Homelessness Reduction Bill

Debate between Andy Burnham and Bob Blackman

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Friday 27th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

The hon. Gentleman says that the protections are in place for applicants. Amendment 2 guarantees a tenancy of at least six months. As I understand it, that is a reduction in the current level, which is at least 12 months. I am not saying that this is necessarily wrong, but I would like him to comment on it. Often, because of the complexity in their life, people at least need security in their tenancy so that they can sort out other problems that they may have. Is six months really long enough? Might it not lead to repeat homelessness as people do not have that longer-term security behind them?

[Bob Blackman]

This has been discussed during the Select Committee’s homelessness inquiry, in the Bill Committee, and during our debates not only in this place but outside it with the various organisations involved. I am very keen that tenancies should be longer than six months, but I am also mindful of the fact that we do not want to get to a point whereby we reduce the amount of accommodation that could be available for people in this vulnerable group. I am equally certain that we do not want to get to a point, as we could have done during some of the debates, where we have an unrighteous circle, as it were, of people becoming homeless, being put in accommodation by a local authority, their tenancy coming to an end, and back they go to being homeless—it just becomes a repeat cycle. We are all committed to wanting to end that cycle. We do not get the opportunity to change legislation on homelessness very often. As I said, it has been 40 years since such legislation was introduced. We therefore want to put in the minimum standards so that, if necessary, the law can be changed by regulation to increase the period. We want a bare minimum to start with.

[Andy Burnham]

I hear what the hon. Gentleman says, and I accept that we would see six months as a minimum, but why cap it at 12 months in the amendment? If we want a minimum standard, that is fine, but why put an upper limit on it?

[Bob Blackman]

The Minister will explain that when he winds up. In certain clauses, there is provision for 12-month tenancies, and during our debates we reduced the position to six months with a cap of 12 months. The right hon. Gentleman should remember, though, that a variety of duties are addressed in the Bill: the relief duty, the prevent duty, and the duty owed to priority-need applicants. The predominant aim has always been not to place priority-need families in a worse position than they would otherwise have been facing.

National Health Service

Debate between Andy Burnham and Bob Blackman

Wednesday 26th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

My right hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point. Make no mistake: if the Bill passes, the NHS will never be the same again. The Bill will unpick the fabric of a public national health care system—a planned system—and turn it into a free-for-all, as he says. Indeed, it is unbelievable to see a letter in The Guardian today from senior Liberal Democrats—many of whom made the same argument a few weeks ago as my right hon. Friend—now saying that, because of a few tweaks to the Secretary of State’s powers, the time has come to abandon all their concerns about the provisions. That is a ridiculous statement to make. If they still have concerns about competition and privatisation, they should have the courage of their convictions and stand up against the Bill, instead of writing sanctimonious letters to The Guardian.

Grip has been lost; the NHS is drifting. However, the Government cannot say that they were not warned. Sir David Nicholson, the chief executive of the NHS, told the Public Accounts Committee that the reorganisation had increased the scale of the financial challenge:

“I’ll not sit here and tell you that the risks have not gone up. They have. The risks of delivering the totality of…the efficiency savings that we need over the next four years have gone up because of the big changes that are going on in the NHS as a whole.”

This has been a lost year in the NHS—a crucial year, when it needed to face up to the financial challenge—but things are not getting better. We face months of further uncertainty, as the Secretary of State battles on with his complicated and unwanted Bill. Four-hundred and ninety pages, 70-page letters to peers, amendments made on the hoof: it is a total mess. The NHS deserves better than this. Even the man the Secretary of State brought in to run his new NHS Commissioning Board describes his Bill as “completely unintelligible,” and went on to say:

“It is going to be messy as we go through a very complex transitional programme.”

And this from the Secretary of State’s friends.

The harsh truth is that the Secretary of State has comprehensively failed to build the consensus he needs behind his Bill. GPs do not want it; nurses do not want it; midwives do not want it; patients do not want it. I say to the Prime Minister and the Health Secretary today: stop digging in. Drop this Bill. If they do, my offer still stands, as our motion makes clear. We will work with the Secretary of State to reform NHS commissioning, giving GPs and other clinicians a bigger role. That can be achieved without legislation and a major structural upheaval of the entire NHS. It can be done through existing legal structures, giving immediate stability and saving millions.

We make our offer again today, as it is time for all politicians to put the NHS first. It is slipping backwards, and the warning signs are there for all to see. Waiting lists and waiting times are getting longer, with a 48% rise in the last year in the numbers of patients waiting more than 18 weeks. When patients are waiting longer, it is unforgivable that £2 billion to £3 billion has been set aside to pay for the costs of reorganisation. It is also unforgivable that £850 million is being spent on making people redundant who will end up being re-employed elsewhere in the system, in the new clinical commissioning groups.

We are witnessing a return to the bad old days of waiting longer or paying to go private. This is just a glimpse of the future. If the Bill passes, the NHS will never be the same again. We have all seen the adverts on television for the health lottery. Is this the right hon. Gentleman’s early marketing and his new brand name for our NHS?

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman not accept that one of the severe problems that the national health service is facing came about on his watch, when primary care trusts were allowed to build up huge deficits without making the economies and efficiencies that should have been made at that time, rather than on this Government’s watch?

[Andy Burnham]

I have never said that the NHS was perfect, or that there were no challenges during our time in government. But let me tell the hon. Gentleman what happened when the NHS was facing those deficits in 2006 and 2007. We took a grip at the centre and we brought those trusts back into financial balance, through hard work. There was a turnaround team in the Department, and we made sure that those difficulties were tackled at root. I do not see the same grip in the national health service right now. I see drift and lack of focus, and I see huge distraction as a result of this unwanted Bill.