Budget Resolutions

Mick Whitley Excerpts

Monday 11th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

When the Chancellor was handed the keys to No. 11 in autumn 2022, he was presented by his supporters on the Government Benches as a safe pair of hands who could be trusted to salvage the public finances from the wreckage of the Tory car crash mini-Budget. Some 18 months later, anyone who still harboured a belief that either he or his party could be trusted with this nation’s finances will have been thoroughly disabused of that by a Budget that put the short-term interests of his party before the long-term needs of the country.

The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics expose the scale of the economic challenges we face. The UK is in the depths of the most prolonged period of economic stagnation since the 1950s, with GDP per capita having fallen over the past seven quarters. For the first time in history, living standards are set to fall over the lifetime of a Parliament. Once again, Britain resembles the sick man of Europe, beset by chronic levels of under-investment and the second slowest growth of any G7 economy. The Chancellor has learned nothing at all from the past 14 years of Tory economic failure. He still clings to the debunked fantasy that if more money is put in the pockets of the most well-off, it will, as if by magic, trickle down to everyone else. He still refuses to recognise the reality that if we want to grow the economy, we need to invest.

If we are serious about securing sustained long-term economic growth, we should begin by supporting the incomes of Britain’s real wealth creators: working-class households, who have been hit hardest of all by the cost of living crisis. That means putting more money in the pockets of the lowest earners through targeted measures such as increasing universal credit and scrapping the two-child benefit limit. That money will then flow into our local economies and high streets. Instead, the Chancellor has delivered tax cuts that the Institute for Fiscal Studies has estimated will disproportionately benefit higher earners, while threatening to blow a hole in the balance sheet with a further £46 billion in unfunded tax cuts.

As a result of the blanket cut to national insurance, we as Members of Parliament on an annual salary of £86,000 will be £750 a year better off. Meanwhile, someone in my constituency earning just £19,000 will be left worse off than before, as a result of the freeze to income tax thresholds. If the Chancellor believes that this Budget will stave off the electoral oblivion his party faces in the looming general election, he is sorely mistaken. He has grossly misread the public mood. Polling by Ipsos and YouGov shows that even with the UK tax burden at its highest rate in 70 years, voters overwhelmingly prioritise higher spending on public services over tax cuts.

In Birkenhead, where the average person is nearly £18,000 worse off in real terms than when Labour was last in power, residents see their local NHS services at breaking point. Their local council, which has had its central Government grant cut by more than 85% since 2010, is teetering from crisis to crisis, year on year. Yet not a single additional penny was committed in last week’s Budget to spending on health, education or social security. The British public understand what this Government do not: we cannot cut our way to growth. They remember how the Tories’ ideologically driven austerity programme derailed the tentative but promising economic recovery secured by the last Labour Government in the wake of the financial crisis, dragged down economic growth year on year and led to the worst decade for economic growth since the industrial revolution. They recognise that, far from austerity II, what Britain needs now is to invest in its crumbling infrastructure and overstretched and underfunded public services.

I must issue a word of warning to my friends on the Opposition Front Bench. The shadow Chancellor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves), has been clear about the dire economic situation that a Labour Government will inherit if Labour wins the next general election. That is an indisputable fact, but the language that we have heard from the shadow Chancellor and the shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones), in recent days—that we have maxed out the credit card and there is no magic money tree—will ring hollow in the ears of many of my constituents, who have seen the profits of the super-rich and big corporations soar during the pandemic and the cost of living crisis, at the expense of their own standards of living. They remain unconvinced that public service reform alone is enough to deliver the quality public services that they deserve.

Despite outward appearances, Britain remains a wealthy country, but that wealth is more unequally distributed than ever. I fear that unless my party is prepared to revisit its opposition to a wealth tax and to commit itself to genuine progressive tax reform, Labour will never be able to accomplish any of what it sets out to do, or what millions of voters believe that it must do.

Proposed Merger of Three UK and Vodafone

Mick Whitley Excerpts

Tuesday 19th September 2023 Westminster Hall

[Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure, Sir George, to serve under your chairmanship. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Stockport (Navendu Mishra) on securing this important debate. I also draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests regarding my membership of Unite the union.

Speaking more than a century ago, Theodore Roosevelt called for congressional action to curb the power and influence of trusts, remarking that

“the state not only has the right to control the great corporations, but is duty bound to control them whenever the need of such control is shown”.

The world has changed beyond recognition since Roosevelt launched his crusade to bust the trusts, but his message—that Governments have a democratic duty to protect their citizens from the aspirations of big businesses to become all-powerful monopolies—is as true now as it was then.

Around the globe, we are witnessing huge corporations’ increasingly aggressive merger and acquisition strategies. It is incumbent upon us to ensure that the interests of our constituents are not trampled over by corporate greed. Should the Three-Vodafone merger succeed, it would create the largest operator in the telecommunications market, with 27 million customers and a 35% market share. It would also reduce the number of mobile network operators in the UK market from four to three.

According to one study, which drew on data from 33 countries over 13 years, 43 telecoms mergers of this kind increased prices by an average of 16.3% per customer. For the average UK customer, that could mean a price hike of between £180 and £300 a year, which is an unaffordable sum for many of the 2.2 million households across the UK that already struggle to meet the costs of mobile services. With more than one in five people in the UK able to access the internet only through their smartphone, this merger also threatens to plunge even more people in Britain into digital poverty, at a time when we need to do more to narrow the digital divide.

As we have heard, this merger raises a number of issues for our national security, for our consumer rights and for the futures of thousands of workers who are currently employed by Three and Vodafone. As elected representatives, it is our responsibility to ensure that the proposed deal is subject to robust democratic scrutiny. However, that has become a near-impossible task, because Parliament has been almost totally excised from the scrutiny process. In fact, today’s debate is one of the few opportunities for Members to have a meaningful discussion about the proposed merger. Instead, the responsibility for ruling on whether the merger should proceed has been delegated to the investment security unit, under the direct oversight of the Cabinet Office, and ultimately the Prime Minister himself.

The Intelligence Security Committee has been scathing in its assessment of the process, stating that

“the Government does not want there to be any meaningful scrutiny of sensitive investment deals. Effective Parliamentary oversight is not some kind of ‘optional extra’—it is a vital safeguard in any functioning Parliamentary democracy.”

I hope the Minister will be able to say on what grounds the Government can justify excluding Members from being involved in scrutinising a proposal that has such enormous ramifications for the telecommunications sector.

This merger is a naked attempt to monopolise the telecommunications sector and strangle the opposition, leaving customers with no recourse when prices are inevitably hiked. There is only one right response. The Government should take the lead of the Competition and Markets Authority—which in August confirmed its original decision to block Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision—and kill this deal.

Football Index Collapse

Mick Whitley Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2022 Westminster Hall

[Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Ghani. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist) for securing this important debate.

The collapse of Football Index in March 2021 left a trail of human misery in its wake. Some £90 million-worth of open stakes has vanished, with an average loss of £3,000 per customer—a life-changing sum for anyone. For some of the people I represent, however, those losses have been far greater still. I have heard from pensioners whose entire life savings have been snatched away, and from constituents who lost more than £100,000 when the platform collapsed. My constituents are not stupid, and nor are they gamblers whose luck simply ran out. They are victims of an unscrupulous, if not outright criminal, scheme that wilfully misled the Gambling Commission, pedalled lies about the state of its financial health, violated the terms of its licence and cynically preyed on fans’ passion for the beautiful game. They deserve so much better than the condescension that has accompanied Football Index’s demise.

Few have been quite as tone-deaf as the chief executive officer of the Gambling Commission, Andrew Rhodes, who had the temerity to lecture victims still coming to terms with their losses by saying that

“no one should gamble more than they can afford to lose.”

In fact, Rhodes and the commission he oversees still have serious questions to answer about their role in this whole saga, because if this is a story about unchecked greed, it is also a story of chronic regulatory failings. The Gambling Commission issued a licence for a product that it did not understand, and ordinary customers were forced to pay the price. Despite receiving warnings about systemic flaws with the index in January 2020, it was not until May 2020 that the commission began investigating. In that time, Football Index signed a sponsorship deal with Queen’s Park Rangers, lending further legitimacy to this elaborate pyramid scheme.

The simple truth is that thousands of Football Index consumers were failed by the very people who were supposed to protect them. My constituents now deserve justice, but despite the publication of the independent review in September last year, it still seems to be a long way away. Successive announcements by both DCMS and the Gambling Commission that no compensation will be made available will come as a bitter blow to people living in my constituency, whose lives have been changed irrevocably as a result of the collapse, and the continued existence of platforms seemingly mimicking Football Index’s business model—including AllStars Trader, which is run by a former Football Index employee —shows that not nearly enough is being done to stop the catastrophe repeating itself. The fact that Football Index was allowed to trade without any oversight from the Financial Conduct Authority, despite styling itself as a trading platform, shows just how badly regulatory reform is needed.

Football Index was not the only app that encouraged ordinary people to hand over small fortunes with the promise of massive returns. In recent years we have seen a massive upsurge in a number of online trading platforms becoming available to ordinary people, such as eToro, Freetrade and Robinhood. Like Football Index, those apps promise ordinary people a way to break into a world previously dominated by big banks and the mega-rich. Those sites, although legal, tempt ordinary people into ploughing massive sums of money into investments that they often have no hope of understanding. Many even model themselves on video games, with users receiving constant pushes to keep investing more.

Despite the obscene amounts of money involved, Ministers are still playing catch-up, and today the world of online investments resembles the wild west, with ordinary people enjoying little to no protection from financial ruin. Without far-reaching reform of the regulations governing those platforms, I fear that the Football Index scandal is doomed to repeat itself. Ministers must act now.

Football Governance

Mick Whitley Excerpts

Monday 25th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Nigel Huddleston]

The view of fans is pivotal. It has been so far, and it will continue to be as we develop the proposals. We will find ways to make sure that fans continue to be engaged in the conversations and discussions, and we will be announcing more information with the White Paper.

[Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

I have spoken before about the importance of ensuring a genuinely fair and equitable distribution of wealth throughout English football. The fan-led review rightly suggests that the Premier League should be doing more to support lower league and grassroots football, so that clubs, such as Tranmere Rovers in my constituency, can continue to nurture the next generation of home-grown talent. While the report’s recommendation of a solidarity transfer levy is welcome, more needs to be done. Can the Minister inform the House what additional steps the Government will be taking to guarantee that clubs like Tranmere, which are so often the beating heart of their communities, see more of the wealth flowing down from the top of the football pyramid?

[Nigel Huddleston]

This is a common appeal we have heard today. Financial distribution in football is not as it should be at the moment. We are appealing to the Premier League to do more. If it does not—if it cannot come to some agreement— we will look at what the responsibilities of the regulator may be to take further action.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mick Whitley Excerpts

Thursday 18th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Ms Dorries]

I am happy to.

[Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

Channel 4 makes an enormous contribution to job growth and region-based media production. In fact, of the 200 independent media production companies that Channel 4 has commissioned over the past two years, almost 140 rely on the broadcaster for at least half their work. Will the Minister concede that the privatisation of Channel 4 will endanger hundreds of jobs and make a mockery of the Government’s levelling-up agenda?

[Julia Lopez]

We are currently looking at all the consultation responses we have received on the question of whether to move ahead with the privatisation of Channel 4. We will look at the question of the independent sector and its health. The sector is thriving at the moment and the impact of the public service broadcasting sector on it is reducing, but it is something we will look closely at.

Channel 4: Privatisation

Mick Whitley Excerpts

Wednesday 21st July 2021 Westminster Hall

[Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab) [V]]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Ms Fovargue. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) for securing this important debate. As broadcasters including Sir David Attenborough have warned, the privatisation of Channel 4 would have disastrous and far-reaching consequences for the film and television sector. The UK’s creative industries are one of the fastest growing sectors of the economy, widely admired across the world. Channel 4 sits at the heart, with its distinct remit to reinvest profits into commissioning. All that would be jeopardised by privatisation.

The claim that the consultation now under way is a response to a changing broadcasting landscape is not believable. The Minister first advocated privatisation all the way back in 1996. His attempts to push through privatisation when he was Culture Secretary were frustrated only because David Cameron, the Prime Minister who sold off Royal Mail for a pittance, recognised the irreparable harm that would do to the wider cultural sector.

In fact, despite all the challenges posed by the rise of the streaming giants, Channel 4 continues to thrive, both critically and commercially. Last year, the channel recorded a record £74 million pre-tax surplus, while also bagging a prime-time Emmy for its coverage of the deteriorating situation in Hong Kong. Viewing figures for the terrestrial channels and All 4 continue to rise. The Minister is confecting a crisis where none is, in order to provide a flimsy pretext for privatisation.

The Minister should come clean about the Government’s motivations. This is not about money; it is about ideology. He wants Channel 4 to be consigned to the dustbin of history because it is simply too good at doing what it is supposed to do. For four decades it has been a leading provider of innovative content that resonates, not just with communities across Britain but across the globe. It is a showcase of what is possible when things are run in the interests of the public good and not for private profit. Since its inception, “Channel 4 News” has spoken truth to power and exposed injustices and corruption at home and abroad. That is something that this Government and this Prime Minister simply cannot stand.

Football Governance

Mick Whitley Excerpts

Monday 14th June 2021 Westminster Hall

[Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab) [V]]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Elliott, and I thank the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) for leading this important debate.

I want to begin by mentioning the league two club in my constituency, Tranmere Rovers. Tranmere were unfairly relegated during the first lockdown because the season ended. Behind the English Football League’s decision to end the season for league one and two clubs lay one thing, and one thing alone, and that was money. Maintaining the prize of entry into the premier league for three lucky championship clubs meant that Tranmere and others were relegated without a ball being kicked. That is one example of why I firmly believe that the fan-led review of football governance must result in the establishment of an independent regulator for football in this country. It is a burning necessity in the light of the scandal of the recently proposed, and thankfully abandoned, European super league.

However, my fear is that, like the Terminator, the ESL will be back unless action is taken now to reform the governance of the entire sport. Compare and contrast the fabulous wealth of the premier league with the tragic scuppering of clubs such as Bury. Compare and contrast the attempt to set up a selfish and permanent closed circle with the work that Tranmere Rovers do in their local community. During the lockdown, the club invested £60,000 in an abandoned recreation facility in one of my town’s most deprived estates, the Beechwood. They have installed a gym and transformed it into a community asset that is giving youngsters an alternative to the lure of county lines drug dealers, and Tranmere fans have supplied 50,000 meals to vulnerable people, more than 1,000 shopping and medication drop-offs, and hundreds of toys to those in need at Christmas. That highlights the reality that most football clubs are community assets. They are there for the local people and the fans, and the best of them work with their fans for the common good of the club and community. I know that many hon. Members have local clubs that do similar activities, but we need to go beyond simply applauding the good work of some and address the key issues that could so easily undermine the game in a way that the threat of the ESL almost did.

There are two issues that I believe an independent regulator can and should tackle. First, we need to reform the distribution of money in the game. The Independent reported the following comment from an official of one of the premier league’s top six:

“We don’t want too many Leicester Citys.”

That outrageous comment comes from a representative of a monopoly—not just in this country, but across European football. The financial giant Deloitte estimated that football clubs require a minimum of £400 million a year to compete at the top level. That needs reform, because it creates a scramble for money, instead of a scramble for sporting glory. The No. 1 priority on the independent regulator’s list must be to devise a genuinely fair and equitable distribution of wealth throughout the football pyramid. Otherwise, there will be a lot more Burys and Boltons.

The No. 2 priority on the list must be to tackle the fractured nature of football governance. We now have the Premier League, the FA and the EFL all pushing different agendas and looking after different aspects of the game, without checks or balances. I believe that the regulator we need is one that represents the whole of the game and ensures that, rather than sacrifice the long-term interests of the game for short-term financial gain, the entire football pyramid works as one. That way, we can put paid to the ESL Terminator ever coming back.

Covid-19: Cultural and Entertainment Sectors

Mick Whitley Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab) [V]]

May I also welcome back my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff Central (Jo Stevens)? I also put on record my immense gratitude to my hon. Friend the Member for Batley and Spen (Tracy Brabin) and my parliamentary neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern), for their tireless campaigning on this issue over many years.

For 10 long years, the Conservative party have taken a wrecking ball to the very foundations of our cultural industries. Ten years of cuts to arts funding and school budgets have decimated the sector. The prestige venues that only the rich can afford may have been preserved, but, thanks to the remorseless advance of property developers, countless grassroots music venues have had to shut up shop. Future generations of talent have nowhere to flourish. Now, the Government’s failure to give the cultural industries the support they need risks condemning huge swathes of the sector to oblivion.

Although the £1.5 billion culture recovery fund was welcome, it has rescued buildings, not livelihoods. Fifty-five thousand jobs have already been lost, and too many creative freelancers—including over a third of all musicians—have been allowed to fall through the gaps of the Government’s financial support schemes, with many leaving the industry for good. The Government’s failure to guarantee creative workers visa-free access to Europe risks depriving thousands of people of a vital part of their income when the pandemic is over.

The failure by the Government to step up and meet this challenge has had a devastating impact on my constituency. The hard work and determination of council leader Janette Williamson and Labour councillors saved the historic Williamson Art Gallery and Museum, but countless other venues have been forced to close their doors forever, and many others remain at risk.

I thank the all-party parliamentary group for the night time economy for giving me access to the response of my constituents to its important inquiry on the impact of covid-19, which testified to a deep-rooted anger at the Government’s chaotic handling of the pandemic and a widespread sense of fear that many venues in my constituency will not survive the next few months. The proprietors of Gallaghers Traditional Pub, which regularly hosts live music, are right to feel “angry and let down”.

There needs to be change when the Chancellor unveils the Budget tomorrow. It is a final chance to save a vital part of our country’s cultural fabric and, with that, a major sector of our economy. Instead of half measures, we need a bold and ambitious strategy that gives the sector confidence in its future and its ability to thrive when we win the war on covid. An extension to the furlough scheme, the cut in VAT and business rates relief will be essential to safeguarding jobs in the sector, but I also call on the Chancellor to recognise the specific challenges facing our country’s cultural industries and at long last introduce bespoke support for a sector that provides not just jobs but enjoyment for millions of people.

Covid-19: Restrictions on Gyms and Sport

Mick Whitley Excerpts

Monday 23rd November 2020 Westminster Hall

[Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) for securing this debate.

I voted for the current lockdown and I do not regret that decision. Indeed, the scientific advice was that it should have been imposed earlier, so my only regret is that Parliament did not support Labour’s proposal for a two-week circuit-break shutdown in October.

One of the sectors hardest hit by the lockdown is the gyms sector—Members can obviously tell that I go to gyms a lot. I have received a considerable number of letters from constituents—both owners and users of gyms—outlining the problems that they have faced.

From the owners, there has been one major complaint. During the full lockdown that began in March, many of them did not receive the financial support that they needed to survive. Notwithstanding the financial support systems put in place by the Treasury as the lockdown unfolded it became clear that many of the Treasury’s conditions and subclauses fell well short of the fulfilling the Chancellor’s original promise of, “Whatever it takes.” As a result, many gym owners were forced out of business. For gym users, the issue was more to do with the fact that exercise is a vital element of both physical and mental health, and the longer gyms remained closed, the more people’s health suffered.

If gyms have to be closed during this second lockdown because they are a major source of infection, then so be it—I am clear about that. But the period between lockdown 1 and lockdown 2 raised my suspicion that the Government have not followed the science. They did not provide any data to show that, during the tier system, gyms were a major source of infection. Even worse, when gyms were forced to close as my constituency was placed in tier 3, gym owners were given less financial support than previously, despite many having spent considerable amounts of money to make their gyms covid-secure. It seems the Government were more concerned about allowing grouse shoots to go ahead than about the amenities vital to the health and wellbeing of my constituents.

That double standard was dramatically exposed when Lancashire went into tier 3. As gyms were closed in my constituency, I expected the same rules to apply. That has been sorted out today by the Prime Minister, but could Lancashire County Council be so different from the Liverpool city region and Birkenhead? No reason was given and gym owners on Merseyside were handed hefty fines for breaking the rules—a classic example in the Dominic Cummings mould. One rule for them and another rule for the rest of us.

I was deeply concerned by that, and with other MPs from the city region I challenged the Government to explain why there were tiers within tiers and to show the science. No business should be breaking the lockdown, but once it is over, we must guarantee that gym owners are given the financial support they need to survive. They and other indoor and outdoor sports, such as tennis and football, should be provided with scientific advice on any possible risks, so that they can take the necessary safety measures in line with covid rules and restrictions.

BBC

Mick Whitley Excerpts

Tuesday 21st July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Whittingdale]

I agree with my hon. Friend. In the service that the BBC provides across the UK, in all the different communities, it is absolutely essential that it tries to sustain support for the licence fee and does not just serve the metropolitan elite in London and Manchester. I am very much aware that communities like those in Cleethorpes are beginning to feel that the BBC is not providing sufficiently for them, and I hope the BBC will take that into account.

[Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab)]

At the general election in 2019, the Conservative party manifesto stated:

“We recognise the value of free TV licences for over-75s and believe they should be funded by the BBC.”

Only months later, over 4.5 million elderly people learned that they are to lose their free TV licence. The question—many people want to know the answer—is: what did the Government do to try to save the free TV licence scheme? Is it now time to recognise that the free TV licence for over-75s is a public good and should be funded by the Government?

[Mr Whittingdale]

I absolutely stand by the wording of the 2019 manifesto. It remains the case that the Government recognise the value of these licences and believe that the BBC should have maintained them. We made that amply clear to the BBC. Ultimately, however, Parliament agreed that the decision should rest with the BBC.