Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords]

Andrew Pakes Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 16th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Pakes (Peterborough) (Lab)]

Phew! Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. [Laughter.] I am privileged to speak on Second Reading of a Bill that is of huge interest to my constituents and the country. After 14 years, the new Government have inherited record levels of illegal sewage dumping in our rivers, lakes and seas, an Environment Agency budget halved since 2010, crumbling infrastructure, with bursting pipes and record spills, and unaccountable water companies.

It is time to change that. It is time to hold our water companies to account and to start fixing the problem. That is why this Government have made the Water (Special Measures) Bill a priority. We need immediate action to end the disgraceful behaviour of water companies and their unruly bosses. We had more than 3,000 hours of sewage poured into our rivers in my constituency alone last year. A lot of sewage came out of the last Government, but certainly not the sewage we are talking about tonight.

After our sewage discharges, Anglian Water, which I know is many Members’ provider, belatedly had to pay £38 million to Ofwat. The year before, Anglian Water’s chief executive received a £1.3 million package in pay and bonuses, despite the company’s poor performance. Despite overseeing the catastrophic failure, water chief executives have paid themselves more than £41 million in bonuses and incentives since 2010. It gets worse: Thames Water’s boss took a £195,000 bonus at the end of March for just three months’ work. That is the unacceptable face of unaccountable privatisation.

Little wonder, then, that constituents writing to me are angry and that people have so little faith in the power of accountability and regulation, when so little was done by the last Government. I asked Ofwat these questions directly when it appeared before the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee recently. The answers were wanting. That is why the Bill is so needed, and why Ministers have brought it forward so quickly. It sets out new powers to make water companies accountable, to ban bonuses for CEOs and senior leaders unless high standards are met, and criminal liability for water executives, and it sets out a new approach to ensuring that water companies live up to their environmental obligations and serve the public good. I want to put on record my thanks to those public servants who have been fighting hard against the water companies, despite the cuts of the last decade: those in the Environment Agency, the public servants in our water utilities, and members of GMB, Unison and Prospect who know what looking after our water and nature is really about.

The Bill treads where the last Government failed to go. Let us be clear about the Conservatives’ legacy: they failed to invest in broken infrastructure and let consumer money be spent irresponsibly on bonuses and shareholder payouts. The Bill rightly calls time on that unruly behaviour. It begins to restore trust in the management of our waterways and in public service and accountable regulation. I commend the Bill.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Pakes Excerpts

Thursday 14th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Dr Allison Gardner (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)]

4. What progress the floods resilience taskforce has made on protecting at-risk communities from flooding.

[Andrew Pakes (Peterborough) (Lab)]

14. What progress the floods resilience taskforce has made on protecting at-risk communities from flooding.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Emma Hardy)]

I am sure the whole House will join me in expressing sympathy with the communities of the Valencia region and across Spain following the dreadful flooding.

This Government’s floods resilience taskforce marks a new approach by national, regional and local government, and by flood risk partners, to better co-ordinate flood preparedness. It met on 12 September, with 40 attendees from 27 organisations agreeing actions including sharing learning from recent floods. This Government will invest £2.4 billion over the next two years to improve flood resilience by maintaining, repairing and building flood defences. Yesterday, at the Association of Drainage Authorities conference, I announced that we will allocate a further £50 million to the internal drainage boards.

[Emma Hardy]

I was delighted to hear that the village is proactively setting up a flood action group. Of course, I appreciate the wonderful work that my hon. Friend is doing to support the village. The Government fully support collaboration between risk management authorities, including local Environment Agency teams and local communities, and we are committed to hearing from people on the ground via the new taskforce. Of course, I would be happy to meet them.

[Andrew Pakes]

I welcome my hon. Friend’s answer. We talk a lot in this House about extreme weather and flooding, but we do not talk enough about the vital role that our internal drainage boards play in protecting and keeping safe our agricultural land and farming. I welcome the Government’s inclusion of the internal drainage boards on the taskforce, and I welcome the money that the Minister put into the system yesterday. That is in stark contrast with the first actions of the 2010 Conservative Government, who cut flood defences by a horrifying 27%.

Will the Minister join me in congratulating the work of my internal drainage board and outline how she will work with it in future?

[Emma Hardy]

I was delighted to speak at the Association of Drainage Authorities conference yesterday, to champion its work and to announce that, after listening to it very carefully, we will provide £50 million over two years—[Interruption.] In answer to the chuntering, the first part has already been spent.

Budget: Implications for Farming Communities

Andrew Pakes Excerpts

Monday 4th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Daniel Zeichner]

The hon. Gentleman is a well-informed, thoughtful person, and I listen closely to what he has to say on these issues, but I do wonder sometimes about the Liberal Democrats’ approach to economics, because that £1 billion would have to come from somewhere. I am afraid that the difference between Labour and the Opposition side of the House is that we are determined to get the public finances in order, because it is upon that basis that future prosperity in the farming sector will come.

In terms of farm incomes, the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that many farms are very marginal. We know that, and it is complicated, but I would say to everyone in this House that the entire inheritance tax system is complicated; I must say I have read a lot over the weekend that was perhaps a little short on accuracy. He is also right about tenant farmers, and we are in close conversation with the Tenant Farmers Association about how the changes can perhaps be used to good effect, because another element which has not been raised so far, interestingly, by the Conservative party is the generational challenge we face in farming. I will not be telling farmers how to run their lives, but it is worth reflecting on the fact that sometimes it is difficult to make that transition and we need to get more younger people into farming.

[Andrew Pakes (Peterborough) (Lab)]

I put on record that I am an officer of the all-party parliamentary group on farming. I also put on record my thanks to farmers who, through a torrid decade, have produced food and sustenance for us in this country. We should all recognise that. Farmers will rightly be anxious after the experiences they have had in the past few years. Does my hon. Friend the Minister agree that that anxiety will only be heightened by the scaremongering from some Members of this House, and will he commit to working with hon. Members, the National Farmers Union and farmers to ensure that the positive elements around food security in this Budget are delivered in the years to come?

[Daniel Zeichner]

My hon. Friend and near neighbour is right to pay tribute to our food producers. One thing we know for sure is that we are going to need food into the future, and farmers are essential to the future of this nation and our economy. That is why we will treat them with the utmost respect and seriousness and have a serious debate about how we transform farming. Again, while this has not been picked up much in the debate so far, the effect of this Budget is to speed up still further that transition to an environmentally friendly, nature-friendly way of farming, alongside producing the food that our country needs. That is a really important transition—I pay tribute to the current Opposition, who started that process in government, but I have been unwavering in my support for it for a number of years and I am determined to see it through to a proper conclusion. My hon. Friend is also right that we will work with everyone involved to get good, sensible outcomes, because that is what this Government are about.

Farming and Food Security

Andrew Pakes Excerpts

Tuesday 8th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mike Reader]

It is very clear that Labour is on the side of our farming and agricultural sector. I stand here as the hopeful chair of the all-party parliamentary group for food. I am sure that those who are concerned about food security will join us at our inaugural general meeting very shortly. I am also a member of the NFU’s food and farming fellowship. It is clear that Labour Members take this issue seriously, and we are dedicating time to ensure that, unlike the previous Government, we work with farmers, not against them.

We are also working across industry. The motion focuses solely on farming, but in order to deliver food security, there must be a cross-sector approach, as I am sure everyone in the House recognises. The approach should include food manufacturing, logistics, retail and the hospitality chain. The whole agrifood ecosystem delivers a gross value added of £147 billion to our economy, including £15 billion through our farming sector, and a whopping £70 billion through our manufacturing, distribution and wholesale sector in food and retail. We want to improve food security in the UK, which is already classified as “broadly stable” by DEFRA.

[Andrew Pakes (Peterborough) (Lab)]

On the issue of stability, I remind my hon. Friend of the opening lines of Labour’s 2010 food and farming strategy:

“We can’t carry on just as we are.”

Farmers I have met in my constituency would make exactly the same claim now, given the record of the last Conservative Government, who scrapped Labour’s food plan in 2010. Does he agree that if we are to invest in food and farming, and to bring jobs and prosperity to rural and urban constituencies, we must back Labour’s new deal for farmers, invest in food and farming jobs, and put a real plan for food security back on the table?

[Mike Reader]

I could not agree more, and could not have said it better myself. However, a holistic approach must be taken across the whole ecosystem to subsidies, funding and investment.

One reason why I chose to speak today is that food security is important to me and my constituents. A recent study found that nearly 10% of people in Northampton struggle to access food, and that gets worse in rural Northamptonshire, as I am sure my constituency neighbour, the hon. Member for South Northamptonshire (Sarah Bool), recognises. Northamptonshire Action with Communities in Rural England found that 45% of residents in rural Northamptonshire worried about food prices, and in 22% of families with children, adults missed meals in order to feed their kids. That is simply not good enough.

I commend the Opposition for supporting the Government’s efforts to improve food security, but the motion is not the way to do that. We must work together, collaboratively and across parties, to support the agrifood industry, and I hope that the Opposition will endeavour to do so after their motion is defeated.