English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (Second sitting)

Andrew Cooper Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th September 2025 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

Do you agree with Gareth?

Bill Butler: I do. My only plea at the moment is that what we have got does not work, so that may be an aspiration.

[Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)]

Q The Bill will create several new mayoral combined authorities, and we might reasonably expect to see more mayoral development corporations created afterward. In recent years, there have been significant questions about the accountability and transparency of mayoral development corporations. Do you think you have sufficient powers currently? Will the Bill provide sufficient powers for the National Audit Office or the Local Audit Office to scrutinise mayoral development corporations properly, or should it be strengthened to clarify that mayoral development corporations should come under either yourselves or local audit?

Gareth Davies: My view is that they are part of the local government landscape. They should be properly audited as part of the local government landscape, and the strengthening that this Bill brings to local government audit needs to apply to those parts of local government as well. I certainly would not try to lift them out of the local government set-up and make them subject to the National Audit Office. We are absolutely national; it should be the Local Audit Office that has a remit for mayoral corporations. I think this is less about the structural picture than about strengthening the local audit arrangements so that every part of the local set-up is audited effectively, including those.

[Andrew Cooper]

Q Do you believe that this Bill will do that?

Gareth Davies: As we have said, it is not going to be quick or easy, but this is the right approach. It is just going to need substantial application of shoulder to the wheel and strong leadership of the new Local Audit Office, when that is created. That will make a big difference because it will have a loud voice in this area of work, and all the levers necessary to acquire the capacity required to perform to a high standard and to restore proper accountability. Even though we know that will not be easy, and we have explained why it is not simple, I think that is the right approach.

Bill Butler: This is getting tedious, but I agree with Gareth. It is a local issue. It is fundamentally important that we recognise that these are local democratic bodies and that the Local Audit Office, and auditors, need to operate independently from them and without unnecessary interference from anywhere else. The job needs to be done properly, and framework in the Bill for reforming local audit is exactly the right direction to go.

As I think we said, we need to address a number of environmental issues now to see that benefit. The risks you described apply to all 716 sets of unassured accounts. In my experience in this area, although audit does not always find a problem, I find it difficult to believe that there are not significant problems lurking where audits have not been completed. I hope there are not many. I would be delighted, but very surprised, if there were none.

[Siân Berry (Brighton Pavilion) (Green)]

Q I want to press you slightly on the make-up of audit committees. Mr Davies said that it was not for him to say, but given the varied make-up of councils across the country, I do not think it would be too hard for you to say that an opposition councillor could be the chair, or something along those lines. In your experience, what makes a good audit committee?

Gareth Davies: It is about the person and their skills and approach more than any office they hold or party they come from. You need the right approach and the right skills to do a good job. I have seen elected politicians fulfil that role brilliantly. The reason I said what I said is that I am a bit suspicious of anything that says, for example, “We must have an independent chair who is not a member of the council.” The audit committee is there to be part of the council’s governance arrangements. If it is too independent of the council, it does not engage with the machinery of running the council or influence the decision makers sufficiently, in my experience. If it is entirely made up of members who, with the best will in the world, do not have the skills required to perform a role that sometimes has technical elements, that model also has weaknesses.

The best models I have seen consist of a cross-party committee of members who are very interested in getting value for money for the taxpayer and ensuring that controls are operating properly across the council, and in ensuring that the council is maintaining public trust; you need people with those kind of motivations, supplemented with some independent membership. The chair does not necessarily have to come from that independent membership, but it must be somebody who is prepared to read all the accounts and ask difficult questions about why a surprising number has appeared out of nowhere.

That is why I would not be prescriptive. You need a mix of skills around the table and the committee must be connected to the leadership of the council, so that difficult messages coming out of the audits are relayed to the decision makers, raised in full council if necessary, and certainly raised with the executive or the mayor. That linkage needs to be clear and fully operational for it to work properly.

Bill Butler: That is not different—

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Andrew Cooper Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 2nd September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to speak on what may prove to be one of the most impactful and transformative pieces of legislation of this Parliament. The Bill represents one of the most significant shifts in local government in more than half a century. It sets out a clear ambition to move power out of Westminster and into the hands of local leaders who know their communities best. For areas such as Cheshire and Warrington, that has the potential finally to give us the tools we need to unlock our full potential and to deliver real, tangible benefits for our communities.

On transport alone, the opportunity is to talk no longer about the decline in bus services but about how we are providing new routes; and to hear, instead of that we have been campaigning for a bridge or railway link for 40 years, “We have a plan to deliver.” On skills, instead of the 92% drop in adult education starters that has occurred in my area between 2015 and 2020, we can talk about how we will fix that.

It is important to recognise, however, that the approach set out in the Bill is not without risks for Cheshire and Warrington with respect to police services. The Bill gives power to the Home Secretary to redraw the policing boundaries to match the mayoral combined authority. There is no consensus in Cheshire that Cheshire police should be reorganised to exclude Halton, which is currently part of the Liverpool city region. Indeed, quite the reverse: it is felt that such a move would be explicitly bad for Halton and would damage the viability of the remainder of Cheshire police. When the Minister sums up, I hope he will provide reassurance that there will be a full consultation before Cheshire police is reorganised, and that it will not be reorganised against the wishes of its communities?

Let me turn to the Bill’s provisions on adult education. The new duty placed on strategic authorities to secure appropriate facilities for the education and training of adults aged 19 and over is a welcome step. In the focus groups that I have run with technology businesses across Cheshire and the wider north-west, there has been a clear divide between mayoral areas and non-mayoral areas, where—with some exceptions—businesses did not feel that there was a good understanding of their needs, nor a plan to deliver on them. The mayoral combined authority presents an opportunity not only to fix that, but to think strategically about taking advantage of projects like HyNet, which will require miles of new hydrogen pipeline and people with the right skills to build it.

An important gap that the Bill does not address is post-16 education. Local authorities currently have a duty to secure enough suitable education and training provision to meet the reasonable needs of all young people in their area who are over compulsory school age, but they lack any powers to deliver this and neither can they meaningfully affect how further education is organised. That is a real challenge, particularly in my constituency, which has been left with big gaps in provision following the 2016 review into post-16 education in Cheshire and Warrington, contributing to NEET levels in Winsford being five percentage points higher than the borough-wide average.

There is an opportunity for the mayoral combined authority to deliver better outcomes for young people in my constituency, but it needs the powers to do so. I urge Ministers to work with colleagues in the Department for Education so that we can use mayors to tackle entrenched inequalities and ensure that every young person, regardless of background, has access to high-quality education and training that prepares them for the future.

This Bill is not just a handover of power, but a partnership between central Government and local communities—between elected leaders and the people they serve. For Cheshire and Warrington, it is a chance to lead by example, and to show what empowered communities can achieve when given the freedom to flourish.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jonathan Brash (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

English devolution is a mess. It is a postcode patchwork of opaque systems, varying powers and unclear lines of accountability. That is not just an historical failure, but profoundly dangerous, because when the public cannot navigate their democracy or do not know who holds the pen on planning, transport, housing or skills, they understandably disengage. Accountability is lost, and in that vacuum politicians can get away with anything.

I will give the House one clear example: in Hartlepool, the Tees Valley Mayor has imposed a mayoral development corporation with very little consultation—certainly not with the public. Planning powers were stripped from the council for large areas of the town, supposedly to be exercised by an appointed board. We fought hard to secure some form of democratic representation on that board, yet of its 14 members, only four hold elected office and only one is there because they have elected office. In any event, the mayor quickly outsourced the majority of those powers to a private company in Manchester, so people who have never walked our streets are now making the majority of the decisions shaping them.

[Andrew Cooper]

Does my hon. Friend agree that mayoral development corporations need to be brought under the remit of the new local audit offices that are proposed in the Bill, placing the power to audit them beyond reasonable doubt?

[Mr Brash]

I agree that far greater powers are required to hold mayoral development corporations to account, and that may be one way of doing it.

The changes are not just about planning powers: publicly owned assets are being transferred from the council and other public bodies. When Labour councillors demanded that those assets, which include Hartlepool’s civic centre, would be returned to public ownership if they were not developed or if the corporation was wound up, that demand was refused. When we asked whether the council could resist this change, the advice was stark: we could not, there was no veto and it could not be stopped by the council. When the council voted against a mayoral development corporation just down the road in Middlesbrough, it was imposed on the town anyway.

Let me be clear that I am not opposed to the principle of development corporations. I was willing to support the one in Hartlepool in the spirit of cross-party co-operation, but the outcome has become confused, with zero accountability and residents left unclear about who to turn to, especially as more and more houses in multiple occupation pop up across our town centre, put there by an unelected, unaccountable company. This is not power in the hands of the people.

Devolution was supposed to mean decisions made closer to communities, but too often the reality is the opposite: power hoarded and pushed further away from the very neighbourhoods that are supposed to be empowered. That is why I support the We’re Right Here campaign, which asks that power does not stop at the mayor’s office but flows to the people themselves. It is championed by Hartlepool’s own community leader, Sacha Bedding. It is a way forward and I hope that Ministers are listening. We must ensure that there is accountability for mayors. They can be the vehicle for delivering for the public, but the power itself can lie only in one place: with the people.

Residential Estate Management Companies

Andrew Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd April 2025 Westminster Hall

[Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stuart. I thank the hon. Member for South Devon (Caroline Voaden) for securing this debate. The Government face many issues as a result of the unholy alliance between weak regulation, private sector greed and the long-term underfunding of local government. We have here a particularly egregious example. Others have spoken, and will continue to speak about the business practices involved in the sector. I want to focus on how we have allowed a system to develop where service charges, and therefore residential estate management companies, are being used inappropriately.

In some parts of the country people pay twice for the same basic services—once for their own and once for everyone else’s. There is an appropriate use of service charging for lifts, common areas and genuinely private outdoor spaces, but it should not be used for sewerage, most highways and the vast majority of play areas and open spaces. It is not uncommon to see a report to the council’s planning committee that says something like, “The council would not wish to take on the inspection and management of these areas.” We know why councils do that, but it must end and the Government need to act accordingly.

My ask to the Minister is simple. The Government should implement section 42 of the Flood and Water Management Act 2010 to require utility adoption for new developments; create an equivalent for highways adoption; and direct councils that the default for publicly accessible spaces is that they are maintained publicly, whether that is by the principal authority or by the town and parish council.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Cooper Excerpts

Monday 7th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Katie Lam (Weald of Kent) (Con)]

3. What steps she plans to take to support house building in London.

[Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)]

15. What steps her Department is taking to increase the supply of housing.

--- Later in debate ---

[Angela Rayner]

We are asking London to deliver record levels of house building. Our revised standard method sets the housing need for London at nearly 88,000 homes per year. The previous Government artificially boosted targets for London using an extra 35% urban uplift. That resulted in a target of nearly 100,000 homes—a third of the previous national target—which could not be justified. The London Mayor has started building more new council homes than at any time since the 1970s. He is getting on with building homes while the Tories have failed and are the blockers.

[Andrew Cooper]

With around 1.3 million people on housing registers in England, it is vital that we achieve a step change in the supply of housing, particularly social housing, over this Parliament; however, in my constituency and across the north-west, housing associations are managing many ageing, low-quality homes that require ongoing investment and maintenance. Homes for the North warns that many of these properties will become uninhabitable and unsuitable for social housing over the next decade. What consideration has my right hon. Friend given to targeting the renewal of social housing, such as through pooling funding with money for decarbonisation, so that registered social landlords can use the money flexibly to combine retrofit, demolition and new build? That would drive regeneration and reduce carbon emissions.

[Angela Rayner]

My hon. Friend is right to highlight the absolute mess that the previous Government left our housing stock in. We will ensure the biggest increase in social house building in a generation, and provide safe, warm and decent homes, by introducing minimum energy efficiency standards and reviewing the decent homes standard. Recent funding includes £1.29 billion for the warm homes social housing fund, £800 million in top-ups to the current affordable homes programme, and a £2 billion down payment on the future programme, which will be used for regeneration projects that will result in a net increase in the number of homes.

Construction Standards: New Build Homes

Andrew Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 25th March 2025 Westminster Hall

[Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Jardine. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood Forest (Michelle Welsh) on securing this debate. As my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Mrs Russell) has previewed, I will focus my comments on the collapse of Stewart Milne Homes North West, and the lasting consequences it has had for many families across my constituency and no doubt the wider north-west region.

Stewart Milne Homes went into administration in January last year, leaving several housing developments half-built, although the three in my constituency had been completed for some years. Nevertheless, homeowners have been left burdened with a potential financial nightmare, as streets and sewers were never properly adopted by the local highways authority or the water company. That has created a situation where residents, who have every right to expect a functioning, safe environment, are instead left with a looming threat of significant costs. The reason for the predicament is simple: there was either no bonded section 38 agreement in place with the local council, or no bonded section 104 agreement with the water company for the adoption of sewers—or, in some cases, neither—despite residents having deeds, on completion of their sale, showing that the estate would be adopted.

I can only speak with direct knowledge of my own constituency, but I am aware, through research undertaken by my team and through conversations with the local authority and with United Utilities, that that is far from a unique situation, leading one to wonder whether Stewart Milne either acted negligently, or actively mis-sold properties on the basis that their roads and sewers would be publicly maintained. My hon. Friend the Member for Congleton makes a reasonable point about director’s duties in that circumstance.

Without those legal agreements, there is no guarantee that local authorities or utility companies will take responsibility for maintaining those essential services. As a result, the burden of making these streets and sewers adoptable—essentially bringing them up to standard—is being shifted directly on to the homeowners. Families who have already invested in their homes, often using their lifelong savings, are now facing huge, unexpected bills.

That is a situation that residents in one development in Middlewich are currently facing. Despite the estate having been practically complete for a decade, the lack of an appropriate agreement means that the sewers on the development have not yet been adopted by United Utilities. Initial estimates from the inspections to date suggest that costs for the required remedial works could run into thousands. Costs are therefore liable to fall on residents. These homeowners are being forced to pay for poor planning, poor practices and poor execution, through no fault of their own.

We cannot and must not allow this situation to continue unchecked. There is a fundamental need for greater oversight and accountability in the house building sector. The mistakes of Stewart Milne should not become the burden of individuals affected by them, and the gaps in regulation that allowed that to happen must be addressed so that no homeowner is ever left in this position again. We need clearer, stronger regulations on the adoption of streets and sewers. Developers must be held accountable for ensuring that all necessary agreements are in place before any properties are occupied, not after the damage is done. On the utility side, that can be done very easily by implementing section 42 of the Flood and Water Management Act, but I would argue that an equivalent is needed for highways.

The financial cost of completing unfinished works should not fall on the shoulders of families who are innocent victims in this situation. In addition, there must be better protection for homeowners in the event of a developer’s failure. We cannot allow this pattern of abandonment and negligence to continue, with large companies walking away without facing the consequences and residents being left with the fallout. We must ensure that this situation is rectified and that no more homeowners are left to bear the burden of a developer’s failure.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Cooper Excerpts

Monday 20th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook]

As I made clear in a previous answer, we remain committed to protecting residential freeholders on these estates from unfair charges. This year, we will consult on implementing the consumer protection provisions in the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024, which will cover up to 1.75 million homes subject to those charges. We intend to bring the measures into force as quickly as possible. I am more than happy to discuss the matter further with the hon. Gentleman.

[Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)]

As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has said, there are 160,000 children in temporary accommodation, and in many cases the definition of “temporary” is being stretched to breaking point. Does she agree that the Government’s homelessness strategy needs to look specifically at the outcomes for children who have experienced long-term or repeated spells in temporary accommodation?

[Angela Rayner]

I absolutely agree. That is why we have an inter-ministerial group—we are determined to tackle homelessness. This is not just about children in temporary accommodation; it affects every single aspect of their lives and outcomes. With our opportunities mission, we are determined to give every child the best possible outcome.

Social Housing Tenants: Antisocial Behaviour

Andrew Cooper Excerpts

Wednesday 8th January 2025 Westminster Hall

[Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey.

Antisocial behaviour affects the very fabric of our neighbourhoods. The problem not only impacts the lives and wellbeing of those directly involved but reverberates throughout our communities, creating an environment of fear, discomfort and division. Ultimately, it serves to undermine the sense of community and safety that we all strive to preserve.

The motion refers to social housing tenants and antisocial behaviour, which is clearly what the hon. Member for Ashfield (Lee Anderson) wishes to focus on, but it is important to give context. ASB occurs in all types of housing and in many other settings. As a councillor, some of the most serious ASB that I dealt with related to neighbour disputes in owner-occupied and private rented housing, along with problems in our town centre, none of which were caused by social housing tenants. Not a day goes by when my casework mailbag does not highlight another example of a family in desperate need of more appropriate affordable housing—which we need to get on and build. Well designed, well managed social housing has an important role to play in that.

That said, social housing providers are in a unique position, in that they are well placed to tackle ASB when it occurs and they can influence factors such as estate design and tenant support to try to prevent it from occurring in the first place. In my local area—which you will be aware of, Ms McVey—I have witnessed at first hand the problems posed by poorly designed and badly planned section 106 affordable housing. There are schemes where properties have been designed without proper outdoor spaces, or where properties have been clustered together for the convenience of the house builder, rather than prioritising good estate management.

With the explosion in homelessness that has occurred over the last 14 years, combined with the systematic dismantling of local government, support services for dealing with addiction issues have been overstretched. In some cases, the clustering of vulnerable individuals without effective support has led to significant antisocial behaviour that directly affects the neighbouring homeowners and the broader community. On top of that, it also diminishes the potential for recovery and stability for the people themselves. This is not a sustainable situation.

To effectively tackle these problems we must advocate for a holistic approach to support. It is crucial that social housing providers and councils work together to provide tenants who are grappling with addiction not only the necessary resources to address their challenges but comprehensive wraparound support systems to help them to maintain their tenancies and transform their lives. We cannot simply place individuals in homes without equipping them with the tools they need to thrive. The funding for homelessness prevention that the Government announced just before Christmas is the first step to tackling the problem.

Changes to the planning system are also needed to deal with this issue. Section 106 affordable homes are vital in tackling the housing crisis, but it is just not good enough to include social housing providers in the design only at the last minute. It is vital that affordable homes are thoughtfully integrated throughout new housing developments, rather than clustered together in one corner.

[Lee Anderson]

This is more like it. The hon. Gentleman talks about integrating social housing into new housing estates; this is a big problem for me in Ashfield. We have had all these new housing estates and they give about 10% for social housing. Most of the time the tenants who move into social houses on private estates are good tenants, but then we get one, two or maybe three nuisance families who create mayhem for the rest of the people.

Bear in mind that people have bought their houses—they are mortgaged. They work seven days a week to pay for their house and next door, in exactly the same built house, is a family who do not go to work. They are smoking weed, causing problems and making peoples’ lives a misery. I have had several cases where people who have actually bought their house have had to move out because the social housing provider has not acted on antisocial behaviour. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that when we build social houses on new housing estates, all the lets should be sensitive lets and it should be based on suitability rather than need?

[Andrew Cooper]

Where I would agree is that a house builder might well release a lot of section 106 properties at the same time, the effect of which could be that, when people are at the top of the waiting list, perhaps at band A, a lot of them are placed simultaneously. When we do that without having the support mechanism in place, without dealing with the addiction issues in the first place and without looking at the issues that might be caused, we can have problems. It is not as simple as the hon. Gentleman perhaps makes out—

[Lee Anderson]

It is.

[Andrew Cooper]

Well, I disagree. It is important to look at this holistically and consider the wider support system we need to put in place when we place people in social housing in the first place.

Finally, we cannot overlook the importance of visible neighbourhood policing, which was disregarded and diminished under the previous Government. A strong police presence in our communities can serve as both a deterrent to antisocial behaviour and a reassurance to residents. It fosters trust and collaboration between law enforcement and the community, creating a safer environment for everyone. That is why I welcome the Government’s commitment to provide 13,000 additional neighbourhood police officers and police community support officers. I hope the Minister can provide an update on the provision of those officers throughout the country, and particularly in Cheshire constabulary in my local police force area.

We must advocate for stronger strategic partnerships between local authorities, housing providers and law enforcement agencies to ensure that our communities are resilient to the threat of antisocial behaviour. Again, I hope the Minister can outline the importance of a multi-agency approach to tackling these problems, and tell us what steps are being taken to promote such collaborative working. It is clear that addressing antisocial behaviour requires a multifaceted approach. I believe that by providing holistic support to vulnerable tenants, advocating for better planning policies and enhancing neighbourhood policing, we can create safer, more harmonious communities for all.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gideon Amos]

We do need to have a clear and effective deterrent. If we do not have properly working police forces and community policing, we will not get that. How we would fund that is something I will return to in my closing remarks.

Everyone deserves decent accommodation. We must provide that, alongside a new generation of rent-to-own housing—so that people have a stake in the houses they live in, because they will ultimately own them—and more key worker accommodation. The hon. Member for Boston and Skegness (Richard Tice) mentioned the experience in New York, where key worker accommodation for police officers and other community professionals in social housing areas had a massive impact. But that depended on resources being put into the police and public services on a big scale to make it work, and that would be needed here in the UK as well. Together, those things can create the stable, mixed communities that are the antidote to antisocial behaviour.

Sadly, the sell-off of council housing over decades of different Conservative Administrations has left too many estates only for those with the most problems, and with fewer and fewer public services to support the families and communities who need them. If we add to that divisive rhetoric pitting one struggling family against another, in an argument about who deserves the home the most, and we have a race to the bottom for the community concerned.

Instead, we should increase the pitiful level of social housing, inject proper community policing, invest in public services and let landlords use their legal powers strongly and appropriately, including through acceptable behaviour contracts, which were pioneered right back in 2003 in Somerset, Islington and other council areas. Together, those measures will prove the most effective way to tackle antisocial behaviour.

Above all, we need to bring back proper community policing, after its total erosion under recent Conservative Governments, and have more bobbies on the beat. Our manifesto would fund and deliver that by investing in acceptable behaviour contracts; making youth diversion schemes a statutory duty, so that every part of the country has pre-charged diversion schemes for young people; freeing up existing officers’ time by creating an online crime agency; drawing up a national recruitment and retention strategy to tackle the shortage of detectives; and abolishing police and crime commissioners, instead investing the savings in frontline policing, including in tougher action on antisocial behaviour.

[Andrew Cooper]

The hon. Gentleman has talked a lot about what we do about antisocial behaviour after we have discovered that it is taking place, and there is an awful lot of emphasis on what the police can do, but does he agree that it is better to deal with antisocial behaviour before it occurs? It is better to deal with underlying addiction issues, and it is better for social housing providers to put resources into tenancy sustainability, so that new tenants understand the behaviour expected of them before problems occur.

[Gideon Amos]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. So many entrenched problems in families and communities need the support of public services and investment in them. If we systematically take away policing, social services support, and local authority support and housing officers, as we have seen with the shrinking of local government over recent years, it is hardly surprising that we get an increase in social problems—we are not investing early on to deal with them. Thank you, Ms McVey, for allowing me to contribute to this important debate.

English Devolution

Andrew Cooper Excerpts

Monday 16th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Jim McMahon]

Local government reorganisation is a statutory process, so it requires local areas to produce plans, as does devolution. Both are required to go to public consultation to solicit views—that is part of the process. When the formal process starts, the Government’s role is to assess the proposals and the consultation as submitted. We do not take a view on geography and form until we make the final decision.

[Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)]

The biggest issues holding back economic growth in Mid Cheshire are long-term under-investment in our transport infrastructure and the lack of a joined-up skills agenda, working with businesses across local authority borders. That is not unique to my constituency. The reality is that, in 2010, east Germany’s economy overtook northern England’s, and that trend has accelerated over the past 14 years. What new powers will the English devolution Bill give strategic authorities to drive improvements in local transport and to take control of their sub-region’s skills agenda?

[Jim McMahon]

This was one of the reasons why we were so keen to complete the map of the north of England. Most would accept that strategic transport, certainly, crosses county boundaries. If we think about connectivity in the north of England, how Lancashire, Greater Manchester, the Liverpool city region, Cheshire, Cumbria and the rest are joined up, and then even into Yorkshire, requires co-ordination. We want mayors and strategic authorities to work together across that pan-region, so that even more powers can be devolved to address the type of issues that my hon. Friend talks about.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Cooper Excerpts

Monday 2nd December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook]

Local plans have to go through examination for a determination of whether they are sound. Hard constraints, such as the type that the hon. Gentleman has just mentioned, will be taken into account when those plans are tested, even under the new framework.

[Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)]

The Government’s commitment to build more affordable homes is both welcome and urgent. However, we also need to ensure that registered providers are willing and able to take on section 106 affordable homes when they are built. In recent years, a combination of factors has meant that too many homes stand empty. Will my hon. Friend say what steps can be taken to tackle the section 106 standing stock scandal?

[Matthew Pennycook]

We recognise that this is a growing problem across the country that is having a severe impact on affordable housing supply. My hon. Friend will not have to wait long to find out what the Government propose to do to bear down on this problem.

Rough Sleeping

Andrew Cooper Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd October 2024 Westminster Hall

[Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing Southall (Deirdre Costigan) on securing and ably leading this important debate on rough sleeping.

Rough sleeping blights our communities and ruins lives. Being forced to sleep on the streets has a devastating impact on every aspect of an individual’s life. It is a frightening and isolating experience that no one should ever have to go through, but it affects thousands of individuals every night who find themselves without a safe place to call home, facing the harsh realities of life on the streets. It is sometimes too easy to talk about this issue and reduce the problems that real people are facing to cold facts and statistics, but that overlooks the real human tragedy that this problem causes. I will not do that, and I believe it is vital that we understand not only the problems associated with rough sleeping, but the underlying causes that perpetuate this crisis.

[David Smith (North Northumberland) (Lab)]

This is such an important debate and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing Southall (Deirdre Costigan) for securing it. We have had a massive increase in rough sleeping, and it is so important to get to the root cause. I declare an interest in that, until July, I was the chief executive of a homelessness charity in the north-east, where we have seen homelessness, and specifically rough sleeping, spike over the last 14 years especially. Our research found that 94% of people who are rough sleeping have experienced serious trauma. Would my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Cheshire (Andrew Cooper) agree that we have to get to the absolute root cause of rough sleeping, especially mental health issues, and that very often it is trauma? Also, in her remarks later, could the Minister respond to the need therefore to have a trauma-informed approach when we address rough sleeping?

[Andrew Cooper]

I agree with that; a trauma-informed approach would benefit a lot of areas of public life, and I bow to my hon. Friend’s greater experience in this area. Rough sleeping is an intractable issue with many diverse and overlapping root causes, including a lack of affordable housing, unemployment, financial instability and family breakdown. Many individuals who find themselves sleeping on the streets are battling complex challenges such as untreated mental health issues, substance abuse and social isolation. Those challenges are often exacerbated by life on the streets, creating a vicious cycle that makes it extraordinarily difficult for individuals to transition back to stable living conditions. To tackle the problem of rough sleeping effectively, we must address those issues.

First, we need to see the construction of more social housing. Secure, affordable and accessible housing is the foundation of a dignified life. It provides not only shelter, but the stability necessary to seek employment, access healthcare and rebuild social connections. That is why I was proud to stand on a manifesto that promised to build 1.5 million more homes over the next five years, including social housing, to ensure that everybody has a safe place to live.

However, building more secure and affordable housing is only part of the solution. It is not enough simply to provide shelter. Simply placing people with complex needs in housing and then leaving them to it is setting many of them up to fail. We must also look to introduce properly funded wraparound support services, which address the needs of those experiencing rough sleeping holistically. That includes providing personalised assistance for individuals struggling with drug and alcohol addiction and mental health issues. By investing in such comprehensive support services, we empower individuals not only to secure a tenancy, but to maintain it, helping them to break the cycle of homelessness, rebuild their lives and foster greater independence and resilience.

We urgently need to see action on this issue, and that is why I welcome the Government’s plan to introduce a new cross-Government strategy to tackle the difficult problem of homelessness. I really hope that strategy will take a comprehensive approach to tackling the root causes of rough sleeping and get us back on track to ending homelessness, so we create a society where everyone has a safe and stable place to call home, coupled with the support they need to thrive.