Business of the House

Bob Blackman Excerpts

Thursday 10th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I quite agree with my hon. Friend. He may know that there is a debate later today in Westminster Hall on social care and that the Health and Social Care Bill is now in another place. We want to break down the iron curtain that has historically existed between health and social care. The establishment of health and wellbeing boards and of personal budgets, to which both social services and the health service will contribute, is helping to break it down and provide a more cohesive service to those in receipt of social or health care.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

As others have mentioned, the Mayor of London has committed himself to raising fares on the underground by RPI plus 2% to get much-needed investment for the underground. His Labour opponent, however, has committed himself to cutting fares by 5% and not raising them until at least 2014. That would mean London being deprived of £835 million of investment in the tube service that we desperately need. May we therefore have a debate on how we can encourage investment in public transport in London and across the country, so that we can expose the lies of the Labour party?

[Sir George Young]

My hon. Friend underlines a point made by other London MPs who are concerned that the infrastructure of the capital should be improved. I commend the Mayor of London and the former Secretary of State for Transport for the agreement that they reached on a settlement going up to 2014-15, which will enable a capital programme of some size to go ahead. That capital programme would be affected if the revenue stream that the Mayor has anticipated were to be eroded, and all Londoners would suffer a disbenefit because the improvements that they are looking forward to would not take place.