Summer Adjournment

Debate between Amanda Milling and Jeremy Lefroy

Thursday 21st July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

It is a privilege to follow the hon. Member for Stirling (Steven Paterson). Given that Staffordshire is often used as the quarry for much of the midlands, I very much sympathise with him. It is also a great honour to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith), who made a very thoughtful speech.

On Monday, I saw two reasons why there is great hope in Stafford for the economic future. One was the almost-completed General Electric factory on the Redhill business park, which Staffordshire County Council set up a few years ago and which will be an extremely important source of employment and innovation for the future. General Electric will base its automaton division there. The second was Biomass Power, a manufacturing and design company that makes biomass equipment. I visited its gasification plant, which will assist the Bombardier works in Belfast in Northern Ireland. That will help Bombardier reduce its energy costs, which is one of the reasons why it will be successful in Belfast. As a result of these and many other initiatives, the percentage of jobseeker’s allowance applicants in Stafford has fallen from 3.2% to 1% over the last six years. During that time, we have welcomed two new Signals regiments, 1 and 16, and they are already playing a major role in the life of our communities. They have been a welcome addition to our community.

A new retail development is due to open in the coming two months on the edge of the town centre, and we need to ensure that it does not suck the life out of the middle of our town centre. The borough council is working with many people, including me, to see what we can do to bring more life into our beautiful town centre.

Stafford is a great centre for volunteering. The proportion of volunteers per head of population is one of the highest in the country. One of our excellent local volunteering organisations is Staffordshire Women’s Aid, which has just opened a new refuge. I very much hope that a Home Office Minister, or my right hon. Friend the new Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, who is a Staffordshire MP, will come and open it formally at some point.

Stafford is building large numbers of houses. We have an excellent local plan, which means that the houses are, by and large, being built in the right place, but I would like to point out the problems that speculative development brings. With a good local plan, there is absolutely no need for speculation, because we have planned the number of houses that we need. Speculative development simply wastes everybody’s time.

[Amanda Milling (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for his support following the closure of Rugeley B power station. Will he join me in trying to get all parties—national and local government—to do everything they can to get the site redeveloped as quickly as possible?

[Jeremy Lefroy]

Of course. My hon. Friend has done incredible work on that and I will support her in whatever way I can, because the site is on the boundary of my constituency as well.

I want to make two other quick points about housing and planning. First, I have already raised in the House issue of the lack of enforcement. It is so important to ensure that when planning permission is given, development is carried out in accordance with it, and that developers do not try to take bits away or add bits that have not been approved. Secondly, could we find a way of ensuring that the new roads that are put into new housing estates are quickly available on maps, especially electronic maps and satnavs? For many months, if not years, those roads do not appear on such maps, so people do not know how to get to the new houses that are being built.

I want to talk briefly about health. The county hospital, about which I spoke many times in the previous Parliament, is now doing well. The accident and emergency department is seeing more people in 14 hours a day than it did in 24 hours a day at its peak, although I continue to urge the restoration of a 24-hour service, which I believe is vital. Many of the wards in the hospital are being refurbished. The stroke unit—a rehabilitation ward—is under review. Many of my constituents have pointed out how important it is. It is all very well talking about helping to rehabilitate people at home. If that is best for the patient, that is fine. In many cases, however, such patients are better served by going to the rehabilitation ward as day cases or for a few hours in a day.

I raised this morning with the Leader of the House the question of drug and alcohol treatment in Staffordshire. We face a cut of up to half in the funding for such treatment and the closure of some excellent units. That cannot be right, and it has to be stopped somehow. I have also raised the question of health visitors. The amount of money dedicated to health visitors is under review, if not being cut. Health visitors play an absolutely vital role in Staffordshire, as they do across the country. Reducing their numbers will be counterproductive, and it will lead only to more pressure on acute hospitals.

The funding of the NHS is a long-term issue, which is why I have joined the right hon. Members for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb) and for Birkenhead (Frank Field) to look at the ways in which we could have a much longer-term funding picture for the NHS and social care. It is quite clear that after 2020, even if the current plans go ahead—I fully support them—we will have some major holes in health service funding.

On transport in our area, I asked about the four-lane running of motorways in questions to the Leader of the House last week. The Transport Committee wrote an excellent report on that, and I ask the Government to look at this matter most carefully. I believe that some of the four-lane running is dangerous. It has now been proposed for junctions 13 to 15 of the M6 in my constituency. Before that goes ahead, I want the Government to look at the system that operates on the M42 smart motorway, which is much better than the permanent four-lane running elsewhere.

As far as rail is concerned, the Norton Bridge viaduct has been put in at the junction on the west coast main line, and it is bringing great improvements. I am very much in favour of that, just as I am against HS2. I continue to be against HS2 because, in my opinion, there are much better alternatives. I am in no way a nimby on this, but there are alternatives that would be cheaper and would provide greater connectivity to far more cities across the country.

Finally, there is a proposal for a massive rail freight interchange in my constituency, which would take up many acres of the green belt. We must look at that most carefully. The proposals brought forward by the developers consortium are simply not acceptable at the moment, and they must be looked at very carefully. This is a national issue, and I urge Ministers to look at this most carefully to see whether there are not alternative sites for this rail freight interchange.

Higher Education and Research Bill

Debate between Amanda Milling and Jeremy Lefroy

2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons & Ways and Means resolution: House of Commons
Tuesday 19th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Amanda Milling]

My right hon. Friend makes an interesting point, on which I am sure there will be further discussions.

It is excellent news that record numbers of students are securing a university place. What is more, the proportion of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds going into higher education is up too. UCAS data show that young people from the most disadvantaged backgrounds are applying at a record rate in the 2016-17 academic year. This is excellent progress. But with more demand for graduates and more skills required in the workplace, the sector cannot stand still, which is why I welcome the provisions in part 1 of the Bill making it easier for new high-quality universities to enter the market. This will mean that more places can be created and that students will have more choice, as well as encouraging greater diversity and innovation in the sector.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend therefore welcome the news that Chinese investors propose to take over the Staffordshire University campus in Stafford, vacated by Staffordshire University, to provide precisely that additional choice and—I am sure—excellence?

[Amanda Milling]

I thank my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour for his point. He is absolutely right. In fact, he must have been reading over my shoulder, because I was just about to talk about Staffordshire University. I currently do not have a university in Cannock Chase, but we have businesses and organisations with close links to Staffordshire University, and I have a lot of constituents who go there. As a consequence of the Bill and opening up the market to new entrants, perhaps one day I will have a new university in my constituency.

In conclusion, we have a world-class higher education sector, but we cannot be complacent. Our economy needs high-quality graduates and our graduates need the skills to contribute to our economy. I welcome the Bill. It demonstrates that the Government have a clear plan for higher education and builds on the progress already made.

Coal-fired Power Stations

Debate between Amanda Milling and Jeremy Lefroy

Wednesday 27th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[Amanda Milling]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for attending this afternoon’s debate, because two of the cooling towers sit in his constituency; we share the cooling towers. He is right that there will be opportunities for homes and enterprise on the site, and later I will discuss some of those opportunities in a bit more detail.

In the short term, the closure of Rugeley B is a blow for the employees, the contractors and the wider supply chain, as well as for the local community, with many clubs and groups using facilities on the site. We cannot be complacent and assume that the area’s resilience will see us through this difficult period. We must be proactive and plan for both the short term and the long term. Of course, my first priority has been to help those people who are directly affected by the potential closure: the workforce, both employees and contractors, and the supply chain. We must ensure that they all get all the support they need at this difficult time.

To give a sense of the scale of the impact, Rugeley B has 150 employees and at least the same number of contractors from across Staffordshire and the midlands; I am pleased so many Staffordshire Members are here this afternoon. Those employees and contractors have worked at the plant for decades. Others with young families have recently bought a home. There is also the wider supply chain, which goes far beyond Rugeley. The impact of the potential closure will be felt in ports and by freight services that serve the power station, and it cannot be overestimated.

The mines and the power stations have been a central part of our local community, with Rugeley B housing facilities including a sports and social club, football and cricket pitches, and even a model railway. If the plant shuts, over the coming months we must find alternatives for the various clubs that will be affected and their 2,000 members. I call on other local community facilities and groups to come forward and offer their support to those clubs and groups that will be affected, and to rehome them, at least for the short term.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

I am very glad that my hon. Friend has secured this debate, and I apologise for being a few minutes late. In my neighbouring constituency of Stafford, we face the prospect of losing sports pitches at Shugborough Hall and at Staffordshire University, because of its transfer up to Stoke, so there is a real crisis for sports facilities in the Rugeley and Stafford area.

[Amanda Milling]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising that issue. He is absolutely right: we are losing facilities, not only at the Rugeley B site but at Shugborough, a few miles up the road. We need to look at leisure provision across the area. One thing that we need to include in any kind of site development at Rugeley B is leisure facilities.

Since the announcement on Rugeley B, I have visited the site and met the owners and unions several times to discuss practical ways in which we can support all those affected. I will hold a jobs fair in Rugeley in June, and I encourage any members of the workforce who might be affected by the potential closure and who are seeking new employment to attend this event. A couple of weeks ago, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government accompanied me on a visit to the site, to understand the situation we face, to tour the site and to understand its potential future uses and the issues that we face in realising them. I take this opportunity to thank him for his time and support.

Whether the plant closes this summer, next year, or even in a few years, it is essential that we speed up plans for Rugeley’s future, and in doing so develop and implement a strategy for the site. The same is true of other coal-fired power station sites that might face closure. We need to mitigate the loss of jobs and create new employment opportunities for all those affected and for the wider economy.

The Rugeley B power station site is of national strategic importance, as it is unique in size, location and connectivity. It is a 374-acre brownfield site that could accommodate a range of different developments, including housing, commercial and industrial units, and a gas turbine; it could help to deliver much-needed homes, jobs and electricity. I will talk about each of these in a bit more detail shortly.

A taskforce that includes the district councils, the county council and the two local enterprise partnerships has been set up. It has held its first meeting to discuss ways of supporting the workforce during the consultation period and to establish strategic plans for the future use of the site if the plant closes. The site is in the heart of England, and it is incredibly well connected by road and rail links. It is close to many of the major motorways and trunk roads, including the M6, the M6 toll road, the M42, the A50, the A38—I could go on. It also sits alongside the west coast main line and has its own siding. The fact that there is an Amazon fulfilment centre on the land opposite Rugeley B demonstrates how well served the location is by various transport links.

Then there is the site’s connectivity. Naturally, as a power station is situated there, the site has national grid connectivity, so there is a strong case for using the existing infrastructure and building a gas power station, which would help to create jobs for the highly skilled workforce at Rugeley B. I also understand that fibre-optic broadband runs down the railway and along nearby canals. This connectivity crossover opens up new enterprise opportunities relating to innovation and technology.