European Football Proposal

James Cartlidge Excerpts

Finance (No. 2) Bill: (Freeports (Stamp Duty Land Tax)) (Ways and Means) & Ways and Means resolution
Monday 19th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Oliver Dowden]

The short answer is yes. The hon. Lady is absolutely right to highlight the impact on the women’s game, which I mentioned in my statement. That is part of how the pyramid works, as she will well know. The finances that have helped the women’s game to go from strength to strength in recent years—it is wonderful to see the strength of the game—come from the pyramid supporting it. If that failed to happen, that would be another big cost of this proposal.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

This is an outrageous proposal, so I strongly welcome the robust set of measures that my right hon. Friend has announced today. On the point of competition law, these clubs will have very powerful legal teams, and they have huge financial resources. Whatever the current legal advice, does he accept in principle that, where a league operates on the basis of not having relegation and is basically based on the wealth that the clubs have, it must be a cartel?

[Oliver Dowden]

My hon. Friend raises a very important point. That is a very valid interpretation of the effect of this proposal. Clearly, I will be working with BEIS and competition lawyers to get greater clarity and definition on that, but I can tell him that I have already discussed it with the Premier League and the FA. We are well aware that competition is going to come into play in this scenario, and we stand ready to work with them and take measures that may be required.

British Library Board (Power to Borrow) Bill

James Cartlidge Excerpts

Friday 13th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Bim Afolami]

It provides a very good advantage to small businesses. If anyone from the Treasury is listening, they will have heard how popular the Budget appears to be on the Government Benches as well as on the Opposition Benches. In this House, whether on Budget day or on big issues of foreign affairs and the like, we often focus on the macro big-ticket items, but often comparatively smaller things in money terms have the biggest impact in local communities. Libraries, and indeed the British Library, are an example of that.

The British Library is enjoyed by more than one and a half million people a year, with another 27 million visits to its website. Its origins in the British Museum Library go back 250 years or so. It is home to Magna Carta, handwritten lyrics by the Beatles and, I am told, even a gravestone. I am not quite sure where they have put it—perhaps in the same place as the “Ed stone” from the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband). Sorry, that was rather mean of me, but I could not resist it.

When I visited the British Library last week to talk about the Bill, the staff were very kind. They showed me some of their manuscripts and exhibits, including manuscripts from the Anglo-Saxon era. As somebody who did his thesis on the development of the burghal system of Edward the Elder, that was a real interest to me, though not to too many others in the world.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

He’s a moderniser.

[Bim Afolami]

I am on the moderniser wing.

I also saw letters from the Anglo-Saxon period to the 20th century, including those from the Conservative Prime Minister Arthur Balfour—his statue is in Members’ Lobby—to a young, ambitious, thrusting Conservative Back Bencher called Winston Churchill, basically telling him to calm down. They showed me everything in between. The collection is almost unparalleled not just in this country but across the world.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bim Afolami]

My hon. Friend makes a very important point. It is worth now explaining exactly how the process works. In effect, the British Library currently has a grant in aid from the Government through the Department. Under this Bill, in the event that the British Library wishes to borrow any money, it will submit an application for a Government loan. That application will include all terms, including the period of time and any terms on the debt, and the man or woman in Whitehall will have to approve that. But there is no monopoly on wisdom anywhere, so let us just say that the investment does not work—that it goes wrong. In that event, the grant in aid to the British Library would be reduced. This Bill will therefore not result in a loss for the taxpayer. If the British Library takes on debt that it does not pay back—either in part or in full—the consequences will be on the British Library. The big failsafe is the fact that the debt has to be approved by the Government. The British Library will not be going out to commercial banks; it has to go through the Government. Hopefully, that will avoid the problem mentioned by my hon. Friend.

[James Cartlidge]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Is not the key point that this legislation is not revolutionary? I believe that the Natural History Museum and the Science Museum have both enjoyed this borrowing power since 2013, and that it is quirk of legislation that the British Library has not. Is it not therefore the case that, rather like many of the books that I have borrowed, this legislation is overdue?

[Bim Afolami]

I agree with my hon. Friend. It is worth saying that in 2013 many DCMS-sponsored museums—such as Kew Gardens, the British Film Institute, Historic England and the Ministry of Defence museums—were given 12 operational freedoms to help them become more financially independent and access finance for new projects, through commercial revenues, philanthropic donations and the like. Of the 12 freedoms, the British Library has 11. It is just that the 12th was prohibited by the 1972 Act, which this Bill seeks to change. My hon. Friend is indeed right that this Bill will bring the British Library up to date with other similar museums.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bim Afolami]

That is a very good question. My under- standing is that the monitoring will be, first, whether the library pays back the money on time, because by paying back on time we show that we are satisfying the terms of our debt and upholding our end of the bargain. More broadly, the Minister on the Treasury Bench is responsible for overseeing the British Library, and indeed all the other sponsored museums and libraries. It is therefore the Department’s responsibility to ensure that the library is operating in a sensible way.

Across both its sites, at Boston Spa in west Yorkshire and at St Pancras in London, the British Library holds over 150 million items. It is interesting to think about the scale of the physical collection, which expands by something like 8 km every year—the distance between Westminster and Greenwich. Then there is the digital archive, which in 2019 alone expanded by the equivalent of 2 billion web pages. The library’s expertise in digitisation means that rare and fragile objects are available for anyone to see online while protecting them from damage—a point my hon. Friend the Member for Wantage (David Johnston) made earlier. That expertise, because it is online, can be shared around the world.

Why is it important that that expertise should be shared around the world? After all, it is the British library, this is the British Parliament and it is for this country. It is important because we are not an isolationist or inward-looking country. The British Library, like the BBC and all sorts of institutions, is critical to our soft power. Those institutions are critical for displaying to our partners and friends around the globe that Britain is not just a leader in the things they know about, such as our armed forces or the English language; we are also a cultural leader. Showing that culture is so important to this country, and the British Library is a key part of that.

Many Members might be thinking, “Why does the British Library really matter? Yes, the library is important, but it is not really core to my politics or the concerns of my constituents.” I will say two words for why it matters: levelling up.[Interruption.] I can see Opposition Front Benchers saying that they have another four years of this. Indeed, they might have another 10 years of it. It means levelling up regionally. As I have said, the British Library reaches out across the country beyond its two sites. With the ability to borrow, it can do even more and have more ambitious plans for spreading its model and its knowledge and expertise throughout the country.

The British Library matters because it is at the forefront of what a public library means in the 21st century. It is not just about lending books and providing people with space to work. In its own words,

“helping businesses to innovate and grow”

is one of the British Library’s core public purposes. Through its network of business and intellectual property centres in public libraries across the country, the British Library offers support and advice to entrepreneurs and small businesses, helping them to thrive, with most of those people being outside the main site in St Pancras; it is important that the House appreciates that.

I visited the business and intellectual property centre in St Pancras last summer with Baroness Neville-Rolfe, to look at ideas for promoting businesses in underperforming regions and helping entrepreneurship. That was when I first came across the people who run the British Library, long before the Bill was conceived, and I was really impressed with the work they were doing. As I was walking around, I talked to not only members of staff but the businessmen and entrepreneurs themselves, and I saw the value that they were getting out of that service. Indeed, I met a constituent who said, “Gosh, Bim, I had to come to the British Library because our local library didn’t have that capacity”—they travelled into London to get that advice from entrepreneurs. My constituency is only 35 miles from London, so imagine how difficult that is for somebody who is 150, 200 or 300 miles away from London. That is what we need to change, and that is one reason why we need the British Library to be able to borrow money.

It means levelling up not just regionally but with those who are under-represented. The impact that the British Library is already having on groups of people who are otherwise under-represented in business is unmistakable. From January 2016 to December 2018, of the business and intellectual property centre users who started a new business, 55% were women, compared with 22% for new business start-ups across the UK, and 31% were from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds, compared with only 5% nationally. Further- more—I found this stat really surprising—17% of all the people who come through the British Library’s business and intellectual property centre have a disability of some kind; nationally, the figure is below 2%. The British Library has already shown that it is doing good work, and we need to help it to do more.

It means levelling up to ensure that the British Library can innovate, just like the entrepreneurs that it helps. The DCMS voted loans scheme, which is the process whereby the British Library will get access to the debt, has already been used by other cultural institutions for things such as new buildings to house collections and conservation studios or to move staff into; newly constructed, purpose-built storage spaces; building new galleries; increasing visitor footfall; and putting more objects on display. Those are the sorts of thing that the British Library could do if it had the ability to borrow.

Our cultural institutions in this country need to be much more commercially minded to generate extra sources of income to help them continue their valuable work. If we go back, say, 40 years, the grants in aid to certain public institutions might have been bigger, but they did not have a digital presence in those days. Now, all those institutions need to have a significant, prominent, effective digital presence, because if they do not, people will not value the physical presence. That is a huge expense that did not exist 40 years ago, and our cultural institutions need to be able to have that.

It is worth me talking about the St Pancras Transformed project, to give a flavour of what could happen across the country if the Bill passes. It is a public-private partnership to extend the London site, to create more exhibition spaces, improved public areas, a better offer for business users and a permanent home for the Alan Turing Institute. It will also provide flexible accommodation for third-party companies and institutions.

[James Cartlidge]

My hon. Friend is getting to the nub of the matter and he is making a fantastic speech. On the other services that the British Library could provide and the commercial aspects, can he tell us whether some of them will be charged for? Obviously, the overwhelming service provided by the British Library is free to use, but some of us would argue that, if it provides a competitive charge for services to cross-subsidise that, that could be justifiable.

[Bim Afolami]

The answer is that some would be charged for and some would not. I repeat the example I gave a few minutes ago about membership. If there were a members’ area in the British Library—it has one at the St Pancras site but if it wanted to extend that model to one of the public libraries across the country—members would pay a subscription that enabled them to go to a certain part of the library. There would also probably be a café in that part of the library, which would obviously charge for food and drink: coffee, tea and the like. Again, the café would be making commercial revenue and the members would pay, but that would not prevent people from going to the library, using the computers, borrowing books, getting advice for their business and so on entirely for free. It is a mixture and it would really depend on the part of the country people are in.

One of the things we have thankfully moved away from in this country over the last 10 or 15 years is the idea that one centralised model works everywhere. I know that libraries operate in my constituency differently from how they operate in the constituency of the hon. Member for Batley and Spen. It is just different: the demographics are different, the ages of people wanting to do things are different; the atmosphere is different; the landscape is different; the sorts of companies people want to set up are different; and the types of books people borrow are different. This is about giving our institutions enough freedom that they can move forward and innovate in an entrepreneurial way, but do that locally in a way that is locally based and locally sourced.

It is time that we gave the British Library the same freedom to borrow, the same flexibility and the same opportunities that so many other cultural institutions have, because this country will benefit from that. The British Library overall will benefit, both in St Pancras and in west Yorkshire. The expanding network of public library hubs will benefit. Indeed, the British people, whom we were all elected to represent, will benefit.

In speaking to colleagues about this Bill, they have been generally supportive, but I was asked one question more than any other. Indeed, I touched on it when my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Laura Trott) made this point earlier. What happens if the British Library borrows money and cannot pay it back? Just to reiterate, should the British Library apply for and receive a Government loan, it would have to pay it back, and if it did not pay it back either in part or in full, the grant in aid would be reduced correspondingly, and the British Library would have to adjust to that reduction in revenue. Ultimately, it would have to make sure that the public purse—the taxpayer—did not lose out as a result of the Bill. It is very important that the House recognises that point.

Some people, although I definitely do not agree with them, have mentioned—[Interruption.] Yes, this sounds like a straw man, but it is actually true. Some people have said that what libraries actually need to do is to move entirely online and get rid of the physical books. [Interruption.] No one here—good—but some people do think that. Indeed, I know some people do because, when I was speaking to the Department about the Bill and thinking about the questions people had already been asking and what had come up, one of the main things that came up was, “Bim, you’re going to have to have an answer to this question”.

So I thought about an answer to the question. My view is that there has to be a mix. Yes, we have to have physical collections, but we also have to match them with digital collections, a good online presence and digitising things where we can so that we can share them across the world—for example, for a school kid doing a project. We all remember having to do projects at school, and we had to go to a library and do all these things. The worse one I had to do was something on the WWF. I spent lots of time working on it, until, the night before, I realised it was meant to be about the World Wildlife Fund, rather than the World Wrestling Federation, which meant I did not get a very good mark. I do not know why I have shared that with everybody, but I have been living with the shame for a long time.

--- Later in debate ---

[Neil O'Brien]

My hon. Friend made an important intervention that was, like the British Library, content-rich. I welcome her words. She is absolutely right that the British Library is helping entrepreneurs, and also that the Bill will help the British Library to be more entrepreneurial. It was the library’s brilliant idea to decide to set up these IP centres—the first in the world—and we are now helping it to expand them.

I welcome the fact that the British Library is going to renew the Boston Spa campus, with all the opportunities around that. The point about having borrowing powers is that it allows for the most to be made of opportunities. I welcome the fact that the library is exploring a presence in Leeds. I love the idea of British Library North. I really like the idea that it might use the old Temple Works. It is a famous building of the industrial revolution that at one point contained the world’s largest room, which is pretty cool. The only thing I would say—to grind my own axe for a moment—is that I would love to see some of these things happening in the midlands, especially the east midlands. So, “British Library, if you are listening, do not forget your old friends in the midlands! Please use your new borrowing powers to help us too.”

All the things that the British Library is doing create opportunities to drive economic growth, in small ways and big. The hon. Member for Batley and Spen (Tracy Brabin) made the good point that there is an excellent café there. It reminded me of the old advert for the Victoria and Albert museum that described it as a very good café with rather a nice museum attached. So there are small things but also much bigger things. One can imagine the physical regeneration and wonderful things that could be done in Leeds with the new campus. The fact that the British Library could borrow would let it go that little bit further.

This is a slightly different category of thing, but Network Rail recently rejigged Market Harborough railway station. It is great, but everything was replaced, like for like, whereas we could have made more of the opportunity of that regeneration. I hope that this new set of powers for the British Library will enable it to make the most of the opportunities and exciting things that it is doing.

I recently published a report on—Members should not groan—levelling up. It looked at, among other things, innovation, science and culture spending. I was struck that, taking Arts Council England and Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport direct funding of national institutions such as the British Library together, London received 47%—nearly half—of the total spending in England in the period from 2010-11 to 2017-18. Amazingly, that is a slightly lower percentage than in previous decades, but the spending is incredibly London-centric.

[James Cartlidge]

Is my hon. Friend aware that, in terms of growth of DCMS sectors in the economy, yes London is No. 1, but not far behind is the north-east?

[Neil O'Brien]

I thank my hon. Friend for that piece of information. It leads me neatly on to what I was going to say. It is striking that Arts Council England has targets and is aggressively moving to spend more of its budget outside London, which I welcome. It is starting from a base line of an absurd proportion of spending in London and is moving, although more slowly than I would like, clearly in the right direction. The reason why total culture is so heavily weighted towards London is not primarily to do with Arts Council England but mainly to do with directly DCMS-funded national institutions, of which the British Library is a main example. In that category of spending, 90% of the spending is in London. That is what drives the huge imbalance in spending. So many of the institutions that we love and cherish are in London. The Department is trying to do more elsewhere, but there is a lot more to be done.

Our national museums and arts institutions have become more innovative and commercial over time, because sometimes you have to speculate to accumulate. That is why today we will be giving them borrowing powers so that they can invest to grow.

It is true that the current British Library building on Euston Road is not as universally loved as the old domed reading room in the British Museum. There are so many wonderful things about that old dome. It had, funnily enough, a papier-mâché ceiling and it was opened in the Victorian era to a breakfast feast that included champagne and ice cream, which is my kind of library. The new building still had a much better fate than the French national library. Francois Mitterand’s library was built at the same time and has suffered technological problems, industrial relations problems and problems with thermal loading. The heat coming into the large glass L-shaped buildings was damaging the books, and the French press were quick to say that it was typical of a Mitterand project that it ended up cooking the books. The British Library has been more successful than that, and than the old Birmingham library, now demolished, which Prince Charles said looked like a place where books were incinerated rather than read.

Despite the fact the new reading room is not quite as beautiful as the old one, which Louis MacNeice imagined in his poem “The British Museum Reading Room” as a great beehive under which scholars worked away to store up knowledge, it is a hugely important national institution doing more and more every day to support our national life and economic growth. We should be proud of it. It is a wonderful institution. I am also proud of my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden, who is today introducing an important piece of legislation that will support and protect an important national institution to do even more for this country.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

I will be extremely brief, but first, let me pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Bim Afolami) for a brilliant speech, and for presenting this worthwhile Bill.

On the principle itself, as has been said, the 1972 Act did not permit the British Library to borrow, hence the reason for this Bill, whereas other famous British institutions got those powers back in 2013. It is important to refer to the letter from the former Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Secretary of State, now Minister for Media and Data, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale). He wrote to the then chair of the Natural History Museum, Lord Green of Hurstpierpoint, about the change in the museum’s borrowing powers. It is important to note that he specifically said this in the letter:

“I encourage you to make the most of these flexibilities, including through considering ways in which capital projects can create income-generating opportunities, making them suitable for loan financing.”

That is really important. I have four children and we take them to the Science Museum and the Natural History Museum. Although it is free to get into those museums, they do have specific paid-for exhibitions, which can be absolutely brilliant. I recognise that we should preserve free access, but it is perfectly right to have very attractive features within the museum that are optional and chargeable. It is interesting to understand that that is where the Secretary of State saw this borrowing power being spent—on new income-generating sources. In my view, the purpose of this legislation is to give new gross value added to the sector, so that a museum can create wonderful new creative things around the country, which is part of that agenda that we call—let us have a drum roll—levelling up. [Hon. Members: “Hooray!”] We are not going to stop. We are going to keep levelling up. This is a very good Bill. It takes a great British asset and makes it even stronger. It is part of our soft power, and it adds to our economy.

I will just finish by referring to an experience in my constituency in Suffolk, which, I hope, will be part of the levelling up agenda—east as well as north, and so on. We have a very prestigious artistic heritage in South Suffolk. We could not move any of it, as it exists permanently. We have the tree, which is technically just outside the boundary, in front of which Mr and Mrs Andrews were painted by Gainsborough in Sudbury itself. We have Gainsborough’s House, where he lived, which has now become a museum, and just up the Stour, we have Flatford mill, which is the living site of the Hay Wain, the most famous English painting, so we have huge heritage. I spoke to Mark Bills, the director of Gainsborough’s House, and asked him whether he had borrowing powers—that is the principle of the Bill. He needs them because there is to be a major refurbishment of Gainsborough’s House. Money comes from the national lottery, but 10% is held back on projects, so it needs to have the ability to borrow, even if it is, in the parlance of a library, on a short-loan basis.

I very much commend the Bill. We should all support it because it adds to a great British institution. I look forward to hearing from my old friend the Minister about what more we can do.

[Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

I, too, rise in support of the Bill and congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Bim Afolami) on bringing it forward. I am also going to mention those dreaded words “levelling up,” as they are a key part of this. It is something that many of us have been banging on about for years. We did not call it “levelling up” then; we called it “a fairer deal for the north” or something like that. Having said that, I fully concede that this is not just about the north; it is about every region in the UK. It is about spreading both facilities and jobs throughout the country. It is great to hear that the north-east is doing well in terms of DCMS funding. That has not been particularly apparent in my trips around the north-east—perhaps it was north-east London.

[James Cartlidge]

It is about the economics sector, not the spending of the Department. In terms of the growth in the DCMS sector within our economy, the second fastest growing part is the north-east.

BBC Licence Fee

James Cartlidge Excerpts

Thursday 6th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Nigel Adams]

The BBC is alive to the issue that the hon. Gentleman raises. It is having to deal with a number of pay-equality cases and I am sure that there will be many more of those cases. Nevertheless, I am sure the hon. Gentleman will appreciate that the BBC is operationally independent from Government.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

Surely this is an incredible opportunity for the BBC. The licence fee restricts its paying base to the UK, but if it had a subscription model, it could export to the entire world. As the Minister said, the BBC’s own prediction is that it will have a global audience of a billion people a week by the end of the decade. If just 5% of those people were to take out a subscription to the iPlayer at £6 a month, the BBC would recoup the entire £3.7 billion that it gets from the licence fee, but as export income instead of a tax on the British people.

[Nigel Adams]

My hon. Friend makes some good points, but we are talking about the decriminalisation consultation, not how the BBC is funded in future. The current model is valid until 2027 and there has to be a conversation before then about what model is appropriate for the BBC in a digital age.

TV Licences for Over-75s

James Cartlidge Excerpts

Wednesday 8th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[Tom Watson]

I agree: it is the most vulnerable and loneliest who will be affected if this policy is implemented. That is why we called this debate.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman is being very generous in giving way. In principle, should a multimillionaire receive a free TV licence?

[Tom Watson]

If we believe in universal benefits and that people who have paid into the Exchequer over their working lives are entitled to benefits, then yes. I hope the hon. Gentleman believes that his party should stick to its manifesto pledges.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Lewisham East (Janet Daby). I stood in Lewisham, Deptford in 2005 when my now neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Braintree (James Cleverly), stood for Lewisham East; obviously, we have both been a bit more successful since then. It is the first time I have spoken after the hon. Lady, and I welcome her to the House.

I was not intending to speak, but earlier I intervened on the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Tom Watson), to ask him a question that is fundamental to this debate. I asked him whether, in principle, a multimillionaire should receive a free TV licence, and he said, in effect, “Of course they should.” I happen to disagree fundamentally with that proposition.

[Kevin Brennan]

In principle, should a multimillionaire receive free treatment on the NHS?

[James Cartlidge]

That is a completely different point, and let me explain why—[Interruption.] Calm down; give me a moment. The original response—the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson) made this point, very fairly—was that it is about universality. The justification for providing free TV licences regardless of wealth is that they are a universal benefit.

As my right hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale) pointed out, however, eligibility for a free TV licence over the age of 75 was introduced only in 2000. There is no way that anyone could say it was a fundamental tenet of the welfare state contract—something that someone would expect to receive in exchange for their contributions—unlike treatment on the national health service, which has been there since just after the war and is very clearly based on the principle of paying into the system, sharing risk and receiving. I think most people accept that point.

[Julie Cooper (Burnley) (Lab)]

Did the hon. Gentleman stand on the Conservative manifesto that promised to retain free TV licences for over-75s?

[James Cartlidge]

I did, but this is a debating Chamber—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Battersea (Marsha De Cordova) does not agree. I hope that she makes some original points when she comes to speak. I simply say that there will probably be a general election at some point in the next few years, and possibly before 2022. In this Chamber, we should debate policy; that is what we are put here to do.

I happen to think that one of the biggest questions we face concerns the fact that people who are going into work today will not receive an occupational pension, because such pensions have disappeared. Many retired people—good luck to them; my parents are in this category —receive good occupational pensions. Some of those people, although not most, would be regarded by many as relatively wealthy. In my view, therefore, we must look at the principle of taxing benefits that are paid out as so-called freebies—of course, the money has to come from somewhere—according to the recipients’ means.

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)]

I want to expand on the point about the difference between the welfare state as originally devised by the 1945 Government, and what we have now. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that it is a moveable feast? Things have been added and taken away over the years. For example, dentistry was included at first, and it is not now. We added the free TV licences in 2000, and David Cameron added universal infant free school meals—heaven forbid that anyone would try to take them away now. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the welfare state has changed and evolved over the years, and that is a good thing?

[James Cartlidge]

The hon. Lady makes a perfectly fair point. The welfare state has always evolved. At heart, however, it is about the contributory system. I think most people would expect that when they pay into the system, they will get what they were told they would receive. Obviously, anyone who was over 75 in 2000 and went on to receive a free TV licence cannot conceivably have been told, when they began paying contributions at the start of their working life, that that was one of the benefits that they would receive.

Of course, the obvious point to be made is this: does that mean that I think we should not have free TV licences for the over-75s? The short answer is that I do not think there should be a TV licence. I agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Maldon that it is not remotely sustainable as a solution. In my office in Parliament, I have three young members of staff. We worked out that we have three subscriptions to Netflix, two to Amazon Prime and one to Now TV. The whole world of TV viewing in this country is changing very rapidly and the licence fee is deeply anachronistic. It is levied on people without any reference to their ability to pay and without reference to whether they even watch the BBC. It does not seem to fit the era in which we live or the direction in which communications is heading.

How should we pay for it? I do not imagine that I am the world’s foremost expert on this point, but I think that—taking the principle of public service broadcasting, which I do believe in—everyone should contribute to some degree, based on their ability to pay. We should look at a core service for the BBC funded by, for example, a supplement on subscriptions to Netflix, to ensure that everyone who benefits from having a public broadcaster contributes to some degree.

In this Chamber, we could all stand up at any time and say the easiest thing. The easiest thing here is to say how wrong it is to take away this responsibility from the Government and put it on the BBC. The easy point to make would be to suggest that we as Conservatives are somehow taking benefits away from people or doing something harsh. The reality is that the welfare contract I have referred to throughout my speech is changing fundamentally.

[Emma Little Pengelly]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[James Cartlidge]

I will give way to the hon. Lady in a moment. It will be my last intervention, Madam Deputy Speaker.

We cannot ignore the fact that we have an intergenerational issue. That is no one’s fault, by the way— no one intended it to be like that—but those entering work now will not receive occupational pensions or many of the benefits that those who have retired have done. The implications of that need to be debated at some point.

[Emma Little Pengelly]

When we look back over the comments from the BBC at that time, it is clear—many people have referenced this—that many people welcomed it because it was getting concessions elsewhere that they believed would offset that. The issue facing us here today is that they got those concessions and banked them. They have now changed their mind and it is older people who are going to suffer. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the ball was dropped and that a guarantee should have been put into the agreement that if concessions were going to be handed over there should at least have been a guaranteed period to protect free licences for older people or for the issue to have come back to this place?

[James Cartlidge]

I have always admired the hon. Lady and in particular her party when it comes to negotiations. They do tend to take a robust stance. I understand the negotiations with my right hon. Friend the Member for Maldon were particularly robust, but she makes a very fair point.

I will conclude by saying that all universal benefits—the winter fuel allowance, the free bus pass and the TV licence—are coming under scrutiny because we are having to look at where we get the money to pay for social care and so on. We cannot spend the money twice. The money we give to someone who owns a vast estate and receives a free TV licence is money we could have spent on the social care of those with dementia and so on. We should not pretend. Public money is not finite and we should debate the fairest way to allocate it. When we look at the sustainability of the TV licence funding system and the sustainability of the welfare contract, we will find that in the years to come there will have to be change. It is time we started to debate that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kevin Brennan]

My hon. Friend accurately describes what is often the modus operandi of this Conservative Government.

The hon. Member for North Devon also said that the BBC had agreed to continue the concession, but that is not true. In the end, the BBC was forced to agree to take on the concession, but with the right to change it. That is the essence of why we are here today—because the BBC is consulting on doing that, and that agreement was made with the Government.

My hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham East (Janet Daby) was one of many Members who pointed out that her mother watched the Parliament channel and was probably watching our proceedings today. I am sure that she would have enjoyed my hon. Friend’s excellent speech, in which she pointed out the importance of the free TV licence concession to older people.

The hon. Member for South Suffolk (James Cartlidge) said that he had not intended to make a speech and was only prompted to do so by his own intervention on the shadow Secretary of State, in which he asked him whether, in principle, a multimillionaire should receive a free TV licence. In response to that, I asked him during his speech whether a multimillionaire should receive free NHS treatment. It is true of any universal benefit that it is available to all; that is the underpinning principle of a universal benefit. The hon. Gentleman is perfectly entitled to make the argument that the TV licence should not be a universal benefit to over-75s. I disagree profoundly with that argument, but it is a perfectly respectable one and he is entitled to make it; but he is not entitled to palm that decision off on the BBC. That is the essence of the argument today. Just like the former Secretary of State, the hon. Gentleman said that he wants ultimately to abolish the licence fee. Well, if that is what he wants, I hope that he would agree that he should come here as he did today and argue for it, put it in his manifesto, put it to the people at an election and see whether they support his proposal.

[James Cartlidge]

We do not have time today to go into this issue in the detail that one would want, but let me say that the NHS is profoundly about risk-sharing. Even a multimillionaire would not be able to afford the huge cost they could face if they had to pay for NHS care for a whole manner of conditions. The TV licence is a set fee of £157, and the hon. Gentleman is arguing that someone who owns vast acres and many mansions should get that for free.

[Kevin Brennan]

As I said, the hon. Gentleman is entitled to make that argument but is not entitled to palm the decision off on the BBC. That is the essence of our point.

My old university friend, my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (John Grogan)—who is still, I think, the distinguished chair of the all-party parliamentary group on the BBC—said that George Osborne is the villain of the piece. I think that many of us can agree with that, in many ways. I am looking forward to the rapturous coverage of my hon. Friend’s speech in the Evening Standard tomorrow. He said that his majority is currently 249, I think. I am sure that he is going to romp home after his speech today when his older constituents read how he so ably supported them.

My hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Julie Cooper) pointed out that for over-75s living alone, TV can literally be a lifeline. She mentioned the amount of money that will be taken out of the pockets of people in her constituency. That is the essential point. If this concession is ended, people in an already hard-pressed community will have to pay in full for their TV licence. That is money that should not be taken out of communities that are struggling at the moment. My hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (Faisal Rashid) read out some of the quotes from constituents who had written to him and pointed out that they understand what the Government are up to and will not be fooled by the approach they are taking.

My hon. Friend the Member for Batley and Spen (Tracy Brabin) knows a lot about TV. Like my brother, she has appeared as an actor on “Coronation Street”, and she knows what she is talking about when she says that TV is a friend to the lonely. The work that she has continued with the Jo Cox Foundation, which she mentioned, is to be commended. It is a pity that the Government are not rethinking their approach in the light of all the evidence about loneliness and older people.

My hon. Friend the Member for Battersea (Marsha De Cordova) accused the Government of devolving their political responsibility for the cuts, and she is absolutely right—that is exactly what they are doing. My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Laura Smith) pointed out that 7,000 people in her constituency receive this welfare provision, as she rightly called it.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden) correctly pointed out that this policy has two effects—on the BBC through the hospital pass that it has been given, and on pensioners in the form of the stealth tax that it will represent if the Government do not act. He also pointed out that 40% of people entitled to pension credit do not receive it, so there will be a double whammy for them. He mentioned the Government’s claim that austerity is over and gave them some political advice. I knew him when he was a political adviser to the former Labour Government, so I would advise the Minister to listen very carefully to what he said, because the Government will pay a political price if they do not.

The hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens) quoted “Flower of Scotland” when referring to the fact that I pointed out that his Scottish Conservative colleagues had been completely wrong when they said that we—his party and my party—had not opposed this measure during the passage through this place of the Digital Economy Act. I can add to what I said about the Committee stage. On 28 November 2016, my colleagues and I tabled an amendment on Report in which we also opposed this measure.

My hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson) told us about her own representations to the BBC’s consultation. I hope that it will listen to what she said, but more importantly, I hope that the Government will listen, because ultimately that is where the responsibility lies. My hon. Friend the Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Hugh Gaffney) rightly said that this was a “Let’s blame the BBC” policy, and that his constituents would pay the price for the Government’s cynical breach of their promise.

I remind the House that we have consistently opposed this underhand stealth tax on older people and the creative sector. We strongly support the excellent campaign that has been run on this by many of my hon. Friends, but also by publications such as the Daily Mirror. It is wrong to outsource social policy to an unelected organisation whose historical mission is to entertain, educate and inform the country, not to decide who should be the beneficiaries of Government social policy. But if the Government believe that that should be part of the BBC’s role, they should have argued for it. They could have put in their manifesto—

Online Harms White Paper

James Cartlidge Excerpts

Monday 8th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

The hon. Lady will see that there is a fairly extensive list of online harms in the White Paper already, and we do not regard it as exhaustive. As she heard me say to the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah), we think it is important that the process should be able to deal with new harms as they emerge. However, she will recognise that it is important to ensure that we preserve what is good and special about the internet—the capacity for people to come up with new ideas, to have discussion and to have a free flow and exchange—while ensuring that the harms that she rightly points to are controlled. That is exactly what the White Paper seeks to do. We do not, as I have said, believe that everything in it will yet be perfect, but it is important that she and others contribute to the process over the next period of consultation and make it better.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

I very much welcome the statement, but returning to the earlier question from my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith), does the Secretary of State accept that if we are not clear about the extent to which the new duty of care impacts on the issue of publisher versus platform, the courts will make that interpretation for us?

[Jeremy Wright]

Harking back to a former life, in my experience there is always a risk of court involvement, but we should seek to be as clear as possible about the responsibilities of online companies. Whatever we choose to call them—platform, publisher or something else—it is their responsibilities and what they are engaged in doing that matter. That is what we are seeking to achieve, and once we have defined that with clarity, the necessary powers will need to be available to a regulator to deal with when that does not happen.

Holocaust (Return of Cultural Objects) (Amendment) Bill

James Cartlidge Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Friday 15th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Theresa Villiers]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. No, I am afraid that the scope of this Bill is defined and narrow and relates to specific circumstances to enable our national museums to return looted property. However, there are provisions within the criminal justice system and the system of international law that are aimed at bringing to justice those responsible for crimes committed during the Nazi era.

The goal of those behind the holocaust went even beyond mass murder and mass killing. The evil men and women responsible also wanted to wipe out all traces of Jewish culture in Europe, and confiscation of property was a significant part of that repulsive project, so returning books and artworks covered by the legislation is not really about their monetary value. It is about restoring to people a tangible physical link with a lost loved one, and it is about the conservation of memories and culture that the Nazis wanted to eliminate.

My Chipping Barnet constituency is home to a number of holocaust survivors. I pay tribute to all of them for their courage and dignity and for the work that so many of them do to recount their stories to try to ensure that we never ever forget what happened. We owe it to them to enable this small recompense—the return of cultural property—to continue.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend. This is a very, very good Bill. I was brought up in her constituency, and, like Mr Speaker, born in Edgware. Many of my friends and neighbours were of the Jewish faith. Some of them had been in concentration camps, or had family members who had perished there. Fundamentally, there should be no sunset clause on the memory that we keep permanently as a society of that terrible outrage, so that we never forget it and therefore repeat it.

[Theresa Villiers]

I wholeheartedly agree with that sentiment.

I would like to close my speech today, as I did on Second Reading, by reading out the thoughts of a family involved in one of these types of cases, not necessarily one directly determined under the 2009 Act, but one that expresses very clearly the underlying principle that we are considering today. Speaking of some paintings that were returned to them, one successful claimant told the Commission for Looted Art:

“They mean so much because these paintings symbolise that lost pre-war world and provide the last link with lives which were utterly destroyed or irrevocably transformed by the Nazis. The objects reflected the character and taste and personality of their owners. Stealing them was another form of taking the people themselves. It’s the meaning of these looted works of art that is central to why restitution is so important. In stealing property, the Nazis made no distinction between rich and poor. They took from both equally and they took everything. And by taking every part of people’s lives, the Nazis were also taking the evidence that people had once lived. So restitution is one way of restoring the dead to the living. That the restitution of looted artworks remains an issue almost 70 years after the war attests to that significance—and not to their financial value.”

Today’s horrific news from the other side of the world shows the horrors that hatred and extremism can lead to even in the modern world. At a time when antisemitic incidents are rising, it is more important than ever to stand up against all forms of hatred, racism and Islamophobia. This Bill is one way in which this House can do that.

Supporting this Bill provides a way to signal that we will not tolerate antisemitism or other forms of hatred, that we will always condemn it and that we will seek to root it out wherever we find it. Supporting this Bill is a way to demonstrate that we will never let the lessons learned from the holocaust to be overlooked or forgotten. Supporting this Bill is a way to show the respect that we bear for holocaust survivors who held on, suffered unimaginable trauma and survived against the odds, and I commend it to the House.

Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation

James Cartlidge Excerpts

Tuesday 20th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Margot James]

And shared, exactly. This is going to be a vital question for the new centre, but it also comes under the regulatory purview of the Information Commissioner.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

Can my hon. Friend assure me that rural communities will have a voice at the centre, especially given the role that AI will play in driving up productivity for farms as we take back control of our agricultural policy when we leave the EU?

[Margot James]

I certainly think that rural areas have a key role to play and a voice that must be listened to as we develop policy in this area. If you will allow me, Mr Speaker, I also want to emphasise the fact that rural areas need better connectivity. Farms need to be able to connect to the coming 5G networks, so that they are able to take advantage of the internet of things and all the other positive benefits that AI will allow.

Oral Answers to Questions

James Cartlidge Excerpts

Thursday 22nd March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Tracey Crouch]

First, of course PC Keith Palmer was an avid Charlton Athletic fan, and it was only right that the club respected him by turning his usual red seat at The Valley white with his number written on it, so his memory will always live on at the football club.

On the hon. Gentleman’s second question, I might not have put it in those terms, Mr Speaker.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

3. What steps his Department is taking to support tourism throughout the UK.

[Chris Davies (Brecon and Radnorshire) (Con)]

5. What steps his Department is taking to support tourism throughout the UK.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Michael Ellis)]

This week is English Tourism Week, and more than 50 Members of Parliament are doing constituency days tomorrow. The Government’s tourism action plan outlines the ways in which we support tourism, both domestic and international, throughout the UK, and VisitBritain works hard to promote Britain as both an international tourist destination and, of course, one for domestic visitors.

[James Cartlidge]

I thank my hon. Friend for that answer. As this is English Tourism Week, may I draw his attention to the wool towns project in Suffolk, where five of our beautiful medieval wool towns—Sudbury, Hadleigh, Long Melford, Lavenham and Clare—are joining together to draw more tourists to the area? I send him a warm invitation to visit the wool towns and to meet the stakeholders who are working so hard to make this happen.

[Michael Ellis]

Yes indeed. I thank my colleague for his interest in this area, and I will always support my colleagues in their efforts to improve the visitor economy in their constituencies. I hope that we can indeed organise a visit to the wool towns. In the meantime, I advise him in the first instance to look into the Discover England fund, which is a great fund. Also, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has the Coastal Communities fund, and sources of funding for initiatives that support the local visitor economy.

Data Protection Bill [Lords]

James Cartlidge Excerpts

Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons
Monday 5th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

I have received representations not only from the National Association of Local Councils, but from the Suffolk Association of Local Councils and many of my own parish councils—including Moulton Parish Council—which do an admirable job in telling me about the pressures facing parish councils throughout the country. I pay tribute to them for their efforts, and for the length of their representations to me.

Of course it is important for parish councils, and other local councils, to follow high-quality data protection standards. The Information Commissioner’s Office has provided extensive guidance to help organisations to prepare for their new responsibilities, and I urge councils to look at it.

The responsibilities of data protection officers—this is relevant to the issue raised by the hon. Gentleman—can be implemented in different ways. For instance, several parish councils can choose to share a single data protection officer, provided that he or she is easily accessible from each establishment. The system does not require the hiring of one person per organisation. Organisations have already been set up to provide this service, and the service itself is important. In the case of a small organisation, such as a very small business or a parish council on a low budget, it is still important for data to be handled and protected carefully, because small organisations too can hold very sensitive personal information. I am extremely sympathetic to the plight of small businesses that must deal with regulation—especially as I come from a small business background myself—but I am also convinced that it is good practice to follow high-quality data protection standards and that it is good for organisations to do so.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

I thank my right hon. Friend for giving way. He is being very generous.

I knew that some small businesses in my constituency were concerned about the impact of the GDPR, so I telephoned the Information Commissioner’s Office to find out what support was available to them. The only answer that the office could give to every question that I asked about how the GDPR would affect small businesses was “Go to the website.” Does my right hon. Friend agree that we should expect better from a telephone line that is funded by the taxpayer?

[Matt Hancock]

I am glad that there is a telephone line. I am sure that the Information Commissioner will be watching the debate and will hear the plea for clear guidance on how small organisations in particular should implement data protection standards, whether they are small councils or small businesses. However, the Information Commissioner’s Office has already provided clearer guidance, as well as the telephone line. It is obviously listening, with the aim of getting the guidance right and ensuring that, in lay terms, meeting the new standards is straightforward. This issue came up in the other place as well. It is important for us to get the implementation right, especially in the case of small organisations.

Telecommunications Infrastructure (Relief from Non-Domestic Rates) Bill

James Cartlidge Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Monday 10th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Helen Whately]

I appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s putting the record straight, because I made an error in my notes. Instead of business rates, I meant to say corporation tax. We disagreed about this point earlier. My point about corporation tax stands. Unfortunately, raising corporation tax results in a reduction in revenue for the Government, as my hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse) pointed out.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Was she as shocked as I was to hear the shadow Secretary of State refer to a “small” increase in corporation tax, because the rate Labour would move it to would be almost a 50% increase on the 17% rate that we will have?

[Helen Whately]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. This point really is significant because as corporation tax rates come down below 20%, businesses behave differently. Businesses are more likely to locate in this country, to invest in their businesses in this country and to create jobs, which is what my constituents and, I am sure, the constituents of the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish want. That also generates the revenue that is paid in taxes to fund public services.