Debate on the Address

Greg Mulholland Excerpts

Wednesday 9th May 2012 Commons Chamber

[Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)]

I think that Members of all parties would endorse the support of the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd) for the Queen’s Speech proposal to introduce legislation to establish an independent adjudicator to ensure that supermarkets deal fairly and lawfully with suppliers. That is clearly one of many proposals that will have all-party support.

In reflecting on the Queen’s Speech, it is probably sensible to consider where we are and where we have been. In recalling where we are, it is important to remember that the Prime Minister’s party does not have a parliamentary majority. After the general election, it was clearly in the nation’s interest to form a coalition. A coalition, however, requires compromise every day. To govern, the Prime Minister has to agree policy initiatives with a political party very different from his own. In practice, the coalition is working a lot better than many would have imagined. The fact is that the Conservative party did not win enough seats or votes to enable us to deliver all our manifesto pledges. The solution is not to blame the coalition, but to seek to win more votes next time.

Notwithstanding the challenges of the coalition, the Government have, since the general election, embarked on a vast reforming programme unprecedented in modern times to reduce the structural deficit and to put through reforms of the NHS that will enable GPs better to design local NHS services for their patients. The Government have reformed primary and secondary education, introduced a new system of university tuition fees and completely overhauled the welfare system to ensure that as many people as possible can live responsible and worthwhile lives free of state dependency. The Government have capped housing benefit and passed the European Union Act 2011 so that in future any EU treaty that transfers powers to the European Union will be subject to a referendum, and never again will a Government be able to surrender sovereignty to Brussels without the full consent of the British people. On Europe, too, the Prime Minister and the Government have vetoed the fiscal pact. Ministers have swept away pages and pages of planning regulations, but in so doing have still managed to protect the green belt, while providing local councillors and local communities with the opportunity to design and develop their own local plans free of top-down Whitehall directives such as regional spatial strategies.

The Government are introducing elected police commissioners and reforming public sector pensions that would otherwise become unaffordable and unsustainable. Importantly, the Government have taken millions of the low-paid out of income tax and have cut corporation tax. We inherited corporation tax at 28% , but by 2014, it will be reduced to 22%. As a result, the UK will have the lowest main corporation tax rate in the G7 and the fourth lowest in the G20. To help businesses further, the Government have introduced a £20 billion national loan guarantee scheme to get cheaper loans to businesses. These have been bold reforms and they have all been achieved without a Conservative majority.

It is not only that the Prime Minister has had to govern with a party that does not have a parliamentary majority, as the second reality is that the Government have no money—and it is not unreasonable to think that a Government with no majority and no money will have problems. We should never forget that the Labour Government left Britain with a deficit that, at £160 billion, was bigger than Greece’s. The Labour Government gave us the longest and deepest recession on record, so that we were one of the first countries into recession and one of the last countries coming out of recession. We should never forget the telling letter left to his successor by the former Chief Secretary to the Treasury, the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne):

“Chief Secretary, I’m afraid there is no money. Kind regards—and good luck!”

That pithy 13-word message—whether it was tongue in cheek or not—well summed up the 13 years of the Labour Government.

[Greg Mulholland (Leeds North West) (LD)]

Does my hon. Friend think it important to remind the House and the country that we are only two years into this historic coalition Government, and considering the economic mess that we were left, it is remarkable how many positive things are in this Queen’s Speech?

[Tony Baldry]

Yes, this Government have probably achieved more in two years than the Blair Government achieved in the whole of their first term.

--- Later in debate ---

[Greg Mulholland]

I agree with the hon. Lady’s point, but does she also agree that we should have a fairer system of voting for Members of both Houses of Parliament?

[Meg Hillier]

Will the hon. Gentleman allow me to continue for a short while?

One of my principal objections to the current House of Lords reform proposals is that I do not agree with the argument that we are making the House of Lords more accountable by having Members elected for a single term of 15 years without being able to stand for re-election. I cannot see how, in a democratic system, that is accountable. Members of the House of Commons have to face the electorate once every five years, and we have witnessed colleagues losing their seats as the electors have made that decision based either on the individual or their party. That is true accountability, although it has been weakened by proposals to change the boundaries every five years, as some electors will therefore never have the chance to vote again for the MP who has represented them. The Government are doing great damage by reducing the accountability of the Members of both Houses. That is a backward step, but it is being dressed up as reform. We must reflect and improve on these proposals if we are to have real change.

I come at this subject as a democrat. I believe that it is beyond the pale to have even an element of heredity in the House of Lords, and that that is rightly out of kilter with modern attitudes. We must not rush headlong into trying to improve the situation and see any change as an improvement. Instead, we must take measured steps and ensure that Parliament properly represents the people, and that we do not fill the House of Lords with stooges who have been selected by party leaders and who never have to face the electorate.

Although I look forward to our debates on this subject, I have to say that it was not raised even once on the doorsteps in my constituency during the most recent election campaign. Indeed, I am usually out on doorsteps while on roving surgeries a couple of times every month, and the last time I canvassed opinion on this topic everybody said they supported a democratically elected House of Lords save for one person who was of Nigerian origin and believed there was some merit in the hereditary principle. His was a lone voice, however. We need democracy, but not in the way that is being proposed.

The Queen’s Speech was a big disappointment. When I was watching it, I suddenly realised that it was nearly over, but many of the issues I had hoped it would address had not been mentioned. It is flimsy and expresses no compelling vision of what the Government want to achieve for this country. We agree with the opening sentence, but its sentiments were not backed up by proposed legislation. There is also no strategic approach to the economic crisis. We repeatedly hear about the need to tackle the deficit, but there are other issues that need to be tackled alongside dealing appropriately with the Government’s finances.

The Queen’s Speech demonstrates that the Government are out of touch and unfair, and we are also increasingly seeing signs of incompetence. The Prime Minister acknowledged that the economy is a higher priority than House of Lords reform, but the Queen’s Speech does little to tackle the economic problems, and I am particularly concerned for the businesses in my constituency and about unemployment.

The unfairness is seen in the retention of the cut in the 50p tax rate, helping the top 1% of earners in this country, while many of my constituents are keen to work but are unable to find the extra eight hours they will need to continue to receive tax credits. At one end, therefore, families who are doing everything they should—they are working hard and trying to work more, but are unable to find those extra hours—are losing out. What they need is some extra hours from their employer, as it is currently very hard to find another job. At the other end, however, millionaires are saving thousands of pounds in tax. That does not strike me or my constituents as fair.

Fortunately for the Government, I do not have sufficient time to dwell on their increasing incompetence. I might mention, however, the border controls fiasco that has been going on since last autumn. It is continuing now, which is especially serious given that we are in the run-up to the Olympics. I might also mention the youth unemployment figures. The Government’s incompetence in that regard will affect a generation of our young people and their families. There are also the ministerial dalliances with BSkyB, which demonstrate a real lack of appropriateness, to put it politely.

There were some announcements in the Gracious Speech that I welcome. I have long been a supporter of the Green investment bank. My big concern is that it is being introduced too late, even though there will be £3 billion of funding—although not all of it is certain. Will the bank be able to move quickly enough to ensure we secure the green investment required to help businesses grow and create the jobs we so desperately need? The environmental ship might have already sailed to other ports in Germany, China and other countries, whose Governments are far ahead of ours.

I also welcome the flexible parental leave proposals. It is important that people have that choice, but it must be couched in the right way so that women do not feel forced to go back to work and pass over the care of the child, whom they may still be nursing, to their partner. The principle of allowing families freedom over how they manage their own affairs is important, however.

Overall, the Government’s economic policy is hurting and it is not working—not in my constituency. Unemployment is rising. It is the worst we have seen for 16 years and of course, youth unemployment—I am on the record as having spoken about this a number of times before—is a real scourge of our society.

There are a couple of proposals I welcome. I welcome the intention to ensure through the children and families Bill that there is an all-through assessment for children and young adults. Too often, my constituents have experienced breaks in the support for their children, either at the age at which they transfer to a different school or when they transition into adulthood. Personal budgets provide a real opportunity for those young people and their families to have control as long as there are safeguards for the many families with whom I deal who would not be able to manage those budgets themselves. We must not throw out the baby with the bathwater and although I welcome the personal budgets, we must ensure that there is a safety net and support for those who are unable to do the necessary paperwork and to manage the employment side of it. The detail will matter if the good intentions in the Bill are to be met, and I look forward to working with my colleagues on my Front Bench to ensure that those needs are considered.

I hope that the children and families Bill will talk about ensuring that children are protected and supported. That seems to be the general feeling. I am concerned, however, that although the Government are considering protecting and supporting certain groups of children on the one hand, actions by other Ministers on safeguarding—such as the suggestion that faith leaders should be exempt from vetting and, if necessary, exempt from being barred from working with children—are a very worrying step. We must be vigilant about ensuring that we do not throw out the baby with the bathwater. The Government are very keen to talk about rolling back the frontiers of the state and rolling back red tape, but as far as the protection of children is concerned, when we put our children—and vulnerable adults, too—in the presence of a stranger, we need some surety that that stranger has been properly vetted. It is not acceptable to rule out one group simply on the basis that they are faith leaders.

Businesses in Hackney have been struggling for some time. We have had some great successes—Silicon roundabout is in my constituency—but they are largely small start-ups and are finding it hard to grow. We have some very innovative business models in a very innovative part of London, but businesses in Hackney are struggling to get loans and even, in many cases, an overdraft facility from their bank. The Prime Minister spoke earlier about Project Merlin, saying that it had worked and that the loan guarantee fund was generous. It is not so much the level of a loan that is an issue, however, but the fact that banks will not loan in the first place. There is an opportunity that has perhaps not yet been missed in the Gracious Speech—we will see whether it has when we have the detail of the legislation—to consider alternative funding methods for businesses. Innovators out there are prepared to fund innovative businesses in a different way and we must ensure that they are properly supported and regulated so that investors and businesses are protected. There are opportunities for more mutuals in the banking sector, which ought to focus on investment in their own areas, helped by their understanding of their locality. They would, of course, be owned by their members.

That brings me on to one thing that was missing from the Gracious Speech. As a Co-op and Labour MP, I was keen to hear the co-operatives consolidation Bill debated during the next Session, but it is not here. Where has that Bill gone? It would have been supported across the House. The previous Government did a great deal to change the law on co-operatives and to provide new legislation that made it easier to set them up, but as that was done piecemeal through different Acts of Parliament, there was room to bring it all together. Consolidation Bills, by their nature, are complicated and difficult, but it would have provided the platform for the introduction of yet more opportunities for mutuals and co-operatives. There is a feeling across this House, shared by members within every party—although it is not necessarily the view of every party—that there needs to be a different way of doing business in this country. If there is a better way of doing business than mutuals, which are owned by their members, who benefit from and see the direct outcomes of that ownership, I do not know what it is.

There is no commitment in the Queen’s Speech to introduce any mutual models at all, as far as we can see. The water Bill would have offered such an opportunity and the energy Bill might have offered opportunities for some mutual solutions, as would, of course, the banking Bill. We need new measures on demutualisation and we have already missed an opportunity through the selling off to the highest bidder, rather than remutualisation, of Northern Rock. If the House is united on the need for banking reform, why not join that up with the idea of the mutual model and ensure that businesses as well as individuals are supported by mutuals?

Another element missing from the Bill that is a concern to my constituents and to me is the antisocial behaviour legislation that we had hoped might be introduced. The message is very confused. One whole year ago, the Government’s consultation on antisocial behaviour finished. They have done the work, yet 12 months on there is no Bill in the Gracious Speech to deal with those issues. A year ago, the Government all but announced their intention to end antisocial behaviour orders, but there is no Bill to do that and the police and residents are left confused about where they stand.

The Government regularly pass the buck to local police forces when challenged on crime issues, but they are robbing them of the tools to do the job. We know that ASBOs require better enforcement and we accept that they are not perfect in every way, but they could be strengthened to deal better with the problem of repeat victimisation. The Government should be trying to build on what is in place and on what has been shown to work, rather than starting again from scratch. We hear that the Government has a plan for a community trigger, which would only guarantee action if five different households reported the same incident. For me, if one person complains, that incident of antisocial behaviour needs to be tackled. It should be taken seriously and investigated.

We also have an alphabet soup of other proposals. The crime prevention injunction and criminal behaviour orders do not do what they say on the tin. I know from experience with gang injunctions in Hackney that it can take a very long time for agencies on the ground to get used to the new powers, for the Crown Prosecution Service to deal with them properly, for courts to understand them and for them to embed. ASBOs might not have been perfect, but they were in the language of my constituents and of constituents up and down the country. People understood them and so did the system. To throw them out without having proper plans in place to replace them is a big mistake.

My constituency has a number of challenges. We have heard from others about youth unemployment. In my constituency, one in four young people under the age of 24 is out of work. Our overall unemployment rate is 12.7%. Those challenges have a major impact on child poverty. There are still children in my constituency who turn up to school in September after a long summer holiday malnourished, because their parents have chaotic lifestyles and have been unable to get them fed. We all support measures to get people into work, but to have a whole generation of young people who are unable to get work or work experience will, I fear, lead to greater challenges for their children.

I do not have time to go into the figures for the ethnic breakdown of unemployment, but let us just take the example of young black men. About 55% of young black men are out of work, which is a staggering figure and much higher than the general norm. It risks becoming a real divide in this country if it is not tackled. It might not be an issue for every hon. Member in this House—as the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi) said, his is not a kaleidoscope county—but let me tell hon. Members that my constituency is a kaleidoscope constituency, as are many others. It is a great strength of our area, but we must not have one group of people so badly affected by Government policy.

Other issues have not been tackled. Housing benefit levels have been cut, rents have continued to rise by a great deal in my constituency and house prices have risen, too. That means that my constituents face a real challenge on housing and homes and nothing in this Queen’s Speech will tackle that, which is a serious mistake. It demonstrates again how the Government are very much out of touch with what really matters to people. Families want to be in a position to support themselves and my constituents’ requirements are very limited in many respects. They are not as demanding as they should be, I believe, but they want a job, a good school for their child, a health service that will work and to know that they can afford a roof over their heads. The job and the roof over their heads are particular challenges at the moment, so although we have these esoteric debates in the Westminster village about House of Lords reform—an issue not once raised on the doorstep—and as much as I think we need to reform the House of Lords, right now the energy of this place should be focused on how to move this country forward, invest in jobs and growth and ensure that we create job opportunities and homes for constituents in my constituency and up and down the country.