City and Town Centres: Regeneration

Helen Grant Excerpts

Wednesday 16th October 2024 Westminster Hall

[David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)]

It has been a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Vickers.

[Sir Roger Gale in the Chair]

I am sure it will continue to be a pleasure to serve under the chairmanship of Sir Roger.

The debate has been wide ranging. It has gone from the commanding heights of the international economy to the truly micro. I commend the hon. Member for Derby North (Catherine Atkinson) for having brought together a wide group of Members with a clear interest in the role of local authorities and in regeneration specifically, but more broadly in the future success of our high streets.

It is always worth remembering that when there are international investment summits, 70% of people in work in the UK are in an enterprise with less than five staff. It is easy for big businesses to turn up and meet the Government. I very much welcome the investments that were announced at the investment summit. I welcomed them when they were announced under the previous Government and I welcome them again. But we need to make sure that those investments continue to manifest as a benefit on our high street.

The pressure of time perhaps meant the hon. Member for Derby North did not have the opportunity to talk about the input of people such as Councillor Barry Lewis, the leader of Derbyshire county council, and Councillor Ben Bradley, the leader of Nottinghamshire, who are examples of local leaders who have championed inward investment. Of course there are many from across the political spectrum.

Here in Parliament is an opportunity for us to reflect that although it is easy to describe the problem, we need to focus on what we can do to make a difference. My hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Bradley Thomas) shared some examples of that from his experience as a council leader. I hope that when the Minister responds he will have something to say about the impact of business rate reliefs.

Currently any English business that is a shop, restaurant, café, bar, pub, cinema, music venue, gym, spa, hotel or any form of leisure venue, can obtain a 75% discount on business rates, capped at £110,000 per business per year. I am aware that that rate relief is not available to the same extent in Labour-run Wales and aware that the Government are about to embark on some Budget decisions. But it is clear that the ability of businesses, such as those that are anchors on our high streets, to secure that relief has been extremely important, especially in the post-covid era, in making sure that our high streets remain vibrant. That sits alongside measures such as—

[Helen Grant (Maidstone and Malling) (Con)]

As we have heard today, town and city centres like mine in Maidstone desperately need a range of vibrant and varied shops and businesses. Does my hon. Friend agree that a reduction in business rates, not just a reform, would incentivise businesses to set up, especially independents and new start-ups? At the same time it would ensure that a level playing field starts to be set with e-commerce and home delivery services.

[David Simmonds]

My hon. Friend represents the county town of Kent and presses the case that the leader of Kent county council, Councillor Roger Gough, makes: as the county town, it is particularly important that Maidstone demonstrates a vibrant and thriving high street. My hon. Friend is a vocal champion for that.

Measures such as business improvement districts and local enterprise partnerships have enabled combinations of local employers, business investors, local authorities, land holders and housing providers to come together to look at how regeneration schemes can best be designed. There is cross-party consensus that local leaders know their communities best and are best placed to design projects to bring the maximum possible benefit.

I acknowledge that it has been challenging to implement the process set out in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 and the schemes that followed from it. For many years, the EU cohesion fund was the key source of inward investment at a strategic level, and in the post-covid and the post-Brexit era, central Government have found it challenging to design a multi-year financial arrangement that replicates it, serves a similar purpose and is deliverable at scale. I wish the new Government well with that challenge.

The 2023 Act also included planning reforms that enable long-empty shop units to be converted to much-needed housing on our high streets. That reflects a longer-term change on our high streets from retail to night-time, leisure and hospitality economies. Those are the businesses that benefit from the highest level of business rate relief, and they are becoming mainstays on our high streets. A number of hon. Members have mentioned the benefit to microbusinesses of approaches such as safer by design, which uses planners’ expertise to build out antisocial behaviour and crime from buildings and developments from the start through their design, layout and physical security measures.

It is important to reflect on the successful regeneration projects of other nations. This debate is focused on towns and cities, but when German reunification took place, national politicians were clear from the start that the project to rebalance the country was going to take 30 years. They were also clear that it would start with significant investment in large cities to create employment and prosperity, and that that would then feed into the wider social and public infrastructure around those towns and cities to ensure that, in due course, everybody in the country could benefit from a higher standard of living. Although we set out an ambition on that scale with the levelling-up projects, we did not have anything like the time and resources to deliver it on the scale that we wanted to, especially with the relentless calls for higher spending on covid in the background, which were a key part of shaping the Government’s financial approach at that time.

I note with a degree of pride that an average of 400 new jobs were created for every single day that the last Government were in office over 14 years. We must remember that work is key to regenerating our high streets—if people have money in their pockets, they will spend it locally. When we left office, youth unemployment was half what it was when we entered.

I read the Crewe business improvement district proposal, which, like many such projects, started out with very specific words: this is a “private sector led proposal”. That is a recognition that private sector investment will be crucial, and I think we are seeing a similar recognition from the new Government.

I have two asks of the Minister. First, will he set out the timetable for the next round of devolution? If he is unable to do so now, would he give us an indication of when he will do so? There are local authorities looking to switch to the elected mayor model. The East Midlands combined authority will be significant for places such as Derbyshire, but there are many other parts of England that are looking to do that.

Secondly, will the Minister commit to, or give us a deadline for a statement on, the retention of the 75% business rate relief that was introduced by the previous Government and is still being followed by the Treasury? It has been critical for keeping investment and employment buoyant on our high streets. We need to make sure that vital lifeline is retained into the future.