Rail Services (Bedfordshire)

Gavin Shuker Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd January 2018 Westminster Hall

[Mr Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered rail services in Bedfordshire.

I am grateful to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. Rail services in Bedfordshire is a wide-ranging subject. Six Members of Parliament represent Bedfordshire, and I am pleased that two of them have been able to attend this short debate. With your permission, Mr Paisley, and that of the Minister, I hope to allow time for them to say a few words about services in their areas.

Rail services in Bedfordshire, and their context, have changed markedly in my time as a Member of Parliament. I grew up in Luton, and throughout that time there was the looming spectre—in a positive way—of Thameslink 2000, now the Thameslink programme. That major upgrade programme was given the go-ahead to totally transform the midland main line as it comes in and goes through the Snow Hill tunnel down to Brighton and the south. The programme has developed significantly since I have been an MP, and it will reach its culmination in the next couple of years when all services are switched on. That major investment programme was developed by the Labour and coalition Governments, and it is now under the Conservative Government. I fully welcome it because it provides much-needed capacity on that vital commuter route.

There have been recent developments in rail services in Bedfordshire in a number of different areas, but there are also long-standing issues that the Department must engage with to bring about service improvements for passengers, and those cannot be overlooked as we reach the end of the programme. In particular, we need vital ministerial action and instruction now as the franchise process on East Midlands Trains goes forward.

If I may, I will speak about two or three local issues that affect Luton residents, and then I will address the vital issue of stopping services on East Midlands Trains. In March 2016 I had the opportunity to raise in an Adjournment debate the long-standing issue of the rebuild of Luton railway station. At the time, I noted that it had been 2,179 days since the issue had last been raised in the House, and I regret to inform Members that in the past two years, the situation has not moved on much.

Luton railway station is in the top 10% of all stations in terms of passenger numbers, but it is old, tired, and inaccessible. In 2009, it was recognised as one of the 10 worst railway stations in the country. The response from the then Labour Government was to award it funding through the Better Stations programme, but that money was pulled after the May 2010 general election. That money was a crucial pot—alongside other pots—that leveraged in cash to get the rebuild. As a result, there is a total lack of disabled facilities to allow people to get to the platforms, and the geography of Luton means that, north and south, the primary access point into the town centre is through the train station, which effectively acts as a wall and barrier for many residents who wish to get to the centre of town with pushchairs or heavy baggage. The centre around the railway station has changed and redeveloped massively, but the same tired station still exists, and as we know, first appearances matter.

If the Minister had been unfortunate enough to start her journey at Luton railway station today, as I did, she would have seen boarded up windows, and the amusingly entitled “water feature” that means that water continues to pour on to platforms. If the single lift was out of action, she would probably have struggled to get access to the platform with her ministerial boxes. Those problems need tackling. A number of abortive schemes have been brought forward, but despite the £6 billion or £7 billion investment from the Thameslink programme, accessibility has diminished as a direct result of that programme. As we go to 12-car running, those with mobility issues must now take a taxi to Luton Airport Parkway, or go on a circuitous route that adds about 15 or 20 minutes to their journey.

The Minister is new to her position, and I hope she will bring a fresh wave of enthusiasm to this issue. Within control period 6, will she specify a rebuild of Luton railway station that befits a town that serves a quarter of a million residents and a wider conurbation? As she knows, the East Midlands franchise is coming up for renewal, and there have been significant moves by the owner of Luton airport, the shareholder, the residents of Luton, and the airport’s operator and board to get the Government to include four fast trains an hour to Luton airport within that franchise.

London Luton airport is a rapidly growing airport in the south-east and the fifth-largest airport by passenger numbers in the UK. It is growing by about 15% a year, and it has great ambitions to take up much of the slack in terms of much-needed airport capacity in the south-east. It is the only London airport without an express train service, and of all London airports it has the lowest percentage of passengers who access it by rail. Some 160 fast East Midlands trains—it will be more under the new franchise—pass daily through Luton Airport Parkway, yet only 10% of them stop. That is a major issue, not least because the new service that connects the terminal to the train station—a major £200 million investment by the people of Luton—will be connected in the next few years. Journey times from St Pancras to the airport gate to check in could be as short as 30 minutes, which is a game changer for connectivity, but that will work only if four fast trains an hour connect the service. London Luton airport is integral to the emerging east-west corridor between Oxford and Cambridge, and to connecting services to the east midlands and the north, and I would like to see progress on that.

Despite the culmination of the Thameslink upgrade programmes over the next year—including physical infrastructure—just before Christmas we learned that there will be a phased introduction of new services of up to 24 trains per hour. Although I understand the desire of the operators to phase in that process, we have had a long time to plan for this. The communication strategy for this has been deeply disappointing, and it is not sufficient just to dump that news on Members of Parliament and commuters shortly before the introduction of a new timetable. This change is so significant that it could have been viewed from space, yet for some reason we learn at the final, gasping moments of the programme, that the full implementation of the timetable will be delayed by two to three years.

Finally, the change from May 2018 to the East Midlands franchise will mean that,

“from 20 May 2018 until the completion of the midland main line upgrade in 2020, East Midlands Trains peak-time services will no longer call at Bedford or Luton. As a result, no EMT services arriving into St Pancras between 07:00 and 10.00, or leaving St Pancras between 16.00 and 19.00, will stop at Luton or Bedford.”

That is a major change and major disruption for many of my constituents who rely on taking a direct train to London, and even more so for those north of Bedford, coming, from example, from Corby or Kettering to work further down the line in Bedford or Luton—and the disruption is happening over a long time. I think that I speak on behalf of all six Bedfordshire Members of Parliament—a group including Conservative, Labour and independent Members—when I say we are deeply disappointed by the way in which things have been communicated, and the shortness of the time window off the back of what even the Rail Minister has acknowledged was a less than perfect consultation exercise on the introduction of the new franchise from 2020. To be told that we shall lose services on East Midlands Trains at exactly the moment when we require them was deeply disappointing.

In the hastily organised meeting chaired by the right hon. Member for North East Bedfordshire (Alistair Burt), where we talked to the operators GTR and East Midlands Trains, and officials from the Department, I asked one simple question: who made the decision? It may not come as a surprise to the Minister, even at this stage of her time in the Department, that a long conversation ensued, with not much clarity at the end of it.

Accountability is vital with such major timetable changes. We all acknowledge, pragmatically, that timetable changes cannot now be reversed for May this year, but my simple ask is that the period of disruption be kept to a minimum. I understand that there are mitigation measures in place, under which GTR will operate additional services that stop at Bedford, Luton and then St Albans—which gets the lion’s share of everything—before going on to St Pancras, but we are used to, and many people’s working patterns are built around, long-distance services and slower commuting services. That is a mix that has served those towns well, and I should like a commitment that East Midlands Trains will again stop during peak hours at Luton and Bedford in the new franchise, and that all efforts will be made to move the changeover date so that it is much earlier. I understand that as the sixth path on East Midlands Trains is introduced, that should not be too difficult. I understand that there may be an issue as to rolling stock, but it is not beyond the wit of the Department to ensure that we do not wait three years.

It would be deeply disappointing, and would undermine the trust of all parties that have supported the £7 billion Thameslink upgrade programme, if the net result were to be more services and seats but a worse user experience for a number of commuters coming from different parts of the network, including Luton, Bedford and Bedfordshire. I make a plea to the Minister to engage fully in the issues affecting rail services in Bedfordshire, to make sure that we deliver for passengers.

Exiting the EU: Costs

Gavin Shuker Excerpts

Wednesday 29th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

I fear that Opposition Members have not made that logical leap yet, but I am sure that my hon. Friend’s question will have helped them reconsider in their own minds.

[Mr Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—[Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Extraordinary behaviour! It is good of the hon. Member for Reading East (Matt Rodda) to drop in on us.

[Mr Shuker]

Can the right hon. Lady name any moment in any aspect of the negotiations so far when the Government have gone head to head with the EU27 on an issue on which they have competing ideas about what to do and come out on top? Is this not yet another example of the Government crumbling and facing up to the reality of leaving the EU?

[Elizabeth Truss]

We are making continuous progress in our negotiations with the EU. Of course, in any negotiation there has to be give and take from both sides. That is exactly what is happening. However, it would be wrong to expose the details of the negotiations at this stage.

Select Committees

Gavin Shuker Excerpts

Tuesday 4th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

I commend the Government for tabling motion 4. It is right for them to implement the commitment that they made during the last Parliament to put the Women and Equalities Committee on a statutory basis in our Standing Orders, and it is right for them to do so on this occasion.

I was a member of the Women and Equalities Committee in the last Parliament, under the brilliant chairmanship of the right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller), and I think that it was a real constitutional innovation. The Committee was significant not just because it produced reports, but through its presence in our constitutional life as well. That point was made to us many times by visitors from other countries, who, rightly or wrongly, look to this place for leadership on many of these issues.

Let me say one thing about Mr Speaker. He is not present, so I feel able to praise him without his blushing too much. I believe that his modernising drive created the conditions in which a constitutional innovation such as the Women and Equalities Committee could come about, under the auspices of the last Government. His work on diversity and inclusion has been particularly commendable, and meant that, just last week, we could discuss how the Committee might be put on a statutory basis.

Let me say a last word, as one who has served on the Committee for the last couple of years. Many people have asked why a straight white man would volunteer or choose to be a member. The answer is very simple. For as long as women’s equality is an issue for women—a women’s issue—it is an issue that is about our society. When we seek to hold back 50% of people in our communities, we are holding back not 50% but 100% of our population. The work done by the last Women and Equalities Committee, particularly on bringing women further into politics and into our public life, identified significant issues involving cultures of bullying and intimidation. It also identified the support that was needed, even at lower levels such as local government. Four party leaders or representatives appeared before us, and all four were men. That underlines the fact that there is much further to go.

There was area in which, in all honesty, I think we struggled. We thought a great deal about flexible working patterns, and ways in which we could make the workplace more available to people from different backgrounds. We struggled to square the circle of how to do that in areas where it is less easy to do flexible working, such as for those with low pay. I suspect that will be a focus for the Committee going forward.

All that said, I commend the motion; the Committee is an excellent innovation and we should be rightly proud in this Parliament that we are bringing it forward.

Enterprise Bill [Lords]

Gavin Shuker Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Jonathan Reynolds]

If the hon. Gentleman approaches this with good intentions, I advise him to talk to some of the retail workers in his constituency to see how they feel about the autonomy they have to decide whether they get to work longer Sundays or not. It is worth pointing out that none of us debating this in the House has to work Sundays if we do not want to.

The current regulations are a good compromise. Shops can trade on Sundays and staff can work if they want. At the same time, Sunday remains a special day, different from any other day of the week. Retail workers can spend some time with their families.

I do not believe the business case for changing Sunday trading regulations stacks up. Retailers already do very well on Sunday, with lots of footfall during a relatively short time window, which makes for more effective trading. The measure will also have a negative effect on smaller shops and retailers that are not subject to the regulations. Their businesses will suffer. In the most recent example of relaxation of Sunday trading—during the Olympics—retail sales actually declined.

As well as declaring my interest as an USDAW-sponsored MP, I am likewise very comfortable declaring my interest as a practising Christian. Understandably, that forms part of my opposition to any changes to Sunday trading, which I know I share with Members on both sides of the House. Of course, we live in a diverse country—I am extremely glad that we do so—but we should recognise that Christianity is the largest religion in this country. For Christians such as myself, Sunday is a special day. Sunday is when my family and I attend church, and the opportunity to do so should not be denied to people who have to work Sundays, whether in the morning or the evening.

[Mr Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

Like my hon. Friend, I will be part of the holy alliance trying to keep Sundays special. For people of a Christian ethos, this is not necessarily about the promotion of church; it is about a deep-rooted sense of who we believe people to be. We are created with the ability to rest as well as to work. Also, our choices have an impact on other people’s choices. The freedom we seek to exercise for ourselves is paid for by other people.

[Jonathan Reynolds]

I endorse those points entirely, although it is worth noting that church attendance in many UK cities, even here in metropolitan London, is steadily rising.

The Government have a responsibility to listen to faith groups on this issue, but they have failed to do so. The changes will place additional pressure on workers and families on what is still a traditional day of rest, a day of religious worship and a day to spend quality time with family members and close friends. For faith, for family and for the rights of many retail workers up and down this country, I will be voting for the amendment. I urge the House to show the courage required today to defeat the Government on this issue.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Shuker]

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way; he is obviously trying to defend a difficult position. The Government support the measure and the Opposition oppose it, yet several of the Minister’s party colleagues share deep concern, tapping into a conservative tradition of trying to preserve our institutions. I gently suggest that he might make better progress by making positive arguments for his proposals to those colleagues rather than by attacking the Opposition, and therefore Members on his side, as Maoists.

[Brandon Lewis]

I appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s comments, but my colleagues and good friends around me are capable of defending themselves and making their case clearly, just as my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes) has done this afternoon. I respect that, but the reality is that we want to provide an opportunity for economic growth and give our high streets the chance to regenerate. The hon. Member for Luton South (Mr Shuker) might want to have a look at the Hansard reports of the Committee stage to see the arguments we had then in more detail.

--- Later in debate ---

[Brandon Lewis]

I would say to the hon. Lady and to colleagues around the House that, as we put these proposals forward, it is important that we make sure that the key performance indicators that will come back to the House a year after the pilots—we will run the pilots for 12 months—cover a whole range of issues. She makes a fair point, and if it is one of the points she and her colleagues want looked at in the pilots, I am very happy to make sure it is. [Interruption.]

The hon. Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan) asks from a sedentary position whether I am going to use up the entire time, and I would gently say to him that, no, I will not. I am about to conclude, but I would just point out to him that I have been spending much of my time taking interventions from his hon. Friends. I find his comments slightly surprising, bearing in mind that this is not an issue he felt needed voting on in Committee.

[Mr Shuker]

Will the Minister give way?

[Brandon Lewis]

No, I am not going to take an intervention. We need to allow other hon. Members to have their say.

We have listened to the principled opposition to our plans. I have listened to colleagues who have made strong, passionate and clear proposals to us, and we are amending them accordingly with our proposal for an exploratory evaluative phase, which we will lay amendments for in the other place—a draft is available for colleagues to look at now. I therefore call on all Members to support the Government’s amendment and to vote against amendment 1.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bill Esterson]

My right hon. Friend makes a good point, and the Government have had ample opportunity in the Lords—[Interruption.] As my hon. Friend the Member for Makerfield (Yvonne Fovargue) reminds me, this provision was not even mentioned in the Lords. It was not in the original Bill, and it was not mentioned until Second Reading, when the Secretary of State announced for the first time that the Bill would cover Sunday trading. The Minister had plenty of time to table amendments then, in Committee, or today, but he chose not to. Why should we believe a word he says?

[Mr Shuker]

Let me underline the point made by the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes). If we want enhanced provisions, surely the logical thing is to vote for amendment 1. There is nothing to prevent the Minister from bringing his provision forward in the House of Lords, regardless of the vote, other than the fact that we have not amended the Bill and it stands in the way he has presented it to us today.

[Bill Esterson]

I completely agree—

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Gavin Shuker Excerpts

Friday 20th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)]

May I apologise to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and to the Secretary of State for the fact that I will not be able to be present for the close of the debate owing to a long-standing constituency commitment?

It is a pleasure to respond to the right hon. Gentleman—probably, I suspect, for the last time in this Parliament. If I may say so, his speech had more than a touch of a valedictory air about it. I join him in his congratulations tweeted yesterday to Lord Kerslake on his elevation to the other place. Lord Kerslake marked that occasion by telling the Local Government Chronicle that the current state of local government finance

“shouldn’t be confused with saying that therefore there’s another round of savings of equivalent size that can simply be taken out...I don’t believe that.”

More of that later.

I hope that someone is keeping score of the number of times we are going to have to hear the words “long-term economic plan” during the whole of this Budget debate. [Interruption.] Well, we did not hear it from the right hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle (Gregory Barker). By my reckoning, it took the Secretary of State 59 seconds to refer to it in his speech. I suspect that the repetition is a comfort blanket for Government Members who, given this wonderful success that we have heard about today, cannot understand why, so close to the general election, they are neck and neck in the opinion polls. The reason is that people know they are not better off under this Government and the Government have failed.

Let me say something about the attempt to rewrite economic history, because it is important to place this on the record. I have heard more than enough times from Government Members the charge that somehow the previous Labour Government brought about the global economic recession. It is not true: fact. Prior to the global economic crash, debt and borrowing were lower. Investment in public services was backed by the pledge of the then Leader of the Opposition, now the Prime Minister, to match Labour’s spending plans pound for pound. The action that we rightly took, against the advice of the then Opposition, kept people in their homes and kept them in their jobs, and not a single person lost a penny of their savings. I am still waiting, all these years after the event, for someone to explain to the House how the decisions taken by the previous Labour Government caused Lehman Brothers to collapse in New York. If anyone has an answer, I will readily give way. The truth is that the British economy was growing and unemployment was falling, and it does no credit to the Government to try to rewrite the past.

In 2010, the Chancellor of the Exchequer said:

“we are on track to have…a balanced structural current budget by the end of this Parliament.”—[Official Report, 22 June 2010; Vol. 512, c. 168.]

As we know, that has not happened, and people have paid the price. They are worse off, they have seen their living standards squeezed, many of the services they rely on have been cut, and the poorest people and the poorest communities have been hardest hit. In the words of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, UK households have experienced

“the slowest recovery in incomes in modern history”.

That is quite some record. Despite the Chancellor’s excuses, we now know that it will take twice as long to balance the books as he said it would, and his plans for the next five years will involve extreme cuts to public spending. Do not take my word for it—listen to what Paul Johnson at the IFS says:

“The cuts of more than 5% implied in each of 2016-17 and 2017-18 are twice the size of any year’s cuts in this parliament.”

No wonder the Liberal Democrats tried to distance themselves from all this in their rather unsuccessful yellow Budget yesterday, but the whole nation knows that they are up to their necks in it because they have been supporting the Tories over the past five years.

It is not only on the deficit that the Government have failed. What about housing, which the Secretary of State mentioned? Having enough homes is of course absolutely fundamental to the economic growth that Members in all parts of the House want to see. If businesses are looking to expand, they need workers to fill those jobs and those workers need somewhere to live. Yet homes are being built at half the rate we need, house prices are rising out of reach, one in four young people in their 20s and early 30s are still living with their parents, and more and more people are having to rent privately, with all the insecurity that that can bring.

Back in 2010, at least two of the Ministers who are present today sat behind their new desks and made a lot of promises about what was going to happen to housing. Appearing before the Communities and Local Government Committee, the then Housing Minister was asked by the Chair:

“do we take it that success for this Government, when you are eventually judged on your record, will be building more homes per year than were being built prior to the recession, and that failure will be building less?”

The Housing Minister replied:

“Yes. Building more homes is the gold standard upon which we shall be judged.”

That was a pretty unequivocal answer.

We must make some allowance for the fact that the then Housing Minister—now the chairman of the Conservative party—does not always get things right, but what have the Government actually achieved? Fact: they have achieved a lower level of peacetime house building than any Government since the 1920s, and a failure to build, in any single year, more homes than the Labour Government built in every single year in which they were in office. The number of new homes for social rent is at its lowest level for 20 years. [Interruption.] Ministers can chunter as much as they like, but those are the facts.

Starts and completions of social homes have collapsed, which makes the Chief Secretary’s claim to the House last week all the more extraordinary. He said then:

“we have the highest annual rate of social house building than under the previous Government or for the past 20 years”.—[Official Report, 10 March 2015; Vol. 594, c. 145.]

If one of the first acts of a Government is to cut the affordable homes budget by 60%, they should not be entirely surprised if there is a collapse.

The Secretary of State talked about affordable homes. He made great play of the subject. I have the figures in front of me—the figures from his own Department, headed

“National trends in additional affordable housing… Trends in gross supply”.

In 2009-10, the supply of “All affordable housing” was 57,980. In 2013-14, the figure was 42,710. During the last full year for which figures are available, affordable house building under the present Government was at its lowest level for nine years. Those are the facts. Ministers have not even returned house building to its level before the global recession. They set a gold standard on which they said they wanted to be judged, and they have comprehensively failed to meet it.

One of the other consequences of the collapse in social house building is the rise in the housing benefit bill over the current Parliament. This year, it reached £24 billion. Half a million more people now rely on help from the Government to pay their rent than relied on it when the coalition came to power—many of them work, but do not earn enough money to pay their rent and other bills and look after their families—and 2.5 million more people live in the private rented sector. There are now 11 million people who rent privately, including a growing number of families with children, but nothing has been done to help generation rent.

[Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

My right hon. Friend has made an excellent point. There are people who are working—working in many of the jobs that have been trumpeted by the Conservatives—but are not earning enough to put food on their tables and a roof over their heads. That is one reason why the Conservatives are failing so shockingly on issues such as housing benefit while claiming to be trying to lower the welfare bill.

[Hilary Benn]

I entirely agree. That is one of the consequences of the cost of living crisis, which is why we want a higher minimum wage.

A Labour Government will do something for generation rent. We will scrap the charging of tenants for letting agents’ fees, we will legislate for three-year tenancies—the Government say that they are in favour of three-year tenancies, but they will not actually make them happen—and we will put a ceiling on rent increases during the second and third years of those tenancies.

As for those who dream of owning their own homes, the Conservative manifesto could not have been clearer, stating:

“We want to create a property-owning democracy where everyone has the chance to own their own home.”

I give credit to the Secretary of State and the Government for the steps that they have taken to try to help first-time buyers, including Help to Buy and the measures in the Budget. We support those moves, especially the help for first-time buyers. However, let me say gently to the Secretary of State that Ministers must know—they must have been advised by their officials, and by plenty of other people—that if demand is increased without an increase in supply, all that will happen is that house prices will rise even further out of reach of people who dream of owning their own homes, the very people whom the House wants to help.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Willetts]

I am touched by the hon. Lady’s intervention. Let me try to explain to her the part of the long-term economic plan that I think is relevant to the comments made by the shadow Secretary of State. When the original fiscal strategy was set out, which included the forecast for economic growth set out by the OBR, the Chancellor made it clear that if growth was not as great as forecast by the OBR, he would accept that tax revenues would regrettably be less and the fall in public spending might not be as great—because of what are called the automatic stabilisers. Those automatic stabilisers were explicitly part of the plan from the beginning and, because of them, we have ended up borrowing rather more than was forecast initially. In other words, what the Opposition criticise as somehow a failure of the plan was always part of the plan. There was always a recognition that it would need that flexibility and if they are really saying that we should have cut even more or raised taxes even more as a result of the economy performing less well in the early years than had been forecast by the OBR because of the crisis in the eurozone, that would have been bad for the economy. I am grateful for this opportunity to explain a key feature of the plan.

I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, and I want to focus on two or three aspects of the Budget. I particularly welcome the imaginative package on savings. The Help to Buy ISA is an excellent innovation. I like the new flexibilities through which savers can put money into an ISA and temporarily withdraw it. It reminds me of the work that I did in the long days of opposition on what we called a lifetime savings account. It was intended to have the flexibility of people being able to put money in and take it out because it recognised the paradox that if people know that they can take their savings out of a savings instrument, they might be willing to save more in the first place. It is like the paradox that the device in the car that enables us to drive faster is the brake—when we know that we can brake we are willing to drive faster and when we know that we can take money out we might be willing to put more in.

Alongside those measures is the extra revenue generated by restricting the lifetime allowance for pension savings to £1 million. That presents the Opposition with a dilemma, because of course it was one of the measures that they announced would help fund their policy on higher education. I would be very interested to hear from the Opposition spokesman, the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger), when she winds up what the Labour party envisages as the future of that much-derided commitment on university finance. Let us be clear what we are talking about. If Labour reduces fees to £6,000, that must be financed by an increase in the public expenditure going to universities. That is of no direct benefit to students, and the most that universities might hope for is some compensation for the loss of the income from fees. The beneficiaries are solely affluent graduates in middle age who will find themselves completing the process of paying loans back rather earlier.

When I heard the shadow Secretary of State speaking so passionately about housing and the importance of investing in it, I wondered what it said about Labour’s priorities. If Labour had £5 billion or £10 billion to spend, why on earth did it decide that its priority was affluent middle-aged graduates rather than, for example, a further package on housing? Many members of the shadow Cabinet must be frustrated by the bizarre priorities reflected in that judgment.

[Gavin Shuker]

The right hon. Gentleman makes his case clearly and in a statesmanlike manner, but I was in this House when he was taking through the legislation on fees. There were 91 speakers over those two days. I did not have the opportunity to speak but I was one of only about 10 Members of Parliament who knew what it was like to graduate with a large amount of student debt. I can tell him that it is paralysing and that it puts people off going to university.

[Mr Willetts]

Fortunately, the evidence is that the number of people applying for university is at a record level and that the proportion of people from disadvantaged backgrounds applying for university under the excellent stewardship of my successor, my right hon. Friend the Minister for Universities, Science and Cities, who I see on the Front Bench, has just hit another record. It looks as though those anxieties were misplaced, thank heavens.

Investment in higher education is part of a wider theme in the Budget. I welcome the proposals to invest in our young people in other ways. We have a fantastic record of falling youth unemployment and we have yet further investment in infrastructure. One of the best ways in which we can protect the interests of future generations is by leaving them with better kit and capital investment than we found.

As the debate was opened by the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, I must say that one of my long-standing Whitehall battles was a belief that the fragmented structure of local authority pension schemes in this country is an obstacle to long-term investment in infrastructure and in venture capital. It is frustrating that we have such a substantial amount of money going into funded pension schemes but, as they are in a multiplicity of small schemes, they cannot aggregate their investment and take the risks that would allow them to invest in substantial venture capital or long-term infrastructure. That is work in progress and more needs to be done.

While I am refighting old battles, let me also say how much I welcome the reference in the Budget Red Book to investment in rural broadband including via satellite. The current situation has never ceased to baffle me. I went to see the launch of a satellite as part of a European Space Agency project from Guiana that was going to deliver broadband services to areas of Africa that could not necessarily get conventional mobile phone coverage. It would be perfectly possible for us to guarantee 100% broadband cover for all parts of Great Britain if we were willing to use satellites to supplement conventional delivery of those services.

Let me end with praise for the Chancellor’s innovations in science and technology. We have established a happy tradition of bold new announcements on science and technology in Budgets and autumn statements. I welcome the ingenuity that has enabled a further £30 million to be invested in the excellent Crick institute.

I particularly welcome the new freedoms for research institutes, which is a response to a real competitive challenge. My hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk (Mr Yeo) mentioned that. Let us be clear what form the competition takes. If a Nobel prize is awarded to a scientist in the UK, the Singaporeans will be absolutely clear that he or she will be able to earn a multiple of their current salary if they go to Singapore, and other competitors will make the same offer. An offer will be made to build a completely new facility of whatever sort they want. Their entire research team will be offered double their salary if they move lock, stock and barrel. It is very important that we are able to compete with such offers.

I think of our record of nuclear R and D. When major American universities recruit for expertise in nuclear R and D, they come calling in the UK. We need to be able to respond to that, and the current regime of salary and other constraints makes that harder. The new freedoms represent an excellent opportunity for us to compete globally in science.

Finally, I welcome the bold measures to support 5G communication. We had a great lead on mobile phone technologies. We lost it, I have to tell Opposition Members, because Labour’s auction of 3G licences was too successful. It extracted too much money from the industry. We have managed to catch up to some extent in 4G. We have a real opportunity to be world leaders in 5G. I support that, and it will in turn make other technological advances, such as the internet of things, possible.

All in all, this is a Budget for the future, a Budget for future generations, and it is a great pleasure for me, in one of my last speeches in this House, to be able to support it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

I do not know whether the right hon. Member for Havant (Mr Willetts) is taking the opportunity of making a valedictory speech next Thursday.

[Mr Willetts]

indicated assent.

[Gavin Shuker]

He is. Good. In that case, I need not offer any further praise other than that which many Government Members expressed when he sat down.

Mr Deputy Speaker, as you know, for the rest of us, life goes on. I am a diligent young man, as you know, so I have done my due diligence in tidying up my office and preparing for disillusionment. [Laugher.] Not so Freudian. I very much hope and expect to return after the enforced recess, which I am sure will give lots of people lots of pleasure.

However, in the process of clearing out my office I came across an incredibly rare document—something which I suspect many people do not have in their office any more—a copy of the 2010 Budget Red Book. That sound of shredding that you heard across Whitehall in recent years has been a series of Red Books being firmly thrown away. I raise the subject with reference to this Budget debate because that volume contains hugely interesting analysis.

In the Budget 2010 Red Book, on the page marked “Responsibility: deficit reduction”, the OBR set out what would happen

“without further action to tackle the deficit”.

It predicted what would happen if the Tory-Lib Dem austerity Budget was not implemented. It predicted that in five years’ time—in other words, in the financial year that we are just coming into—public sector net borrowing would remain at 4% of gross domestic product, having been at or above 5% in six consecutive years. It predicted that the structural deficit today would be at 2.8% of GDP, with the structural current deficit at 1.6%, and that debt would be rising, in the year that we are currently in, to 74.4% of GDP, with annual debt repayments of £67 billion.

We are forced to ask ourselves a question: at the end of this Parliament, after five years of Tories and Lib Dems in control, what happened next? Well, the stark analysis is that the Chancellor’s actions were worse than doing nothing. They talked down the economy for political ends and then threw what was at that point a growing economy into neutral for three years. Our public finances have performed worse than if the emergency Tory-Lib Dem Budget of 2010 had never happened.

This year’s Budget was meant to be the reward. It was meant to be the election-setting Budget. After four years of Tory pain, this was meant to be the sunny uplands—the debt starting to be paid off, the deficit ended. But the Government failed—by their own standards, not mine but those that they laid out in this book. It is the slowest recovery for 200 years. And it is to be followed after the election, should the Tories be back in power, with a slashing twice as big as that of any previous year, or any year in this Parliament.

So where are we? Public sector net borrowing is forecast to be 5%—not 4%—in 2014-15 and 4% next year. In fact, that is the same level forecast by the OBR if no action had been taken in that emergency Budget. The structural deficit is forecast to be 4.2%—not 2.8%—in 2014-15. The structural current budget deficit is running at 2.5%—not the 1.6% predicted. That is not just the same as inaction; it is worse. The public debt is still rising this year. It is claimed that it will drop in the next year, as we know, but we know that is because of some cleverly timed asset sales. We will see what happens next year. The public debt is forecast to hit 80.4% this year—five whole percentage points higher than it would have been if no action had been taken.

On all these measures—on borrowing, on the structural deficit, on the structural current deficit, on the debt—this Tory-Lib Dem austerity programme has undermined their own plans and our public finances. While we are talking about the debt, let us not forget that this Government have borrowed more than every previous Labour Administration put together. They have doubled the debt and it is still rising today. The Government have borrowed more in just over three years than the last Labour Government borrowed in 13 years, so we will take no lectures from them on the public debt and deficit.

Let me tackle this head-on. The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and the right hon. Member for Havant made a case for what should be done. The Secretary of State’s response was deeply telling when he was challenged on the fact that the Government had only halved the deficit rather than eradicated it, as was their original plan. He said that Labour Members were conflicted or confused—that our saying that the deficit should be lower was a sign that we were pushing for deeper, further and harder cuts. That is so telling because it points to the fact that to this Administration, everything is a nail and all they have is a hammer. But growth is a three-legged stool as are the public finances, despite the Government’s ideology. It is not just cuts but growth. There were three lost years before the inevitable rebound—admittedly aided by lower borrowing costs owing to a lack of demand in the eurozone and aided by a low oil price, which the Chancellor, by the way, has had nothing to do with despite the fact that he has tried to claim the credit for it—and the slowest recovery in 200 years.

Living standards matter. The Government failed, at the start of this Parliament, to see living standards as a central issue, with effects on tax receipts, job security and in-work benefits. The Chancellor spent an hour on Wednesday telling us that we have never had it so good. That does not reflect real people’s experiences of this economy, of their job security, of their children’s future, and the additional prices that they are paying for this Government’s failure.

There you have it, Mr Deputy Speaker. All this pain, all this hardship, paid for not on the backs of those with the broadest shoulders, who have received significant tax cuts, but on the backs of the poor. Families hammered; debt doubled and debt rising; growth years behind; and the deficit only halfway there, with deep pain to come. We are still borrowing £90 billion a year. For all the noise, for all the bluster and for all the words exchanged over the Dispatch Boxes in five Budget statements and five autumn statements, ordinary people are taking the pain. Unbelievably, this has been worse than doing nothing. That is the great Tory tragedy, not their triumph. Wednesday’s speech should be known for the hubris that it displayed.

EU Budget (Surcharge)

Gavin Shuker Excerpts

Monday 10th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend is right. Of course, this is not the Government’s money: it is the people’s money—taxpayers’ money. People work very hard to earn money and then they pay taxes on it, and it is the policy of the Conservative party to keep taxes as low as possible.

[Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

Given that the relationship between GDP and the European Union budget was understood before this series of events, and yet the Government appeared to be asleep at the wheel, what was the reason for their reluctance in getting their act together properly in the first place? Was it the Chancellor’s unwillingness to fess up to the Prime Minister or to stand up to his Back Benchers?

[Mr Osborne]

I am not sure it was worth waiting 45 minutes for that question. The Prime Minister of the Netherlands, the President of the European Commission and the vice-president of the European Commission with responsibility for the budget all said that it was not clear until late October what the amount would be. That is why, the moment we found out, we got it on the European Council agenda, and the European Council agreed that it would be discussed at ECOFIN.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gavin Shuker Excerpts

Tuesday 4th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend makes a good point about the impact of business rates. That is of course why we have extended small business rate relief and helped 360,000 small properties. It is why we have offered the £1,000 high street discount to stores in Harrogate and elsewhere around the country. We are going to review the business rate system to make sure that it is simpler, fairer, more transparent and more responsive to economic circumstances, and he is very welcome to take part in that review.

[Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

T2. What is the link between the Chancellor’s £7 billion of unfunded tax cuts and his blocking of the OBR from auditing the tax and spend plans of other political parties ahead of the election? I suggest that the clue is in the question.

[Mr Osborne]

Interestingly, we conducted an independent review by one of the Canadian officials involved in auditing their finances—

Amendment of the Law

Gavin Shuker Excerpts

Thursday 20th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

That is not actually true. All recoveries tend to start with consumer spending, but lack of investment is a deep-rooted problem in the United Kingdom, and it is a problem with which we are trying to deal. However, if the hon. Gentleman studies the figures from the Office for Budget Responsibility, he will see that business investment increased by 7% last year, and the CBI projections for this year are higher than that. Business investment is beginning to take serious shape.

I think that, when we speak of growth, recovery and productivity, it is worth our while reflecting on some of the 18 Budget statements to which I have listened and responded in the past. For more than a decade, Budgets were introduced by the present Opposition, and there was a very positive story every year until we reached 2008. We had 2% growth, and there was enormous triumphalist cheering about the wonders of the brilliant Government economic policy that had produced that achievement. Comparisons were made with the past which suggested that this was the greatest economic performance, if not since the Victorians, probably since the Georgians, the Tudors or even the Romans. However, we had to go back to the Greeks to find the word that captured the spirit of those early Budgets. It was the word “hubris”, which encapsulated the Opposition’s simple inability to understand that weaknesses were building up during that growth.

Our Government are confident that we now have recovery. We are positive about it, and proud of our contribution to it. However, we acknowledge that there are some deep-seated historical weaknesses that now need to be addressed, and the Chancellor did address them in a systematic way in the Budget yesterday. The first and most important way of dealing with those weaknesses—and the driver of productivity—is, of course, higher levels of investment. That is why the extension of investment allowances, which will substantially increase the incentives for small and medium-sized companies, particularly those in the manufacturing sector—over time and in terms of scale—is such a big step forward, and is so welcome.

[Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Business Secretary is clearly confident that he could have run the economy better than Labour during the 13 years during which it was in power, and I suspect that that enthusiasm and confidence have continued into the present Parliament. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman could outline some of the ways in which the economy would be run differently if he, rather than the right hon. Member for Tatton (Mr Osborne), were Chancellor.

[Vince Cable]

I find that many of my ideas have been incorporated in Government policy, and I am very pleased about the progress that we are making in that respect.

Of course, increased investment depends on business confidence. Because we are approaching the election season, a danger is posed by some of the comments being made by the Opposition. Sir George Cox, who used to be at the Institute of Directors and is now an adviser to the Opposition, suggested recently that the business-averse policies of the shadow Chancellor and his leader were doing serious damage not to their own credibility, but to confidence in the country. I would underline that. If we have policies that appear to commit future Governments to energy price freezes that prevent new energy investment, we are undermining investment. Of course it is not just the Opposition; the people who want to take Britain out of the European Union and want to take Scotland out of Britain are also undermining investment confidence. Political certainty requires at least literate policies from the Opposition, which in the area of price freezes certainly is not the case.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is extremely gracious of you to call me to speak in this debate, Madam Deputy Speaker.

I want to say a few words about a genuine long-term plan—Government Members seem to use the phrase “long-term plan” quite a bit—for work. It is clear that this Budget has ducked the key challenge of how we ensure that as the number of jobs in the economy increases, the quality of those jobs improves at the same time.

There has been much talk in this place over many years—not only by Government Members but by Opposition Members—about where improvements to the British economy will come from. There has been a lot of talk about entrepreneurialism, finance and different sectors of industry, but we tend not to step back to talk about the quality of work, even though work is fundamental to how we generate growth in our economy and how people find dignity during most of their waking hours in the day.

My broadest concern is that as we talk about the effects of this Budget—fiscal measures here, changes to taxation there—we may to a degree miss the point. We know that what makes work satisfying to people is autonomy, mastery and purpose. I fear that those three values are getting lost in the recovery that is under way. I shall suggest a few ways in which we might respond through policy to improve the quality of work for millions of people up and down the country.

It is a tragedy when people find themselves unemployed and when there is long-term unemployment. In Luton, 950 young people are without work and are claiming jobseeker’s allowance, and 1,300 people of all ages have been out of work for more than 12 months. Behind each figure is a human tragedy that affects many families. Older people who find themselves out of work find it incredibly difficult to get a job, and we know that many of them will not find one in the current economy.

At the same time, there is a cost of living crisis. Wages and prices have become decoupled. It is estimated that it will take 15 years for wages to recover and get back to the consumer prices index level of inflation. It is debatable whether they will ever reach the retail prices index level.

We need to tackle the issue at both ends: work and the quality of that work. On the quality of work, we have seen a tripling of the number of zero-hours contracts. More people are working in the economy, but many of them are on zero-hours contracts and have little job security. Those who are still in work have had their rights taken away. For example, there are the challenges with tribunals, which we have discussed in the House before. We cannot win in a race to the bottom. Many people still cannot get a job. There is a lack of dignity in not having a job, but there is also a lack of dignity in having a poor quality job. This is a long-term challenge not just for this Government, but for whichever Government find themselves in power next.

Labour’s jobs guarantee could be a necessary first step in allowing young people in particular to find work and get back into the rhythm and dignity of work. We then need to look at the quality of the work and the remuneration for it. That is why we need an expansion of the living wage. Our policy of a 12-month tax rebate for low-paid workers who are bumped up to the living wage for the first time, which would pay for itself over time, would be extremely helpful, as would the reintroduction of the 10p rate. That would be hugely important in encouraging people to get back into work.

We need action to meet the challenges of our economy. An alarming statistic that other Members have talked about is the productivity gap. Output per hour in this country is 21% lower than the G7 average. That hints at a lack of business investment in machinery and so on.

I return to autonomy, mastery and purpose. Where will the high-skilled jobs come from in this economy? When will we recognise the cost of living? Many people will look at the actions of the Government and conclude that in the Budget they have ducked the challenge. If they were running a business the way they are running the economy, they would be sweating the assets to get growth. I think it is fine to sweat the assets for a period, but we must recognise that the greatest asset we have is the people of this country, and they will not put up with a Government who sweat the asset that is their work.

National Minimum Wage

Gavin Shuker Excerpts

Wednesday 15th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. With almost 1 million young people out of work—250,000 of them for more than a year—hitting them further by saying that they should not be entitled to a minimum wage is doubly unfair, cruel and callous.

[Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

Is not a further point that there are many threats to wages in rural communities in particular—where the cost of living is higher—not least as a result of this Government’s shameful decision to abolish the Agricultural Wages Board, which protected the pay of many low-paid people?

[Rachel Reeves]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention and for his work on these issues as a shadow Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Minister.

Labour Members know that a strengthened minimum wage and practical policies to promote the living wage are essential to building a recovery that works for working people and to securing rising standards of living for the future. That means stronger penalties and effective enforcement against rogue employers who flout the minimum wage. It means plans to restore the value of the minimum wage, which has been lost over the past three and a half years. It means the Government doing their bit to support the campaign for a living wage by setting an example with their own employees and contracts, as Labour councils are doing up and down this country, and it means the Government sharing the savings to the Treasury with employers who commit to paying the living wage, as we will do with our Make Work Pay contracts.

The national minimum wage is one of Labour’s proudest achievements. It was opposed by the Tories every step of the way, while their coalition partners tried to water it down and frustrate its purpose, and the current Business Secretary sat on his hands. That is why we cannot trust the Tories or their Liberal Democrat supporters to protect the minimum wage, why we cannot trust the Tories to enforce or strengthen it, and why we cannot trust them to deal with the cost of living crisis.

It therefore again falls to Labour to protect and strengthen the national minimum wage by increasing fines for those who exploit workers; investigating rogue employers and enforcing the law properly; restoring the value of the national minimum wage and catching up the lost ground of the past three years; and encouraging employers who can do so to go further and to pay the living wage.

I suspect that when the Secretary of State gets to his feet, he will tell us how he now supports the minimum wage and wants it to be increased and to be enforced better. If that is his way of apologising for his past sins, so be it, but I must warn him and his Government that we will be watching. Working people who are struggling to earn a living and to survive the cost of living crisis need more than warm words and liberal promises; they need action, and only a Labour Government will deliver that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Vince Cable]

I suspect that that is also true, but I am trying to get away from the tribal debate that the shadow Secretary of State was so keen to launch.

To return to the thread of the argument, we have had a major shock, and it has reduced real earnings and the real minimum wage. I fully acknowledge that; it is a matter of fact. The question is: what is being done to mitigate the effects? Two major changes have taken place. First, the Government have recognised that earnings are not the same as take-home pay and disposable income, and we have therefore concentrated our tax policy on lifting low earners out of tax. As a result, 2.7 million low earners now pay no income tax. Those working 28 hours a week on the minimum wage pay no income tax, while those on 35 hours pay only one third of the income tax they paid at the beginning of this Government. We have therefore considerably reduced the impact of the squeeze on real incomes by using tax policy.

The second highly relevant issue is the level of unemployment. After the great crash in 1929, unemployment rose to 20%. In the recent financial crisis, countries less affected than the UK have had considerably higher unemployment—I am talking about France and Sweden, among others. We reached a peak of 8.5%; it has now gone down to 7% and is falling. We have record numbers of people in work, while the number of jobs has increased by 1.3 million, in the wake of this enormous economic crisis. Now, why has that happened? It has happened because millions of individual workers, realising that there is a choice to be made between jobs and pay, have wisely decided that it is much more important to keep the employment.

The Low Pay Commission, speaking for the country as a whole, rather than for individuals, has reinforced that assessment. In its 2012 report, it explained its analysis in the following terms—let us remember this is not the Government, but an independent commission representing unions, employers and independent assessors. It said its aim was a minimum wage that helped

“as many low-paid workers as possible without any significant adverse impact on employment or the economy.”

That became the mandate—the remit—that I have used, and it is virtually identical to the remit used by my Labour predecessor. I simply ask Labour Members what they object to in that remit. Do they seriously think that the Low Pay Commission and the Secretary of State should ignore the state of the economy or the level of employment? What do they think is fundamentally wrong with the remit?

[Gavin Shuker]

From the tone of the Secretary of State’s remarks, it is clear that, following the banking crisis of 2008, this is a deep issue that confronts us as a nation. He is right in his analysis, and many workers have chosen not to push for pay rises in the light of that situation. The challenge facing us, however, is surely one that requires a political response. I disagree slightly with his characterisation of this Government’s policy. What it has resulted in has been clearly demonstrated in 41 of the last 42 months, with people being able to buy less with what they are being paid. If he is saying there will be no change, then Opposition Members will continue to call out for that change.

[Vince Cable]

I keep hearing the call from Opposition Members for a political intervention. Are the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues saying that this system—a very good system that his Government established, based on the Low Pay Commission analysis—should be torn up and a political settlement imposed? Is he suggesting that the remit, which takes account of the impact of the minimum wage on employment, should be disregarded? Is that the argument?

Oral Answers to Questions

Gavin Shuker Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

I very much share my hon. Friend’s ambition for this policy. We should consider a threshold of at least £10,500 in this Parliament, and that will be an objective of my Liberal Democrat party. It would be right for the age-related threshold and the main threshold, once they are aligned, to rise in tandem thereafter.

[Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)]

18. Does the Chief Secretary share the concerns of Citizens Advice that changes to the threshold are more than swamped by the changes to benefits in other areas?

[Danny Alexander]

No, I do not share that analysis. It ignores the fact that increases to the personal allowance, along with many of our reforms to the welfare system, increase substantially the incentives for people to go into work. The private sector has created a net 1.4 million jobs since 2010, so there are more job opportunities to go around too.