Arcadia and Debenhams: Business Support and Job Retention

Baroness Neville-Rolfe Excerpts

Thursday 3rd December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I cannot comment on the Government’s intentions or otherwise to create worker-directed representation on company boards, but the audit trail of Arcadia is quite clear. The auditor’s report was clear that there was a material uncertainty about the group’s ability to continue as a going concern. It also failed to publish its 2019 accounts this August. Late filing of accounts attracts an automatic penalty fine and is an alert. As to whether there need to be specific investigations of directors, the administrators have a duty to report within three months of the insolvency on the conduct of the company’s current and former directors.

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

The Government have done a great deal to support this highly competitive sector, and little more can profitably be done to help these firms. Schumpeter’s creative destruction nearly always builds a better world eventually, as resources and skilled staff shift into new areas of opportunity; I remember that from the sad collapse of Woolworths when I was in retail. What does the Minister think can be done with the stores and sites that are freed up by this sad collapse this week?

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I thank my noble friend for her supportive and constructive comments. The Government recently reformed the use classes to create a new commercial business and service use class. This will give businesses greater flexibility to change to a broad range of uses such as leisure and as shops and offices, as well as nurseries and health centres, without the need for planning permission. This means that businesses will be able to adapt to changing circumstances and respond to the needs of their local communities more easily and quickly. More widely, we are looking to transform the planning system as set out in the White Paper, Planning for the Future, which will make it simpler, quicker and more accessible, and more certain.