Easter Adjournment

Ian Liddell-Grainger Excerpts

Thursday 29th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Ian Liddell-Grainger (Bridgwater and West Somerset) (Con)]

The House may not be surprised by the subject about which I will be speaking. I will be speaking about it because the Government have just announced that two councils are to be merged, and I will be speaking on behalf of my constituents.

I was very pleased to hear from the hon. Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) about the festival of the north. I have a slight vested interest in Newcastle, and I think that it is fantastic news. I urge colleagues to go to Newcastle, which is a very beautiful city—partly because we built it.

I welcome the chance to contribute to the debate, although what I have to say will not please everyone. I want to tell the House about a town hall in Somerset that is being spoon-fed huge sums of public money and, I am afraid, wasting every penny. The name of the waster is Taunton Deane Borough Council—unfortunately, because it has just been announced that it will be amalgamated with my local council, West Somerset. It had ambitions to take over the council, and last week the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government gave it the thumbs up.

Most people shook their heads in disbelief and shock, including the locals in Taunton Deane, as they read the latest letters in the local paper. The Taunton Deane councillors plan to change the council’s name, sack more than a third of the workforce, spend millions of pounds that, unfortunately, we do not have on computers that do not seem to work, make themselves comfy in new offices on which they are spending £11 million although they are worth £5 million, and then come begging to Whitehall when it all goes wrong. Even the unions, which have been instrumental in providing information, agree with that.

In these dark corners of local government, incompetence rules, and we often find greed as well, not to mention sharp practice in many cases—not just in my area—and occasionally, I am afraid, corruption. Taunton Deane Borough Council has been making a dodgy name for itself for many years, long before my time, and has been rattling its tin in Whitehall for ages. The Government recently handed it £7 million to pay for a new road, which runs along the edge of my boundary. It never occurred to anyone that you cannot sanction a brand-new housing estate unless you build a brand-new road first.

What Taunton Deane is very good at is dishing out planning permission to builders. It is a tiny council, but, believe it or not, it wants to build 17,000 new houses. The effects of that on the roads and the infrastructure will be devastating for my constituents. A great many of those houses will be erected by people—dare I call them mates?—in the local area. The hon. Member for Gateshead will recall the days of Poulson and others. The council leader, believe it not, is a builder. Mates’ rates matter big time in Taunton, and these mates all work around Taunton.

What gets my goat is that, while laying concrete on its green fields, the council has the bare-faced cheek to pretend that it has an environmentally friendly master plan. The Government have rewarded it with a few hundred thousand pounds, which, admittedly, is not a lot in the scheme of things, but it is pretending that a few more badly planned housing estates will add up to a shiny garden town. The idea of garden towns is to build something new, and to aspire, but that does not apply in this case. Taunton Deane specialises in dreams in my area, which is a bit worrying, especially with Glastonbury down the road. Its latest lunacies include borrowing millions of pounds to tart up its headquarters, and trying to buy a hotel. Why a local council should want to buy a hotel is slightly beyond me.

The council’s leadership is rather like Arthur Daley, in a three-wheeled Reliant, flogging “cut and shut” Cortinas to unsuspecting civil servants. They will probably all end up in the canal. What saddens me is that the Government so often cave in too quickly and pay up. I would say the same about Governments on either side of the House. We must stand up against petty bureaucracies. Underfunding may be a problem, but overfunding is a downright scandal.

The future of West Somerset council, in my constituency, is being dictated by a group of people who have no interest in it whatever. It has 28 councillors, and the number will go down to roughly 15, perhaps 14. Taunton Deane has demanded red lines. It has no code of conduct, and no precept for any of its parishes. There is no town council in a town that contains about 100,000 people. The whole thing is run by someone who has a pointed beard and looks like Arthur Daley.

The point I am making is that this is not the way to conduct local government. My area is the sparsest part of England, because we have Exmoor and the Quantocks, which is an area of outstanding natural beauty. We cannot build on the coastline. We have enormous flood plains, which, as many of my colleagues will remember, have been affected rather devastatingly. Our room for manoeuvre is very tight. We have one secondary—we do not need any more, to be fair—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I call Martin Whitfield.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Lord Commissioner of Her Majesty’s Treasury (Paul Maynard)]

I enjoy learning new things every day. It is a delight to take part in a much underrated parliamentary tradition. Many of us often participate in these debates. I am disappointed that more do not realise what a great chance it is to see the better side of Parliament. Who can forget my contribution—I think that it was in 2013—when I spoke for 10 minutes on the heritage protection of the built civil nuclear environment? No one remembers it at all, but I can assure the House that it was a scintillating performance.

I find that one of the hardest things about being a Member is retaining my own sense of good will towards all Members, whatever side of the House they happen to sit on. We often forget that we all come to this place wanting to achieve the same thing, which is to make a positive difference in the communities that we serve. This can often be hard to discern as time goes by. Our debates can grow fractious. As we have heard even today, our remedies to the problems that we see day by day vary widely. We often have very different ideas as to how we should solve the problems that we come across.

Such debates underline the fact, however, that we have far more in common as Members than what divides us. The Chairman of the Backbench Business Committee, the hon. Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns), is a prime example of that. Week after week, he gives us opportunities to discuss the issues that matter most to Members across this House. Today, we had one such debate on autism, and it was an excellent way to spend a profitable couple of hours. I was only disappointed that I could not speak in it myself.

My last effort before being made a Minister was to chair a review of apprenticeships for people with autism for the Department for Education. That is an amazing thing. It underlines that one does not need to be a Minister to make a difference in this place. I made that point in my maiden speech. Everywhere we go in this place, as the hon. Member for Lewisham, Deptford (Vicky Foxcroft) pointed out, we can make a real, positive difference. I think we often underestimate just how much change we can effect without standing at this Dispatch Box.

The Chairman of the Backbench Business Committee made some worthwhile points. I was delighted to hear him talk about De La Rue, which is a genuinely excellent British company printing banknotes and passports around the world. It relies on an export market that is out there. I am sure that he has heard many of the arguments that have been employed over the past few days. He will know that the legal process is ongoing. He will also know that many other jobs—some 50 jobs, I believe—have been created by the alternative bid that has been successful. The security-related work will be carried out in the UK, so there are no national security concerns. I think that we all wish De La Rue well. It is an important part of the British economy and his own local economy. I am sure that we all wish him every success in that in future.

The hon. Gentleman was right to raise the importance of the economic progress that is being made across the whole north-east. Every time we have an exchange in this Chamber, I seem to make a point about the investment that we have made in new rolling stock for the Metro—a decision that I took as a Minister at the Department for Transport. To me, that is a sign of this Government’s commitment to the north-east and the importance we place on economic growth in the region.

[Mr Liddell-Grainger]

May I say, as a former major in the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers, that my hon. Friend’s point about the north-east is absolutely right? I had the great privilege to live there for many years. I commanded X-ray Company of the 6th Battalion the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers. It is a wonderful area. There is a proposal in the north-east to have the incredible showcase that I mentioned earlier. Again, I urge all colleagues to visit it. Does my hon. Friend agree that the north-east is to be celebrated and visited?

[Paul Maynard]

I certainly agree; it is indeed an area to be celebrated. Perhaps my hon. Friend is thinking of moving to the north-east and seeking election in a constituency there—I do not know. He has spoken almost more about that area than his own.

The Chairman of the Backbench Business Committee was kind enough to mention a constituency case that I came across involving sleep-in workers. I have met two of the many organisations involved. He may be aware that my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire (Heidi Allen) took a delegation to see the Prime Minister to discuss this issue. The matter is before the courts, which are carefully examining exactly how this is dealt with. We are more than aware that there is an issue to be resolved. I have seen the consequences for myself in my own constituency.

My final point to the hon. Gentleman is that I am delighted that the Great Exhibition of the North is occurring in Gateshead, tinged only by slight disappointment that it is not occurring in Blackpool. However, anything that gives me a good reason to go over to Gateshead and Newcastle has to be a good thing, and I look forward to paying a visit.

I struggle to believe that my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Sir David Amess) has been in this House for 35 years. Once again, he showed the virtues of compression. I sometimes think that every single one of his constituents must write to him when the pre-recess Adjournment debate beckons just so that they get a mention in his speech. I am sympathetic towards city status for Southend, but on one condition: if I support Southend’s bid, he has to support Blackpool’s. It has to be one for one.