Levelling Up

Baroness Hayman of Ullock Excerpts

Monday 7th February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

My Lords, if the Statement and the paper with it are the sum total of the Government’s ambition, their legacy will be to have held back the aspirations of towns, cities and villages across the UK. Britain is the birthplace of industry and of towns, villages and cities with huge plans for their future. But over the 11 wasted years of Conservative Britain, our country has stalled.

This paper was meant to mark a turning point, but instead, we have more of the same: no new funding, no new ideas and certainly no new plan. Instead, we have 332 pages, which show just how divorced the Government are from the ambitions of the local communities that make up this country. Above all, what we needed from the Government was a strategy to bring jobs and prosperity to the places that need them most. People should not be expected to leave their home towns to build a successful career, but there are no credible solutions to end this in the paper, only recycled slogans.

The Government need to come forward with a plan to rebuild British industry—buying, making and selling more at home and giving public contracts to UK companies, both big and small. What plans do the Government have to encourage high-skilled industries to move to the areas that the IFS has determined to have the highest net loss of graduates? And how will Ministers reverse the sharp decline in people aged 16-24 studying apprenticeships?

Our town centres have the potential to once again be local hubs of growth, but since this Government came to power over a decade ago, British high streets have lost 10,000 shops, 6,000 pubs and more than 7,000 bank branches. If the Government are serious about reversing this trend, they need to completely reform and replace the system of business rates, which is burdening businesses of all sizes. The solution is not just to tackle the tax burden but to incentivise investment and provide more security to small businesses, which will themselves face the consequences of the Government’s cost of living crisis. Does the Minister accept the warning of many high street chains, which have called for the wholesale reform of business rates?

As much as the paper falls short because it lacks ambition, it also relies on the broken idea that towns and villages only exist to feed off cities. So much of the narrative still relies on the notion that investing in cities is enough to spur growth in nearby towns. For example, look at how any talk of building new transport links is about bringing people from towns into core cities, rather than connecting the towns together. Look at the focus on the largest cities in each region.

No one would doubt that cities deserve the Government’s support to grow, but towns should also be seen as distinct places with proud identities, and the Government really should respect that. Towns and villages need their own industries, jobs, culture, good quality homes and high streets. They should not be the places people are expected to leave if they are to live well. So, what assessment has the Minister made of the recent findings of the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee, which has called for greater transparency in the awarding of levelling-up funding to towns?

Ultimately, the only way that cities, towns and villages will be able to realise their ambitions is if the Government give them the power to do so. That is why the Government need a new, place-based approach, up-ending the current settlement so that local areas have real powers and resources to make long-term investment decisions that work for their own communities.

The Statement also makes no mention of net zero, green jobs or the climate crisis, while the full White Paper dedicates just three pages exclusively to net zero—two of which are entirely picture based. The Government have failed to detail any new green economy funding beyond previous commitments. Just how serious are this Government about tackling climate change and investing in the green jobs of the future?

One theme is staggeringly absent from the Government’s paper: safety and security. People deserve to feel protected in their town, their village, their city, but the fear of violence and crime casts a shadow over millions of families. Across the UK only one in 20 crimes leads to a charge; that is half the figure since 2015. Today violent crime is at record levels, with nearly 2 million violent offences last year, and an epidemic of violence against women and girls, with only 3.3% of sexual offences leading to charges.

This is why the Government urgently need to introduce new police hubs and new neighbourhood prevention teams to tackle anti-social behaviour and put more police on the beat in local communities. Does the Minister agree that, if levelling up is to have any meaning, it must include addressing the threat of violent crime, which disproportionately impacts different areas across Britain?

I finish by drawing the Minister’s attention to the words of one of his party colleagues, the deputy leader of Shropshire Council, as reported by the BBC’s Jo Gallacher. Councillor Potter, who represents the county which witnessed the birth of the Industrial Revolution, said that the report shows that Shropshire is

“overlooked, unrecognised, taken for granted and completely undervalued”

by the Government. Those words will ring true across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, because the publication of this report shows what many already knew—that levelling up is a slogan, and behind it are only empty promises.