Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Margaret Greenwood Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 8th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)]

There can be no levelling up in the UK until there is a restoration of funding for the public services on which we all rely. Conservative Governments since 2010 have decimated funding to local authorities. Central Government funding for Wirral Council dropped 85% between 2010 and 2020. The impact on our communities is devastating. As a result, in Wirral West the future of libraries in Hoylake, Irby, Pensby and Woodchurch is uncertain, as is the future of Woodchurch leisure centre and swimming pool. Far from levelling up, the loss of those facilities means the running down and impoverishment of the lives of everyone who relies on the services. How short-sighted of the Government to ignore the importance of libraries, pools and leisure centres.

There can be no levelling up until the Government provide building blocks for educational progression for adults in all communities. The Learning and Work Institute highlighted that more than 9 million adults have low literacy or numeracy skills, 13 million have low digital skills and more than 850,000 people say that they cannot speak English well or at all, yet the number of adults taking classes to improve their skills has fallen significantly in recent years. Those numbers are stark, yet the Government have failed to understand how important such provision is for levelling up opportunity across the country.

There can be no levelling up when around 4 million children are living in poverty and the cost of living crisis is threatening to push many more into poverty. Why does the Bill not address food insecurity? Between April 2021 and March 2022, 2.1 million emergency food parcels were given to people in crisis by food banks in the Trussell Trust network.

There can be no levelling up for all generations if the Government repeatedly fail to act on the climate crisis. They should ban fracking and underground coal gasification once and for all. Instead, they have commissioned the British Geological Survey to advise on the latest scientific evidence around shale gas extraction. We do not need a review to know that fracking is not the answer to our energy needs. Exploring the extraction of fossil fuels is an absurd and irresponsible response to the climate crisis. As Greenpeace UK said, the Government should stop

“pandering to fracking obsessives who aren’t up to speed with the realities of 21st century energy”.

The Better Planning Coalition, a group of 27 organisations across the housing, planning, environmental, transport and heritage sectors, said that

“the current proposals for new Environmental Outcome Reports give far too much leeway to Ministers to amend and replace vital aspects of environmental law.”

The coalition is concerned that those

“powers could be used to weaken essential safeguards for nature”.

It believes:

“Any new environmental assessment system should be set out in primary legislation, not in secondary…and clearly deliver for nature, climate, cultural heritage and landscape.”

The recent announcement by Leverhulme Estate that it has submitted planning applications to build 788 homes on the green belt in Wirral is a matter of real concern, as local residents and campaigners have made clear to me. The Government must introduce much stronger protection for the green belt. It is incredibly important for the health and wellbeing of people who live nearby and has an important part to play in our response to the climate and ecological emergency, supporting habitats for wildlife and allowing nature to flourish.

In conclusion, the Government are failing to provide our communities with the public services and facilities that they need; failing to tackle the crisis in adult literacy that is leaving many unable to realise their potential; failing to tackle poverty; and letting down both this and future generations on the environment. Put simply, the Government’s levelling-up Bill fails to deliver.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Margaret Greenwood Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 23rd November 2022 Commons Chamber

To conclude, I welcome the Bill. It sets out to achieve a lot, and I believe it will benefit from amendments made today. I look forward to seeing its progression in the other place and its final stages in due course.

[Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)]

I will focus my remarks on new clause 84, tabled in my name. I thank colleagues who have put their names to it.

New clause 84 would require the Government to include reducing geographical disparities in adult literacy as one of their levelling-up missions. Additionally, it would require them, during each mission period, to review levels of adult literacy in the UK, to publish the findings of that review and to set out a strategy to improve levels of adult literacy and eradicate illiteracy in the UK. I believe that that is vital.

Poor literacy skills and illiteracy often consign people to insecure and low-paid work. They are a form of deprivation that can lead to isolation and poverty and can leave people vulnerable to exploitation. They can also impact on their children, as people with very low literacy skills often lack the confidence and ability to read to their children when they are young or assist them with their homework when they are older. That compounds the problem and means that a whole cohort of children are disadvantaged due to a lack of support at home in learning to enjoy reading. Very low literacy levels also leave people unable to fulfil their potential in other ways, such as navigating opportunities for travel, training, housing, leisure or work.

It is quite remarkable that the most recent national survey of adult basic skills in England was the 2011 skills for life survey, commissioned by the previous Labour Government. The survey interviewed more than 7,200 adults aged 16-65 in England and assessed their literacy, numeracy and information and communications technology skills. Their skills were assessed against the five lowest national qualification framework levels, which are entry levels 1 to 3 and levels 1 and 2.

As a guide, entry level 1 is equivalent to the expected level of attainment for pupils aged 5 to 6; entry level 2 to that for ages 7 to 9 and entry level 3 to that for ages 9 to 11. Adults with literacy skills at entry level 3 or below are deemed to be functionally illiterate. The survey found that in 2011 5.1 million adults, or 14.9% of the adult population, had literacy levels at entry level 3 or below, meaning that they were functionally illiterate.

The survey looked at differences between the regions in England and found that rates of functional illiteracy varied considerably. The highest levels were in London at 28% and the lowest were in the rest of the south-east and the south-west at 9%. Those figures demonstrate clear disparities among the regions, although one reason thought to be behind the high figure for London was the much higher proportion of adults living there for whom English is not their first spoken language.

However, analysis of only those adults with English as a first language shows that their rates of functional illiteracy were still highest in London and the north-east, both at 17%. Meanwhile, in the south-east, they were almost half that level at 9% and in the south-west 8%, while the national average was 12%. Those are the findings of the 2011 survey.

In 2022, according to the National Literacy Trust, 7.1 million adults in England can be described as functionally illiterate—so clearly things have got worse, not better. Such people can understand accurately and independently short, straightforward text on familiar topics, and obtain information from everyday sources, but reading information from unfamiliar sources or topics could cause problems.

Those 7.1 million adults represent 16.4%—or one in six—of the adult population in England. In Scotland, one in four adults experiences challenges because of a lack of literacy skills; in Northern Ireland, one in five adults has poor literacy skills; and in Wales, one in eight adults lacks basic literacy skills. That represents a crisis, and one that requires immediate attention from the Government. It is shameful that there has been no follow-up by the Government to the 2011 skills for life survey, which was commissioned by the last Labour Government. Why has there been no survey since?

We are considering levelling up, so it is important to understand that there are also regional disparities in the take-up of adult education in general. Nesta noted in its 2020 report, “Education for all: making the case for a fairer adult learning system”:

“There are major differences in the rates of participation in adult learning in different parts of the UK”.

According to its analysis,

“the South West and London stood out from the other regions, reporting higher participation levels of about 16 per cent. In contrast, Northern Ireland reported participation of around 10 per cent,”

and participation was also low in the north-east of England. It also found huge differences in participation within individual regions. For instance, the analysis showed that London had the greatest variation in participation of any region; the participation of adults in the west and north-west of outer London was 18%, compared with just 12% in the east of inner London. 

Stephen Evans, the chief executive of the Learning and Work Institute, recently said that

“We need to level up lifelong learning”

and that

“we’re limiting people’s opportunities based on who they are and where they’re from. We’ve got to change that.”

I think he is absolutely right, and I hope the Minister takes note. Improving levels of adult literacy is important not only for empowering individuals to make the most of their lives, but for the economy, too. The millions of people who struggle to read and write undoubtedly make up a large proportion of those furthest away from the labour market.

As the WEA has noted, employers say that they value essential skills such as communication, teamwork and creative thinking, as well as the foundation of literacy, numeracy and digital skills. The CBI says that over 90% of the workforce will need to retrain by 2030. Clearly, those who struggle to read and write must be a priority for the Government if we are to improve productivity and address inequality. 

Organisations such as the Good Things Foundation do important work on digital literacy and supporting people in need. Digital literacy skills are very important and have become more so as the world of work and methods of communication have changed drastically in recent years. However, people need literacy skills to acquire digital literacy, so we need action from the Government. It is notable that the Government introduced a £560 million adult numeracy programme last year, but there was nothing for literacy. Why? It is an essential skill for life in the 21st century. The Institute for Fiscal Studies cited a 50% fall in spending on classroom-based adult education between 2010-11 and 2020-21. That represents a massive cut in the provision of community-based adult learning opportunities, which are crucial for the delivery of adult literacy.

Addressing the crisis in adult literacy is a matter of real urgency if we are to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to reach their potential and if we are to address the economic challenges that our country faces. It makes absolutely no sense for the Government to continue ignoring this crisis. There can be no levelling up in the UK without a focused and well-resourced response to the crisis in adult literacy. I call on Members across the House to support new clause 84.

[Ben Bradley (Mansfield) (Con)]

It is nice to be called near the beginning of a debate, Mr Deputy Speaker; I am grateful that I have managed to catch your eye—perhaps it is because I have put a tie on today. I am also grateful for the chance to speak on Report, as I sat on the Bill Committee in its latter stages, but for only five of the many, many sessions that the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris) mentioned, so I experienced only a fraction of the joy that he did.

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak given my interest both in this place and as the leader of a council that is directly involved in devolution negotiations. Indeed, they are probably some of the more advanced negotiations and, to proceed, they require the Bill to pass. I thank the Minister for her response on a number of technical points in recent days and weeks, and for her commitment to this agenda, which I know she is passionate about.

The amendments focus largely on devolution in combined authorities. As I have repeated, I am frustrated that the planning parts are even in the Bill. It started as a Levelling-Up Bill, but planning was added to it later and has complicated it and made it difficult and controversial. Those could have been two separate things. We could have flown through this very quickly. I know it is before the Minister’s time, so I do not expect her to account for that, but the Bill could have been far simpler than it now is. The timing of all this is vital for the delivery of some of these combined authorities. If the Bill is delayed, it will delay the timeline for the delivery of these outcomes that we all seek, so it is important that the Bill is allowed to progress quickly.

Since my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) said some 18 months ago that these deals would be a key driver for levelling up, progress has been positive. Mansfield is often at the wrong end of many tables that would put it front and centre of the levelling-up agenda, so we wanted to be at the front of the queue for new powers and new funds. We are currently consulting on a new devolution deal, worth £1.14 billion initially in additional gainshare funding into our region, plus powers over transport, skills and economic development.

Huge opportunities for us stem from this Bill and from other existing growth projects across the region, whether that is our freeport, our development company, which is also formalising and given its powers through this Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill, integrated rail plan projects or spherical tokamak for energy production—STEP fusion—which was recently announced for north Nottinghamshire. When painting out this opportunity for business clubs, residents and education providers recently, I have used the STEP fusion example. It is a £20 billion project with investment from the Government and the UK Atomic Energy Authority that could put us front and centre of clean energy for the world in 20 or 30 years’ time. It is a huge, long-term project, and what devolution gives us—I would like to think this is part of why our area was attractive for the bid—is the ability not only to have a prototype power plant in the future, but to create the skills environment and training opportunities around it, working with our colleges and universities so that local children can take up those courses and move into that space. That way, rather than just importing nuclear scientists from other parts of the world, young people in places such as Mansfield are given the opportunity to build and create.

The deal also means we will have the power to fill in the gaps in our transport system and ensure local people can easily access those opportunities and get to and from those jobs. That is game changing. There will be kids in my constituency who, in 20 years’ time, will work not just in nuclear science but in its supply chain who could never have dreamed of those opportunities on their doorstep even just a few months ago. The power of this deal and these opportunities is incredibly meaningful. Finally, the east midlands can be in the premier league alongside other regional partners; I hope we will do a bit better than Forest so far, although things are picking up. The project is a huge opportunity.

I welcome new clauses 61 and 62, which enhance the powers of Mayors over that key route network. Members will not be surprised by this if they have campaigned in elections, particularly local elections, but highways are always at the top of residents’ list. They are probably the one service, particularly at upper-tier, county level, that everybody uses and experiences, so they are always top of the list. More power and opportunity to engage in this space and work with National Highways on a wider range of networks and to do that more closely and in a more joined-up way is beneficial. I also look forward to the negotiations for our region around this transport pot and investment that is part of our deal and is yet to come.

I am afraid I cannot support new clause 71 tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice). I appreciate that he was making a particular case for his area, and he was right to do so; we all do the same thing. But one benefit of devolution—the Government have said that every area across the country will have the right to access this opportunity—is the chance to have some clarity and consistency within a structure that is currently incredibly complicated. I speak for an area that has, arguably, three tiers of local government. We see a combined authority as an opportunity to make coherent sense of that and to pull us into a structure that allows us to have shared strategies.

Other areas might take a different view, but it is not inconsistent or unrealistic to say that if someone wants the same powers as the west midlands, for example, they should have the same accountable structure as the west midlands. That will allow Government to have a consistent relationship with each region and each part of the country with those regional Mayors. That is my personal view from my experience of that engagement. If, having devolved powers, built structures and offered everyone that chance, we end up with a more complicated structure with different systems across the country, that would be a bad thing.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ben Bradley]

I agree with the hon. Lady’s premise; I have made the same case to Government myself. I simply point out that last year’s Treasury report, which I was reading this morning, which laid out the conclusions of an initial review of business rates, set out a five-year timetable for change. It is not as powerful or as fast as I would like, but that review has already begun and therefore new clause 46 appears to duplicate action where it is already happening.

As we heard from the hon. Member for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood), new clause 84 seeks to get adult literacy written into levelling-up missions, but, as far as I can see, that is largely already there. The missions already speak to more people achieving basic standards of reading and writing, as well as improving skills, while one of the key strands of the devolved settlements is adult skills. It is fantastic that that is passed down to a regional level, giving us the opportunity to have far more clout and say over how such skills are delivered, so I think adult skills, such as numeracy and literacy, are at the forefront of the Bill as it stands.

[Margaret Greenwood]

Will the hon. Gentleman therefore be supporting new clause 84?

[Ben Bradley]

As I just said, as far as I can see, the provision is already there and therefore the new clause is unnecessary. Our conversations about devolution within the region have revolved massively around adult skills. In the future, I would like to see Government further devolve powers in related areas, particularly around provision delivered by such organisations as the Department for Work and Pensions, so that there will be a chance to engage in employability conversations and boost basic skills. I look forward to conversations about that in the future.

From conversations with officials and Ministers, it is clear that once we have the framework and structure, we can come back and talk about new things we would like to see devolved down to our region. That is an example of an area where Whitehall struggles to join things up and where such matters can fall through the gaps in a siloed system. One of my favourite examples of that is youth work, which sits across about six Departments so a joined-up strategy is difficult to achieve. If we can devolve such matters to a regional level, we will be able to share budgets and strategies and do things more effectively. I hope we will be able to have those conversations with Government in the future.

My final point is about flexibility in local budgets. I had the honour of hosting the local government Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley), in Nottinghamshire a few weeks ago. We went into great detail about the council budget, the opportunities and risks of it, and some of the things that could be done that do not cost the Government any money. In the spirit of empowering local leaders and devolving powers to local areas, it is key to give them more flexibility over existing budgets.

If I had the same budget in my local authority but all the rules and ringfences about what I could spend it on were removed, I would have a surplus and I would not have a problem. The lack of flexibility in the system means that I can spend the budget only on certain things that are not always the priority. There is a good opportunity, whether in the upcoming local government settlement or in the 2023 devolution deals and beyond, to genuinely empower local council leaders to be able to take decisions on funding key priorities.

I will point to one example. In common with many people, I have a bus service improvement fund in Nottinghamshire County Council that allows me to build bus lanes. At the same time, I have a shortfall in the funding that I need to keep the buses running. I could end up in a scenario where I have to build bus lanes, but I have no buses to run in them, even though the money is already in my bank account and if I were allowed to do so, I could spend it on keeping the buses. That is just one example, and there are many more. Flexibility and empowerment of local councils and leaders is hugely important. I am pleased that the Government have committed to that through devolution, but there is more that could be done to support the sustainability of local councils too.

In conclusion, the timescales of the Bill are hugely important. It needs to be completed on time in the spring or early summer if we are to pass statutory instruments and stick to timetables and targets for elections in 2024. I urge the Government to push the Bill through and ensure that we meet those timescales, otherwise my region will be stranded: the deal will be done, the structures will be in place and everything will be ready to go, but we will have to wait another year for another set of elections. That seems arbitrary and would be incredibly frustrating. We are at the front of the queue and we just want to be let in the door. I trust that the Government will recognise the importance of delivering on those commitments. I look forward, of course, to speaking to the Minister in due course about the success of Mansfield’s levelling-up fund bid—she may hear that from a few hon. Members in this debate—so there are many conversations still to have.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dehenna Davison]

I thank right hon. and hon. Members for their contributions, and I put on record again my thanks to all the Members who served in Committee during the somewhat lengthy consideration of the Bill. I will endeavour to respond to the points that have arisen today, but before I do, I re-emphasise the importance that the Government place on the three interconnected themes from our debate: devolution, regeneration and levelling up. Local power exercised accountably is the only way that we will extend opportunity throughout our country. Too often, Governments have fallen into the trap of thinking that controlling more will make local areas more effective, but the lessons of the past 70 years are clear: that approach does not work and we must trust local areas with the tools to build their futures.

Let me turn to some of the individual matters that Members raised. My right hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice) is not yet back in his place, but I was grateful for his incredibly passionate contribution and his rousing speech about the wonderful, unique qualities of Cornwall. I look forward to visiting Cornwall soon and to working with him and other Cornwall colleagues on progressing a deal that works for the people of Cornwall.

My right hon. Friend spoke to amendment 70, on which I point him and other concerned Members to clause 68, which would amend the statutory test so that the Secretary of State has to consider

“the economic, social and environmental well-being of some or all of the people who live or work”

in an area. That means that the impacts of devolution on an area’s community, including those identifying as belonging to a national minority, such as the Cornish, would be duly considered under social wellbeing when deciding whether the test is met. Hopefully, that provides some reassurance.

My right hon. Friend also spoke about new clause 71, on whether the framework for a tier 3 deal is accessible without a Mayor. We in the Government are committed to that framework. We believe that directly elected Mayors with a clear path of accountability and a convening power to make change happen is really important, but the key point is that there will be no imposition from Government to have a Mayor. It is for local areas to decide what tier of deal they want to access. If they do not want to access a tier 3 deal and impose a Mayor, clearly, that option is available to them. Also, if they wish to, the framework allows them to deepen devolution later at their own pace. The Government are not imposing these measures. It is for local areas to decide what will work best for them in the framework that we have set out.

My hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (James Grundy) is a great and passionate advocate for his constituents and his constituency. I heard loud and clear his point about Leigh station and I will raise that with colleagues at the Department for Transport. He raised the point about how a one-size-fits-all approach does not necessarily always work. That is why it is so important that we negotiate deals on a local basis, so that every deal we have is negotiated with local authorities and other local stakeholders to ensure that it will work for the local area.

My hon. Friend raised a good point about engagement with Members of Parliament. Although I am relatively new to my role, I certainly want to endeavour to do that better as we progress devolution, either in existing deals or when we look at new devolution deals in the future.

I am incredibly grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle (John Stevenson) for his support on devolution and on the importance of strong, accountable local leadership. I am pleased to see his gung-ho passion for rolling out Mayors across the country, but as my hon. Friend the Member for Leigh says, not every area wants a Mayor. I do not believe that we should be imposing Mayors without local consent, but I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle that we do not want any areas being left behind. I am happy to engage with him and with the Northern Research Group on the question of how best to further the devolution agenda in his region and across England.

My hon. Friend the Member for Mansfield (Ben Bradley) made the crucial point that timing is vital. We need the Bill to get Royal Assent in a timely fashion to ensure that some of the devolution deals we have agreed get over the line in time for the elections in 2024. I know that my hon. Friend recognises the incredible opportunities that a devolution deal can bring to his local residents. He spoke about the need for simpler funding; the Department is exploring the issue and will publish a funding simplification strategy in due course.

[Margaret Greenwood]

I am not sure whether the Minister was in the Chamber for the remarks that the hon. Member for Mansfield (Ben Bradley) made about new clause 84, which would require the Government to make

“reducing geographical disparities in adult literacy”

one of their missions, and to set out a plan

“to improve levels of adult literacy and eradicate illiteracy”.

The hon. Member seems to think that the Bill makes provision for that. It does not. Does the Minister agree that addressing adult literacy is a core issue if we are to get the very best out of everybody and give everybody the opportunities they need?

[Dehenna Davison]

The hon. Member must have read my mind, because hers is next on my list of points to address. I am grateful for her passionate contribution on adult literacy. We all agree in this House that education is vital to levelling up, but the Bill is designed to provide a framework for the formation of missions rather than to set out the missions themselves. She will have seen in the White Paper some of the missions that we have published, which refer to educational attainment. I also point her to the Government’s work in other areas, such as funding courses for adults who do not have a level 2 English or maths qualification so that they can get those skills.

The hon. Member for Hemsworth (Jon Trickett) raised several issues relating to social mobility. I was most struck by his point about inter-village transport; I face that issue in my constituency, so I can very much relate to it. Some of the devolution deals that we have negotiated and are looking to negotiate will mean more transport powers being conveyed to local areas and Mayors. That provides an opportunity for a rethink of how local transport is operated. As we spread more devolution deals around the country, that opportunity will be brought to more local areas. The hon. Member’s point has been heard loud and clear.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Margaret Greenwood Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 13th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Margaret Greenwood is the last Member with four minutes, and then we will move to a three-minute limit.

[Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. This Bill introduces national development management policies, or NDMPs, which will have primacy over local development plans, meaning that those plans could be easily and rapidly rendered out of date by changes to national policies. My constituents who are campaigning to protect the green belt will be concerned about that, and I pay tribute to them and support their campaign.

The Bill states:

“If to any extent the development plan conflicts with a national development management policy, the conflict must be resolved in favour of the national development management policy”,

so local democratic processes for determining planning decisions could be seriously undermined. New clause 73 in my name would ensure that the Government cannot use NDMPs to allow housing to be built on green-belt land. It is remarkable that, despite the Bill introducing NDMPs, the Government have not set out what will be in their scope. Surely the Government would want to be clear about that before legislating for their introduction.

It is clear that, under the Conservatives, there has not been sufficient protection for the green belt. According to the Campaign to Protect Rural England, more than 42% of planning applications submitted for green-belt land in the 10 years to 2020 were granted, and importantly, the report also points out that there is sufficient brownfield land for more than 1 million homes.

Part 5 of the Bill replaces the current system of environmental impact assessments and strategic environmental assessments with a new environmental outcomes report regime. New clause 72 would require EOR regulations made under part 5 to be subject to the super-affirmative procedure to ensure a high level of scrutiny. EIAs and SEAs have been vital to the protection of sites of local, national and international environmental importance for decades. They set out and assess the impacts that developments may have on the environment, and help local authorities to decide on planning applications. It is a matter of extreme concern that a huge amount of detail—including information on which plans and projects EORs will apply to—is deferred to secondary legislation. In effect, the Bill gives a blank cheque to Ministers to change environmental protections in the planning system. The super-affirmative procedure should be used to provide much-needed greater parliamentary oversight.

The Bill currently states that, before making any EOR regulations that contain provision for what the specified environmental outcomes are to be, the Secretary of State must have regard to the current environmental improvement plan. This omits crucial considerations such as the preservation of the green belt, the protection of heritage and climate obligations, which should be central to any environmental assessment process. Amendment 63 addresses that omission. It is vital for the Secretary of State, as well as having regard to considerations such as protecting the green belt and meeting our climate obligations, to have regard to the protection of heritage when setting EOR regulations, because heritage and the historical character of the places where we live are immensely important.

The green belt is not safe in the hands of the Conservatives, and the Bill should be strengthened to provide much greater protections for it. People will not forgive politicians who concrete over the rural landscapes that they value so much. Nor can we trust this Government to protect the environment and address the climate emergency: that was made abundantly clear last week by the Secretary of State’s decision to grant permission for a new coal mine in Cumbria, a shocking decision which has attracted the attention, and the concern, of John Kerry, the United States climate envoy.

In 2019, the UK Parliament declared a climate and environment emergency. I call on the Government to accept new clauses 72 and 73 and amendment 63, which I believe would strengthen the Bill.

[Andrew Lewer (Northampton South) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak to new clause 12, which is tabled in my name and which would introduce new requirements to encourage the development of small brownfield sites. I thank colleagues on both sides of the House who have supported it. I do not propose to put it to a vote, because the Housing and Planning Minister—my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Lucy Frazer)—has indicated her interest in it and given assurances that it will be part of the Government’s future thinking.

We should all know the scale of the crisis that we are facing. In 2003, 59% of households led by someone aged between 25 and 34 owned their homes; by 2020, the figure had fallen to 47%. At this rate, we are destined to see the majority of people under 50 doomed to a life of permanent renting.

Because of increasing wage-to-house-price ratios, we are witnessing a steady fall in home ownership. In 2019, 65% of households in England owned their homes, a fall from 71% in 2003. The decline in home ownership has been especially pronounced in younger age groups: the number of homeowners aged between 25 and 34 has fallen from 59% to 41%. That puts more and more pressure on the private rented sector. Rental demand is up 142% when compared with the five-year average, while supply is down by 46%. Rents are soaring as a result.

We are having this debate later than was intended, largely owing to the issue of housing targets. They are not the preserve of the left or liberals; Sir Keith Joseph was attacking Labour for not having them in the early 1960s. And I take issue with the phrase “housing target”. This is not a target, but a minimum need. It is a gaping, strategic deficit, and a clear and present danger to economic growth.

There is a need to make tough decisions. It is time to lead and not to follow. Abolishing housing targets is an example of failing by following, and opening ourselves up to the accusation of acting for perceived short- term political gain. The best time to build a house was 20 years ago; the second best time is now. As a Conservative, I believe that one of the Government’s best attributes is their ability to indicate and signal to the markets, and in this case we must do all we can to let the markets know that it is time to build—and yes, to build beautifully too.

The national Government of this country nationalised land use via the Town and Country Planning Act 1947, which is still in force. Since 2001, the population of this country has increased by 8 million. That is on the national Government as well. The national Government cannot have nationalised land use and restrictions, and be responsible for such a massive population increase, and then turn round and say, “It’s localism, isn’t it?” It is not localism, and the dropping of targets is a very unfortunate step.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Margaret Greenwood Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 17th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Maclean]

I want to reiterate my thanks to my former colleague, my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Dehenna Davison), who did so much to shepherd the Bill to its current position. I completely agree with her. The best way to ensure levelling up across the country is by voting Conservative, because we have done more than any other Government to spread opportunity around the country.

To avoid anything that would duplicate the work I just mentioned, we have tabled an amendment that will require the Government to have regard to the needs of rural communities in preparing the statement of levelling-up missions. That is consistent with the approach we have taken in other areas, including with respect to the devolved Administrations.

We have heard the concerns highlighted through Lords amendment 199 on access to banking facilities for communities, and we share those concerns. Branch closures are commercial decisions for banks, and we do not believe that a blanket requirement on local authorities to produce strategies to inhibit that would be effective or proportionate. Instead, the Treasury will continue to support the roll-out of alternative services, such as banking hubs, which will ensure that communities across the country have access to the facilities they need.

[Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)]

On Lords amendment 199, a lot of constituents have written to me with their concerns about bank closures. In West Kirby in my constituency, when the last bank closes next year there will be a banking hub, but it will not meet the needs of everyone across the constituency. Does the Minister agree that banks, post offices and so forth are incredibly important, particularly for those who are not able to or do not have the facility to access the internet and do their transactions online? Will she reconsider that position?