Oral Answers to Questions
Craig Tracey Excerpts(7 months, 3 weeks ago)
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Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Steve Barclay)
Around 45% of the Government’s £5.2 billion investment in flood protection is targeted at rural communities, and the Minister for Water is allocating £75 million of funding specifically to internal drainage boards, which, again, serve many rural constituencies.
Craig Tracey
I thank the Secretary of State for his answer. In recent months, parts of North Warwickshire and Bedworth, including Austrey, Polesworth and the Woodlands, have seen significant and unprecedented flooding, which has caused real damage to houses and businesses and upheaval for local residents. Will the Secretary of State set out what other steps can be taken to prevent this from happening and to stop these situations becoming the norm?
Steve Barclay
My hon. Friend has been a real constituency champion in highlighting some of the flooding issues that have occurred in North Warwickshire and Bedworth. Of the Environment Agency investment over six years, £24 million is going specifically into protecting 800 properties, and I know we will have further discussions on the work that he is doing locally to tackle flooding.
Oral Answers to Questions
Craig Tracey Excerpts(11 months ago)
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Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Question 2 is in the name of Bob Blackman, but I see that he is not present. Will the Minister answer Question 7, which is grouped with it?
Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Robbie Moore)
The Government’s fly-tipping grants are helping councils across the country put a stop to fly-tipping at hotspots, by spending £1.2 million on the issue and a further £1 million will be awarded in the spring. In July, we increased the maximum penalty councils can issue from £400 to £1,000. From April, all income from those penalties will be reinvested in enforcement and cleaning up fly-tipping in local areas.
Craig Tracey
I welcome the Minister to his place. Fly-tipping is a huge problem across North Warwickshire and Bedworth, with thousands of incidents every year, particularly in rural areas where the farming community is left to bear the brunt of many of the costs. We are lucky to have a dedicated rural crime team, who do amazing work helping to tackle the issue, but will the Minister give an update on the progress of the national rural crime unit in tackling the scourge on our communities?
Robbie Moore
I am very happy to pay tribute to the dedicated Warwickshire rural crime team, which does fantastic work in that area, and especially to Carol Cotterill, who leads on it. The Government are funding a new fly-tipping post in the national rural crime unit to optimise the role that the police can take in tackling fly-tipping in rural areas. We have also confirmed reforms to waste carrier registration, the introduction of digital waste tracking, and the abolition of DIY local waste tips.
Oral Answers to Questions
Craig Tracey Excerpts(2 years, 4 months ago)
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Victoria Prentis
I dispute that. We very much have a plan to continue to help people with the pressures on the cost of living. This is a very difficult and sensitive issue. Often, the higher costs are in the housing or the fuel sphere, but it is important that we continue to work with the Trussell Trust and others, with which we have an excellent working relationship after the pandemic. We have all learned to deal in a much more granular way with food supply chains and how to get food to people who need it. It is important that we dial down the political tone on this and continue to help people who need it.
Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Rebecca Pow)
Village halls are at the heart of so many rural communities, and I am absolutely delighted that we have launched the platinum jubilee village hall improvement fund. Just as a mark of how important I think village halls are, let me tell Members that, when our own village celebrated 50 years of its village hall, I wrote a song about it, which I am still being teased about.
Craig Tracey
I thank the Minister for not sharing that song with us.
As a former chair of my local village hall, I know how important village halls can be in connecting people of all ages. That was particularly evident during the pandemic. Village halls are generally run by small dedicated teams of volunteers who, unfortunately, are continually scraping around for the cash to keep them open. What more can we do to give easier and more sustainable funding to ensure that as many of these vital community hubs as possible can stay open?
Rebecca Pow
My hon. Friend makes such a good point. I congratulate him on his former role, and all those who have been on village hall committees. That included my husband who regaled me with many tales of what was said at the village hall committee. Our platinum jubilee village hall fund will provide for many halls the support they need to modernise, upgrade, and put in new internet and so forth. We also have a grant to support Action with Communities in Rural England to provide support for village halls across the whole country with advice, including on other sources of funding.
Flooding
Craig Tracey Excerpts(4 years, 8 months ago)
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Luke Pollard
I agree we need action, but it was action we did not get during the floods. It was action we required from the Prime Minister to call a Cobra meeting that we did not get. It was action to unlock the necessary funding that we did not get. I agree we need action and hope he will support this motion so that we get a lessons learned review that helps Ministers to make better decisions next time and get the action he desperately wants.
The review we are asking for would look at how we learn lessons as a country, how the Government learn lessons and how the work and innovations of local communities can be recognised, but the Government’s amendment seeks to do only one thing: not learn the lessons of the flooding. It would delete the lessons learned review and silence the voices of flooded communities. I want the voices of those communities under water heard in the review we are proposing. I want to hear from the small business owners in Telford whose shops have been flooded about the difficulties they face replacing stock when insurance companies refuse to insure them. I want to hear from the farmers next to the River Severn who fear that their crops will have been destroyed by the water damage in their fields. I want to hear from the homeowners in west Yorkshire who have yet again had to wash dirty water from their homes, wash the smell of sewage from their homes, replace their furniture and carpets and worry about whether the insurance will pay out and how much the premiums will be next year, if they are to be covered at all. I want to hear the voices of the emergency services who have had their numbers cut and cut again by years of Tory austerity. I want to hear from the Welsh coal mining communities who are now living in fear of a landslide from water-sodden spoil tips.
I want to hear from all of them in this review, and yet Ministers have proposed an amendment that says they will not have a lessons learned review, will not look at what worked well and what did not, and will not ask communities what works for them. Every Tory MP who votes against our motion will be doing something very simple: refusing to listen and learn the lessons of the flooding and refusing to improve their response to flooding in a calm and independent manner. Those under water communities, many of which are represented by Conservative MPs, will wonder what happened to their Members of Parliament. When given an opportunity to get the voice of those communities heard, they will have decided to turn against that—that is not leadership.
Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
The hon. Member talked about the role of insurance companies. I chair the all-party group on insurance and financial services and work quite closely with Flood Re. Since it was launched in 2016, Flood Re has been a great example of the Government and the insurance industry working together: 300,000 more properties have now been insured and four out of five properties with previous flood claims can now get insurance at half the price it was before. I am sure he will welcome that fact. It is a great example of the Government working with the industry to help solve this problem.
Luke Pollard
Flood Re has resulted in some improvements—the hon. Gentleman is right about that—but it does not insure homes or provide cover for homes built since 2009, and he will know that it does not include support for small businesses, so there are huge holes in the scheme that need to be filled. We need a scheme that works. At the moment, Flood Re is not delivering as was originally intended for all affected communities. The Government are carrying out a review of the Flood Re scheme, and I urge Ministers to encourage it to report quickly, because we need the Flood Re scheme to work properly to ensure that there are no gaps in it.
The reason that we are calling for a review today is that the flood waters will, we hope, soon subside and the camera crews will pack up, but as the media agenda moves on, the damage, disruption and destruction of the floods will remain for those communities that have been affected. It will take many months for those communities to recover, but we know from past floods that it will actually take many years for the damage to be undone, for payments to be received and for the mitigations to be put in place. That is why a lessons learned review is so important.
We know that the Prime Minister was missing during the floods, but he now has an opportunity to create a lessons learned review to learn the lessons of what has happened. However, he has decided against doing that. We know that the Conservatives’ political choice to implement a programme of brutal austerity over the past 10 years has made the fight against the climate crisis so much harder. The Environment Agency has again and again asked for extra money—£1 billion a year just to mitigate the impacts of floods and defend our communities. We need long-term structural change if we are to combat future floods, including restoring nature in uplands, ending the rotational burning of peatlands, implementing proper catchment area management strategies and building proper flood defences where appropriate. All these changes need genuine funding and a long-term plan.
But it is not just the Environment Agency that has been cut; our local councils have too, and our fire and rescue services. There is a regional disparity in the cuts for fire and rescue services as well. Across England, 23% of our firefighters have been lost in Tory cuts since 2010, but West Yorkshire, where some of the most severe flooding has happened, has lost over a third of its firefighters in austerity cuts. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Grahame Morris) has raised this issue directly with Ministers before, but I would like to invite the Secretary of State to look again at whether fire and rescue services need a statutory duty around flooding, as they have in Scotland and Wales.
It is also important that we look at the effect of the flooding on our farmers. That includes considering short-term actions such as a derogation of crop diversification and a reinstatement of the farming recovery fund to mitigate the damage that flooding has caused. The Secretary of State came unstuck at the NFU conference and answered concerns about the three-crop rule very poorly, but there is now a genuine opportunity to help farmers by using the powers that he already has to support them. In the long term, we need to ensure that our farmland is used sensibly to prevent flooding and to restore the ability to keep more water upstream.
We also need to recognise the need for change on match-funding. I have raised this matter before. Poorer communities should not be asked to match the same as wealthier communities, because we know that in that situation the wealthier communities have their flood defences funded and the poor ones do not. My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves) has raised this in relation to her city time and again, but she has still not had a satisfactory answer. The Budget next week is an opportunity for Ministers to fund flood defences properly. I would like to see the Budget used as a climate budget to recognise the true scale of the climate crisis and have funding directed accordingly. I suspect we will not have that, but I hope there will be some mention of flooding. I hope that funding will be directed at those communities that are currently under water and that a long-term plan is put in place in relation to this.
We have our criticisms of the Government, and the Prime Minister in particular, for failing to act with the seriousness that the climate emergency requires, but setting that aside, we have before us in this motion a modest proposal to learn the lessons of the three storms and to conduct an independent review into what happened. We owe it to those communities that are currently under water, those that have been flooded and those that are repairing the damage from the storms to listen to them and to do everything in our power to learn the lessons to ensure that it does not happen again.
I say to every Tory MP whose communities are under water and who votes against this modest ask that I wish them well on their return to their flooded communities. I wish them well in explaining why a review into the lessons learned will not be happening and why they voted against it. I wish them well in explaining to the people whose homes and businesses were flooded why they are denying them a voice. I wish them well in that, because they have the chance today to vote for such an independent review, and for those flooded communities, that will be a very modest ask as they scrub their floors to clean up the sewage that has come through the pipes, as they repair their homes and as they work out how to restore the stock in their businesses that have been so damaged. For them, this is a modest ask, and it is something that should be supported by everyone in this House. I hope that Tory MPs will reflect on this before they back the Government’s amendment to not learn the lessons of the flooding incidents. I hope that, as a Parliament, we can come together on this. I hope that the warm words that will be no doubt come from the Secretary of State at the Dispatch Box in a moment can be added to with the action that is so desperately needed. I commend this Labour motion to the House.
Oral Answers to Questions
Craig Tracey Excerpts(4 years, 9 months ago)
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Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Theresa Villiers)
Waste crime blights local communities and our environment and this Government are determined to tackle it. Over the past six years, we have invested £60 million in measures to achieve that. Last month, we launched a joint unit for waste crime, led by the Environment Agency, and including the National Crime Agency, HMRC and the police. This new unit will help us crack down on serious and organised crime in the waste sector.
Craig Tracey
Fly-tipping in particular is an issue that costs our local councils and landowners hundreds of thousands pounds annually to clear up, with rural communities particularly affected. Just last week, the village of Austrey in my constituency was targeted yet again. What additional resources and powers can we give our local authorities and police to eradicate this scourge once and for all?
Theresa Villiers
I fully appreciate how strongly my hon. Friend’s constituents feel about that issue, as do mine in Barnet. We are giving local authorities additional powers through our Environment Bill to tackle fly-tipping. We have also already enhanced their powers to search and seize vehicles, which may be involved in this menace, and we have granted them power to issue fixed penalty notices, and I encourage them to use those powers.
Oral Answers to Questions
Craig Tracey Excerpts(5 years ago)
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Theresa Villiers
I can reassure the hon. Lady that a Conservative Government will put this Bill on the Order Paper very soon after we are re-elected to serve this country.
Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Theresa Villiers)
Waste crime blights local communities and the environment, and we are committed to tackling it. We have given the Environment Agency £60 million extra to tackle waste crime since 2014. The Environment Bill takes forward a number of commitments on preventing, detecting and deterring waste crime.
Craig Tracey
Fly-tipping is a scourge in many communities across North Warwickshire and Bedworth, and it costs councils and local landowners hundreds of thousands of pounds to clear up, but it is often unwittingly facilitated by householders failing to ask whether a valid waste licence is in place. What steps can householders take to check that there is a valid licence, so that they do not unwittingly become the recipient of a fine themselves?
Theresa Villiers
Householders can check using the carrier’s business name or registration number, which the carrier should be able to give them on request, and they have the opportunity to check those against the details on the Environment Agency website, or by ringing the Environment Agency helpline.
Oral Answers to Questions
Craig Tracey Excerpts(5 years, 4 months ago)
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Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
Robert Courts (Witney) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dr Thérèse Coffey)
We have strengthened the national planning policy framework to make it clear that all development within its scope should achieve net gains for biodiversity. We have consulted on proposals to mandate biodiversity net gain for development, and will use the forthcoming environment Bill to legislate for a net gain system.
Craig Tracey
I thank the Minister for that answer, but will she assure me that she is taking action to ensure that all major infrastructure projects comply with all environmental licences, permissions and protections?
Oral Answers to Questions
Craig Tracey Excerpts(5 years, 6 months ago)
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Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Dr Thérèse Coffey)
Village halls are at the heart of rural communities, and we want to ensure that they remain so for many years to come. That is why, on 5 April this year, the Government launched a £3 million fund to improve them. Grants of up to £75,000, or 20% of the project costs, are available for the refurbishment and alteration of these essential community buildings.
Craig Tracey
Village halls are a vital asset in many rural parts of my constituency, offering a wide range of activities for groups of people of all ages. I know that from personal experience, having served as chair of my local village hall in Shuttington for several years before my election. I welcome the fund, but how are village hall committees being encouraged to apply for it, given that they are often run by a large number of dedicated volunteers?
Dr Coffey
We have publicised the grant scheme on social media and fundraising community websites, and there have been more than 70 expressions of interest. The National Association of Local Councils has been informed, and I am sure that it will use its networks to advertise the scheme. I should point out that the deadline for applications is March 2020. The funds may already have been allocated by then, so we want to encourage as many village halls as possible to get on with their project proposals.
Oral Answers to Questions
Craig Tracey Excerpts(5 years, 8 months ago)
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Michael Gove
There is a clear legislative framework following on from the ban introduced by the Labour Government, and this Government have no intention of changing that ban.
Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)
It has been made clear, and it was a manifesto commitment, that once we leave the European Union, we will take early steps to control the export of live farm animals. We are considering all options in the context of our exit from the EU and as part of our broader commitment to further strengthen animal welfare standards.
Oral Answers to Questions
Craig Tracey Excerpts(5 years, 9 months ago)
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Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)
The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (George Eustice)
The Agriculture Bill is a central part of the Government’s programme of legislation to deliver a smooth departure from the European Union. It is the most significant reform of agricultural legislation in more than 70 years. The Bill creates powers to build a new environmental land management system; to incentivise higher animal welfare; to support technology and investment on farms; and to improve fairness and transparency in the supply chain.
Craig Tracey
I welcome the Agriculture Bill, because for nearly 50 years our farmers have been tied to a fundamentally flawed common agricultural policy where payments are skewed towards the largest landowners. Can the Minister provide further detail on the public goods that will be rewarded under the new scheme?
George Eustice
I thank my hon. Friend for the sterling work he did on the Agriculture Bill Committee and as a member of the DEFRA team until recently. As he says, we are completely changing the focus of our agricultural support for the delivery of public goods. That could include improving habitats, water quality and soil health, promoting biodiversity, advancing animal welfare and allowing public access.