Flooding
Debate between Angela Smith and Lord Pickles(10 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
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Mr Pickles
As always, my right hon. Friend is correct. We cannot have conventional orthodoxy, and neither should we replace one inflexible orthodoxy with another. We have only to stand close to these rivers, some of which were previously gentle and meandering, or to see that monstrous gap in Brunel’s railway to see the sheer strength of nature. Conventional orthodoxy has to be re-examined, and instead we need bespoke solutions for each area of the country.
Angela Smith (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Lab)
When he got the job, the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs removed from his Department’s list of priorities an intention
“to prepare for and manage risk from flood and other environmental emergencies”.
Does the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government agree that this was a terrible error of judgment on the part of his colleague?
Mr Pickles
My right hon. Friend replaced an enormous, overbearing bureaucratic system with an emphasis on some key issues, one of which was flood defences. As a consequence, we are spending more on this than the Labour party did in its last five years in office, and no matter how much the Opposition huff and puff, they cannot get away from that basic fact.
Local Government Finance
Debate between Angela Smith and Lord Pickles
Mr Pickles
I am delighted to say that in order to protect those good folk from the excesses of a Labour council, we have found £10 million to ensure that nobody has to pay more than 8.5%. Perhaps I should give notice that if councils persist in charging the poor—it is only Labour councils that are doing so—I may take the necessary powers to prevent them from doing so. I am delighted to tell the hon. Gentleman, because he wants it to be read out, that his area receives £3,222 per household and has a loss of less than 0.9%.
Angela Smith (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Lab)
The leader of Sheffield city council has said that the Government’s cuts will mean the end of local government as we know it. As we have heard, the Local Government Association has declared that Tory-led West Somerset council is “not viable” over the longer term. Does the Secretary of State anticipate any other councils becoming no longer viable as a result of the Government’s huge cuts?
Mr Pickles
That is not what the leader of the council was saying when we were doling out all the extra money by way of the city deals. He was telling us how he was going to progress things.
Mr Pickles
I beg the hon. Lady’s pardon. The light was not very good.
We are telling local authorities to work together and join services together. If they stay in the kind of dump or great fug that Opposition Members seem to want, in which they do not co-operate with one another, that prediction will come true, but if they co-operate, things will be better.