Local Government Finance (Rural Authorities)

Brandon Lewis Excerpts

Monday 11th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Brandon Lewis)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Neil Parish) on securing today’s important debate. It seems ironic that the first time I am at the Dispatch Box at this time of night since the last time I was here at this time of night, we are debating rural areas looking for fair funding. Last time, it was about urban areas, and Newcastle Members and others made the same sort of case for those areas.

I shall have to keep my remarks relatively short, as the hon. Member for Derby North (Chris Williamson) talked for some time, and I want to ensure that my hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton and Honiton gets the chance to sum up. If I do not cover everything Members have brought up this evening, I would be happy for them to come and see me—now or over the next few months—as we continue to argue passionately and with great determination over the issues raised tonight. However, as one of my hon. Friends commented a few moments ago, the tone of the debate changed dramatically when the hon. Member for Derby North decided to avoid the fact that it was the last Government who had pledged £52 billion in local government cuts. Labour Members have seemed not to want to discuss that in any way, while opposing every change and every reduction that we have introduced to deal with the deficit that we inherited from their Government. That cannot give any credibility to what they say about the money that is needed for local authorities.

The hon. Gentleman spoke of standing up for local government. What he should have observed tonight, and over the past few weeks, is the Secretary of State and other Government Members standing up for their local residents, for their communities, and for the hard-working taxpayers for whom we have introduced the council tax freeze option.

[Chris Williamson]

In that spirit—the spirit of Government Members standing up for their communities —will the Minister invite the Secretary of State to stand up for local government throughout the country, and argue with the Treasury the case for giving it a fairer share of the cake? Does he accept that its funding has been cut by 28%, which is a far larger reduction than any imposed by other Departments?

[Brandon Lewis]

I thought that the hon. Gentleman had something to say that was different from what he had already said. Again, he avoided mentioning the £52 billion of cuts that his party had pledged to make. My point is that Government Members, including the Secretary of State, are standing up for the people whom we are elected to stand up for—the hard-working residents who will benefit from the council tax freeze that this Government are providing.

Let me say in the few moments that I have left that the thinking behind this local government financial settlement took into account ways in which councils can make progress in the years ahead, and that we believe it to be fair to both north and south and to both rural and urban communities. As others have pointed out, we have managed—although, I recognise, not to the extent that some would have liked—to reduce the gap between rural and urban. We have made adjustments to relative needs formulas to reflect the greater cost of providing services in rural areas. That is one of only three formula changes in the settlement. We have increased the weight of super-sparse areas in the formula, doubled the sparsity weight for older people’s social care, reinstated the sparsity adjustment for county-level environmental protective and cultural services, and introduced a sparsity adjustment for fire and rescue. As a result, funding per head is falling by less in predominantly rural authorities than in predominantly urban authorities, in all classes.

[Mr Graham Stuart]

Members on both sides of the House are concerned about the 2014-15 settlement and the position up to 2020. Can my hon. Friend assure us that Ministers will be willing to discuss next year’s settlement, and to ensure that we get the settlements right from then onwards?

[Brandon Lewis]

I can confirm that. I have had a few meetings with my hon. Friend, and he has—rightly—made a powerful case for people in rural areas. I can tell him that I shall be happy to continue to talk to Members from all parts of the country about next year’s settlement.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger) raised the position of West Somerset. I have visited West Somerset and met the council leader a number of times. I know my hon. Friend will agree that, given its critical mass—the area has just 35,000 residents—it must consider sharing management and services with other authorities.

There is much more to be said about this subject. I shall be happy to meet Members individually to discuss it with them, but I want to ensure that my hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton and Honiton has a couple of minutes in which to sum up the debate.