Shared Prosperity Fund

Paul Blomfield Excerpts

Tuesday 14th May 2019 Westminster Hall

[Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) on securing this debate.

In the 1980s, when the Thatcher Government broke the industries on which our economy was built—steel and coal—we faced really tough times in South Yorkshire. We sunk to become one of the poorest regions in Europe, and because of that, the EU stepped in with funding. In reply to some of the comments that have been made, I say that that funding responded to what we asked for locally and funded programmes that were delivered by local organisations.

European structural funds were key to rebuilding our economy. Objective 1 funding provided £820 million to more than 250 organisations and 650 projects, from major projects such as the Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre, which has become a national flagship for industrial innovation, to small community initiatives that reskill people. The economy grew by 8.5%.

Shamefully, under Government policy since 2010, regional inequality has grown again. We are back where we were before: below 75% of the average gross domestic product of the EU and one of the poorest regions in Europe—formally designated a “less developed region” along with Tees Valley and Durham, Lincolnshire, west Wales and Cornwall, which have been mentioned.

On those regions, the February report from Conference of Peripheral Maritime Regions of Europe, which my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley Central mentioned, stated this for 2021 to 2027:

“All five of these regions would stand to receive EU support in excess of 500 euros per capita for the seven-year period.”

That would mean £605 million for South Yorkshire.

I was puzzled by the Minister’s intervention, as he seemed to suggest that because those areas voted leave they should not expect to receive that funding. That is not what they were promised in the referendum campaign, nor was it what they were promised subsequently.

[Jake Berry]

Nor was that what I said.

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[Paul Blomfield]

The Minister is chuntering from a sedentary position, but I hope he will respond to the question that I am about to ask.

To cast our minds back, we were promised that we would not be worse off, and in February I wrote to the Secretary of State, asking him to commit to providing the £605 million that we would have received had the country remained a member of the European Union. Replying on behalf of the Secretary of State, the Minister sidestepped the question and instead told me about a stakeholder event in Huddersfield—I am sure it was very useful. Today, I again ask that simple question: will the Government commit to providing regional development funding that is equivalent to the money we would have received from the European Union as less developed regions—yes or no?

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Jake Berry)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. I start in the traditional way by congratulating the hon. Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) on an excellent speech. As with so many things that we do together, with our shared passion to drive forward the economy of the northern powerhouse, there was very little I disagreed with in his speech, although there were a few things I will mention if I get the opportunity. Many Members asked similar questions, so before I deal with individual contributions I will address some of the more general points.

Let us be realistic about this debate: Members have picked me up on my saying that many areas that voted leave have been recipients of EU structural funds. One of my jobs in Government is administering many EU structural funds, and some Opposition Members may have done that job during the Labour Government. Those funds are hugely bureaucratic, and they do not target many of the things that we are desperate, across the Chamber, to drive in every constituency—including mine in east Lancashire, which is a deprived area in the north of England. Those funds are often inefficient. Although we have heard about some of the brilliant things they have done, such as supporting Mencap, which the hon. Gentleman mentioned, they have been hugely inefficient in many places.

My hon. Friends the Members for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double) and for North Cornwall (Scott Mann) made interesting points about how some of those funds have been wasted in Cornwall. I suspect that may be part of the reason—although I would be the first to accept that the picture is very complicated—why 68% of the people who live in Barnsley and 60% of the people who live in Oldham voted to leave the European Union. We in this place have to address some of people’s deep frustrations about inequality, which traditionally have not been addressed or targeted by European structural funds.

We keep referring to European structural funds as European money. Let us be absolutely clear: this is British taxpayers’ money, which is given to the European Union and then, after a large percentage of it has been removed, returned to our country.

[Paul Blomfield]

Will the Minister give way?

[Jake Berry]

I will not, sorry—there have been many interventions.

That is why, looking to the future, in our 2017 general election manifesto, my party—the Conservative party—said we would come forward with a new UK shared prosperity fund that would be designed to reduce inequalities between communities across the four nations of our United Kingdom and target productivity. That was reiterated by my right hon. Friend the Communities Secretary in a written ministerial statement in July 2018 laying out some of the foundations of the UK shared prosperity fund.

The Government accept that tackling inequality is absolutely something we need to grip in this country. The hon. Member for Leigh (Jo Platt) mentioned that Leigh, which I know well—it is just down the road from my constituency—does not have a railway station. It is not the case that there was a railway station there that was closed by a Conservative Government; that is a sign of decades of under-investment in northern transport infrastructure by successive Governments. The UK shared prosperity fund should seek to challenge some of the inequalities that we see north, south, east and west across the United Kingdom.