Local Government Finance

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Wednesday 11th February 2026 Commons Chamber

[David Simmonds]

I hesitate to disagree with my right hon. Friend, but it was not ever thus. The rural services grant referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Sir Ashley Fox) was a measure to address those additional cost burdens, including direct costs arising from statutory duties. It was a funding stream that is being removed by this Labour Government.

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—

[Natasha Irons (Croydon East) (Lab)]

rose—

[David Simmonds]

I will give way to my constituency neighbour.

[Gareth Thomas]

The shadow Minister will remember that when the Conservative party took control of Harrow council four years ago, it did so on a promise of freezing council tax, which he presumably campaigned on. Instead, council tax has risen by 20% over the past four years. Will the shadow Minister take the opportunity to apologise to the people of Pinner—indeed, of Harrow more generally—for his party saying one thing when it was campaigning and then doing exactly the reverse, increasing the cost of living for his constituents and mine?

[David Simmonds]

Without wishing to be parochial, I am sure the hon. Member would also like to join in the apologies for the appalling level of corruption that had taken place under Labour in the London borough of Harrow. As has been covered extensively in the local and national media, it left an astonishing legacy of cost overruns in the local authority’s highways department, which has taken a good deal to recover from. I am sure we would not want the House to be inadvertently misled about the impact of those cost overruns.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Harrow council was on the verge of bankruptcy until Ministers announced substantial extra funding in the local government settlement. Council officers told councillors that they were facing a budget deficit of more than £32 million, and they were planning to use virtually all the council’s reserves to fill the gap if the settlement for Harrow was not as generous as in fact it was. They were even contemplating having to ask for exceptional financial support status, so I particularly welcome the 31% increase in funding for Harrow over this Parliament that the Government announced in December. The last multi-year funding settlement for the council, under Theresa May and Boris Johnson, delivered just a 5% increase, so a 31% uplift over this Parliament is a significant step forward.

Harrow certainly needs that uplift, because over the last four years residents have become increasingly concerned about how the council has been managed. Council tax has increased by more than inflation every year. Rents and service charges imposed by the council have rocketed. Crucial parts of the council’s responsibilities have been rated as inadequate and needing improvement. Basic critical services such as street cleaning have been cut to the bone, and new housing to ease the housing and homelessness crisis has been stalled, delayed or just axed. Council officers have told senior councillors that without that increase, Harrow would have faced having to approach the Secretary of State; it would have been at risk of bankruptcy, and of needing exceptional financial support.

Although a combination of recent mismanagement of council finances and a decade of austerity has done considerable damage to our public services, Harrow remains one of the lowest-funded councils, both in London and nationally, so I say gently to the Secretary of State that I hope he will understand when I tell him that I will continue to press for further funds to improve our local services. It is worth underlining that between 2013-14 and 2022-23, the council saw cuts in its funding from the Tory, and Tory-Liberal Democrat, Governments of more than £50 million, and a reduction of a shocking 97% in the revenue support grants. One of the consequences of that level of austerity was vastly weakened public services.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

May I tell the hon. Gentleman about austerity?

[Gareth Thomas]

I am happy to give the right hon. Gentleman a way into the debate, but he might prefer to sit down and make a longer contribution later.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

No, no. The one thing that the Secretary of State got right when he was wagging his finger to my left was his implication about the Liberal Democrats. I was at the heart of that Administration. Danny Alexander was Chief Secretary to the Treasury and had to be restrained by George Osborne, so gung-ho was he about making greater cuts. Personally, I would have given him his head, but don’t let them escape!

[Gareth Thomas]

I am happy to join the right hon. Gentleman in again condemning the role that the Liberal Democrats played, but if he was the sane voice in the Government at the time, I hope he will forgive me for being—slightly—even more concerned about what was going on.

One of the understated problems resulting from the austerity that Harrow has suffered has been the decline in the quality of vital local services. Children’s services were rated inadequate by Ofsted just last year, and immediate improvement was required in eight areas. They included leadership stability, particularly relating to management and oversight of staff and social workers; the

“quality of support, advice and guidance for care leavers”;

the “quality of help” for children who were homeless; the

“quality and consistency in the response”

when care leavers went missing; and the consistency of staffing to support children. Some of the most vulnerable children in my community and across Harrow more generally have been let down by Harrow council. Two years earlier, the Conservative councillors who led Harrow council had driven through major cuts to children’s services of over £2.5 million. Astonishingly, the current Conservative leadership locally is proposing another round of major cuts to children’s services.

One particular case in my constituency stands out. At a nursery, parents reported significant bruising on their child, in what looked like the shape of a child’s footprint. The matter was referred to social services. The parents were arrested and went to court, and the child was taken into emergency foster care. Eventually, the case against the parents was rightly dropped when the court accepted that the original bruising was caused by a child’s foot. In the meantime, during supervised contact that was arranged by Harrow social services, the parents found extensive injuries on the child and reported them to the social worker. Given the scale of the injuries, there should have been a serious investigation at the time, but there was not. In the nearly three years since, the council has struggled to get answers to its questions, and the parents inevitably remain profoundly affected by what has happened to their child, and by what they have been put through as a family. I wish I could say that was an isolated case, but it is not. Although I welcome the additional funding that the council will get, which it will be able to put into social care for young people, there are other measures that I hope the Secretary of State will consider further down the line.

It is not just children’s services that have been affected; the Care Quality Commission has said that adult social care run by Harrow council requires improvement. That certainly did not come as a huge surprise to many carers, elderly people and other vulnerable adults in Harrow. Just last year, the council was ordered to pay compensation to an elderly resident with dementia and her family. The resident needed medical help after she was neglected and let down by the care home in which she had been placed by Harrow council.

Since 2022, Harrow has become the third most expensive council in London for council tax, behind Tory-run Croydon and Liberal Democrat-led Kingston upon Thames. Harrow’s Conservative councillors have put up council tax by the maximum possible every year they have been in power, and they plan to continue doing so—a 20% rise in council tax since 2022, despite their promises to freeze it.

Council tenants have been hit with the maximum rent increases allowable in each of the past four years, while leaseholders’ service charges have rocketed. Astonishingly, some leaseholders in properties owned by Harrow council are expecting to see their service charges rise by 70% this year. One family, currently paying £2,000 annually, have been sent a bill for £3,400 for next year. Those rates are simply unacceptable in the midst of a cost of living crisis, and I hope the council will review them urgently.

[Lincoln Jopp]

Does the hon. Member believe that people who promise not to raise council tax should not raise council tax?

[Gareth Thomas]

Conservative councillors in Harrow promised not to raise council tax but duly did so. I hope the hon. Gentleman will join me in urging the shadow Secretary of State to ask the leader of the council to explain to the people of Harrow why he reneged on his promise.

Regeneration should be an opportunity to build more affordable and social housing, and to help tackle the housing crisis that we face in communities like mine. It should surely involve local communities, create opportunities for them to come together, and provide for key local services. Instead, the completion of the redevelopment of the Grange Farm estate has been delayed multiple times—again, a product of the lack of funding and poor leadership locally.

[Matt Rodda]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent point, and I am very sorry to hear about the challenges that his residents have with their council. Some local authorities are doing the exact opposite of what he describes. In my area, Reading borough council recently opened 46 new council houses, built on its own land, as part of a programme to build nearly 800. There are local authorities that are able to grip this issue, and I am very sad to hear about the situation at his council. Perhaps it could learn something from Reading and other councils around the country.

[Gareth Thomas]

I would certainly welcome the news that the Conservative councillors in Harrow responsible for housing were looking at councils that are committed to building more council homes, like those in my hon. Friend’s constituency.

The failure to complete the redevelopment means that residents have had to put up with mice, damp and substandard accommodation for too long on the Grange Farm estate. On other regeneration schemes in Wealdstone, plans for affordable housing have been axed, no new council housing that had not already been planned by the previous council has been built, and a primary school that was due to be provided has been axed. Developers are not being held properly to account, and a major opportunity to lift the quality of life in the borough has been missed.

A consistent complaint that I have heard from constituents of mine is that they find it very difficult to get to see anyone at the council. They do not know where to go to meet council staff to sort out problems and discuss issues in their neighbourhood. Shortly after the local Conservative party took over running Harrow council, it closed Harrow’s civic centre. It was due to be replaced by a smaller set of council offices in Wealdstone, on what is currently the Peel Road car park. That would have given Harrow residents access to council staff, and helped increase the number of people using businesses on the local high street. It would have freed up council-owned land for much-needed affordable housing and for new workspaces, retail and commercial spaces, as well as a new primary school, a new library, a new park for residents to enjoy and a new town square. However, the civic centre remains closed—derelict and boarded up—and major decisions on regeneration have been delayed or cancelled. No new set of accessible council offices is planned, and no one knows when, or indeed if, new promised housing will go ahead. Instead, local Conservative councillors have spent thousands of pounds doing up their council offices, yet members of the public are not allowed in.

[Lincoln Jopp]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

--- Later in debate ---

[Gareth Thomas]

If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I have given way to him once, and I leave him to hope to catch your eye later, Madam Deputy Speaker.

The public will get their say on the situation in Harrow in May, but the failures at Harrow council raise other questions. Reversing the decade and more of austerity for local services is clearly a priority, and the settlement that was announced in December makes a good start on that objective. Harrow certainly needs a serious examination of its funding formula, but surely raising the quality of local services needs to be more than just the responsibility of local people. In 2015, the Opposition parties decided to abolish the Audit Commission, a body that usefully challenged councils much earlier on, and helped prevent many poor management practices of the sort we regularly see in Harrow from developing and getting out of control.

[Danny Beales]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Rightly, this Government are putting more money back into local government for the first time in many years. That is long overdue, but that money has to be well spent. Unfortunately, what he describes in Harrow is quite similar to the experience of my residents in Hillingdon. The independent auditors are quite damning about the council’s budgeting approach. Millions of pounds have been misallocated, and there were no opening and closing balances, well into the financial year. It was recently reported by the press that the council, in a secret deal, had written off a former Tory councillor’s debt, all while applying for exceptional financial support from this Government, so I completely agree with him. Do we not need more independent oversight and audit of local government finance?

[Gareth Thomas]

We certainly need more independent oversight of the way in which Conservative councils in outer London are managing their finances. I am completely with my hon. Friend on that score, and the story of what has happened in Hillingdon is almost as bad as the situation we have faced in Harrow over the last four years. The one bright spot has been the increase in finance that the Secretary of State has delivered for Harrow. We need a review of the funding formula for Harrow, but I welcome the settlement we have had, and I look forward to continuing to persuade him of the case for more funding in Harrow.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

Holocaust Memorial Day

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Thursday 29th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Bob Blackman]

Indeed, I condemn that action, and all actions that seek in some way, shape or form to glorify or justify the Holocaust.

The lesson matters profoundly today. Holocaust Memorial Day plays a vital part in educating the public on the dangers of prejudice, discrimination and hatred—dangers that, if left unchecked, can escalate once again into violence and even genocide. It honours survivors and preserves their testimony, particularly now that the number of first-hand witnesses is sadly diminishing—a point to which the hon. Member for Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket alluded. The theme for this year, “Bridging Generations”, is therefore a powerful call to action. The responsibility for remembrance does not end with the survivors. It must be passed on to their children, grandchildren and all of us, so that memory becomes responsibility. That matters, because antisemitism in the UK remains at alarmingly high levels. Following the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel on 7 October 2023, antisemitic incidents surged dramatically. According to the Community Security Trust, 1,521 antisemitic incidents were recorded in the first half of 2025 alone—the second highest total ever recorded for that period. Although that is lower than the number in the record year of 2024, that still represents a sustained and deeply troubling level of hostility that is far above the pre-October 7 averages.

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, I do not always agree with him, but I very much agree with the case that he is making today and what he is saying. He mentioned the surge in antisemitism in the UK. Would he agree that Ofcom needs to crack down on online hatred—particularly antisemitism, but also Islamophobic tweets? The Jewish community and those of many other faiths are subject to a terrifying amount of online hatred.

[Bob Blackman]

I thank the hon. Gentleman, my constituency neighbour, for that intervention. The sad reality is that following my question to the Deputy Prime Minister yesterday, my social media accounts were loaded with antisemitic tropes. It is a disgrace, and Ofcom has to take action. It is our duty to ensure that hate speech is never allowed to continue. I believe in free speech, but I do not believe in preaching hatred to one another, regardless of religion, and action has to be taken on that.

Greater London and Greater Manchester remain hotspots of antisemitism; there was an attack on the synagogue in Manchester during Yom Kippur. Online antisemitism, to which the hon. Member for Harrow West (Gareth Thomas) just referred, now accounts for well more than a third of all incidents. Holocaust-related abuse appears with disturbing frequency, and there has been a sharp rise in the glorification of the Holocaust. Behind these statistics lies a chilling reality: many Jewish people in Britain feel unsafe, unwelcome or forced to hide their identity in public. Surveys suggest that around half have considered leaving the UK due to antisemitism. That should trouble every one of us.

We must be honest about the ways in which contemporary antisemitism often disguises itself. Increasingly, anti-Israel activism functions as a Trojan horse for antisemitism, allowing ancient prejudice to re-enter public discourse under the cover of political critique. Legitimate criticism of any Government is entirely valid, but when Israel becomes uniquely demonised, Zionism is used as a slur and Jewish institutions and individuals are targeted, regardless of their views, we are no longer in the realm of political debate. CST data shows that a significant proportion of antisemitic incidents now blend anti-Zionist language with classic antisemitic tropes: claims of secret control, collective guilt or global conspiracy. On campuses and online platforms, and in public demonstrations such as yesterday’s, Jewish students and citizens are increasingly made to feel responsible simply for who they are. That not only undermines free speech; it poisons it.

We must confront the disturbing rise of Holocaust inversion: the grotesque distortion that portrays Jews or Israel as the new Nazis. That is not merely offensive rhetoric; it threatens and trivialises the Shoah, inverts reality, and inflicts profound harm on survivors and their families. Equating the Star of David with the swastika or accusing the Jewish state of genocide is not historical analysis; it is antisemitism. We must be clear and unequivocal in condemning it.

On Holocaust Memorial Day, we should acknowledge the historical link between the Holocaust and the modern state of Israel. Zionism long predates the second world war, but the genocide of European Jewry underscored with devastating clarity the need for a Jewish homeland—a place of refuge and self-determination. Many Holocaust survivors helped build that nation, carrying the scars of the camps with them. Attempts to de-legitimise Israel ignore that history and risk erasing the fundamental lesson of “never again”.

Finally, I want to turn to the future. Last week, the Holocaust Memorial Act 2026 received Royal Assent, paving the way for the national Holocaust memorial and learning centre to be built in Victoria Tower Gardens, beside this very Parliament. Proposed by a cross-party commission more than a decade ago, the memorial will honour the victims and educate generations to come. The proposal was started by Lord Cameron and was supported cross-party. As the hon. Member for Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket said, we must get that memorial built before the last of the survivors is no longer with us. Its location matters. It will stand as a permanent reminder, at the heart of our democracy, of where hatred can lead when left unchallenged.

As we remember the victims today, we also reaffirm our responsibility to challenge antisemitism wherever it appears, defend democratic values and human dignity, and ensure that history is neither forgotten nor distorted. When we see demonstrations and attempts to blockade Jewish businesses, restaurants and synagogues, we must call it out for what it is: antisemitism, pure and simple. Remembrance is not only about the past; it is a warning for the present, and a duty that we owe to future generations. I and, I believe, the whole House will recommit to carrying out that duty.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Monday 13th October 2025 Commons Chamber

[Samantha Dixon]

Absolutely. I am really encouraged by the way that local communities are seizing the opportunity of Pride in Place funding, and taking it forward to deal with an issue that affects every council across the country.

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

9. Whether he plans to include community-led housing within the long-term housing strategy.

[The Minister for Housing and Planning (Matthew Pennycook)]

The Government recognise that community-led housing delivers a wide range of benefits. We strengthened support for it in the revised national planning policy framework published last year, and in March we announced a 10-year social finance investment to provide capital funding for community-led housing. As part of the development of our long-term housing strategy, we are considering how the Government might further support the growth of the sector.

[Gareth Thomas]

Redwood Housing Co-operative spans five floors of social housing in the iconic OXO Tower on the south bank of the River Thames. Given that Redwood is run by its tenants, charges some of the lowest rents in central London and offers some of the best views, should not every community have a Redwood?

[Matthew Pennycook]

My hon. Friend has long championed co-operatives, and I recognise his commitment to expanding co-ops in London and across the country. With that example, he draws our attention to the benefits that they can provide. We are considering opportunities to legislate to establish a legal framework for a co-operative housing tenure, which would help formalise the rights and responsibilities of both co-operatives and their tenants, and make co-operative housing a more attractive option. As my hon. Friend will know, I am more than happy to discuss the matter with him further at a suitable opportunity in the near future.

Indefinite Leave to Remain

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Monday 8th September 2025 Westminster Hall

[Rachel Blake]

I thank the hon. Member for that contribution.

I want to focus my remarks on those who have BNO visas and particularly on the importance of stability in that system. I first became particularly interested in the lives of people living in Hong Kong because of my constituent, Jimmy Lai, who is currently interred in Hong Kong because he stood up for freedom and democracy. That brought me to be profoundly concerned about the importance of BNO visas.

While it is absolutely right that we should be discussing how we appropriately balance the many benefits of migration with the concerns that some people have about the current system, I do think it important that we have stability in the system and recognise that the bar to securing indefinite leave to remain is already high. I will be focusing very closely on the Home Office proposals to ensure that we are standing by those principles and the values of fairness and stability.

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. I wonder whether she will allow me to register a concern on behalf of those from Hong Kong who live in Harrow, many of whom are making a very significant contribution to our community and are genuinely worried about these proposals.

[Rachel Blake]

I thank my hon. Friend for those remarks about the concerns of his constituents in Harrow.

In any forthcoming consultation, I will focus on ensuring that we stick to those values of fairness and stability. There is already a high bar for those seeking indefinite leave to remain, who came to this country expecting to comply with particular rules and will be going forward with their applications in the very near future.

Local Government Finance (England)

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Wednesday 9th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Why does the Secretary of State think that the Conservative chair of the Local Government Association, James Jamieson, has criticised the settlement for not including sufficient funding to tackle the considerable additional pressures on local services, particularly with respect to vulnerable adults and children?

[Michael Gove]

I talked to James Jamieson this morning, as I do most weeks. One reason why he leads the LGA is that he is a brilliant Conservative council leader. If James were here, I think he would say he was not criticising but encouraging us, as any friend would, to do even better. It is striking that the welcome that the local government sector gave this year’s funding settlement was broader, deeper and more cordial than it has been for some years. Politics being politics, any sector will always, entirely understandably, want its champion to be someone who can ask for more.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

This has been a really interesting debate. I want to pick up a few points made by hon. Members. In particular, my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) gently—and rightly—chastised the Government for not offering a multi-year agreement for local government and asked what has happened to business rates reform. He and my right hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley (Sir George Howarth) rightly made afresh the point about the need for a fair funding review to focus genuinely on need and poverty if the Government’s levelling-up agenda is to have any substance.

If I may, I will also praise the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) and his point about fiscal and financial devolution for local government. Sadly, we remain one of the most centralised nations, certainly in Europe, in the way we approach local services. Like him, I would strongly support the Secretary of State’s taking up the challenge of negotiating with the Chancellor of the Exchequer for more fiscal devolution for local government. Nowhere is the argument for such fiscal and financial devolution more pertinent than in the scandalous treatment of Transport for London, with the Secretary of State for Transport demanding that the Mayor of London put up council tax to pay for concessionary fares for the elderly and the young—of which more anon, if I may. I also thought the hon. Member was right about special educational needs and the need to provide more dedicated funding, particularly to London authorities as virtually every London borough is facing huge additional pressures in that area.

Local councils are fundamental to the quality of the places where we live. They are not always universally loved, but they are essential for keeping our communities safe and our streets clean. They help create the environment in which we all want to live—for example, through the planning decisions they take—and they drive opportunities for young and old to access high-quality education, the arts, sports and leisure. Yet, tragically, they have been neglected for a decade under the Conservative party.

Too many in our communities up and down the country feel that they are not able to influence the future of the area in which they live, and that they have too little control over how their area looks, how it changes and the services they can access. If we are to help constituents shape the areas they live in and drive improvements in the services they depend on, then one—not the only one, but a crucial one—of the essential routes to doing that is to empower local councils. That means tackling the legacy of the active neglect of local councils which, I am afraid to say, has characterised the Treasury and much of the Department in recent years.

A number of bodies over recent years have published studies that paint an all-too-similar and familiar picture of declining support from central Government to local councils. Those funding cuts have made it easier for developers to do what they want where they want, and the 600-plus changes to planning law that Ministers have brought in have certainly helped in that regard. The funding cuts have made it harder to strengthen community-run services, and they have put pressure on councils to sell community assets and slowed down investment in crucial local services.

The National Audit Office has charted how the spending power of local councils, funded by central Government, has fallen in real terms by more than 50% in the last 10 years. Those cuts in funding have coincided with growing pressures on council-run services through bigger populations; the increasing numbers of the elderly, vulnerable adults and young people needing vital care and support; and, in London in particular, the rising number of homeless families. All of that has helped to squeeze the discretionary funding that councils have to spend on enforcement action against antisocial behaviour and rogue developments, as well as on street cleaning, services such as libraries, and supporting local charities, all of which have together impacted slowly but steadily on the quality of life in our towns and district centres.

Across London, since 2010, councils have seen a 25% reduction in funding, even though there are 1 million more Londoners. Harrow remains one of the lowest-funded councils both in London and nationally. We are fortunately well led by Councillor Graham Henson, we have strong officers and, certainly over the last four years, we have had very strong finance leads in Natasha Proctor and Councillor Adam Swersky. However, over the last 10 years, the main source of funding from central Government to Harrow—the revenue support grant—has reduced by 97% to just £1.6 million, a reduction of over £50 million for Harrow. There are other grants, but they are ringfenced to a large extent. To maintain balanced budgets, the council has had to find £150 million of savings as well as ways to raise new income, and has had to decide between making cuts to services or raising council tax. It has been able to make savings and efficiencies of some £98 million over that time, but it has had to reduce services and consistently to increase council tax in line with the Government’s expectations.

Despite all those steps, every year it remains a huge challenge to balance the council’s budget. Harrow has a good track record of financial management. It has strong collection rates and has not reported a revenue budget overspend for many years. It has not had to use its small reserves to prop up its budget. It is a remarkable tribute to officers and councillors in Harrow that they have such a good record of financial management, but of course in the past two years in particular they have done all that while managing the disproportionate impact of covid on the borough. Of course, the pandemic has affected every part of the UK. In Harrow there has been a significantly higher than average rate of infection compared with the rest of London, yet Harrow has received one of the lowest allocations of emergency funding of all London boroughs. In 2019-20, Harrow’s core spending power per head was estimated to be £170 lower than the London average and £75 lower than the England average. The fair funding review that has been promised needs to tackle that disparity.

Despite the considerable financial challenges the council has faced, it has succeeded in securing the future of vital community assets. The future of Harrow Arts Centre is now secure, investment in the Sir Roger Bannister athletics stadium has been achieved and the Harrow Museum has a new funding future. That is all positive and the council is trying to increase support to the victims of domestic violence and to young carers, as well as to improve street cleaning and to increase enforcement activity and investment in local parks. However, it is not able to increase support or invest at the level that it and local residents would want because of the financial challenges that I have set out.

Councils are far from universally popular, as I have said. They can seem too remote and their services can be frustrating to access, but in my experience in Harrow there are proud and committed staff in every part of the council who are determined to do what they can to make Harrow an even better place to live. Harrow councillors, those from my party and those in the opposition ranks, who challenge them, are remarkably dedicated given that most are paid very little and have to manage their responsibilities alongside other jobs. I want Harrow to be an even better place to live, and first of all that requires the Government to invest more in the ambitions of local people by supporting Harrow Council more than they have to date.

I also want to mention London and how the Mayor of London is being pressured into raising council tax to protect vital travel concessions for young people and the over-60s and to provide further funding for policing. Indeed, I understand that the Secretary of State for Transport personally told the Mayor that council tax had to go up. The pandemic has had the same devastating impact on the finances of TfL as it did on privatised rail companies, yet those failing privatised rail companies were bailed out straight away and without any strings attached.

Despite the Mayor’s doing the right thing to protect Londoners during the pandemic, the Transport Secretary is still refusing to fund TfL properly, offering only another sticking plaster deal. As I understand it, the Transport Secretary is refusing to meet the Mayor to discuss those issues.

[Chris Loder]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the Secretary of State for Transport and this Conservative Government have—I understand for the second time—given the Mayor a multibillion-pound settlement to help with the operation of TfL, which has been to the detriment of constituencies such as mine in West Dorset, where we are not able to get the transport, in favour of Transport for London?

[Gareth Thomas]

With all due respect to the hon. Gentleman, I do not think it will help the people of West Dorset or the rest of the UK in general if we leave London with a poor transport service. Just as I would like to see his community getting better support from the Secretary of State, I hope he might have the grace to recognise that Harrow and London in general also need to be properly supported as we come out of the pandemic.

[Mr Jones]

Is not the reason why Dorset has one of the highest levels of council tax that the Government who have been in power since 2010 have reduced the revenue support grant directly to that council and pushed it on to local Dorset taxpayers?

[Gareth Thomas]

My right hon. Friend makes an important point. I do not know whether the hon. Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder) has been challenging the Government in that regard—I think I heard a bit of gentle criticism, but perhaps he needs to make some more pointed remarks to the Secretary of State in private.

We are in the midst of a cost of living crisis, and Government Ministers are demanding further council tax rises to fund local councils, the police and transport for the elderly and the young in Harrow. That is yet another financial blow to hard-hit families. If, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy) on the Front Bench rightly said at the outset, the Conservative party had not allowed so much money to be wasted on fraud, corruption and personal protective equipment that could not be used, there would be money to invest in more policing in local councils such as Dorset and, crucially, Harrow, and to invest in better services for local people in my borough and beyond.

CCRC Decision on 44 Post Office Prosecutions

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Monday 5th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Paul Scully]

Nobody but nobody, least of all me, can fail to be appalled by what we read about some of the situations, and some of the hardship and worse that many constituents have been through. That is why I am determined to listen to the evidence to ensure that we get those answers, so that it can never happen again.

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

The truth is that Ministers have set up a half-baked inquiry in response to this extraordinary scandal, without the powers to fully get to the bottom of this mess. Will the Minister at least commit to returning to this House to set out in full both the compensation arrangements and any financial implications for the future of the Post Office?

[Paul Scully]

Let us see what the result is from Sir Wyn Williams’ investigations and inquiry in the first place. Compensation is a matter for the Post Office, which has talked about the historical shortfall scheme. It wants to ensure that people who are wrongfully convicted are compensated accordingly.

Local Government Responsibilities: Public Services

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Wednesday 18th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Barbara Keeley]

I agree with my hon. Friend. It is great to hear that the NHS will get what it needs, but what about the social care sector?

We know, as my hon. Friend just said, that many care providers were already on the brink of collapse. Many will not have reserves to fall back on. I ask the Minister, as my hon. Friend just has: what will the Government do to sustain care provision and ensure that care providers are able to carry on delivering care at this time?

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend is making a good point about social care in the broader sense. I want to raise the needs of local charities, some of which provide social care, and others provide a range of other services. Does she know whether some of the funding that the Government have allocated to local authorities will be earmarked to support continued funding of those local charities and community groups, or whether that has not yet been considered?

[Barbara Keeley]

That is a very good question, and we should ask it in addition to the questions that I will ask, because the independent and voluntary sector is vital in our communities and in care provision.

I want to touch on the issues facing care homes across the country. We know that the Government are asking older people to avoid social contact for the next three months, but we need to be clear—clearer than we have been—about what that will mean for people in care homes. Will the Government recommend that all visits from friends and family be stopped until June? Can the Minister tell us what guidance on visits they are giving to organisations running care homes? Providers and their networks do not seem to have had any clarity yet.

The Care Quality Commission has announced a pause in its inspections, freeing up staff time to focus on care, but today it has published its independent review of Whorlton Hall. That was a shocking scandal. People with learning disabilities and autistic people and their families will want reassurances that, once this crisis passes, the CQC will focus its full efforts on ensuring that something like Whorlton Hall never happens again.

Many older and disabled people do not receive formal social care. Instead, they rely on unpaid friends and family. I know that many unpaid carers are worried that they will contract coronavirus or have to self-isolate and be unable to give the care they normally do. What steps should any unpaid carer who has symptoms of coronavirus take? If they are being asked to self-isolate, what alternative care can be provided at short notice? If someone cares for a person they do not live with, what steps can be taken if the carer has to self-isolate or if the Government have to further restrict travel, as many unpaid carers live some distance away from the people they care for?

Young carers—children and young people—may need more support than others in managing the changing situation in their lives, especially if their local supermarket or pharmacist does not have supplies. It is important that, if schools or years within schools close, it is understood which children within those schools are identified as young carers. It is often the case that a school or a teacher within a school is the only person who knows that one of their pupils is looking after someone at home. Schools could nominate a lead person to make regular contact with young carers during this difficult time when they are not in school.

Another major issue facing carers is the supply of medicines, hygiene products and food. Carers have to source supplies such as antibacterial wipes or disinfectant themselves. Unfortunately, we have seen panic buying of those goods, making them far harder to acquire. What can the Government and local authorities do to ensure that unpaid carers and the people they care for do not have to go without crucial supplies, including food?

The Government’s reasonable worst-case scenario implies that we can expect to see one in five workers off sick at the same time. There are an estimated 122,000 vacancies across social care currently—a workforce problem that we know forces existing care staff to cut visits short or work beyond their paid hours. It is understandable that people receiving care and unpaid family carers are very concerned about how care can be provided if we get to a situation where large numbers of care staff are off sick or self-isolating.

In the coronavirus Bill, the Government want to make changes to the Care Act 2014 to enable local authorities to prioritise the services they offer, in order to ensure that the most urgent and serious care needs are met, even if that means not meeting everyone’s assessed needs in full or delaying some assessments. I am sure that we will discuss those measures when we consider the Bill next week, but the guidance on the Bill says:

“Local authorities will still be expected to do as much as they can to comply with their duties to meet needs during this period and these amendments would not remove the duty of care they have towards an individual’s risk of serious neglect or harm.

These powers would only be used if demand pressures and workforce illness during the pandemic meant that local authorities were at imminent risk of failing to fulfil their duties and only last the duration of the emergency.”

I know that people who are worried about this will want to hear any further guidance on the circumstances under which the powers would be used. Finally, I want to touch on some of the issues facing specific groups who are receiving social care.

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[Gareth Thomas]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way to me a second time. Is there not also a broader point about certainty of future funding for local authorities and certainty about which of the additional costs they face from coronavirus will be met by central Government going forward? My local authority, which is not by any definition well off, is concerned about when it will receive clarity from the Government on which costs it can reasonably expect Ministers to cover.

[Barbara Keeley]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We will need certainty about those things when we look at the coronavirus emergency Bill, which we will do shortly, but this lands on local authorities at a time when they do not have any certainty. There is much about their financial position that needs to be made clearer to local authorities. I also agree with my hon. Friend: my local authority has had budgets cut by more than 50% since 2010, and we were in what we were calling a crisis in social care even before this happened.

I want to talk more fully about people with dementia and people with learning disabilities. There are a million people with dementia in this country and many people with learning disabilities. Not all of them will be able to comprehend the importance of self-isolation and then act appropriately. What measures and guidance will the Government introduce to help people with learning disabilities or dementia to self-isolate? Many working-age people with disabilities may be more vulnerable. Conditions such as Down syndrome or multiple sclerosis could increase the risk of respiratory infection, and the guidance suggests that people with these conditions would self-isolate. Can the Minister tell us what financial support will be available for them and their families if they have to stop work to do that?

We understand that this is a difficult and challenging time for all, but the Government have talked of using volunteers in health and social care services. People with disabilities and older people who need care have some of the most complex care needs. How will the Government ensure that people with complex needs continue to receive the support and care they need to stay in their own homes?

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[Luke Hall]

I am sorry to give the hon. Lady a similar answer to the one I gave the hon. Member for Luton South (Rachel Hopkins), but we will outline a package of support very shortly. I can assure her that that guidance will be out by the end of tomorrow. I very much hope that by that time her local authority will have security to start financial planning.

[Gareth Thomas]

I understand the difficulty the Minister has in giving us the clarity we would all like on our authorities’ particular concerns. Certainly, my local authority would like clarity that this package of support will not be for just this financial year, albeit that the support, and clarity on what it can be spent on, is needed now. Given the impact that this situation will have on local authority finances beyond this financial year, it would be reassuring to have soon the beginnings of some certainty about financial support for the next financial year. Local authority staff would also like the ability to get in contact with people in Government so they can understand and pass on answers to some of the detailed questions that businesses and other organisations have about what the Government are announcing.

[Luke Hall]

Those are two points well made. On the hon. Gentleman’s second point, if he is having any trouble at all communicating with my Department, he should please let me know directly. I assure him that we are speaking to councils every single day to make sure that we communicate information as quickly as possible in this fast-moving environment. We understand that getting out the guidance as quickly as we can is going to be vital.

As the hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South said, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government announced the initial £3.2 million targeted at rough sleepers and people who are in danger of sleeping rough, in case they need accommodation should they need to self-isolate. She asked for assurances about whether that was the totality of the amount; I assure her that that was the initial funding. We are of course continuing to look at what will be a complex matter as we look to support some of those people into accommodation during self-isolation periods.

Draft National Minimum Wage (Amendment) Regulations 2020 Draft National Minimum Wage (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 2020

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Tuesday 17th March 2020 General Committees

[Paul Scully]

By contacting 2,000 employers, we are reminding them of their legal responsibilities. I understand the hon. Gentleman’s concern about vulnerability and whistleblowing in those situations, but that is why it is important that we give HMRC the resource that it needs to have proactive oversight, and to go to those companies that are most likely to offer and advertise unpaid internships, so that we can nip it in the bud. To build our understanding, so that HMRC can follow the matter up properly, we have incorporated a question into the Department for Education’s employer skills survey, asking 90,000 UK employers whether they have used unpaid interns. Results are expected in late spring 2020, and we will follow up on that.

On the protection of the low-paid self-employed, we will introduce the Employment Bill, which covers a couple of the questions that were raised. That is a result of the good work plan published by Matthew Taylor and his colleagues. We hope to tackle a number of the issues raised in that report and will publish the Bill as soon as we can to ensure that it gets scrutiny from, and involvement of, all parties in its development. I look forward to introducing the Bill and having debates on it so that we continue to lead on workers’ rights.

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I apologise for missing the Minister’s opening remarks. He will understand the particular concern among the low-paid and self-employed about their situation during the coronavirus crisis, as my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston mentioned. Can the Minister give us a hint about Government announcements in that area, as part of the process of reassuring constituents who are in that employment bracket?

[Paul Scully]

Unfortunately, I am not the Chancellor, but I look forward to the statement this evening. At this time, it is important that we continue to speak out daily for businesses and, as the hon. Gentleman rightly points out, for the self-employed, for workers and for people who are worried not just about their jobs and the viability of the business, but about shifts in those areas. Make no mistake, we have all seen in our inboxes the amount of concern out there, so it is so important that we continue to address the concerns of self-employed workers, employees and businesses. The Chancellor introduced a timely and targeted package last week in his Budget, but things are clearly moving at pace, and we will see what he says during his statement at 7 o’clock.

On the future of the national living wage, although we are increasing it and getting through the technicalities now, it is really important to reiterate the point about younger workers. We are planning to extend the reach of the national living wage to workers aged 23 and over from April 2021, and to workers aged 21 and over by 2024. Unfortunately, I suspect that the children of the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston will have already reached that higher level by that time.

A UK-wide minimum wage, recommended by the independent expert Low Pay Commission, ensures that the pay of the lowest paid in society is protected, and means that businesses compete on a level playing field. In 2016, the Government committed to raising the national living wage to 60% of median earnings, and we have stayed true to that commitment. We have the highest employment rate since comparable records began. The strength of our labour market shows that a higher minimum wage can go hand in hand with strong employment growth.

Local Government Finance (England)

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Monday 24th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Robert Jenrick]

It will be, yes, and that is absolutely right. It is important that the new formula, when we bring it forward, takes account of sparsity, the cost of delivering public services in rural settings and the fact that there is deprivation to be found in shire counties, as there is in other parts of the country. I say that as a representative of the county of Nottinghamshire, with long-standing pockets of deprivation in former coalfield communities, all of which needs to be taken into consideration as we bring forward a better updated formula.

Another priority on which not just social care but so many other vital services rest is ensuring that councils have the stability that they need to plan ahead, and I believe that this settlement will help them to do that. It maintains all the grants from 2019-20 and increases core funding in line with inflation. Today, I am announcing a £40 million boost for the sector from the business rates levy account—extra funding that I know will be very welcome by the sector. I recognise that this is a one-year settlement, and I will be leading another push at the comprehensive spending review later this year to ensure that local services get the long-term funding that they need. This stability also gives authorities a platform from which to drive efficiencies and learn from the very best practice of councils across the country, and will act as a spur to improvement.

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

One of the ways in which the Secretary of State could give multi-year, almost permanent, guarantees about levels of funding is through a much more ambitious programme of devolution. Is it not time for an English devolution Bill, so that all councils have the fiscal powers that they need to meet the needs of their communities?

[Robert Jenrick]

If the hon. Gentleman will give me a few minutes, I will come on to our ambitious plans for devolution. He will have seen in the Queen’s Speech that later this year we will bring forward a White Paper on English devolution, which we hope will build on the very good work done in recent years, including to establish Mayors across the country.

Today’s settlement is good news on many counts; it provides more money and more stability for councils, but above all, it is good news for local people. We are delivering the best settlement for a decade while keeping people’s council tax bills low. Under the Conservatives, council tax in England is 6% lower in real terms than in 2010. The average council tax bill increase in 2020-21 is projected to be below 4%. That compares to an average increase of 5.8% between 1997 and 2010. It was a Conservative-led Government who ultimately made sure that local people had the final say on their council tax bills, following years of tax rises under Labour.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Coming from Harrow, where the local authority has seen its grant from the Government reduced by some 97% in eight years, it is pretty difficult for me to find much to cheer in the report. Harrow’s core spending power per head this financial year is estimated to be £170 lower than the London average and £75 lower than the average for the rest of England. In short, we are one of the lowest-funded boroughs in London and nationally.

Despite No. 10’s talk of levelling up, there do not yet appear to be any grounds for optimism that the Chancellor’s Budget or future spending reviews are likely to lift Harrow up to a level of spending power similar to our neighbours in Hillingdon, Hertfordshire and Barnet. To be fair to those neighbours and, indeed, to other councils throughout the rest of England, it is not as if any of them are hugely well funded either. Councils in England face an £8 billion funding gap by 2025. Inevitably, more and more councils are struggling to balance the books and more and more councils are using reserves to plug budget holes.

Tory Northamptonshire has become the poster boy for troubled councils everywhere. It is true that incompetence and an over-zealous approach to privatisation were two particular local factors that drove the bankruptcy there, but the reality is that all councils are having to divert money away from youth services, public health, parks and libraries to fund the most basic services, such as street cleaning, social care and homelessness, and even those services are stripped down to the bone. In the long term, that is not only a false economy but affects our constituents’ wellbeing and sense of contentment with life in modern Britain. It means that some of the most vulnerable—those who are desperately in need of care or skilled specialist support in schools—will not get the back-up that they need. In the 21st century, in one of the richest nations in the world, it is difficult to fathom why Ministers are so comfortable about that situation.

If we are really to give the towns and villages of England, and the counties and communities of our great country, the control and transformation of fortunes that so many are desperate to see, the revitalisation of local councils and devolution of more power more consistently, even to the least fashionable of our town halls, is a first essential step. That great slogan “Take back control”, which spoke to so many, did not for most, I suspect, mean taking back powers from Brussels merely to allow Whitehall and Downing Street to continue to lord it over the rest of the country even more.

In recent years, the pace of devolution in England has slowed. The term “northern powerhouse” was a wonderfully evocative turn of phrase, but the lack of funding that followed its invention rightly generated much scepticism. A new surge of energy, with real financial power being devolved to northern councils, seems overdue, even from my distant southern viewpoint. If that is what the Department’s White Paper is set to offer, that would seem to be some progress, but London and the London councils need the same and more, as steps towards a genuine transfer of direct power back to the people. We need a new settlement of powers to help London tackle its major challenges, such as growing inequality, ever-increasing poverty, the skills shortage, the climate and housing crises and even violent crime. All require the mayor, the Assembly and, crucially, local councils to have access to greater powers to create London-specific solutions to London’s problems.

London generates more wealth for Britain’s people and contains more of our citizens than any other part of the UK. Indeed, London generated a third of the UK’s total GDP in 2018, yet we still do not have full control over skills or even benefits budgets.

I do not question the need for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland to continue to benefit from the Barnett formula, but I do think that the people of Barnet, and indeed the whole of London, should have our own funding formula too. London is the most expensive place to live and work in the UK, yet our Mayor and Assembly do not have the power to legislate on such crucial issues here, whereas Scotland can do so through Holyrood. In any future constitutional settlement, the UK’s southern powerhouse—its capital city—should be given the same powers as our national friends in Holyrood, the Senedd and Stormont.

For example, why can London not have the same powers now as the Scottish Parliament? Clearly there is not the same national issue driving the debate about where power best lies, but I would argue that the size of our capital’s population and the scale of the challenges it faces demands similar treatment. Why not give London, through our Assembly and Mayor, the right to legislate on all housing and planning matters? Why not have the same income tax-varying powers that Scotland has? Why do Londoners have to beg Whitehall for action to tackle air pollution, when the Mayor and city hall should be given full control to put in place a joined-up strategy to tackle all the various triggers of the pollution challenge in London? Too many of the powers they need are still locked up tight in the great Departments of state just down the road from here.

Why can London not have more control over how our water and sewage services are delivered and what we pay for them? There are more people living in absolute poverty in London than anywhere else in the UK, yet London’s local politicians in the Assembly and in the form of the Mayor are not allowed to determine the London living wage. The right to greater devolution is one that all England deserves, but London is the southern powerhouse of our United Kingdom, and its continued success will be even more essential post Brexit.

I recognise that with Rory Stewart’s sleeping bag having more cut-through than Shaun Bailey at the moment, there will not be much immediate enthusiasm in No. 10 for shifting more power to city hall, but London’s success benefits the whole country. The home counties, in particular, benefit from London’s city state success. All those Tory shires benefit from Labour London, and vice versa. When London grows, so too does the rest of the country. The reverse is also true; when London’s problems inhibit our potential, in the end it is not just Londoners who suffer. It took more than 40 years to start building work on Crossrail. Given the demands on our public transport system, we cannot afford to waste another 40 years before work on Crossrail 2 gets underway.

Levelling up, city deals and the northern powerhouse are all indicators of the slow dance, in our own very British way, towards federalism. London has an essential role to play with the nations of the UK in recasting the Union for the 21st century. For too long our country has been seen as comprising England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. I have always thought that we needed to empower the towns and cities of England alongside Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales, and London. There is growing recognition that, in order to secure the Union, the United Kingdom will have to reform and change. London cannot be ignored on that journey, and neither can the rest of England’s town and cities.

A better funding settlement than today’s shabby offering is long overdue, but a Government who want to defend the Union should also set out clearly and soon a package of legislative and fiscal devolution to turbo-charge the federal journey that our country needs to undertake.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Monday 13th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Robert Jenrick]

I thank my hon. Friend for her question. We are currently reviewing the recommendations of the commission and I shall respond in due course. I would be very happy to meet her and representatives from the Academy for Urbanism.

As regards capturing uplifts in land value, local planning authorities already use section 106 and the community infrastructure levy to pay for crucial affordable housing and infrastructure, and, as a result of changes we have made recently, there will shortly be greater transparency so that residents can see where this money is going.

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I have absolutely no idea whether co-operative housing is likely to benefit from the Government’s Building Better, Building Beautiful initiative, but by my definition it certainly should. Would the Secretary of State be willing to meet me and a small delegation from the co-op housing movement to see whether there can be a replication here in the UK of the successes that co-ops have had in the US in housing veterans and other people?