Transport for London Bill [Lords]

Debate between Andy Slaughter and Ruth Cadbury

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons & Report stage & 3rd reading
Tuesday 12th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Andy Slaughter]

That is a complex question—perhaps even more complex than my hon. Friend divines, despite his huge knowledge and intellect. It goes to the heart of the Bill and the fact that TfL has got itself into a sort of spiral with property developers and, as a result, does not know where it is going or where its best interests and those of its customers lie. Is its primary objective to uphold and improve its infrastructure, stock and services? Is it to compensate for the billions of pounds being withdrawn very cynically by the Chancellor, or is it going into a whole new area of operation where it will become some kind of poor man’s property developer?

I think that my hon. Friend will get the answer if he stays for the whole debate—if not, he may have to look at Hansard. My short answer to him now is that no one, not even the strongest opponents of the Bill—I include myself, the petitioners and the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers in that bracket—would not wish TfL to maximise its income and its opportunities for development and to be able to develop on its operational and non-operational land and, in the process, improve its facilities. I hope that we have made substantial progress—although, it has been like drawing teeth over these five-plus years—but I am not sure that I can give him a full assurance that that will be the case as a consequence of this Bill.

However, I can give my hon. Friend a full assurance that from 5 May, when our right hon. Friend the Member for Tooting (Sadiq Khan) will be installed as Mayor of London, the importance of stations such as Harrow-on-the-Hill will be foremost in his mind. I have visited Harrow-on-the-Hill and know that it could do with a great deal of improvement. I know that my hon. Friend will continue to fight strongly for that.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

Surely the purpose of TfL is to provide the best, most efficient and most cost-efficient transport services for this great city of London. Is it not therefore right that it uses its assets in the best way to achieve that aim? Does my hon. Friend think that this Bill will achieve that objective in such a way that we can have confidence that TfL can use its resources to best effect to achieve its core aim?

[Andy Slaughter]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Certainly, my amendments—I will go through them one by one—are designed to improve the Bill in the way she suggests. I will add a slight rider to what she says, however, because I think that TfL, as a public authority, has a slighter wider duty. We see that in the way it has disposed of assets in a cavalier fashion, entered into inappropriate deals with property developers and—perhaps most worrying of all in the context of the Bill—set out at this stage to say that its future priority, perhaps understandably, given the amount of money it is losing to the Treasury, will be to maximise the commercial opportunity of the land it holds. That sounds fine, if the money is going to subsidise fare payers. However, if it produces the type of development that is harmful to the London economy as a whole, and to Londoners—for example, by excluding affordable housing from its prime sites—then I think it needs to be brought up short. The problem is that TfL is trying to do several things at once. Yes, I am sure that it is trying to do as much as it can to subsidise its operations, but at the same time it is taking very risky steps in the deals it is doing with property developers. Part of that will be cured by the withdrawal of clause 5, but not all of it.

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[Andy Slaughter]

That is right. I am afraid that almost every planning application for residential development I now see ignores all the basic principles and tenets of building on a human scale, with sufficient amenity space and in such a way that impossible constraints are not imposed on existing neighbourhoods in terms of congestion, overlooking and environmental pollution, while also almost entirely excluding social infrastructure, such as hospitals and schools.

This is not the way London was built. Ironically, in the Victorian era—when the railways were built, and the suburbs expanded along those routes—we had far less town planning than we do now, but they somehow managed to build liveable communities, with all such factors. The combination of greed on the part of the developers and desperation on the part of much of the public sector means that we are now building monstrosities that nobody will want to live in.

[Ruth Cadbury]

To make another observation, if I may, about liveable communities, TfL owns a lot of shopfronts and high street properties. Is it not beholden on TfL, when it develops properties, to give some consideration to the kind of uses that such retail frontages are put to so that we ensure that they provide a usable range of businesses and services for the communities living in the new flats, which will of course include a significant proportion of affordable units?

[Andy Slaughter]

That is another very good point. I am afraid that it is another one on which TfL does not have a terribly good record. In Brixton market or Shepherd’s Bush market, which I am very familiar with, there are many historical amenities, including retail areas—they have been there for decades, if not, in some cases, for centuries—of which TfL has been the custodian, that are now under threat. Again, that is simply because the bottom line always has to take precedence.

Such an approach is often self-defeating, because we end up building a white elephant. The best example I can give is the Hammersmith Broadway. TfL pressed ahead with that development some 30 years ago. Nobody wanted it, and it ruined the town centre, as we thought, for the foreseeable future. However, we have now found out that there are plans to pull the whole thing down and start again. Even within its own rather limited and pedestrian view, which is to make the maximum capital out of it, such an approach often does not work. We must have schemes that actually work—work with existing communities, and work in terms of long-term commercial prospects—rather than something that looks as though it will provide a quick subsidy for the sort of works at Harrow on the Hill that were mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West.

Let me press on. I am almost the last man standing in this debate—not quite, because I have had the assistance of my hon. Friend and of my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth, who have a particular interest in this matter—but it has had a glorious number of supporters so far. I see that the shadow Chancellor has joined us on the Front Bench. I will spare his blushes, but I was just about to pay tribute to what he and the Leader of the Opposition have done. They have really cracked the whip on the Bill. If he has looked at the amendment paper, he will have spotted that I have filched quite a large number of his amendments to propose myself. I would not have done that if they were not excellent in their own right. I will not speak to them at great length.

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[Ruth Cadbury]

My hon. Friend makes a strong point about the risk of taking land out of operational use or losing land that could be put into operational use should transport demands change. Would it not therefore be appropriate to undertake a fully transparent assessment of all TfL’s land prior to any deals being done by the private sector that might take land out of operational use?

[Andy Slaughter]

I am grateful for that intervention, because transparency is very important here. We have asked several times for a terrier of TfL property so we can know exactly what sites are owned and where they are. I certainly think that all London MPs should be entitled to know what sites reside in their own constituencies. That is the first point: we need to know what we are dealing with here. I agree entirely.

Subsections (2) and (3) of new clause 1 would introduce what is a theme in other amendments: the need to consult. We need to consult the public, who fund TfL through their taxes and fares, and the responsible elected bodies—the GLA and the London boroughs—before these decisions are taken. It is absolutely the case that TfL, in the past, certainly before it came under the Mayor’s control, behaved like a medieval baron. It was extraordinarily unaccountable. There is nothing as unaccountable as a public body with no democratic accountability. At least one can sit down with private sector organisations, talk to them and reach a deal. When dealing with organisations such as TfL, as was, or the NHS, as is, one often finds oneself intruding on the privacy of these organisations. Despite their being fully funded by the taxpayer, they have no mechanism for such engagement, which takes us back to the point made by my hon. Friend the hon. Member for Harrow West about ensuring that the boards of these organisations have proper representation of the public and other interests. I therefore say in new clause 1 that the public, as well as the London boroughs and the GLA, should be consulted before contracts for development are entered into.

Part of the role of the Mayor should be to ensure that that democratic element is put in train. I have to say I have not seen any sign of that under the current Mayor. I have found that TfL’s decision making has been just as opaque, and I am hoping we will see a sea change in that. I believe that all public bodies, irrespective of their primary function, have a wider public duty. With local authorities, that is generally accepted. Indeed, there is now legislation saying that they have a community role and function to look after the general interest of their communities, as well as specific individual functions. We have moved a long way from the Nicholas Ridley days of their meeting once a year and handing out contracts. Similarly, other public bodies have a wider role. At the end of the day, such public bodies are taxpayer funded and have a responsibility to the communities in which they reside. We require private developers, through the community infrastructure levy and section 106 agreements, to make a contribution in that way, and I believe that public bodies should equally make a contribution. That is what I am asking for.

That theme is continued in my amendments 9 to 16, which I will deal with more briefly. I feel that this is rather a pinched Bill that wants to do things in a hurry. Whenever steps are to be taken, they are taken within two months, but I think three months would be the normal and more appropriate period of time. I am not sure where the two-month period has come from.

So far as amendments 9, 10, 11 and 12 are concerned, the Bill grants TfL substantial new powers. It is right to say that the two major operative clauses have now been dropped. The first, dropped at a relatively early stage in the House of Lords, was a scandalous attempt to get land sales done without any oversight by the Secretary of State or anyone else. The other is the clause being dropped today, which would have allowed these rather dubious property ventures to be entered into. However, there is still quite a lot of substance here, and we are right to look critically at what the Bill says in those respects.

Clause 1 states that the powers given in clause 4 will come into force at the end of the period of two months, while clause 3 states that the appointed day is at the end of that same two-month period. I see nothing wrong with three months. I am sure that the promoter will enlighten me if there is a particularly good reason for having two rather than the more common three months. I also say—this is provided for in amendment 12—that none of these provisions should come into force until there has been

“a review of the…potential risks to the assets of Transport for London arising from the exercise of the relevant powers…and…likely effectiveness of measures put in place by Transport for London in mitigation.”

Some may say that this is rather belt and braces, but I tabled this amendment because of experience. My experience is that TfL has not always behaved with the degree of probity or reserve that is necessary, and has got itself into a mess; later I shall quote the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers, who put it in slightly less polite language than that. It is a case of once bitten, twice shy. Where a public body does not have a good track record on consulting and making the right decisions on matters outside its core remit, and where it proposes a massive expansion in the work it does, we are entitled to ask first for a longer pause for proper assessments and reviews, and for consultation. Amendment 16 is relevant here. I am not asking for consultation not with every Tom, Dick and Harry, but with those who have a legitimate interest as the elected representatives of the people of London.

I shall say no more on that. I shall not dwell on those amendments any further. They are improving amendments. They do nothing more than that, and I say the same about amendment 19, which adds to clause 4. It simply sets out in more detail what should happen when consent is given by the Secretary of State under the clause. It says that there should be a proper process, and that it should be dealt with through a statutory instrument.

Amendments 7 and 8 relate to what I shall call my major residual concern; most of my concerns about the Bill have been dealt with. Let me be clear that nobody—no Labour Member in the hall of fame of those who have worked on the Bill—doubts the need for TfL to be as solvent as possible, or to subsidise fares as far as possible. In proposing amendments to clause 4(2), we are not suggesting that it should not be open to TfL—this is a major change in the Bill—to use its property as security for money that it borrows. The idea is essentially to enable TfL to borrow cheaply. It has the power to borrow at present, but it does not have the power to secure that borrowing against its substantial assets, and I see no reason why it should not be able to do so. However, I do think that the phrase

“Those things are the charging by a TfL subsidiary of all or any of its property as security for money which it borrows”

goes a little bit too far, although it may be simply a term of art. That is why, in amendment 17, I have proposed the substitution of the words “no more than 25%” for the words “all or any”. That is still a substantial proportion of TfL’s property, and I should have thought that such sums would be at least sufficient to fund anything that it could be required to do. The Minister may say that the Government do not intend to allow TfL to mortgage its entire estate, but I think that a little clarity would be advisable.

The main purpose of amendments 7 and 8 is to ensure that, while TfL is permitted to borrow against its own property for the purpose of legitimate investment opportunities, it is not allowed to borrow for the purpose of providing guarantees or indemnities for third parties. The reason for that is, I should have thought, pretty obvious. While debating this Bill, we have engaged in long discussions about TfL’s conduct in the context of its new-found policy of joint venture with its private sector partners. I do not, in principle, oppose that new policy. The logic of it is that, rather than disposing of assets, TfL will acquire a capital sum that could be invested to give a return. It will embark on a joint venture with a development partner of some kind, and will then have both a retained stake in the land and a revenue stream from its development. I see nothing wrong with that, and it seems to fit better into the picture in which TfL needs such a revenue stream more than ever before. Our objection is to the type of partner and the type of deal with which TfL has been involved.

However, the same logic could be applied to TfL’s borrowing. Borrowing for its own purposes and its own uses against its assets is one thing, but borrowing in order to guarantee or indemnify a third party strikes me as completely different. I should like reassurance from the Bill’s sponsor before deciding whether the issue should be put to a vote. In explaining why I say that, I must return to the experience of Earls Court. Not only is it the experience that is most familiar to me, but it is a massive project.

A deal was done whereby a piece of land wholly owned, freehold, by TfL, with some leasehold interests—in some cases quite short leasehold interests—is held by its development partner, Capco. That has been converted into a joint venture. TfL is the minority stakeholder, with 37%, and therefore does not have a controlling interest in what happens to the land. The joint venture company’s purchase price of the TfL land, with the Capco leasehold interest, appears to be substantially below the market price—perhaps by as much as a factor of three, if we compare the price paid, £335 million, with the current valuation of the asset by Capco, which is in excess of £1 billion. Moreover, it is being paid for by the interest-free loan from TfL. Where is the risk, and where is the cost to the private sector partner?

Let us remember that the private sector partner is not the international property company Capco; it is, in that hallowed phrase so often used by the petitioners, and particularly by Mr Osband, a £2 company based in Jersey with no other assets, and which could disappear off the face of the earth, leaving TfL to pick up any liabilities at the end of the day. I and many others were worried that that was the type of property deal that TfL was entering into, and we hope that that worry will now be removed, certainly for any new ventures, by the withdrawal of clause 5. However, such arrangements remain a possibility in relation to how the secured borrowing by TfL would be put to work.

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[Andy Slaughter]

Well, here we are, after only five and a half years, with a Bill that is better than it was when the petition was first presented in the other place on 29 November 2010. It has had an interesting history. I suspect it will be reviewed in various civil service colleges and sixth forms in years to come—although I do not think it will give any pleasure to those who study it—as an example of how not to do a private Bill, because it really did not have to be like this.

There have been some highlights, or lowlights. There was a time when the Bill was considered by the other place to be uncontentious: it went through Committees unopposed and its Second Reading was a formality. Then, up popped an organisation called the West London Line Group, which I am pleased to say is stationed, if I can put it that way, in my constituency. It pointed out that TfL was seeking, under what was then clause 4 of the Bill, to dispose of any land it wanted without the consent of the Secretary of State. After important but cursory scrutiny, TfL backed off from that most contentious and controversial part of the Bill.

The Bill then went to sleep for a long time. There were periods of 18 months when nothing happened. I do not know why that was. I have never actually asked TfL and I am not sure it could tell me even if I did. When the Bill finally came to this House in 2014—four years into its life—things became a bit more lively, because a number of parties, which I mentioned earlier, identified that it still contained some controversial parts.

More importantly, we were beginning to see, or suspect, that there were other motives behind the Bill. I do not know what TfL knew in 2010 about how quickly its revenue stream was going to be withdrawn—I suspect that it must at least have thought that that would be the case—or whether it was contemplating some of its proposed large-scale property deals. To some extent, we owe a debt of gratitude to Capco for its aggressive exploitation of the West Kensington and Earls Court development, which has become a cause célèbre in many ways. Indeed, it will shortly be the subject of a complaint to the European Commission on state aid, because so bad was the deal that TfL got for the Earls Court exhibition centres that those who are making the complaint contend that it amounts to unlawful state aid. In other words, the subsidy and the help that TfL has given to Capco to allow it to boost its share price, boost its profits and boost its directors’ bonuses may be unlawful under European law. We will see how well that complaint fares, but the fact that it has been contemplated suggests just how little confidence and faith many of the people who have scrutinised the Bill have in TfL’s ability to get a good deal.

I said that I would mention what the RMT has said about the matter. In the press release that it put out today, it stated:

“The construction firms with which TfL plans to engage, are running rings around TfL, helping the hapless organisation offload its prime London assets at well below the market rate.

We have no confidence in TfL to be able to secure a fair price for its land—and our concerns are borne out by its dreadful governance failures in relation to the development of Earls Court”

and:

“There is a fresh financial crisis brewing—meaning that there is an increased risk of corporate defaults—especially in the over-leveraged property sector.”

I pause to say that Capco is now discounting its luxury properties by about 20%, according to press reports last week. The press release continued:

“TfL is entering the property development game at precisely the wrong moment and in precisely the wrong way”.

That is how RMT put it. I might have chosen different words, but I cannot disagree with those sentiments. Those were real fears about the way in which TfL was, in a completely new way but across the board in relation to its assets, turning 5,700 acres of land into development sites.

As we found out, the whole thing was about money, specifically the Chancellor’s decision to withdraw £2.8 billion of Revenue funding from TfL over the next five years. That has led TfL, as I described in the earlier debate, to indulge in what I believe are risky, dubious and foolish interventions in the property market, which have allowed developers to use whatever vehicles they like with the support of a public sector organisation. It really stuck in the craw that the House was going to pass legislation that would have enabled those sorts of deals and developments to be done. It is good that the clause that contained those provisions was withdrawn in the other place and clause 5 has been withdrawn today.

If anybody does not believe me, I am happy to take any hon. Members to the Earls Court site, where they will be able to see the huge disruption that has been caused to a whole neighbourhood of London by dust, noise, the removal of asbestos, the threat to the security of residents and property, and the way in which the interests of small business, whole estates of people and small streets are being overridden. TfL has no control over that any longer, because it is just a sleeping partner. It is now a minority stakeholder in the land that it used to own, which it sold off at an undervalue, with loans that it guaranteed at nil interest rate. That cannot give us any confidence that if TfL had been allowed the powers that clause 5 would have given it, it would have used them in any proper way.

I am pleased that we have reached this stage, and I was pleased to hear the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) say that TfL has, belatedly, properly responded to the concerns that have been expressed not only in this House but in the other place. I am glad, therefore, that the Bill, as the hon. Gentleman candidly admitted, bears no resemblance to the one that was introduced five and a half years ago. Not only have five and a half years and a lot of debating time elapsed, but we have ended up with something that is a mere shadow of what it was before.

There is a remaining concern that I do not feel has been addressed. I did not press it to a vote. I do not think I would have won the vote if I had—I say that rather churlishly—judging by what happened on a previous occasion, when the payroll vote all came in to vote. I am sorry if I have again kept them away from their dinner tonight. As I said a few moments ago, I worry that there is still that continuing arrogance. Those at TfL say, “We know best”, but they do not know best. They do not have a track record of doing this. In some ways, I would not expect them to have that. They are mainly transport people and they are running a railway—and quite a lot of the time, they do a good job of running a railway—but they are now getting into bed with some of the biggest property sharks and some of the least appropriate people to develop London. I am afraid that the way in which they are doing so really is a case of the lamb trying to lie down with the wolves.

I am worried about that for the future. I suspect that it will not worry me so much once we know the outcome of the mayoral election. Nevertheless, the Bill still indicates things—including in clause 4, which we have just debated in relation to amendment 7, that will still allow TfL to guarantee and indemnify third parties, and to secure those guarantees and indemnities against their own assets—that TfL should not be in the business of doing.

When we started to debate the Bill a couple hours ago, my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Mr Thomas) raised some very important points, which I said I would address on Third Reading, in relation to the sort of developments we can expect on TfL land. What is the purpose of the Bill? We now know—we did not know it, although TfL may have done, back in 2010—that it is mainly about making up for lost revenue. It is mainly about TfL being deprived of billions of pounds of revenue by the Chancellor. However, it is also about the type of city we will live in in London, because TfL is one of the largest public sector landowners and it is seeking to develop many of its sites. I have mentioned some in my own constituency or borough, such as in Parsons Green and Earls Court, and others may well be brought forward in the future. We do not know the list of developments, even though several hundred major sites are on it. One of the first things that the new Mayor could do is to publish that list and make sure that all MPs take an interest in it. I suspect that there would be substantial interest among London MPs from all parties when the list becomes available.

TfL has a wider responsibility. It should not just keep fares as low as possible, although that is important, and run an efficient railway, but ensure, as custodian of the largest part of the public realm in London, that it deals with that properly. It has a fantastic history: some TfL stations are among the best architectural buildings in London. The pride that ran all through the Victorian era and into the inter-war period—in the 1930s, there were developments of lines and stations out to the suburbs—is a fantastic credit to London and this country. It would be a terrible shame if, in the 21st century, TfL decided to build, through the variety of investment vehicles that we are tonight giving it permission to use, not just hideous overdevelopments and monstrosities, but non-functional buildings that do us no credit whatsoever either architecturally or in terms of use.

Increasingly, that is we are seeing with the sort of development partnerships into which TfL is going. When I looked at the short list of development partners that TfL has brought out I shuddered because they are exactly the same companies that are ruining the borough I live in with their riverside developments, their tall, faceless towers and the things from their pattern books that show no architectural merit whatsoever. Such developments minimise the proportion of affordable housing and the amount of amenity space, and they do not provide any social benefit at all. Unfortunately, hard-pressed local authorities—as the planning authorities, this falls back on them—which are cutting their budgets by up to 50%, are in no position to deal with that.

This is a David and Goliath battle. It is not City Hall or the town hall that holds all the cards—the bureaucrat and Big Brother. The developers hold all the cards. They can afford the people who can make the viability assessments that they want, as well as the surveyors, architects, lawyers, consultants and accountants to run rings around TfL and the boroughs to get the developments that they want.

[Ruth Cadbury]

I thank my hon. Friend for his work on the Bill and what he has achieved—in particular, the removal of one specific clause. He rightly raises concerns about the planning system and how TfL’s potential private sector partners could run rings around local authorities. Is it not true that the situation will be even worse if the Housing and Planning Bill is passed, as the Government are, in effect, removing and reducing the power of local authorities to intervene actively in planning applications and decisions?

[Andy Slaughter]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend. She makes two very good points about the Housing and Planning Bill. One is its anti-localist feel, as it takes planning authority away from the boroughs. The other is what that Bill is doing to housing. It is not just the case that the Government, and the coalition Government before them, have been negligent. They have been actively supporting unaffordable housing and diminishing the role of affordable housing in London.

That is very clear in the Housing and Planning Bill, in which we have not just the sale of housing association properties, but the subsidising of those sales by the sale of council properties. I have had direct experience of this problem. My borough is the only one in which, under Conservative control, the quantum of social housing actually decreased over a period of years. It did not go up at all; it went down, through demolitions, sales and other matters of that kind. That is exactly what we are seeing. The situation is getting worse. The point that I made earlier—I hope my hon. Friend agrees with it—is that we have to build more affordable housing, social housing and shared ownership housing, and more private rented housing that is affordable, especially for young people. We also need genuine low-cost home ownership.

That should be being delivered through a Bill such as this one, because TfL has that responsibility as a major public landholder in London. But it is not being delivered. The type of investment vehicles promoted through the Bill and the type of partners that will be selected will simply mean we see more of what we call safe deposit flats being built.

TfL may ask what it can do, given that its money is being taken away by the Government and it has to pull as much money as it possibly can from commercial developments. I have already explained why I think that is a short-sighted view, which may not achieve even its short-term objective of making TfL a lot of money. The luxury property market may also be in trouble.

We need sustainable development, in town centres and around stations in particular. We need car-free development, for people of all income levels and from all backgrounds. Those are the people who make our city work. Of course, if those people are able to live in zones 1, 2 and 3, they will not be clogging up the tubes and buses, as they will be nearer to where they work. TfL already has major capacity problems, and is making a rod for its own back by helping with the process of social cleansing and pushing people out of London.

This Bill should be about Londoners’ housing and environment; it should promote air quality and alternative means of travel to the car. It should also be about having an efficient and effective transport system. It is not about any of those things, but about promoting dodgy investment vehicles with dodgy investment partners to maximise the gain for private sector development companies without their taking any risk, as that risk will instead be loaded on to the public sector, in the person of TfL. That is why we have opposed the Bill so strongly, over the past two years in particular, but also before then.

I am glad that TfL, the sponsor and possibly even the Government have listened. I suspect we have succeeded in modifying 90% of what we wanted to modify. It just did not have to be like this. When I met TfL two or three weeks ago, I said “Do you really want to go through another long debate like this in Parliament? Why don’t you hold this back until the new Mayor gets elected? I bet you could agree something that we could all agree on within half an hour.” I am afraid it did not take that in the spirit in which it was intended and it wished to press ahead. Well, it has got its Bill now. I suspect it wasted a very large sum of fare payers’ money on all its experts to get it through, which it did not need to do. I suspect it is not at all happy with the result. I hope it has had an object lesson in how Parliament works. We will not put up with the pig in a poke that the Bill was in its original form.

There are some good provisions in the Bill, but almost by definition we have not discussed them because they are unexceptional and have general support. There are still one or two bad things in the Bill. The Bill has had an unhappy history. I hope that at the very least TfL will learn two lessons: how to approach bringing Private Bills to this House and to the other place; and that we will continue to scrutinise how it does deals and how it tries to develop its property portfolio. TfL has to do this not only in its own interests as an organisation, but in the interests of the fare payer and the taxpayer, and in the interests of Londoners as a whole.

NHS in London

Debate between Andy Slaughter and Ruth Cadbury

Thursday 24th March 2016 Westminster Hall

[Andy Slaughter]

That is exactly the document I have been discussing. In some ways, Clare Parker’s embarrassment comes through in that letter. She is a good officer. She is the officer primarily responsible for delivering “Shaping a Healthier Future” and is effectively running five CCGs in that capacity. I think she would like to be more candid with us than she is in that letter. I urge the Minister to encourage people in CCGs, trusts and the Department to be more candid. She might find that there is more understanding of the problems than she thinks.

The question is—I discussed it with Clare Parker only a few weeks ago—where are we going with this programme? If the Treasury is putting out alarm signals about whether it can fund the programme, and principally the rebuilding of St Mary’s and Charing Cross, what will happen? The strong rumour is that reductions in service will have to take place, because services have a financial cost. The type 1 A&E and other services will have to go from Charing Cross, with the hospital effectively becoming a primary care and treatment centre, and the situation will be similar at Ealing.

Rather than the demolition, clearing and part sale of those sites, followed by rebuilding, which would cost hundreds of millions of pounds, we may just mothball the existing buildings, which are on the whole ’60s and ’70s buildings, with part of them not being used at all and the rest being used for the new facilities. In some ways, that would be the worst of all worlds, although it would at least preserves the sites and the capacity for future Governments to reactivate them. That has certainly not been denied to me, although I think it was said that that is a more advanced plan at Ealing than at Charing Cross, where it is still plan B. In other words, demolition is still on the cards, but there has to be a fall-back position if the Treasury does not fund it.

There is another factor. Even if the NHS does not move on, the rest of the world does. My hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck), who could not be here today, is pressuring strongly for the facts in relation to St Mary’s hospital, which serves her constituents, as I am for Charing Cross. Because of the grandiose scheme to build the “Pole”, or the new Shard, which would take up some of the land on the St Mary’s site, the existing plans will no longer be possible. Instead of the A&E, there will be a nice piazza outside a 95-storey office block, which I am sure is much more useful to constituents. Such fundamental changes will mean that the land is more valuable, the building costs are greater and the substantial plans for the modernisation of St Mary’s will not be able to go ahead, at least as planned. Yet many of the buildings there are listed, so what is happening? I like to think that something is happening, but I would also like to be told about it. It is unacceptable for three years to pass without any information being put on the record or given out.

Anne Rainsberry also said that we are still maintaining the Keogh principles, as if that would be a surprise or we would not welcome it. Many of the changes that have happened are, of course, improvements to the service. The hyper-acute stroke unit at Charing Cross has been classed as the best in the country. It is a fantastic unit that saves a lot of lives. The stroke unit from St Mary’s has just been moved to Charing Cross. Of course, the costs associated with that and with ensuring that it operates properly will apparently be wasted, because in four or five years’ time, the intention is to close it, demolish it and move it all back to St Mary’s again. I just cannot follow the logic, and I begin to lose confidence in the NHS’s ability to plan.

We have been through all this about three times in west London. We went through the whole Paddington basin fiasco and other schemes to do with merging Hammersmith and Charing Cross hospitals. In that time, demand has changed. The latest figures show that demand for A&E at Charing Cross has gone up by 13%, and none of the hospitals is meeting its A&E waiting target. There is massive population expansion, and I was pleased to be told by NHS England that when the business plan is produced, it will be based on the latest figures, so we will not be relying on the population statistics from five years ago.

The population is growing astronomically. When people drive through west London, they can see building going on on every street corner. The anticipated growth in population runs to tens or hundreds of thousands over a very short period, yet whenever I look at the plans—I assure hon. Members that I look at them all, as I monitor demographic changes—I never see any increase in public services. I never see the new schools, hospitals or GP surgeries, I just see massive blocks of luxury flats being put up everywhere. Even people who live in blocks of luxury flats get ill sometimes, although I have genuinely been told that it will mostly be wealthy young professionals living there and they will not need hospitals, so I do not need to worry too much about them.

[Ruth Cadbury]

Skiing injuries.

[Andy Slaughter]

Well, perhaps. The situation does not give us a lot of confidence in the plans that are being made.

I hope that I have given a flavour of what is happening. I cannot do much more than that, because I do not have the information available. This is the No. 1 issue for my constituents, yet when I look back to see how often I have raised it—I have made one speech on it since the election and asked a few questions to Ministers—I am sorry to see that on the whole, I get pretty dismissive answers. I do not think that is how this Minister would wish to behave.

I ask that sooner or later—sooner, preferably—we get the business plan so that we can see what changes are being proposed and what the timetable is. I also ask for a realistic reassessment of the need for acute hospital services, because I do not believe that “Shaping a Healthier Future”—2010 or 2012—will be the appropriate mechanism for doing that. If the Government are prepared to do that, I am sure that all Members, irrespective of party or of the proposals for their local hospital, will be prepared to sit down and negotiate.

Housing Supply (London)

Debate between Andy Slaughter and Ruth Cadbury

Wednesday 15th July 2015 Westminster Hall

[Andy Slaughter]

rose—

[Ruth Cadbury]

rose—