Local Government Finance

Debate between Gareth Thomas and Anna Soubry

Wednesday 22nd February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Thomas]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point, which is why it is all the more worrying that Ministers want to abolish the revenue support grant totally under the Local Government Finance Bill.

Perhaps I should not be too harsh on the Secretary of State. After all, he has had a rough week. He was accused by the former Conservative party chairman of “spinning the numbers”, and I hear that there was concern among Conservative Members that the Secretary of State was being hung out to dry by colleagues, so it was good to hear the Prime Minister’s spokesperson confirm that No. 10 still had full confidence in him. In truth, in just eight short months, the Secretary of State has been found asleep at the wheel twice—with a social care crisis entirely of the Government’s own making, about which he was warned well in advance; and now a business rates crisis, which he must have known might create a problem for many businesses, given that his party delayed the revaluation by two years, yet the seriousness of which it has apparently taken him until now to grasp.

[Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if county councils such as Nottinghamshire want to do better on social care, they can look at cutting their costs by going into a unitary authority? Conservative county councillors in Nottinghamshire agreed that that was a good idea, but Labour county councillors, no doubt thinking of their allowances, decided it was a bad idea.

[Mr Thomas]

I encourage the right hon. Lady, for whom I normally have a lot of respect, not to make such partisan and, I suspect, inaccurate points, but to look at a booklet published by the LGA Labour group that gives 100 examples of the way in which Labour councils have innovated during the past few years. She may want to encourage some Conservative councillors whom she knows to follow such examples.

The Secretary of State sent a letter to all his Conservative colleagues claiming that the concerns raised about business rates by businesses and hospitals were based, apparently, on a

“relentless campaign of distortions and half-truths”.

Leaving aside the question of whether it was right to release the figures just to Members of his own party, the irony is that, as was quickly exposed, the actual bills businesses will receive are likely to be 7% higher than the figures he produced. I gently suggest that the Secretary of State is in danger of getting a reputation for being sloppy in his use of figures.

Ministers have known about the business rates revaluation for a long time. Indeed, when announcing the delay, the right hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Sir Eric Pickles) explained that it was to prevent “unexpected hikes” in business rates. Why did the current group of Ministers not think to analyse its consequences a little earlier? How can it possibly be fair that the overall business rates bill for Amazon, which has avoided paying much in corporation tax despite making huge profits, has gone down while family-run businesses that have existed on local high streets for decades face huge rises in their business rates bills? To accuse, as the Secretary of State effectively did, the Federation of Small Businesses, the CBI and the British Retail Consortium of “distortions and half-truths” in their campaigning is a disgrace. He should apologise to them.

Military Covenant

Debate between Gareth Thomas and Anna Soubry

Wednesday 22nd October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

We are. Members will have noticed that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence has come to the Chamber specifically to listen to the debate. He has reminded me—I should have known this—that he has already visited Northern Ireland. The hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) is not in his place, but I remember him inviting me to Northern Ireland some time ago when I had a different ministerial role. I assume that that invitation still stands—his colleagues will no doubt ask him about that for me. I would be more than happy to come over—in fact, I would love to—and not only see the examples of which we have heard, but help in any way I can so that people in Northern Ireland understand what the covenant is all about.

[Mr Thomas]

After the hon. Lady has been to Northern Ireland, I wonder whether I could tempt her to go to Virginia in the United States and visit the home base of the Navy Federal credit union. It is the world’s biggest credit union and the only people who can join it are members of the US military and their families. Would that offer further motivation for the hon. Lady in her helpful conversations with civil servants at the Ministry of Defence about the possibility of a British military credit union?

[Anna Soubry]

I think that’s a bit off the motion, if I may say so, but, hey, it doesn’t matter: it’s always worth getting in a good point. I would ask the hon. Gentleman to speak to the noble Lord Kennedy, with whom I had a very good meeting recently, who will tell him that huge progress has been made on credit unions.

To return to the subject of the debate, we have ensured that war pensions and armed forces compensation payments for veterans are disregarded for the purposes of entitlement to benefits, and that the most seriously injured veterans receive a new independence payment so they are not affected by changes to the disability living allowance. Those are just some examples of the steps we have taken to support our armed forces community and ensure the Government are living up to the principles of the armed forces covenant. The 2014 armed forces covenant annual report, which will be laid before Parliament before Christmas, will provide further details on the work we have done and the progress that we have made, as well as on areas in which we need to do more.

In a devolved society, there will always be differences in service provision in different parts of the UK. Only yesterday I had the great pleasure of attending the Army Families Federation annual conference, at which several people made quite serious complaints about standards. For example, some of those from Wales complained about education and health in Wales, over which, unfortunately, I have no control whatever. We are aware that there are disparities in services, but I am afraid that that is often the consequence of devolution.

It is heartening that even with the different political and legal situation in Northern Ireland—as we have heard, such differences can make armed forces issues more challenging than elsewhere in the country—the armed forces covenant now extends to Northern Ireland almost in its entirety, notwithstanding the difficulties of councils not signing up. I must mention one of our concerns. We now know that all councils in Britain have signed up to the covenant, but the most important thing is for them to deliver on it. If I may say so, it is very easy for a council to sign up to it, put out a press release and get all the good publicity, but delivery is what is most important. We certainly take the view that there has been some good delivery in Northern Ireland.