Housing, Communities and Local Government: Departmental Spending

Bob Seely Excerpts

Thursday 9th July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Bob Seely (Isle of Wight) (Con)]

I thank the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) for securing this important debate. It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), who as ever, on this and many other issues, talks extremely good sense.

I want to start with a couple of thanks yous and then move on to some Island-specific points. First, I thank the Isle of Wight Council and all its staff for their exceptional work in looking after Islanders during this dreadful pandemic. On behalf of Islanders, I thank John Metcalfe and Wendy Perera and all their teams, and council leader Dave Stewart and his senior team, Councillors Stuart Hutchinson and Wayne Whittle. I mention those people because it is important to give recognition where recognition is due.

I also thank the Government. I understand that local government has now received £4.3 billion from the Government. In the Isle of Wight, we have received about £105 million. That has gone through largely to our local businesses, and some has gone to the council. We are keen to try to keep the final £8 million for reasons that, in the next 120 seconds, I will briefly outline.

I was going to talk about housing, which, as the Minister knows, is a big issue on the Island. However, because he is here and the Housing Minister is not, I will talk about the Island deal, which, as he knows, is in six areas. I am delighted to say that we are already getting a better deal on the Island. We got £100 million of extra capital investment last year—£48 million in the NHS to drive forward reform, some great pilot schemes, and about £46 million for Ryde railway pier and Ryde railway—so we are getting there.

There are six other areas that I would like to talk about—but not now; I am only going to do one now. Those include NHS provision; unavoidably small hospitals have different economies of scale from significant hospitals, in the district general hospital model, that have the required or approved number of users. We also have agricultural issues, transport issues and, as I say, housing issues.

However, on local government funding specifically, I say to the Minister and his officials—I know they are working up some options, which I am delighted about—that any support for the Island must consider the additional costs of providing public services on an island. It is academically proven, beyond reasonable doubt, that it costs more to provide public services on an island—in isolated communities—than elsewhere. There is no serious debate about the additional costs. None of this will set a precedent, because the Isle of Wight is the only island of any significant size in the local government structure in England and Wales. There is no precedent being set at all.

We have an ambitious council. I very much hope that it is going to buy a critical site in East Cowes this evening as part of a jobs hub and jobs investment programme, and I look forward to that. However, when I meet the Minister and his officials to talk about the Island deal, can we please do so understanding that there will be no precedent being set? There are additional costs of providing public services on an island, which sadly have not been recognised in the past half-century.