Local Government Funding

Dan Jarvis Excerpts

Wednesday 27th March 2019 Westminster Hall

[Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Main. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Thelma Walker)—a near neighbour of mine—on securing this important and timely debate.

I rise to speak as someone who, both as a Member of Parliament and as Mayor of the Sheffield city region, works very closely with our local authorities. Not only do I lead the combined authority of Barnsley, Doncaster, Rotherham and Sheffield, but through the Yorkshire leaders board, I work very closely with all of Yorkshire’s other local authority leaders. As hon. Members will know, the work of our local authorities is critical to the communities that they are there to serve.

I was out on the doorstep in Barnsley at the weekend talking to my constituents and, although some of them wanted to talk about Brexit—completely understandably —many of them wanted to talk about other things, including bins, potholes, parking, antisocial behaviour and, of course, housing. Those are incredibly important issues that fall to local government.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Anne Main (in the Chair)]

We have already waited for the customary 15 minutes. The proposer of the motion and both Front Benchers are here, so we will carry on.

[Dan Jarvis]

Thank you, Mrs Main. I am happy to give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwura).

[Chi Onwurah]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way so graciously. He is absolutely right: when we knock on people’s doors, we hear about the issues that matter to them. Increasingly over the past nine years since I was elected, constituents have told me that litter is destroying the environment in which they and their children live, because of central Government cuts to local authority and police funding.

[Dan Jarvis]

My hon. Friend raises an important point that is often raised with me by local residents, as is fly-tipping, which is a big concern for many of my constituents. One of my local residents, Kevin Osborne, has been running a long-standing campaign against the fly-tippers, as has Barnsley Council, which has taken decisive, innovative action to prosecute them. My hon. Friend raises an important point that is of great concern to our constituents.

Before the Division, I was talking about important local issues that fall to local government. We all instinctively understand that councils and councillors work hard every day to improve the lives of our residents, but they face a funding crisis. Austerity has caused huge damage to communities across the country. It has undermined the way we protect children at risk, disabled adults and vulnerable older people, and it has reduced the quantity and quality of community services such as street cleaning, libraries and rubbish collection.

We should be honest about the fact that reduced funding is not just about numbers on a spreadsheet, but about a reduction in the capacity to invest in prevention. The cuts represent a false economy. If councils cannot fund sufficient support for older people, more of them will end up being admitted to hospital. Less money for children’s services means our young people will only get by, rather than thrive. Failure to invest in public transport stifles economic growth, isolates communities, reduces social mobility and damages our environment. Those are just a few examples of an austerity agenda that lacks any form of long-term strategy.

[Neil Coyle]

In cash terms, Southwark has lost 50% of Government funding since 2010 and faces another £8.6 million funding cut this year. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is deceitful of the Prime Minister to claim that austerity is over?

[Dan Jarvis]

My hon. Friend raises an incredibly important point. Following eight years of austerity and some £7 billion of cuts, neither the autumn Budget nor the more recent spring statement offered any comfort to our local authorities. The Local Government Association has projected that local councils will face a funding gap of £7.8 billion by 2025, and they still face a cut of £1.3 billion next year. Last autumn’s Budget offer of £650 million for the coming year is nowhere near enough even to close the funding gap for social care, let alone to address the shortfall in other services. Such concerns cannot be addressed by the piecemeal redistribution of income that we have seen from the Government.

Central and local government need to work together on the fundamental reform of the funding of our community services, and I believe that devolution offers the opportunity to do that. When we get it right, it offers a fairer and more democratic means of governing and delivering, where working people have a greater say in the choices that affect their lives and a greater stake in the services on which they rely. We can seek radical, transformative change to our communities only if those communities can control their destinies themselves. That means that the Government need to listen to and invest in those communities and the leaders they have elected to represent them.

We need to abandon an economic and political model in which the only hope is that wealth will trickle down and prosperity will ripple out. We must replace it with a fully empowered three-tier system of government—local, regional and national—giving each tier the powers and resources that it needs to make a difference in the communities for which it is responsible. Only if we do that correctly will we put the right people at the heart of decision making, end the status quo in which so many people have become disenfranchised, and allow communities to overcome the challenges they face, and thrive. Greater funding and stronger powers for local authorities should be the first step of that journey.