Oral Answers to Questions
Louise Haigh Excerpts(6 days, 15 hours ago)
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Sarah Hall (Warrington South) (Lab/Co-op)
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office (Louise Haigh)
The Office for the Prime Minister and Cabinet, and No. 10 North, are working closely with regional leaders, the Treasury, and Departments across Government to align national policy with the long-term economic priorities of different places and to remove barriers to growth. This includes fiscally devolving a share of income tax and business rates to mayors, giving local leaders greater power to attract private investment, create good jobs and deliver growth in every postcode.
Sarah Hall
Britain’s future growth depends on having the infrastructure, energy, skills and industrial capacity to support it, but too often, investment is held back because the problems—whether grid capacity, water, transport or skills—sit across different Departments. How will the Department make sure this Government deal with those problems together, so that we can reindustrialise Britain and bring growth to every postcode?
Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to highlight this issue. For too long, in order to unlock growth for their areas, local leaders have had to navigate Whitehall Departments that have played them off against each other. No. 10 North brings those local leaders’ priorities into the heart of Government, gets the right people around the table and drives joined-up action, ensuring that the centre works as one to unlock good growth in every part of the United Kingdom.
Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)
Our long-term economic success is only going to be strengthened by our cyber-security. As Ministers are aware, right next to GCHQ in Cheltenham is the Golden Valley development, which is going to support our cyber-security capacity. It is a vital development for the nation, as well as for my local area. Will the Government go a little bit further on the matter of the designated area, so that proceeds from that development can be held locally, which I think is in line with the new agenda being set by the Cabinet Office? Will they also restart the discussions with the local authorities and the developer around the places for growth scheme, as they seem to have stalled?
Louise Haigh
I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his question. That is exactly the kind of project that No. 10 North will gladly look at, to consider whether it should be a designated zone for further retention powers. I will ask No. 10 North to write to the hon. Gentleman and consider the proposal.
Mr Peter Bedford (Mid Leicestershire) (Con)
Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office (Louise Haigh)
The Infected Blood Compensation Authority has asked 6,321 people to start their claims. I am sorry to say that the horrible nature of this awful scandal means that there is inherent uncertainty about the number of eligible people, but we are deeply committed to ensuring that everyone eligible receives the compensation they are due. IBCA has a registration service, which supports its understanding of who intends to claim. As of 25 August, IBCA had received 20,487 registrations.
Dame Meg Hillier
I welcome my right hon. Friend to her place and thank her for that response, which demonstrates the complications of these schemes. I asked the National Audit Office to look into this, and yesterday the Public Accounts Committee published its report on compensation schemes, suggesting that a central body be established. I know that she and her Department will respond formally to that in due course, but could she give the House a hint about whether she thinks there is room for improvement? The Government set up different compensation schemes on different systems that can be very complicated, and we do not seem to be learning from better practice.
Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend, with her considerable experience in this area, is absolutely right. The fact of the matter is that no amount of money will make up for the impact that this terrible tragedy has had on countless victims and their families, but we are determined to deliver justice as swiftly as possible. We are very grateful for the work and time of the Committee in assessing the progress made on compensation schemes. We are also considering this as part of the Government’s response to the Williams inquiry report, in which we indicated that the Government would give further thought to how redress should be delivered in future. We will respond to the Public Accounts Committee in due course.
Joe Robertson (Isle of Wight East) (Con)
I recently met my constituent Stan, whose father died as a result of contaminated blood. Like many families, he is facing an endless delay through poor administration of the scheme. It feels as though a scandal within a scandal is unfolding as mistakes are made and further stress is caused to families. What steps is the Minister taking to ensure that the scheme is administered properly and mistakes are cut out, and would she consider meeting me to explore the issues raised by my constituent’s case?
Louise Haigh
I am incredibly sorry to hear about the experience of Stan and the death of his family member. Unfortunately, that experience has been shared by too many people, and the Government, including my predecessor as Minister for the Cabinet Office, have done considerable work to improve the scheme, setting out a number of reforms and new statutory instruments. I will ask my noble Friend the Minister in the other place to meet the hon. Member and his constituent to consider his experience and how we can improve the system.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
Alex McIntyre (Gloucester) (Lab)
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office (Louise Haigh)
Last month I announced reforms to public procurement that will cut red tape and focus social value on delivering good jobs and skills development. In the autumn, I will publish new guidance to ensure that central Government procurement consistently supports jobs, skills and people in every postcode.
Alex McIntyre
Procurement matters because, done well, it supports local jobs in Gloucester and in communities like mine. Together Gloucestershire is a local organisation that is an excellent example of how procurement can be done differently. It works with local businesses and the public sector to showcase the talent and skill in our county and provides a procurement portal for organisations to access them. Will the Secretary of State meet me and Together Gloucestershire to discuss how that model can be better supported and developed further?
Louise Haigh
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing the important work of Together Gloucestershire to the House’s attention. It is an excellent example of where social value can ensure that British taxpayer’s money is directed towards delivering British jobs and skills in our constituency. I will ask the Minister and our officials to meet with my hon. Friend and businesses in his constituency.
Gordon McKee (Glasgow South) (Lab)
Tom Gordon (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (LD)
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office (Louise Haigh)
For far too long, the state has found itself reaching for the comfort blanket of consultation, review and process. To deliver change at the pace and scale the public expect, my Department is stripping out needless bureaucracy. Between 2019 and 2023, the Government asked the public three times for their views on introducing legislation to microchip cats—you couldn’t make it up, Madam Deputy Speaker. If we cannot microchip cats without tying them up in red tape, it is little wonder the public have lost faith that the Government can deliver change. I am telling ministerial colleagues that consultations are not required, and we will introduce reforms to minimise the risk of judicial review. Once the necessary legislation has passed, transport, water and other major infrastructure projects will benefit from parliamentary authorisation. Governments are elected to lead, not to hide behind process. This Government will lead and put public control at the heart of our decision making.
Tom Gordon
No sum of money can truly replace the loss of a loved one. On my summer supermarket surgery tour, I spoke to one constituent who lost his father as a result of contaminated blood products. He wanted me to ask the First Secretary of State about future scheduled payments. Will she consider index-linking compensation to inflation so that delay does not shrink the value of what families have been awarded?
Louise Haigh
I am very sorry to hear about the appalling experience of the hon. Gentleman’s constituent. As was mentioned earlier in Cabinet questions, we have made considerable efforts to improve the scheme and ensure that constituents receive their compensation as quickly as possible. Reports are being laid in the House today, and we will consider the hon. Gentleman’s question as we go forward.
Alex Burghart (Brentwood and Ongar) (Con)
Over the summer, the Prime Minister announced that mayors will keep a proportion of income tax receipts. Why will mayors like Conservative Mayor Ben Houchen not be allowed to use that money to cut taxes or offer rebates to local residents and businesses?
Louise Haigh
The Mayor of the Tees Valley Ben Houchen already has the ability to provide grants to businesses and communities. He is very welcome to do so with the considerable funding that he already receives.
Alex Burghart
I thank the right hon. Lady for her answer, but she did not answer my question. My question was about the income tax receipts that Ben Houchen will be allowed to retain. Over the summer, she said that he would not be allowed to use that to give rebates to local individuals and businesses. At the moment, councils already have the power to levy council tax discounts and business rate discounts. Why can mayors not do the same with income tax receipts?
Louise Haigh
I will explain it to the shadow Secretary of State. There is a difference between rebates and grants. The mayor does not have the ability to provide rebates now and is unlikely to in the future, because it would involve getting data from His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs and having the ability to set income tax thresholds, which we will of course not be devolving to a mayoral level. If the Mayor of the Tees Valley wishes to support businesses and communities, he is as welcome to now as he will be in the future.
Rachel Taylor (North Warwickshire and Bedworth) (Lab)
Louise Haigh
Giving young people opportunities to reach their potential is a key priority for this Government. That is why we have asked Alan Milburn to push forward this agenda, looking at young people not in employment, education or training. We are using specific local social value schemes that suppliers can support through public procurement, which will provide much-needed education, employment and training so that young people can progress.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.
Ian Lavery (Blyth and Ashington) (Lab)
It has been nearly two years since the contaminated blood inquiry report was published. People think that the matter is finished, but it is not: some 18,000 infected and affected individuals still have not begun their claims. Will my right hon. Friend reaffirm to this House her commitment to the contaminated blood community, and will she meet the all-party parliamentary group on haemophilia and contaminated blood so that we can discuss the best way to press those cases home expediently?
Louise Haigh
I thank and congratulate my hon. Friend on his many years of campaigning on this terrible issue. He will know about the Prime Minister’s personal involvement in and commitment to this issue, about his personal experience of campaigning alongside the victims, and how important he and the Department consider the matter. The Infected Blood Compensation Authority has now paid out over £2.2 billion in final compensation payments, but we are very aware that there is much more to do. The Minister in the other place will be happy to meet my hon. Friend’s APPG.
Wendy Morton (Aldridge-Brownhills) (Con)
Mr Andrew Snowden (Fylde) (Con)
Louise Haigh
A number of responsibilities were removed from the Cabinet Office in order to create the new Office for the Prime Minister and Cabinet, a central new body at the heart of Government committed to delivering the priorities of the Prime Minister and the British people.
Richard Quigley (Isle of Wight West) (Lab)
May I say how happy I am to welcome my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster to her place? I know she will continue to be a fantastic champion for the Isle of Wight. Per capita—not the pension people but per head of population—the island tops the league for tech and advanced manufacturing, but despite our brilliant pedigree, under the previous Government, we were continually overlooked for funding and investment. Will my right hon. Friend assure me that she will use her office to secure sustained growth in our postcodes, so that the island can finally receive the recognition, investment and job opportunities that its contribution to our economy deserves?
Louise Haigh
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his kind words and continual championing of the Isle of Wight. I will ensure that fixing his ferry is top of my to-do list. The proposal that he outlines is exactly the kind of work that No. 10 North has been designed to champion to drive good growth in every postcode, north and south.
Alex Brewer (North East Hampshire) (LD)
Rewiring the State
Louise Haigh Excerpts(2 weeks ago)
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The First Secretary of State (Louise Haigh)
With your permission, Mr Speaker, I would like to make a statement on the work of the newly formed Office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet and the change it will bring.
On the steps of Downing Street six weeks ago, the Prime Minister set out the priorities that will guide this Government. He was clear that 40 years of overly centralised decision making and over-privatisation have stripped power and resources away from communities in every nation and region of this country; that public control over the things that matter so much to people’s lives has been systematically eroded and become a barrier to businesses wanting to start and grow; and that a broken economic and political model has cost good jobs and opportunities in many parts of the country, while delivering sky-high prices in exchange for poorer customer services.
The Prime Minister was clear that this Government will be the circuit breaker that our country needs: a Government who will take power from Westminster and Whitehall, and put it in the hands of the communities who are best placed to use it; who will rewire Britain, so that our politics and our economy work for every person and every place. On a bedrock of fiscal discipline, we will build a pro-business culture and an innovation-led economy that delivers good growth in every postcode.
We have wasted no time in delivering on that commitment. In the newly formed Office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, we are rewiring the machinery of government so that the Prime Minister has the resources and levers he needs to deliver on his priorities. By stripping out many of the bureaucratic functions of the office, we have created a stronger, more focused Department that is capable of driving forward the Prime Minister’s agenda. This Government recognise that for far too long there has been a disconnect between the Cabinet Office and No. 10, and it is that lack of joined-up thinking that has hampered the ability of successive Prime Ministers to drive forward their own agendas across Government.
We have had a dichotomy at the heart of Government: the most centralised state in the G20, with one of the most underpowered centres. In the newly established OPMC, we are ensuring that the Prime Minister has the support and resources he needs to deliver the change that the public are impatient to see. From that office, we will drive forward work across Government to put the essentials, such as water, transport, energy and housing, under greater public control, in order to regenerate our communities, breathe new life into our high streets and give people more room to breathe through action on the cost of living.
That work of change has begun. Working closely with the Prime Minister and the Cabinet Secretary, we have begun the work of shifting power and resources away from Whitehall. Through our devolution blueprint and the establishment of No. 10 North, we have created a new engine of regional economic growth that will empower places that have been overlooked by Westminster for too long. We are granting new powers to strategic authorities to take more control over the future of their regions: a greater share of locally generated revenues, beginning with business rates; and more control over housing, public transport and infrastructure. For the first time, local leaders will have the power and resources they need to invest in the things that matter most to their communities.
This Government are filling in the map to bring an end to the system of two-tier devolution, so that by the end of 2028 we are able to extend to all parts of England the same offer that the rest have enjoyed for many years. This is how we can empower communities, drive local economic growth, create new jobs and deliver maximum benefit to the people who live there. This is devolution by design and devolution by default, and by working across Government we will build a new economic model that begins to put life’s essentials back under stronger public control and make them affordable for people again.
Working with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government and the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster Central (Sally Jameson)—and building on the strong foundations laid down by my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones), whom I thank for his work—we are delivering a once-in-a-generation rebalancing of power in this country. This is what a rewired state looks like: one that is relentlessly focused on delivering for the people of this country, with empowered communities and good growth in every postcode. These are the tests against which our decisions will be measured and the metrics by which our actions will be judged.
Last month, the Chancellor and I announced reforms to public procurement that will cut red tape and unleash a new wave of British job creation. Too often, small and medium-sized businesses have struggled to navigate complicated procurement processes that seem to prioritise everything. When we prioritise everything, we prioritise nothing, so we are making the process simpler and doing things differently. From next year, businesses seeking to win a share of £90 billion in central Government contracts will be left in no doubt about what we want from them: creating good jobs and giving young people the skills they need for the future. These new rules will ensure that the £90 billion spent each year through Government contracts supports British jobs, skills and people in every postcode.
We are going further in our reforms to public procurement to ensure that taxpayers’ money is delivering more for our communities. For the first time since 2020, we are removing the defence exemption from social value. That means billions of pounds of defence contracts will soon give weighting to jobs and skills for young people across Britain. This is how we back businesses in every part of the country. In my ministerial colleagues, Parliamentary Secretaries to the Cabinet Office my hon. Friends the Members for Gateshead Central and Whickham (Mark Ferguson) and for Chipping Barnet (Dan Tomlinson), businesses looking to build and grow here in Britain—creating those good jobs and driving that good growth—will have strong advocates in this Government.
The work of my Department in strengthening our national resilience and co-ordinating the Government’s response to emergencies remains central. Over the summer, we saw communities across the country impacted by unprecedented wildfires precipitated by one of the hottest and driest summers on record—a reminder of the very real and present threats to the UK posed by climate change. During the third week of August, four major incidents were declared across south Wales, Hampshire, Cambridgeshire and the west midlands. By 13 August, fire and rescue services were tackling 47 wildfire incidents, and 79 separate requests for additional equipment and resources were made by fire and rescue services. In south Wales alone, more than 200 military personnel were deployed to tackle 14 separate incidents.
Such was the extent of support provided across the country that almost every service was impacted or involved in the response, and some of the most stretched services faced the prospect of having to deprioritise certain call-outs due to the pressures on the system. The day before the national alert was issued, close to 12,000 999 calls were recorded in a single day, which is six times the average call volume. Many services were stretched to breaking point, but continued to work around the clock to protect lives, communities and properties. I am sure everyone in the House will join me in thanking our emergency services and military personnel, who put themselves in harm’s way to keep us safe.
On 14 August, when the Government received direct requests from fire and rescue services for urgent Government intervention, we took decisive action. A national emergency alert was issued to provide the public with clear guidance on the steps they should take to avoid inadvertently contributing to an already dangerous situation. It should come as no surprise that the British public did their bit. Within 48 hours, there was a 42% decrease in the number of 999 calls, falling from 12,000 to 5,200, and by Monday morning the number of live wildfire incidents had fallen from 47 to 27. This gave our fire and rescue services the breathing space they needed to tackle existing fires and keep us all safe.
Over the coming weeks, I will continue to work closely with Cabinet colleagues to ensure the Government’s response meets the scale of the challenges we face. I will also be working closely with my right hon. Friend the Minister for Security in ensuring that this Government take a long-term and strategic approach to the country’s preparedness. The Government will continue to work closely with our frontline services and local resilience forums to mitigate the risks posed by extreme weather and drought, including a £100 million increase in funding for the fire services and a £65 million boost in support of our farmers.
In the interests of brevity, I will touch briefly on the work that is happening elsewhere in my Department. I have been delighted to welcome my right hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Kanishka Narayan) not only to his role as the Minister for Artificial Intelligence, but to join us around the Cabinet table. The Prime Minister has been clear that he sees harnessing the potential of artificial intelligence as a central part of our country’s future, and the elevation of this role reflects the ambition this Government have to make Britain a world leader in these advanced technologies.
I am also pleased to welcome the Minister for Intergovernmental Relations and European Relations to his role. My right hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln (Mr Falconer) has wasted no time in the vital work of building stronger ties with our closest neighbours and allies. I was very grateful to him for interrupting his honeymoon to come home and be appointed to the post.
My Department is also bringing forward a programme to modernise the operation of the state. We are taking public control of the way Government work—cutting out the unnecessary processes and needless reviews that slow decision making and stifle innovation. At the heart of this agenda will be the restoration of Ministers’ responsibility and agency to deliver the change they promise, with increased accountability to Parliament and the public for the direction they set and the decisions they take. We will bring forward new methods of public deliberation in policy development and do away with box-ticking consultation with the usual suspects. Fewer decisions will be delegated to unelected bodies, and the way decisions are made will be scrutinised in Parliament, not in the courts, ending the warm bath of constructive ambiguity that politics has been too happy to soak in for far too long.
I am aware—I am deeply honoured—that I am the first woman to hold the role of First Secretary of State since the late, great Barbara Castle. I am confident that if I can channel even a fraction of the energy and determination that she brought to this role, collectively we can change our country for the better. For too long, too many places have been written out of our national story; their contribution ignored and their potential overlooked. People feel like the system just does not work for them. That is why in 2024 they voted for change. This Government are on a mission to ensure we can deliver on the Prime Minister’s and the public’s priorities. This is a collective endeavour, and together we will deliver the lasting change that people deserve. I commend this statement to the House.
Alex Burghart (Brentwood and Ongar) (Con)
I thank the deputy Prime Minister for advance sight of her statement. I congratulate her on her appointment—it is a major achievement—and I look forward to working with her.
I also congratulate the right hon. Lady on the wording of her statement. The phrase “rewiring the state” was first coined by the Leader of the Opposition in her leadership contest in the summer of 2024, and for a very good reason. The state does need rewiring; we agree on that. It is in urgent need of rewiring. It needs rewiring so that politicians can make decisions, it needs rewiring so that elected Governments can fulfil their mandates speedily, and it needs rewiring so that the state does not continue to grow ad infinitum.
I know that the new Administration delight in nothing more than criticising the Blair Government. There were many reasons to criticise the Blair Government, but I wish to talk about just three: the first is quangos, the second is the nature of the Treasury and the third is the issue of legal constraint. Some of the worst of these problems are those of entrenched institutional inertia. We have seen over time how quangos have led to Ministers having less agency over important decisions that affect our constituents’ lives, so it is unfortunate that the deputy Prime Minister has today announced the creation of a massive new quango in the OneGov Delivery Agency. It will be in charge of Government recruitment, the civil service, pensions, shared services, security vetting, and so on. It will oversee the spending of considerable public money. It is a step in the wrong direction, because Ministers will retain responsibility for those services, but they will lose power over them.
One of the reasons we have seen a proliferation of arm’s length bodies is that they have become a way of dodging excessive bureaucracy put on by the centre. In this instance, by the centre I really mean the Treasury. In its modern form, the Treasury is the behemoth created by Gordon Brown and designed to control Whitehall and to reduce departmental Ministers’ authority over their spend and their decisions. I was therefore genuinely interested to hear the right hon. Lady say over the summer that the Treasury was an “imperial finance department”. I had rather hoped that she was going to lead the charge to smash the barricades and destroy this terrible imperial power, but instead it appears that the empire has struck back. The briefing we were given initially was that No. 10 North was going to take control of growth. That seems to have been watered down. It is now rumoured that the Chancellor will give the speech on growth next week, and that the real power remains within No. 11 south. Will the right hon. Lady tell the House what powers, levers and budget she will have, as head of No. 10 North, to increase growth across the UK?
Legal constraint is obviously a massive problem. Over the Blair years, laws such as the Human Rights Act 1998 and environmental legislation created endless sources of judicial review, which made it increasingly difficult for Government to do things—to build infrastructure and so on. That is a colossal drag on the capabilities of the state. If the right hon. Lady wishes to work on that, the Conservatives would be happy to work with her.
In the statement, we heard a further exposition on devolution and the merits of No. 10 North. For that to be credible, the Government need to be able to give three basic guarantees. The first is that this will lead to an overall reduction in the size of the civil service. Despite promises made after the election, the opposite has happened under Labour; since the general election, the headcount of the civil service has risen by over 11,000. Will that be reduced, and by when? The second guarantee is on the nature of devolution—whether it is driven by the interests of local people, or just by those of one party. Over the summer, Labour councillors were allowed to redraw the boundaries of the authorities that they hope to represent, and to do so before any independent review by the Local Government Boundary Commission. Labour set about the biggest reorganisation of local government in 50 years with no mandate to do so, and announced it on the day before recess, with no scrutiny. One wonders how it can be localism if it is imposed—and imposed with constraints.
Also over the summer, after the Prime Minister had made his interesting announcement about assigned income tax and retained business rates, the Mayor of the Tees Valley, Lord Houchen, said that he would create
“a new rebate scheme to put money back into people’s pockets and let families keep more of the money they earn.”
It is an excellent idea—an excellent Conservative idea—so excellent that it was immediately shot down by the deputy Prime Minister. Will she tell us whether combined authority mayors will be able to cut taxes or give rebates, so that working people can keep more of their money—or will this just lead to higher taxes? Otherwise, it appears that local mayors will not have the freedom to cut taxes; they will only have the freedom to increase them. They will only have the freedom to increase the size of the state, not reduce it. It appears that this Government are rewiring the state—but just to grow it.
The last point is simply about cost. How much is this reorganisation costing? How much is being spent on No. 10 North? How much will need to be spent in order to power the localisation agenda that this Administration have put forward? Where is that money coming from? Is it coming from other Departments, in which case, from where, or is it coming from tax, and if so, which taxes? If it is coming from borrowing—well, I think the bond markets will have something to say about that. Until the Government can show that they are able to cut taxes and spending, so that we can get real growth across the country, I am afraid that all of this will just be another northern pipe-dream.
Louise Haigh
The Prime Minister set out how he plans to cut tax on the very first day of his premiership. I thank the shadow Secretary for his kind words. My title is First Secretary of State; he may wish to be the shadow deputy Prime Minister, but that would not be shadowing me.
I am glad that we can find common ground. I will start with the cost of No. 10 North, which I imagine the hon. Gentleman knows already, given the sheer quantity of parliamentary questions and freedom of information requests that have come in over the summer. No. 10 North has been fully funded from existing Cabinet Office budgets, with no additional spending pressure. We are grateful to colleagues in Manchester for hosting us in Heron House so graciously; that is working exceptionally well.
I absolutely agree—I hope we can work together on this—with the hon. Gentleman on looking at where we can streamline the state and ensuring that elected Governments of any stripe can make the decisions that they have been elected to take. There is an awful lot of common ground and frustration that people from across this House share about unelected regulators and quangos standing in the way of democratically elected politicians. There is a serious commitment from this Government to tearing away that red tape and ensuring that we can deliver the change that we were elected to deliver. I therefore gently point out the irony in his asking me to ensure that a quango, the Local Government Boundary Commission, takes decisions on local government reorganisation, rather than the democratically elected Communities Secretary.
We have already been clear that the central civil service is expected to shrink, that we want it to be more streamlined and efficient, and that our commitment to devolution and rewiring the state absolutely means fewer civil servants at the centre and building the capacity and capability of regional and local government. Local government was a huge victim of the decade of austerity, which held back growth in our local economies.
We are moving policy functions out of the Cabinet Office in order to streamline things and ensure that we can be ruthlessly committed to delivering the Prime Minister’s priorities; I make no apologies for that. We have transferred a number of strategic functions into No. 10 North, including local economic growth and devolution strategy, which we have moved from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, and local economic growth policy, which we have moved from the Treasury; that is a little bit of a chip at its empire.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)
I offer two congratulations: first, to my right hon. Friend and constituency neighbour, the First Secretary, on her well-deserved promotion—I am sure she will do an excellent job. Secondly, I congratulate her and the Prime Minister for their real commitment to devolution, which I have wanted to see for an awfully long time. I hope it is devolution to local councils, as first-tier authorities, as well as to strategic authorities.
One area that has not been covered so far is education. The First Secretary is probably aware that in five wards in my constituency with high levels of deprivation, there is not a single sixth form. Responsibility for that rests totally with academy trusts, and the local council has no power or influence over it whatsoever. When she looks again at devolution to bodies with democratic control, could she look at the education system? That will be key to tackling the problem of those not in education, employment or training.
Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and my constituency shares that exact same problem: in the east, there are fewer sixth-form options than in the wealthier west of the constituency. That is huge issue for educational inequality for our constituents, and I will take it away and look at it with the Education Secretary. My hon. Friend will also note that we have committed to devolution of 16-to-19 funding as well.
Lisa Smart (Hazel Grove) (LD)
I thank the First Secretary of State for advance sight of her statement, and warmly welcome her to her place. The Liberal Democrats strongly agree that the political system is overly centralised. We believe that the best decisions are taken closest to the people they affect, but renewing communities must also mean giving councils the powers and resources that they need to revitalise our high streets, support independent businesses and improve local public services. After years of severe financial pressure, devolution cannot simply mean transferring responsibilities from Whitehall without the funding necessary to deliver them.
The First Secretary mentioned national resilience. That is about whether the lights stay on, whether the shelves stay stocked, and whether a family in Hazel Grove can get through a week or more of serious destruction without losing their livelihood. The covid inquiry was blunt: it found that we were ill prepared for an emergency, never mind a pandemic. Those failures cost lives, and people deserve to know that lessons have been acted on, rather than filed away.
There is certainly progress to welcome. We have the resilience action plan, the UK Resilience Academy, and Exercise Pegasus, which was the largest pandemic exercise this country has ever run. Those are steps that my party has long called for, but announcements are not preparedness. I would welcome hearing from the First Secretary what plans she has to improve public awareness and understanding of what the whole of society needs to do to be ready. We are in an increasingly uncertain world, so will the Government think again on digital sovereignty, so that the critical systems that our constituents rely on are not dependent on suppliers that this country cannot control?
I strongly agree with the First Secretary that this country has a broken political system. Later this afternoon, we will debate the Representation of the People Bill, which is meant to fix that. It takes some steps in the right direction, but fails to rise to the moment. Does she agree that there is still so much more to do, starting with halting the scourge of big money that is poisoning our democracy by capping political donations and bringing in a fairer voting system? We need to fix our politics so that we can get on with fixing the country. I have heard her talk previously in this House about moving fast and fixing things. I urge her to crack on.
Louise Haigh
I am grateful to the hon. Lady, and I can confirm that my motto of moving fast and fixing things is still firmly in place. She is absolutely right that in order to deliver devolution effectively and deliver the growth and improved public services that we need, resource and revenue are needed. We have committed to allowing strategic authorities to take a share of income tax and business rates, so that they are incentivised to grow their economies, and can take their fair share to reinvest in those economies.
On digital sovereignty, my right hon. Friend the Minister for Artificial Intelligence is looking at that, through his taskforce. It is one of the important workstreams that he is considering with colleagues across Government. I am sure that he will update the House in due course.
As the hon. Lady says, we will debate the elections Bill this afternoon. She and I absolutely share a commitment to stopping big money, and foreign money in particular, interfering in our politics. I will work with colleagues across Government through the defending democracy taskforce, chaired by my right hon. Friend the Security Minister, to look at what further steps we can take beyond the Bill.
Finally, on preparedness, my predecessor announced in July that we will deliver a campaign to raise awareness of the simple steps that households can take to keep themselves safe during everyday emergencies, like extreme weather. We will announce more information and begin that campaign later this year.
Mr Paul Foster (South Ribble) (Lab)
Lancashire has missed out on Government investment for decades, and my constituents in South Ribble have been treated to nothing but the scraps of investment left in the pot at the end of the year. We now have an opportunity like no other in generations. Lancashire needs devolution and an elected mayor. Will the First Secretary of State facilitate an urgent meeting for me and Lancashire colleagues with No. 10 North to unlock this desperately needed opportunity for real investment and prosperity in Lancashire?
Louise Haigh
I am extremely grateful for my hon. Friend’s enthusiasm for that settlement for Lancashire. He is absolutely right that it is the way to deliver power and resources for his community and unlock its potential. I am sure that you agree, Mr Speaker. No. 10 North will be extremely busy, given the number of requests that are pouring in, but I will make sure that my hon. Friend is top of the queue.
Sir Oliver Dowden (Hertsmere) (Con)
I congratulate the First Secretary of State and welcome her to a very important role in government. I agree with a number of things that she said, particularly about strengthening the role of No. 10. However, there is a large gap in this statement on rewiring the state, and that is to do with civil service reform. There are many excellent civil servants, but I am afraid that it remains a classic 80:20 model; 20% of exceptionally good civil servants do about 80% of the work. If we are really to rewire the state, we need to look at that and not only empower that 20% to deliver more, but find savings from the headcount among the 80%. If the Secretary of State really wants to rewire the state, I urge her to grasp this nettle while she looks at the entire picture.
Louise Haigh
A significant programme of civil service reform is under way, led by the Cabinet Secretary. That programme has already begun reforming the civil service recruitment system to ensure that it hires and promotes truly brilliant people. It is reviewing the talent strategy to develop and grow talent right across the civil service and the whole UK, and is launching capability reviews to assess departmental delivery. It is identifying areas for improvement and building on the successful transformation already under way through the Places for Growth programme. However, I absolutely agree that we need to go further.
Anneliese Dodds (Oxford East) (Lab/Co-op)
Over recess, a number of disturbing cases of artificial intelligence agents escaping control of their owners and undertaking unauthorised activity became public. In one case, 1,200 agents collaborated on an unsanctioned message board before 700 of them engaged in an attack on the company Hugging Face. Can the First Secretary confirm that following the governmental rewiring that she has described, her Department will be responsible for dealing with risks from so-called AI misalignment, and given the lack of frontier model controls, will she introduce regulation in this area, and co-ordinate with international partners on this matter?
Louise Haigh
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for the work that she has done on this issue—I know that she is extremely expert in this area. Work is ongoing, with mobilised action across Government and industry, asking Cabinet Ministers to work directly with regulators and supply chains and writing to UK businesses with clear steps to strengthen their cyber-defences. The National Cyber Security Centre has engaged with more than a thousand stakeholders in the wake of Mythos’s release to galvanise action and share best practice. She is absolutely right that over the summer, during a routine cyber-evaluation, the AI Security Institute identified an incident in which AI agents took sustained unsanctioned action that was directed at real people and organisations. It was detected within an hour. We have been completely transparent about the incident, and we have immediately learned lessons from it.
Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)
I, too, welcome the First Secretary of State to her place—it is great to see her back on the Treasury Bench. I also welcome the creation of the Office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. The right hon. Lady is absolutely right that in a centralised system it was the most underpowered organisation imaginable, and it needed some turbocharging.
I hope that the First Secretary will agree that rewiring has to be a process, not an event. The Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee will remember the great fanfare with which mission-led government was talked about a couple of years ago, before it died a rather slow, lamentable death. Can she assure us that she has both the personal energy and commitment to see this through to the end, as well as the support and resources around her in order to achieve it?
I echo the call from my hon. Friend the shadow Minister about the importance of looking at quangos and arm’s length bodies, particularly within the devolution and decision-making space, because too many of them have got out of control. I also echo the point about outsourcing, because outsourcing takes away a lot of agency from local communities and individuals, and that needs to be looked at with some urgency.
Louise Haigh
Mr Speaker, I am loving all the common ground that we are finding with Opposition Members today. I completely agree that we need to look at outsourcing across Government. The previous Administration already took significant steps to reduce spend on consultancy and began the work on the largest wave of insourcing in a generation, as promised in our manifesto. I have worked with the hon. Gentleman in the past, and he has witnessed my energy up close. He can be assured of my continued commitment to this agenda.
Kirsteen Sullivan (Bathgate and Linlithgow) (Lab/Co-op)
I begin by welcoming my right hon. Friend to her place and wish her every success in her new role. I thank her for this statement and for this Government’s renewed focus on reindustrialisation in the UK, bringing opportunity and economic growth to every corner of the UK. With everything pushing towards increased manufacturing and construction, personal protective equipment is more important than ever as the last line of defence between workers and hazardous materials and incidents. The state has a role to play here; it can lead by example and ensure that every worker gets the protection they need to do their job safely. Will my right hon. Friend meet me to discuss public sector procurement specifications and BS 30417 on inclusive PPE?
Louise Haigh
I congratulate my hon. Friend on her sustained campaign in this area. I know that she has done an extraordinary amount of work in continuing to raise issues around PPE when they have fallen out of the public spotlight post covid. The Minister responsible for procurement will be delighted to meet her to discuss this issue.
Steve Darling (Torbay) (LD)
For my Torbay constituents, and indeed all constituents in Devon and Cornwall, No. 10 North is actually two hours further away than No. 10 Downing Street. Although we Liberal Democrats genuinely welcome devolution that brings power closer to people, I represent a constituency that has high levels of deprivation. Can the First Secretary of State advise me on how the Government’s reforms will support areas such as mine in particular?
Louise Haigh
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. The reforms that have been proposed through the devolution blueprint and Cabinet statement are designed to address exactly that issue. For too long, devolution has been two-tier, allowing certain areas of the country to steam ahead while others have not been given the powers and resources that they deserve. Devon and Cornwall will be incentivised with potential powers and resources, including the overnight visitor levy. The hon. Gentleman will have heard the Prime Minister mention his trip to Cornwall and engagement with the authorities there, including Devon. I appreciate that it is a long journey to Manchester—it is quite an irritating trip even from Sheffield, to be honest—but I hope that he will engage with No. 10 North on this important issue so that we can deliver for his constituents.
Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on securing this role; I have no doubt that she will do a wonderful job. I was particularly interested in what she said about her Department strengthening national resilience, which will remain central. We have just had the hottest summer on record. This country was built for a climate that no longer exists, as we were told on the Environmental Audit Committee, and 2,500 people are estimated to have died this summer as a result. Diabetics, asthmatics, the very old and the very young are particularly at threat.
Does my right hon. Friend have any plans to bring forward the new national adaptation plan? The national adaptation plan 3 under the previous Government was widely derided, but there is currently no plan for a new one until 2028, and it is clear that the pressures we are facing in summer are worse than ever before. Can she tell us whether there will be a new national adaptation plan or, if not, what she is going to do to ensure that we are better prepared next summer than we were this summer?
Louise Haigh
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his continued work in this important area and on the environment. Tackling the threats posed by climate change requires consistent and co-ordinated action across every Department. From £710 million to fund upgrades to our school estate to the construction of nine new reservoirs across the country, this Government are taking the necessary steps to ensure that our country is more resilient and our communities are kept safe. He will have heard the Prime Minister refer to an upcoming wildfire summit. I hope that he will participate fully in that. I will return to him on our commitment on the national adaptation plan.
Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Normally when functions and roles are devolved from London to another area, we see a diminution in the capital and an increase in the area concerned. There is an obvious danger of duplication by having a No. 10 North and a No. 10 South, so will the First Secretary, whom I congratulate on her appointment, be transparent about this and agree that the public should be able to see how many people are working permanently in No. 10 North, how many are working permanently in No. 10 South, and how many are going back and forth between the two?
Louise Haigh
The right hon. Gentleman is right that traditionally the model of moving people or roles out of London has meant duplication in the centre. That is exactly what we are attempting to fix. We want new senior roles across the country. I pay tribute to the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Richmond and Northallerton (Rishi Sunak), who created the Darlington campus. That campus is a proper model of delivery, with senior policy making and civil servants in Darlington, based around the Treasury there. It has helped to deliver and change decision making, and that is exactly what No. 10 North is attempting to do.
Noah Law (St Austell and Newquay) (Lab)
I welcome the steps taken by the First Secretary to ensure that strategic authorities such as Cornwall have the capacity to deliver on our growth agenda, but I want to ask specifically what steps she has taken to ensure that both national and local government have the financial analytical capability to identify those most promising investment cases and help shepherd them towards success.
Louise Haigh
It is an excellent question and something that my hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Dan Tomlinson), who sits in the Treasury as well as the Cabinet Office, has been working on through No. 10 North. We are planning a brand of civil service reform that will move civil servants from the centre to regional and local government in order to share expertise, and we will provide them with the AI and data expertise that we have at the centre in order to do exactly that.
Graham Leadbitter (Moray West, Nairn and Strathspey) (SNP)
Can I remind the First Secretary that during this summer my constituency experienced the extensive Cairngorms wildfire? It was a major incident in difficult terrain that destroyed around 20 square miles of iconic hillside and forestry, threatened homes and businesses, and required the efforts of over 500 firefighters and volunteers.
There are actions required of the UK Government, the devolved Governments and numerous public agencies and landowners, and I am pressing all of them on these issues. With the risk growing, my ask of the First Secretary is that the lack of military aerial firefighting capability within the UK be urgently reviewed, so that aerial assistance can be provided in these extreme and often prolonged incidents. What work is being done with our European neighbours in respect of mutual aid in tackling wildfires? We must recognise that exceptional local effort cannot be a substitute for national and international preparedness.
Louise Haigh
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his question. My thoughts and sympathies are with all those affected in his constituency by the wildfire. Some £100 million has already been invested in fire and rescue services, and we will continue to look at the issues that he raises to do with equipment in future Budgets. We are engaging with our European neighbours on exactly this issue, and we are well aware of the opportunities that arise from it.
Amanda Martin (Portsmouth North) (Lab)
I welcome the First Secretary to her place, and I thank her for making her first constituency visit to Portsmouth North and the fantastic Griffon Marine. As Portsmouth is a coastal city, residents are rightly furious that Southern Water continues to pump sewage into our seas. We have had hardly any rain this summer, yet sewage pollution and rising bills continue while private companies make profits. It is abundantly clear that privatisation under the Tories has failed the British public again and again. Could the First Secretary of State set out a little more detail of the Government’s plans to reform the industry and give the public greater control over our water companies?
Louise Haigh
It was a great pleasure to visit my hon. Friend and announce our procurement reforms at Griffon Marine in her constituency. The Prime Minister has been repeatedly clear that more public control of our water industry is not just desired but absolutely necessary. The current system, with the poor infrastructure, investment, higher water bills and the kind of sewage, leakage and poor quality that she described, can continue no longer. We will set out our plans for reform shortly.
Sir Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)
I welcome the right hon. Lady to her place, and I am sure that she will be very effective at this job. On the issue of wildfires, may I urge her to talk to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, which is putting further constraints on moorland owners? Moorland owners have traditionally undertaken controlled burning, and they are really worried at the moment that this change in DEFRA policy will make moorland areas such as the one I represent more vulnerable to wildfires in the future?
Louise Haigh
I am extremely grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his characteristically constructive and thoughtful contribution. I will, of course, raise that with DEFRA and look into the specific issue on his behalf.
Andrew Pakes (Peterborough) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure to welcome my right hon. Friend to her place. The greatest shift of power in rewiring this country we have seen started in Rochdale in 1844, when the Rochdale pioneers came together and created and inspired a worldwide movement. We now have our first ever Labour and Co-operative Prime Minister and an historic commitment to double the size of the co-operative and mutual economy, highlighting the vital role of double devolution, which is not just about giving power to institutions; it is also about giving power directly to people to take part in creating their own solutions and power in their communities. What assessment has my right hon. Friend made of the machinery of government and its ability to deliver on this fantastic ambition?
Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend has put it incredibly poetically—better than I ever could. He is absolutely right that the machinery of government and the culture across Whitehall need to be challenged. The Prime Minister has been clear that this Government will bring about an end to local and regional government coming to Whitehall with a begging bowl. Whitehall and the Government as a whole have been told in no uncertain terms that they will now be required to justify why policies are not devolved, rather than the other way around.
Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)
The transition to clean energy could be an opportunity to build a different model that would, to use the First Secretary of State’s own words, end
“overly centralised decision making and over-privatisation”.
Development thus far has simply concentrated power in the hands of the big corporates and left communities feeling left behind and disempowered. In Shetland, we host one of the largest onshore wind farms in the country, but we have the highest levels of fuel poverty, and last year the developer SSE was paid £9 million in constraint payments not to generate electricity—that is regulatory madness. In this rewired state, will the communities that host renewable energy developments have control and get direct financial benefit from them?
Louise Haigh
The right hon. Gentleman raises a number of really important and interesting issues that will be considered as we look to greater public control of our energy system. Local and community control is central to the Prime Minister’s vision for public control, and that “madness”, as the right hon. Gentleman described it, is something that will drive our energy reforms.
Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)
I, too, welcome the First Secretary of State to her place and welcome today’s statement as well as the one in July. The first English devolution settlement was, of course, for London, and despite some incremental improvements since 1999, our capital’s mayor, the Greater London Authority and the 32 London boroughs are not currently set up to deliver on the capital’s full potential, whether on productivity and growth or in dealing with our housing crisis and the massive increase in temporary accommodation spending to combat homelessness. Will revisiting London’s devolution settlement will be on her and her team’s agenda?
Louise Haigh
The Mayor of London has been involved in continued talks through No. 10 North on the devolution settlement. We will continue to consider what further powers and resources London deserves.
David Mundell (Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale) (Con)
I congratulate the First Secretary of State on her appointment. Will she confirm to me and to the House that the intergovernmental relations responsibilities in her Department will be given the weight they require? Indeed, part of that is about making the case for the continuance of the United Kingdom. We have three First Ministers across the United Kingdom whose position is that they want to break up the United Kingdom. The Scottish Government have already brought forward a time-wasting and unnecessary Bill to hold another divisive independence referendum. It is vital that the Government play their part in pushing back against independence in Scotland and elsewhere, and making the case for the United Kingdom.
Louise Haigh
I absolutely agree with the right hon. Gentleman. The Prime Minister has been clear repeatedly that we stand against Scottish independence and against an independence referendum. We will continue to make the case for the Union. That responsibility will be held very highly, importantly and closely by my right hon. Friend the Minister for Intergovernmental Relations and European Relations.
Catherine Fookes (Monmouthshire) (Lab)
I, too, welcome the First Secretary of State to her place, particularly as she has smashed another glass ceiling by being the first woman to hold the role. In her statement, she talked about wildfires. There was not one in Monmouthshire per se, but they were all around the edge of Monmouthshire, and there was a lot of smoke in houses in Abergavenny. I therefore really look forward to the summit she will hold on wildfires.
One thing that the First Secretary of State did not mention and which I would like to draw her attention to is civil service pensions. I have a huge number of constituents who are waiting. I know that that issue comes under her Department, and I would really like her support on it.
Louise Haigh
May I be absolutely clear that the service levels for the civil service pension scheme following the move to Capita have been completely unacceptable? Our immediate priority is to stabilise the service and give current and former civil servants the service they deserve. We are using all our commercial levers, including withholding payments, to hold Capita to account for its failure, and we will continue to do so until service levels are fully restored. The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster Central (Sally Jameson), will shortly update the House on further progress.
Adrian Ramsay (Waveney Valley) (Green)
This summer, we have seen extreme heat and prolonged drought, with far too many people losing their lives in heatwaves, huge pressures on farming and many wildfires. We are unlikely to have another cooler summer than this year, and we need to be prepared for an ever-warming world. That requires a cross-Government approach. While there has been lots of talk of a No. 10 for the north—and devolution is welcome—does the First Secretary of State recognise that we could have a No. 10 for the future in the form of a climate protection unit in the Cabinet Office, which is needed to drive the cross-Government approach we must have to keep people safe?
Louise Haigh
I am grateful to the hon. Member. He is right that we have to learn to live with the new normal we have experienced over the summer. Cobra is the right team within the Department to co-ordinate activity across Government. We have worked closely with the Environment Agency, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the Met Office and others in response to the extreme heat we have seen and to prepare for future summers.
Jonathan Davies (Mid Derbyshire) (Lab)
I very much welcome what the First Secretary of State had to say about using No. 10 North to drive a pro-business culture, empower communities and deliver growth in every postcode. In Mid Derbyshire, we have one of the best projects to help her and the Government meet that aspiration in the regeneration of the Belper mills. That will bring 130 new homes to the Derwent valley and a visitor centre, where we have a UNESCO world heritage site. We are so close to securing investment from the East Midlands combined county authority to make this happen. Can she help me by offering a meeting at No. 10 North with its staff to ensure that we get that investment over the line to build the homes we need and deliver growth in Mid Derbyshire?
Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend is right to champion that important development. I would be delighted to facilitate a meeting for him in No. 10 North.
Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)
Will the First Secretary of State’s exercise in delivering democracy and local accountability and empowering local people include a look at large organisations that cannot be described as governmental or as quangos but that nevertheless exist firmly within the public domain, are established by statute, serve the public and are big employers, and in which the public have a direct interest, such as the National Trust? That is ripe for review—it is meant to be reviewed periodically—and it would certainly fall within the scope of the work she has been talking about.
Louise Haigh
I will take that point away. We have already made significant progress in our review on closing or merging arm’s length bodies, including NHS England and the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments. We know that we need to go further, and we will close or merge those where that is justified as part of our plans to rewire Whitehall. I will write to the right hon. Gentleman on the issue he raises.
Peter Swallow (Bracknell) (Lab)
As the Government work at pace to move power out of Westminster and into our communities, I am keen for Bracknell to get a share of that. That is why I support devolution for the Thames valley. The First Secretary of State will know that leaders across Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Swindon have written to her setting out their ambition for a mayoral strategic authority. That is excellent progress, but we have been here before and I do not want to see us lose the momentum. Will she set up a meeting for herself and her No. 10 North team with leaders and MPs from across the region so that we can sign on the dotted line, get this agreed and finally get the devolution that the Thames valley so badly needs?
Louise Haigh
It is fantastic to hear my hon. Friend’s enthusiasm. We have set ourselves such a tight deadline exactly to ensure that we fill in the map of the whole of England and do not lose the momentum of this moment. I would be delighted to meet him and his colleagues from the Thames valley to sign on the dotted line.
Manuela Perteghella (Stratford-on-Avon) (LD)
I, too, warmly welcome the First Secretary of State to her place. Last month, my constituents experienced wildfires, including the major incident in the parish of Salford Priors where Warwickshire fire and rescue service worked through extremely challenging conditions to protect homes and save lives. I pay tribute to all the firefighters, ambulance crew and those from the local community who assisted. Given the increasing frequency of heatwaves and drought and the severity of wildfires, particularly in rural areas where access to water is challenging and gaining access to burning fields is difficult, will she tell the House what urgent actions are being taken to better protect rural communities, farmland and natural habitats from future wildfire risk?
Louise Haigh
I again send my thoughts and sympathies to those affected by the wildfire in the hon. Lady’s constituency. The Prime Minister set out funding over the summer specifically for farmers in relation to resilience. We have awarded £100 million to the fire service and will co-ordinate a wildfire summit on where we need to go further, more details of which will be announced in the near future.
Dave Robertson (Lichfield) (Lab)
I welcome my right hon. Friend to her place and thank her for her earlier comments about the wildfires this summer. Staffordshire fire and rescue service saw more than 600 outdoor fires in July alone. That does not include any of those that happened in August. It is important that, in this place, we recognise the bravery of those firefighters who were out there day in, day out. Every human instinct, on looking at the wall of flame they were faced with, tells us to run the other way, but those men and women went out there day after day, ran towards danger and kept our communities safe. I thank them.
Will the First Secretary of State ensure that the voice of firefighters is at the heart of preparing for the changing climate and that they get what they need to protect our communities? I make particular reference to retained firefighters. I am aware of retained firefighters in Staffs who did an eight or 10-hour shift fighting wildfires, went home, got in the shower and went to their day job. They are absolute heroes and deserve all our respect. If we can make sure that their voices are at the heart of the response, that would be a very good thing.
Louise Haigh
I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for his words and praise. My grandfather was a firefighter in Chesterfield, so I join my hon. Friend in sending our thanks and gratitude to the heroes who kept us safe over the summer. He is right to draw attention to the fact that so many fires, which did not even make the news, were being quietly fought by them on our behalf. We will ensure that their voice is central to the work we do as we prepare for future summers.
Ben Obese-Jecty (Huntingdon) (Con)
Following on from that point about firefighters, one of the wildfires among the major incidents the First Secretary of State referred to in her statement was in Cambridgeshire at Holme Fen nature reserve, to which up to 20 fire engines responded, along with 150 firefighters from as far afield as Merseyside, Durham and Devon and Somerset. My thanks go to all those firefighters who assisted Cambridgeshire fire and rescue in tackling that dangerous peat fire.
Will the First Secretary of State explain how the £100 million that she referred to will be allocated? Is it a one-off payment, or is it an uplift to the current funding formula, which needs to be updated for fire and rescue? Will she give a little more detail on the asset refresh programme and whether the assets that firefighters are crucially in need of will be allocated quickly?
Louise Haigh
I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s support for the fire service. The £100 million has already been allocated, so that will have been done under the existing funding formula. Future allocations will be determined at the Budget.
Chris Curtis (Milton Keynes North) (Lab)
I want to ask about devolution and transport. Since we introduced Transport and Works Act orders in the 1990s, we have dramatically decreased the number of new tramlines, which we know are a big driver of local growth, being built in the UK. France has a mass rapid transit system in every town and city with a population of over 150,000 people, yet Leeds is the biggest place in western Europe without any mass rapid transit system at all. Will the First Secretary please tell us what powers she will push downwards to combined authorities to allow them to build new tramlines, and how she will make that a success?
Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point. I have seen it for myself in places as small as Dijon in France, which have incredibly well-functioning integrated transport systems that include tram networks. That is in large part because they are able to raise and keep revenue themselves and continue to invest it in their transport networks. We are removing the veto on decision making for transport infrastructure and devolving a number of powers under the Transport and Works Act 1992, which will speed up the delivery of mass transit networks. My hon. Friend will have heard the Prime Minister’s commitment to both Leeds and Bristol and to working with their mayoral authorities to deliver that at pace.
Richard Tice (Boston and Skegness) (Reform)
I congratulate the First Secretary on her appointment. I am sure that the reforms planned to rewire the state are well-intentioned, but it seems that we are going from No. 10 plus the Cabinet Office to No. 10, No. 10 North, the Office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, the Cabinet Office and a new OneGov Delivery Agency. We are going from two to five. Does she understand our concerns that she is increasing the size of the state, increasing the cost and slowing down decision making?
Louise Haigh
We will reduce the size of the central civil service, shift power and resources out of Whitehall and speed up decision making.
Andrew Cooper (Mid Cheshire) (Lab)
May I congratulate the First Secretary of State on her appointment and welcome the creation of No. 10 North as part of the Government’s commitment to drive good growth in every postcode? In that vein, is she aware of the series of funding decisions that have been taken by the Science and Technology Facilities Council that, taken together, will shift publicly funded research and development activity from north to south? The Prime Minister has already committed to intervening over Jodrell Bank, but will the First Secretary look at the broader issue and consider how the balance of R&D spend across the country can support economic growth in every region?
Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend raises an incredibly important point, which goes exactly to the issue that I raised about ensuring that non-elected bodies that are not accountable to politicians are not given free rein to make decisions. I will, of course, take away that issue.
Mr Louie French (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)
When the British public voted to take back control, they did not vote for Westminster to later duplicate the cost of politics and the civil service. Will the First Secretary of State confirm whether civil servants now working outside London will still receive the London-weighted salary, and will Ministers now working outside London still be able to claim for London-based housing?
Louise Haigh
The staffing of No. 10 North has been done on an interim basis to get it set up and running. We will recruit permanently and, of course, those roles will be based in Manchester.
Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)
Bearing in mind your family connection to the fire services in Harlow, Madam Deputy Speaker, I pay tribute to fire officers across my constituency. I also welcome the First Secretary to her place; I know that she is a friend of Harlow. I thank the Government for their investment in our town, not just through the UK Health Security Agency, but through funding for rough sleeping and the 48 businesses that will benefit from the defence investment plan. On rewiring the state, I think previous Governments have seen working with the charity and voluntary sector as a cheaper option, yet volunteers and community services have expertise that we can utilise. We need to think about how they are funded properly and supported in the long term.
Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend is right. Working with the charity and voluntary sector at local and regional level can be far better if we ensure they are properly funded and empowered to make decisions, procure and work in partnership. Through double devolution closest to the ground, we will ensure that the CVS is properly utilised and funded.
Adam Dance (Yeovil) (LD)
I welcome the First Secretary to her place. One area of the state that needs rewiring is support for neurodiverse people, because lots of decision makers do not get it. Will the First Secretary appoint a Minister for neurodiversity to the Cabinet Office to help ensure decision makers across the country get it and solve the challenges related to neurodivergence that they may face?
Louise Haigh
The hon. Gentleman raises an extremely interesting point, and I appreciate its importance. I will take away the wider point and establish what work needs to be done to ensure that properly dealing with neurodiversity is embedded across the whole of Government.
John Slinger (Rugby) (Lab)
I welcome the First Secretary of State to her place and support her determination to rewire the state. In her statement, she spoke about an underpowered centre of Government and how Ministers often lack agency. In my view, Members of this House—MPs—also often lack agency and are underpowered. In the light of the welcome devolution of greater powers to unitary authorities and metro mayors, does she agree that it is important that we discuss and debate, in this place and elsewhere, the role of MPs? In fact, I have applied for debates on the subject. As we look to rewire the state, we need to enhance the status, powers and authority of Members of this place.
Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend makes an important point. I encourage him to raise it with the Leader of the House so that we have proper time in the Chamber to debate the issue.
Ann Davies (Caerfyrddin) (PC)
Diolch yn fawr, Madam Dirprwy Lefarydd. It is great to see the powers being devolved to England to drive economic growth, yet the most minimal powers are not being considered for Wales. The promise made by the UK Government in February to jointly consult with the Welsh Government on the devolution of the vacant land tax has stalled. Will the First Secretary of State say what conversations she has had with the Treasury on that matter, and tell us when the consultation will be published?
Louise Haigh
As the hon. Lady knows, the Prime Minister said yesterday that we will be hosting a National Economic Council with the First Ministers of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland in order to discuss devolution at length, and the decisions around devolution that she has described will be made from there.
Vikki Slade (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)
I align myself with the comments about firefighters and suggest that the right hon. Lady might need a bigger room for the summit, as there is so much interest in it.
I seek some clarity on business rates. She mentioned that devolution might lead to business rates retention, but it is the structure of business rates that is causing the decline of our high streets and the decimation of our hospitality sector. Giving local authorities such as Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole council and Dorset council the right to cut them will simply move the problem from the business to the statutory services of the councils. Could she clarify this and expand a little on her intentions?
Louise Haigh
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for allowing me to be clear about this issue. The Prime Minister made clear his intention around business rates very early in his premiership, including on cutting business rates for pubs and hospitality and businesses that really benefit our high streets. Where we are proposing devolution is for business rates retention, encouraging areas to grow their economy and then enjoy a share of that. They will not have any difference in altering the level of business rates, but they will be incentivised and be able to keep a share of them.
Ayoub Khan (Birmingham Perry Barr) (Ind)
I congratulate the First Secretary on her post and appreciate the work the Government are doing on extreme weather. In my constituency last week, more than 60 families were left devastated by rainfall and flooding. I appreciate the £65 million that is being offered to farmers and the £100 million for emergency services, but will the First Secretary meet me and Birmingham city council to see what package could be offered to support those 60 families and to prevent a repeat of what took place last week?
Louise Haigh
I am incredibly sorry to hear about the impact on the 60 families in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency and about their displacement. Off the back of the summer and the preparations we are making for wildfires, we are now preparing for flooding, and we are making extensive preparations for a wide range of scenarios ahead of winter. I will ensure that the relevant Minister meets him to consider what response we can make to his community.
Jess Brown-Fuller (Chichester) (LD)
On the subject of wildfires, the Prime Minister has said that he does not believe our fire service have the right equipment, and I could not agree with him more. West Sussex fire and rescue service currently does not have access to wildfire personal protective equipment, and its newest off-road vehicle is 26 years old. Will the First Secretary of State or the relevant Minister please meet me and the chief fire officer of West Sussex fire and rescue to talk about how we can ensure that we keep the services on a sustainable financial footing so that they can keep us safe and we can also keep them safe?
Louise Haigh
The hon. Lady is absolutely right and raises incredibly important points. I can assure her that these issues will be considered by the wildfire summit, which I agree will need a bigger room at this rate.
Brendan O’Hara (Argyll, Bute and South Lochaber) (SNP)
A 15-minute statement on rewiring the state, yet Scotland does not merit a single mention—not even the Cairngorm wildfire. It is becoming increasingly clear that this Prime Minister is almost exclusively focused on pursuing an English domestic agenda. Having lost five parliamentary elections in a row and slumped to 17% of the vote last May, I can understand why the Labour party has given up in Scotland, but does the Minister think it is wise to make it so obvious?
Louise Haigh
Apologies, Madam Deputy Speaker; I chose to address issues that I was directly responsible for. The hon. Gentleman will be aware that fire and rescue services are well and truly devolved in Scotland. As we have repeatedly said, we will be hosting a meeting of the National Economic Council with the First Minister. The Prime Minister has already met him and is committed to devolving power outside of Holyrood, which is as equally centralised a Government as the one that we are transferring power out of now.
Tom Gordon (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (LD)
I welcome the First Secretary of State to her place. Two weeks ago I held a hospitality business roundtable, and its participants will be pleased to hear her mention a pro-business culture and cutting the barriers that businesses face. At that event at North Bar, one thing that businesses such as the Fat Badger, Westmorland Coffee and other lovely hospitality businesses in Harrogate and Knaresborough brought up was the high VAT rates that our businesses face. They are some of the highest in Europe, so will she make it her mission and this Government’s mission to look at how we can cut VAT to support local businesses and get our high streets and local areas thriving?
Louise Haigh
We are incredibly conscious of the burdens that small businesses are facing, particularly ones like the Fat Badger in Harrogate. That is why the Prime Minister set as his priority reducing burdens and cutting taxes for businesses—hospitality businesses in particular—in the first days of his premiership. High street regeneration and breathing life into our villages, towns and cities is absolutely a priority of this regime.
Caroline Voaden (South Devon) (LD)
The First Secretary of State talks about a broken political model that will cost jobs and opportunities, and I am afraid the decision that the predecessor Government made on local government reorganisation in Devon is exactly that: it will create a two-tier Devon, leaving one area behind. It has carved out three urban growth areas and dumped together all the bits that are left behind in a vast rural local authority of 100 miles from north to south with a road network equivalent to that of Luxembourg, leaving communities divided with little chance of ever being sustainable. This rural local authority has no chance of the same growth opportunities that the other ones have. This goes against everything the Prime Minister believes in about devolution being done from the ground up with the consent of communities, not from the top down from Whitehall. He told me that himself in July, so I urge the First Secretary and the Minister for Communities to listen to me, to other Devon MPs—perhaps not the Labour ones—and to the thousands of my constituents, and to review this decision.
Louise Haigh
I will ensure that the hon. Lady’s concerns are heard by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, and I can confirm that the Communities Secretary will determine next steps on local government reform by the end of October 2026.
Danny Kruger (East Wiltshire) (Reform)
I want to be constructive because I welcome the creation of a stronger centre, with a proper political centre in No. 10 and a corporate HQ for the non-political functions. My question to the Minister is: what is the residual point of the Cabinet Office in this new structure? Some 12,000 people are currently employed in the Cabinet Office and all its quangos. Some of them will be redistributed, but what is the point of that office in future? Likewise, what is the point of the Cabinet Secretary’s post? How is anything going to change when the same people are working in the same buildings, under the same incentives?
Louise Haigh
The Cabinet Office supports the wider civil service and still fulfils a number of incredibly important functions, including cross co-ordination of governmental priorities. The Cabinet Secretary’s role is to run the civil service as a whole, and that role will always be required.
Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)
I warmly welcome the First Secretary to her post. I also welcome her good judgment in taking one of the esteemed former members of our Health and Social Care Committee, the hon. Member for Worthing West (Dr Cooper), to be her Parliamentary Private Secretary. I know the First Secretary has probably already had some of this in her ear already, but I cannot lose this opportunity. This morning, the Health and Social Care Committee, with the Education Committee, heard moving evidence about why death by suicide has now overtaken almost everything else as the No. 1 reason that we lose children in this country. Often when we dive into issues like this, we find that education is not talking to health or to the local authorities. It cannot be beyond the wit of man, or indeed a shared governance structure with the right fiscal flows, to stop these stories happening. Will the First Secretary of State meet me to discuss what we are seeing in the Committee so that we can unlock the potential in all parts of society, because without doing that, I fear that the devolution agenda might fail?
Louise Haigh
I am incredibly grateful to the hon. Member, who I have worked with over many years on a number of campaigns. As ever, she raises an incredibly important point. I cannot imagine there are many people in this House who have not been touched by suicide in one way or another. I certainly have, in my close family. It is an incredibly important point that she raises and one that should and could be easily fixed in terms of the specific problems that can lead to state failings. Of course I would be delighted to meet her to discuss how we can address this.
Mr Adnan Hussain (Blackburn) (Ind)
The First Secretary has said that the purpose of rewiring the state is to get power and resource to communities and deliver for people in every postcode. In Blackburn, patients are being treated in corridors because our hospital simply does not have the capacity it needs. So I ask: how will these reforms ensure that communities like mine, where the need is greatest, actually receive the investment we need?
Louise Haigh
Health is absolutely part of the devolution agenda. We are already pursuing a number of reforms, including the abolition of NHS England, to ensure that decisions can be made democratically at the centre of Government and then pushed locally, and to ensure that they are resourced where possible. I will take away the hon. Gentleman’s specific issue and raise it with the Health Secretary.
Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)
The First Secretary mentioned the heroics of firefighters during the summer. Gloucestershire fire and rescue service was involved in fighting the wildfires, even though we did not have any within our county boundaries, but the funding pressures on the fire service in Gloucestershire are now so acute that Cheltenham West fire station will be closed overnight if the consultation proposals are accepted. That cannot be right when we know we are going to be having more wildfires, perhaps even in Gloucestershire. Will the First Secretary have a chat with her colleagues in MHCLG to work out how we can get the support that the county fire service and the county council need to keep Cheltenham West fire station open overnight?
Louise Haigh
We are incredibly conscious of the historical underfunding of fire services across the country. That is why the previous Administration committed an additional £100 million to local fire and rescue services. Future funding decisions will be for the Budget.
Freddie van Mierlo (Henley and Thame) (LD)
My summer tour took me to such wonderful villages as Forest Hill, Little Milton, Stanton St John and Warborough, and no one I met wants to be part of the new proposed Greater Oxford authority. These parishes have been pressganged into a new authority they do not want to be part of. Will the Government review the decision to split Oxfordshire into three—a messy solution—and support other solutions, such as the two-and-one local authority proposals?
Louise Haigh
The Prime Minister has been clear that we do not want to impose anything centrally on areas that do not want to combine areas. I am sure that we can facilitate a meeting or discussion in No. 10 North to ensure that we get the right authority, powers and resources for the hon. Gentleman’s area.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I welcome the First Secretary to her new role and wish her well. The hon. Lady’s appointment comes at a critical time for the United Kingdom. She will know that the fundamental pillar of our Union is fairness, and right now the funding model for Northern Ireland is anything but fair. The current Barnett consequential framework is fundamentally broken. It fails to account for the unique, severe and acute objective needs of our public services, health sector and infrastructure in Northern Ireland. Does the hon. Lady, as the Minister for the Cabinet Office and co-ordinator of Government policy, agree that rewiring the funding formula must be treated as a priority cross-Cabinet issue, and will she commit to working across the Treasury and the Northern Ireland Office to replace the outdated mechanism with a needs-based funding floor?
Louise Haigh
As the Prime Minister said in Prime Minister’s questions earlier, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland has opened a negotiation process with Stormont to look at funding and the funding pressures that have emerged. Fundamental to that negotiation will be reform of the decisions that Stormont makes and the way that the Executive have made decisions historically, which has repeatedly led to funding pressures. We need to ensure that these negotiations result in true reform, so we do not end up in this position again.
Oral Answers to Questions
Louise Haigh Excerpts(1 year, 6 months ago)
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Hilary Benn
As I said during the last Northern Ireland questions, no one wants to see that happen. We are currently working to find a lawful way of dealing with the problems that were created by the way in which the original interim custody orders were signed in 1972 and, I think, 1973. In 2020, the Supreme Court found that orders that had not been signed and considered by the then Secretary of State were not lawful.
Louise Haigh (Sheffield Heeley) (Lab)
In 2019, Boris Johnson commissioned the Shawcross report on Libyan-sponsored IRA terrorism. United States citizens have received compensation from the Libyan Government for attacks on British soil, but UK citizens never have. Will the Secretary of State work with the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office to ensure that the report is published?
Hilary Benn
The whole House will have profound sympathy for all the victims of Gaddafi-sponsored IRA terrorism, and all the victims of the troubles. The Shawcross report was commissioned by the last Government as an internal report, and decisions on the report and its future are currently under review by the FCDO.
Oral Answers to Questions
Louise Haigh Excerpts(1 year, 7 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
In December 2020, I was in my office, working on the expected Brexit deal with my team. We had to analyse the deal as it came in at speed and prepare and deliver a live statement at speed on one of the most important issues for our country in recent years. That was what I was doing. What were the Conservatives doing? Bringing suitcases of booze into Downing Street, partying and fighting, vomiting up the walls, leaving the cleaners to remove red wine stains. That is the difference. I was working—they were partying.
Louise Haigh (Sheffield Heeley) (Lab)
I know that the whole House will support the Prime Minister’s comments and send our thoughts to the family of Harvey Willgoose and all those who loved him after his tragic and senseless death on Monday. I support the Government’s actions to tackle the sale of certain knives online, but before the national media attention moves on from yet another tragic death of a young person, I know that the Prime Minister will agree that in order to tackle the scale of the crisis engulfing too many of our communities, we need a whole-system, cross-Government approach to address the root causes of violence. Will he commit his Government to such a national strategy?
The Prime Minister
This incident was horrific and senseless, and I thank my right hon. Friend for raising it. I think the thoughts of the whole House are with the victim’s family and friends, and the school community and wider community who have been impacted by this. We are all grateful to the first responders—the police officers and the medical staff who attended the scene—and it is right that South Yorkshire police are given the time and space to carry out their investigation.
We need to do everything we can to bear down on knife crime. It is too easy to get knives online, and it is too easy to carry knives without proper consequences. That is why we have made it an absolute priority in government to absolutely bear down on knife crime, and I hope that it is a cross-party issue.
Automotive Industry
Louise Haigh Excerpts(3 years, 2 months ago)
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Ms Ghani
We are topping and tailing this debate with a Transport Minister and I know he is keen to touch on charging points, but the public charging network is growing quickly, and public charging devices have more than tripled in four years, from 10,300 devices in January 2019, to more than 43,000 in June 2023. The Government expect that around 300,000 charge points will be needed as a minimum by 2030. They are being rolled out at pace, but I do not doubt there will be constituency, case-by-case charge point concerns and the Minister will reflect on those.
One concern that the SMMT and all Members of Parliament who have manufacturing plants in their constituencies regularly raise with me is access to talent. Car companies need highly skilled individuals across the entirety of their business. One reason the UK is attractive is our world-leading universities, with four UK institutions in the global top 10, according to the QS world university rankings. But that is not all. We have supported the automotive sector through the apprenticeship levy, with £2.7 billion funding by the 2024-25 financial year. That will support apprenticeships in non-levy employers, often SMEs, where the Government will continue to pay 95% of apprentice training costs.
We recognise the importance of a level playing field. That is why, at the spring Budget, the Chancellor launched a new capital allowance offer. Businesses will now benefit from full expensing, which offers 100% first-year relief to companies on qualifying new main-rate plant and machinery investments from 1 April 2023 until 31 March 2026, the 50% first-year allowance for expenditure by companies on new special rate assets until 31 March 2026, and the annual investment allowance, which provides 100% first-year relief for plant and machinery investments up to £1 million.
Due to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, energy costs have been an issue and a concern for the sector. That is why we have again intervened on behalf of the automotive sector, as well as many others, to ensure that the UK’s offer is competitive. It is why the Government have implemented a range of targeted measures to ensure that energy costs for high energy intensive industries, including battery manufacturing, are in line with other major economies around the world, levelling the playing field for British companies across Europe through the British industry supercharger scheme. In addition, to take just one example, the industrial energy transformation fund, now in its third phase, was designed to help businesses with high energy use to cut their energy bills and carbon emissions by investing in energy-efficient and low-carbon technologies. This Government announced £315 million of funding in the 2018 Budget available up to 2027.
The hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde talked about providing confidence and support for the sector, and I want to flesh out some of the announcements he was unable to bring himself to say at the Dispatch Box in case that was put into Hansard. Companies continue to show confidence in the UK, and we have announced major investments across the UK, including the £1 billion from Nissan and Envision to create an EV manufacturing hub in Sunderland. I was just on the phone to Envision this morning. It is an end-to-end supply chain. We have £100 million from Stellantis for its site in Ellesmere Port, and £380 million from Ford to make Halewood its first EV components site in Europe.
Jaguar Land Rover has also announced that it will be investing £15 billion over five years into its industrial footprint as part of its move towards electrification. That is great news for the west midlands, where JLR has three production sites, research and development facilities, and its headquarters. I am hugely confident that the UK will continue to attract investments large and small to enable the EV transition and deliver green jobs. Those are the stories we should be promoting at the Dispatch Box, not playing down.
The Government recognise the concerns of the sector, and we are dealing with serious global challenges, including rising costs because of Putin’s horrific war in Ukraine, supply chains disrupted by covid aftershocks and countries turning inward towards protectionism, by which, of course, I mean the Inflation Reduction Act. Acknowledging those issues, over the course of the summer I have been holding a series of business roundtables to understand exactly where the challenges in supply chains are most acute, and where the Government and businesses can work together more closely to ensure that the UK’s supply chains are resilient, now and in the future.
Those headwinds have been felt across the globe, and where the UK sector has been impacted, it has not been uniquely impacted. The entire automotive sector is midway through a once-in-a-lifetime shift away from the internal combustion engine towards zero-emission vehicles. That is good not just for our net zero ambitions; it also has the potential to provide wider economic and social benefits. Of course, our competitors know that too, and the race to secure zero-emission manufacturing capacity across the world is fierce. Some countries seem willing to spend eye-watering amounts. We will be offering targeted investment in the future of the auto manufacturing sector. That means focusing on exactly where we know we are ahead of the game internationally, offering targeted and measured support that reflects the size and scale of our outstanding automotive sector.
As I have said, we have more than a chequebook to attract companies to these shores; our highly productive and skilled workforce, focus on innovation and tech and the ease of doing business are key factors in a company’s decision to base itself in the UK. There is a backdrop of intensely challenging constraints on the sector globally, while the sector is undergoing a seismic technological transformation. It is clearly a difficult situation for manufacturers across the world, but there are positives to be considered, especially here in the UK. The SMMT reported that UK commercial vehicle production has just had its best May performance since 2008, growing by 36.9%—I thought the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde might crack a smile for the sector—and year-to-date output is some 47.6% above the pre-pandemic levels of 2019. That is the message we want to send internationally. It clearly shows that the UK automotive sector is strong, dynamic and fundamentally capable. I want the UK to have a thriving automotive industry. As we take on these global challenges, we will take them on together with the sector.
Some mention was made of R&D support, and I will share all the work we have done. Our R&D and capital programmes delivered through the Advanced Propulsion Centre and the automotive transformation fund are positioning the UK as one of the best places in the world to design, develop and build zero-emission vehicles. They are working together to support the creation of an internationally competitive electric vehicle supply chain. In the coming months, after engagement with industry, the Government will build on those programmes to take decisive action and ensure future investment in the manufacture of zero-emission vehicles, as part of our commitment to building a cleaner, greener, more sustainable Britain fit for the world of the future, not the world of the past that the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde is fixated on.
The automotive transformation fund supports the creation of an internationally competitive electric vehicle supply chain in the UK. It provides support to late-stage R&D and capital investments in strategically important technologies. That includes unlocking strategic investments in gigafactories, which I will come to, motors and drives, power electronics and fuel cell systems. Our automotive industry has a long and proud history. We are determined to build on our heritage as we invest in the technologies of the future, positioning the UK as one of the best locations in the world to manufacture electric vehicles.
I have spoken previously about the Advanced Propulsion Centre, because it does fantastic work in driving technology forward. It was founded in 2013 as a £1 billion joint venture between the automotive industry and the Government to help the industry meet the challenges of innovation and decarbonisation. It facilitates funding to UK-based research and development projects developing zero-emission technologies. The programme helps accelerate the development, commercialising and manufacture of advanced propulsion technologies in the UK. So far, it has supported 199 projects involving 450 partners. It is estimated to have supported more than 55,000 highly skilled jobs and is projected to save more than 350 million tonnes of CO2—the equivalent of removing the lifetime emissions of 14.1 million cars.
Those projects include the setting up of a joint venture between Unipart and Williams Advanced Engineering to manufacture batteries in Coventry, Danfoss setting up a centre of excellence for hydraulic R&D at its plant in Scotland, and Equipmake increasing the size of its manufacturing plant in Norfolk to meet demand for its electric drive unit. That shows how much work can be delivered and how many jobs created if we work with industry and help it de-risk in adopting new technologies.
I recently visited the Warwick Manufacturing Group, which the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde alluded to. I am surprised he did not applaud the work further.
Ms Ghani
He could have gone further.
I saw at first hand the cutting-edge future mobility research being done in Coventry, the birthplace of British motor manufacturing. While in Coventry, I also had the opportunity to attend the Advanced Propulsion Centre to discuss how we can build on the success of our existing R&D and capital investment programmes. During the visit I met year 6 pupils from Templars Primary School in Coventry who attended the Advanced Propulsion Centre’s STEM day. That is a prime example of outreach activity to inspire the next generation of automotive engineers.
We cannot talk about the automotive sector without thinking about the broader supply chain and one of my particular passions, critical minerals, which I am surprised the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde did not spend more time discussing. He missed out the key point of what is needed to produce electric vehicles. We know that China dominates the EV market, partly due to its grip on the supply chain. It controls much of the mining of crucial raw materials, and 80% of battery making for EVs is controlled by Chinese firms. It is also the world’s top car exporter.
I am not sure whether the hon. Member has had time to read Ed Conway’s recent book, “Material World”, which makes some key points on lithium. We know that reserves of the metal are concentrated in a handful of nations. In his book, he said that lithium reserves are concentrated in “a handful of nations”, so that “while the rest of the world panics about China’s dominance of the battery supply chain, many in Beijing are simultaneously panicking about China’s reliance on the rest of the world’s raw materials.”
We know that an EV car battery contains 40 kg of lithium, 10 kg of cobalt, 10 kg of manganese and 40 kg of nickel, and that is before we consider the graphite that goes into the anode. Those materials have to come from somewhere, which is why we updated our critical minerals strategy in the “Critical Minerals Refresh”—[Interruption.] That was a positive noise from the hon. Member—to ensure we were supporting the sector through the whole supply chain. I encourage colleagues to read Ed Conway’s book. I am not on commission, by the way; it is just a good read.
The hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde talked about not having a strategy, but we are working with industry to make sure it can plan for the future. To do that, we had the “Critical Minerals Refresh”, which came from the integrated review. We are making sure that we are focused on batteries and the EV supply chain here in the UK. Recent good news that the hon. Member also forgot to mention is the joint venture between British Lithium and Imerys, announced on 29 June. That is a massive boost to the critical minerals supply chain in the UK.
By the end of the decade, the development of Cornwall as the UK’s leading lithium hub will supply enough lithium carbonate for 500,000 electric cars a year. To help secure the supply of critical minerals, the Government have not only refreshed our critical minerals strategy, but put in place a task and finish group to work with industry so that it can highlight its particular vulnerabilities and we can provide it with the confidence and resilience it needs in its supply chains.
Most recently, I visited Indonesia, where I met Indonesian Ministers to emphasise that the UK has a lot to offer on critical minerals, particularly in relation to private finance, environmental, social and governance capabilities, and mining services. I also visited key mine sites and met companies that are critical in the battery supply chain and in critical mineral production, including some innovative UK companies showcasing the best of British—I know that sentence would be hard for the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde ever to put on the record.
This year, I have also visited South Africa, where I represented the UK at the Minerals Security Partnership ministerial meeting and confirmed the UK’s intention to host the next such meeting during London Metal Exchange Week in October. I also visited Canada, where I signed the UK-Canada critical minerals statement of intent and launched our critical minerals dialogue with Canada, forging a key partnership with one of the most important global players in the critical minerals ecosystem. The hon. Member will want to have a moment to reflect on and applaud our work internationally and domestically on critical minerals.
Louise Haigh (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab)
This has been an excellent debate, informed by real experts from across the House who are clear champions of their constituencies and of the automotive industry. I think the House can agree, following today’s debate, that our automotive industry is truly the crown of British industry.
However, I would say very gently to the Minister that her speech really did sound out of touch with the reality that the industry and the workforce across our country are currently facing. We were treated to 35 minutes, but there was absolutely no plan, no explanation as to why we still do not have in place the strategy to ramp up our battery production, and no plan for how we are going to deal with the looming rules of origin deadline or the ZEV mandate.
As we have heard powerfully today, the industry is struggling under a Government who have no plan or strategy, and are constantly risking more jobs being shipped overseas. My hon. Friends the Members for Luton North (Sarah Owen), for Luton South (Rachel Hopkins), for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders), for Llanelli (Dame Nia Griffith), for Wansbeck and for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western) all spelled out clearly the impact of this on their communities. This debate has been enormously enhanced by their contributions, and they are huge champions of the automotive industry in this place.
In the face of the new geopolitical reality and the approach our global allies are taking, the Government’s current approach is little short of reckless. The Biden Administration are at the forefront of this new economic approach, taking an active role in rebuilding America’s manufacturing base through their groundbreaking Inflation Reduction Act and the CHIPS Act. The European Union, with its Net Zero Industry Act, aims for 40% of its green industry to be based at home, and the Powering Australia plan is set to create 600,000 jobs and spur 76 billion Australian dollars of investment. Yet here in the UK, this Government seem content to settle for less and are resigned to good jobs and green growth continuing to head overseas.
So much for levelling up: it is exactly the communities that have already suffered from deindustrialisation that will be hit all over again. We know the story, and we have heard it again today, of how good, high-skilled, well-paid jobs disappear and their alternatives are low-paid and insecure, and of how poverty rises, inequality increases and the social fabric of communities is permanently torn. We simply cannot allow it to happen again, because the warning signs are already flashing.
Just two weeks ago, the Business and Trade Secretary and I both spoke at the British car manufacturers conference. The industry was clear that it urgently needs a strategy—or anything—from this Government. Mike Hawes, who has been quoted many times today, warned:
“We just need a plan, and one more cunning than Baldrick’s. I don’t care whether it’s called industrial competitiveness, activism, or dare we say it, an industrial strategy. We just know we need it, and we need it urgently.”
What did the Secretary of State have to say in response? I quote directly:
“We will come out with plans soon, please stick with us”.
Is that really the best the Government can offer—begging industry to wait a little longer and to hold its nerve, as they admit that they have no plan after 13 years in government?
The reality is that we cannot afford to wait any longer. For decades, our car industry has been at the forefront of innovation and expertise. We have heard fantastic examples of that from my hon. Friends the Members for Warwick and Leamington, for Ellesmere Port and Neston, for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr Mahmood), for Llanelli, and for Luton North, as well as from my hon. Friend the Member for Luton South, who is a fantastic champion of motorsports. Under the Conservatives, however, we are losing the race for the jobs of the future. Car production has already slumped by one-third since 2010. By 2025, Germany will manufacture 10 times more batteries than we do, and the US 30 times.
We heard the whole sorry tale of the history of Britishvolt from my hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck. He is right—it is an ideal site for a gigafactory, because it has the grid connections and supply chain in the north-east, but it has been failed, repeatedly, by this Government. Manufacturers are already leaving the UK or shutting up shop: Arrival has left Bicester for the US; Honda has closed its Swindon plant after 35 years of production; Ford has cut thousands of jobs at its Halewood plant; and manufacturers in the supply chain such as SKF in Luton are at risk of being offshored to Poland. Yet more problems are looming, self-inflicted by this reckless Government.
We have heard many times today of the impending cliff edge through the trade and co-operation agreement, with new rules of origin requirements that will apply huge tariffs to UK exports if we cannot produce enough batteries at home. The Government have had two and a half years since the agreement was signed, but they have failed to use that time to ramp up our battery capacity. That is coupled with their own looming ZEV mandate that industry has no detail about. Our industry will be slapped with tariffs, and demand will move to countries with the battery capacity such as China.
Communities such as Llanelli, Luton, Birmingham, Elsmere Port and Wansbeck will suffer, as will those such as Blyth, West Brom, South Derbyshire, Durham, and Crewe. That is why many constituents across the country will wonder why this debate has been so one-sided and from one side of the House, and why Labour will create the conditions for our car industry not just to survive, but to thrive. Our vision is one where good jobs in the industries of the future—jobs that people can be proud of and raise a family on—are brought back to our industrial heartlands. That is why, alongside my hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde, we have developed a plan to turbocharge electric vehicle manufacturing.
First, we will address the consequence of the Conservatives’ Brexit deal, acting to avoid the cliff edge in the TCA that will slap tariff on our electric vehicles. We will rapidly scale up our domestic battery industry by part-financing eight additional gigafactories through our green prosperity plan. We will accelerate the EV charge point roll-out by setting new, binding targets on Governments, and we will make the UK a clean energy superpower by 2030, lowering the sky-high electricity costs for UK industries and cutting £93 billion in energy bills for the British people, by investing in cleaner, cheaper, homegrown power for our country.
With Labour’s plan to turbocharge our EV transition the opportunities are clear for all to see, and we have heard them expressed loud and clear today: resilience to withstand geopolitical shocks; 80,000 good, green jobs right here, not in China; £30 billion of investment across the country, forging resilience at home while creating new partnerships abroad; an active state working in concert with innovative, world-leading manufacturers, pursuing a modern industrial strategy; and new life breathed into our hollowed out industrial base. Mr Deputy Speaker, Labour will not shy away from the challenges facing our car industry. We will back it every step of the way, and we have the plan to prove it. I urge colleagues to support our motion today.
Doncaster Sheffield Airport
Louise Haigh Excerpts(3 years, 10 months ago)
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Louise Haigh (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab)
I like the Minister very much and I wish her well in her ministerial duties, but she is not the aviation Minister; the Secretary of State should be here to answer this urgent question. A critical regional airport is days away from closure and she cannot be bothered to turn up. What message does it send to the people of South Yorkshire, 125,000 of whom signed a petition to keep the airport open, that she will not attend the Chamber and cannot even attend meetings with South Yorkshire MPs and leaders to discuss how we can protect Doncaster Sheffield airport? The Government have repeatedly refused to meet the Mayor of South Yorkshire and other regional leaders to discuss what options are open. It is truly a slap in the face to the hundreds of people whose jobs currently hang in the balance.
When the right hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss)—the Prime Minister for the next few hours at least—came to Yorkshire, she gave a commitment on behalf of the Government to protect Doncaster Sheffield airport. That commitment must outlast her Government, not least because this airport is of strategic significance: it has one of the longest runways in Britain, it is the base for the National Police Air Service, and it is a home to national coastguard operations.
Thanks to the leadership of the Mayor of South Yorkshire, credible investors have been identified, but it is obvious that the Peel Group never had any intention of negotiating in good faith, so it is not an option for Doncaster Council or the Mayor to purchase shares in the airport, given that the Peel Group is refusing to sell. It is willing to let the airport close, to let infrastructure be degraded and to remove any chance of its being reopened in future.
The case for action from the Government is crystal clear. The use of emergency powers under the Civil Contingencies Act is the only possible measure to keep the airport running. Potential investors have made it clear that the Secretary of State’s refusal to use those powers is creating far greater uncertainty and instability, and is making purchase at any point in future even more unlikely. Can the Minister outline precisely why the Secretary of State has refused to consider the use of the Act? That decision is political, so it is beholden on her to explain to the people of South Yorkshire why she refuses to use it. If she continues to refuse, will the Minister lay out what powers exist anywhere else that could keep the airport running?
As we await the third Prime Minister in seven weeks, there is less than a week left to save the airport. If the Government do not take the action that the people of South Yorkshire desperately need them to take, the people will conclude that this is final proof that the Tories’ levelling-up agenda is dead.
Katherine Fletcher
The message to the people of South Yorkshire is that they have an incredibly strong local champion in my hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley (Nick Fletcher), who has been working tirelessly to make it happen from day one. The previous aviation Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Robert Courts), who is present, has already met the combined authority. The hon. Lady asks where the power lies; it lies with the Labour mayoral combined authority—the local council. [Interruption.] Well, let me address the Civil Contingencies Act: it was introduced by the Blair Government. When the Minister brought it to the House, it was envisioned that it would be used in only the most serious circumstances and
“would be used rarely, if ever”.—[Official Report, 19 January 2004; Vol. 416, c. 1109.]
No Government have used it in 18 years. The Opposition—[Interruption.] The Labour party bringing in a law that was not serious; that would astonish me! What you are doing is trying to find a piece of politicking, instead of sitting down—[Interruption.] Sorry, it is my first go, Madam Deputy Speaker. You are—[Hon. Members: “You’re doing it again!”] The hon. Lady will forgive me, as it is my first go. [Interruption.] What we need is for the Peel Group to sit down with the commercial people, and that is what it promised to do when it sat down with the aviation Minister on 19 October.
Oral Answers to Questions
Louise Haigh Excerpts(4 years, 5 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
I think what the House has already heard is that we are taking legal action—
The Prime Minister
Yes, we are—against the company concerned, under the 1992 and 1996 Acts. That is the right thing to do, because it seems to me that that the company has broken the law. But if the right hon. and learned Gentleman is asking this Government to do what Labour usually wants us to do and actively pitchfork away investment around the country from overseas, that is not what we will do. We will take ’em to court, we will defend the rights of British workers, but what we will not do is launch a wholehearted campaign against overseas investment, as Labour would want, because that is completely wrong—and wrong for those workers.
Oral Answers to Questions
Louise Haigh Excerpts(5 years, 1 month ago)
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Brandon Lewis
My right hon. Friend is right. I saw some of the comments made in yesterday’s debate and, as I said last week, we recognise the strength of feeling and the concerns that people have. There is, understandably, a range of views on legacy, as it is a complex and sensitive issue. We are committed to further discussions, as I have already said, and we remain committed to many of the key principles laid out in the Stormont House agreement.
To come to the core of my right hon. Friend’s question, the Stormont House agreement was in 2014. We are seven years on, and it has not been deliverable in its current format. Parts of it that were to be delivered by the Executive, such as an oral history by 2016, have not been delivered. We need to move on and get those things working.
We also need to acknowledge the reality that even the investigative body, the Historical Investigations Unit that was envisaged, would take, by a conservative estimate, between 10 and 20 years to complete its workload. On that timescale, many families would be timed out of any prospect of information or justice. We need to be honest about the reality of where we are today.
Louise Haigh (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab)
Does the Secretary of State agree that, in order for any legacy policy proposal to be sustainable and effective, victims must be at the heart of the process? Can he outline what engagement he has had with victims across the UK, including the families of the Birmingham pub bombing victims?
Brandon Lewis
I agree with the hon. Lady that we want to make sure that the outcomes we come to on legacy are able to deliver for victims and the families of victims, particularly those families who want information and understanding, truth and accountability. We are working through that at the moment.
There is a wide range of engagement, both through my Department and through me personally, with a whole range of groups, not just the Northern Ireland parties but the victims’ groups, too. I am always happy to engage with and meet victims’ groups. We have been engaging with them this week, as we did last week and the week before, and we will continue to do so across the whole UK in the weeks ahead.
Louise Haigh
I am grateful for that answer, and I am grateful that the Secretary of State agrees that victims need to be at the heart of the process. Why have reports suggested that paramilitaries, the victim makers, were made aware of the Government’s plans for an amnesty before the victims were?
Brandon Lewis
They were not. I outlined the proposals here in Parliament last week, and I have not had those kinds of conversations. I saw some reports of such conversations, but I am not sure where they have come from or what the hon. Lady is referring to.
Oral Answers to Questions
Louise Haigh Excerpts(5 years, 3 months ago)
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Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend the Chairman of the Select Committee makes an important point. I have not had a chance to see the transcript of the meeting this morning that he and his Committee had with Lord Foster, but I work closely with Lord Foster on these issues and one of the key things is that mutual understanding and trust. That is one of the reasons I have always felt strongly that our colleagues, friends and partners in the EU should be engaging with civic society and businesses in Northern Ireland to ensure that they really understand the sensitivities and the nuances in Northern Ireland. I am pleased that the Commission and Maroš Šefčovič have done a couple of those meetings already. I would like to see more of that as we go forward, so that we can build that understanding. It is fundamental to the basis of having trust that each one understands why it matters to deliver on the protocol in the way that was always intended: in a pragmatic, flexible way that delivers for the people of Northern Ireland.
Louise Haigh (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab)
I join the Secretary of State in sending all our love to Jo’s family on this very difficult day, and in paying tribute to the outgoing First Minister, Arlene Foster, for her many years of public service and for the lesson she has treated all of us to in recent weeks on how to do politics with dignity, even in difficult times.
I support the Secretary of State in his efforts to ensure that there is a strong, stable, functioning Executive in the current negotiations to meet the enormous challenges facing Northern Ireland, and one that respects all existing commitments. However, it was an extraordinary diplomatic failure for the Prime Minister to spend a crucial summit on home soil being rebuked by our closest allies. Northern Ireland does not have any more time for bickering or blame games, so is it not time to get serious and commit to a veterinary agreement that would eliminate the vast majority of checks down the middle of our Union?
Brandon Lewis
The hon. Lady has a different reading of the weekend. One thing that was very clear over the weekend was that our partners—particularly our partners and friends in the United States—were very much in the same place as us on the precedence and importance of protecting and delivering on the Good Friday agreement. That is something that they were such a strong part of, and that we are always focused on as being of paramount importance for us. We have put forward a number of proposals—more than a dozen, I believe—to the European Union Commission around how we can deliver on the protocol in a pragmatic, flexible way that delivers for the people and businesses in Northern Ireland. We look forward to continuing those discussions with the EU, but when the EU talks about flexibility and pragmatism, it has to show it as well as talk about it.
Louise Haigh
We need to see the details of that veterinary agreement in order to ensure that it really would eliminate the vast majority of those checks. A significant part of the problem is that people in Northern Ireland feel that these changes have been imposed on them—that they have been done to them, not with them. So how is the Secretary of State going to ensure that representatives from politics, business and civil society in Northern Ireland are brought meaningfully into the negotiations, not just engagement, so that any solution is sustainable and permanently eases tensions?
Oral Answers to Questions
Louise Haigh Excerpts(5 years, 4 months ago)
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Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend the Chairman of the Select Committee makes a very important point, as others have, about the impact and importance of dealing with social media. Yes, absolutely: I have spoken to the chief constable and outlined to him our full support and we are working with the police to ensure that they have access to the full capabilities to work and deal with social media issues. We obviously recognise that policing is a devolved matter, but they have our full support and we will continue to work with them on those issues.
Louise Haigh (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab)
May I, too, associate myself with the comments about, and send our best wishes to, the serving police officer? As a former special constable, I know that the whole police family will be reeling today, and my thoughts are with them all.
It is not an exaggeration to say that, in the 23 years since the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, the peace process has never been as vulnerable as it is now. The north-south institutions fundamental to the support of Irish nationalists are under pressure, and the east-west relationship has been seriously undermined by the Prime Minister and his approach to Brexit. The Secretary of State bears a responsibility to help stabilise the situation, so will he ensure that the British-Irish Council is urgently convened to give Northern Ireland representatives a voice in discussions around the protocol and huge decisions about their own future?
Brandon Lewis
Yes. I suggest that the hon. Lady looks back: a while ago, we announced that the British-Irish Council would meet on 11 June. It continues its regular meetings, which have never stopped; the last one was in November. But yes—as it has been regularly meeting.
Louise Haigh
I suggest that 11 June is not an urgent meeting and recommend that that meeting should be brought forward urgently to discuss these important issues.
The Secretary of State will know that some very young children, born long after the Good Friday agreement, have been involved in some of the recent disorder. Does he agree that, wherever appropriate, working with the PSNI, restorative justice should be used to ensure that those children are not criminalised and do not run the risk of falling into the toxic, coercive grip of paramilitaries?
Brandon Lewis
Yes, absolutely. I will also just say that the Northern Ireland Executive have been involved in the specialist committee, which feeds into the Joint Committee, through the work that we do through the engagement forums and, actually, a meeting with Vice-President Maroš Šefčovič just a few weeks ago. They are consistently involved and feeding into the process and the work that we do with the EU, but as I say, the British-Irish Council date was set a short while ago.
On the hon. Lady’s comments about young people, she is absolutely right; I fully support that point. Community groups and youth groups have been working with young people, not just in the last few weeks but consistently over the last year or so. They do amazing work to help young people to see a way through to a prosperous and exciting future. We should all be doing all we can to support, promote and encourage that so that people are not tempted, whether through social media or though bad advice in the heat of the moment in the streets, as we saw a few weeks ago, into the type of behaviour that gives them a criminal record and curtails their opportunities for the future.