Defending Public Services

Lyn Brown Excerpts

Monday 23rd May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)]

Each year, the Government put before Parliament their expenditure programme, the Budget, and their legislative programme, the Queen’s Speech. These two moments in the parliamentary calendar are meant to encapsulate what the Government are all about, what they will do and how the country will change. Ministers like to make grand claims on the merits of their programmes, and it is our duty to detach the cheerleading and scrutinise the reality of what is being said.

The scrutiny of the March Budget saw the Government’s triumphalist claims fall apart under the weight of reality. Debt forecasts are up, growth is down, and public services are continuing to be chipped away, with inner-city constituencies such as mine hit the hardest. We saw little ambition to enable the fifth largest economy in the world to work for ordinary people, or any ambition truly to invest in our futures.

Two months on from the Budget, the new legislative programme is now before us. It comes with more triumphalist claims about life chances, but in reality those claims mask a Government coming apart at the seams. We know the Prime Minister’s eye is on Europe, and his potential successors are sizing up his job. It is a Tory Game of Thrones. The White Walkers are out to get him, but before we feel sorry for this beleaguered Prime Minister struggling to keep Britain in the EU, let us remember that it is his weakness before his party and his MPs that has brought us to the brink of an exit from Europe—an exit that would be disastrous for our country.

Let us look at the Queen’s Speech. It is possible that not everything in it will be bad. It is possible that the lifetime savings Bill is a positive development, but we cannot be sure without seeing the detail. There is a lot more that is not good for Britain and will exacerbate the public service crisis. Above all, there is a glaring gap, which is a lack of purpose and a lack of direction. The programme does not even attempt to tackle the country’s many challenges, which include: a growing housing crisis with a need for many more social, intermediate and affordable homes; an ageing population and health inequalities; a skills deficit and productivity gap that contribute to chronic low growth; and an air pollution crisis in our capital and, as I understand it, elsewhere.

Ministers claim that the programme is about life chances and a one nation approach, but let us look at what is happening. There is a growing gap in life chances across the country. The Government’s own Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission says:

“There is a gulf between today’s divided Britain and the ‘one nation’ the Prime Minister desires to lead.”

The commission says there is

“a growing social divide by income and by class.”

Wealth inequality has risen for the first time in almost a decade, says that deeply socialist paper, the Financial Times. The Institute for Fiscal Studies says two thirds of children in poverty live in working households, up from just over half in five years. The number of children living in absolute poverty, after housing costs, has risen by 500,000. Public services are under ever more pressure, and things are getting markedly worse than they were in 2010.

NHS waiting times in England are longer, with more than 3.5 million people on waiting lists. A&E has seen the worst performance figures on record, with patients waiting longer to be seen. There are also longer waiting times to see a GP. Cuts to older people’s care have seen delayed discharges from hospitals reaching a record high. Cuts to nurse training places have led to staff shortages, and also created a massive financial hole as agency staff have had to be hired to cover the vacancies.

There are fewer police and fewer firefighters. Social services are under strain, and social worker vacancies are on the rise. Sure Start centres have closed. Teachers and doctors are leaving the professions. Museums and libraries have been decimated, leaving children and families without basic educational resources to supplement their schooling. House building is at its lowest since the 1920s, and homelessness in London has leapt 80% since 2010. These are not just figures, but personal stories of anguish. We are seeing a real impact on lives, on jobs, and, ultimately, on life chances. That is the real story of Britain under Conservative rule.

I must praise the valiant efforts of councils, especially Labour councils, to try to keep things running. They are innovating, but with the financial squeeze—a 25% cut in budget during the last Parliament and an 8% cut set for this one—and the policies of this Government, it is becoming ever more difficult to do so. That is the rub: the Government have the wrong priorities. Who supports what is happening in the NHS—the unnecessary reorganisation and the attack on junior doctors? It is certainly not the patients or NHS staff. The NHS is a prized national asset and provider of collective health security. The Government’s approach is more about the prejudices of the former Health Secretary and the bunker mentality of his successor. I am glad that there has been some backing down, but it is simply not enough.

Who supports the Government’s plans for the BBC? Looking at my postbag, it does not seem to be the licence fee payers, the actors or the programme makers. What benefit is it to Britain to run down the BBC, a prized national asset with a global reputation? The action seems to be more about the prejudices of the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. There has been a backing down, but it is not enough.

Who supports the forced academisation of all schools? It is not the teachers, the parents, the pupils, or even the Tory councils. What does it solve to force good schools to concentrate on unnecessary reorganisation? It is more about prejudices relating to state schools. There is little consideration of the real issues of falling school budgets, chronic teacher shortages, not enough good school places and children being left to fall behind. There has been another backing down on academisation, but why the need for so many U-turns, and why is the Bill even in the Queen’s speech? Those are just some examples of the wrong priorities; there are many more.

A long time ago, the Prime Minister said:

“We will trust the professionals.”

How little we hear of that now. The Government’s approach is riven with contradictions. The devolution agenda offers a real opportunity for improved services. I am talking about the opportunity to bring services together in localities and to use new technologies and ways of delivery. We also have new leadership. I am delighted that Sadiq Khan was elected Mayor in London and Marvin Rees in Bristol. There is a real opportunity there, but devolution is going hand in hand with a raft of Government cuts. It is the political interference that is having a lasting effect. The Government are driving the destruction of the sense of public value, public service, and public assets and the principles of collaboration and excellence. I plead with Ministers and Government Members to be a little more honest. The right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith), freed from the shackles of Cabinet responsibility, admitted when he resigned that there is a lack of fairness and compassion. He said that the disabled will be impacted by the Government’s policies, which have been

“enacted in order to meet the fiscal self-imposed restraints that I believe are more and more perceived as distinctly political rather than in the national economic interest.”

This Queen’s Speech is not about the challenges that are facing Britain. It is not an honest conversation about how public services can be improved and reshaped to meet the needs of all of us in the 21st century. Sadly, it is a missed opportunity from a Prime Minister who is running out of time to prove that he can leave a positive legacy for our public services and indeed for our country.