Cost of Living: Fiscal Approach

Debate between Derek Twigg and Tim Farron

Wednesday 25th May 2022 Westminster Hall

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I congratulate the hon. Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) on his excellent opening remarks and on securing this debate.

There is a tide of poverty, terrifyingly large, growing in every single community in our country. I wonder what the point of this place is if we do not seek to meet the needs of people who literally cannot see how they can put food on the table for their children, pay their bills or pay their rent or mortgage. It is a crisis like no other facing this country.

I will focus my remarks on how that tide of poverty is affecting rural communities such as mine in Cumbria and elsewhere in the country. In my constituency, we have incredibly low unemployment—very low. Pretty much everybody I know, particularly those on low wages, are working multiple jobs. The idea that they can do extra hours or get a better-paid job is a colossal insult to them, as they work tirelessly to provide for their families. The massive majority of people in receipt of universal credit in our communities in Westmoreland, South Lakeland and Eden are in work. They work incredibly hard, but their wages do not keep pace with the rapidly rising cost of living.

The cost of living in an area such as our is exacerbated by the cost of housing. The average house price in my constituency is about £270,000 and the average household income is about £26,000. Do the maths: nobody on an average income can afford anything like an average home in our community. There is extra pressure, because the pandemic has massively increased the housing need in our area. We have seen the absolute evaporation of the long-term private rented market into the holiday let market. In my community, there has been a 32% rise in one year in the number of homes going into the holiday let sector. What were those holiday lets beforehand? They were people’s homes—family homes. People were evicted via section 21s—something the Government said they would abolish in their manifesto—and the availability of properties for those families to live in was diminished.

In parts of Devon, there has been a 70% reduction in the availability of long-term lets that are affordable to local families. It feels like the lakeland clearances are going on in our community. In Ambleside, a couple, both of whom worked, with children in the local school, were given their marching orders—they were evicted via section 21 from the rented property they had lived in for several years. There was nowhere else available in their community to rent, as everything else had gone to Airbnb or become a second home, so they had to give up their jobs, their children had to be removed from their school, and the family had to move to the next county in order to start all over again. It is miserable, and the consequence for our economy is huge.

What does it mean for our workforce? In the dales town of Sedbergh, which is a relatively small place, with fewer than 2,000 houses, there were 103 job vacancies as of last week because there is nowhere affordable for anybody on a modest, moderate, average or low income to rent, never mind buy—that is for the birds in the current era. That impacts on business. Some of the poorest people I know in communities such as mine run their own businesses. They pay and keep their staff—they cannot recruit enough staff—and they pay themselves less than the minimum wage. They live on next to nothing; they live in poverty.

Another huge problem that affects rural communities such as mine is fuel costs. Many of my constituents are not on the mains, so there are no energy price caps, no matter how high and ridiculous the prices are for people who run their property off liquid gas or oil. If someone wants to get the bus just one way from Kendal to Ambleside to get to their job, they have to spend more than an hour’s pay. Likewise, fuel costs are much more impactful when people have to travel miles and miles. My hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone) also mentioned the huge impact on the care sector. We cannot recruit people to care for people in their homes.

We cannot miss the impact that the Government’s fiscal policies are having on farming. This year the Government are taking 20% of farm incomes without replacing them for 98% of the farmers in my community. That has an impact on rural poverty in communities such as mine throughout Cumbria. It also impacts on our ability as a country to produce food, and that means rising food prices for everybody else. It is morally wrong and incredibly stupid.

Of course the Government should be taxing the energy companies and redistributing that money to ensure that people are not in penury. Of course they should be cutting VAT to help people. The bottom line is that press releases will not pay bills. The Government need to act now.

[Derek Twigg (in the Chair)]

I will now impose a four-minute limit on Back Benchers, and I will call the SNP spokesman no later than 3.41 pm.