Youth Unemployment
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Albert Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab)
Before I became a Member I ran a centre for the unemployed during the 1990s, so I know how painful things are for people who are unemployed long term. The hon. Member for Enfield North (Nick de Bois) referred to public sector jobs. Let us make it clear: nurses and teachers have real jobs and provide real service to our communities.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne) is right to compare and contrast the recessions of the 1990s and the present. In my constituency, unemployment was 100% higher during the recession of the 1990s, because the programmes—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. I understand the point the hon. Gentleman is making, but we must have shorter interventions. I am sure the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill has grasped the point.
Mr Byrne
I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen). As many of my hon. Friends are doing this afternoon, he underlines the point that right across the country, over an extended period of Labour’s term in office, youth unemployment was falling fast. Unemployment can never be as low as Members want, but the question that confronts us is how to draw the right lessons from those overwhelming successes in getting people back into work and how to apply the lessons to the present crisis when one in five young people is not in work.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. One at a time. If Mr Byrne does not wish to give way, the Minister will have to accept it. I am sure he has noticed that the Minister wants to intervene.
Mr Byrne
I will give way to the Minister in a moment. The whole House wants an explanation of why the promise to get more people back to work has been broken by the Prime Minister, because the Department for Work and Pensions has lost yet another battle to the Treasury.
The Office for Budget Responsibility says that the claimant count next year will be 1.5 million, the same, by the way, as this year. The problem is undiminished, yet the help is being cut away—the Minister’s Department is projecting 250,000 fewer places. When the correspondent from the BBC checked the figures this morning, she was told by a DWP official that she was right. So how is the Government’s scheme the biggest back to work plan ever? Is not the truth that the Minister has been done over once more by the Chancellor? Let him explain.
Toby Perkins
If you realised that they were making such a mess of things, why did you agree to follow those plans? Is it not the right hon. Gentleman who has the amnesia?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. Members should not be using “you”—I have no responsibility for this and am certainly not guilty for the unemployment figures.
Chris Grayling
We spent years warning the Labour Government that their spending was getting out of control and that they were mismanaging our economy, and now we see the consequences of what they did. What are we to do about the mess they created? Let us start by debunking some of the myths that they are peddling. To listen to them, one might think that it was all the fault of the coalition. Only last night the shadow Secretary of State stated in a press release:
“Labour’s legacy was falling youth unemployment and a pioneering programme to get 200,000 young people back to work. The Tories scrapped that programme and now youth unemployment has escalated to a record high.”
What a load of complete tosh.
The programme to which the shadow Secretary of State referred is the future jobs fund. Listening to him, one would think that we had scrapped that programme last May, but as we sit here today, young people are still being referred to placements through the future jobs fund. Although Labour’s attempts to support the unemployed had largely proved to be expensive failures, we decided early on that we would not remove them until our alternatives were in place. If the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill is right and things are getting worse, even though all the programmes we inherited from his Government are still running, what on earth does that say about the quality of provision he put in place?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. Before I bring other Members in, let me just say that the Front Benchers have taken up quite a lot of time because of interventions. We now have an eight-minute limit on speeches. Not all Members have to take all eight minutes, and fewer interventions will mean that I can get more people in. I call Mr Chris Ruane.
Housing Benefit
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years ago)
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Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Before I call the next speaker, I must inform the House that I am going to reduce the speaking time to seven minutes, because so many Members wish to contribute and I want to ensure that all of them can do so.
Neil Carmichael
There is one big unfairness, and that is the level of debt that you have left us to deal with. You are talking about cuts, but we are giving people opportunities as well, and that is what fundamentally underpins the changes to housing benefit. What do you say about that?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
We are not going to use the word “you” in future, are we, because I am not responsible?
Mr Clarke
I was about to deal with the hon. Gentleman’s point, and I will do so with the respect that it deserves—frankly, that is very briefly.
The hon. Member for Colchester (Bob Russell) rightly reminded us of the role of Lord Beveridge in dealing with these matters, followed, as he said, by Clement Attlee, who built the welfare state—and whose record on housing was outstanding—and who did so after the war, having dealt with one of the biggest deficits in history. So when it comes to deficits, do not blame it on my people—the people with whom I have grown up.
People have been complaining about the media. I am sick and tired of the media expression “workshy”. We have already been told by the TUC—I prefer its figures to the ones that we have heard from Conservative Members—that only one in eight people who make applications are unemployed. We are not talking about the workshy; we are talking about the work-starved.
Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)
Like you, I am sick and tired of the Tories blaming the need to make cuts on the ordinary working person, when we know that it was the bankers who caused the crisis. What do you think—
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. Members are using the word “you”, but I am not responsible. I call Tom Clarke.
Mr Clarke
I repeat that we are dealing with people, including those with disabilities. They are going to be dragged along for tests, sometimes lasting 10 minutes, and then be told that their payments will be cut off. That happened in my constituency in the 1980s, when person after person told me about such experiences.
The Government tell us that there are hard choices, but there are no harder choices than those that have to be made by people living in high-rise flats who cannot afford electricity or gas given the increased energy charges that we are experiencing. They have to choose whether to eat or have heating, and whether to have any leisure activities at all or to stay at home. On top of that, something that is at the very heart of their income is to be attacked—housing subsidies, as they have been called. Nobody said anything about subsidies given to the bankers.
Jenny Willott
On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. I should just like to correct the record. Earlier in the debate, the hon. Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) quoted my website, suggesting that I had criticised the current Government for hitting the poorest hardest. I am sure it was a simple oversight, but in fact the quote that he referred to was from 2009 and referred to my criticisms of the previous Labour Administration.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
I have to say that that is not quite a point of order, but you have certainly got the clarification on the record.
Jobs and the Unemployed
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. Before I call the next speaker, I would appreciate it if Members could try to aim for 11-minute speeches. If they do not, not everybody will get in. I did not want to put the clock on, but I am being tempted. I understand that Members have a lot to say, but I ask them not to forget, if they take interventions, that if they can stick to around 11 minutes I will be much happier.
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. Before I call the next speaker, I remind the House that I asked hon. Members to limit the amount of time they took. Can we try to stick to 10 minutes? Hon. Members should please not take as many interventions, because otherwise people will miss out. I did not want to turn the clock on, but I am getting more tempted by the minute.
Capital Gains Tax (Rates)
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 4 months ago)
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Sarah Newton (Truro and Falmouth) (Con)
I think that I will be the last person this evening to make their maiden speech—[Interruption.] No, I am sorry—I stand corrected. I am the penultimate person to do so.
Having grown up in Falmouth and having been confirmed in Truro cathedral, it is a real privilege to stand here today as the first MP for the new constituency of Truro and Falmouth. I am particularly pleased to join today’s debate, in which we are discussing the important contribution that many of the measures in the Budget will make in enabling enterprise to prosper in my constituency.
My immediate predecessors will be well known to Members of this House. Matthew Taylor served for more than 20 years as the Member for Truro and St Austell, and he played an important role in highlighting the issues of living and working in the countryside of Cornwall in his well-respected Taylor report. As chairman of the National Housing Federation and a director of South West Water, as well as serving in the House of Lords as a Lib Dem peer, he will be able to continue his work on the issues identified in his report. I look forward to helping him to take the words from its pages and put them into action, especially in delivering truly affordable homes for local people to buy or rent.
Julia Goldsworthy served as the Member for Falmouth and Camborne in the last Parliament, and she has recently returned to the Westminster to work as special adviser to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury. Her work in creating the Sustainable Communities Act 2007 is noteworthy, as is her dedicated campaigning work for NHS services in Cornwall. I look forward to working with her in her new role.
I have often heard colleagues in this House refer to Cornwall as part of the Celtic fringe; no doubt that is intended in a humorous way. While I am very proud of the Celtic culture, sports and traditions of Cornwall, there is absolutely nothing “fringe” about Cornwall or its people. Cornwall throughout the ages has been, and will continue to be, at the cutting edge of important national developments, as well as being at the centre of key moments of our history. The industrial revolution started in Cornwall, and Cornwall is leading the new industrial revolution—that of delivering the renewable and sustainable energy that our future economic security and growth will depend upon. Cornwall’s pioneering and inventive people and enterprises are ready to rise to the challenge of delivering a low-carbon economy and secure energy supplies. They need a Government who understand how to create the right market conditions for enterprise to succeed. I believe that this coalition Government have the determination to do this, and so to unlock potential in Cornwall.
My constituency is a slice of central Cornwall running from the north to the south coasts. It includes Cornwall’s administrative, retail and media centre and its only city—Truro. The Royal Cornwall hospital, the only acute hospital in the whole county, is in Truro, along with the Peninsula medical and dental school. I am grateful for the dedication of the staff in our NHS in Cornwall and the people who work hard in all our public services.
Cornwall has benefited from EU objective 1 funding, and now convergence funding, which has helped to develop the knowledge-based economy. Combined Universities in Cornwall has enabled people of all ages to access the opportunity to undertake higher education and obtain new skills. University College Falmouth is a world-leading arts organisation.
Throughout the constituency are very many beautiful villages, from the rugged splendour of the north coast villages of St Agnes and Perranporth to the no less beautiful but gentler coastline of the Roseland peninsula. As hon. Members will be aware, tourism is an important industry in Cornwall. Thanks to local farmers and fishermen, there is a thriving and growing local food scene, which comes together into some mouth-watering food festivals enjoyed by locals and tourists alike. I am delighted that the new coalition Government recognise the importance of farming and fishing to our national food security.
In the hinterlands of the constituency are the ruins of many of the mines for which Cornwall is famous. As a descendant of Cornish miners, I am particularly pleased to see renewable energy enterprises developing in the ruins of the old tin and copper mines. Cornwall has the hottest rocks in the UK and is a natural location for geothermal energy production. That, combined with our rich tradition of engineering and inventiveness, provides an ideal environment and ideal skills to develop that sustainable form of energy. Geothermal Engineering Ltd has submitted a popularly backed planning application to Cornwall council and if it is successful, we will see the first commercial geothermal energy plant in the UK, which will produce 10 MW of renewable energy to be fed into the national grid.
Nearby, at the former mine of Mount Wellington, is Kensa Engineering, an award-winning manufacturer of ground heat pumps that works with social housing providers across the country to deliver low-carbon energy and at the same time lift people out of fuel poverty. I am delighted that the coalition Government have stated their support for renewable energy incentives. I believe that the Government’s priority, as set out in the Budget, to enable more business finance and financial support for the low-carbon economy, will help support excellent low-carbon companies and energy providers such as those in my constituency. The Government’s emphasis on the need for economic growth to come from the private sector will also, I believe, create a better environment for the many businesses that already contribute so much to the local economy, particularly at Falmouth port.
Falmouth is not only important to the economy of Cornwall as the third-largest natural harbour in the world, it is of strategic importance to the UK. Falmouth has a long and proud maritime history and, as the most westerly port in the Atlantic gateway, has been at the centre of trade since ancient times. As ships for all purposes, including those needed to service marine renewables and the Navy, are getting larger, the deep waters of that safe haven are ever more important to the nation, not just to Cornwall.
I understand that many of the measures in the Budget will be tough for people living and working in my constituency. I do, however, believe that by taking the brave decisions in this Budget—
Tackling Poverty in the UK
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. Just before we move on, may I point out that Mr Speaker has stated that Back Benchers will be limited to 10 minutes?
Mr Tom Watson (West Bromwich East) (Lab)
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. As you will note, according to today’s Order Paper there is supposed to be a written ministerial statement on special advisers. I have just been to the Library and it was not there, but two media companies have telephoned me to tell me that Mr Andy Coulson is paid more than the Deputy Prime Minister, and that there has been a significant increase in the number of spin doctors at No. 10. Is it possible for a Minister to come to the House to apologise for the discourtesy, and to explain the seeming anomaly whereby a hired hand is paid more than an elected Deputy Prime Minister?
Mr Deputy Speaker
That is not a point of order and not a matter for me, but I can tell the hon. Gentleman that he has put it on the record, and has made the point that I presume he wanted to make.