BBC Local Radio

Debate between Helen Goodman and Nicholas Dakin

Wednesday 26th October 2011 Westminster Hall

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under you, Mrs Osborne. I congratulate the hon. Member for Worcester (Mr Walker) on initiating this first-class debate. There is clearly concern across the House; more than 50 Members have been here this morning. There is a lot more to say, and the BBC needs to hear that there is cross-party agreement on our serious concern about its proposed cuts to local radio.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Exeter (Mr Bradshaw) pointed out that the BBC must take a strategic approach to shaping services. At the moment, it is not clear that it has done so. Local radio accounts for only 4% of its costs, yet the cuts will have a disproportionate impact on local radio, not because the amount of money being sought—12%--is above average but because it obviously costs more to broadcast in lots of different places.

[Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making a good point. Does she agree that in the case of Radio Humberside, which is in its 40th anniversary year, losing 10 staff from a team of 42 will have the impact that she describes on quantity and quality of output?

[Helen Goodman]

Yes. My hon. Friend is quite right. One interesting thing that has emerged in this debate is the regional bias in the cuts. Many more Members from the north and west of the country are here, because those areas will be harder hit. Merseyside and Tees will be cut by 20%, while Somerset will be cut by 2%. It is not clear why. That also means that people will continue to feel that the BBC has a metropolitan bias.

Finance (No. 3) Bill

Debate between Helen Goodman and Nicholas Dakin

Tuesday 3rd May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Nic Dakin]

I quote T. S. Eliot to remind us that bankers have played good parts in the world of culture, finance and many other things, and to remind us through his words of the pain of growth and rebirth. Economic growth is a difficult business. That is the business that we should be in, and we should make sure that bankers play their part in that.

Bankers were not always about bonuses, and conversations about banks were not always about bonuses. Sadly, since the credit crunch and the global financial crisis, more attention has been focused on how great the anomaly is. We have heard the telephone-number salaries quoted and compared with the situation of people in our constituencies who are doing their best to bring their families up to be aspirational and to move forward in their lives.

[Helen Goodman]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the criteria for awarding bonuses are strange? Is it not ironic that at a time when the clearing banks are closing branches in our constituencies, bankers are taking huge bonuses?

[Nic Dakin]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. She draws attention to the fact that people see banks closing and services becoming less available and more remote at the same time as large bonuses are being given out, with no apparent transparency and no clear criteria.

The Bill delivers a tax benefit for banks—a bonus for banks, rather than for UK plc—in the form of the £2.5 billion bank levy, which should be compared with the £3.5 billion bank bonus last year, and with £100 million being given back through cuts in corporation tax. At a time when the banks should be putting more in to atone for the situation we are in and to help the engine of the economy, the Government are allowing them to take more out. That does not seem fair to me, and it does not seem fair to the people I represent.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nic Dakin]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. Clearly, the amendment aims to provoke a review of how we best ensure that bankers’ bonuses are taxed efficiently and effectively, rather than ineffectively, as the Government are currently, which is always a danger unless we are vigilant, as my hon. Friend suggests.

[Helen Goodman]

I shall of course vote for the amendment this evening, but it does raise the question of whether it ought to be the Chancellor who reviews the bank levy or, because of the serious problems in the way in which the Government have handled it, the Public Accounts Committee.