Budget Resolutions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Wednesday 6th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is quite surreal to follow the hon. Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell). Like him, I believe in small business, but small business growth will not solve the problems in the public sector, which has been squeezed during 14 years of this Tory Government until the pips squeak. However good it is, small business will not refill council coffers and ensure basic social services and special educational needs in schools. Small business will not solve the NHS waiting lists or bring schools off their knees.

This Government and the Government of the austerity years have caused all those problems, and crashed the economy in September 2022, leaving families and businesses crushed. Those who survived the pandemic have faced real hardship since. This is a Budget of a desperate Government—another slew of promises that will not be delivered on. That is what we focus on in the Public Accounts Committee: delivery. We look at optimistic, sometimes well-intentioned promises that fail because there is no plan for delivery.

In my own borough we see such poverty. Earlier today, in Prime Minister’s questions, the Prime Minister said that equality has increased and inequality has reduced under his Government. Not in my borough, as 48% of children in Hackney—nearly one in two—live in poverty after housing costs are taken into account. Even in inner London, we are the 22nd most deprived local authority in England. There is real, day-to-day poverty. I invite anyone to join me on my doorstep surgeries and see the reality.

Let me tell the House a story about that reality. I could choose many constituents, but I visited a particular lady just a few weeks ago, who lives in a two-bedroom council flat with her husband and four daughters. The flat is only marginally bigger than my office in this building, and only a bit smaller than a Committee Room. Three of her daughters share a very small bedroom with bunk beds. The toddler shares with her parents. The bathroom and kitchen are so tiny that two people at a time hardly fit. They share one living space.

Government failures over housing and Brexit mean that children are leaving London. For my constituent, that means that the local school is closing because rolls are dropping. The cost of housing means that they have no prospect of moving anywhere else, because of the shortage of properties in the social rented sector, where more than 8,000 households are on the waiting list. According to the most recent verified figures, only 671 homes became available during 2021-22, compared with more than 1,200 in 2016-17. Both of those figures are outstripped by demand.

The cost of housing means that many people are being shipped out to temporary homes, ripped from their schools, churches, mosques and communities. That means that my constituent’s local school is closing, as are others. On top of the overcrowding, her four daughters need to move schools. They are a working family who want to do well, but they have little opportunity. Down the road is the product of the Government’s free school policy: a school with 25 pupils per class. Members who know how schools funding works will know that that school will never be financially sustainable, because schools are funded on 30, 60 or 90 pupils per class. The trust that has taken it over from the one that failed is struggling with the finances. A brand-new building has been built, but it is unsustainable, while other schools are closing thanks to Government policies.

The housing costs across my borough are absolutely wretched. So many people are renting privately but unaffordably. More people rent socially than privately, but they live in overcrowded conditions. An average two-bed rent is just under £2,000 a month. There are 30% fewer privately rented properties available now on Rightmove compared with before the pandemic, and no properties available to those on low incomes at local housing allowance rates. This is the real, day-to-day impact of Government policy. So many people are housed outside the borough.

[Chris Grayling (Epsom and Ewell) (Con)]

Forgive me if I misunderstand how our system of government works, but social housing in the hon. Lady’s constituency is the responsibility of the Labour Mayor of London, is it not?

--- Later in debate ---

[Dame Meg Hillier]

I do not have time to explain, but no; it is the responsibility of the council. Many properties were sold off under right to buy, which means that fewer properties are available. People like my constituent are living cheek by jowl with people in private rented accommodation, often sold to cash buyers if it is above seven storeys, who pay private rents at the rate that I mentioned. The differential is extraordinary, and it means that no one can move from one to the other. The social rented housing that is so desperately needed because of the cost of buying or renting private housing is not available.

Under this Mayor and the previous Mayor, my borough has been building council housing for social rent, as have many housing association partners, but because there is no Government subsidy, every time they build a social rent they pretty much have to build another to sell at market rate in order to cross-subsidise. That is a quick lesson in social housing economics. That shows the detachment, because people in this Chamber do not realise the reality of life for so many in London.

Let us look at the real human impacts. There are 3,777 children in temporary accommodation in Hackney—enough to fill eight primary schools, and equivalent to 1% of the borough’s population. Those children want to live in London but cannot afford to do so. Not only that, but they are being passed from pillar to post, from temporary accommodation to temporary accommodation, and moving school regularly. This is a squeeze on opportunity.

For those at the higher end who might be able to get on to the housing ladder, the lifetime ISA is an opportunity missed in the Budget because it provides support only for a property purchase of up to £450,000 nationally. That rate is higher in London, but even that does not cover the cost, given that, typically, a brand-new two-bedroom property costs £750,000. Who is able to afford that?

On public spending, the Chancellor merrily talked about reductions in spending in most Departments. I have not had time to go through the Red Book in detail, but we see a huge drop. The Home Office budget alone is going down significantly, which is a concern considering all the challenges in policing, immigration and other security issues that it has to deal with, and we could look at education, too. All those budgets are reducing.

There are big nasties out there in every Department that will cost money for whoever is in power. There is the civil nuclear decommissioning and rebuilding of our nuclear power stations, the nuclear enterprise and the costs of decommissioning nuclear submarines. We have not even decommissioned one of those—the first will be done in 2026—and that is becoming an urgent crisis.

There are 700,000 pupils in crumbling schools. These are just some issues where input is needed. On the schools budget, the Department for Education wanted £4 billion a year to build the new schools that were necessary, but it was granted £2.7 billion. We have already seen its capital budget reducing.

The Chancellor talked about public sector productivity and reform. The Public Accounts Committee, which I am proud to chair, examines that endlessly, and too often we see optimistic plans that do not deliver, as I said. He is already spending what he is promising to deliver on that. Let me tell hon. Members that this takes a long time. We need reform and digital transformation, but we cannot deliver those changes and budget savings overnight. We need a long-term approach—slow politics, if you like—where both sides of the House, whoever is in government, agree that some things just have to happen and should not be at the whim of a Government who are on their last desperate stages to try to prove that they have something to offer the British public.

[Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)]

The hon. Lady is making an excellent speech about all the things that were not in the Budget. Does she agree that the biggest missed opportunity is not investing in the green transition?

[Dame Meg Hillier]

There are so many missed opportunities. The child benefit issue was a mess of this Government’s making. They have now broken the independent taxation rule and that is a problem.

This Government have broken Britain. My constituents are worse off than they were 14 years ago, and worse still, they have no hope. We need to see a Government who will deliver hope, opportunity, housing and school improvements, and cut waiting lists. We need to mend broken Britain; we need a general election and a Labour Government now.