Debate on the Address

Ian Liddell-Grainger Excerpts

Tuesday 11th May 2021 Commons Chamber

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

I am delighted to take part in this debate, because today—as you probably know, Madam Deputy Speaker—is Somerset Day, an event of such historical insignificance that it took a letter from the Secretary of State himself to remind me. Somerset Day, unfortunately, is a publicity stunt with no genuine history behind it. It was invented six years ago to offer credibility to the then leader of the county council—the one who today, I am afraid, was waving a rather pertuse flag that shows an overweight dragon with blood pressure problems and a background of fluorescent custard.

We have had an interesting debate, and it was also interesting to listen to Her Majesty. As somebody who has been involved in the Commonwealth, I absolutely agree with the Government that we have to do our bit for overseas aid. I know that we have cut the budget, but we do so many other things: things to do with governance, with children, with education, and with healthcare, which we are seeing especially now. I am always grateful for the amount of time and effort that the Government put into the Commonwealth. It is a massively important organisation, as you know, Madam Deputy Speaker—one that has cross-party support and enormous support throughout the world.

This Gracious Speech has hit on some interesting issues. The first, for me, is jobs, because down here in the heart of Somerset we are building the Hinkley Point C nuclear power station. We have not stopped; we have continued on throughout the pandemic. We are also known for large distribution centres, which have carried on throughout the pandemic. We do an enormous amount of manufacturing—it has all carried on throughout the pandemic. We are therefore incredibly grateful for the money that the Government have made available to keep those businesses going and keep the wheels of commerce turning. On skills and learning, we have probably the best tertiary college in the United Kingdom, Bridgwater & Taunton, which does a phenomenal job.

However, I would just like to say a couple of words of caution. The first is about the rural deficit. If we really want to even up between rural, urban and whatever, we must put more money into rural communities. West Somerset, which I also represent, is by and large fairly poor. It is a massive area, made up of a national park, an area of outstanding national beauty, a coastline and, dare I say it, flood plains—you couldn’t make it up. We need that money to keep us going, and thereby hangs a problem, which is, of course, planning. The Government are quite right to say that we need more houses. I do not dispute that; I agree. However, I would be interested to know where we stand on flood plains, national parks, areas of outstanding national beauty and areas that we should perhaps not build on, because they are parts of our heritage. That needs to come out in the detail; if it does not, I think a lot of people will worry.

There is one point that is not in the Queen’s Speech, and I am really sad about that. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government has had important legislation on planning announced today, as we know, but I wonder how much thought has gone into other problems. He has intervened, I am afraid, to say that he would like to prevent district councils in Somerset from holding a referendum. The district councils want to give the people of Somerset a voice about the plans to reform local government. I think we are all in favour of democracy, but the county council does not want the people to be asked—it wants to tell them. The county council believes that the Secretary of State will ignore the results of this referendum—he has said so—and accept the county’s plans to form a giant, impersonal unitary authority. That is not in the spirit of what we have heard today.

This is becoming a very bitter battle indeed. The referendum has already had positive support from hundreds of district councils of every political persuasion. More Conservatives have voted to have a referendum than voted for the county. It will start next week, whatever the Secretary of State says, and it will cost considerably less than the £1 million already spent by the county, which has its own delivery team and which has 24 people in its press office—more than No. 10, intriguingly. The county will force through any change without any kind of vote. My right hon. Friend has offered the people an online questionnaire to fill in, but I am not sure that is democratic. There were no checks to ensure that only people in Somerset took part. It was, I am afraid, a shallow, trivial exercise that made a joke of democracy. If we treat voters like that, they will turn on us, as we all know and as we have seen over the last few days. Somerset may look true blue now, but the people of Somerset deserve fair play and will punish those who deprive them of it. We have seen it before. So happy Somerset Day to all of us, and I do spare a thought for the purple dragon that we are trying to make extinct because it deserves to be.

On my final note on planning, I cover the Somerset levels, and as you will know, Madam Deputy Speaker, 12% of my constituency went under water in 2014. I say to the Government—not just for my area, but for the United Kingdom—that flooding, because we are on an island, is devastating. It is terrifying because we cannot control it, and we certainly cannot stop it when it gets away from us. I would ask the Government to make sure that adequate resources, legally and legislatively, are put into the system so that we can defend—because defend we must—against it. The days, as was the case pre-2014, when the Environment Agency says we will have managed retreat have to stop. We cannot do this, because if we do a lot of our country will be under threat. We cannot ignore climate change but, equally, we cannot ignore the damage that flooding can do. The defences around the Hinkley Point nuclear power station are staggering, and rightly so, but I have seen the cost of doing these things, and I cannot afford to leave Somerset County Council to do them, because it will make a pig’s ear of them. Therefore, I ask the Government to please look at this, along with the jobs, the skills and the rural updating, and also to make sure that places such as Somerset are properly covered by properly elected councillors, not by some supernumerary, out-of-touch, irrelevant bunch of people who really do not care. Long live the dragon, and may we slay the ones we do not like.