Policy for Growth

Jane Ellison Excerpts

Thursday 11th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Jane Ellison (Battersea) (Con)]

I would like to touch on a couple of specific points and, if there is time, to make a more general point.

I very much welcome the Prime Minister’s recent announcement about entrepreneur visas, when he spoke about laying out the red carpet for business people who come here to create wealth and jobs. Had that approach been in operation in recent years, it might have helped two constituents of mine. They are New Zealand nationals who run a multi-million pound technology business, which is now based in the UK. They came to this country following a meeting with Lord Digby Jones in 2008, when he visited New Zealand as part of a Government trade delegation seeking to attract investors and businesses to the UK. Following that meeting, they decided to relocate to the UK, and subsequently applied for leave to remain in May 2010, having set up their board in this country and secured more than £1 million of orders.

The UK Border Agency has yet to consider my constituents’ applications, and it is over six months since they were first submitted. My constituents run a company that creates products sold internationally, and they are often required to go overseas to secure further orders for their company, and, by extension, for the UK. Clearly they cannot do so while their passports are held for indefinite periods by the UKBA, and are available only for identification purposes, not for travel. If those business women want to use their passports, they go to the back of the queue. My constituents have told me that they are already considering relocating their business to Singapore or Hong Kong, as there are fewer barriers to setting up and relocating businesses there. However, they do not want to do that; they want to be based here in the UK. It would be a great loss to our economy if they relocated, and their case is indicative of a wider problem. I hope that Business Ministers can address the matter urgently with Home Office colleagues.

Tax increment financing schemes allow local authorities to fund major regeneration projects by borrowing against the future increase in local business rate income. We have talked a lot about the conflict between public and private regeneration, but TIFs bring the two together, allowing borrowing against the income of companies set up in the regenerated areas. TIFs have been successful in the US, and there have been some pilots in this country. TIFs are of particular interest to my constituency and people across London, and probably to people across the country, as it is hoped that they will help to fund the extension of the Northern line into the Nine Elms area, close to this place, and put Battersea power station on the underground map.

Members on both sides of the House may be interested to know that a detailed regeneration plan for that iconic building is finally going to the local planning authority this evening, with a recommendation for approval. If the plan gets the go-ahead, the funding for the tube extension, via a TIF, will be vital for securing thousands of new jobs and homes. I welcome the consultation outlined in October’s local growth paper, but I am given to understand that Business Ministers envisage TIFs being available only from 2013. I realise that they will require legislation, but I hope—this is also a plea—that Ministers can accelerate that timetable, to make possible their introduction much earlier.

I want to make a more general and perhaps slightly unfashionable point. It is time to stop talking down the financial services sector. We know about the huge problems in banking, which have been well covered in the debate, and many of the criticisms were correct. Nevertheless, financial services is a world-leading British industry. It is essential to economic growth, and a major export success for the UK.

The UK has global leadership in the provision of a number of financial services. For example, the UK insurance industry is the largest in Europe, and London is the world’s largest international insurance market.

[Andrew Bridgen]

Does my hon. Friend agree that so-called banker-bashing is extremely unhelpful?

[Jane Ellison]

It is unhelpful. The banking sector’s mistakes and the problems with lending are well documented. They have been covered, rightly, in this debate, but they should not obscure the wider interest that we all have in a thriving financial services industry. More than 1 million people are employed in that industry, two thirds of whom are outside London.

[Alison McGovern]

Will the hon. Lady acknowledge that our leading role in the financial services industry was one reason why the global crash in that very industry meant that Britain was exposed to that crash in ways that some other countries were not, and that it affected us more for that reason?

[Jane Ellison]

I am happy to take the hon. Lady’s point, and I have acknowledged it. I am trying to get across the point that we must see the wider picture. In most large banks and large City insurance and law firms, 40% of the staff are not professional; they are support staff. The wealth generated by those businesses supports many other businesses. It is essential to put some balance back into the debate.

I am a London MP, but I hail from north of Watford. I am not a banker, and never have been; I was a retailer for 23 years before coming to the House. Nevertheless, on behalf of the shopkeepers, restaurateurs, support staff, myriad small businesses, and the many thousands of people who work in the financial services industries at levels far below the super-rich, I call on all hon. Members to bear it in mind that a thriving City is good for the UK and for a great many people beyond those we hear about in the headlines. Let us not allow our frustration about bonuses and bank lending to blind us to that fact.