Closure of Sovereign House, Newport

Debate between Paul Flynn and Nick Thomas-Symonds

Wednesday 19th July 2017 Westminster Hall

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the closure of Sovereign House in Newport.

It is a special pleasure to meet under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. We know of your great contributions to debates in this House, in the Council of Europe and elsewhere, but it is the first time that I have had the chance to serve under your chairmanship.

The closure of Sovereign House in Newport is causing great anxiety in the city and elsewhere, because there is a threat to other jobs. We are not Luddites in Newport. We are very proud of the civil servants we have there, who have behaved magnificently over the past 50 or 60 years. They are of growing importance in the economy of Newport because of the collapse of much of our manufacturing industry. They have done marvellous work and we are greatly proud of the contribution they have made. They are certainly at the heart of the Newport community.

Our civil servants turned out to be absolutely right on one of the few things on which they disagreed with the Government. They were very supportive of shared services, which was a disruptive but very successful Government move to concentrate services in Newport, but when there was a move to privatise services, the people involved quite rightly objected. They were absolutely right to do so, because we went from a position of having saved the country £120 million to one in which there was a loss.

As I have said throughout my time in Parliament, having watched the civil service grow, prosper and provide a marvellous service for the country, the concern is based not on any Luddite proposal or unbalanced view, but on the fact that the civil service goes through various stages in which there is a holy grail. It used to be the Next Steps agencies, and then it was outsourcing, and now we are in the era of the super-hub—people take “super-hubism” up with an almost religious fervour. I am sure that young civil servants are told, “If you want to have a successful career, go into hubism, because that’s the way we are going.” The momentum takes over.

[Nick Thomas-Symonds (Torfaen) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. What the move to super-hubs neglects is the importance of having the jobs in local communities and the support they give to local communities. It also disregards the needs of workers, particularly those with caring and family responsibilities, who have the advantage of jobs close to home.

[Paul Flynn]

My hon. Friend makes his point with great force. That is precisely the position. People are attracted to super-hubs because they want their career to leave a legacy. If they can think that they have built super-hubs—great phallus symbols—in various places, they can relax when they eventually retire to their haciendas in Spain. It is something to be achieved, but it is not always rational or right.

I thank the Minister for having met my hon. Friend the Member for Newport East (Jessica Morden) and myself to discuss the matter. We want to see a clear, practical exposition of why this decision is the right one. To my knowledge, Sovereign House has been operating since the early ’60s and has provided jobs right in the heart of the city for all that time. There are 182 people working there now, but there is capacity for 400. It is a great asset to the city. One point that is not always taken into account is that the vibrancy of the city centre depends on the workers who are there. They have their lunch in the city, use the shops and so on, so they add to it. If a city is to thrive and survive, we need that working population at its heart. Where does that point come into the calculations of those who make the decisions?

Wales Bill

Debate between Paul Flynn and Nick Thomas-Symonds

Monday 12th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Paul Flynn]

Yes. We are working in close harmony with the Welsh Government on most of the recommendations. There is a sensible consensus between the Welsh Government, the UK Government and most parties. That is the only way forward if we are to build trust in devolution.

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

The point is that since most of the necessity tests have been removed from the Bill the issue of the separate legal jurisdiction has become less complicated. The position outlined by my hon. Friend about looking at this emerging body of Welsh law and finding a pragmatic solution is entirely sensible and appropriate.

[Paul Flynn]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend—we acknowledge his expertise in this matter. We will be looking for practical solutions. We hope that this subject comes up before the next Bill, but it guarantees the eternal nature of such Bills.

The Secretary of State described amendments 68 and 69 as mischievous, but I assure him that they are constructive and topical with Members having today gone through the trauma of the proposed constituency boundary changes. The proposals have brought anguish or joy to those of us who are looking forward to long careers in this House. As a late developer in politics and in life, I felt some anxiety that my career, which will reach its halfway point next year, could be cut short prematurely by the boundary changes, so I took some special interest in the matter.

The amendments propose changes to the methods used for deciding the number of Welsh Assembly Members. We have a crisis of democracy in this country. The mother of democracy has been degraded in many ways, a charge which comes from both sides of the House. People can buy their seats in the House of Lords through the acceptable practice of making donations to one of the three main parties. The Lords has 200 superfluous Members. Who said that? It was the new Speaker in the House of Lords. There is a case for immediate reform of that unelected place.

Problems also arise from other parts of our democracy. The hon. Member for Broxbourne (Mr Walker), Chairman of the Procedure Committee, made a powerful point last Thursday when he said that the planned move to cut the number of elected Members of Parliament was unjustified

“while the Lords continues to gorge itself on new arrivals.”—[Official Report, 8 September 2016; Vol. 614, c. 502.]

He is absolutely right. We need to change our democracy in many ways.

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

My hon. Friend is rightly highlighting that there the debate should be broader than just what is mentioned in the amendments. Does he agree that there is an enormous democratic deficit in pushing ahead with the constituency boundary changes when nearly 2 million people newly on the electoral register will not be counted?

[Paul Flynn]

It is the virtual disfranchisement of 2 million, so it is wrong on that basis. The timing is wrong.

Analysis of the boundary changes by Lord Hayward, a former Member of this House and Conservative peer, suggests that Labour would lose 13% of its MPs and that the Conservatives would lose 5%. Looking at the wreckage of our democratic system, which piece is being reformed?