Local Government Finance (England)

Chris Loder Excerpts

Wednesday 9th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Absolutely. The position of those who are served by Newham Council has been very clearly outlined by the hon. Lady. Within the context of the settlement we are debating today, we will look at all the additional support we can give to those who are dealing with the consequences of covid.

[Chris Loder (West Dorset) (Con)]

Boroughs such as Newham will benefit from £38 million under the settlement, compared with rural areas such as Dorset, which will receive nothing. Does my right hon. Friend agree that should be borne in mind?

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[Chris Loder (West Dorset) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to contribute to this debate and a pleasure to be here with my constituency neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax). We are here today to represent Dorset and to make sure that the Government take on board the priority of Dorset, particularly for me as the Member for West Dorset.

I was busy looking through the revenue support grant spreadsheet the other day when it had just been announced to see whether Dorset was in it. I did not see it. I thought that that was an error, but, regrettably, Dorset does not feature in the revenue support grant. My neighbouring colleagues and I have been looking for a meeting with the Secretary of State for a little while now. I am very grateful that there has been a bit of a flurry of action and that, hopefully, we will have that meeting very soon, but I just want to say how disappointed we are that, after the draft finance settlement was put forward, and despite my colleagues and I hoping to meet Ministers and, indeed, the Secretary of State, we have not been able to do so in order to make the case on behalf of the residents, not just of West Dorset but of the wider Dorset Council area.

The last time that I had a look, Dorset had the second highest council tax in the country at band E level—£2,233 for a band E property before any discounts, with a revenue support grant of zero. Wandsworth’s band E council tax is £845 per annum, yet it has a revenue support grant of £24.3 million. In Dorset, 30% of the population is over 65 years old, with all of the associated social care costs, difficulties and challenges that go with it, compared with Wandsworth, where only 10% of the population is over 65. London receives 10 times the amount per passenger journey than we do in Dorset to support local transport and bus services. Indeed, only more recently, we hear of billions more going to support Transport for London, yet we are struggling in Dorset to run a bus service.

In Dorset, we have a railway line with the worst frequency in the country. I was looking through this wonderful levelling up document, which is very good and I commend it to the House, but, although it contains many excellent initiatives for the country, regrettably there is not much in there for Dorset. I say to the Secretary of State that we would be very grateful if he considered the letter that the Leader of the Council sent to him just a week or two ago to help us with this issue, particularly in terms of the local plan. That would be much appreciated. Also, in terms of future levelling-up plans, any influence he might bring to bear ahead of a future six-year contract to be signed with the DFT and one of the local railway companies to operate that railway line with the worst frequency in the country would be much welcomed.

I shall conclude, because I know that my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset wants to speak and I do not want to steal any of his thunder. The point that I shall repeat for the House is that whilst the perception from many in the House is that Dorset is a well-off community—a chocolate-box area with plenty of lovely thatched houses—we have more than our fair share of difficulties. Conservative-led Dorset Council has done an excellent job managing those difficulties over the last couple of years and I think it is fair to say that we are very grateful to the Department for many of the things that have happened in recent times.

I particularly welcome the fact that, as I understand it, the Dorset local enterprise partnership is under review. We would be very grateful if that could be expedited imminently; it will run out of money with which to operate quite soon. As the Minister knows, I am a clear advocate of change because I do not think it has delivered much, and I think the effectiveness of the LEP is an indicator of how much or little there may be in the levelling-up plan to benefit rural Dorset.

I will be supporting my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State’s motion today. I understand that he has had many difficult things to navigate, but I want to put clearly on the record that it is not acceptable for us, going forward as Dorset MPs, and particularly for me, as the Member for rural West Dorset, that we continually end up in this place, where we have some of the highest council tax rates in the country, with zero revenue support grant, when others, who have some of the lowest council tax rates in the country, have considerable millions of pounds of support.

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[Chris Loder]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the Secretary of State for Transport and this Conservative Government have—I understand for the second time—given the Mayor a multibillion-pound settlement to help with the operation of TfL, which has been to the detriment of constituencies such as mine in West Dorset, where we are not able to get the transport, in favour of Transport for London?

[Gareth Thomas]

With all due respect to the hon. Gentleman, I do not think it will help the people of West Dorset or the rest of the UK in general if we leave London with a poor transport service. Just as I would like to see his community getting better support from the Secretary of State, I hope he might have the grace to recognise that Harrow and London in general also need to be properly supported as we come out of the pandemic.

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[Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)]

There have been some excellent contributions, from Members across the House, highlighting the brilliant work that many of our councils—yes, I include parish and town councils—right across the country have been doing in these challenging periods. That has been noted by hon. Members today. We heard interesting contributions from the hon. Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder), who has been mixing it up a little on the issues of region versus region, and rural versus urban. I suggest to him that he should probably get the broadband sorted out in Ilfracombe, so that when the Chancellor is there in the future he can send a positive tweet to the likes of the Prime Minister.

[Chris Loder]

rose—

[Mike Amesbury]

I must move on—I have acknowledged the hon. Gentleman.

My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts), who chairs the Select Committee, referred to the political choice of austerity over a 10-year period and the stark consequences for Sheffield City Council—I think £3 billion was cut from the council. My right hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley (Sir George Howarth) referred to the need for three-year settlements. I believe we are now in the fourth year of one-year settlements. How can we plan resources effectively—how can we plan for the future and invest in early years—when we have continued one-year settlements?

The hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) rightly referred to the need for genuine fiscal and financial devolution, and I concur. The hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) spoke about the public health grant, which is being reduced in real terms, and the pressures on mental health. My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Gareth Thomas) referred to devolution, concurring with the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst. My right hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) referred to the cut of more than 50%, as measured by the National Audit Office, that has been imposed over the past 10 years in communities up and down the country.

If the levelling-up White Paper did not already out the Department as being devoid of any real ambition or strategy to better the lives of people across our regions, this settlement is the confirmation. It might not be 300 pages, and I might not have learned much about the last 10,000 years of urban settlements, but it once again reminds us that this Government do not truly back our communities, do not back our councils and certainly do not back our country. No wonder that Tory councillor and Local Government Association Chairman James Jamieson, whom the Secretary of State phones on a regular basis—

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Neil O'Brien)]

I begin by paying tribute to the work of councils across the country. Over the last two years, they have been our foot soldiers in the fight against covid. They have innovated, worked hard and done incredible things to keep our vital services going, and they cannot be thanked often enough. I also thank officials in central Government and the Minister for Levelling Up Communities, my hon. Friend the Member for Saffron Walden (Kemi Badenoch), for their work in producing this balanced settlement today. She is away following the death of her father but she has done a lot of work to bring us to this point.

I also thank Members from across the House for their thoughtful and considered contributions to the debate. I would like to take some of them in turn and, as I do so, I will highlight what the settlement will mean for their area’s spending power. My hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder)—the spending power of his area will go up by 6.8%—made the important point that even though areas may look pretty, or “chocolate box” to use his words, we must recognise that there are areas of serious deprivation in some of them. That is one of the reasons why we are maintaining the rules over such grant. It is at the highest level—£85 million—that it has been. I know that his council leader has met with the former Minister for Housing, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Christopher Pincher), and the letter that they sent has been replied to. I look forward to further conversations with my hon. Friend.

[Chris Loder]

I really appreciate my hon. Friend responding to these points. I should be clear for the record that I, my colleagues and the leader of the council have been asking to meet Ministers for a very long time. I appreciate my hon. Friend’s comeback, but it is important to note that we would appreciate it if the meeting were expedited. I do not think that it has taken place.

[Neil O'Brien]

I assure my hon. Friend that we will expedite that.

Let me turn to the thoughtful comments made by the Chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee, the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts)—the spending power of Sheffield will go up by 7.6% under this settlement. He noted, to use his phrase, that the settlement was better than in some years, which may be faint praise, but we will take it. He raised the very important long-term issue about the relevance of upward pressure on social care caused by an ageing society, and one in which we do a better job of caring for the sick and disabled. As a party, we have taken difficult decisions to adequately fund that and the NHS, and difficult decisions on tax. We are also taking steps, as we set out in the House earlier, to promote the integration of health and social care, because we all know that is one of the crucial things we can do to make that sustainable in the longer term.