Oral Answers to Questions

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Tuesday 15th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[James Cartlidge]

Like the hon. Gentleman, I represent a rural constituency, where probably the majority of households use heating oil. As he knows, the alternative fuel payment will ensure that all households that do not benefit from the energy price guarantee receive support for the cost of the fuel they use. We are currently consulting the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy on the timing and delivery mechanism for the alternative fuel payment. We are committed to delivering it this winter.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

T10. FairFuelUK’s latest survey of 17,000 motorists and hauliers shows that they continue to be punished by crippling and needlessly high fuel taxation, from which the Treasury has benefited to the tune of £3 billion. That is why I am backing the campaign of The Sun and FairFuelUK to keep the fuel duty cut at the very least. Does the Chancellor agree?

[James Cartlidge]

My hon. Friend, like The Sun newspaper, is a champion of motorists, hauliers and all those in his constituency who rely on petrol and diesel vehicles for their—[Interruption.] Opposition Members laugh, but my hon. Friend is standing up for his constituents and doing the right thing. He is absolutely right to highlight the huge tax cut we put in place in the spring statement, worth £2.4 billion, through 5p a litre off the duty rate on petrol and diesel for 12 months. Of course, I cannot make fiscal decisions at the Dispatch Box, but we do keep these matters under review.

UK Gross Domestic Product

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Monday 13th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[John Glen]

The hon. Lady will know that just two weeks ago, the Chancellor came to this Dispatch Box and made a series of targeted interventions, in a greater way than many were calling for, to give assistance to the most vulnerable in our society—to pensioners, to those on means-tested benefits and to the disabled—with more support for pensioners on top of that. She will also know that as we approach the fiscal event, we will look at the state of the economy and the best possible interventions to assist not only that growth narrative, but the most vulnerable.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

It does not shock me that the Labour party uses any opportunity it has to come in here and bash Britain and sneer at places such as Stoke-on-Trent. It is thanks to this Conservative Government and a Conservative-led council that thousands of new jobs have been created through the successful Ceramics Valley enterprise zone. We also have the 500 new Home Office jobs and up to 1,700 new jobs thanks to the Kidsgrove town deal. Does the Minister agree that it is this Government who are putting places such as Stoke-on-Trent firmly on the map?

[John Glen]

I do not think Stoke-on-Trent could have a better advocate than my hon. Friend, with his passionate desire to highlight the successes going on in his constituency. I absolutely agree that it is that positivity, and focusing on interventions that make a real difference to people who live in his community, that people will remember as we move forward.

Economic Update

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Thursday 3rd February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Rishi Sunak]

I am glad that the hon. Gentleman recognises that there are two sets of Barnett consequentials for Northern Ireland stemming from each of the policies, which sum total £250 million. He will appreciate that I cannot comment on future tax and welfare policy but, as always, I will take what his says and reflect on it.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

I warmly welcome the Chancellor’s statement because 94% of properties in Stoke-on-Trent are in council tax bands A to C, so the £150 rebate will do wonders across Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke. From his recent visit to the city, he knows that the ceramics sector is an energy-intensive industry and will be looking for more creative solutions in the short term to help with rising energy costs. Can he confirm that he will meet me and other Stoke-on-Trent MPs to discuss those ideas further?

[Rishi Sunak]

I am always happy to meet my hon. Friends from Stoke, which benefited from not just one, not just two, but three successful levelling-up fund bids, and which I was pleased to visit recently. My hon. Friend is right and he is, rightly, a proper champion for the ceramics sector in this House. I enjoyed meeting representatives from that sector on my recent visit and I would be happy to meet him and them to discuss the situation further.

Household Energy Bills: VAT

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Tuesday 11th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

On 9 June 2016, the right hon. Lady said:

“We are unable to get rid of VAT on fuel bills”

because the EU prevents us from doing so, despite fuel poverty, but nothing prevents the right hon. Lady from doing the right thing today by voting with us this evening.

There is a straight choice in today’s vote. A cut in VAT will make a real difference. If someone is on a lower income, they will feel the benefit of a VAT cut on their bills because they spend more of their household budget on energy. If someone is a pensioner, they spend twice as much on energy and will be hit even harder by the rising energy price cap. A cut on VAT for home energy bills would be an immediate relief for all. I can understand why the Government do not want to back Opposition policies, as the right hon. Lady has said. However, they would in fact only be honouring the Prime Minister’s own commitments, because the Prime Minister was once the greatest advocate of the VAT cut on home energy bills. In 2016, he said:

“When we Vote Leave, we will be able to scrap this unfair and damaging tax.”

Not once, but three times he has backed a VAT cut on energy bills. Many on the Government Benches have since joined that call. The Chief Secretary went halfway there just last year when he said that VAT on electricity should be cut. But now that the Prime Minister has a chance to actually do something, and he and his Chancellor say no. The problem is that you cannot pay bills on broken promises.

Speaking of the Chancellor, yet again he is in hiding. He was not here yesterday when we debated fiscal responsibility, and he is not here today to debate the cost of living. Maybe he has gone back to California. Had he been here, I would have asked him not just about his broken promises on VAT; I would also have asked, given that he lives and works next door to No. 10 Downing Street, how long he has known about the party on 20 May 2020, and what he has done or said about this disgraceful breach of lockdown rules. Was he at the party when it happened next door, or was he at his window taking the pictures? He might not want to answer my questions, but the country deserves to know whether he too has colluded in the 18-month cover-up.

In just 80 days’ time, on 1 April, working people will be hit—[Interruption.] Get on your feet. Tell your constituents why you will not be voting for a reduction in VAT this evening. Be my guest.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

I am very grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way. She talks about levelling up, but it is Stoke-on-Trent’s Conservative-led council and this Conservative Government that have delivered £56 million from the levelling-up fund, £29 million from the transforming cities fund, and 550 brand-new Home Office jobs. The only Stoke that the hon. Lady knows is Stoke Newington, not Stoke-on-Trent.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. Let us just take the temperature down a little. I did not want to interrupt the hon. Lady when she was in full flow, but she must not call the hon. Gentleman “you”, because that might confuse him with me, and we would not want that.

Conduct of the Right Hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Tuesday 30th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

I am hoping that the hon. Lady will use this opportunity to apologise to my predecessor Ruth Smeeth for the bullying and harassment that she faced from Labour party members simply for being Jewish.

[Anneliese Dodds]

I will, of course, respond to the hon. Member’s comments because, just as I said to his hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Lee Anderson), when the Labour party finds action that is inappropriate, we act. We have changed our systems. We have made sure that we comply with what is required of us. If the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) wishes to defend his party happily allowing a Member who has been found to have engaged in sexual harassment to be back on its Benches, that is up to him. It is his decision.

In that foreword on standards, again, the Prime Minister states that there should be:

“No misuse of taxpayer money”—

that, from a Prime Minister who gave us the VIP lane for personal protective equipment contracts, with £3.5 billion of taxpayers’ money given to party donors and Conservative cronies who were recommended by Conservative Ministers, MPs and Downing Street officials. Those contracts so often failed to deliver while our nurses and care workers struggled and while many British firms’ offers of help were passed over.

Nationality and Borders Bill (Fourteenth sitting)

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd November 2021 Public Bill Committees

The Government’s new clauses appear to suggest that there is a simple process to determine age accurately. This is worrying. We must avoid viewing age assessments in asylum cases in this way. We need to get age assessments right. That will involve taking a broader approach than the Government have laid out in new clauses 29 to 37. The new clauses on age assessments risk vulnerable children and young people being denied rights they deserve, protection they need and support we must offer. We oppose the measures set out in the new clauses, and we oppose clause 58 standing part of the Bill.

Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)

-

It will probably not shock Committee members that I support what the Government are doing on age assessments. Ultimately, it is about ensuring that we protect our young people in our United Kingdom. When people say that they are children and will be in a classroom surrounded by people of a similar age, we need to make sure that they are indeed children.

As a former teacher, I understand the importance of this. As a former head of year who had responsibility for safeguarding, covering welfare, attendance and the behaviour of young people, it makes no sense to me why anyone would oppose a measure to make sure that people who claim to be young people are indeed young people. An individual who has nothing to hide should have nothing to fear in this regard. It is absolutely essential that age assessments take place to make sure that people claiming to be of school age are indeed of that ilk, because ultimately other young people could be put in a very vulnerable situation.

Stuart C. McDonald

- - Excerpts

We want age assessments to be as accurate as they can be at the moment, not just through the work of social work groups but with input from outside. Does the hon. Gentleman have any concerns about the impact on children who end up being wrongly placed in adult facilities?

Jonathan Gullis

-

Of course—absolutely. Young people should not be placed in a situation like that, for safety reasons. As a former teacher, I would not want a 14 or 15-year-old to be somewhere they felt unsafe. The problem is that we have a broken asylum system that needs fixing. Age assessments can be avoided if people do not try to enter the country illegally, but come by safe and legal routes, where we can have documentation.

There are other ways to prove someone’s identity, age and application, as we have done in Afghanistan and Syria, which will ultimately be a much better system than having illegal economic migrants crossing the English channel from Calais and entering this country illegally. They are putting a huge strain on the public services of our country and on the people of Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke, whose area is the fifth largest contributor to the asylum dispersal scheme.

Age assessment is absolutely essential. It is another way of reminding people that if they make an illegal entry into this country they will face a number of procedures to verify the credibility of their asylum claim, their identity and their age, in order to ensure we protect our country’s young and vulnerable people. It is the right and proper thing to, and I fully applaud the Minister on pushing this essential clause.

Craig Whittaker

- - Excerpts

Let me start with amendment 150. I would say to the hon. Member for Sheffield Central that his amendment applies to all aspects of age assessments, not only the use of scientific measures. As such, it is extremely broad, although I do not know if that remains his intention.

The Home Office takes its statutory duties towards the welfare of children very seriously. The current age assessment system is desperately in need of reform. We have heard many reports from local authorities about the prevalence of adults posing as children and claiming services designed for children, including accommodation, education and social care. This poses significant risks to the welfare of genuine children in our care system and undermines the integrity of the immigration system. Equally, we need to safeguard vulnerable children from being placed in adult services, although I am not sure I agree with the hon. Member for Sheffield Central when he said that this is headline grabbing.

We must do everything in our power—whatever that is—to safeguard children, including vulnerable and unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.

Nationality and Borders Bill (Fourteenth sitting)

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 2nd November 2021 Public Bill Committees

The Government’s new clauses appear to suggest that there is a simple process to determine age accurately. This is worrying. We must avoid viewing age assessments in asylum cases in this way. We need to get age assessments right. That will involve taking a broader approach than the Government have laid out in new clauses 29 to 37. The new clauses on age assessments risk vulnerable children and young people being denied rights they deserve, protection they need and support we must offer. We oppose the measures set out in the new clauses, and we oppose clause 58 standing part of the Bill.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

It will probably not shock Committee members that I support what the Government are doing on age assessments. Ultimately, it is about ensuring that we protect our young people in our United Kingdom. When people say that they are children and will be in a classroom surrounded by people of a similar age, we need to make sure that they are indeed children.

As a former teacher, I understand the importance of this. As a former head of year who had responsibility for safeguarding, covering welfare, attendance and the behaviour of young people, it makes no sense to me why anyone would oppose a measure to make sure that people who claim to be young people are indeed young people. An individual who has nothing to hide should have nothing to fear in this regard. It is absolutely essential that age assessments take place to make sure that people claiming to be of school age are indeed of that ilk, because ultimately other young people could be put in a very vulnerable situation.

[Stuart C. McDonald]

We want age assessments to be as accurate as they can be at the moment, not just through the work of social work groups but with input from outside. Does the hon. Gentleman have any concerns about the impact on children who end up being wrongly placed in adult facilities?

[Jonathan Gullis]

Of course—absolutely. Young people should not be placed in a situation like that, for safety reasons. As a former teacher, I would not want a 14 or 15-year-old to be somewhere they felt unsafe. The problem is that we have a broken asylum system that needs fixing. Age assessments can be avoided if people do not try to enter the country illegally, but come by safe and legal routes, where we can have documentation.

There are other ways to prove someone’s identity, age and application, as we have done in Afghanistan and Syria, which will ultimately be a much better system than having illegal economic migrants crossing the English channel from Calais and entering this country illegally. They are putting a huge strain on the public services of our country and on the people of Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke, whose area is the fifth largest contributor to the asylum dispersal scheme.

Age assessment is absolutely essential. It is another way of reminding people that if they make an illegal entry into this country they will face a number of procedures to verify the credibility of their asylum claim, their identity and their age, in order to ensure we protect our country’s young and vulnerable people. It is the right and proper thing to, and I fully applaud the Minister on pushing this essential clause.

[Craig Whittaker]

Let me start with amendment 150. I would say to the hon. Member for Sheffield Central that his amendment applies to all aspects of age assessments, not only the use of scientific measures. As such, it is extremely broad, although I do not know if that remains his intention.

The Home Office takes its statutory duties towards the welfare of children very seriously. The current age assessment system is desperately in need of reform. We have heard many reports from local authorities about the prevalence of adults posing as children and claiming services designed for children, including accommodation, education and social care. This poses significant risks to the welfare of genuine children in our care system and undermines the integrity of the immigration system. Equally, we need to safeguard vulnerable children from being placed in adult services, although I am not sure I agree with the hon. Member for Sheffield Central when he said that this is headline grabbing.

We must do everything in our power—whatever that is—to safeguard children, including vulnerable and unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Rishi Sunak]

The reduced rate of VAT was put in place to support the hospitality industry during coronavirus. It extends all the way to next spring; it does not step up until next March, as the hon. Lady pointed out. As she also pointed out, the Government are putting in place business rates support to help businesses in that industry—as I said previously, up to £110,000 for each business next year through a 50% discount on their business rates, with Barnett consequentials flowing to Scotland as a result.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

Brewers have gone through a really challenging time throughout the pandemic, so the Chancellor’s announcement of a reduction in the draft beer duty rate was extremely welcome. Keith and Dave Bott, owners of Titanic Brewery, want to pass on their thanks to the Chancellor directly and hope that he can come and enjoy the Bulls Head in Burslem to celebrate this fantastic achievement.

[Rishi Sunak]

I thank my hon. Friend for the kind invitation, which he also sent me by phone. I look forward to accepting it soon and to celebrating Stoke’s success in not one, not two but three levelling-up fund bids.

Brexit: Opportunities

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Michael Ellis]

I disagree with the hon. Lady on one thing: I do not think that Northern Ireland has only one unique selling point. I think it has multiple selling points and the people of Northern Ireland are an integral part of this kingdom. Of course, tourism is one element of Northern Ireland that is also a substantial prowess. She does recognise, I know, that in this House, this party and this Government have always focused on supporting the people throughout the United Kingdom, which is why we are pushing the levelling-up agenda that she has been hearing so much about. She will find that that will continue to support her constituents and the people of the whole Province of Northern Ireland.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

I warmly welcome the Paymaster General to his place, and, obviously, I warmly welcome the statement.

One of the many reasons the people of Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke—over 70%—voted to leave the European Union was their wish to see us take back control of our borders. As we are being asked to feed in some ideas, may I feed one idea to the Paymaster General? Let us get out of the European convention on human rights, and then let us scrap the Human Rights Act in this country, so that foreign criminals who are taking advantage of the current system, and economic migrants who are crossing the English channel and entering this country illegally, can be deported very much more quickly than they are now.

[Michael Ellis]

I hear my hon. Friend’s points and of course he knows that we are now taking back control of our borders.

Levelling-up Agenda

Jonathan Gullis Excerpts

Wednesday 15th September 2021 Westminster Hall

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for the second time today, Mr Robertson, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) on securing this important debate. I will read out some statistics, because for too long, sadly, Stoke-on-Trent was talked about in a negative light by my predecessors, so I will talk about how great Stoke-on-Trent actually is and what it has been doing under not only a Conservative Government but a Conservative-led city council, led by the fantastic Councillor Abi Brown.

Stoke-on-Trent was ranked first for jobs growth in 2020. Between 2015 and 2018 it saw wages increase by 11.7%, with a 3.9% annual increase. In 2019-20 we built over 1,000 new homes, of which 97% were built on brownfield land. We are the eighth fastest growing economy in England, which includes London. We have created over 8,000 jobs in the last five years. We have the Ceramic Valley enterprise zone, which is one of the most successful enterprise zones in the UK. I am delighted that Tunstall Arrow phase 2 is effectively already under way and bookings are being made. The city council has done a fantastic thing by carrying on the business rates relief, using its own finances to encourage more businesses to come to the area. There is a fantastic story here for Stoke-on-Trent.

I am very sorry to get into the petty party politics, as some people might accuse us of, but I do so because when the Labour party lost Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke, it was because it spent too long talking the area down and never talked it up. It spent too long telling people how poor they were and how deprived they were, but never offering a solution to the problem. In fact, Labour’s legacy in Stoke-on-Trent was to build a hospital—the Royal Stoke University Hospital—with a disastrous private finance initiative debt, which means £20 million a year is being stolen from the frontline to pay that debt. Labour built a hospital with 200 fewer beds than the old hospital, which is even more insane.

We saw jobs and ceramics enterprises being shipped off to China, which means I am very grateful still to have Churchill China, Steelite International and Burleigh Pottery in my constituency. They are still doing well, but sadly that industry dying meant that towns such as Burslem and Tunstall, two of the five original towns of Stoke-on-Trent, are now in a much worse state. Those places were forgotten, because for 70 years they had Labour Members of Parliament.

I am the first ever Conservative Member of Parliament for my constituency. What has happened over time, as we have seen that transition from Labour to the Conservatives, is that things are now happening. By the way, that does not mean that I do not acknowledge that there are challenges in Stoke-on-Trent. As I say, the mother town of Burslem has one of the highest number of closed shops anywhere in the United Kingdom. The town used to thrive off Royal Doulton and many other Pot Bank factories, but now that is simply not the case. I am trying to find a future for that town. I was delighted to have spent my summer handing out a survey asking residents for their views—over 300 responses have come in—and I am working with the city council to create a vision, perhaps for an arts and creative culture that will link in with Middleport Pottery.

In Tunstall, the high street is predominantly privately owned. I know that because I rent my constituency office on that high street—it is in an old shop. The top end of the high street is falling into disrepair, but I am delighted that the city council is working with me to hold private landlords to account for allowing their shops to fall into disrepair.

However, to offer the Minister more evidence of levelling up, it is the Conservative-led Stoke-on-Trent City Council that has invested £4 million into Longton town hall, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Jack Brereton), and it is spending over £4 million on Tunstall town hall in my constituency of Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke. That will see council offices, a police post, a children’s centre and much more bringing this heritage building back to life, which will bring more footfall to the town centre and hopefully see it rejuvenate.

There is so much more opportunity. I fell in love with the city back in 2018, when I first started campaigning there, because I saw what others did not, which is a people who were desperate for change but just needed someone to go and fight for them. I am absolutely delighted to be their champion, as I have said many times.

I know that we have just heard some hon. Members talk about the town deal fund. I am a member of Kidsgrove’s town deal board. It is important to remember that these towns got this money before I was even elected as a Member of Parliament, but it was a Conservative Government who decided that the town of Kidsgrove, which is linked with Talke and Newchapel, would benefit from a town deal fund that, in total and including the advance town deal payment, came to £17.6 million. I can tell Members that when I go out door-knocking in Kidsgrove, the people there cannot believe what that money has done.

We have invested £2.75 million in Kidsgrove sports centre, which means that this facility will reopen in spring 2022. Rather than building a new one at higher expense to the taxpayer, the existing one will be refurbished and reopened. Why is that so important, Mr Robertson? In 2017, the then Labour-run Newcastle-under-Lyme Borough Council was offered the sports centre for £1, and it said no. There was a fantastic, community-run campaign led by Mark Clews, Dave Rigby, Ray Williams and Councillor Gill Burnett, who was a Labour councillor but has since become a Conservative over the decision on the sports centre. They got the borough council behind it, and they certainly got me behind it. Ultimately, we will see that facility reopened, which means swimming and a gym will return to Kidsgrove, which has one of the highest childhood obesity rates in the country.

We are also seeing the upgrading of the town centre with the new indoor town centre hub, which will hopefully have a new GP surgery in the middle, as well as a post office, and will link in with the job centre based in Kidsgrove. This will hopefully bring a bit of a coffee culture to the town centre. That will also be linked with Kidsgrove railway station. I give credit here to my predecessor’s predecessor, Joan Walley, who secured £5.5 million from the Access for All fund for the station, which now has a new footbridge. I decided that we should use the town deal board money to upgrade the ticket office, which will have a community café and more space for the volunteers, who do a fantastic job of looking after the station. There will also be 200 car parking spaces and a bus terminal, after the bridge was strengthened, meaning we will have a better integrated transport system. There will also be one hour’s free parking for people to do the three-minute walk to the town centre.

We are going to unlock the Chatterley Valley West employment site with over £2 million of investment, which could bring up to 2,000 jobs to the local area. It baffles me that the Labour councillors in Talke & Butt Lane—the ward where I live—moan that this money has been spent about 200 feet outside the Kidsgrove parish area. They are moaning that we have invested more than £2 million in a strategic employment site that will bring 2,000 jobs to the area. Again, in Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke, Labour is showing that it is far more interested in seeing money not spent in our local area, and not championing the local cause.

We have built one of the UK’s leading pump tracks at Newchapel recreation ground, which has had visitors from Worcester and Scotland, while BMX riders such as Kyle Evans, a former Team GB European champion, have used the facility. For £100,000, it has created a buzz in Kidsgrove, giving young people access to more facilities. When I was elected, I was told that there was nothing for young people to do. Now the sports centre is coming back and there is a new pump track.

Finally, we have worked with the King’s Church of England Academy, which now has FIFA-standard 3G AstroTurf pitches. The schoolchildren can use that facility during the day and the school can open it up to the community during the evenings and weekends, bringing revenue to the school to invest in the community.

This is what a town deal has done for my area, and I am proud to be part of it. I will benefit from the fact that the swimming pool exists—as a Kidsgrove parish resident, my daughter, who is just over a year old, will be able to learn to swim in her local swimming facility. Every pound invested by the community into that sports centre is going straight back into it, because the community group that ran the campaign are taking over the day-to-day running of that fabulous facility.

Not only have the Government done all of that, but they have delivered on the second largest announcement of civil service job moves of any Department, after Darlington. I know that the Home Secretary looks forward to spending her time up there on occasion. However, she might not be aware that, under the Places for Growth programme, 550 jobs are coming to Stoke-on-Trent via the Home Office. A new innovation centre will provide jobs at all career stages, including apprenticeships to help Stokies get into great civil service careers. Initially, there will be 50 caseworker roles, with a further 200 jobs at an asylum co-ordination hub, and that will expand to about 560 jobs by 2025. In addition to the caseworker roles, the centre will include operational, IT, policy and corporate functions, and will offer exciting career paths to local people. There will also be a number of senior civil service roles in Stoke-on-Trent, meaning that the people there will have a voice in Government. If anyone wants to understand why the people of Stoke-on-Trent voted overwhelmingly to leave—by 73%, in my constituency—it is because they thought that if London did not care about them, then Brussels would not have a bloody clue about their local area. That is why we are finally seeing a big change there.

What can the Government continue to do? The shopping list has not ended unfortunately, Minister. Stoke has had an appetiser and a bit of a main course, but we are still hungry for more, and dessert will come in the form of the levelling-up fund bid that we have submitted. We are lucky to be rated as a grade 1 priority area. We thank the Government for listening to our calls and understanding the deprivation.

[Jim Shannon]

It is hard not to be enthused by the hon. Gentleman’s energy. I congratulate him and his colleague, the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Jo Gideon), who is no longer present but was here for the previous debate. Does he agree that it is very important to have a partnership and relationship between the MP and the local council, and that it is part of the success story that he refers to?

[Jonathan Gullis]

I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who I love taking an intervention from—it is a parliamentary privilege. He is right: the relationship between the local council and the local MP is so important, because if we end up butting heads nothing will happen. That is not benefiting the people who have elected us to serve them.

I take the fact that those votes will end. I do not sit here arrogantly; they were lent votes, and if I do not deliver, I will be sacked. Every single one of my constituents is a Lord Sugar, so they will hire me or fire me. I take that responsibility absolutely seriously. I say on every doorstep that I do. That is why I do not stop banging on about my local area. That is why the Minister must be bored to death of hearing about Stoke-on-Trent from me and my hon. Friends the Members for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Jo Gideon) and for Stoke-on-Trent South—the Stoke mafia, as we have come to be known in the Tea Room. We will keep fighting for our local area. Councillor Abi Brown is a tour de force—a young, dynamic, forward-thinking council leader paving the way, and now having a major role in the Local Government Association as well.

Let us go over the levelling-up fund bid, which for me is a litmus test of the Government’s commitment. It is a £73.5 million bid. Some £3.5 million will go into Tunstall, which will turn an old library and swimming baths back into a mixed-use facility, including flats, a multi-purpose exhibition space and a café. It will turn one of the largest city centre regeneration areas in the west midlands into a thriving hotel, flat accommodation and hopefully indoor arena that will specialise in e-sports. There is so much potential in those fantastic bids, which are in with the Treasury. I know that the Minister wants to make my Christmas. One way that she can achieve that is by ensuring that we deliver on those bids. We have bid for the transport elements as well.

We have also bid on the Stoke-to-Leek line through the Restoring your Railway fund. It is a fantastic bid, with four constituency MPs bidding for it jointly. It will unlock people being able to commute around north Staffordshire, meaning that we finally have better transport. I hope that, alongside rail, we will get some Bus Back Better opportunities, because 30% of the people of Stoke-on-Trent do not have access to a car, and the current bus service is not good enough.

[Mr Laurence Robertson (in the Chair)]

We need to start the Front-Bench speeches at 5.25 pm. I call Catherine McKinnell.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (Kemi Badenoch)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I congratulate the hon. Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) on securing this debate on a topic about which he has been very vocal. We both care very deeply about it, and I hope he understands that the Government feel the same way.

In a speech on this issue delivered exactly two months ago today, the Prime Minister said:

“it is the mission of this government to unite and level up across the whole of the UK, not just because that is morally right, but because if we fail we are simply squandering vast reserves of human capital and we are failing to allow people to fulfil their potential and we are holding our country back.”

Changing a situation in which for too many people geography turns out to be destiny is this Government’s defining goal. That is what levelling up means: opportunity for all, wherever and whoever.

Hon. Members raised a number of important points, and I will try to address as many of them as I can in the time allowed. Bids are being assessed by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, the Department for Transport and other relevant Departments. I cannot discuss them here, but successful bids will be announced this autumn. I wish all constituencies and local authorities that have put forward bids to the Government the very best of luck. We want to do as much as we can for everybody. Resources are not infinite, but we will do the very best we can.

The hon. Member for Barnsley Central said that it is about not words, but action, so I hope he will be happy for me to summarise briefly what the Government have done and what we intend to do. Opposition Members complain that we are not investing enough, but the fact is that last year’s spending review announced record investment in infrastructure with all the benefits that will bring. This year’s review, which will conclude on 27 October, will build on that progress. It will focus on strong, innovative public services, a transition to net zero and delivering our plan for growth. To emphasise the quantum of money, core departmental spending is set to grow in real terms at nearly 4% per year on average over this Parliament. That means, in 2024-25, £140 billion more per year in cash terms than at the start of the Parliament, so it simply is not true that we are not investing.

One of our more exciting policies that the Treasury has really been promoting is freeports, which create good-quality jobs. We think they will do so much. They will become magnets for dynamic, fast-growing businesses, generating prosperity in areas where people may sometimes feel that they have been forgotten. At the Budget, we announced eight new freeports, one of which is in Felixstowe. I know it is not Lowestoft, but it will have positive benefits for Norfolk and Suffolk, and will benefit areas such as Lowestoft.

My hon. Friend the Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) asked about coastal communities. He said a lot that I will address further in my remarks, but at Budget the Government invested quite a lot in policies that will benefit coastal communities—not just the levelling-up fund but the £5.2 billion flood and coastal defence programme, which starts this month. We are also allocating £1.2 billion over the years to support the roll-out of gigabit-capable broadband in hard-to-reach areas. I know he will appreciate that.

[Jonathan Gullis]

I want to quickly mention the fact that in Stoke-on-Trent, we have £9.2 million to install gigabit broadband, making us the first gigabit city in the country. That has been done with Government funding and VX Fiber. We brought that project in under budget and saved the Treasury £600,000. I thought this was a great opportunity for the Minister to congratulate the city of Stoke-on-Trent on delivering once again.

[Kemi Badenoch]

I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. I have been really bowled over by how the Stoke mafia have been such champions for their area, never talking it down. I thank him for reminding me about the amount we have given to Stoke. I believe we have also given Lowestoft about £24.9 million within the towns fund, so money is going to all the right places—the places that need this cash.

Building infrastructure is also essential, and we have launched a number of schemes, such as the towns fund. The hon. Member for Barnsley Central mentioned the UK Infrastructure Bank and said that it is all very well that we have it, but it is a critical thing. It is up and running and planning its first investment. Crucially, it will partner with the private sector and local government to kick-start major infrastructure projects, contributing not just to levelling up but to achieving net zero. A third of its initial £12 billion in funding is specifically earmarked for local and mayoral authorities, just like his. The expectation is that these investments will also spark a crowd-in effect, with private backers keen, themselves, to invest in the kind of infrastructure we need. The Government cannot do everything. We need the private sector to take part in this. I did not hear the hon. Member for Barnsley Central mention the private sector in his speech, and I hope that he might do so in his closing remarks. The private sector is crucial in delivering levelling up, and I am very happy to meet him and speak to him about what it can do. It cannot be just Government.

Hon. Members also talked about skills and education. Absolutely—I completely agree with them. Skills and education will be the cornerstone of our future economic success. Here, too, we are working hard to change lives, whether through the £95 million lifetime skills guarantee, the £43 million we have provided to expand employer-led skills retraining boot camps across England this year, or the £3,000 we have been giving employers for every apprentice they take on before the end of this month.

The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) talked about health inequalities and her bid, which I wish her every success with. We very much recognise this; I am also the Minister for Equalities, and the Government have been doing quite a lot within this space. However, I remind all Members that funding is very tight. Last week, when we did vote for additional health funding, Opposition Members did not walk through the Lobby with us to vote for extra money for the NHS.

Returning to the point about what the Government are doing, local authorities have a part to play, as the hon. Member for Barnsley Central and others said. We are not into top-down politics, or Government imposing solutions by decree, whatever it is they say. We think national, but we do act local. That is why we have given local authorities the power to drive forward funding applications. We have given lots of powers to local authorities, and I would be very keen to hear what our mayors and local authorities are doing with those powers.

We are also trying to avoid what has historically been a siloed approach. The levelling-up fund, which is run by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and the Department for Transport, was designed together with the Treasury. That is an example of how we are doing better working together, and it is why I am very happy to respond in this debate, even though many of the issues that hon. Members have raised are managed and administered by other Departments.

We have also talked about taking a more flexible approach to devolution in England. I know that the hon. Member for Gordon (Richard Thomson) is requesting far, far more, but I am afraid that is not something we will grant at this time. We do want to do devolution better, rewriting the rulebook and giving new deals for counties, so that the people who know their communities best can do the best for them. Through the devolution deals, we have already committed £7.5 billion of unringfenced gainshare investment for nine mayoral combined authorities over 30 years, to be spent on local priorities.

I will also mention, specifically for the hon. Member for Barnsley Central, that through the city region sustainable transport settlements, eight MCAs are set to receive £4.2 billion over the next five years. Through the transforming cities fund, Sheffield city region—soon to be the South Yorkshire mayoral combined authority—has itself received a total of £171 million to fund local transport projects, including a new bus rapid transit link in Barnsley. That is just part of the investment that the Government are making across the country.

The right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden) asked what exactly it means to level up. I hear that again and again. I feel that we repeat ourselves, but people still do not take it in. Levelling up is the chance for the Government to improve life chances and everyday life for people in underperforming places. Those places have not been underperforming since 2010—they have been underperforming for decades, under successive Governments.

We acknowledge the gains we have made and that there is still work to do, but structural issues are geographic for some places, and we believe that we have the right policies to tackle those. Many of the examples that my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) gave show how we can deliver that.

There were lots of accusations about the levelling-up fund being pork barrel politics for Conservative constituencies. I utterly reject that. It is absolutely untrue. It is also untrue nonsense that the Chief Whip is deciding which MPs will get funding. Those are just nonsensical media speculations. We, on this side of the House, know that we are doing right for the people of this country. That is why we have more Conservative seats than ever, and many, like Stoke, used to be Labour.

For those who are unsure, the levelling-up fund is intended to invest in infrastructure that improves everyday life across the UK. We recognise that it does not always go to the most deprived places. It is a formula that takes many things into account, and it will prioritise those bids, as has been said, from places in highest need.