create the opportunity for investors to see our towns at their best.

We need to make sure that councils can afford to support tourism. The squeeze on councils over the last decade under the Conservatives has made it virtually impossible for councils to fund these non-statutory things. I would like the Government to keep considering options such as tourism levies, local visitor economy partnerships and other ways for local councils to generate income. Lib Dems call on the new Labour Government to properly fund local government, urgently close the £4 billion local government funding gap and let councils lead change.

As a former council leader I have witnessed how councils have had to reinvent themselves time and again. They touch every home and business, so investing locally will pay dividends. We know what works. Just as importantly, councils know what does not work. Just like the big industries that shaped our cities for the first half of the 20th century that are not coming back, the giant retailers that shaped our town centres in the second half are part of history, too. To create thriving communities, we need the Government to invest locally and let places choose how they regenerate.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Alex Norris)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Sir Roger, and to speak for the Government in the debate, which I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North (Catherine Atkinson) on securing. She can tell by the attendance and enthusiasm of hon. Members that she has clearly struck a nerve. I support much of what she said, particularly her passion for the regeneration of our towns and cities to create safe and flourishing local communities.

I represent a Nottingham constituency, so although I will endeavour to get through the rest of the debate without making a Derby joke, that will be very difficult given our important local rivalries—if you see me starting to dance on the spot, Sir Roger, that is why. My hon. Friend’s points about pride, safety and vacancy are at the nub of the debate. I will cover them, as well as a number of contributions from other hon. Members, in my remarks.

Localism is important, and it was mentioned by the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Vikki Slade), and many other hon. Members. The hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole characterised it as an “intensely local” debate. My hon. Friend the Member for Luton South and South Bedfordshire (Rachel Hopkins) talked about giving communities the tools. My hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Frith), who I know is now participating in the debate in the main Chamber, talked about local people being the real experts, and I totally agree with that. We made a clear commitment in our manifesto to work closely in a new partnership approach with local authorities and elected mayors to stabilise the funding system and build a new one.

The shadow Minister rightly talked about the previous Government’s efforts: the future high streets fund, town deals, levelling-up fund, community ownership fund, UK shared prosperity fund, and long-term plan for towns—lots of different interventions. He has heard me say this before, but my analysis is that they are less than the sum of their parts. It is our job, as a new Government, to make good on our commitment to introduce a more allocative model, perhaps on a longer-term basis, with less central direction and more local decision making.

[Baggy Shanker (Derby South) (Lab/Co-op)]

Despite successive challenges from devastating local government cuts, the impact of lockdowns during the covid pandemic, and 14 years of under-investment from the last Government, we are fighting back in Derby. We have turned a corner, and I would say that we are actually on the up. We now have a Labour Government, a Labour East Midlands Mayor—who is key to this solution—and a Labour council.

Importantly, we have a really strong private-public sector partnership trying to deliver a cleaner, safer and more prosperous Derby, but there is lots more to do. Does the Minister agree that there is more scope to regenerate our city centres with a forward-thinking, collaborative Government who work with the private sector, but put working people at the forefront?

[Sir Roger Gale (in the Chair)]

Order. The Minister has a very limited amount of time to wind up. I appreciate that there will be hon. Members who have not said everything that they want to, but I ask them to resist the temptation of doing so if the Minister is to respond to the debate.

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for the intervention from my hon. Friend the Member for Derby South (Baggy Shanker), and praise his work as leader of the council. This is politics-blind: we want to see a real alignment of national, regional or sub-regional government with the local authority and the local community, all working together in the shared interest and using tools and resources in the best way. That speaks to the new model that I talked about, as invited to by my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton Itchen (Darren Paffey). We want to bring resources together across Government—a theme mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth North (Amanda Martin)—to get the best of it.

My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Connor Naismith) made a good point about local events. I am conscious that the biggest personal and professional embarrassment of my life took place in Crewe town centre 16 and a half years ago—it is a matter of public record—but nevertheless, I know it to be a vibrant town centre. The point made by the hon. Member for Bromsgrove (Bradley Thomas) about investment portfolios is exactly right, understanding that there should be, as the shadow Minister said, a global reach even to the most local communities. That is the environment we need to create.

Regarding the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), I had a chance to talk to some business owners from Newtownards when I presented at the High Street Heroes awards for Retail NI, which does excellent work in this space. I am afraid that Ballymena won on that day, but I know the creativity is there. The key is—this is different, as he said, in a devolved sense—to get the tools and resources to the experts, who are the local community.

It is no secret that growth is at the centre of our mission and at the core of the new Government’s activity, especially local growth in towns and city centres, and the businesses in our communities that make our high streets successful. There is no one vision for that—it will look different everywhere, and that is a good thing—but there are common themes around safety, accessibility and the types and mix of businesses and services we want to see. I will refer briefly to a couple of those themes and to some of the work that has be done so far.

Prior to the election, we committed to our five-point plan on anti-social behaviour and shoplifting; banking hubs; late payments; revamping empty shops, pubs and community spaces; and business rates. That work is under way.

My hon. Friends the Members for Derby North, for Portsmouth North, and for Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes (Melanie Onn) mentioned vacancy. We will be bringing in high street rental auctions very soon—as my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North said, we need only secondary legislation—to give local communities the power, through their council, to bring vacant units back into use. I am really looking forward to that. We have also committed, as part of the English devolution Bill process, to go further with the community right to buy. I know there is a lot of interest in that; it is on its way. Those are real tools to help communities to shape place.

The theme of safety has come up frequently, and was mentioned by my hon. Friends the Members for Peterborough (Andrew Pakes) and for Southend East and Rochford (Mr Alaba). Combating violence in retail is a personal passion of mine. We know that that type of crime and violence in communities is a doom loop, because it creates more vacancies and makes people less likely to go out, which in turn creates an environment where such behaviour thrives.

As part of our safer streets mission, we have committed to a neighbourhood policing guarantee that includes returning patrols to town centres; 13,000 more police and police community support officers; and a named officer in every community for people to turn to. We want communities to have their say in how they are used and, most of all, to know who to talk to. To be clear, there will be tools to tackle people who persistently harm their local community—for example, new respect orders that have growing penalties and a specific offence of violence against retail workers. Those measures will make our communities safer to live in, work in and visit.

I am conscious that I am very near the end of the debate, which I think is at 4.14 pm. Is that right, Sir Roger?

[Sir Roger Gale (in the Chair)]

Given injury time for the Division, the debate will end at 4.18 pm, but the mover of the motion will need a couple of minutes to wind up.

[Alex Norris]

I might move my 1.5 speed down to 1.4 speed, then!

Hon. Members, including my hon. Friends the Members for Macclesfield (Tim Roca) and for Cowdenbeath and Kirkcaldy (Melanie Ward) and the shadow Minister, mentioned business rates, which we are very mindful of. As we have said, we intend to level the playing field between the high street and online giants to incentivise investment, tackle empty properties and support entrepreneurs in that venture. However, that measure has to be revenue-neutral because of the important work that business rates do.

Hon. Members invite me to make a slightly more fulsome commitment than I can today, because we are two weeks away from a major fiscal event. As they would expect, any significant tax announcement will be made then by the Chancellor, so I have to hold a little bit back. We have made the commitment we have made, however, and I have said what I have said today. We understand how important the issue of business rates is.

My hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Jess Asato) talked about the loss of the final bank in Beccles, how that is a totemic moment for a high street or town, and the impact it has on footfall, which is at the heart of the viability and safety of businesses. We are very keen on and committed to banking hubs: we have committed to rolling out 350 by the end of the Parliament, and we expect 100 to already be in place by Christmas. I have no doubt that she will be an advocate for her community in that regard. Banking hubs could become not only important in arresting one of the major sources of decline we have seen over the years, but a very attractive anchor on a high street, helping to bring in other businesses. There is a lot to go for in the banking hubs space.

Hon. Members have mentioned planning. We do not have time to talk about the whole planning system, but we want an environment that promotes the new mix. The Lib Dem spokesperson, the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole, talked about not wanting to go back to the past, but it will not be, because we could order a book in two clicks on our phone—in this debate, heaven forfend. Instead, we know that the future will look different. Whether it is banking hubs, a mix of retail and leisure or, as the shadow Minister said, housing in the right conditions, it is about that new mix, and we want to ensure that communities have the tools and resources to shape place to ensure that they have that.

I will draw my remarks to a close so that my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North has time to sum up, and I will end where I started by congratulating her on introducing the debate. We have heard from hon. Members across the nations and regions of the UK. There are many common challenges, but there is a real enthusiasm for the powers and resources to shape place locally, and that is what this Government will deliver.

Voter Identification: HM Armed Forces Veteran Card

Alex Norris Excerpts

Tuesday 15th October 2024 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Alex Norris)]

To encourage participation in our democracy, this Government are committed to ensuring all legitimate voters have the ability to vote in our elections.

Working alongside the Minister for Veterans and People, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Selly Oak (Al Carns), we are pleased to today, 15 October, lay the statutory instrument—the Voter Identification (Amendment of List of Specified Documents) Regulations 2024—required to add the HM armed forces veteran card (“veteran card”) to the list of photographic identifications accepted in polling stations as voter ID, thereby fulfilling a key manifesto commitment.

Voter identification

The Government are committed to carefully and thoroughly reviewing the voter identification rules and evaluating how they impacted citizens during the general election. Work is already under way on this evaluation, using data gathered at polling stations along with public opinion survey results and qualitative research with electors and the electoral sector. We will be taking into account the findings and recommendations of the Electoral Commission, due this autumn, as part of this review and publishing our full report next year. Any reforms to voter ID in the future will always respect and promote the rights of veterans.

Reviews and major changes to electoral law, if done right, take time, research and careful consideration, and we will be bringing forward firm proposals on the wider voter ID policy in due course. However, there are some clear gaps in the existing provisions—such as the current absence of the veteran card from the accepted voter ID list—on which we can make quick progress while the evaluation is ongoing to improve consistency and widen participation.

At the heart of our security are the men and women who serve and risk their lives for this country. It was unacceptable that the previous Government failed to add the veteran card to the list of accepted voter identifications. Including the card, alongside the already accepted Ministry of Defence identification card (the MOD90 card), will bring parity between veterans and serving armed services personnel with regard to the ID they can use in polling stations. We recognise that the veteran card is a powerful symbol of veterans’ service and its addition to the list is one of the things this Government are doing to honour their contribution. The addition of the veteran card supports them engaging in the elections process and in exercising their democratic rights. We would like to thank those who have campaigned to make this change a reality.

Progress on wider electoral reform

The Government have set out their commitment to strengthen the integrity of elections and encourage wide participation in the democratic process. Fulfilling our commitment on the veteran card is only the first step in that journey. We are also making progress in several other areas to deliver on these promises. Work has begun on what is required to extend the franchise for all UK elections to allow 16 and 17-year-olds to vote, and legislation for this will be introduced in due course, strengthening our democracy and empowering young people to participate in it.

It is not only young people who should be encouraged to participate. While Electoral Commission reports show consistency in the accuracy and completeness of electoral registers over recent years, we know there remains a significant number of people missing from our registers and we will tackle this unacceptable participation gap by taking action to improve rates of electoral registration. We are exploring a wide range of options to deliver on this commitment, including through the use of data and online services to support electoral registration officers increase registration levels.

We are clear that electoral reform will require careful consideration and engagement with both the electoral sector and with citizens themselves.

Alongside widening participation, the Government are committed to protecting the integrity of and public trust in our electoral processes. Effective regulation and enforcement of how our politics are financed plays a key role in maintaining this trust. Foreign money has no place in the UK’s political system, which is why the law is clear that foreign donations to political parties are not permitted in the UK. However, as threats and challenges evolve, we must continue to do likewise: more can and should be done to ensure our political finance framework remains robust. We therefore committed in our manifesto to strengthening the rules around donations to political parties, and, working closely with the Electoral Commission, are considering a range of measures to achieve this. Firm proposals will be brought forward in due course.

Fixing the foundations of elections delivery

The Government are committed to supporting returning officers, electoral registration officers and their teams in their delivery of our democracy. We have heard and understood the consistent message from the electoral sector that electoral law is outdated and difficult to work with and that while elections continue at present to be delivered effectively, that is not without risk and comes at a personal and professional cost to elections teams.

The Government therefore will, alongside the work to deliver manifesto commitments, look to identify and address the biggest challenges and pain-points in the current system for electoral registration and conduct. We will do this in partnership with the elections sector, using the large body of evidence that already exists and the reflections of the sector on the reality of delivery of recent polls, to ensure we prioritise the right issues and identify solutions that work.

We will continue to provide Parliament with updates on our progress across all of these workstreams to strengthen our democracy and uphold the integrity and resilience of our elections.

[HCWS139]

Housing, Communities and Local Government

Alex Norris Excerpts

Monday 7th October 2024 Written Corrections

The following extract is from the debate on Building Safety and Resilience on 11 September 2024.

[Alex Norris]

Colleagues have talked about buying, selling or remortgaging homes. We have seen improvements in that space, but we remain vigilant. We will continue to hold particularly the 10 largest lenders to account following their commitment to lend on properties even where remediation is not yet complete. They must keep that promise.

[Official Report, 11 September 2024; Vol. 753, c. 928.]

Written correction submitted by the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, the hon. Member for Nottingham North and Kimberley (Alex Norris):

[Alex Norris]

Colleagues have talked about buying, selling or remortgaging homes. We have seen improvements in that space, but we remain vigilant. We will continue to hold particularly the 10 major lenders to account following their commitment to lend on properties even where remediation is not yet complete. They must keep that promise.

UK Shared Prosperity Fund

Alex Norris Excerpts

Thursday 12th September 2024 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Alex Norris)]

It is a pleasure to respond on behalf of the Government to the excellent speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood (Lauren Edwards). I am conscious that when I spoke in closing for the Government yesterday, my contribution lasted an unlikely 48 minutes. I am delighted—not least because my voice is a little on the cusp—that the rules of the House will prevent such a reoccurrence.

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate and on the strength of the case she made. It is clear from what she has said just now and previously—I am similarly grateful for the question she asked me at oral questions last week—how strongly she feels about the UK shared prosperity fund as well as the work she did in Medway and the impact she made with the fund. There is clearly an awful lot to learn from the Medway example, and I look forward to doing that when we meet again shortly after the conference recess.

[Dr Zubir Ahmed (Glasgow South West) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way and to my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood (Lauren Edwards) for securing this really important debate. Scotland has been a beneficiary of the shared prosperity fund to the tune of £212 million since 2022, over £70 million of which has come to my home city of Glasgow. Does the Minister agree that that is a demonstration of the Union dividend, which Scotland and the nations and regions of the United Kingdom enjoy by being part of this Union? Does he further agree that the shared prosperity fund is an important vehicle for bringing equity to the regions and nations of the United Kingdom?

[Alex Norris]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. The United Kingdom Government are ambitious for growth across all of the United Kingdom. Ours is a four-nations commitment, and we look forward to working closely with colleagues in Scotland, in all strands of local growth funding, to ensure that people across Scotland —and in Wales and Northern Ireland—get the benefits of growth and that dividend of which he speaks. On the particular point about the UK shared prosperity fund, I agree on its effectiveness and will talk about its future, as I know colleagues are keen for me to do.

[Jonathan Davies (Mid Derbyshire) (Lab)]

I too thank my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood (Lauren Edwards) for introducing this important debate. Councils across the country, including in Derbyshire, have faced appalling cuts over the last decade, and the UKSPF has been one of the few points of light in what has been a very dark decade for local authorities. I warmly welcome the new Government’s commitment to offer councils a three-year funding settlement, but can I encourage the Minister to lobby the Treasury to see what more it can do for local authorities, because the important services they provide are on the cusp of being inaccessible to people?

[Alex Norris]

My hon. Friend makes an important point about the health of local government. Like many colleagues, I am a veteran of local government, and I am very conscious of the pressures it is under. As we design a new model for local growth, I am also conscious that local authorities will be at the heart of making it effective. If they do not have the capacity because of those pressures, that will be a limiting factor on our success, and I am very mindful of that.

I have seen at first hand the good work that the UKSPF has done in my constituency, and I appreciate why there is such interest in its future. It has helped to support organisations that are addressing unemployment and providing training, such as the Bestwood Partnership and Evolve, which have made a huge difference to our community. It has also backed community projects such as the Kimberley community garden, allowing its members to redevelop their site and continue important community outreach work. So I understand very strongly why there is such interest in the fund.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood said, future funding is a matter for the Chancellor and the Budget—of course, we have the ongoing spending review, and the budget on 30 October. I appreciate the frustration that comes with that answer, but I am afraid that that is where we are at the moment. However, that does not prevent me from addressing a number of the points that my hon. Friend made.

It is one of the beauties of the electoral cycle and of our democracy that a change election brings in colleagues with a lot of different experiences. My hon. Friend talked about the impact that the £3.3 million from the UKSPF has had in Medway and about what she did to design the work involved, and I am keen to learn from that. It is good to hear how the funding has supported growth in high streets and towns, increasing footfall, supporting local businesses and regeneration in the town centres of Chatham, Rainham and Gillingham, and addressing local challenges and, crucially, opportunities alongside community leaders. It has also supported projects such as Emerge Advocacy, which supports young people struggling with their mental health, and Mutual Aid Road Reps, which was formed during the covid pandemic to combat loneliness and isolation. Those hugely significant projects reach people who are often the hardest to reach, and the UKSPF has backed them.

Similarly, and very attractively, as my hon. Friend said, the fund has made sure that there have been great events in Medway, such as the Chinese new year festival, Easter celebrations, heritage awareness events and the Intra Lateral arts festival. There are lots of great things, and the model in Medway shows that putting local people in charge and letting them set local priorities yields great results, including a significant increase in town centre footfall and a greater sense of community. When my hon. Friend says Medway is a model, there is a lot of evidence for that, and I look forward to hearing about it.

[Jayne Kirkham]

My query is about the current version of the shared prosperity fund. Some of the capital projects going on at the moment are time-limited to the end of March. Some will not be finished by then, but local authorities are rushing to complete them and spending more money because they are worried that some of it—the current money, not the future money—could be clawed back. Will the Minister confirm that that will not be an issue with those existing projects and that that money will not be clawed back, so those projects can be completed?

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for that intervention. As my hon. Friend knows, I have inherited 15, 16 or 17 strands of local growth funding, all at different stages, with the decisions made, in many cases, many years ago. We are trying to make the most sense of them and get the best value out of them. With regard to the projects she mentions, I encourage my hon. Friend to help her local projects to engage with my officials, so that they can give clarity on precisely what the timelines are in the context of what may well be discussed as part of the Budget. I am very happy to work with her to make sure that that happens.

Turning to some of the challenges to the UKSPF mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood, we have to start with the future of the programme. Local authorities, right hon. and hon. Members, and organisations across the country that deliver projects have rightly been seeking clarity on what comes next. My mailbag is very full, and we are giving the matter full consideration. We recognise the hard work undertaken—it is important that that is stated from the Dispatch Box—and we recognise the challenges that time poses. Organisations traditionally funded in annual cycles constantly have to put hard-working members of staff on 90-day redundancy notices. That puts pressure on people who then perhaps seek other work, because it does not suit them and their life—and why would it? We understand that those cliff edges are not a good thing. They are at the forefront of our minds as we think about the future.

--- Later in debate ---

[Melanie Ward]

It also helps employability and, crucially, access to work. Does the Minister agree that such cross-UK funding is hugely important for areas like mine, where inequality is an issue?

[Alex Norris]

I am very grateful for that intervention. I think I can probably speak for most colleagues when I say that the general election was, in many regards, quite a tricky one this time, but one of the few sources of joy was my right hon. Friend, the Deputy Prime Minister’s battle bus, which seemed to reach admirable distances up and down the country, including to Fife. I know, from having spoken to her, how much she enjoyed that visit. The model my hon. Friend the Member for Cowdenbeath and Kirkcaldy (Melanie Ward) mentions is a great example of the impact being made on people’s lives across Fife and in many different parts of the UK. We are very mindful of that.

I want to address the challenges mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood. She started with timescales. Certainly, the tiny run-in in year one is not an example of good practice, and is something we would always seek to avoid. I do not think that the Government of the day thought it was a good idea, but I think they rather found themselves a victim of circumstance. We absolutely hear that point.

My hon. Friend mentioned the Local Government Association’s desire for a six to eight-year funding window. Again, I understand that very well. I have to say that that is quite challenging. Governments generally budget on a three-year cycle and often decisions are made on a one-year cycle. We have talked about wanting to give more certainty and a longer time period. I cannot commit to six to eight years, but I can commit to that principle. She mentioned the impact of single-year funding, and as I said, we very much understand that.

On my hon. Friend’s point about central restrictions and monitoring, that is one of the points on which the new Government intend to diverge from the old one. My view is that we need to give communities up and down the UK the tools and resources to use their expertise to improve their community within the framework set by the Prime Minister and his missions for the country. They are the experts in this case, not Ministers. We want a lighter touch on monitoring, and we want to be less directive on what the funding is for. UKSPF is actually a very good example of that, relative to other local growth funding, but I hear some of the challenges on that. They are important design challenges that I think we can engineer out as part of any future local growth funding programming.

Our model of local growth is reflected in the conversations we have had with local authorities and communities up and down the country. We know there is a desire to move to a more allocative settlement, with fewer beauty parades and a stronger focus on deprivation and need. We know there is a real desire for a lighter touch on monitoring, which can become a cottage industry in itself, and that is our view, too. Growth is at the heart of the things that will shape our future and growth. With local growth funding, the clue will be in the name. We want to ensure that the projects chosen by local communities drive growth.

Of course, we must see the fiscal picture in the context of the inheritance left by the last Government. This morning my hon. Friend penned an article on a well-known Labour-leaning blog, and what I took from that was the mutual desire of this Government and local government to reset the relationship to make it a better partnership, and to drive better outcomes. That will, I think, lead us to a more positive place. If local authorities are in the room and fully engaged, they may be able to use their creativity to combine funds with other funding streams, so that the money can go further. The shared prosperity fund has been a good model, but we will make changes, particularly in relation to short-term timescales and reducing some of the burdens. I have mentioned the importance of resetting the relationship with local government. Notwithstanding what we will be discussing on 30 October, those principles will guide everything we do to promote local growth.

We, as a Government, are committed to growth across the United Kingdom. We were elected on a manifesto that stressed the need to adopt a partnership approach with local authorities and an intention to stabilise the funding system, and we are going to do that. We are working closely with local authorities, stakeholders, the Scottish Parliament, the Senedd and the Northern Ireland Executive and will continue to do so, to ensure that there is a smooth transition to a new funding regime. I look forward to visiting Northern Ireland on Monday to talk further to colleagues who are interested in the UKSPF.

My hon. Friends are rightly seeking certainty. I know that they want that as soon as possible, and we have at least a bit of a pathway towards it, because, as always, important announcements will be made in the Budget statement and the ongoing spending review will shape the future. We hear the strong messages that my hon. Friends have conveyed. It has been brilliant to hear about the excellent work done in Medway and in other parts of the country, and I am keen to work with colleagues as we go forward to shape local growth funding.

Question put and agreed to.

New Housing: Environmental Standards

Alex Norris Excerpts

Thursday 12th September 2024 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Alex Norris)]

It is pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Stringer.

I am grateful for the opportunity to close this important debate on environmental standards for new housing on behalf of the Government. I start by adding my congratulations to the hon. Member for North Herefordshire (Ellie Chowns) on securing this debate and on the way she led it. I thought her speech was a real tour de force. I could not really believe that it was the first debate she has led in this place, because she spoke with admirable clarity and power. I have to say that is not how I remember speaking in my first Westminster Hall debate seven years ago. In the spirit of the clarity with which she spoke, I will seek to address the points she raised in turn.

I also want to mention the contribution from the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage (Olly Glover), with its thoughtful and well-pitched tone about the importance of bringing people with us, so that people see this as a good and positive thing in their life and are partners in the process, rather than net zero being something that happens to them. That is really important for us, as leaders in our own communities, and for the country.

We are mindful of the fact that the homes we build today will shape the environmental landscape for generations to come. The hon. Member for Guildford (Zöe Franklin) talked about not putting burdens on future generations. The choices we make shape the built environment that our children will inherit. It is with that long-term perspective that the Government remain steadfast in the commitment to achieving net zero by 2050. The energy efficiency of our buildings and the standards we set to drive that efficiency are instrumental in realising that goal.

Of course, we are acting in the context of an inherited housing crisis and our banner commitment, made during the election, to build 1.5 million new homes over the course of this Parliament. Again, ensuring that those homes meet the needs of homeowners and contribute positively to the environment is not a luxury: high environmental standards are a necessity. Those two goals must not be seen as being in competition, but rather as mutually supportive, because the decarbonisation of new buildings is a vital part of net zero efforts.

From homes to offices, the UK’s built environment is responsible for about 30% of our greenhouse gas emissions. By improving energy efficiency and moving to cleaner sources of heat, we can reduce those emissions now and in the future and, as the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage said, create warmer, healthier homes, protecting future generations from the impacts of climate change. But there are very real consequences of rising energy costs in the here and now, and the job of Government is to find the balance between getting those homes built, as the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds) said, and doing so in a way that is realisable. In many ways, that is our challenge.

I turn to the five points the hon. Member for North Herefordshire raised. First, with regard to future homes and building standards, we are clear in our commitment to introduce new standards next year that will set homes and buildings on a path away from the use of volatile fossil fuels. Those homes will be future-proofed, with low-carbon heating and high levels of building fabric standards, which I know she is interested in. That will ensure that they do not require retrofitting to become zero carbon as the electricity grid continues to decarbonise, which speaks again to the point made by the hon. Member for Guildford.

The previous Government published a consultation in December, which closed in March. We are a new Government—I hate to say it, but it is true—and have been going for only a little more than two months, so we are looking at that very carefully. In her written question to my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing, Planning and Building Safety and her contribution today, the hon. Member for North Herefordshire stressed the need for a response and was keen to know when it will be. I am afraid I have to tell her that it will be in due course. We are talking to the industry and the public, and we want to ensure the standards we set are ambitious and achievable.

The hon. Lady mentioned local authorities, and I can give her clarity on that point. Plan makers’ powers have not been restricted. The Planning and Energy Act 2008 allows plan makers to set energy efficiency standards at a local level that go beyond national building regulation standards, but that must be done in a way that is consistent with national policy. That is the balance that local decision makers will have to strike, but they have that ability.

The hon. Lady also mentioned the written ministerial statement and said that she wants clarity about its future. I am afraid that it is currently subject to judicial review, and as a result I cannot say very much about it at this time.

[Calum Miller]

I am grateful to the Minister for addressing my comments and those of the hon. Member for North Herefordshire (Ellie Chowns). On local authorities’ powers, will he consider issuing a new written ministerial statement in advance of the new housing standards to clarify the one published on 13 December 2023 by the previous Government, which threw some of the efforts by local authorities to raise standards into disarray?

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for that question. I cannot make that commitment to the hon. Member today. I hope the assurance I have given has demonstrated that there is a pretty clear landing zone for local authorities, but it must work within national standards. I also make the point, as others have, that the future homes standard consultation has come to a close, and we are consulting on the national planning policy framework. So there are some moving plates in the current setting of standards and we must be mindful of them.

The second point that the hon. Member for North Herefordshire made was about embodied carbon. As we make progress on solar panels, heat pumps and all the other ways to reduce operational carbon emissions, we will see emissions fall in buildings, and therefore embodied carbon will make up proportionally more of a building’s whole-life carbon emissions. We are committed to understanding the scale of the challenge as part of our broader efforts to decarbonise the construction sector. It is vital that we encourage industry to reduce embodied carbon by choosing lower-carbon, but still high-quality, materials. That requires a fundamental shift in design and construction, and that is why we are pushing so hard to encourage the adoption of more efficient design practices that minimise waste, which the hon. Member for Guildford mentioned, and make better use of low-carbon materials such as timber. There are some very exciting new technologies in that space. Where it is safe to do so, higher-carbon materials will be gradually replaced along the way.

The third point that the hon. Member for North Herefordshire made was about solar panels, and this is where we may slightly differ. The Government’s judgment is that we should set targets with regard to performance—what is the energy performance of the new home? Solar panels may well be part of that, but for some buildings they will not be suitable. As a result, if the choice is primarily solar, we miss out on a whole array of innovations that can help those homes reduce their carbon footprint, and there is a risk to cost-effectiveness. As I say, we are goal-oriented, rather than method-oriented.

The hon. Lady mentioned biodiversity net gain. We should recognise and build on the work that the previous Government did in this space. We see this—I think they did too—as a real opportunity as we address our urgent housing needs. We owe it to future generations to ensure that development leaves the natural environment in a measurably better state than it was. That is now mandatory for new applications for developments: all new developments, with limited exceptions, will be required to deliver at least 10% measurable net gain. The hon. Lady spoke about 1.5 million bird and bat boxes, but I would not want to be quite as prescriptive as that. We expect to see net gain, whether through the creation or enhancement of habitats on or off site, or through the purchase of registered biodiversity units on the new open market. We are working very hard with the sector to make sure that it realises those brilliant opportunities.

Let me turn to the hon. Lady’s fifth point, which was on resilience and water. As the Minister for local resilience, among a number of things, that was of particular interest to me. Immediately prior to the debate, I took part in the inaugural meeting of the flood resilience taskforce, which seeks to bring together partners to reduce the number and the impact of floods. I know from having dealt with constituents that having your house flooded is one of the very worst things that can happen to you, short of losing your life or losing a loved one, because you live with the impact of it for so long.

We have a responsibility to make sure that development does not contribute to greater flooding, and the planning system is at the heart of that. We must ensure that development is in areas at the lowest risk of flooding and that it uses sustainable drainage systems to mimic natural systems and to slow the flow of surface waters. The current consultation on proposed reforms to the NPPF is seeking views, and we would be interested to hear from colleagues on that. It is a big opportunity.

The hon. Lady also mentioned water. Safeguarding the water supply is crucial to meeting our climate obligations. As we undertake consultations, we are actively looking at options relating to water efficiency in planning and building regulations. We are developing guidance on water-positive and net zero water developments and on how to integrate water efficiency into energy efficiency and retrofit programmes.

To make a quick point about the NPPF, the planning system is critical to delivering sustainable development that aligns with climate goals. Our NPPF reform marks an important milestone in that journey. Our consultation is seeking views on how planning policy can better support the industry to adapt. We hope to get that feedback, and we will consider any and all contributions.

The Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner, made a point about product standards to me for the fourth time in the past 24 hours. I can give him clarity that nothing in that statement from 2 September is about the reduction of standards—far from it. I reiterate the commitment I made yesterday that the Minister for building safety, my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney (Rushanara Ali), will write to him with further detail.

While building the homes this country needs to tackle the housing crisis, we will ensure that our climate change commitments are met. We will set high energy-efficiency standards, ensure water efficiency, secure biodiversity net gain and deliver flood-resilient developments as we lay the foundations of a sustainable future. We will ensure that everyone has access to a decent, warm and affordable home. That will be one of the standards by which this Parliament is measured and one of the ways in which our adherence to the manifesto on which we were elected is measured, too. We are actively doing that work. I am grateful to colleagues who want us to go further and faster, and that pressure is welcome. I look forward to working with all colleagues as we go along that journey.

Building Safety and Resilience

Alex Norris Excerpts

Wednesday 11th September 2024 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Alex Norris)]

This has been an important debate on the safety of our residential buildings and, more importantly, the safety of the residents who call those buildings home. The final report of the Grenfell Tower inquiry sets out the appalling failures of the industry and successive Governments. As my right hon. and learned Friend the Prime Minister set out in his statement to the House, we apologise on behalf of the state to each and every one of the bereaved families and survivors, and to the immediate Grenfell community.

We will demand responsibility for building safety—responsibility from this Government and responsibility across the industry. Too many buildings still have unsafe cladding, and the pace of remediation has been too slow. Like many colleagues in the House, I was in this Chamber seven years ago. Had we said to ourselves then that we would still be in the same situation seven years later, I think we would have considered that we had failed. That is very much the case, and this Government intend to address the failure. As I say, too many buildings have unsafe cladding, and the funding is there. There is no excuse for a building owner not to enter a cladding scheme for which they are eligible. We will accelerate efforts to bring all remaining buildings into remediation schemes, and empower regulators and local authorities to act, including by considering new legislation.

For good reason, much of this debate has been about safety rather than resilience, but as the Minister with responsibility for local resilience, I want to make the point that we are looking very closely at resilience at both national and local levels in response to the Grenfell Tower inquiry and the inquiry into the covid pandemic. We are looking at ways in which we can response to crises, and the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is leading a review of resilience, which will include work with the devolved Governments, regional mayors, local leaders and local resilience partnerships. Again, the reports have said that we ought be doing that. We are looking at the recommendations very carefully, and making sure that local areas are empowered and have the capacity to respond in times of crisis.

[Zarah Sultana]

I thank the Minister for giving way on the point about resilience. Obviously, firefighters and the FBU are key stakeholders in resilience work. I want to ask a question that I asked earlier about the statutory advisory body in response to Grenfell: what is the Government’s timetable for developing that and getting it on board?

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for her question. I was the shadow Fire Minister before the election, and I was very proud to get into our manifesto the commitment to get the fire family in the same room and drive standards. I cannot give her the exact date today, but I can tell her that dealing with this issue is a priority for the Home Office and we are getting on with it.

This has been a slightly odd debate, because its substance is exceptionally serious and rooted in one of the nation’s greatest tragedies, but we have also had the joy of a dozen Members making their maiden speeches. The hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill (Peter Fortune) said in his eloquent speech that he hoped those watching would understand why it has been this way. I will pay due respect to those colleagues by reflecting on some of the things they have said.

I start with the hon. Member for Bromley and Biggin Hill. Everything he said about his predecessor, Bob Neill, was true. Bob is so respected on both sides of the House, and the way the hon. Gentleman started was very much the way that Bob finished, which was very encouraging. He mentioned the brave pilots leaving his constituency to go to war, and their sacrifice so that we can hold debates today. That represents the spirit that we should all hold to, every day that we are here. His point was well made. He also bravely said that the only football league team that had a Conservative Member of Parliament was his team in Bromley, and that Notts County fans might remind people of that at the weekend. As a Member of Parliament for Nottingham, I will let my Pies-supporting friends know, although I think the language might be more choice than the suggestion the hon. Gentleman came up with.

My hon. Friend the Member for Calder Valley (Josh Fenton-Glynn) has shown incredible persistence in getting here. As he said, this was his fourth time standing for election, and that says a lot about him, because others might not have bothered. It is really hard to run for election, certainly in the face of disappointment and, in 2017, of an incredibly narrow loss. Others might have looked for alternative seats, but he loves his community. Calder Valley and he are one and the same, so it does not surprise me that he stayed on, and it is a source of great joy that he is here. He talked about the longest running No. 2 in the charts having originated from Calder Valley. He was No. 2 for a long time, but now he has reached No. 1.

Similarly, the hon. Member for Guildford (Zöe Franklin) she said that this was her third attempt to get elected, and she has shown similar persistence. She said that she brought with her a message of change. She mentioned special educational needs and water quality; this Parliament —and indeed this Government—will be measured by the progress made on those two issues.

Like me, my hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Oliver Ryan) is proudly one of the 43 Labour and Co-op Members of this Parliament. We join 11 Mayors and more than 1,000 councillors as Labour and Co-operators. It is a great joy to see him in his place. I was struck by what he said; it made me feel similarly about my community. He talked about the proud heritage of his town, but also its ambitious future. He said that the industries might change, but the principles will be the same. As Minister for towns, I give the commitment that I will work closely with him to make that a reality, although I thought he was brave to say that a Labour leader had come from his constituency very early on; I saw the Whips making notes straight away.

[Josh Fenton-Glynn]

I thank the Minister for his kind words. I am sure he will agree that towns are the centre of a lot of our communities. I hope he will support the continued efforts to rejuvenate town centres—efforts seen in communities such as mine in Calder Valley, and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Oliver Ryan). We need to make sure that our towns continue to thrive in the coming century, and reinvent themselves, just as the mills reinvented themselves in my community.

[Alex Norris]

I absolutely can give that commitment. I think the model will change—well, I know the model will change. We want to get rid of the beauty parades, and move to a more allocative model of funding based on local priorities and local leadership, in order to rejuvenate our towns and drive our economy forwards.

The hon. Member for Chippenham (Sarah Gibson) confessed that she was previously an architect. I hope that she will bring her insight to the Department’s work, particularly on housing. Our door will be open. Possibly not uncommonly, she says that she will fight for more train stations for her constituency. I suspect that many will join her.

There was a beautiful irony in my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes North (Chris Curtis) saying that his constituency is the home of the cock and bull story, because although he is always very modest about this, he has a significant public profile in an industry that is about anything but cock and bull stories. It is all about very hard polling. On many occasions, when I have had an idea that I think is brilliant, he has disappointed me by finding a way to say on Twitter why what I propose is not right or desirable in the eyes of the public. But he has always been a friend to me when I have asked him stupid questions about polling, and I appreciate that.

[Chris Curtis]

Will the Minister give way?

[Alex Norris]

I will in a second, but I have not finished with my hon. Friend just yet. He is a very well-known pollster, but people do not know just how much he loves Milton Keynes; he loves it to the point of perhaps going on about it a bit, but not today. There is great experience from Milton Keynes on the subject of new towns and cities, and I hope that he will help us in this Parliament.

[Chris Curtis]

My background in polling taught me that we need to listen and speak to people from across society, as we did in that industry, and make sure that there is nobody who does not get listened to. That is very important in this debate, because a lot of the problems addressed in it are caused by communities and housing bodies not being listened to. That has resulted in a lot of these problems not being brought to the forefront. Does the Minister agree that across politics, and on all the issues that we discuss in this House, we need to be make sure that we listen and speak to everyone in society, as pollsters do?

[Alex Norris]

That is right. That is a well-expressed sentiment, in the context of this debate. It is our job, of course, to express what we think, and all of us will have strongly held views, but it is so crucial that we be tribunes for our community and give voice to those who are least heard; that is such an important role.

[Alan Gemmell (Central Ayrshire) (Lab)]

I was pleased to hear the Minister make reference to new towns. My constituency of Central Ayrshire benefits from the new town of Irvine, where I was born. Just recently, Irvine was part of the Government’s long-term plan for towns programme, and secured a commitment to £20 million to help us bring Irvine back to its best days. I hope that the Minister agrees that new towns are essential to economic growth and development, both in Scotland and the rest of the UK.

[Alex Norris]

I could not agree more. New towns were a feature of our manifesto, and there is a deal of public excitement about that.

[Mr Dhesi]

The Minister knows that I have a great deal of time and admiration for him. I have risen to my feet on the subject of building safety because many of my Slough constituents, particularly leaseholders, are fed up of being fleeced. The Labour party manifesto committed to leasehold reform, so will the Minister say exactly what actions the Government will take to assuage the concerns of my constituents?

--- Later in debate ---

[Alex Norris]

As always, my hon. Friend gives great voice to the people of Slough. We have heard clearly the message on leasehold reform, and we are looking at it very closely. I will cover a little of what we are planning to do in the substantive part of my speech.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cowdenbeath and Kirkcaldy (Melanie Ward) made important points about her fight, and her predecessor’s fight, for women’s equality. So much progress has been made, but we are well short of an equal Parliament, as we are every time. We should all reflect on that, as a collective and in our political parties, and on how we can change that. It will change in our lifetime, but the pace is far too slow. My hon. Friend has the enviable, but perhaps daunting, task of following not only Gordon Brown but Jennie Lee, two giants of the Labour movement, but the passion and conviction with which she spoke augurs well, as does her work for Medical Aid for Palestinians recently; she spoke very movingly about her colleagues and the work they do.

[Melanie Ward]

My hon. Friend will have noticed that in my first speech, I mentioned that in Fife, we have a housing emergency. I draw his attention to the fact that in March, the SNP Scottish Government cut the affordable supply programme budget by almost £200 million. The new UK Labour Government are having to clean up the mess left by the Conservative Government—their black hole of £22 billion. In Scotland, the SNP has been in power for 17 years and has no excuse. Fife council had hoped to build 1,250 new council homes over the next five years, but that is now under threat. Too many people in my area, as I said in my speech, do not have a safe, appropriate place to call home. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is about time the SNP took responsibility for its financial mismanagement? I note once again that SNP Members are not present in the Chamber for this important debate.

[Alex Norris]

This is perhaps the defining issue of this generation. All political leaders have to demonstrate that they understand the frustration and pain caused by the lack of decent housing in this country. We are talking today about some very direct and fatal consequences, but across the country, there are other ways in which housing problems limit aspiration, health and opportunity. We were elected on a manifesto promise to deliver change, but colleagues in other parts of the Union have to realise that they also have responsibility. It is time to make fewer excuses and build more houses.

[Dr Zubir Ahmed (Glasgow South West) (Lab)]

I am frustrated with the SNP Government’s slow progress on facilitating the removal of dangerous, flammable cladding. The Scottish Government were allocated £97 million by this place to facilitate the programme, but only £11 million has been used, with only one project being completed to date. Does the Minister agree that the SNP Government need to address this imbalance urgently?

[Alex Norris]

If anything has come out of the report, and if we have learned anything over the last seven years, it is that getting these remediations done requires really strong political will. We made that commitment in the apology we gave, and we are taking action. We need to see that north of the border, too.

[Emily Darlington]

On strong political leadership, will the Minister join me in congratulating those councils that, as soon as the new building regulations came out, took immediate action to put in a waking watch? I am talking about the wider regulations—not just the ones about cladding, but the ones about compartmentalisation. In Milton Keynes, within a year, we had emptied two tower blocks that had compartmentalisation, rehoused more than 300 families, and then demolished the towers, whereas Milton Keynes families in private developments with similar issues are still waiting for remediation work to be done. We often hear that councils are slower than the private sector, but does the Minister agree that councils have responded more quickly and more responsibly than the private sector to these issues?

[Alex Norris]

My hon. Friend is too humble to point to her role in Milton Keynes, but the political will exercised on that and many other housing issues has got results. The Government will display the same degree of political will, and we need to see it in local government, too. Milton Keynes sets a really good example.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent West) (Lab)]

It is troubling that many owners, who, according to the Act, are responsible for fire safety in these blocks, are seeking to establish themselves in foreign jurisdictions, often in tax havens. How can the Government take action to ensure that those who are responsible—often those who were responsible for the defects in the first place—and who are now seeking to evade jurisdiction in this country, can be brought to justice? Will the Government have to appropriate these buildings to do the remediation work that is so badly needed, and not at residents’ expense?

[Alex Norris]

This is on two tracks. First, we have deals with 55 of the biggest developers to do those remediations. The money is there, and they need to get on with it. A significant majority, if not a vast majority, of cases will see that action. That will cover most people. As my hon. Friend says, action is not as easy where firms have gone bust, disappeared or chosen more nefarious options to evade their responsibilities. We have set aside grant funding to ensure people do not suffer as a result of that, so I hope that gives an assurance that, no matter the hoops or the attempts at evasion made by those who really ought to do better, the Government will stand by the people who are most affected.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Alex Norris]

An enviable choice of hon. Friends wish to intervene. I give way first to my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin (Alistair Strathern).

[Alistair Strathern (Hitchin) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way; he is clearly very popular. I want to follow up on the compelling point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Brent West (Barry Gardiner), who said that a lot of the issues we have talked about today are exacerbated by the fact that the owners of the buildings—the freeholders, in these cases—are not always willing to fulfil their obligations to do right by their tenants. This Government are committed to enacting legislation to bring in the important reforms needed to truly bring an end to the problematic nature of leasehold relationships. Will the Minister be working closely with others in his Department to ensure building safety is at the heart of those regulations, so we have a joined-up approach to tackling the issue at its root?

[Alex Norris]

I will come back to what we are going to do about leasehold in more detail in a second, but the principles are exactly as he says. We will be holding those principles in our heads as we consider our response to the report, to ensure our actions, legislative or otherwise, meet the moment.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Alex Norris]

I am about halfway through my remarks about the maiden speeches we have heard, but I assure colleagues that I have an awful lot to say on the substance of the debate. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] I am keen to take interventions at that point, but it would be a great joy if they could let me finish my remarks about the maiden speeches first.

My hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and Solway was born and bred of his community, and obviously comes from a long line of people who have made a difference to it. His experience around leasehold will be useful for us in government, as will his knowledge of electrical safety, which is at the root of the issue.

My hon. Friend the Member for Halesowen (Alex Ballinger) talked about two predecessors who were distinctive—one for their hair and one for their coat—and I wondered what his distinctive nature might be. Sadly, it will not be his name, as I join him in that already, but I wonder if the distinction will be the extraordinary service in the armed forces that he, his brother and four generations of his family have given to our country. His is a staggering story of commitment to this country. He is now entering a different phase and type of service, in which I know he will excel and that he will find rewarding in different ways, serving his country and his community.

My hon. Friend the Member for Crawley (Peter Lamb) talked about first coming here as a 15-year-old and, as a result, getting a taste and enthusiasm for the House. I wondered how many other Members came here when they were younger and were inspired. In my case, I was 11, but I suspect that will be true for many others. It speaks to the responsibility that we have as parliamentarians to use the brilliant things that Parliament has to share and promote Parliament and democracy to young people in our communities. I commend my hon. Friend for his brilliant work on his borough council. I am not surprised he has made the analysis that he now wants to come here and fight for his town, because I made a similar analysis. I know it frustrates him when people say, about his constituency, that Gatwick is distinctive of it, but it is an important part of our country, both for holidaymakers and for people arriving for the first time. That first moment is so important to their integration and their lives here.

My hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Tracy Gilbert) shared her story. I am sure many right hon. and hon. Members would associate themselves with the challenges in childhood that inspired her to be here today. She spoke about housing being a devolved issue and it is right that it should be handled appropriately, but I hope she has taken some succour, as I have, from the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister’s attempts to reset relations with devolved Governments. On the issue of housing, as on many others, we can do good work. She offered us all a visit, as well as the inducement of whisky and the Edinburgh festival.

[Brian Leishman]

I am sure the Minister will remember from my speech the harrowing story of my constituents from Tillicoultry who have suffered, and continue to suffer, from the horrible mental and physical impact of being evacuated from their homes at such short notice. Will he agree to meet me to discuss possible solutions for my constituents, bearing in mind the resetting of relationships between this Labour Government and the Scottish Government and the fact that housing is a devolved issue?

[Alex Norris]

My hon. Friend makes some very important points about reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete, which I shall address shortly. On his request to meet me, let me say that I am always happy to accept such invitations. As I am the Minister with lead responsibility for resilience, it may be better if my hon. Friend the Minister with responsibility for building safety takes that meeting. She is very keen to meet colleagues to discuss what support we can offer as a Government.

Finally, my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight West (Mr Quigley) may be a proud islander, but I can detect a Nottinghamshire accent from 10 paces—watching “Sherwood” makes my ears go. I know that he is a proud islander, but, like his predecessor, he has that connection with Nottinghamshire. He also has the accolade of being the first chip shop owner to enter Parliament. That again is a very good inducement to get colleagues, and perhaps Ministers, to visit him. We do recognise that life is different on the island, and, as a result, some of the challenges are different. We in the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government are ready to support him in his work in that space.

I move on to the contributions of colleagues who were not making their maiden speech. That is probably well timed because, judging by the faces behind me, my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) is coming to the end of his time as Select Committee Chair. He has shown such incredible leadership; he is a great parliamentarian, and has always been such a good and kind friend to me. I think it is safe to say that Ministers who have been before his Committee have found him tough and hard, but also very fair. He is also a very kind man. His service has been extraordinary.

Let me mention some of the points that my hon. Friend made. He talked about what help can be given to residents who wish to legally challenge recalcitrant owners and developers. Regulators have powers to act against such owners, and we expect them to do so. Our Department is responsible for holding to account developers who have signed the developer remediation contract, so if residents are concerned about the progress of remediation of their building, they should contact the regulator. If they are concerned about the progress of developer-led remediation, they should contact the Department. I hope that addresses the hon. Gentleman’s point.

[Clive Efford]

I do not know whether my hon. Friend heard the example that I gave earlier of a management agency not giving the information to leaseholders to check whether they were being charged the right amount of money or even to seek legal redress. There seems to be no power to force those agencies to give that information.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alex Norris]

My hon. Friend will be pleased with the answer that I have to that question, which, with his forbearance, I will give once I have dealt with the next few questions.

My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East referenced the Morrell and Day report, published last year, to which the previous Government did not respond. The intention of this Government is to bring forward proposals for system-wide reform of the construction products regulatory regime, which will tackle issues both in that report and the Grenfell Tower inquiry report. We think that it makes sense to do that as a collective piece of work.

My hon. Friend mentioned product manufacturers and remediation costs, which the shadow Minister also talked about. We are currently working on identifying how we might strengthen the Building Safety Act 2022 to ensure that such manufacturers can make a contribution. We have been taking action already through the recovery strategy unit to hold those construction product manufacturers to account and to get money out of them for their share of the costs. Where the work has not had the results that we wanted, we have written to institutional investors and encouraged sponsors to reconsider their partnership, which has resulted in the severance of two sponsorship deals, as well as another to which a colleague referred earlier. We know that more may be needed in this space, so we will continue to do that.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Alex Norris]

I will.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

It is very hard not to have an intervention from Jim Shannon.

[Jim Shannon]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I outlined the case for the legislation and for building safety and resilience going forward. Does the Minister intend to share the findings with the regions of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, which I represent, so that the appropriate Department in the Northern Ireland Assembly can take the legislative measures forward constructively to ensure safety for us in Northern Ireland as well?

[Alex Norris]

I can give the hon. Gentleman that assurance. We will absolutely share the best of our knowledge and insight—I am sure that will be a two-way process—to ensure that we are doing right by everybody across Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

[Mr Betts]

I thank the Minister for his kind words about my chairing of the Select Committee. I am really pleased that he is now looking at raising some money from product manufacturers; they have escaped their responsibilities for far too long. Might I suggest that he use some of the money raised to help with social housing providers, given the concerns that I raised about their being treated differently in their access to the building safety fund?

[Alex Norris]

My hon. Friend’s suggestions often come with a smile but a degree of force. He will know that we are not very far from a spending review and a Budget, so I will not make financial commitments at this point. However, that idea is well expressed, and duly noted as a result. I am grateful for it.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

I endorse what the Minister says about our hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts). I, too, had the great honour of serving on his Committee many years ago, and at that time the focus was very much on housing.

In relation to building safety in Islington, where we all live on top of each other in flats, in 2021 there were 31 dangerous blocks of flats, which was terrifying for my constituents, many of whom were in fact private tenants, not social housing tenants. We did an audit in my office, and have been pushing. We now have only four blocks left, but it ought to be put on the record how terrifying it was over the years for those local residents, who had to pay for fire watches, could not sell their flats, and did not know what was going to happen. I have not been known for praising the Department over the years, but we are very grateful in Islington South for the support that we have been given by the Department until now.

[Alex Norris]

The right hon. Lady has put that on the record. It speaks to my earlier point about the importance of political will in this space. If we just wait for something to happen, we are not going to see it. There needs to be political grip at the national and local level, and we will certainly play our role in that. On her point about what her constituents lived with, she would have been sitting on the Opposition Front Bench seven years ago—I was behind her—when everybody said, “Never again. What action can we take? No job is too big or small.” But that is not what happened. It was a huge broken promise to the British people—her constituents and beyond.

[Mike Amesbury]

On the point about political will, the leasehold system is unfortunately still alive and kicking. I know that many of us look forward to seeing that feudal system kicked into the history books via oncoming legislation. It seems that service charges have become a cash cow for some interesting characters in the industry. What will the Minister and his team do to ensure that we move things forward, and that commonhold is the de facto tenancy in this country for flats?

[Alex Norris]

My hon. Friend heard what I said about leasehold, and what we said in the manifesto that we both stood on. I will get to service charges shortly, because both he and our hon. Friend the Member for Eltham and Chislehurst (Clive Efford) made that point very well. I think they will be glad to hear what I have to say.

Let me deal first, though, with prosecutions, referring particularly to my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington and Bayswater (Joe Powell). He has the closest stake in this issue, and spoke today with incredible passion. I know that he will be an outstanding advocate for his community, and I am sure that he will bring forward a lot of his frustrations about the pace of change. I think that point was well made. He has made multiple times the point about prosecutions. As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister set out in his recent statement to the House, those affected have waited too long for justice, and those responsible must be held accountable. As the Met police have said, this will take time. It is one of the largest and most complex investigations that they have ever had to conduct, with 180 officers and staff dedicated to it. We fully support the Met and the Crown Prosecution Service as they carry out their investigations. They must be given space to do that.

[Emily Darlington]

We have been talking quite passionately in this debate, but we often lose sight of the stories of those who were actually affected. I think not least of a woman—she shall remain anonymous—who bought her flat as a way to ensure that she and her husband would be debt-free in their retirement. Unfortunately, her husband has passed away. Although they planned to be able to pay for the insurance and the service charge, those costs have gone up by 600%. She, an elderly lady in her retirement, is now accruing debt that she never wanted to pass on to her family. That is an issue not of cladding, but of wider things. For her, the mess that has been left, and the lack of clarity around remediation, means that her daily life is now a stressful situation. Does the Minister agree that the Secretary of State in the previous Government, who is responsible for this mess and misery, has no place leading any political party in this country?

[Alex Norris]

Everyone will have been angered by what we saw in the report. All those who played a part and made decisions will rightly reflect on their role and responsibilities in this, and will, I assume, make appropriate judgments in respect of the scale of the issue. My hon. Friend talks about service charges, so I will turn next to that point.

[Alan Gemmell]

Before the Minister moves on to service charges, I remind the House of something that I said last week, following the Prime Minister’s statement, about a similar fire that took place in Irvine in my constituency in 1999. A fire ripped through a 14-storey block of flats, leading to one fatality. Thanks to the work of my predecessor, Sir Brian Donohoe, building regulations were changed following that fire. I hope that the Minister will consider those building regulations and the Garnock Court fire as he examines what went wrong in the terrible tragedy at Grenfell.

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for that thoughtful intervention. I can assure my hon. Friend that Ministers are indeed considering that as part of this whole process. We need to learn those lessons.

[Barry Gardiner]

On regulation, my hon. Friend will know that Sir Martin Moore-Bick’s report made very strong statements about the difficulty of reconciling the role of maintaining standards with the competitive environment. It was when building control ceased to be the responsibility solely of local authorities and became privatised building control functions that things started to go wrong. What action will my hon. Friend and the Government take to ensure that one set of standards is applied in one particular way and is not subject to trading? Saying “We will give you a shortcut if you come to us” is what went on, but it is wrong and needs to stop.

[Alex Norris]

Throughout the debate, colleagues have raised important and startling accounts of just that—the way in which standards have been circumvented. That speaks to what my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East said at the beginning about how the culture has fallen into a race to the bottom. On the regulatory changes that my hon. Friend the Member for Brent West (Barry Gardiner) wants to see from the Government, we are looking at the report and have made commitments to come back on it within six months. We will give the Chamber the chance to discuss the report in greater detail. I hope he can give us the space to come forward with those suggestions and changes, but his points are well made.

[Douglas McAllister (West Dunbartonshire) (Lab)]

The UK Government have pledged to speed up the process of removing dangerous cladding from English buildings following the publication of the damning Grenfell inquiry report, which set out a series of significant failures. Does the Minister agree that the Scottish Government must start treating the issue with the urgency it deserves? The SNP has already re-profiled hundreds of thousands of pounds from this vital programme to plug the black hole it created in its own budget. This cannot happen again. Building safety cannot be sacrificed to SNP incompetence and financial mismanagement.

[Alex Norris]

A theme of this debate has been that we will not make the changes we need to make or keep people safe in the way they should be able to expect without really strong political will, at whatever level and whatever point politicians touch the process. It is incumbent on all of us to use all the levers and tools we have to ensure that we meet our responsibilities. Where colleagues have not done so, they really must reflect on that, frankly, and change.

[Oliver Ryan]

The Minister is being very generous with his time. I wonder whether he will meet me and representatives from Burnley council, which has a very good retrofit scheme that actually makes profit for the council and seems to retrofit street after street of terraced houses in Burnley. I note with interest the comments made by the shadow Minister about arm’s length companies used under the previous Labour Government to precipitate retrofit programmes. In areas such as Burnley, including Burnley Wood and Trinity, that approach worked and actually brought a great deal of investment into streets that are, quite frankly, still in need of repair and retrofit. Is the Minister interested in coming to Burnley to meet me on that front, and may I praise him for his kind words about Burnley, Padiham and Brierfield earlier?

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for that kind offer. Of course I will readily accept a visit to Burnley—perhaps through the lens of my role as the local growth and towns Minister. We could have a very interesting visit and I would be glad to do it.

I am conscious of the time; I am going to run out of it, unthinkably. We may have to pick up any further interventions in a different form, because I want to get to the points about buildings insurance, lending and service charges raised by my hon. Friends the Members for Runcorn and Helsby (Mike Amesbury), for Eltham and Chislehurst and for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Adam Jogee).

One thing we know is that there has not been enough change in this space over the past seven years, but there has been change in the insurance bills that many leaseholders have been facing. We understand the financial and emotional impact that extreme insurance premiums have been having on leaseholders. Affected leaseholders have been burdened with paying too high premiums for too long. I assure colleagues that we are working actively to reduce premiums for leaseholders, and we are reviewing how better to protect leaseholders from costs and push for fair premiums for leaseholders in buildings with fire safety issues.

Colleagues have talked about buying, selling or remortgaging homes. We have seen improvements in that space, but we remain vigilant. We will continue to hold particularly the 10 largest lenders to account following their commitment to lend on properties even where remediation is not yet complete. They must keep that promise.

On service charges, by law, variable service charges must be reasonable. As colleagues have raised, that has been stretched significantly by some of the practices we have seen. The Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024 contains measures to ensure that leaseholders get key financial and non-financial information so that they can scrutinise and hold to account the organisations that they are working with on service charges. Not all of that legislation has been commenced; secondary legislation is required, but we are working on that actively. We just want to get it right.

My hon. Friend the Member for Reading Central (Matt Rodda) talked about the pace of remediation. Again, we accept that the pace is too slow; we have said that throughout, and what we have seen in Dagenham and Slough are horrific reminders of the risk that unsafe cladding still poses to far too many people. The Deputy Prime Minister has been very clear on her intention to drive that forward—again, there is that political will—and to get more action out of manufacturers, freeholders, developers and organisations with responsibility for making sure that buildings are safe. Too many building owners are still not acting quickly enough, so we will investigate, pursue the most egregious actors who are creating unacceptable delays, and hold them to account. The message from this Dispatch Box and from this Government is clear: “Use the routes we have created to get your buildings fixed, and get on with it.”

I now turn to the points made by the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) and the hon. Member for Coventry South (Zarah Sultana) about the inquiry. The right hon. Gentleman expressed concern that the report would be shelved, and the hon. Lady was concerned that it would just be words, so again, let me make the commitment—this speaks to the response I gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Brent West (Barry Gardiner)—that the report’s recommendations must be considered with the seriousness that this tragedy deserves. We will look at all 58 recommendations in detail; there will be a debate on the Floor of this House; we will respond in full within six months; and we will be listening to the community throughout the process. We will update Parliament annually on our progress so that we can be held to account, but we will also get on quickly with the things we can do, whether that is speeding up remediation or reforming construction products. The change has not been at the pace that it ought to have been, but it will get better. I can commit that the report will not, as the right hon. Gentleman has said, just be shelved—far from it.

The hon. Members for Surrey Heath (Dr Pinkerton) and for Woking (Mr Forster) mentioned buildings under 11 metres. Our approach to cladding remediation has been to prioritise the risk of loss of life. It is generally accepted that the risk to life is proportional to the height of buildings, so the risk to life is usually lower in buildings under 11 metres, and they are very unlikely to need the same costly remediation. Building safety remediation works may be required in a very small number of those buildings, but so far, our casework as a Department over the past couple of years shows that of the more than 160 cases that have been raised, only three have fallen into that category. As such, we think that is an appropriate distinction to draw.

My hon. Friend the Member for Alloa and Grangemouth (Brian Leishman) made a point about RAAC. This issue is different in Scotland than it is in England: Scotland has its own responsibilities, which the Scottish Government must work within, and as I said to my hon. Friend, we will work within the best practices too. It is the duty of building owners, including local authorities if they are the owner, to fulfil their duties to manage building safety and performance risks of all kinds—including RAAC—in a proportionate manner.

The shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), talked about personal evacuation plans, or PEEPs. We must ensure that the most vulnerable in our society are protected. On 2 September, through a written ministerial statement, the Government announced that the Home Office will bring forward in the autumn proposals to improve fire safety and the evacuation of disabled or vulnerable residents in high-rise and higher-risk residential buildings in England. Those proposals will be called residential PEEPs. Through them, residents with disabilities and impairments will be entitled to a person-centred risk assessment to identify the appropriate equipment and adjustments to aid their fire safety and evacuation, as well as a residential PEEP statement that says what vulnerable residents should do in the event of a fire. The Government have committed funding next year to begin that important work by supporting social housing providers to deliver PEEPs for their renters.

The shadow Minister also mentioned product hallmarks. We stand by what was said in the written ministerial statement—I would have hoped that gave enough confidence —but for clarity, this is about stronger standards, not weaker standards. I hope the hon. Gentleman can take confidence from that.

[David Simmonds]

Will the Minister give way?

[Alex Norris]

Very briefly.

[David Simmonds]

I would just like to press the Minister for the assurance I am seeking: that the Government have taken steps to ensure that all products that meet the 2015 European standards, and therefore are within the scope of what the hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney (Rushanara Ali) said in the written ministerial statement, will also—as a minimum—meet the 2018 post-Grenfell UK standards.

[Alex Norris]

My colleague and hon. Friend, the Minister for building safety, has heard that intervention. As I say, everything that we have said is about higher standards, not lesser standards, but my hon. Friend will write to the hon. Gentleman about the issue he has raised. Again, I hope that I can assure him that this is about greater standards, not lesser ones.

To conclude, as the Prime Minister made clear, the Grenfell Tower tragedy was the result of unacceptable, inherent and systematic issues and decades of failure from both industry and Government. It is going to take political will to change that, and we offer it.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered building safety and resilience.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alex Norris Excerpts

Monday 2nd September 2024 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Alex Norris)]

We are committed to supporting the businesses and communities that make our high streets flourish. We are funding new partnership models with high street accelerators, implementing high street rental auctions, and introducing a strong new right to buy for community assets to empower local communities to rejuvenate our high streets and address the blight of vacant premises.

[Naushabah Khan]

High streets up and down the country are the backbone of our communities, but over the years have been facing decline. For example, Gillingham High Street in my constituency, where only yesterday we launched our Love Gillingham campaign and initiative, faces numerous challenges. Will the Minister agree to meet me to discuss some of those challenges, as well as the possibility of a compulsory register of properties on high streets, so that councils can easily engage with owners to find new uses for them when they fall vacant?

[Alex Norris]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question. I totally agree on the important role that healthy and vibrant high streets play for communities. Initiatives such as Love Gillingham are vital in bringing local people together to create high streets that work for them. Ensuring that local authorities and the communities they serve have the tools they need to support the high street is a priority. With regards to ownership, HM Land Registry is searchable for a variety of information, but I welcome the chance to meet my hon. Friend to discuss that, and perhaps Love Gillingham as well.

[Patrick Hurley]

The regeneration and refurbishment of town centres such as mine is being structurally disincentivised by the tax regime, which gives preferential treatment to new builds on out-of-town retail parks, instead of renovating our much-loved historic high streets. Southport’s town centre is beautiful, but has definitely seen better days. Just this weekend, our much-loved independent bookshop, Broadhurst, was closed down after over 100 years of trading. Given the dire economic circumstances we inherited from the former Government, what can the Minister do to incentivise the private sector to invest in our town centres and high streets, bringing life back to them?

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for that question. With your forbearance, Mr Speaker, may I say, before I answer, that I and my ministerial colleagues know my hon. Friend’s community has been through a dreadful last few weeks and that our support is with them? I know he will come forward with other ways in which we can help. We went through something similar in Nottingham and I know how dreadful it is for the community. We are here to help.

On the tax regime, we are committed to a fairer business rate system. In our manifesto, we pledged to level the playing field between the high street and online giants, as well as to incentivise investment, tackle empty properties and support entrepreneurship. Listening to business and communities, we will continue to consider how we can go further to support high streets, while new powers such as rental auctions and the right to buy community assets empower those communities to address decline.

[Lauren Edwards]

The Government are rightly focused on bringing empty properties back into use as part of our commitment to regenerate high streets, but encouraging footfall by supporting local communities to hold events in our town centres is another way we can bring life back to our high streets and support local businesses. That is certainly the approach I took when I was the cabinet member on Medway Council in charge of economic regeneration, using the UK shared prosperity fund. Will my hon. Friend meet me to discuss learnings from that experience and what an improved new fund could look like under this Government?

[Alex Norris]

I thank my hon. Friend for her kind invitation: I am keen to understand more about the Medway experience. I know that the UK shared prosperity fund has been used very effectively throughout the country, and that there is a great deal of interest in its future. Decisions on funding beyond March 2025 are a matter for the Budget, but in the meantime I am keen to talk to my hon. Friend about her experience and the lessons that have been learnt.

[Lee Pitcher]

My constituency is full of great high streets. Bawtry was buzzing when I visited it yesterday for the car show, and I have also recently visited Parkin Butchers and Tyto Law Solicitors in Crowle. These people take huge pride in the services and products that they offer, but just down the road shop premises are vacant and, in some instances, have been vacant for months, if not years. How do the Government intend to stop the buying up of such outlets and deal with the lack of any obvious urgency, or indeed potential, in respect of their ever being reopened?

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for that question. We have all been through a major political event or two this year. As is customary, we have been knocking on doors, and we know how frustrated people all over the country feel about the vacancies on their local high streets which are bringing down their areas. We have to rebalance this. High street rental auctions, which I have already mentioned, will give councils powers to require landlords to bring vacant commercial properties back into use for their original purpose so that we no longer see all those boarded-up units described by my hon. Friend, with people just sitting on them without providing any social purpose.

[Mr Speaker]

I call Mel Stride. Sorry; he is not here.

[Wendy Morton (Aldridge-Brownhills) (Con)]

Our high streets are undoubtedly changing. Conservative-led Walsall Council is working hard to secure positive change in areas such as Brownhills and the regeneration of Ravenscourt, and we have a new civic square. What additional resources will the Minister make available to councils? The regeneration of our high streets, both residential and commercial, is an excellent way of helping to protect green-belt land by also regenerating important town centres.

[Alex Norris]

The right hon. Lady is exactly right. The future of the high street is not about returning to how things were. There must be a place for leisure, a place, of course, for retail and a place for residential properties, and councils of all political persuasions throughout the country are trying to find that perfect alchemy. We have inherited an extremely difficult funding situation, but we are working our way through it, and future funding decisions will be made in the Budget on 30 October.

[Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

I am not sure that Mel would be all that flattered, actually!

Banking facilities are important to our high street traders. Bedale, among other towns, has no banks, and does not even have a working ATM. Given that banks have saved about £3 billion a year by closing branches, what is the Minister doing with his counterpart in the Treasury to ensure that we have proper banking facilities in towns such as Bedale?

[Alex Norris]

The hon. Gentleman knows whereof he speaks. This is another question that we are addressing up and down the country. We know that banking facilities bring people into towns and villages, and give rise to a virtuous circle. We have committed ourselves to providing 350 new banking hubs and, as the hon. Gentleman suggested, we are working with Treasury colleagues on their delivery.

[Sarah Dyke (Glastonbury and Somerton) (LD)]

The outdated business rates system has left some market towns, such as Wincanton in my constituency, with empty premises on the high streets, damaging communities’ sense of pride and preventing councils from benefiting on the back of flourishing town centres. Will the Minister work with his Treasury colleagues to boost small businesses and regenerate high streets by reforming damaging business rates?

[Alex Norris]

That is a commitment that we made at the previous election, and we intend to deliver on it.

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

I congratulate the Secretary of State on her recent reappointment, and also on her dancing skills.

The stronger towns fund has been extremely successful in Hereford, and the question has arisen as to whether any of the funds that may be within that scheme and have not been used elsewhere could be redeployed. May I invite the Secretary of State and her team to consider whether that might be possible and, potentially, put in a bid? That would pour important new life into a scheme that is already going incredibly well.

[Alex Norris]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question. We want to see greater flexibility, and we want to see more integrated, single-settlement funding pots so that local communities have that flexibility. We are dealing with a transition from the previous model that we inherited, and it will take time to re-engineer from one to the other. Initial spending decisions will be a matter for 30 October but, in principle, I understand exactly what he is saying and the value that communities would take from that.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester Rusholme) (Lab)]

3. What steps she is taking to help tackle Islamophobia.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anna Dixon (Shipley) (Lab)]

The last Government made local councils compete for pots of money. Bingley pool in my constituency was due to receive a levelling-up award. Those funds are vital for the regeneration of our towns. Can my hon. Friend update the House on the review of those awards, and on the timescale for informing communities such as mine, who have been let down by the Conservatives’ unfunded promises, of the results?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Alex Norris)]

I share my hon. Friend’s anger that promises that did not have a strong financial backing were made to communities—promises that the Government are having to work their way through. As I said, we want to move away from the broken competitive model, but we know that promises have been made, and we are working on them. Hon. Members will hear further answers from us before the Budget on 30 October.

[Sir Roger Gale (Herne Bay and Sandwich) (Con)]

The national planning policy framework clearly militates against building on agricultural land. Notwithstanding the Minister’s desire not to interfere in local democracy, will he write to the leader of Thanet district council to remind him that agricultural land is the stuff that we grow food on, and cannot be for housing if we are to remain sustainable?

--- Later in debate ---

[Peter Dowd (Bootle) (Lab)]

The Deputy Prime Minister has shown that her footwork at the Dispatch Box is as good as her footwork on the dance floor. At this year’s election, veterans who brought along their veterans’ ID card to prove their identity were turned away. Will the Minister guarantee that this will change?

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for that very important question. Veterans were turned away at the recent elections. We have committed to changing that, and we will introduce the necessary regulations in due course.

Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill (Sixth sitting)

Alex Norris Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 14th September 2023 Public Bill Committees

Division 20

Question accordingly negatived.

Ayes: 2

---

Scottish National Party: 2

Noes: 9

---

Conservative: 9

[Alex Norris (Nottingham North) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move amendment 10, in clause 7, page 5, line 32, leave out subsection (8).

This amendment removes provisions stipulating that providing information in compliance with an information notice does not breach obligations of confidence or other restrictions on disclosure.

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Dame Caroline.

Clause 7 sets out the significant powers to compel information that will be made available to the enforcement authorities detailed in clause 6. As we have heard, the enforcement authority will most often be the Secretary of State. The provisions in clause 7 provide enforcement authorities with the power to prepare and issue an information notice to request from a relevant public body information relating to a decision in respect of the Bill. The enforcement authority—usually the Secretary of State, as I say—can request any information likely to be useful for it to assess whether the provisions of the Bill have been contravened or are likely to be contravened.

Provision is also made in respect of clause 4, the gagging clause. Clause 7 means that the enforcement authority can request information if it is satisfied that a public body subject to the Bill is about to publish, may publish or has already published a statement prohibited by the Bill. The most egregious provision is subsection (8), which provides:

“A person providing information in compliance with an information notice does not breach—

(a) any obligation of confidence owed by the person in respect of the information, or

(b) any other restriction on the disclosure of information (however imposed).”

“However imposed” is a challenging phrase. It seems to grant the Secretary of State or other relevant bodies the power to issue notices that would not only require all information to be handed over, but override normally protected duties of confidentiality, safeguarding or legal privilege. That is very significant. We would argue that those powers of investigation go beyond the powers of the security services to compel information. There is no clarity or sense of what checks and balances there are. Even the security services, which do not have that degree of power, have oversight mechanisms such as the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament. Frankly, this seems to be a very strong power to reserve to the Security of State or, indeed, the Office for Students.

We have heard evidence from multiple witnesses who are concerned about these provisions. We did hear from others who are less concerned, but even if colleagues consider the case I have set out to be wrong or overstated, the ambiguity is obvious. At the very least, the Bill is not clear enough. It is important to say that the Government do not—if I have understood properly what the Minister told the Committee last week—want the provisions to supersede legal privilege. That is welcome, and I am keen to have similar commitments regarding safeguarding duties. If that is the case, amendment 10 promotes that.

I believe that the Government ought to accept our amendment, or at least propose an alternative in lieu. What is in the Bill seems overbearing; if not overbearing, it is definitely unclear. That, at least, must be resolved.

[Felicity Buchan]

Amendment 10 would remove clause 7(8), which stipulates that providing information in compliance with an information notice does not breach obligations of confidence or other restrictions on disclosure.

The intention behind clause 7 is to provide a power for enforcement authorities to issue information notices to require information from a relevant public body relating to a decision in respect of the Bill. As drafted, the clause sets out a necessary and proportionate power for enforcement authorities properly to investigate potential breaches of the ban.

I must be clear that the clause does not place an undue burden on public bodies in scope of the ban. Information may be requested only if the enforcement authority is satisfied that a person has made or will make a decision or statement in breach of the Bill and that the information is likely to be useful for the enforcement authority’s investigation. Subsection (8) provides standard wording in order to give assurance to the person complying with the information notice that they will not be breaching an obligation of confidence or any other restriction on disclosure. The Bill is by no means unique in including such drafting; the same caveat is provided for in the Agriculture Act 2020, the Building Safety Act 2022 and the Health and Care Act 2022, for example.

The hon. Member for Nottingham North has said that he is concerned that the subsection would override the privilege between lawyer and client. I can reassure him that it does not. Legal professional privilege is a fundamental common-law right, including for those public bodies captured by the Bill, and specific words would not be needed to override it. The information power therefore does not extend to legally privileged material; I can confirm that I will clarify that point explicitly in the Bill’s explanatory notes. I would also add that Richard Hermer KC has subsequently clarified, in written evidence to the Committee on this point, his view that it is likely that a court would not deem legal professional privilege to be overridden by the clause.

Subsection (8) does not provide a right to extract the information, nor does it give a power to the Government; it simply provides the person who is disclosing information necessary to investigate a potential breach with protection against a claim for breach of confidence or any other restriction. I therefore ask the hon. Member to withdraw his amendment.

[Kim Leadbeater (Batley and Spen) (Lab)]

It is really important that legislation passed by the House be clear and unambiguous. As we have heard repeatedly in this Committee from a wide variety of sources, including witnesses who gave oral evidence and those who submitted written evidence, the Bill fails that test.

This subsection is another example of that. The open-ended reference to

“any other restriction on the disclosure of information”

makes no distinction, for example, between somebody expressing a view in a private and in a professional capacity. That cannot be right. Subsection (8) should be deleted.

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Batley and Spen for her very effective contribution, with which I agree.

I hear what the Minister says about the intention behind the clause and about whether it is necessary and proportionate. I can probably agree with “necessary”, but there is still a divergence of views between us on “proportionate”. I also hear what the Minister says about commonality with other pieces of legislation. I am willing to accept that clause 7(8) is not a unique provision, but I do not think that that means that it is therefore the right provision. It could be badly drafted here and elsewhere too; that would not be without precedent.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment 11, in clause 10, page 7, line 20, at end insert

“within 60 days of the passage of this Act.”

This amendment specifies that regulations prescribing a maximum monetary penalty must be made within 60 days of the Bill being passed

Amendment 12, in clause 10, page 7, line 21, leave out “may” and insert “must”.

This amendment, together with Amendment 13, would require the publication of regulations in matters to which the enforcement authority must, or must not, have regard in exercising its powers within 60 days of the passage of the Act.

Amendment 13, in clause 10, page 7, line 23, at end insert

“within 60 days of the passage of this Act.”

See explanatory statement to Amendment 12.

Clause 10 stand part.

[Alex Norris]

I rise to speak to amendments 11 to 13, which relate to clauses 9 and 10. Clause 10(1) states that:

“The Secretary of State must, by regulations, prescribe a maximum penalty for the purposes of section 9”.

Clause 9 states that an enforcement authority may impose a monetary penalty on someone if they do not comply with the provisions of the Bill. Similarly, clause 10(2) states that:

“The Secretary of State may, by regulations, make provision about matters to which the enforcement authority must, or must not, have regard in exercising its powers under section 9”,

which refers to the power to impose monetary penalties.

The regulations set by the Secretary of State will be highly consequential, because they will show how the sharper elements of the Bill, which we have already discussed, will interact with the rights and freedoms of individuals. They will outline the monetary penalty, but also what the enforcement authority—most often, the Secretary of State—will weigh in making a decision. As drafted the Bill does not specify when the Secretary of State must make these regulations and when they will take effect. That leaves a degree of ambiguity, and a gap where people will be waiting to see when the provisions start to bite.

The Minister previously talked about measures being necessary and proportionate. It is necessary to have an enforcement regime, and proportionate for the shoe to drop at some point; otherwise there is no point in having the legislation. Also, having made a significant number of points around Henry VIII provisions, and, at length, been quite displeased by some of them, even someone with my hard heart would say that it is proportionate for those to be set by regulations, because they will change over time.

The quid pro quo for that is what I have set out in amendments 11, 12 and 13, which remove some of the ambiguity and has the Government say when they intend to set the regulations. These probing amendments—I will not press them to a Division—set out what ought to happen within 60 days of Royal Assent, which would give a degree of clarity for those who are getting their decisions in order and understanding when the provisions are likely to fall. I think that is proportionate. If 60 days is too short or long a period, I hope the Minister will say when the Government intend to do this. I suspect they want to get on with it, but people ought to have that clarity.

[Felicity Buchan]

Amendment 11 would require the Secretary of State, via regulations, to set a maximum fine that can be imposed on public authorities in breach of the ban within 60 days of the Bill being passed. The suggestion by the hon. Member for Nottingham North to set a deadline of 60 days for the Secretary of State, while well intentioned, is inappropriate.

It is crucial that the threshold for fines is carefully decided in consultation with enforcement authorities, including the Office for Students and The Pensions Regulator. Since that will also be done by the affirmative procedure, the measure will need to go through both Houses. It will need to go through the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee in the House of Lords, and it would need to be debated in both Houses. Clearly, it is a piece of legislation that the Government want to be implemented, so I give the Committee my word that we will do this as expeditiously as possible. It is wrong, however, to commit to 60 days.

The same arguments apply to amendments 12 and 13. We agree that expediency in setting out details of the enforcement regime is important, but we need to take into account proper consultation with the regulators and enforcement authorities, as well as due scrutiny in both Houses. For that reason, I ask the hon. Member for Nottingham North to withdraw the amendments—I know that he said they were probing amendments.

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for that answer from the Minister. I am happy to withdraw the amendment on that basis. The point about consultation is important, so I hope that is a full consultation, both with potential enforcement authorities and those who speak for those that are going to fall under the provisions, such as the Local Government Association.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 9 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 10 and 11 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 12

Application of prohibitions

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

[Alex Norris]

Clause 12 adds back the local government pension scheme. We heard in evidence just how seriously the local government pension scheme takes its fiduciary duties. This is overreach. The case for the inclusion of the local government pension scheme is weak. Again, I think this will play out later down the line in further discussions in the other place. Its inclusion, which is significant and will add an extra burden and anxiety for people working hard to deliver important benefits for their members, is not really necessary, so I hope the Minister will reflect on that.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 12 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 13 to 16 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 17

General provision

12 noon

[The Chair]

Amendments 16 and 17 to clause 17 were debated in an earlier group. I have not selected those amendments for separate decision, because they are incompatible with an earlier decision, namely that clause 2 stand part of the Bill.

Amendment proposed: 1, in clause 17, page 10, line 39, at end insert—

“(1A) Section 1 does not apply to decisions made by—

(a) Scottish Ministers, unless a motion has been passed by the Scottish Parliament indicating its consent to this Act;

(b) Welsh Ministers, unless a motion has been passed by Senedd Cymru indicating its consent to this Act;

(c) a Northern Ireland department, unless a motion has been passed by the Northern Ireland Assembly indicating its consent to this Act.”—(Wayne David.)

Question put, That the amendment be made.

--- Later in debate ---

[Felicity Buchan]

May I take this opportunity to thank the entire Committee? We have worked effectively and expeditiously. I also thank the two Chairs and the Clerks.

[Alex Norris]

Similarly, I want to put on record our thanks to you, Dame Caroline, and Sir George, to the top-class Clerks for all their help, to the civil servants for their work and to my colleagues. I draw special attention to my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy), who was shadow Secretary of State on Second Reading, for her efforts and support while we have been getting our work together, and to the Minister for her collegiate work, both inside and outside this room. I also thank her colleagues.

[Chris Stephens]

May I first thank you, Dame Caroline, and Sir George for chairing these sittings? I also commend all Members. There has been much debate around the Bill, and many of us have regarded it as essential that we debate it in a tone that is appropriate but also robust. I think we have done that in this Committee. I would like to thank all hon. Members for the tone they have adopted and also for their good humour. That has been essential for the Bill, which has been fairly controversial.

We will obviously reflect on the changes we want to see in the stages to come. I do think there is going to be a challenge on the Government’s side, because a number of their Members are very critical of the Bill. The fact that no amendments have been agreed will be a test for them. I again thank you, Dame Caroline, and Sir George, as well as the Clerks, for all the help we have had.

Lastly, it was unfortunate that there was no evidence from a Palestine support group in our evidence sessions. I do not believe there was a conspiracy on that. I think it was perhaps more cock-up than conspiracy, but I hope it is something we will all learn from. We should have all views heard, and we might all want to take that point away and reflect on it.

Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill (Fifth sitting)

Alex Norris Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 12th September 2023 Public Bill Committees

[Steve McCabe]

I have to say that I agree with that last comment—I think clause 4 is unworkable, and it adds nothing to the Bill. It is a bit like clause 3(7). If anything, it undermines some of the intentions behind the Bill. Not surprisingly, it has been referred to as a gagging clause. It is virtually Kafkaesque, because it is coming a bit close to thought control. We are asked to accept that a person is not only prevented from doing something that contravenes clause 1 but that they are to be prevented from saying that, if it were perfectly legal to do so, they would want to do it. It would appear that they are not allowed to think that either. As I understand it, the Government say that the justification—this is an honourable aim—is that they are trying to protect community cohesion.

I ask hon. Members to pause for a second and work out how many people they know, and what institutions, would argue that community cohesion is being protected and safeguarded by these measures. The clause might prevent a person from saying that they intend to contravene clause 1 or that they would implement decisions that would, effectively, contravene clause 1 if it were legal to do, but it does not prevent them from saying a whole series of other abusive and offensive things about the state of Israel or anywhere else. In fact, it gives them a licence to say all those other things, and there is not a thing that can be done about it, provided they stay within the limits of existing law. I cannot see how this restriction is going to protect community cohesion. It is likely to have the opposite effect and to give those who do not share the Minister’s objectives on BDS a licence to look for ways to be abusive and offensive and still stay within the limits of the law.

I share the Minister’s desire to protect community cohesion and, as I have said, her overall objectives on the Bill, but I ask her to reflect on whether the proposals will really have the effect she seeks or whether it might be smarter to withdraw what is a pretty dysfunctional clause and go back to the drawing board to see whether there are more practical ways in which we could unite on protecting community cohesion.

[Alex Norris (Nottingham North) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to follow the passionate and high-quality contributions from the hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts and my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak. I rise to address the issue of whether clause 4 should stand part of the Bill, because the Opposition believe that it should not. As we have heard, this is the so-called gagging clause, and colleagues will remember the significant discomfort about this provision on both sides of the House on Second Reading. It takes the Bill far beyond the existing consensus on combatting BDS actions that target specific states and into the realms of placing serious restrictions on freedom of expression.

Having listened carefully throughout our proceedings, I still cannot understand why the Government are so attached to clause 4. The road it takes us down is not helpful, and it will only muddy the waters in terms of what the Government seek to do. Let us be clear what clause 4 does. As we have heard from colleagues, it prohibits public bodies—yes, the entity but, in reality, the people who make it up—from making a statement that they would breach clause 1, were they able to, as a result of moral or political disapproval of a foreign state’s conduct. It is one thing to say that they cannot do it; now, they cannot even say that they would wish to—they cannot even talk about it.

We have heard the Minister’s qualification, and I will turn to it shortly. However, we must assess what is on the face of the Bill, which is a really bizarre limit on freedom of expression and contrary to the British values on which we pride ourselves. I know that there are Conservative colleagues who pride themselves on being free speech champions—indeed, it is a big part of what they do in this place and online—and I say to them that this may well be their moment to prove that.

I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge), who spoke so powerfully on Second Reading about her experiences fighting the British National party and about why this clause cannot stand. She said:

“arguments are never won by suppressing democratic debate”.—[Official Report, 3 July 2023; Vol. 735, c. 615.]

I agree. That is a lesson that politicians on both the left and the right are still wrestling with—certainly in the online space—and need to learn.

There is also a wider problem. This is part of a broader range of efforts by the Government to curtail free expression—a legislative programme that has whittled away at the civic space over many years. That includes the Trade Union Act 2016, the Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Act 2014, the Public Order Act 2023 and more. The Bill adds to those as yet another unacceptable fetter on free expression. There is consensus to make progress on the Bill, but clause 4 is a particular sticking point.

We have heard from the Minister, in the evidence sessions and today, some admirable attempts to clear this up. She has said that this is a very narrowly understood restriction and that individuals who may be a decision maker on one day can talk in a personal capacity on another, when they are not making the decisions. I think that fails on three fronts.

First, that is not what it says on the face of the Bill. Clause 4(1) states that a statement of intent to “contravene section 1”, were that permissible, is not allowed and, at line 15, the words “(in whatever terms)” are added. I cannot square “in whatever terms” with what the Minister has said. If someone was on a television programme, could they have a disclaimer and set aside the “in whatever terms” provision? I do not think those two things sit together, and I feel confident that an enforcement authority relying on judicial review for oversight would fall back on what is on the face of the Bill, rather than what we have heard.

Secondly, I would argue that a person who is a decision maker because they lead a local authority, is a cabinet member or is even, perhaps, a member of the council or a Mayor is always a decision maker. I do not think that they can just turn it off or on. I do not think that saying that is credible. I know that when people overreach in what they say on social media or in the media more generally, they might try to disassociate themselves from it in an attempt to shield their colleagues, but I do not think they get much shrift in that. Never mind when we get to the conflation where—we have current precedent—a leader of a council is a Member of Parliament. We also have recent and multiple examples, including one that lasted a significant period, where a Member of Parliament was also an elected Mayor. Are they fettered from talking about foreign policy in debates in this place? Can they take off those hats? I do not believe that they credibly can.

Finally, and this is the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak, we heard on Second Reading, and we have heard in Committee, that the purpose of the clause is to stop decision makers adding to or creating a situation where a community, particularly a minority one, is made unsafe. This is important, and the evidence from the Jewish Leadership Council and the Board of Deputies of British Jews brought that home. What the Minister has said in Committee, however, is that a decision maker could essentially say whatever they want, up to the point of advocating a boycott, and avoid that harm. As my hon. Friend says, it implies that a person can stand up and say anything they wish, in the most inflammatory terms, but that would not make people feel or be less safe. All that would do that would be the final phrase, “And I think we should boycott them.” I would say that the 200 words of inflammatory speech—of conspiracy theories and racist or hateful language—is where the harm is.

The clause does not add anything to the Bill, which leads us to our problem. We are being asked by the Government simultaneously to accept that the provision is broad enough to be impactful and to protect from harm, but narrow enough, as the Minister says, to apply in only a very small number of cases at a very small moment in time. I would say that those two things cannot be true together. The clause does not have to exist for the Bill to operate, which is why I believe we can safely vote against it without harming the overall goal.

[Bob Blackman]

Can I just put a contrary argument about the logic and flow of the Bill as planned? First, we have to look at clause 1. We are talking about individuals who are making decisions about placing contracts and buying goods and services from organisations that are affected by foreign policy. That is the first decision. Only the people in that position are affected in this way.

I am not a lawyer, either, but this is how I read the situation. A person cannot say, “I am going to break the law.” We cannot have an individual making a decision standing up and saying that. It clearly would be a contravention of the Bill and would be quite logical, and that is why we have clause 4(1)(a). If the person was to say, “If it were lawful to do so, I would act in this way,” that would create problems in community cohesion. We have seen that in what Leicester wanted to do, which is a prime example of what could happen if this clause is not included. From what I have heard, saying that this is about people in a representative democracy, whatever their guise, muddies the waters. The BDS movement focuses on Israel, the occupied territories and the Golan Heights, and it is targeting public authorities of all types.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful to the Minister for the case that she is making. We agree with everything she said about that hateful speech, but the problem is that she just said, a minute before, that so long as a person essentially walks out of the council building, or says, “I am talking in an individual capacity”, despite being the leader of the council, they can say all those things and there is no protection under the clause. What meaningful advantage does the clause actually provide?

[Felicity Buchan]

This very much has the advantage of preventing Leicester City Council from making such a declaration. So anyone representing the views of Leicester City Council and saying, “I am standing here giving the views of Leicester City Council” is not allowed to do that.

Let me move on to exact circumstances. Under the clause, individuals, including councillors, are not prevented from making statements of their personal opinions freely in their own capacity. Councillors are not a public authority and, therefore, they will not be prevented from expressing their support for or voting in favour of a BDS motion. For example, representations made by councillors during a debate that indicate that they would be in favour of their local authority engaging in boycotts or a divestment campaign will not be captured by the clause. It will apply only to statements made on behalf of a local authority. Therefore, if a local authority published the minutes of a debate or a meeting in which a councillor said that they would be in favour of their local authority engaging in such campaigns, this would not be captured.

As I have promised, I will make that distinction clear in the Bill’s explanatory notes. We want this to be very clear. There is a real concern that recent declarations of anti-Israel boycotts, even when they are not implemented in practice, have driven and contributed to rising antisemitism.

--- Later in debate ---

Enforcement authorities

[Alex Norris]

I beg to move amendment 8, in clause 6, page 4, line 28, at end insert—

“(3A) In relation to a decision or statement made by, or for the purposes of, a local authority, the enforcement authority is the Office for Local Government.”

This amendment changes the enforcement authority for local authorities from the Secretary of State or Treasury to the Office for Local Government.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment 9, in clause 6, page 4, line 38, leave out subsection (6).

This amendment removes the provision allow the Secretary of State or Minister for the Cabinet Office to amend this section so as to change the enforcement authority in relation to a particular description of decision or statement.

Clause stand part.

[Alex Norris]

Clause 6 sets out the enforcement authorities for the Bill’s provisions. Subsection (2) sets out that the enforcement authority is the Secretary of State or the Treasury, unless otherwise stated. Subsection (4) states that for any decision or statement made by an English higher education provider, the enforcement authority will be the Office for Students. On the face of it, that seems a fairly benign set-up for enforcement, but it creates a distinction in how the Bill treats different public bodies, on which I would like to press the Minister.

On the one hand, the Bill is saying that enforcement against higher education providers will be given over to a third actor, the Office for Students. On the other hand, it is saying that local government will be policed by national Government instead. Amendment 8 tries to put those things on a more consistent footing and to say that there should be less variance in enforcement. The amendment puts forward the Office for Local Government as a more suitable authority for enforcement of the Bill’s provisions in relation to local government.

I hope that the Minister will cover this issue in her response, because I do not know why there is divergence. She can put me right if I am wrong, but I fear that this is a continuation of central Government’s heavy-handed manner with regard to local authorities. Part of the problem with our approach is that we get devolution when local leaders get the answer “right”, but not so much when central Government disagree with them. Adding clause 6 to the Bill unamended will continue the trend of the Government wishing to keep the reins on local government. Given that they have already chosen to use the Office for Students, surely aligning that with the Office for Local Government would make an awful lot more sense.

Amendment 9 is similar to my amendment 4 on Henry VIII powers. The Government are reserving the ability to change the enforcement authorities as they wish under subsection (6). Amendment 9 seeks to delete that provision and ensure that we can set out, through normal parliamentary processes, who will enforce the legislation. Local councils are not going to change that much, and public bodies generally are not going to change that much, but the Government need emergency powers to vary the enforcement agency. If the Government wish to do things a certain way, they should put that in the Bill, and if they wish to change it they should return to Parliament through primary processes.

[Felicity Buchan]

I urge the Committee to reject the amendments. Let me explain why.

Amendment 8 would establish the Office for Local Government as the enforcement authority in relation to a decision or statement made by local authorities, except where specified otherwise. We have carefully considered the most appropriate enforcement authorities across the sectors that are covered by the Bill; for example, the Pensions Regulator has an existing role in regulating the administration and governance of the local government pension scheme. Although we are expanding some powers, the enforcement authorities listed in the Bill already have an existing role in enforcement for those public authorities. That is not the case for the Office for Local Government, which the hon. Member for Nottingham North is proposing.

The Office for Local Government is not envisaged as an enforcement authority for anything. It is intended to provide data and analysis about the performance of local government and to support its improvement, but it is not envisaged to have a role in regulating local government’s activities. It would therefore not be appropriate for it to have an enforcement role against local authorities in this context. Furthermore, Oflog is an office of the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and, as such, does not have a statutory basis. The effect of amendment 8 would therefore be to keep responsibility with the Secretary of State.

Amendment 9 would remove the power given to the Secretary of State or the Minister for the Cabinet Office to change the enforcement authorities in relation to a decision or statement captured by the Bill. The Bill will provide a power for the Secretary of State and other enforcement authorities to issue compliance notices, and to investigate and fine public bodies, where there is a breach of the ban. Public bodies subject to the ban will also be susceptible to judicial review if they break this law.

We have carefully considered the most appropriate enforcement authorities across some of the sectors covered by the Bill, such as the Pensions Regulator. For higher education providers on the register of the Office for Students, the Office for Students should be the responsible enforcement authority. As the Bill is drafted, the Secretary of State or the Treasury should be the enforcement authority for all other public bodies subject to clauses 1 and 4. Ministers of the Crown are not subject to the additional enforcement regime but are subject to judicial review.

In time, the most appropriate regulators for each of the sectors covered by the Bill may change. The Bill provides the necessary flexibility, via the power given to the Secretary of State or the Minister for the Cabinet Office, to update the respective enforcement authorities if they change. For those reasons, I ask the hon. Member for Nottingham North to withdraw his amendments.

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for the Minister’s reply. I do not intend to press either amendment to a Division, but I will make a couple of points in response.

The Minister mentions that Oflog may not sit elegantly with the Office for Students, because the Office for Students has an existing role doing this type of activity, whereas Oflog does not. However, Oflog was only established in June, so of course it does not have a similar record or similar experience, but that is a person-made thing that could be changed. The Minister also says that Oflog was not envisaged as an enforcement authority, but I cannot believe that the Office for Students was ever really envisaged to be an enforcement authority either.

Similarly, the default enforcement authority in the Bill is the Secretary of State. I do not think that many people go to the ballot box imagining the capacities of different Secretaries of State to kick doors in; I hope not, anyway, because they certainly would not cast a ballot for me. I am therefore not wholly convinced that that is a brilliant argument against the amendment.

I also cannot accept the final point that the most appropriate agency may change in time. If that were the case as a result of the disestablishment of the Office for Students, say, that would itself require primary legislation, and the enforcement agency would be changed routinely as part of that. I do not think that Ministers should have the ability to change enforcement agencies on a whim—because one agency does not give the answers they want, for example—but I think there is a real risk of that. However, I do not think that that is enough to divide the Committee at this point, so I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 6 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned. —(Jacob Young.)

Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill (Fourth sitting)

Alex Norris Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 12th September 2023 Public Bill Committees

[Ms Qaisar]

Essentially, I want to talk about the impact that a local government can have when people at a localised level can outline how they feel about human rights records. This Government should take heed of that, because at that time it was Thatcher’s Government who imposed sanctions on apartheid South Africa and maintained close links with political leaders in apartheid South Africa.

I have tabled a number of amendments to clause 1. I have spoken at length about amendment 22. Amendment 31 is intended to probe the use of a subjective rather than objective test to establish whether a decision maker has contravened clause 1. In reality, there are so many amendments that could be made to clause 1. That is not just my view; we heard it from numerous witnesses during our evidence sessions last week and from multiple organisations that have submitted written evidence. The Minister should really go back and start from scratch.

[Alex Norris (Nottingham North) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Sir George, and to speak to amendment 3, which stands in my name.

We have now moved to the short but important process of line-by-line scrutiny of the Bill, which is itself short but important, with just 17 clauses and a schedule. In the high-quality Second Reading debate, we saw the significant strength of feeling among Members across the House. Frankly, there was not an even party political divide, which always makes things a bit more interesting. I suspect that colleagues’ mailbags, like mine, have been full of strong views from their constituents.

On Second Reading, the Opposition tabled a reasoned amendment setting out our significant concerns about the Bill, which very much start with clause 1. It is a long-standing Opposition position that we do not support boycott, divestment and sanctions-type activity against the state of Israel. As my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly said on Thursday, we are implacably imposed to it. I cannot improve upon that sentiment, which is also the view of the Government. It should not have been hard, if that was what the Government wanted, to build consensus around a proportionate set of regulations that would tackle the issue. Instead, clause 1 and the Bill generally are needlessly broad, with sweeping powers and far-reaching effects. Whether consciously or not, that has created an undesirable degree of division.

The Opposition do not think it wrong, in itself, for public bodies to take ethical investment and procurement decisions, given that there is a long history of councils, universities and others taking a stance in defence of freedom and human rights. After all, it is local ratepayers’ money, and it is reasonable for them to want a say in how to spend or invest it. Similarly, the money in a pension fund belongs not to the Secretary of State but to its members, so it is reasonable for members of funds, through their trustees, to wish to express their views on how the money is invested. We know that that is also the Government’s view, because they have carved out a wide range of exceptions in the schedule. It is clearly not in debate that there ought to be a degree of local say on such activity.

However, it is important to say, at the start of our line-by-line scrutiny, that there is a significant difference between legitimate criticism of a foreign state’s Government and what some have sought to do in recent years. There are those who have sought to target Israel alone, hold it to different standards than others and create hostility towards Jewish people in the UK. That is completely wrong, and we fully support efforts to tackle antisemitism in this country. However, this solution is not sufficient. In its unamended form, clause 1 will go far beyond what we are seeking to resolve and will create a series of problems along the way.

My amendment 3 seeks to clarify the ambiguous wording that a public body may not have regard to a “territorial consideration” when making procurement and investment decisions. As the then shadow Secretary of State—my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy)—and I asked on Second Reading, is that supposed to mean that public bodies may refuse goods from a nation state such as China because of a general disregard for human rights, but may not refuse cotton goods from a territory such as Xinjiang state because of concerns about genocide of the Uyghur population? Or does it mean, as I suspect it may, that all actions of all foreign Governments are beyond the scope of local decision makers unless excepted in the schedule? Perhaps it is illustrative of where we are in the process of reviewing the Bill that that remains in doubt. We have seen doubt in the written evidence, and obviously doubt was felt at Second Reading, too. We need greater clarity in the Bill.

My amendment 3 is a probing amendment. I will not seek to divide the Committee on it, but I hope that it will provide an opportunity for the Minister to give clarity. I think we know that the Government mean that it is not territory-only boycotts that are out of scope, but rather that all boycott-type activity, where it disapproves of foreign conduct, is out of scope. I hope to hear that from the Minister.

I turn to the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts. My amendment 3 would have the same effect as her amendment 23 and is similar to amendment 22, so the same arguments stand.

I am interested to hear what the Minister has to say about amendment 31. It relates to the important debates we had in our evidence sessions about the reasonable observer test, which I struggled with a little. When I asked the witness panel about that, we heard slightly mixed evidence. I was willing to accept it as a term of art which would be well known to the courts and therefore not likely to provide another issue for litigation, but that point seems to be in doubt. I hope that the Minister can be clear about why this approach has been chosen.

I have no doubt that this legislation is heading straight for the courts. That was obvious from written and oral evidence and the Second Reading debate, and it will be obvious throughout our line-by-line discussions. Our debates in Committee will be germane to court proceedings as well, so it is important to have the greatest possible clarity in the Bill and in our discussions.

Finally, amendment 30 relates to a matter that I shall address in detail when we debate clause 4 stand part.

Conceptually, the Bill stands up and is easy enough to understand when we think about public bodies as entities in their own right. However, it swiftly starts to disintegrate when we consider that those entities are made up of a person or persons. I thought that there were some admirable logical gymnastics on that point from the Minister during our evidence sessions. She said that on one day a person might be a councillor, a trustee or a Mayor, and thus the decision maker, but that on another day, in another context, they might no longer be and would therefore not have their freedom of expression fettered. I am not sure that that is credible, but I suspect that the Minister will want to speak to that point, so I hope to hear some greater clarity on it.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Felicity Buchan)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir George, with other hon. Members from all parties. The Bill is an important piece of legislation that has been brought to this place to fulfil a manifesto commitment to ensure that the UK speaks with one voice internationally, and to promote community cohesion within the United Kingdom. We have 17 clauses and one schedule to discuss in four sittings.

Amendments 22 and 23 would remove the references to “territorial consideration” from the Bill. I am not sure that this is what the hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts intended, but the amendments would broaden the scope of the Bill. In its current form, the Bill will prohibit only territorial considerations

“that would cause a reasonable observer of the decision-making process to conclude that the decision was influenced by political or moral disapproval of foreign state conduct”,

but the amendments would mean that when a public authority is making a procurement or investment decision, all considerations influenced by political or moral disapproval of foreign state conduct would be captured, not just territorial considerations—unless, of course, they were also excluded in the schedule.

The condition of “territorial consideration” in the ban means that the Bill only bans certain boycotts or divestments that “specifically or mainly” have regard to a country or territory. It does not currently, for example, prohibit public authorities that have an environmental policy for their procurement or investment decisions that is universal rather than country-specific. The amendments would arguably prohibit such policies, which is not the intention of the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

That is indeed a point of order. The remaining amendments in the group will be taken either in the next clause or later, when we come to clause 17, because they are consequential on the lead amendment.

Clause 3

Exceptions

[Alex Norris]

I beg to move amendment 4, in clause 3, page 2, line 17, leave out subsections (2) and (3).

This amendment would remove provisions allowing Ministers to amend the Schedule, via regulations, to add a description of decision or consideration, or amend or remove considerations added under previous regulations.

Clause 3 makes a number of exceptions, set out in the schedule, to the proposed ban on decisions made by public bodies in respect of foreign states—that is, it allows for certain conduct to be in scope for ethical decision making, such as environmental concerns. We support the principle of excepting certain powers from the Bill, and Members will not be surprised to hear that we are pleased to see labour rights there. However, the clause then bakes in a rather unacceptable and significant power grab by the Secretary of State over the ethical procurement decisions that a public body may wish to make.

Looking around the room, I see some Members who have been here longer than me and some who have been here for a bit less time, but I bet everyone will agree that one thing we were not told before we came here was that while we thought we would be talking about great matters of state, we would end up talking about Henry VIII regulations. Whatever happens, all roads lead to this bit of the Bill. I am continuing that unbroken streak, though perhaps not at length, as this argument is made frequently.

Clause 3(2) will provide the Secretary of State or Minister for the Cabinet Office with the power to amend this vital schedule in which the exceptions are laid out. That is an eccentric and totally unacceptable and unnecessary provision. This Parliament is rightly spending lots of time on this legislation. We have taken oral and written evidence from witnesses and will have multiple debates in the Chamber. We have convened this Bill Committee and will go through the Bill line by line, and then this process will be repeated in the other place. That is so we get the provisions right.

What we are being asked to do in the light of clause 3 and the schedule is to divine whether we think the range of exceptions is right. Is it broad enough? Is it too broad? Should we add any more? Should we take any out? That is the purpose of Parliament and parliamentary scrutiny. Yet we are being asked to put a provision in the Bill that the Secretary of State can just change that anyway via secondary means. That creates an unacceptable imbalance between the Executive and the legislature.

The problem is best understood in contrast to subsection (5) because that is a mirroring provision. It allows the Secretary of State to add or remove countries from the list of places that public bodies may boycott. We have not sought to amend that, because we know from recent painful experience that foreign affairs have a habit of moving on, and there must be an opportunity for the Government of the day to make changes swiftly. That is entirely reasonable in the case of foreign affairs and entirely unreasonable in the case of exempted activities, because they will not change quickly. Environmental and labour concerns are anchor issues that will dominate debates long after all of us are gone. The Secretary of State and the Government more generally do not need the power to vary that quickly.

If we do not accept the amendment and we accept what is in the Bill, what all colleagues—Opposition and, frankly, Government Back Benchers too—are being told is, “Do all the due process, but don’t worry; we will just change it later if we fancy it”. That is not good enough in a parliamentary democracy, and we should delete the provision today.

[Kim Leadbeater (Batley and Spen) (Lab)]

I will make just a short contribution, if I may. I associate myself with the comments of our shadow Minister. The matters covered by the Bill relate to issues of fundamental importance: the interpretation of UK foreign policy and the ability of public bodies to respond. We live in uncertain times, and the UK’s position as an influential country on the world’s stage will understandably need to change in response to events in many areas of instability. In those circumstances, it would be fundamentally wrong for Ministers to reserve to themselves the power to amend the schedule in the Bill without returning to Parliament and giving MPs and, indeed, interested parties the opportunity to scrutinise and, where necessary, object to it. That is why I support amendment 4.

--- Later in debate ---

[Felicity Buchan]

Amendment 4 would remove the power granted to the Secretary of State to amend the schedule so as to make exemptions to the ban for certain bodies and functions and certain types of considerations, and to amend or remove regulations made under those powers.

The power is necessary to ensure that the ban can evolve over time and operate as intended. The Bill rightly applies to the full range of public authorities. That is necessary to ensure that we have a consistent approach to foreign policy and to stop public authorities being distracted from their core duties by divisive debates and policies. In the event that the ban has unintended consequences for a public authority and impacts on its ability to deliver its core functions, however, this power will allow the Secretary of State to exempt the body, or a function of that body, from the ban via a statutory instrument. The exercise of the power will be subject to affirmative resolution by both Houses.

The power will also allow the Secretary of State to exempt certain types of considerations from the ban. That may be necessary if the Secretary of State needs to react quickly to international events. In the drafting of this legislation, my officials have been careful to ensure that the Bill applies only to appropriate bodies and types of considerations. However, the Government may also decide that a certain consideration should be made exempt from the ban so that the Bill can operate as intended. The Secretary of State requires the power so that he can respond effectively to potential unintended consequences that the Bill might have on a public authority without the need for primary legislation. If that had to be done through primary legislation, a public authority might have its ability to carry out public functions hindered for an extended period. I therefore ask the hon. Member for Nottingham North to withdraw his amendment.

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for that answer, but I am afraid that the Minister has rather made the Opposition’s case for us. It is deeply concerning to hear that the purpose of the provision is about anxiety in Government concerning the possibility of a bundle of unintended consequences that could hinder a public body’s activities for a number of months, as has been said. That is the reality—we have said that from start to finish. This thing will set a fire. This thing will roll in ways that we cannot conceive of, because it is so broadly drawn and, in places, so erratically drawn. That is a reason for not proceeding with the Bill in this form, and for coming back together to produce—as we are all keen to—something that is less broad and wide-ranging, but delivering a solution to the problem that we are seeking to tackle.

The Minister’s argument is not for retaining subsection (2), but for revisiting the provisions. I therefore hope that, having said that, she will reflect on the fact that she discussed the great anxiety about the unintended consequences of the Bill. That is what we should be addressing, instead of just giving yet more powers to Secretaries of State to act as they wish. I will press the amendment to a Division.

Question put, That the amendment be made.

--- Later in debate ---

Division 6

Question accordingly negatived.

Ayes: 2

Noes: 10

[Alex Norris]

I beg to move amendment 2, in clause 3, page 2, line 40, at end insert—

“(4A) Section 1 does not apply to a decision which has been made in accordance with a Statement of Policy Relating to Human Rights.

(4B) A Statement of Policy Relating to Human Rights—

(a) is a public authority’s policy criteria relating to disinvestment in cases concerning contravention of human rights; and

(b) must be applied consistently by the public authority to all foreign countries.

(4C) Within 60 days of the passing of this Act, the Secretary of State must publish, and lay before Parliament, guidance on the form, content and application of Statements for the purposes of this section.

(4D) Public authorities must have regard to the guidance referenced in subsection (4C) when devising a Statement.”

This amendment would exempt public bodies from the prohibition in section 1, where the decision has been made in accordance with a Statement of Policy Relating to Human Rights. A Statement may not single out individual nations, but would have to be applied consistently, and in accordance with guidance published by the Secretary of State.

We heard on Second Reading, and again today, that the Government want to put disapproval of the conduct of foreign states and their territories beyond the scope of competent activity for local public bodies, in order to stop public bodies taking partial and potentially harmful stances. However, this Bill is akin to using a nuclear weapon to crack that nut. We have just heard from the Minister that the Government are so concerned about the unintended consequences the Bill may have that they are having to reserve the powers to change it quickly later, lest a public body be shut down for a number of months. The Committee just accepted that change, but it is yet another power grab by the Secretary of State and it is heavy-handed in its enforcement.

Amendment 2 sets out an alternative approach. We have been clear from the outset that it is possible to achieve what both the Government and the Opposition wish to achieve but without the overreach of the Bill in its current form. Amendment 2 would allow a public body to produce a document that sets out its policy on procurement and human rights and for that to be developed in accordance with guidance published by the Secretary of State. This is a relatively long-held Opposition policy. Indeed, it is similar to an amendment I tabled to the Procurement Bill many months ago. It is vital that procurement decisions made with regard to human rights issues be applied across the board, not just to prevent unethical actions against specific states but to ensure that common actions have the greatest impact.

Such a statement of ethical policy would thus ensure consistency in how contracting authorities—or public bodies more generally—decide on such matters, and inconsistent application would be prohibited. The practical effect would be to make it unambiguous that if a public body does not wish to procure goods from Russia because of President Putin’s abhorrent human rights abuses in Ukraine, the law will be on its side. If the same body does not wish to procure services from Xinjiang because of the appalling treatment of Uyghur Muslims, the law will be on its side.

[Chris Stephens]

The hon. Gentleman is making an excellent speech. In our evidence sessions, we heard very powerful testimony from Uyghur society and the Uyghur people, who said that we really need to look at this part of the Bill. Does he also agree that it is very interesting that witnesses on the Government’s side support disinvestment for China, for the very reasons that he has just outlined?

--- Later in debate ---

[Alex Norris]

I agree. After hearing that testimony, I reflected on one of the things that I love the most about my country—I think about this quite a lot—which is that we stand up for people who need it, whether by providing shelter or by never walking on the other side of the road. I see things through that prism. I think it is a really fundamental British value, and I am concerned that we will lose some of that. Of course, significant matters of foreign policy are the reserve of the Government of the day, but the issue should not just be left to Government Ministers. The outpouring of support for Ukraine, both in my city and across the country, showed that people take that seriously and want to have a role and a say—they want to be part of that process. That is part of building common cause, but I fear that this goes too far and will squeeze some of that out.

Our amendment 2 makes our approach to the matter very clear. If a public body acts only against a particular state—for instance, the world’s only Jewish state—while not applying the same approach to human rights abuses everywhere, such actions would be illegal. Our amendment would not just ensure that there are consistent decisions and that communities are not singled out; it would also strengthen our country’s commitment to stand against human rights abuses all over the world.

Our country has always defended the fundamental, inalienable human rights of all people. Procurement and investment decisions are part of that, and we should not shirk that role when it is the right thing to do. The amendment would ensure that public bodies could still play their part and that the contemptible actions of those who target one state while looking the other way when abuses are committed elsewhere are finally prohibited.

As I said on Second Reading, our amendment could be technically deficient—I am never sure whether we are supposed to admit that in Parliament, but it is clear anyway. If it is technically deficient—after all, I drafted it, and am perfectly willing to say that it is the work of a human being—we are more than willing to work with the Government to find something that works in both principle and substance. I hope to hear from the Minister that there is willingness to meet us a little bit on this, so that we can tackle the problem that we are all trying to address.

[Kim Leadbeater]

I rise to speak briefly but strongly in favour of amendment 2. The UK should be a beacon for human rights, not just here at home but in our foreign policy and our relations with other states. That can be done only on the basis of a consistent application of the principles we seek to uphold. It is not hard to do that when human rights abuses are committed by countries we are in conflict with. However, we must be ready to apply the same standards to countries we regard as allies and friends. That is not always easy, but if we fail to do so, we open ourselves up to accusations of double standards and hypocrisy.

--- Later in debate ---

[Felicity Buchan]

That is a very good point. This amendment carries the risk of allowing a multitude of different statements on human rights, without any consistency, resulting in the community friction that we all desperately seek to avoid. That is why we are looking to boycott the BDS movement.

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for the Minister’s response. To address the point made by the hon. Member for Harrow East, the circumstance he outlined could happen now, of course. Part of the reason we are here and that legislation in this space is important is that it does not happen in that way, does it? As we heard in the evidence sessions, it almost exclusively tends to be targeted at Israel. I do not think there is any evidence to suggest that local expertise is causing a thousand flowers to bloom across public bodies. Actually, amendment 2 would protect against that because it would give local authorities tools to say, “Look, we can only do this if we can engage in it across the piece, and we don’t think that that is core business.”

The Minister has expressed her concerns about distractions for local authorities. I know from my time in a local authority, during which we pushed back against a boycott of Israel, that these things flair up over a short period, a lot of energy goes into them, and it would have been much better to have had a fixed point. The amendment reserves the right of the Secretary of State to set out the form, so there would be no wild variance across all public bodies. It would give them a fixed point to anchor to, which would take a lot of pressure off the leaders of public bodies.

I am grateful to the Minister for making those points, but the reality is that we are in slightly different positions. I still hold out the hope—and I will be actively working on this between now and the final stages of this Bill—that our positions will become closer. At this point, however, given that the gap has not closed during this debate, I will have to press my amendment to a Division. We want to send a clear message that there are other ways of achieving this very important purpose.