Oral Answers to Questions Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateAlicia Kearns
Main Page: Alicia Kearns (Conservative - Rutland and Stamford)Department Debates - View all Alicia Kearns's debates with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government
(1 year, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberI am grateful to the hon. Lady for speaking so passionately about the bid for her constituency. I am certainly willing to engage with her and Ministers at the Department for Transport to see what more we can do.
Rutland and Melton councils have put forward a brilliant blueprint for rural innovation in our levelling-up bid, focused on health and transport. The context is an urgent need to put social mobility into funding formulas for those areas of deprivation otherwise hidden by affluence. Will my right hon. Friend do what he said he would do back in February: take up an offer that is too good to be true by coming to Rutland and Melton to discuss the bid and the future of social mobility funding?
What an alluring invitation—and yes. As my hon. Friend the Member for South Leicestershire (Alberto Costa) pointed out earlier, Leicestershire and Rutland are relatively poorly funded in comparison with other local authorities, which is why the particular plight of deprived communities in my hon. Friend’s constituency and elsewhere is at the forefront of our minds.