Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Neil Hudson Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 8th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Dr Neil Hudson (Penrith and The Border) (Con)]

I very much welcome the aims and missions of the Bill on education, skills, health and wellbeing, transport connectivity and closing gaps in opportunity. Levelling up is a key priority for the Government and a key priority for me representing a rural constituency. I am passionate that rural areas are looked after by the levelling-up agenda and recently held an Adjournment debate on that very issue.

Transport access is pivotal in levelling up. Unfortunately, in 2014, Cumbria County Council took the decision to stop using central Government moneys to subsidise commercial bus services. That led to a reduction in services. Last year, Cumbria received £1.5 million from the rural mobility fund, but this year it did not receive anything. I am concerned that the funding system needs to be looked at. Central Government and local government need to work together to produce better services. We have fantastic volunteer services in Cumbria—the Fellrunner, the Border Rambler—but we need people to work together.

I have been working closely with Alston Moor Federation of schools to see what can be done to improve transport access. Pupils and teachers tell me that, basically, students are being disincentivised to go to the next stage of their education because of the lack of transport facilities. That is not levelling up; that is really unfair. There are similar themes in other schools in my constituency, including in William Howard School, Ullswater Community College and Nelson Thomlinson School to name just a few. Students are having to drive themselves on challenging rural roads or rely on families, and are sometimes taking the life-changing decision not to go to the next stage of their education. The Government have, quite rightly, said that people need to be in education up until the age of 18, but the discretion is with the local authorities as to what level of transport is available for post-16. I really urge the Government to put a duty on local authorities to look after people post-16, so they can get to the next stage of their lives. I have raised the issue with various Government Departments, but we really need to get central Government working with local government to improve the life chances of our young people.

Digital connectivity is absolutely paramount in the levelling-up agenda. I have been calling for better broadband and mobile phone coverage in rural Cumbria, as have colleagues across the House for their parts of the country. I firmly believe that part of levelling up has to mean physical and virtual connectivity, so again I urge people to work together.

Along those lines, local government restructuring has presented some challenges for rural Cumbria. I am concerned that there is inertia—lack of grant applications, lack of decision making—as we have new authorities coming in. I urge people to work together to ensure that public services can still be delivered. I again ask the Department to allow parish councils to be able to meet in virtual or hybrid formats, so that local decision making can be made in isolated communities, too.

We have heard about housing from many colleagues. In my part of the world, the second home issue is at crisis point. People are being priced out of their local communities and are unable to live in their own communities. I am pleased that the Government have moved on that issue, closing some of the council tax loopholes, and that the Bill looks at increasing costs on second homes, but we really do need more affordable housing for our local area, so that people can get on to the next stage of their lives.

Furthermore, in terms of levelling up our communities, we need equality of access to all our healthcare services. I feel passionately that we need equality on rural mental health for people to be able to access services and that is part of the levelling-up agenda, too.