Family Businesses

Joe Morris Excerpts

Wednesday 26th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Joe Morris (Hexham) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow some measured and passionate speeches from across the House on this important subject. As Members will know, I am very proud to represent England’s largest constituency by geographic area, and an area that was found to be one of the happiest in the country, with one of the best senses of community and belonging.

Over the recent recess, I was able to host a roundtable with the conductors of the “Belonging Barometer”, which was attended by many local businesses and community organisations. As has just been said, family businesses are the glue that binds together many of the strands of our community, particularly across the Tyne valley. In the aftermath of Storm Éowyn, we have seen heartening examples of family-run businesses in particular coming out, helping their community, providing those places to stay and to recuperate for communities that have taken a battering from extreme weather events that are sadly becoming all too common.

I was disappointed to read the Opposition motion. Once again, we are here discussing a kind of hodgepodge of various gripes and groans that the Conservatives have with Government policy. That is absolutely fine, and it is their right so to do—there are Members sitting on the Tory Benches now who I genuinely respect and, in some cases, admire—but they are better than that, and they should be better than that. [Laughter.] They can laugh if they want, although I know that some of them have considerable experience in writing manifestos that perhaps did not play out so well.

Ultimately, we need to achieve an environment in which family businesses and small businesses across the country and across our constituencies are genuinely supported by Government. One of the things that has come to my attention since being elected as the first non-Conservative MP for Hexham in a century is that a lot of businesses have said to me, “It is nice to have an MP who is really connected to the constituency—one who is not complacent.” That compares with some of the treatment that rural communities have received from the Conservative party in years past. We have MPs who are genuinely rooted in their communities, who went to school in those communities and who got their first jobs in local businesses. They can speak to businesses in their constituencies and deliver messages down here.

I have had conversations with businesses such as Brocksbushes farm shop, which did involve some patient disagreement over the Budget, but mainly involved real concerns over local infrastructure, such as the lack of bus stops on the A69 and the difficulties that the young people it employs have in getting to the business to work. The farm shop does a fantastic job. My now fiancée and I went pumpkin-picking there just after the election. It was a wonderful event, although I think Hana probably enjoyed it more than I did. Ultimately, from having those positive conversations and looking at what business needs, we can see that it is infrastructure and investment. They need a Government who listen, not one who embark on some kind of haywire, high-minded ideological crusade, as the Opposition did when in government. [Laughter.] They can laugh.

[Laurence Turner]

Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the other major challenges that small food businesses face is importing and exporting ingredients? That needs to be a focus for the review of the trade and co-operation agreement next year.

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[Joe Morris]

My hon. Friend is far more well read and well researched than I could ever hope to be, but those barriers to import and export come up whenever I speak to farmers and food businesses. Getting the products made by fantastic businesses in our communities out to consumers is simply not as easy as it used to be.

The main concerns that I hear in my constituency are about infrastructure, bus routes and a lack of roads that are navigable, in some cases. I went out to visit the village of Newton—it has not so much a pothole, but more of a small gorge that has been carved into the road—to hear updates on the parish council’s continued missives to the county council. That is the kind of thing that holds back small and family businesses in my constituency, because they simply do not know whether the delivery driver will be able to get to their premises or they will be able to get to work. That is what is causing real uncertainty and real harm to businesses.

I urge Opposition Members to get a grip of their party and to object to some of the more terminally online things, such as this conspiracy theory over the pint. It is, as I have said, beneath them.

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[Lewis Cocking]

Businesses in my constituency are putting off investing and employing local people because of the jobs tax and the Government’s proposed new regulation. I hope that when the Minister winds up, he will say what the Government will do to create the next generation of entrepreneurs.

We could turbocharge the education system. There are lots of fantastic teachers in my constituency and across the country who do a sterling job for young people. We could say to people who have created businesses, “We will give you some money off your tax bill if you go back to your secondary school and teach not from a textbook, but from real life experience about how to create growth, jobs and businesses and enthuse those students about creating their own businesses.” People do not have to go to a maths class to understand maths. Someone who has run a business could come in and say, “Right, we’ve got to do your accounts now. You’ve got to see how much you are going to pay people and how much tax you will pay.” We could get people in from the creative industries. They could say, “Right, now you have to design your logo. How are you going to do that? You’ve got to design a TV advertisement for your product, for what you are going to sell.” We could be doing that. We could be thinking outside the box.

I have not heard what support the Government are giving to create the next generation of entrepreneurs. If we do not unlock their aspiration and continue to allow people to take risks and invest in their ideas, there will be no taxes coming in or money for public services. We must do this, and we must do it more regularly. I hope the Minister will tell the House how he will unlock the next generation of entrepreneurs and how we will support people to take what is, as I said, a massive risk.

[Joe Morris]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if the next generation of young people cannot get to work because of broken public transport, potholes or illness, it will ultimately hold them back? We are taking steps to fix those problems.

[Lewis Cocking]

The hon. Gentleman’s party is actually cutting the capital budget for transport. I have made this point time and again, but the Government could take on the utility companies that endlessly dig up the roads so that my constituents and many others across the country have to sit in traffic. That costs the taxpayer and the economy billions of pounds. If we get people to the shops and to work quicker, and traders, electricians and builders get to their sites quicker so that they can do their jobs, that will unlock growth, put more pounds in their pockets to spend on local high streets, which we need to protect, and enable them to take risks and employ people. But I have not heard that from the Government—I have not heard that we will take on the utility companies; I have not heard that we will unlock the aspiration of this country’s next generation through the education system.

Labour Members said in their manifesto and during the election campaign that they were the party of economic growth. I gently say to them that that is not working because fundamentally they do not understand that it is private business and our hard-working constituents in family businesses who create economic growth—not this disastrous Labour Government.