Levelling-up Fund Round 2: Bidding Process

Chris Stephens Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2023 Westminster Hall

[Anne McLaughlin (Glasgow North East) (SNP)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the Levelling Up Fund round 2 bidding process.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. Round two of levelling up: what on earth was that all about? [Laughter.] Is that an intervention already?

It seems like a lifetime ago that Boris Johnson stood on the steps of 10 Downing Street promising that he was going to level up the UK with money to areas that had been left behind, ravaged by successive Tory Governments—those might not have been his exact words—and bearing the brunt of each and every austerity measure, where the poor pay for the excesses of the rich, as per usual. Two Prime Ministers later and we have just had the announcement of the second phase of the levelling-up fund.

Glasgow submitted seven bids to the second round, many of which would have helped to redevelop some of the most deprived communities in Scotland. Officers and councillors spent months preparing the bids to give our communities the best possible chance of securing funding, and the latest estimates are that around £500,000-worth of officer time went into them. That is why I have secured this debate. It was a complete waste of effort and a complete waste of the energy, skills and knowledge that Glasgow City Council professionals and councillors alike poured into the bids. I pay tribute to them for the incredible work they did; however, as I said, it was a complete waste of their time and a shameful waste of half a million pounds that my local authority simply cannot afford.

It was waste, but not because they were not successful. I accept that if funding is going to be provided in that way—I do not agree with it and will come to that—there are no guarantees. The reason why it was a waste of time and money is that it was not possible for them to be successful as the Government changed the rules at the eleventh hour. My understanding is that Ministers intervened at the last minute to say that if a local authority had been awarded funding of any amount in the first round, no bids could be awarded funding in this round. That sudden and inexplicable shifting of the goal posts ruled all of Glasgow’s bids ineligible for funding.

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

Is my hon. Friend seriously telling the Chamber that local authorities had spent hours and months preparing a bid and that at the last minute the scorings were changed by ministerial interference because a local authority may have had funding in round one and was then automatically disqualified in round two? That is a scandal.

[Anne McLaughlin]

It is a scandal. That is exactly what I am saying because that is exactly what we were told and the explanation the council was given. At a time when local authorities are feeling the financial strain more than ever, it was just wrong and, frankly, cruel.

For Glasgow City Council, funded by the Scottish Government—a Government who, unlike this one, have to live within their immediate means and, unlike this one, have to provide a balanced budget—the financial flexibility simply is not there. Glasgow City Council also has other financial pressures, unique to the city, in that when the SNP was elected it finally settled the previous Labour council’s decade-long equal pay dispute with mainly female employees. That was absolutely the right thing to do and I am extremely proud of my SNP councillor colleagues for that, but it was a massive bill that Glasgow will be paying for years to come.

The council was already in an extremely tight financial position because the Scottish Government are in a tight financial position, and that position was even tighter because it is paying the price for the previous council’s 10-year battle with women workers. The council was doing the best it could with the resources it had. Let me say to everyone here that Glasgow City Council’s work is regularly replicated around the UK because it runs some inspirational programmes despite financial constraints. However, given those additional constraints, it was even more galling to see the UK Government wave the carrot of levelling-up funding in front of our noses, only to snatch it away at the last minute.

I said that I do not agree with the way the funding is awarded. Forcing councils to compete against one another is a terrible way to distribute finance that should, by rights, just be given to local authorities to address local problems. Of course, the possibility of securing much-needed investment could not be turned down, so the work was done, and the bids were submitted in good faith.

Glasgow had some fantastic bids. We know this, not because we have seen them—although we have—but because our council officers were told as much by UK civil servants. Until the night before the announcement, the discussions were about which of them were most likely to be successful. I would like the Minister to explain to us exactly what happened in the 24 hours leading up to the final decisions being made.

My own constituency’s bid was for the regeneration of Saracen, Stonyhurst and Allander Streets in Possilpark, creating an urban park and building on the excellent work of the community-led business improvement district. To me, that is the epitome of levelling up—working with communities to build economic prosperity and resilience in areas of deprivation to support and develop what these communities have already started themselves. It is about supporting their empowerment. Instead, Possilpark has been discarded. The people of Possilpark deserve better.

The bid for Easterhouse, another area of Glasgow with historical and generational inequality, was for an incredible project that would have redeveloped the local shopping centre and public realm, not only linking the college and social enterprise hub but improving active travel routes and access to and the promotion of the wonderful Seven Lochs wetland park. It would have been a much-needed boost to the area, which was, statistically, the worst impacted by covid in the whole of Scotland. Again, Easterhouse and the people of Easterhouse were discarded. Again, I say that the people of Easterhouse deserve so much better.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Sir Christopher. I will depart from my prepared text, because the allegations made by my hon. Friends the Members for Glasgow North East (Anne McLaughlin), and for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss), are so serious that they require an immediate answer from the Minister, when she responds. Local authority officials spend a great deal of time preparing bids, only to be advised at the last minute that because money had been given in a previous round, they were knocked out of the competition. I want the Minister to confirm that was the case. If it was, it is scandalous, and there are grounds for looking at the process legally, as was said. It is astonishing that local authorities have been put in this position. If local authorities were told at the start that a bid was ineligible if the authority received funding in round 1, they would not bother applying for round 2. Or was this a last-minute decision?

[Alun Cairns]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Chris Stephens]

I am conscious of time; I apologise to the right hon. Gentleman. [Interruption.] He has had more than one bite at the cherry.

This is so serious. Local authorities would not have applied in round 2 if they had been told that because they got something in round 1, they would not be successful. The Minister needs to tell us when local authorities were advised of that.

There are also questions about scoring. We would think that there would be scores, and that any local authority, whether successful or not, could say to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, “Can we see our scores, please? Can you tell us where we went wrong, and why we were unsuccessful, so that if we apply in the next round, we can put that right?”. When will local authorities be told their scores? Or is it the case, as my hon. Friends allege, that local authorities were told in the week leading up to the announcement that they would be successful, and then were suddenly told that they would not be? There is something not quite right about the process; something smells here.

Can the Minister tell us how many local authorities were advised that they would get something, and then did not? I have heard that Glasgow officials were told that their bids were excellent—in fact, that they were even told, “Tell us which ones you are prioritising out of the seven.” I hope that the answer was Linthouse, but I do not know whether Glasgow officials suggested it. They were then advised that they were not getting money. That is absolutely scandalous, and it is no wonder that Members from across the House are suspicious about the whole process and the lack of transparency that seems to envelop it, given what appears to be a last-minute change by Ministers.

Knowing who made the decision is critical to this debate. Who said that if a local authority was successful in round 1, it would not get money in round 2? As a principle, that is absolutely wrong. The hon. Member for Clacton (Giles Watling) made the reasonable point that there are areas in the country that are deprived, and I do not see any reason for deciding that because money was allocated to a local authority in round 1, it should be ineligible for round 2. He made a number of points about deprived areas needing a succession of funds, and he argued that position rather well on behalf of his constituency and his local authority. There is no reason at all why a local authority should not qualify in both rounds, so something is not quite right here.

I hope the Minister will answer those questions, because people listen to statements from the current Prime Minister—we have had a number of them over the past year. His comments about taking money away from deprived areas are amplified by the allegations that have been made this afternoon. People now think that the scheme is some sort of pork barrel exercise aimed at returning as many Conservative MPs as possible in the next election. I will leave it there; I hope that the Minister will respond to my points.