Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords]

Julie Minns Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 16th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Ms Julie Minns (Carlisle) (Lab)]

On the eve of this year’s general election, hundreds of Carlisle residents woke to find that brown water was coming out of their taps. Some might describe the stained water as a metaphor for 14 years of Conservative failure but, for most of my residents, it was just another reminder of the poor service they have had to endure from the local water company. Indeed, in the last two weeks alone, there have been 56 sewage discharges within a 5-mile radius of Carlisle, lasting a total of 152 hours.

This not only has the impact of harming local wildlife, as we have already heard this evening, but it also makes our rivers a no-go zone for locals. As someone who enjoys cold-water swimming, I find it a tragedy that our rivers, which have defined our great border city for centuries, have been reduced to the personal polluting pools of United Utilities.

Yet our system rewards this behaviour. Just last month, the company announced hundreds of millions in profit while seeking to further increase customer bills by an astounding 32%. Bonuses just shy of £1.5 million were doled out to two executives, on top of salaries already topping £1 million. This is the state of water regulation in this country—one where polluting, not the polluter, pays.

At least, that was the state of affairs under the previous Government, but not any more. I am delighted that this Bill is giving us the powers finally to hold the water companies to account, finally to block bonuses to underperforming water bosses, finally to levy fines that genuinely deter polluting our waterways, and finally to stop these companies marking their own homework by introducing proper independent monitoring of every outlet.

The water industry was a wild west under the last Government, and I for one am delighted that there is a new sheriff in town.

Rural Affairs

Julie Minns Excerpts

Monday 11th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Ms Julie Minns (Carlisle) (Lab)]

We have had an excellent and varied debate that perfectly illustrates the variety and colour of rural life in our country today. I want to concentrate on one aspect of rural life that blights the lives of people who live in rural north Cumbria, in my constituency, and across all of the UK: rural crime. I congratulate the hon. Member for Mid Buckinghamshire (Greg Smith) on his work on this issue. I will certainly support him in trying to ensure that that statutory instrument is brought forward.

Rural crime, be it sheep rustling, fly-tipping or the theft of vehicles or equipment, has exactly the same impact on the communities and individuals it affects: it has a huge financial repercussion on everyone whose livelihoods rely on livestock and machinery for the generation of their income. It leaves rural communities feeling vulnerable and fearful for their personal safety. However, despite that financial and personal cost, it is a fact that rural crime rose under the last Government.

NFU Mutual’s figures show that there was a 4.3% increase in crime in 2023, pushing the cost of rural crime to a shocking figure of over £52 million. In my own county of Cumbria, rural theft cost an estimated £815,000—a rise of 12% on the previous year. It is clear that criminal gangs have been able to take advantage of the holes left in rural frontline policing, as a direct result of cuts to rural police forces under the last Government, to target farmyards and fields across Britain.

Rural crime is no longer the preserve of the opportunist thief. Instead, we now see internationally organised criminal activity, with gangs that target high value farm machinery and GPS kits, knowing that they can be sold all over the world. That degree of serious organised crime demands a serious, organised response, and I am pleased that it is this Government that are delivering that response in the form of a cross-governmental rural crime strategy.

In Cumbria, our new Labour police, fire and crime commissioner is committed to building on the work of our dedicated rural crime team, which recently marked its first anniversary. During that year, the team recovered stolen property worth £820,000, cut quad bike thefts by 10% and made dozens of arrests. More importantly, that same team engaged directly with rural communities, making over 200 visits to victims of rural crime.

[Sir John Hayes]

If I can be helpful to the hon. Lady, the critical thing is to get the police funding formula reviewed. It disadvantages counties like Cumbria and Lincolnshire, and has done for years. No Government, Labour or Conservative, has dealt with that. Will she join me in writing to the Minister, and perhaps to the Treasury, to suggest that we do just that in order to prioritise rural areas like hers and mine?

[Ms Minns]

I thank the right hon. Member for his intervention. As we have heard, funding for rural communities affects not just crime and policing, but the availability of GPs, healthcare and dentistry. If anyone on the Conservative Benches would like to explain to my constituents why they have to go on a 100 mile round trip to register with an NHS dentist, I would happily take that intervention.

On the point about personalised engagement with rural communities, I draw the House’s attention to the dedication of one particular rural police officer in my constituency: PC Susan Holliday. I should declare that Susan and I have been friends for over 50 years, and she has spent 37 of those years as a special constable in Cumbria constabulary, clocking up over 5,000 hours in her own time in the last decade alone, and exhausting every possible long-service award available to her as a special constable and that she is entitled to. Herself a farmer, Susan was integral to the setting up of Cumbria constabulary’s farm watch scheme, and she is well known to the rural communities across the north of my constituency.

Sadly, the excellent work of officers like Susan was too often undermined by the cuts to frontline policing that we saw in 14 years of chaotic Conservative Government. Those 14 years saw the closure of rural police stations and the diversion of officers away from their rural beats to plug the gaps in policing in our towns and city centres. It is not before time that we finally have a Government that will back our frontline rural police officers with a rural crime strategy. That strategy will increase police patrols in rural areas, has tougher measures to clamp down on antisocial behaviour and has stronger laws to prevent farm theft, fly-tipping and drug dealing. I am delighted that this Government will deliver the rural crime strategy that communities like mine in north Cumbria so desperately need.

Budget: Implications for Farming Communities

Julie Minns Excerpts

Monday 4th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Daniel Zeichner]

I look forward to many more such exchanges over the Dispatch Box with the hon. Gentleman. What I said earlier was that on my many visits around the country, people consistently told me that they were concerned about how the system was being abused and how people were coming in and buying up land over their head. That is what I said, and that is what I stand by. As for these measures, I am afraid that this is a Budget that stands in its entirety—and the whole country needs stability, so it will stand.

[Ms Julie Minns (Carlisle) (Lab)]

A few months ago, I visited my constituents Andrew and Ada, who farm in a remote north-east corner of Cumbria. Sadly, after 14 years under Conservative Governments, they are largely getting by on Ada’s pension. Will the Minister set out what support will be available to farmers such as my constituents, following last week’s Budget?

[Daniel Zeichner]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right; many people in this country, and many farmers in particular, are struggling to get by. That is why it is very important that in this Budget we maintained the budget for the support schemes that people are getting used to; it is interesting to note that they are now being subscribed to in much higher numbers. That support will be available to help people to make the transition and to go on supplying food for this country, which is so important.

Farming and Food Security

Julie Minns Excerpts

Tuesday 8th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Tim Farron]

That is the real challenge, so we need to ensure that there is more money in the budget for welfare schemes and support to ensure that farmers can carry on farming. If we are taking the basic payment out relentlessly without anything to replace it, the Government should not be surprised if there is carnage. That is not just personal carnage and tragedies, but also a reduction in our ability to feed ourselves as a country.

Let us concentrate for a moment or two, before I shut up, on what we can do to put things right. First, the Liberal Democrats believe wholeheartedly, as in our costed manifesto, that there should be an additional billion pounds in the budget. We recognise that we cannot restore nature, tackle climate change or produce food on the cheap. We want to use at least some of that money to invest in trusted on-farm advice. A Conservative Member earlier made the point about how much of the EU money went to big landowners, but the problem is that the current situation is even worse. Who is not getting in? It is smaller farmers. If someone is working 90 hours a week on their farm, they do not have time to go and get informed and to engage in the process outside. They need someone they trust on their farm to hold their hand through the process of getting into this new world, so that there is a future for them and for their family. That is where some of that money needs to go.

We need to recognise that much of the money has disproportionately gone to big landowners, both public and private. The BBC reported, and I know this to be true, that one landowner alone evicted 65 tenants from one estate in in April 2024, giving people notice to quit that estate. The distribution of money between the richer farmers and the poorer is even worse than it was under the common agricultural policy, and we never thought that would even be possible. But we are seeing what I would describe, in no way lightly, as the Lakeland clearances, and as we lose livestock, we lose people.

I want to say something else positive. I have already mentioned at least one Conservative positively; Baroness Rock also did a tremendous job with the tenant farming review. The shadow Secretary of State’s predecessor did not meet her in all her time in her position. I am concerned to learn that Baroness Rock got the sack—whatever happened, she has been removed from her role—as the report is hugely important. Tenants need protecting, and there must be a tenant farm commissioner. I urge the Government to take on Baroness Rock’s report and recommendations in full, without any mitigation or equivocation.

The Government could also ensure that people in stewardship schemes are allowed into the SFI. Let us ensure that Farming in Protected Landscapes, which is a really important grant scheme, is renewed; its current end date is the end of March. Let us also do something fundamentally radical but blindingly obvious: let us make food a public good. Let us ensure that our agricultural policy actually encourages people to produce food.

This issue is not just about transition—people have talked about the trade deals; the Conservative Government threw Britain’s farmers under the bus when it came to them. There is also the lack of access to our nearest markets, which some Labour Members have mentioned, and the importance of restoring and normalising relationships with our biggest export market over the channel. For a generation, the Conservatives will carry around their neck, like an albatross, their record of betraying and taking for granted our rural communities in general, and farmers in particular.

[Ms Julie Minns (Carlisle) (Lab)]

Does the hon. Member agree that one of the elements of that betrayal was on rural crime, which increased, again, in the last 12 months? Will he join me in congratulating Cumbria’s rural crime team on their one-year anniversary, and in supporting the Government’s commitment, finally, to reversing the disgraceful rise in rural crime that we saw under the last Government?

[Tim Farron]

Yes.

Flood Defences: West Worcestershire

Julie Minns Excerpts

Wednesday 24th July 2024 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Emma Hardy)]

Thank you and congratulations, Madam Deputy Speaker. It is a night of firsts—I am giving my first speech as Minister and we have you here for the first time as Deputy Speaker—but of course we have the continuity of the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) being here to intervene in the Adjournment debate. As so many things change, so many things remain the same. Long may that continue.

I am delighted to respond to the hon. Member for West Worcestershire (Dame Harriett Baldwin), who I hold in high regard and esteem. I enjoyed our time together on the Treasury Committee. I am pleased, in my first debate as Minister, to be able to talk to her about something that we had conversations about before I took this role. I want to state at the beginning that I will be very happy to continue the conversation; I recognise that she requested a meeting and I will be more than happy to follow that up.

The hon. Member alluded to 2007, which we remember very well. She talked about the challenge and the impact in her constituency, and it was the same for me in Hull—absolutely devastating. As she mentioned, people continue to feel the trauma, which has a long-lasting impact not just on the economy and the state of people’s property, but on people’s mental health. I therefore want to make it abundantly clear that this Government are committed more than ever to protecting communities from flooding. It is one of our top five priorities in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and the good news is that the work has already begun.

I want to be as open and honest as possible with the hon. Member, so I have looked in detail at the two schemes that I was aware she would raise tonight. Although I have been informed that the Environment Agency has completed some work since 2007 and progress has been made—I am sure we both want to acknowledge that—these two schemes do seem to be particularly difficult. I recognise that she raised the same issue with the previous Minister. I extend my sympathies to all the communities of West Worcestershire who were affected by the winter flooding, which is an awful thing for anyone to experience. I enjoy and share the hon. Member’s persistence. In fact, I believe that this place only works when we have persistent and talented women leading the way, so I am absolutely with her on that.

Let me turn first to the Severn Stoke flood alleviation scheme. I understand that the hon. Member was involved in securing some of the soil required for the embankment. My understanding of the situation is that if the scheme is completed, it will better protect 18 homes and businesses and the Rose and Crown pub, which I have heard good things about, but the difficulty seems to be making sure that the scheme is within the funding envelope that has been allocated. My understanding—I will make a comment on the funding formula—is that the benefits of the scheme, as assessed, cannot be greater than the cost of delivering the scheme. The funding envelope that has been allocated is based on the benefit that is meant to be given, so the scheme has to be delivered within that envelope, even though payment in kind has been received, in terms of the provision of the soil. That is the difficulty with that particular scheme. The good news is that the Environment Agency is still working on finding a contractor; it is still going out there and talking to organisations that could deliver the scheme within the budget available.

The hon. Member mentioned the role that she could play. She has knowledge and experience of businesses in the area, and that might be one avenue to explore with contractors, who would learn the benefits that they would bring to the city and how they would be celebrated. We would need to make sure that they could deliver within the funding that is provided. That is the particular difficulty, as I understand it. I recognise the frustration that the hon. Member expressed. There can be nothing more frustrating than, to use her words, a forlorn pile of soil sitting there doing nothing. I share her frustration, and I hope that we can find the contractor that is needed.

[Ms Julie Minns (Carlisle) (Lab)]

Does the Minister agree that many flood schemes have not been completed, including a number in my constituency of Carlisle, as a direct result of the economic chaos created by the previous Government, which has forced the Environment Agency to cancel a quarter of the planned schemes?

[Emma Hardy]

It is great to see my hon. Friend in the Chamber. She is right. The economic chaos that we face, and which continued as we changed Government, Prime Ministers and Chancellors, did not provide the stability needed to get on with these schemes and deliver them. The change that people required has now taken place, and we have stability and new Ministers—hopefully, I am not going anywhere quickly—so I hope we can get on and deliver. I hope that my hon. Friend will be persistent in pursuing this issue.

I had a careful look at the Tenbury Wells scheme mentioned by the hon. Member for West Worcestershire and how complicated the measure would be. As she said, it would potentially involve people having to move house and, at times, parts of their garden being removed and roads being closed. I understand that the necessary consultation has been undertaken with residents, in the detail needed. Nobody wants a scheme that will be expensive and disruptive, or that does not perform as expected. Anything put in place must also be in keeping with that beautiful part of the country. As a result, design costs have increased repeatedly. There is always the difficulty that we want something that is as good as possible at ensuring flood alleviation, designed in the best possible way, in keeping with the character of the town and that causes minimum disruption.

My understanding of the situation is that the scheme has become much more expensive as time has gone on; that is something that we might want to discuss in more detail when we meet. It is important that we get it right, and that it is affordable, given the amount of money that has been allocated. I am happy to take forward that conversation. I would not want to be the Minister for delivering something that residents would not want to have in their community.

As the hon. Member will know from the National Audit Office report, “Resilience to flooding”, which was published last November, we have inherited a floods capital programme that faces extreme delivery challenges. As has been mentioned, the NAO cites a number of projects that have not gone through, partly because they could not be delivered within the timeframe, partly because of inflation, and partly because of covid and other challenges in government. That has had an impact, so I am reviewing absolutely everything that is going on in the Environment Agency and looking at all the schemes. I want to update hon. Members on all that as quickly as possible, and if anyone wishes to see me about individual schemes, they are more than welcome to do so.