Opel/Vauxhall: Sale to PSA Group

Debate between Greg Clark and John Pugh

Monday 6th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

I hope that it is, and we should do everything we can to make sure that it is. A company that is committed to expansion has an opportunity to ensure that that includes the expansion of UK plants. It is an area in which we are strong and in which we have a high reputation, and this should be an opportunity for us to make what is good even better.

[John Pugh (Southport) (LD)]

I cannot help feeling that the Minister is being a little bit complacent. Some 76% of cars produced at Ellesmere Port are exported, but many of them are left-hand drive cars for Europe. Would it really make sense to Peugeot to continue left-hand drive production outside the EU, and not in Poland or Germany?

[Greg Clark]

I persuade companies to invest in Britain; I think that the hon. Gentleman is thinking up reasons for them to be put off. I believe that the efficiency and the innovation that we have in this country are what cause people to invest here, and I will do all that I can to make this a positive and expanding industry in the future.

Sustainable Communities

Debate between Greg Clark and John Pugh

Wednesday 13th June 2012 Westminster Hall

[The Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Greg Clark)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Weir. I join the congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives (Andrew George) on securing the debate. I detect from the excellent speeches that we are a band of believers. It is a pleasure to be able to respond the debate and to speak again on one of the most important Acts of Parliament that we have passed in recent years. As was made clear by the references to the various midwives from all parties and of different vintages of parliamentarian, it very much reflects the view of the whole House of Commons representing our various constituencies. The legislation going on to the statute book was an early marker of the power of leadership for people in constituencies, beyond political parties.

I am delighted that so many Members contributed to the debate. It is good to see my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies) here. I know that he was to speak at the funeral of his neighbour and constituent, whom he knew for 50 years. He has attended the debate to represent his constituents, and I am sure that members of his community will greatly respect the obligations that he has to the House. I offer my condolences and, I am sure, those of other Members to the family of his friend and constituent.

The ambitions of my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives are completely shared by the Government. The cross-party support for the Sustainable Communities Act 2007 has been striking. If I were to summarise the Act’s contribution, I would say that it established the principle that the right of initiative should not be held in monopoly by people in Westminster and Whitehall—that we should not be the only people who can propose changes to the way things are done, but that that right of initiative should increasingly, and perhaps more normally, come from people in communities, and we as parliamentarians and members of Governments should respond to the initiatives of people in communities.

Our role should be to be the midwives to good ideas that come from local level. It is extraordinary that for so many years—decades—it has been the almost unthinking assumption that ideas have to come from this place and are then visited upon our communities. The notion that Ministers in Whitehall or parliamentarians in Westminster have exclusive access to wisdom and sagacity when it comes to ideas is extraordinary. More than that, as was evident in the contributions today from representatives of almost every part of the United Kingdom, the idea that any place in the UK is in any sense identical to another is for the birds. It is the glory of this House that we represent places that are unique and have their own local character and civic and political traditions—every aspect of community life is reflected.

When people in communities are given the right of initiative, we should of course expect that they will want to do things their own way—differently from one another and from one place to another, and differently from how they have been done in the past. Traditionally, Government and, too often, local government have, first, been frightened of those differences and, secondly, tried to suppress and iron them out. They have tried to impose uniformity across the country, across counties or across districts, as though the differences were regrettable anomalies, rather than a reflection of different requirements and needs that should be positively encouraged.

The principle established in the 2007 Act—that every community in the country should have right of initiative, the right to be heard and the right to address the Government directly and pitch its ideas to them, and that the Government should be under a legal duty to respond—is important not only as a principle, but as the germ of an idea whereby it has an even greater influence on our deliberations across the board. It has been seminal in the Government’s thinking on various reforms, such as the 2011 Act. Section 1 of that Act on the general power of competence reverses completely the old idea that local government exists to do what central Government require of it. That has changed and local government is free to do whatever it wants in pursuit of the service of local people, unless what it proposes is specifically prohibited by central Government. That seems to be the correct default position. The contributions of the debates over many years on the 2007 Act were important in establishing that principle across Government.

[John Pugh]

On what central Government may or may not prohibit, there is much Government thinking at the moment about making social services entitlements portable across local communities, no matter in which local community someone is resident. How do we manage that tension?

[Greg Clark]

I am not saying that there are no tensions, but rather than start from the position that nothing is possible that was not previously allowed, one should deal with each case and consider whether it may give rise to problems. That is exactly the philosophy and spirit of the 2007 Act. My hon. Friend the Member for St Ives offered many suggestions, all of which I accept it is our duty to consider. I hope that they will come through the procedure of the 2007 Act. That is the right approach.

Let me say a little about the process and then I shall respond to some of the points made—I am conscious that I have very little time. I do not accept the admonishment of the hon. Member for City of Durham (Roberta Blackman-Woods) about the timeliness of the measure for two reasons. First, part of the frustration that many communities experienced during the early days of the 2007 Act was that, having responded to an invitation to submit proposals in October 2008, the previous Government did not respond at all before they left office. We inherited every one of the proposals made under that initial call for evidence. The previous Government took no action whatever and sat on them for nearly two years, but within six months we responded to all the proposals.

More than that, we have swept away the requirement to be forced to consider proposals from communities. We have now established a principle in my Department that any proposal from any member of the public or any community can be pitched to the Government, and we will consider it and it can be tracked in real time via the barrier busting service. There is a website—www.barrierbusting.communities.gov.uk—and since it was launched in December 2010, we have dealt with 258 cases that have come from it. With the regulations, we are talking about back-stop powers for people who are dissatisfied with the Government’s response.

I signed the regulations to bring these measures into effect today. It took a little time because the consultation revealed disagreement between the representatives of local councils and the representatives of community groups, such as Local Works. I was keen that we should not take the lowest common denominator, but seek agreement, which we have been able to do on matters including, for example, the retention of the duty to seek agreement and the establishment of an advisory board to the selector. I fully expect Local Works to be part of that process and group. We have very much strengthened the regulations, and it was absolutely right to do so.

The regulations were signed today and will be formally laid before Parliament within a week—they need to be printed. They will come into force by 26 July 2012. They include a duty on local authorities to consult their communities. There will be a memorandum of understanding between the Secretary of State and the selector to include a time limit during which proposals that have been submitted for consideration will be considered—that is likely to be a maximum of six months, except for special cases. There will be a requirement to be transparent about the processes that are gone through. We will publish simultaneously with the Hansard report of today’s debate the response to the consultation, and a consultation specifically—it is required, unfortunately —to allow parish councils to submit proposals directly. Parish councils already can submit proposals through the barrier busting website, but we will consult on that additional safeguard. I strongly believe that we should allow parish councils, through the principle of subsidiarity, to engage in that process.

I am keen to see many applications. People should not wait to go through the formal process; if they want to pitch directly to the Government, they should. I hope and am confident that following the enactment of the regulations, the rights of every community in the country will be robustly enshrined.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Greg Clark and John Pugh

Monday 12th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

As I suggested, the Localism Act 2011 abolishes top-down imposition and releases local communities to have their say, and with the new planning framework it will be unambiguously clear that it is local communities that do things their way.

[John Pugh (Southport) (LD)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Greg Clark and John Pugh

Thursday 25th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

The right hon. Lady makes a mistake that afflicted the Government of whom she was a member—the fatal flaw of confusing plans with homes. In many cases there was an inverse relationship: the higher the target, the lower the number of homes actually built. That is why we want to reform the planning system. The Government’s intention has been absolutely clear. There is not a councillor, planner or developer in the country who does not know that the regional strategies are on the way out and will be buried and interred for ever.

[Dr John Pugh (Southport) (LD)]

8. What his policy is on the distribution of reductions to local authority funding over the comprehensive spending review period; and if he will make a statement.