Oral Answers to Questions

Oliver Letwin Excerpts

Wednesday 14th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab)]

3. What assessment his Department has made of the role of the big society initiative in tackling social exclusion.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)]

The big society is all about building social capital, which is key to solving social exclusion. There are four places where most of us build the relationships that sustain us: in the family, in school, in our communities and at work. We are taking action to build social capital in all of those through a focus on the 120,000 most troubled families, through competition and raising standards in schools, through community organisers and the community first initiative in communities and through the Work programme, the rehabilitation revolution and the drug and alcohol recovery programme.

[Jonathan Ashworth]

I thank the Minister for that answer and I know that he is sincere in wanting to see civic society flourish, as am I. In Leicester, many organisations who work with vulnerable people at risk of social exclusion, such as the Shama women’s centre or those at the Saffron Lane resource centre, increasingly find that their grants and pots of money are being cut. Does the Minister think he will be able to create the big society on the cheap?

[Mr Letwin]

As I said the previous time the hon. Gentleman asked such a question, he is extraordinarily assiduous in this area. I have done some further research on where he has been recently and the Saffron Lane centre that he describes is, I am glad to say, one area where the community organisers to which I referred will be located. While I am at it, it is clear that the hon. Gentleman drags the Government with him every time he goes anywhere. He also visited the Eyres Monsell centre and that is now receiving a £50,000 grant from the community grants system. We can be said to be delivering not on the cheap but on the expensive in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency.

[Jon Trickett (Hemsworth) (Lab)]

This year, 40,000 households were made homeless. As we approach Christmas and with today’s rise in unemployment, Shelter estimates that every two minutes someone else faces losing their home. Now we hear that Government cuts to the big society have resulted in homeless charities facing 25% reductions in their funding. Will the Minister at least immediately agree to restore the social exclusion taskforce, which the Government shamelessly abolished when they entered the Cabinet Office, so that in the future the homeless and others who suffer from social exclusion will at least have a voice when he and his colleagues make such hard-hearted decisions?

[Mr Letwin]

I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman misunderstands the changes in the machinery of government that have taken place under this Government. It is perfectly true that the social exclusion taskforce has been abolished, and the reason for that is that we have set up instead a fully fledged first-rank Cabinet committee on social justice—

[Jon Trickett]

It meets in secret.

[Mr Letwin]

It is not in the least secret, as the hon. Gentleman mutters from a sedentary position, in the sense that it will produce a social justice strategy that he will be able to read along with the rest of the House. I think he will find that we are putting absolutely at the centre of our activities the fostering of the big society in order to help, among other things, those who are homeless. That is also one of the reasons why we recently issued our housing strategy, which does more than the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues did in many years to try to improve housing in this country.

[Jim McGovern (Dundee West) (Lab)]

4. Whether his Department has considered altering its guidance on the disposal of official Government documents.

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[Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con)]

9. How small and medium-sized enterprises in Calder Valley constituency can bid for central Government information and communications technology and facilities management contracts.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)]

It is absolutely vital that small and medium-sized enterprises should be able to bid for ICT and other contracts, and that is why the Minister for the Cabinet Office said a moment or two ago that we have set an ambition for 25% of contracts to go to SMEs. We have also simplified the contracting process, making it easier for SMEs to find out what the Government seek to purchase, and I recommend that the enterprises in my hon. Friend’s constituency look at the Contracts Finder website, which I have been on myself, It is an absolutely admirable one-stop shop for finding out about Government contracts.

[Craig Whittaker]

I thank the Minister for that reply. I am not a cynical kind of guy, but I wonder whether he can give the House some examples of how the Government are helping SMEs by awarding them contracts.

[Mr Letwin]

Yes, I can, and I refer again to something that my right hon. Friend was saying. Recently, the Government’s very large domestic travel contract was let—the domestic side alone amounts to £1.1 billion a year of travel—and one might have expected it to go to a very large firm, but, because of the way in which my right hon. Friend structured it, it went to Redfern Travel, a company with 33 employees. It is a small or, at any rate and by anyone’s definition, only a medium-scale enterprise, and it was able to win the contract. The managing director said:

“The award of this contract…clearly demonstrates that…any SME can not only bid for major Government contracts, but also meet the challenging requirements”,

so I think that that is a very good test case.

[Esther McVey (Wirral West) (Con)]

rose—

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[Michael Dugher (Barnsley East) (Lab)]

According to figures published by the Cabinet Office last week, the Deputy Prime Minister has appointed four more special advisers at a cost to the taxpayer of at least £190,000. At a time when the average family is set to lose £320 a year as a result of tax credit changes and at a time when almost everyone is asking what exactly is the point of the Deputy Prime Minister, does the Minister think that this is a good use of public money?

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)]

I would have thought that the hon. Gentleman would realise that it is extremely important in a coalition that the Deputy Prime Minister as well as the Prime Minister should have adequate research support. It is extraordinarily difficult for Government Members to take comments of that kind seriously, given the previous Government’s record on employing special advisers.

[Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

T5. Can the Minister confirm how many civil servants went on strike in the recent action?