Business of the House

Anna Turley Excerpts

Thursday 10th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

I congratulate Yum Yum World on its survival. Plenty of children and some adults will be delighted by that, but go easy on the sugar everybody!

My hon. Friend raises an important point about business rates and how we can keep our high streets thriving. He will know that the Government have made changes worth more than £13 billion in aggregate to businesses, including taking more than 600,000 small businesses out of paying any business rates at all. Our dedicated Retail Sector Council brings the Government and retail sector organisations together to consider what more we can do to ensure thriving high streets.

[Anna Turley (Redcar) (Lab/Co-op)]

My constituency staff and I have challenged a large number of unfair private parking penalty charges. We have won back more than £700 for local constituents who were wrongly charged, including a constituent who was charged outside a doctor’s surgery for dropping off his wife who has a serious long-term health condition. The Parking (Code of Practice) Bill, promoted by the right hon. Member for East Yorkshire (Sir Greg Knight), was accepted by this House. Will the Leader of the House say when we can expect that Bill to return to this place, and whether it will get Government support? I am sure there will be a lot of interest from across the Chamber.

[Andrea Leadsom]

I am very sympathetic to what the hon. Lady says, and by coincidence, my office has also been dealing with a number of complaints about unfair parking tickets. It is a real problem, and MPs often successfully challenge such matters on behalf of our constituents—I share the hon. Lady’s success levels. She raises an important point about the private Member’s Bill and, as she knows, I attempted to schedule six additional days for the consideration of private Members’ Bills. Unfortunately that motion was subject to an Opposition amendment and was therefore not put to the House. However, I intend to work through the usual channels to provide further information on days to consider private Members’ Bills.