Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Andrew Murrison Excerpts

Monday 13th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)]

We have had a veritable constellation of maiden speeches today, but I am bound to observe that the contributions of my two parliamentary neighbours, my hon. Friends the Members for Chippenham (Michelle Donelan) and for Somerton and Frome (David Warburton), were excellent. I must say that, during the election campaign, I spent a great deal of time in their seats, one of which has a majority that is now significantly larger than mine.

We have heard a lot about the northern powerhouse and the midlands engine room, and I am left wondering where that leaves the west country and the south-west. During a debate last week on the south-west’s economy, my hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Neil Parish) suggested that it was the land of milk and honey. I am more of a glass half-empty sort of bloke, and I think it is more the promised land—the land to which much is traditionally promised, but to which little is delivered.

I am delighted that the Budget was rather more positive than that for the west country. I am particularly delighted at the £7.2 billion for transport infrastructure. That will certainly help with the A391 and the north Devon link road. I hope that it will help dramatically with the A303, which is known as the highway to the sun. That route has a pretty bad accident record, and I must say that its inadequacies have acted to pressurise the economy in my constituency and further west. Its full dualling from top to tail is well overdue, and I look forward to that project’s completion over the next very few years.

As we get very excited about HS2, which I certainly support, we must also think about rail networks elsewhere in the country. In the south-west, we have traditionally come to see ourselves as the poor country cousins of the rail network. I hope very much that the new stations fund might look, for example, at Tisbury and its platform arrangements. It should eliminate once and for all the need for the Tisbury loop, which adds seven minutes to the journey to London Waterloo. That is quaint in the Victorian sense, but my constituents would rather like to see the end of it as we move towards a more efficient and effective rail transport network.

I am delighted to note that there is £10 million for broadband in the south-west. This rural part of the country very much depends on good connectivity. Rural businesses are suffering greatly because of our failure to communicate properly. It is all very well to say that 95% of the country will be connected to superfast broadband, but not if nearly 100% of urban areas being connected necessarily means that there is a problem in rural and more isolated areas. One has to accept that it is expensive to deliver broadband in more remote locations, but deliver it we must if we are serious about the rural economy.

I am delighted that the Budget statement made a commitment to 2% on defence. My area depends very heavily on defence and security. The £1.5 billion for our security and intelligence services is very welcome. A significant number of my constituents work in that sector, and it is clearly vital to invest properly in it.

I am also very pleased that the Army is continuing to move back from Germany. Wiltshire is the heart and soul of the British Army. It is its natural home, and we must ensure that the Army’s relocation from Germany, at the tail end of its operations there, is expedited and that the troops come home as soon as possible. It is good for our economy locally, and it is most certainly good for the units concerned.

In the few moments I have left, I want to mention paragraph 2.21 of the Red Book on health. Healthcare is clearly a big topic for all of us as constituency MPs. I am delighted that the Government have backed the NHS’s own Stevens report to the tune of £8 billion. Our health service is evolving rapidly: it will be and has to be more focused on primary care and to be more concentrated in large regional and sub-regional centres, and it is bound to be more professionally driven, with a remorseless focus on outcomes. Some of our healthcare outcomes are still lamentable. In this 21st century, we must ensure that the outcomes for constituents approximate to the very best in Europe, rather than be among some of the very worst. We must ensure that people are treated in the community, in parochial settings when appropriate, reserving care in hospitals for those who truly need it. In particular, we need to do away with the awful situation of elderly people and people with chronic long-term conditions ending up in large hospitals inappropriately, where they do badly and where it is expensive to treat them. They ought to be treated more locally by general practitioners and I am very pleased that the Red Book refers to that. I hope that that process will continue.