Bailiffs: Regulatory Reform

Debate between Jim Cunningham and Emma Reynolds

Wednesday 9th January 2019 Westminster Hall

[Emma Reynolds]

I could not agree more and would love to see other councils around the country follow that example, for which I thank my hon. Friend, who I am sure played a part in bringing that about. When we hear these cases, it is incumbent on all Members of Parliament to bring them to the Government. It is incumbent on all councils and any other public authorities that are owed money to seek a constructive way to get that money and to help people pay that debt back rather than threatening them with bailiffs.

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

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. Five or six years ago, I had a Bill that would have established an independent body to regulate bailiffs. I had some very nasty cases in my constituency at the time, which prompted me. Unfortunately, the Bill did not go through because the Government stopped it. I hope my hon. Friend’s Bill gets through, because it is important that we regulate bailiffs properly and give them proper training.

[Emma Reynolds]

An independent regulator, training for bailiffs and standards that are enforced are essential—I will come to that towards the end of my speech. I put on record my thanks to my hon. Friend for trying to push the issue a few years back. I hope I can follow in his footsteps. I have applied for a ten-minute rule Bill, and I hope I can get something on the statute book, although I also hope the Government will beat me to it.

The examples I quoted remind us that anybody could end up in this situation, although in many cases, the people involved are vulnerable. Often it starts with a small fine or debt that escalates, and it can spiral out of control. Citizens Advice recently found that such experiences have a very negative impact on people’s mental health and financial position. Some of those who are likely to fall into debt already have a mental health problem.

Parliamentary Scrutiny of Leaving the EU

Debate between Jim Cunningham and Emma Reynolds

Wednesday 12th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan), who gave a powerful speech. I agreed with everything she said, and I want to reiterate something that she said at the end and the beginning of her speech.

Like the right hon. Lady, I campaigned to remain in the European Union but, like her, I accept the result of the referendum. Although the Prime Minister and her Ministers have spent the past few months parroting the mantra “Brexit means Brexit”, that is simply meaningless tautology. People voted leave for many different reasons, and Brexit could take many different forms. A majority of my constituents voted leave for various reasons, but they did not vote leave to become poorer, they did not vote leave for their wages to drop, and they did not vote leave to lose their job. I urge the Government to bear that in mind in everything they do.

Members on both sides of the House, from different corners of our country, have a hugely important job to do. Our job is not to rerun the referendum, nor is it to block our exit from the EU. It is to hold the Government to account and make sure that they secure the best possible deal for the country and our constituents.

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

My hon. Friend makes an important point. She, like me, represents a midlands constituency, and therefore she, like me, will want some answers on what the Government’s future relationship with the single market will be, bearing in mind that it was a previous Conservative Government who took us into it. More importantly, companies such as Jaguar Land Rover and Nissan want to know those answers for the purpose of future investment, because Jaguar Land Rover has invested a lot of money in the midlands. Years ago Nissan was going to invest in Coventry but could not get regional aid, and that is why we went into the single market.

[Emma Reynolds]

I agree entirely. Jaguar Land Rover is also a very important company in my constituency. Those companies want clarity from the Government. The Brexit Minister told the House earlier today that he has made several statements and appeared before several Select Committees, but he has said almost entirely nothing. We need clarity and proper parliamentary scrutiny. That does not mean seeking to thwart the will of the people, as the right hon. Member for Loughborough said so powerfully.

I will focus my remarks on three tests that I want to put to the Government. First, are they driven by the national interest or their party’s interest? So far, regrettably, their record is not good. Was it purely a coincidence that the Prime Minister’s announcement that we would invoke article 50 by the end of March 2017 happened to be on the first day of the Conservative party conference? Was it just a coincidence that she wanted to reassure her party faithful that she, having been a lukewarm remainer, actually thinks that we should leave the EU?

Equally, the Conservative party’s interest was uppermost in the Prime Minister’s mind when she claimed that

‘there is no such thing as a choice between ‘soft Brexit’ and ‘hard Brexit’’,

because she knows that her party is divided on the issue. That is not only bizarre, but wrong. If there was no such distinction, why did the pound slump to a 31-year low days after the Tory party conference, due to fears of a hard Brexit? If there is no such distinction, why has the Treasury said that a hard Brexit could cost £66 billion a year in lost revenue and that the economy will be between 5% and 9% smaller than it would be if we stay in the single market? If there is no such distinction, why has Nissan said that there will be no further investment in its UK plants if it does not know whether in future it will face tariffs on its exports to the rest of the EU?

It is clear to me that some Tory Members—we have heard it already today—are happy to trade with the rest of the EU, which is still our main trading partner, on WTO terms. Worryingly, the International Development Secretary seems to be in that category. However, other right hon. and hon. Members on the Conservative Benches disagree. The right hon. Member for Broxtowe (Anna Soubry) called it “bonkers.” She is right, because it would mean tariffs on our exports: 10% on cars, 20% on beer and whisky, and obviously non-tariff barriers on trade.

The Conservative party’s 2015 manifesto—the right hon. Member for Loughborough has already mentioned this, but it is worth repeating—stressed:

“We benefit from the Single Market…We are clear about what we want from Europe. We say: yes to the Single Market.”

That is the basis on which the Conservatives were elected to government. They were right last year, which is why the Government must push to retain access to the single market.

Secondly—this is a really difficult test—can the Government mitigate the risks of leaving and maximise the opportunities? Again, so far the record is not good. Many right hon. and hon. Members on the Conservative Benches seem to believe that there are only upsides to leaving the EU, but it is obvious that there are some fundamental risks to our economy if we get this wrong. The Government should level with people and say, “Exiting the EU will not be straightforward; it will be difficult, sensitive and, indeed, risky.”

I believe that the Government must aim for a soft Brexit. That means having the best possible access to the single market without tariff and non-tariff barriers, and retaining workers’ rights, environmental and consumer protections and the security measures that are so vital to keeping our country safe. But I also believe that we need to look at some restrictions on free movement. I had many conversations with constituents in Wolverhampton who voted to leave the EU. They did so for a variety of reasons, but one of those was immigration. Some say that reconciling the two issues is impossible, but within the European economic area Norway has an emergency brake on free movement and Liechtenstein has controls over it, and within the four freedoms of people, capital, goods and services in the EU, there is not absolute free movement of services.

My third test—I will be brief, as I am going to run out of time—is that the Government should not be in denial about the point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn). We need to negotiate a transition period. If we are to negotiate a free trade deal with the rest of the EU, there is going to be a cliff edge between exiting, including closing the article 50 negotiations, and the conclusion of that free trade deal. That will take years; it will be a mixed deal and national Parliaments throughout the 27 member states will have to ratify it. I hope that the Brexit Secretary of State will not be in denial about that issue, which is one of the most important aspects of our renegotiation. I also hope that the Government will start to do a lot better.

Local Government Budgets

Debate between Jim Cunningham and Emma Reynolds

Wednesday 12th January 2011 Westminster Hall

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

May I take this opportunity to thank Mr Speaker for granting this debate on an important subject? I notice that the Minister is looking serious, to say the least. I want to start by mentioning the world economic situation that existed before the current Government came to power. It is worth reminding people that the economic difficulties were worldwide and started in America with Lehman Brothers. As hon. Members will recall, the then American President could have taken action to bail out Lehman Brothers, but chose not to. That obviously had a knock-on effect on the banking system, particularly in this country.

Hon. Members will also remember looking at news bulletins that showed people queuing up to withdraw money from banks such as Northern Rock. Had the then Government not taken action across the whole economic fabric of this country, that bank may well have collapsed. Despite all their faults, the previous Government introduced a number of measures to address the situation, such as the car scrappage scheme. Last week’s figures from the motor car industry show that sales have gone up by 2 million this year, which demonstrates that the measures taken by the previous Government to address the problem have paid off. It is worth reminding ourselves that in 1997 when Labour took office, 50p from every £1 of taxpayers’ money was used to pay off the national debt. During their first two years, the previous Government spent a lot of time doing exactly that—paying off the national debt.

Measures implemented by the present Government will certainly have an effect on places such as Coventry, and on a number of local authorities up and down the country. A number of west midlands MPs are present in the Chamber, and they will want to talk about how the Government’s policies for local government will affect their particular situations. The details in the provisional local government settlement have created a lot of problems for many local authorities, and brought further bad news as far as Coventry is concerned. The £19 million cut in the formula grant is most worrying, as are cuts to other specific grants of £17 million. Incredibly, at this late stage we still await the details of some grant funding streams from the Government that have not yet been clarified.

At present, Coventry city council is trying to manage the massive and inequitable reduction in resources announced on 13 December. In fairness, it has tried to take sensible steps to anticipate part of that reduction, and to its credit it has redesigned its services and introduced modern procurement practices. The Minister has praised Coventry for its efforts to look for value for money; nevertheless, I want to highlight the scale of the grant reductions facing the city. Because of the cuts, the council has been forced by the Tory-led Government possibly to cut more than 500 posts over the next 18 months. The amount of money the council spends on the local economy will also reduce dramatically, and if we add to that the capital proposals for the Building Schools for the Future programme, that is another £300 million that could leave Coventry’s economy. We are not yet clear what the capital allocation will be for repairs to school buildings and the rebuilding of schools. We should have received information on that this month, but we are still waiting for the Secretary of State for Education to provide it. That has an impact on staff in Coventry city council. The front-loading of cuts means that staff losses will be required at an early stage of the spending cuts, which will affect not only staff but families across Coventry. The overall impact of the measures means that Coventry council is expected to lose about £45 million.

Let me turn to the impact on the west midlands economy. The cuts will have a significant knock-on effect on local businesses and employment in the region, and we can see what is happening in other sectors as cuts and reforms begin to bite. In the health sector, for example, possible cuts were announced last Monday in the local press—in Coventry and Warwickshire, some 450 jobs could go in the national health service. Cuts of over 20% are projected for the West Midlands police force, which will have an impact on the fight against crime. As I have indicated, we do not know what will happen with the Building Schools for the Future programme.

The public and private sectors will not be able to invest in the regeneration and infrastructure of the region. We are still awaiting a decision on the Knuckle project, which could help the employment situation in Coventry. Over the years, Coventry MPs have lobbied various Governments in order to get that project off the ground. I will not go into great detail about that, but I hope the Minister will tell his colleagues that we need a decision that can help to mitigate unemployment in Coventry.

The abolition of funding from regional development agencies has meant that there is little funding to lever in private sector investment for large-scale redevelopment projects. There are two parts to local government cuts for Coventry city council. First, the formula grant will lose in excess of £19 million, and secondly, specific grants will lose in excess of £17 million. There will be a 27% cut to local government funding over four years, which in real terms equates to a cut of 8% per annum to the formula grant.

As I said earlier, there will be further cuts to specific grants, but—unbelievably—we will not know the final grant settlement until the end of January 2011. That puts Coventry city council under further financial pressure and it will not be able to continue providing services at the same level. There will be far fewer grants and they will have a lower overall value. It is a great concern that many grant streams will end. That will have a significant impact on Coventry—some 58% of the council’s gross expenditure for 2010-11 is resourced through specific grants, and £19 million of grant funding is likely to fall out, including a large number of former area-based grants such as local enterprise growth initiatives and a number of children-related grants. The future is unclear for Connexions and adult education.

Some grants that will end immediately include various education grants aimed at raising school standards; employment activities that help people back to work and, as a consequence, strengthen the local economy; community services; one-off grants to the homeless; sporting futures and football foundations; youth crime action; dealing with fly-tipping; and environmental grants for safer communities. We must consider other measures that will affect the disadvantaged. The front-loaded cuts proposed by the Government, combined with the impact of the VAT increase, will mean fewer services, of a lower quality, although people will be expected to pay more for them. That will be this Government’s legacy.

[Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend that it is the poorest who will be hit hardest. In Wolverhampton, the 28th most deprived local authority in the country, we are expecting cuts to the city council budget of 24%. Does my hon. Friend agree that such cuts are too fast and too deep and will hit the poorest hardest?

[Mr Cunningham]

Obviously, I have to agree with my hon. Friend. As she will know, the Building Schools for the Future programme certainly affects her constituency, and there will be an economic impact on it in that regard. The Government, although there was an economic problem, have gone over the top in addressing it. That has become apparent as they have rushed into all these local government cuts.

Capital funding has all but dried up. We are seeing the abolition of Building Schools for the Future where money has been lost, there is no replacement work and schools are in desperate need of repair. Notwithstanding the cuts to housing benefit and council tax administration costs, in real terms central Government will be cutting 5% of support at the time when administration is most needed. There are more claimants than ever before. The unavoidable conclusion of those actions is that many of the poorest will be affected disproportionately. That includes the proposals relating to legal aid, which is not part of this debate.

We were preparing a four-year plan to deal with the situation, and obviously there would have been a certain amount of rationalisation as far as we were concerned, but we certainly would not have been rushing in all directions, as the present Government have been doing over the past seven or eight months, to inflict cuts on people.

There is a new word for cuts these days: I am talking about the thing called “damping”. No doubt the Minister will enlighten us on that one. The coalition’s damping methodology throws up a number of concerns for the people of Coventry, which I shall briefly discuss. Once again, Coventry has lost resources. We did so in the 1980s under the previous Conservative Government. Our capital programmes were capped in those days. People have short memories. What the present Government are doing is not new; the then Government were doing it way back in the ’80s. For the period of 2011-12, Coventry is set to lose £8 million through that process alone. That leaves the authority with a reduction in resources of 6%, which is 1% worse than the national average. The coalition has tried to defend the damping process by saying that the money is being given to the more needy authorities. However, that is simply not happening in many instances.

Let us consider the main problems with damping as many authorities see it. On closer inspection of the actual effects, the damping in the provisional settlement considers only authorities’ formula grant; it does not consider the authorities’ change in overall resources. Relative spending power combines the impacts of formula grant, council tax and other revenue grants.

Although the average is a 5% reduction, there is wide variation in the outcomes for individuals. The Government have tried to disguise how deep the cuts are by including in their calculations money that councils raise themselves. Their own statistics reveal that councils will lose on average 12.1% of their core central Government funding this year. Perversely, six of the most affluent local authorities will gain a joint total of £130 million from the damping process. For example, West Sussex gains £6 million, with a reduction of less than 1%. Richmond upon Thames gains £15 million, with a reduction of less than 1%. Alarmingly, Surrey will gain £62 million from the damping process. Clearly, this damping is not fit for purpose—to coin a phrase from a former Home Secretary and colleague of ours—and should not be used to allocate formula grant.

We suggest a change to the damping system. Many councils raise far more from council tax than they receive from the Government. Therefore, a comprehensive assessment of each authority’s overall resource position should be examined. The current unfairness is taking money and jobs out of Coventry and 77 other authorities across the country. I urge the Minister to consider changing over to that approach, which, as I understand it, has been suggested to civil servants by officers from Coventry city council.

There is an overwhelming lack of clarity from the coalition Government about the time frame. Councils across the west midlands and beyond are being forced to make rushed decisions, with no time to plan for the consequences. That could end up costing more than it saves. There is a lack of information. Councillors and officers are in no way information-rich as they go into this unfamiliar process. There is little guidance from the Department and there is great uncertainty. The Secretary of State for Education’s capital spending review is not expected until later this year. We thought that it would be January and, as I have said, I am not clear now on when we shall know what the settlement will be.

For all the coalition’s talk of localism, it has dumped its cuts on local councils. The coalition’s plans for local government do not include growth or jobs: it is merely a deficit reduction policy. The coalition must make up its mind. Is it dealing with a new economic situation, which was the original argument, or is it rebalancing the economy, which is the new one? The solution is the same, but the approach and the reasons are different.