Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

1st reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 2nd July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)]

I start by thanking the Backbench Business Committee for allowing this debate on this incredibly important matter. I thank the hon. Members for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier), for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts), for Birmingham, Ladywood (Shabana Mahmood) and for Newton Abbot (Anne Marie Morris) for supporting the application, along with all the members of the Public Accounts Committee. I also thank the hon. Members for Redcar (Anna Turley) and for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western), who submitted similar applications that have been lumped in with this debate. I also give my thanks in advance to everyone who wants to speak today; I will be as quick as I possibly can.

Local government spending is a story of unsustainability and inequality. According to the Local Government Association, which is holding its conference as we speak, funding to local government and business rates have fallen by £4.1 billion since 2015. Councils have far less spending power, but here is the rub: our local councils are having to deal with a big growth in demand for key services. Taking into account the decrease in Government grants, subsidised a bit by the increase in council tax, our councils have lost nearly a third of their spending power over the last nine years, and key services are suffering.

We all know what that means, at its heart, for the most vulnerable in our communities. Since 2010 the number of homeless households has risen by 33%, the number of looked-after children is up by nearly 11% and the number of people aged 65 and over in need of care has increased by 14%. It is great that we are living longer, but central Government have not grasped the nettle.

The combination of with higher national insurance contributions, the apprenticeship levy and the national living wage means that councils are at breaking point. Given the major stresses on children’s services and adult social care, I will focus on those today, but there are many others, and I look forward to other Members making contributions about their local area.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

For childcare and other local authority services, central Government have shifted funding away from a grant system and on to business rates. Shopkeepers, in particular, are now finding it difficult to carry on their business. Central Government have also failed to deliver on social council housing, which is an indictment.

[Layla Moran]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution. In fact, spending on services has decreased by 19.2% in real terms, which is not sustainable.

In my local area, Vale of White Horse District Council is a good example. We won the council from the Conservatives in the last round of local elections, and now we have sight of the finances. I am sure this is not unique in the country, but there is not enough money to fund the basic statutory services that the council is expected to deliver. The council is therefore eating into its reserves at an alarming rate. Coupled with that, an outsourcing agreement that was meant to save the council £50 million, and in fact has saved nothing, is projected to cost the taxpayer money. We are in a dire situation in the Vale.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Monday 17th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend is quite right: one of the problems with housing development in the past in this country is that we have tended to build the houses first and cope with the infrastructure last. We have attempted to reverse that equation, and we now have £5.5 billion dedicated to housing infrastructure, which is specifically designed to release land to build the houses the next generation needs. I would be more than happy to meet him to discuss the possibility of a North Northamptonshire bid to the housing infrastructure fund either now or in the future.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

When the Secretary of State meets the Chancellor to do the spending review, will he stress to the Chancellor that while a lot of money has been put into local government, it is inadequate to prevent the closure of libraries, or to cover issues such as social services and particularly youth clubs? Will he ensure that the Chancellor has a look at that and, more importantly, at social care in the community?

[James Brokenshire]

Through the last local government financial settlement, we increased the funding available to local councils for dealing with some of the issues of social care. If the hon. Gentleman is asking me to champion the needs of local government and to recognise the quality services it delivers, with the amazing work delivered by our councils up and down the country, I can assure him that I will absolutely be doing that.

Shared Prosperity Fund

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Tuesday 14th May 2019 Westminster Hall

[Dan Jarvis]

I agree. I will make those points later in my speech.

I have seen at first hand what local areas can do when they come together to drive economic growth, but also how they can be limited and constrained by the powers and resources available to them. European or Government funding can often come with limitations that inhibit creative thinking, making it difficult to deliver significant structural changes.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. When I was leader of Coventry City Council a long time ago, we badly needed regional aid, which at that time came from Europe. One thing that investors asked was what our skills, transport systems and so forth were like. If we could not answer those questions, sometimes we did not get the aid, and as a consequence we lobbied for regional aid for a couple of years. It is very important that we get some guarantees out of the Government, because whether we happen to live in Wales, Scotland or the west midlands, we need real answers. If we do not get them, investment will fall, costing us jobs. This is a very serious situation; I cannot stress that enough.

[Dan Jarvis]

My hon. Friend speaks with great authority on these matters. He has put his finger on the nub of the issue, which is that decisions that will have an impact on local communities are best made by those communities themselves. Through the devolution agenda, the Government have a very exciting opportunity to devolve not just decision making, but the powers and resources required to deliver those decisions.

I was expressing frustration about the criteria that are sometimes applied to pots of funding. Central Government funding in particular can often be short-term or pit places against one another. Sadly, at times it can be driven by political short-termism, by pork barrel politics or by who shouts loudest and longest. Under such circumstances, it is hard to plan for the future, and it can be more difficult to be strategic.

From 2020 onwards, the funding allocated to regions from the European Union will come to an end. From 2021, so will the funding allocated through the local growth fund programme. Together, the programmes have totalled billions of pounds of investment. The European funding element in the current programme alone has been worth €207 million for the Sheffield city region, €796 million for Yorkshire and the Humber, €513 million for Northern Ireland, €895 million for Scotland and €2.413 billion for Wales.

Non-Domestic Rating (Preparation for Digital Services) Bill

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons
Monday 13th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[Rishi Sunak]

The measure is even narrower than that; it is simply a paving measure, which I will come on to, that enables that exploratory work to start so that future Ministers will be able to come to this House with firmer proposals, with costs attached, depending on the eventual design of the system that is ultimately decided to be appropriate after extensive consultation with the sector. If my right hon. Friend bears with me, I hope his question will be answered later. If not, I will be happy to have him intervene again.

In the lead-up to the 2016 Budget, the Government undertook a wide-ranging review of the business rates system, in response to public calls to reform. As well as seeking views on the business rates tax itself, the review invited specific feedback on the administration of the rates system, including how business rates are collected.

Responding to the review, business groups called for a number of changes to the way the system is run, including switching the annual indexation of the business rates multiplier to the consumer prices index, rather than the retail prices index; implementing more frequent valuations; and modernising the billing and collection of business rates. I am pleased to say that the Government have already begun reforming the system to implement those changes.

Ratepayers are already benefiting from the change to the annual indexation of business rates from RPI to CPI, which was brought forward by two years, to April 2018. That measure alone is worth almost £6 billion to businesses over the next five years. The Government have also committed to increase the frequency of business rate revaluations from every five years to every three. To ensure that businesses benefit from that change at the earliest point, the Government have further announced that the next revaluation will be brought forward from 2022 to 2021. That will ensure that, as requested, business rates bills more accurately reflect properties’ up-to-date rental value and any relative changes in rents.

The Bill will enable us to begin exploring how to modernise the billing and collection of rates. Businesses in this country are of course already banking, paying bills and making sales online. Our tax system needs to keep pace.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Has the Minister seen press reports today that some major companies are calling for a 20% reduction in business rates? Does he have any comments to make about that?

[Rishi Sunak]

It is important to remember that the Bill is much narrower in scope than the design of the business rates system and how individual businesses pay the bills they are given. My hon. Friend the Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Jake Berry), the high streets Minister, is looking forward to winding up the debate, and he will be able to give the House chapter and verse on every single initiative the Government have undertaken to support businesses on the high street. In sum, there has been £13 billion of relief since the 2016 Budget, and a third of all businesses no longer pay any rates at all.

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[Jim McMahon (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab/Co-op)]

I will not put the House through a rendition of “Happy birthday”—[Hon. Members: “Shame!”] But many happy returns.

Perhaps this is a missed opportunity. It is a shame, really, that the Bill is so narrow, because we have a good five hours where we could have talked about the real threats our businesses face, the dangers to our high streets and the many representations made on this issue. Nevertheless, this Bill is progress. Following the falling of the Local Government Finance Bill when the general election was called, we encouraged the Government to come forward with non-controversial elements of that Bill. Clause 14 was not controversial, so I am glad to see it in this Bill.

Local councils are on the frontline of government, delivering services that people rely on and which both support and enrich our communities on a day-to-day basis. Labour welcomes the modernisation of tax collection and the move to online payment and account facilities. However, the proposal to develop an online payment system led by HMRC, as set out in the Bill, does raise some questions.

Madam Deputy Speaker, I refer you to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests as a vice-president of the Local Government Association, the body that represents councils, which are the billing authorities responsible for the collection of business rates. It, like me, wants confirmation that the move to develop an online payment collection facility will not change the fundamental and historical role of local councils as billing authorities with the legal responsibility for the collection of business rates. In the design of this new bridging system, to what extent have the Government sought input and representation from local government? Local government has significant experience in designing systems and processes, and it is important to draw on that to make the best of this proposal.

As the Government are investing in digital services, do they intend to streamline this online facility with the check, challenge and appeal process already in place? That would make it easier for businesses to have an end-to-end business rate system in place, marrying in one system the payment mechanism with the ability to check and appeal business rates. What payment mechanism will be in place to transfer funds to local authorities, especially in rate retention pilots? Who will be responsible for the collection of rates, and who will underwrite funds lost through non-collection?

The most critical issue is the wider sustainability of business rates and their role in funding local public services and encouraging local economies to thrive. Local government has already seen severe cuts after nine years of brutal and devastating Tory austerity.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

One of the reasons that there is a reaction from businesses regarding the level of business rates is that while central Government should have been responsible for funding certain services, they have shoved that on to local authorities, which have had to put that through business rates, just like the police and fire authorities’ precepts.

[Jim McMahon]

It is a matter of fact that the Government are moving towards the self-financing of local government. That is fine if a local authority can generate money through business rates and council tax in its local economy, but if, for whatever reason—usually for historical reasons—it is not able to do that, the Government do not care if councils sink or swim. That is no way to fund adult social care or children’s safeguarding services, or to make sure the homeless get the support they need either. Quite frankly, it shows a callous disregard for the role of central Government in making sure that every area gets its fair share of funding. That is a critical point.

[Mr Cunningham]

Anybody who has any experience of local government—my hon. Friend does, as do I and many others in here—knows that three or four years down the road, though they hint at looking again at business rates, Ministers will come along and tell everybody in local government, “You’re profligate, you’re spending too much, so we’ll cap you.” As I am sure he will remember, we have had all this before.

[Jim McMahon]

The hallmark of local government across parties—this is not a party point—is that people roll up their sleeves and get on with it. They do not complain; instead, they find solutions to the difficult challenges facing the community, but that is made much harder when central Government are disconnected.

Successive Secretaries of State have failed to champion local government, which is why I welcome our shadow Secretary of State having that local government background and experience and really believing in it. I hope he will be Secretary of State in the future, leading on this from the Government Benches. It is critical that the Secretary of State should not batter local government all the time. It needs a champion to celebrate what goes on in every community and, regardless of party affiliation, to fly the flag for what has been proven to be the most efficient arm of government—they are our champions, and we should thank them for all the work they do.

By 2025, there will be a funding gap in local government of £8 billion, and by 2020 local authorities will have faced core funding cuts at the hands of central Government of nearly £16 billion since 2010. That means that councils will have lost 60p for every £1 the Government previously provided to cover local public services. Next year, 168 councils will receive no funding whatever from central Government to meet the cost of rising demand for local public services.

What impact will that have? We can talk about the big numbers, and £16 billion is a huge number and has had a huge impact, but this is really about people and communities—the streets where people live, the communities that bind people together and make places decent places to live. The cuts have had a dramatic impact on government services. Youth centres have closed; libraries have reduced their hours, and hundreds have closed altogether; and meanwhile, social care is on the verge of collapse. Warning after warning has been issued, but the Government, particularly the Treasury, have not come to the table. As a result, our councils are having to make difficult and unwelcome decisions about where to make efficiency savings, and that is hampering their ability to prioritise social good above all else.

Moving to an online payment system administered by HMRC, but with links through to local billing authorities, raises a more fundamental point about taxation on business overall. Currently, many believe it operates in a silo and that the approach to business taxation is very disjointed. While our town centres and high streets are going to the wall, the online giants are making record profits and ensuring that as much as possible is sent offshore. The Government should use this opportunity not just to introduce a digital payment system, but to undertake a more fundamental review of business taxation overall to ensure that tax is generated where the wealth is created and that our town centres and communities are properly supported. We look forward to scrutinising the Bill properly and to hearing answers to the questions posed.

Sikhs: Contribution to the UK

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Tuesday 30th April 2019 Westminster Hall

[Seema Malhotra]

My right hon. Friend makes an extremely important point. I am sure that all hon. Members present would agree with him. My hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) will talk further about that point and the campaign he has helped to lead in Parliament.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Following on from what our right hon. Friend has just said, the Sikh contribution in the first and second world wars was very significant, particularly in places such as Burma. Sikhs played a prominent part in the battles of El Alamein, which were some of the greatest victories of the second world war, and that should not be forgotten. I reinforce what our right hon. Friend said about a memorial to the Sikh soldiers.

[Seema Malhotra]

My hon. Friend has a long-standing record of working with his local Sikh community. I will also make that point, as will my hon. Friend the Member for Slough.

Local Government and Social Care Funding

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Wednesday 24th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Dr Whitford]

I utterly agree and, obviously, the Department’s name was changed to the Department of Health and Social Care to reflect that need for integration, yet that is not the discussion we are hearing.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

The hon. Lady is making a valuable contribution. One of the big problems in social care is the lack of social workers, which local authorities cannot fund because of the gigantic cuts conducted over the years by this Government. It is about time we faced up to the fact that austerity has gone on far longer than the second world war and, quite frankly, rationing.

[Dr Whitford]

The hon. Gentleman talks about the workforce, but in both the NHS funding settlement and the forward plan we see a big injection into NHS England, but no extra funding for Health Education England or for public health. Preventing illness is the cheapest thing we can do yet, for decades, Governments of all colours in all places have failed to do that. Unfortunately, the long-term plan does not do it, either.

Age UK talks about 1.5 million people being left without sufficient care and support at home, and it describes the number of people needing elderly social care increasing by almost 50% since 2010, but local authority-funded patients in England are down by a quarter over that time. A third of patients depend on family support, but 2 million carers are over 65 themselves, and 400,000 of them are over 80. Look at the burden we are putting on elderly people to care for their elderly partners, often without respite or support.

Housing

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Tuesday 9th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

I accept that we need to build a hell of a lot more homes of all types and that is exactly what we are trying to do. We are in the process of creating a situation where everyone who wants to build can build and can seek assistance from the Government to do so, if they are willing to be ambitious—from the private sector to housing associations, councils or anybody who wants to build. We think that this problem is so acute that we cannot be partial about who gets to build the homes.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

I am sorry that I came into the debate a bit late; I was held up. On encouraging local authorities to build, exactly what help can the Government give local authorities to build social housing? I have had a number of people who are homeless—I have had families—coming to my surgeries desperate for accommodation. The local authorities do not have the resources. How is the Minister going to provide them?

[Kit Malthouse]

As I hope the hon. Gentleman knows, we lifted the borrowing cap on local councils so they can now borrow to build a generation of new homes. We have opened up the affordable homes programme to councils to bid in for Government money—grant funding—so that they can seek to build social homes. I am more than happy to write to him with details of how his council can access that.

Turning back to ownership, as I said, I wanted to turn “generation rent” into “generation own”, but we also believe that fairness should not stop once people get the keys. That is why the Secretary of State unveiled a new industry pledge last month to bring an end to onerous lease terms, such as the doubling of ground rents. More than 40 leading developers and freeholders have signed that pledge and I encourage others to follow the lead. We are bringing forward legislation to require developers to belong to a new homes ombudsman to champion the rights of home buyers and to ensure that they get the quality build that they rightly expect. We will soon consult on how this will work so that we can ensure that consumers’ problems are resolved faster and more effectively.

Local Government Finance

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Tuesday 5th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

I must make some progress.

I know that local authorities were also pleased to hear that we plan to distribute £180 million of surplus in the business rates retention levy account in 2018-19, which was generated by strong growth in business rates income, to every authority in England, based on need. But as well as more control, councils want and need to see a clearer link between the allocation of resources and local circumstances.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I have tried two or three times to draw the Secretary of State’s attention to serious cuts in Coventry, and the people of Coventry want to know what the benefits are in relation to the £1 billion that he just announced—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order. The Secretary of State has the right to take as many or as few interventions as he wishes. He is aware that there is pressure on time. I am not sure whether the hon. Gentleman has put in to speak, but he really does have to wait until the Secretary of State wants to give way. I do not like points of order getting in the way of speeches, because I do not think it is fair on others who are waiting to speak.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Gwynne]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The fact is that councils are the lynchpin of the provision of proper, cohesive, joined-up services with other agencies, whether housing associations, the police, leisure services or youth services. It is crucial that our councils and councillors are given the resources they need so that we do not cost-shunt from one area of the public sector on to the others. It is self-defeating to cut youth services, early intervention and police budgets at the same time, because we end up in the situation my hon. Friend describes.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way. I was rather surprised that the Secretary of State did not give way to me; he is usually quite generous, so I am disappointed.

More importantly, it is vital to the people of Coventry that we represent them. Their budgets—if I can put it that way—through the city council have been cut by well over 50%. That has affected libraries, children’s services, care in the community—I could give a litany. It has been a general attack on public services, whether we talk about local authorities, the health service or other services. It is vital that we know the breakdown of the £1 billion pounds that the Secretary of State just announced—I noticed that he tried to avoid that. My hon. Friend is right that central Government are shifting expenditure on to the local council tax payer, rather than facing up to their own responsibilities.

[Andrew Gwynne]

My hon. Friend, who is a doughty champion of the people of the city of Coventry, is absolutely right. What we have seen today from this Secretary of State is smoke and mirrors. He can talk about a spending power increase across local government, but that is predicated on every English local authority increasing council tax by the maximum level possible—an eye-watering, inflation-busting increase. We know that not every local authority can raise sufficient money by council tax alone, which is the reason behind the revenue support grant. A 50% cut to the revenue support grant of my hon. Friend’s city of Coventry is a big cut by monetary standards. Coventry’s council tax base does not allow the city council to raise anything like enough money to plug that gap.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim McMahon (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab/Co-op)]

We have not heard a great deal today. We expected, perhaps, a rabbit to be pulled out of a hat. Word had it that the Prime Minister had a few quid to give out, but we have not seen much of that today. It could have been used in a morally just way: it could have been sent to the areas that have suffered the biggest cuts although they also suffer the most significant deprivation. Those areas have been targeted by the Government, as has been set out today in the many excellent speeches made by Labour Members in particular.

My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) said that people now questioned why they were paying council tax at all, given that the neighbourhood services that they received were being reduced. My hon. Friends the Members for Liverpool, Riverside (Dame Louise Ellman), for City of Chester (Christian Matheson) and for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) made the same points about the human cost of removing vital public services. My right hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones), my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham (Lyn Brown) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne) outlined the very real community impact of austerity and the Government’s targeting of our communities. Through to my hon. Friends the Members for Redcar (Anna Turley) and for High Peak (Ruth George), we heard story after story of the human and community cost of austerity.

What shift did we get from the Government? Absolutely none. Why? This has not happened by accident, and the Government will not suddenly wake up and realise that they have made a horrible mistake. The policy has been deliberate and targeted from day one. The Institute for Fiscal Studies said:

“In England, cuts have been much larger for poorer, more grant-dependent councils than their richer neighbours.”

Why?

“This pattern arose directly from the way central Government allocated grants.”

That was deliberate and targeted and it has not stopped today. Despite our calls and our outlining the real human cost, the policy continues.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

If the Government were serious about helping women and bringing an end to austerity, they could have funded local authorities to give free bus passes to the women they robbed of their pensions. Surely they could have done something like that.

[Jim McMahon]

The Government have been very good at shifting money from those who need it most to areas that will secure the support of their Back Benchers. How many times today have we heard Conservative Back Benchers praising their Front Benchers and thanking them for giving in to their lobbying? So much back patting has gone on as Government Members congratulate each other on taking food off the tables of the poorest in society to shift funding to the richest.

We have heard time and again from Conservative Members how much more expensive services are in rural areas. There is no doubt that some services are more expensive to deliver in rural areas by unit cost. However, let us look at the evidence. In 2014, the Government commissioned a report that examined every single service that local authorities deliver throughout England. It showed that it is true that some, but only 15%, of services are more expensive in rural areas. In urban areas, 31% of services are more expensive, and whether areas are urban or rural has no bearing on the delivery of 50% of services. The evidence therefore shows that services are more expensive to deliver in urban areas. That is because the deprivation is ingrained and generational. It is tied to the local economies, and councils are there to try to keep it all together.

When our communities have asked for hope and direction, what have they been given? Not even warm words or an acknowledgement of the human cost. Now more than a million older people do not get the social care they would have got in 2010. Children who are at risk of violence and abuse are not given the protection they need, because the Government have walked away and said that it is nothing to do with them. It is everything to do with them. When other Departments were fighting their corner, where was the Ministry? When austerity first struck, local government was hit hardest. We have lost 800,000 members of staff from local government. We have the lowest number of staff since comparable records began, yet the central Government workforce is the largest since comparable records began. Local government has taken more of a hit than any other Department. Within local government, Labour-controlled areas have taken the hit, and that is politically motivated.

The Government had the chance to put this right today. They have failed to be fair and just, and failed the people we come into this place to serve. Shame on the lot of you.

Holocaust Memorial Day

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Thursday 24th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

I, too, congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley North (Ian Austin) on securing this debate. It is important that we mark this day so that we and future generations remember the atrocities that happened during the second world war and that have occurred in genocides since. I note that this year marks the 25th anniversary of the genocide in Rwanda and the 40th anniversary of the end of the genocide in Cambodia. I have always had an interest in the holocaust, having written my dissertation on the subject, and I am constantly shocked and saddened as I continue to read about the events that happened during that terrible time. I spent Christmas reading Primo Levi.

As many other hon. Members have shared, the theme for this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day is Torn from Home, exploring what it means to be taken from a place of safety and the trauma of the loss. It is important to reflect on the personal and emotive feelings that are generated when we try to imagine what it must be like no longer to have a place of safety or security to call home, and to live with the constant threat of violence and fear of the unknown. One of the most famous accounts of being torn from home during the holocaust is Anne Frank’s diary, which shares her family’s story of finding an alternative home. This is an extract from her diary, from 11 July 1942:

“I don’t think I’ll ever feel at home in this house, but that doesn’t mean I hate it. It’s more like being on holiday in some strange pension. Kind of an odd way to look at life in hiding, but that’s how things are.”

The diary abruptly ends on 1 August 1944, three days before her family were discovered in their secret annexe and torn from their place of safety. As Members will all be aware, Anne Frank was only a child and tragically lost her life at just 15 years old. In her diary, she describes how she felt as a child in hiding, saying:

“It’s utterly impossible for me to build my life on a foundation of chaos, suffering and death.”

I find it particularly difficult to comprehend the fate of children in the holocaust. Many Members will be aware that I have spent a lot of my time campaigning in Parliament for the rights of children, and when I read about the experiences of children in concentration camps, it truly breaks my heart. I understand that around 1.5 million children died in the holocaust—a number too great even to comprehend.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Like a number of Members, I visited the Auschwitz concentration camp many years ago. Most people who have done so will tell you that it is a horrendous thing to see and to remember. More importantly, does my hon. Friend agree that we should be keeping our eye on Europe at the moment, because the rise of the right shows that certain parts of Europe have not learned the lessons of the holocaust?

[Carolyn Harris]

I most certainly do agree with my hon. Friend. I would love to visit Auschwitz, but my own personal tragedy—my son would have been 38 today —has prevented me from doing so. I intend to rectify that, however, and I hope to go there this year.

Young children were particularly vulnerable and were often sent immediately to the gas chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau. One of the reasons for this was that, along with the elderly, children were unable to participate in forced labour in the camps. That was why so many lost their lives. As well as more than 1 million Jewish children being killed, tens of thousands of Romany children, German children with physical and mental disabilities living in institutions and Polish children lost their lives.

Fire Safety and Cladding

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Reed]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for her intervention. I, too, look forward to hearing a response from the Minister. I have tried to find out whether a newly rebuilt school in my own constituency has flammable cladding, but it seems impossible to do so. If I, as the local Member of Parliament with the access that I have to the relevant authorities, cannot find out, I pity those poor parents who are trying to find out whether their children will be safe after they have taken them to school each morning. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response on that point.

I came to this subject because a block in my constituency, Citiscape, has the same sort of cladding—aluminium composite material cladding—that was on Grenfell Tower. The cost of removing and replacing the cladding was £2 million. The managing agents wrote to leaseholders in the block, who received estimates of up to £30,000 each for the work to be carried out. Of course the vast majority could not afford that—not many people have £30,000 lying around in the bank, particularly not those who have just bought their first flat and are stretched on their mortgage—but they were told that unless everybody paid up, the work would not happen. In effect, nothing would be done to keep the people in the block safe. We approached the freeholder, but the freeholder is not legally liable to carry out the work and there was no way to compel the freeholder to do it. The builders also are not legally liable to carry out the work. They can rely on the fact that there are concerns about lack of clarity in the building regulations and guidance, and they had been following the guidance that they believed meant that the cladding was safe. It turned out at Grenfell that ACM cladding is absolutely not safe.

When the case came to the housing tribunal, it ruled that the leaseholders were liable. We hear welcome words from Ministers at the Dispatch Box saying that leaseholders should not be made to pay, but in fact the housing tribunal—the legal body responsible for adjudicating on the matter—said the leaseholders were indeed responsible and would have to pay. In the case of Citiscape and others where not all the leaseholders can pay, the work will not be done. People are stuck living in blocks with Grenfell-style flammable cladding strapped on the outside; they are living with their families, their children and their parents in absolute terror.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his speech and the argument he is making. It has long been argued that there should be some reform of leasehold law. We have tinkered with it over the years, but it needs to be dealt with properly, and Governments have shied away from doing so. I thought that the Secretary of State had said that he would discuss leaseholds with the people involved, some of the companies and so on. About 12 months ago, I said to the previous Secretary of State that what the Government should have done after Grenfell was to take emergency powers. Had they done so, we would not have some of these problems now. They did not do it and the rest is history.

[Mr Reed]

I am grateful for that helpful intervention and look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

I said that there were concerns about the state of the building regulations and the guidance, and it is worth exploring briefly how we got into a position where the regulations were so lax or could be interpreted in such a way. Back in 2009, there was a fire in Lakanal House in Camberwell, central London, that resulted in the death of six people, including a baby. An inquest conducted an inquiry, which took a number of years, and reported in 2013 in a very long document that contained some very clear recommendations. The inquiry said that the fire safety regulations—specifically, part B of the building regulations, which cover fire safety, and the associated guidance—were unclear, and that that was the reason why unsafe and combustible cladding was being strapped on buildings where people lived with their families. The coroner was absolutely clear that if that lack of clarity was not remedied, we would be running the risk of further fires and further deaths.