Industrial Strategy Consultation

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Greg Clark

Monday 23rd January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is one of the proposals in the Green Paper that I hope will have his support through the consultation.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

The Green Paper rightly focuses on productivity, but there is one area of infrastructure where Britain lags enormously behind all our competitors: the cost of childcare. Childcare costs more in Britain than it does in every other OECD country apart from Switzerland—it takes up over 40% of the average wage—yet it is hardly mentioned in the Green Paper. That is the way to liberate the talent of women. What is he going to do about it?

[Greg Clark]

The Green Paper invites comments and proposals, so I look forward to seeing the right hon. Lady’s response to it. As I said earlier, the Government have taken very seriously the importance of childcare in allowing women and men to return to work in good jobs, and we have made great progress. I will be interested to read her response to the consultation.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Greg Clark

Tuesday 13th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

The passion with which my hon. Friend makes his point attests to the opportunities within our approach to industrial strategy to ensure that there is growth across the United Kingdom, including in Yorkshire. He will know that I have taken a great interest in that in my previous roles, and he can be absolutely assured that that interest will not diminish in the months ahead.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

T2. The current review of network charging for small embedded generators such as Slough Heat and Power will mean huge increases in costs for them. Is the Department determined to make energy generation the preserve of big businesses only?

Local Government Finance

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Greg Clark

Monday 8th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

May I add my welcome to the new Serjeant at Arms?

Given what my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) said, I am grateful that he is sitting far away from the Dispatch Box. I am grateful, however, for his good wishes. Dorset is a well-run county council, and it has important costs as a result of being a beautiful rural county. The extra funding that it will receive from April this year will be £4.10 million which I know, having spoken to the leader of the council, will make a big difference in managing the transition that was a great concern for the authority.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Slough is the smallest unitary authority in the country. In response to questions, the Secretary of State announced that fellow Berkshire unitary authorities, West Berkshire and Wokingham, will receive £1.4 million transitional funding. Slough faces particular pressures, as it is on the border of London and has a changing, high-needs population. What are we going to get?

[Greg Clark]

It sounds as though the right hon. Lady wants to participate in the review of needs and of the cost of delivering those needs, so I am surprised that she has not welcomed the announcement that I have just made.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Greg Clark

Monday 8th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

I have been looking carefully at the responses to the consultation on local government finance, including that from Leicestershire, which seems to make a perfectly reasonable point that the essential requirement is that the underlying formula should reflect the different costs of providing services in different places. If my hon. Friend is patient and comes back a little later, I shall have more to say then.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Is it not a fact that in practice, despite their rhetoric, Conservative councils are charging more than Labour councils? That is what the question from the hon. Member for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen) conceals.

[Greg Clark]

It is a long-established fact that Conservative councils offer lower council tax than Labour councils, which accounts for their success and their majority in local government.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Greg Clark

Monday 9th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. She supports the charity in her constituency, and I have had the privilege of seeing the fantastic work done by a charity in my constituency. Part of the point of the additional funding that has been made available is for local authorities to work with such voluntary groups to ensure that a service is available to all women who need it at the time when they need it.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Every Member will know that depending on charities for that type of service means depending on groups that are working hand to mouth and have no future security. Will the Secretary of State insist that local authorities give them a secure funding future and invest in specialist services, rather than expecting housing associations that are open only between 9 o’clock and 5 o’clock to make refuge provision?

[Greg Clark]

The right hon. Lady is right that voluntary organisations need to work with local authorities. There needs to be a network of provision across the country, because the victims of domestic violence often have to go to a different local authority area to flee the people who have persecuted them and engaged in violence against them. She is right that there needs to be a dependable national system.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Greg Clark

Thursday 26th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Universities, Science and Cities (Greg Clark)]

I certainly congratulate my hon. Friend, along with colleagues, on his lobbying for that important expansion of that new enterprise zone. We are seeing across the country that enterprise zones are one of a number of policies that are attracting and driving jobs. Very large numbers of jobs are being created, reversing the pattern under the previous Government.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

T7. In the time that he has been in government, East Berkshire college has lost 40% of its Government funding, and the courses that have been hit, while apprenticeships have been protected, are technician-level courses, so we will not have the nursery nurses, the lab technicians or the IT technicians that business and industry desperately need. What is he going to do about it?