Oral Answers to Questions

Mike Wood Excerpts

Thursday 23rd September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Michael Ellis]

We have tried to operate the protocol in good faith, but the problems are significant and they are growing. The hon. Lady should be concerned about the fact that the Northern Ireland Executive noted that, from January to March, about 20% of all of the European Union’s checks were being conducted in respect of Northern Ireland, even though Northern Ireland’s population is just 0.5% of the EU as a whole. It is unacceptable, and those are the sort of problems on which she ought to focus.

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)]

9. What steps the Government are taking to increase opportunities for small businesses to bid for Government contracts.

[The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office (Steve Barclay)]

We are increasing opportunities for small and medium-sized enterprises in a variety of ways, from transparently publishing contract pipelines to simplifying the bidding process. Those measures are working. The latest procurement figures show that £15.5 billion was paid to SMEs to help deliver public services. That is the highest since records began in 2013 and a £1.3 billion increase on the previous year.

[Mike Wood]

Dudley South has many fantastic firms doing innovative work, particularly in world-class advanced engineering, but, too often, the size of Government contracts mean that only a handful of multinationals are able to compete. Will my right hon. Friend do everything that he can to ensure that public procurement contracts are advertised in the smallest chunks possible so that Government and public services can take full advantage of the talents in our SMEs?

[Steve Barclay]

My hon. Friend raises a very legitimate point, and, in short, yes we will. To encourage the issue he highlights, we require public buyers to divide contracts into more accessible lots, or to explain why they cannot, so that tender requirements can be matched to smaller business specialisms. I know that he is a champion for Dudley South and that is exactly the sort of measure that will help businesses in his constituency.

Health and Social Care

Mike Wood Excerpts

Tuesday 7th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I know that the Labour party wants to nationalise everything, which would be typically insane since the vast majority of care is provided by the private sector. What we are doing is lifting people’s wages with the national living wage, investing in training and putting half a billion pounds into progression of the caring workforce, and we will also make sure that local councils get the funding they need to support a fair cost of care.

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)]

When people cannot get an appointment with their GP they often turn to hospital A&E departments, or miss out on early intervention which places greater pressure on our health system further down the line. As part of his plan for the NHS to recover, will the Prime Minister make sure that everybody can get face-to-face appointments with their GP without further delay?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is completely right and speaks for colleagues across the House: we need to reform the system so that GPs see the right people at the right time and in the right numbers.

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Mike Wood Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)]

I, too, thank the Chancellor for delivering a solid a Budget statement in very challenging times. His achievement is reflected in the fact that the official Opposition party ran out of speakers well over half an hour ago, so little was there to say in response.

The Chancellor had three primary tasks today: first, to provide immediate support to protect the jobs and livelihoods of the people in our constituencies while the impact of this pandemic continues to be felt so sharply; secondly, to lay a framework for rebuilding and the recovery as part of the road map to reopening; and thirdly, to level up—to rebalance our economy away from over-reliance on a small number of sectors in a relatively small part of the country. He achieved that in today’s Budget, seemingly leaving the Leader of the Opposition with very little left to say—although, being the Leader of the Opposition, that did not seem to prevent him from taking a long time to demonstrate the fact.

The immediate support for people’s jobs and livelihoods is clear. The extension to the job retention scheme will help 5,300 of my constituents in Dudley South, and I am pleased to see that the support offered to self-employed workers is being extended to cover some of the more recent entries into that part of the labour market.

As we start to reopen and rebuild, the support that has been put in place for so many of the parts of the economy that have been hit hardest by lockdown and the pandemic, particularly retail and hospitality—the restart grants; the freeze on VAT for hospitality and tourism; the freeze on duties, cancelling the index-linked duty rises; and the extension of the business rates holiday—is extremely important for major employers in our constituencies.

Finally, on levelling up, the Leader of the Opposition spoke about the last 10 years. Actually, under the last Labour Government, Dudley’s gross value added relative to the rest of the country fell from 78% in 1997 to a really quite woeful 64% in 2010. Since 2013, we have started to address that, and it has started to increase; in the five years before this pandemic, salaries in Dudley rose more quickly than anywhere else in the country. I am pleased that Dudley has been identified as a priority area for the UK renewal fund and the levelling up fund, investing in our people and our infrastructure.

Covid-19: Road Map

Mike Wood Excerpts

Monday 22nd February 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Take-up is accelerating among all those groups, but the hon. Member is right to say that it has been slower in some groups than in others. That is why we have rolled out the network of community champions. However, it is also important for him and for all of us to champion the uptake of vaccines across all our communities in our constituencies.

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con) [V]]

The vaccine roll-out has been more successful than even the most optimistic of us could have predicted in December. While the Prime Minister is clearly right to insist that this road map must be irreversible so that we do not risk a further lockdown, will he ensure that, if vaccinations prove to be as effective as we all hope, the Government can continue to review whether later stages might progress more quickly as long as the numbers of deaths and hospital admissions continue to fall?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an interesting point, which I am sure will have occurred to many other colleagues and people up and down the country. I have given the reason for the interval between the dates I set out: we need to be certain about the impact of the relaxations we are making, with the four weeks plus one that we need. The other point is that I think people would much rather have a date they know is as certain as it can possibly be at this stage to fix on and work towards rather than more uncertainty and fluidity.

EU Exit: Negotiations and the Joint Committee

Mike Wood Excerpts

Monday 19th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Yes, and that was an admirably Unionist intervention from the hon. Gentleman .

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)]

Businesses in Dudley South and across the Black Country trade with countries in every part of the world. Further to the earlier question from my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich East (Nicola Richards), what support is available for businesses to understand the changes to customs and tax rules, so that they can prepare to take advantage of those opportunities as we become an independent trading nation again?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. It is the case that we are intensifying our communications campaign. On the Government Digital Service gov.uk website, the transition page outlines some of the information required. The Prime Minister and I are meeting business representative organisations tomorrow in order to reinforce that, but I would be very happy to talk to him and other colleagues in the west midlands, in our manufacturing heartland, to reinforce exactly what it is that we can provide businesses to support them to take advantage of these new opportunities.

Covid-19 Update

Mike Wood Excerpts

Monday 12th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I must respectfully take issue with the right hon. Gentleman’s characterisation of the scheme, which remains internationally competitive. In France, it is 60% for some, 70% for others. In Germany, it is about the same. In Italy, they have an 80% provision, but there is a serious cap—a very low cap—-in Ireland; it is down at 60%. This is a highly competitive scheme, and it is one that I think is generous by international comparisons. On his point about evictions, nobody wants to see anybody evicted because of the hardship they have suffered because of coronavirus, and that is why we have extended the period in which landlords are prevented from conducting such evictions by a further six months.

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)]

Families across the country, in whichever of the new tiers, rely on childcare, whether formal or informal. Without it, key workers and those in the wider economy would be unable to work and many children would be unable to get to and from school. Will my right hon. Friend make sure that access to childcare, whether it is professional childcare or relatives and neighbours, remains available throughout this pandemic?

[The Prime Minister]

Yes, of course. My hon. Friend is totally right about the importance of childcare. We remain committed to giving 30 hours of free childcare. The crucial thing about our measures is to keep the economy moving as much as possible.

Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Mike Wood Excerpts

Report stage & 3rd reading & 3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 14th July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Cat Smith]

I would argue that the wards, which are obviously drawn by the Local Government Boundary Commission, do actually reflect communities to a great extent. If we are to go down the path of splitting wards, we will end up with the ridiculous situation, like we did at the previous review, where constituencies such as Port Talbot had a shopping centre in one constituency and the high street in another constituency. My new clause seeks to minimise the chances of such ridiculous situations occurring again. Under the current Bill, the Commission will struggle to respect the factors laid out in rule five, which, of course, Members will know, are the existing constituencies, local government boundaries, local ties and geography.

During the evidence sessions of this Bill, the secretariat for the Boundary Commission for England spoke about the difficulties caused by this small tolerance, which makes it

“much harder to have regard to the other factors…such as the importance of not breaking local ties, and having regard to local authority boundaries and features of natural geography.”

He said:

“Basically, the smaller you make the tolerance, the fewer options we have…The larger you make it, the more options we have and the more flexibility…to have regard to the other factors”.––[Official Report, Parliamentary Constituencies Public Bill Committee, 18 June 2020; c. 7, Q3.]

So while the Government keep saying the boundary commissions will listen to the views of communities in the drawing of the boundaries, some communities will literally be wasting their time putting forward those arguments if the restrictive quota will mathematically prevent the commissioners from respecting their views and the community ties.

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)]

The hon. Lady raises the case of Port Talbot in a previous review. Does she not accept that this was actually one of the reasons why it should be easier for the boundary commissions to split wards, because the whole point of the Port Talbot proposals was that they have to come to those combinations because they are working with entire wards?

[Cat Smith]

I think in the case of Port Talbot it was the 5% quota that meant that that decision had to be reached. When we are talking about quotas, we know that internationally a larger quota is used and promoted as best practice for securing fair representation. Indeed, the Council of Europe’s Venice Commission’s code of good practice in electoral matters recommends allowing a standard permissible tolerance of an average of plus or minus 10%.

As the Minister knows, there is a consensus amongst respected experts such as David Rosser and Professor Charles Pattie who agree that the 5% rule causes significant disruption to community boundaries.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mike Wood]

The right hon. Member will remember that the Halesowen and Selly Oak constituency was dropped by the Boundary Commission in its revised proposals. Does that not show how an independent Boundary Commission can respond well to reasoned arguments—rather better sometimes than parliamentarians?

[John Spellar]

Why did it come up with that in the first place when it was clearly such a dumb proposal? Parliament was the necessary corrective to this. It said: “This doesn’t work”, and by the way Conservative Members were still in a majority at the time. What’s even more extraordinary, in this Parliament, where the Government have a clear majority, they still do not believe they could carry the day with their own Members. There is a danger of that. There is a danger that the bureaucracy of the Boundary Commission will not pay regard to local sensitivities or communities and we will end up once again with boundaries of which Governor Gerry of Massachusetts, the founder of the gerrymander, would have been proud.

At the same time, it would be much better to go back to many of the basic principles, such as the principle, where possible, of not crossing borough or ward boundaries. In urban areas as well, these places form communities. The hon. Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell) is right about the size of some of the building blocks. That is why, within boroughs and other areas, people might have to accept some temporary disparity, but that might be a better than having one MP representing part of a particular ward and another representing the rest. Equally, there is the problem of orphan wards, which we have in many areas of the boundary review, whereby one ward is in a constituency in another borough. Inevitably, the focus of the Member of Parliament will be on the main borough. It is unnecessary and gratuitous.

It all depends on whether people believe, as I certainly do, and many Conservative Members do as well, in the fundamental principle of individual constituencies with individual Members of Parliament, not proportional list Members. If people think that Members of Parliaments’ connection to their constituencies does not matter, that is fine—just have a national list. I fundamentally do not believe that—and by the way nor did the British public when they voted it down in a referendum.

Let us be clear: we want to ensure that parliamentarians represent their constituencies and their constituency interests, and that is why we need a parliamentary override and a slightly wider area of discretion, so that anomalies can be properly dealt with and responded to, rather than the artificial constructs the Boundary Commission is forced into—maybe sometimes it goes into them a little too willingly—instead of looking at the interests of localities, particularly in urban areas.

--- Later in debate ---

In conclusion, I support the Bill and I oppose the amendments. We have to trust our judiciary and the Boundary Commission. We have to trust the fact that this is business as usual when it comes to how we make legislation, how we pass laws and I commend the Bill to the House.

[Mike Wood]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and a very happy Black Country Day to you today. As a proud Black Country man it has been an honour to represent communities in Dudley South for the past five years. I hope to have the opportunity to do so for a number of years to come. Like many other constituencies in this country, the boundaries on which I was elected were last fundamentally altered ahead of the 1997 general election, based on electorates from the early 1990s. We are literally a generation out of date on the boundaries on which many of the constituencies in the west midlands were drawn up.

Like Members on both sides of the House, I am enormously fond of all parts of my constituency. I love every last ward and polling district of it. It would be a real wrench if any of it were to be taken out of Dudley South, but we also have to recognise that, like many of the Black Country constituencies, the current size of the constituency is under the quota whether it is based on 600 or 650. Many constituencies in the Black Country will need to take in additional areas and, of course, some will be divided between constituencies. I am as likely to find myself without a constituency to represent as any other Member of Parliament, but when we are considering fundamental constitutional reform such as this one it is not about whether I have a constituency to represent. This is not about me. This is about the wider electoral system. It must be a fundamental premise of our electoral system that constituencies have to be as close to the same size as is possible.

One of the very few upsides of this horrific outbreak and lockdown has been the opportunity to spend a little more time helping my children with their schoolwork at home. My daughter is in year 7 and she is studying the people’s charter of 1838—it was referred to by my hon. Friend for Heywood and Middleton (Chris Clarkson)—which includes the campaign for constituencies based on equal numbers of electors. Many Opposition Members —and possibly even some Government Members—consider themselves the natural heirs of 19th century radicals, but instead of picking up the torch of William Lovett and Feargus O’Connor, it seems they are choosing to put themselves on the side of those arguing for representation on the basis of acres of land and for the geographic extent of a constituency to somehow override the priority of equalising the number of electors represented within. That cannot be the right way. It was not the right way in the 19th century and it is certainly not the right way in a 21st century democracy.

There is a better way, one that has been referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell); we can make sure that equal-sized constituencies can be drawn up that properly represent local constituencies if the boundary commissions are encouraged to look more favourably at dividing wards across constituencies where the alternative would be unnatural constituencies or dividing communities. That was done in the west midlands during the last review and it is one reason why the proposals by the right hon. Member for Warley (John Spellar)—he is not in his place—for a Halesowen and Selly Oak constituency, for Sutton Coldfield to be divided and for various other strange things in the initial recommendations were not in the final recommendations. It was precisely because in only three wards across the whole of the west midlands are they able to divide across natural boundaries within those wards, which are amalgamations of wards, and therefore have more natural boundaries across the constituency.

Let me briefly touch on the issue of automatic implementation. The right hon. Gentleman said that, as Parliament, we instruct these independent bodies to go out and draw up rules, and therefore we should be able to decide whether to implement them and whether they are the right decisions. But we also instructed the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority to draw up parliamentary pay and conditions. In the not-too-distant future, it will look as strange to people that we think we should draw the constituency boundaries on which we are elected—

Oral Answers to Questions

Mike Wood Excerpts

Wednesday 17th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

The most vital tool in social mobility is education, which is why we are absolutely determined to get children back to school and to support children who are not in school through virtual lessons. I encourage the Scottish Government to follow the leadership that we are showing.

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)]

Nobody’s chances in life should be limited by the colour of their skin or their ethnic background. What progress is the Prime Minister’s race disparity commission, and when might we start to see results?

[The Minister for Equalities (Kemi Badenoch)]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right and touches on why the Government have set up the commission: to understand why disparities exist, what works and what does not, and to present recommendations for action across Government and other public bodies. It should report by the end of the year.

Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Mike Wood Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion & Programme motion: House of Commons
Tuesday 2nd June 2020 Commons Chamber

[David Linden]

I am afraid that on this one the hon. Gentleman is at risk of comparing not just apples and oranges, but apples and avocados. He knows quite well that the Scottish Parliament has a system whereby there are constituency Members of the Scottish Parliament and regional Members of the Scottish Parliament. I am afraid that he is conflating two issues, and perhaps doing so deliberately.

As I say, based on the current electoral quotas, we would probably see Scotland going down by two or three seats. That would be to the advantage of other parts of the UK, which seems wholly unfair. It certainly does not ring true with what people in Scotland were told in 2014, during the independence referendum. Back then, we were told that we should lead the United Kingdom in the event of a no vote. On the contrary, we have probably never felt more excluded, more isolated and ignored in the UK, as has certainly been highlighted by the Brexit process.

To be clear to the Minister, we must remain with 59 seats in Scotland. I think any Member of Parliament who represents Scotland in this House should be getting behind that argument, regardless of party. However, the Government are not guaranteeing that at the moment, so I will seek to push this by way of amendment when the Bill goes upstairs to the Committee corridor.

Secondly, I want to turn to clause 7 of the Bill, and in particular the enumeration date, which causes difficulties for us. The registration numbers are clearly a little off at the moment, and I would expect registration in Scotland to increase next year as we approach a Scottish Parliament election, so I am concerned about the cut-off date of December 2020. I appreciate what the Minister has said about going back and reviewing that. We will certainly hold the Government’s feet to the fire on that in the Public Bill Committee.

Thirdly and finally, I am deeply concerned about the provision in clause 2(3), which I believe is a power grab, removing the role of both Houses of Parliament. It was not that long ago that Ministers, including the Lord President of the Council, spent huge amounts of time talking about the sovereignty of Parliament, saying that Parliament is sovereign and Parliament has taken back control, yet clause 2(3) specifically removes the role of both Houses of Parliament. Frankly, it is alarming to see the Executive trying to grab power over boundaries, which has led in places such as America to nonsensical partisan electoral maps. Any Members who want to do a bit more research on that should just look at the 4th congressional district of Illinois, which is frankly gerrymandering on steroids.

The Government’s explanatory notes for the Bill gloss over the fact that boundaries will

“no longer be subject to any parliamentary procedure or approval”,

instead being in the gift of the Cabinet Office and its Ministers. That is fundamentally an Executive power grab.

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)]

I am listening carefully to the points the hon. Gentleman is making powerfully, but does he not accept that with our parliamentary system, in which the governing party will normally have an overall majority, this is the reverse of that? It is moving power away from the Government-controlled House of Commons and giving it to an independent Boundary Commission. Personally, I have confidence in it: I have not had problems with its proposals in the past, even when they have disadvantaged my party.

[David Linden]

The one flaw in that argument is that in the last Parliament the Government started with a majority, and the majority disappeared. I do not think it happens to be a bad thing that we put things in front of Parliament, and if Parliament does not want them, it rejects them. I think all of us who served in the last Parliament remember the inconvenience of that and the stress that it caused the Government. I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman, who I understand is a Brexiteer, cannot have his cake and eat it. He cannot say that Parliament is sovereign and Parliament should be taking back control, and then bring forward legislation that removes the role of Parliament. That, I am afraid, is a massive contradiction.

Covid-19: Strategy

Mike Wood Excerpts

Monday 11th May 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

That is not right.

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con) [V]]

Many businesses restarting operations are unlikely to have order books full enough to sustain a full workforce for months after the end of formal restrictions. Will the Prime Minister look at how job support can be tapered rather than being withdrawn overnight, and how more flexibility can be added, such as being able to re-furlough for a week at a time to reflect a firm’s workforce needs?

[The Prime Minister]

I think that the furloughing scheme has been one of the most remarkable features of the Government’s response. It is unlike anything seen internationally, with 6.5 million people currently being supported. It is absolutely right that we should do it. I do not want to anticipate what my right hon. Friend the Chancellor is going to say; the House will hear more about that tomorrow.