Coastal Towns (Government Policy)

Martin Vickers Excerpts

Tuesday 20th July 2010 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Andrew Stunell)]

It is good to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Amess. Thank you very much for inviting colleagues to intervene; I very much appreciated that invitation.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Boston and Skegness (Mark Simmonds) for bringing this subject to the Chamber. The fact that 10 Members have contributed to the debate and another six would have liked to is an indication of its importance. My hon. Friend tried to hide his light under a bushel, but failed because several hon. Members shook that bushel. He was, of course, the author of “No longer the end of the line” and has been a vigorous exponent of his cause for a long while. I thank him for that and for the eloquence of his contribution today. I shall do my best to answer the questions put by him and other hon. Members, but I will have to keep an eye on the time and be mindful of possible interventions.

As several hon. Members said, we should not talk down either the continuing appeal of our seaside towns or their potential. Anecdotes were related during the debate, but objective evidence was provided by Sheffield Hallam university, with the support of the Department for Communities and Local Government, which showed that coastal and seaside areas still have a very strong appeal and great potential for the future. That report, which was published last month, found that our seaside tourist industry is alive and well and continuing to grow. I will not repeat the figures that were given in the debate because we are running short of time. Let me make it clear, though, that the coalition Government recognise that coastal and seaside towns face many real problems. They all have unique histories and often differ widely in their economic, social and physical situations and indeed in their history and reputation. None the less, they face some common challenges, which include poor transport links, a dependence on low-wage and low-skill jobs, high levels of benefit claimants, low educational attainment—there is a mixed view on that, but it is a serious problem in some places—and shared private rented housing.

The Government believe that such challenges are best tackled through local solutions. In response to the hon. Member for Blackpool South (Mr Marsden), I am not talking about completely turning off the tap. The point at issue here is who decides how the money is spent. After considering example after example, we are clear that local areas need to be free to determine their own future. They need to be freed from central Government direction and regulation. Let me pick up on two points that were made in respect of that matter. The new Government will give each local authority the capacity to have its personalised approach to HMOs, rather than a blanket central prescription. That is the way to target what needs to be done without imposing burdens on those who do not need them.

My hon. Friend the Member for Redcar (Ian Swales) mentioned the planning system and the way in which it might result in projects being imposed on an area. We are devolving the planning framework to local authorities, so that they can establish their local plans and have the freedom to take those decisions. We are putting power into the hands of local people and local communities, which is very much at the heart of the big society.

[Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)]

I accept what the Minister says about intervention and passing down power to local authorities. Will he also tell us about the powers that local authorities have in relation to Government agencies, such as the Environment Agency and Natural England, whereby they are mandated to do something, rather than given advice?

[Andrew Stunell]

We are, of course, having a cull of quangos. I cannot answer the hon. Gentleman’s specific point, but if he wants to draw my attention to particularly unhelpful prescriptive measures being imposed on his local area, I would be very happy to hear from him.

That leads me nicely on to the fact that we are publishing, probably in December, the localism Bill, which will devolve greater powers to councils and to neighbourhoods so that local communities can shape their own future. We want to give local communities, including those on the coast, the tools and incentives to support business growth and to create an enterprise culture. We recognise that coastal towns have unique challenges and that they need locally tailored solutions. It would be a mistake for us to say, “Here is the guide book that will apply equally to all the resorts in Britain.” That is why we are inviting local authorities and business leaders to come together to form local enterprise partnerships to replace the existing regional development agencies. The Secretaries of State for the Departments for Communities and Local Government and for Business, Innovation and Skills have already written to local councils and business leaders inviting them to come forward with proposals. I know that a number of coastal local authorities are already considering proposals that would take them into local enterprise partnerships. The list with which I have been provided includes the Fylde coast in Lancashire, which may or may not include Fleetwood—incidentally, I will not be trying whelks any time soon, given what has been said—Bournemouth, Poole and Dorset and Portsmouth, Southampton and Hampshire. I am sure that others will be doing the same. Those local enterprise partnerships will empower groups of councils and businesses working together to provide the strategic leadership that their areas need to set out local economic priorities.