Covid-19: Maternity and Parental Leave

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Monday 5th October 2020 Westminster Hall

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship in such an important debate, Madam Deputy Speaker. I thank the 337 people from my constituency of York Central who signed the petition, which aims to make things right for parents.

I want to put on the record how important it is to support women through their pregnancies. Will the Minister raise with colleagues at the Department of Health and Social Care how essential it is that birthing partners and fathers are able to accompany the woman from pregnancy to birth—antenatal care, scans and hospital appointments—and for any care required after birth?

I will touch on two key issues. First, I thank the Petitions Committee for its report and its 23 recommendations, on which I want to reflect in the little time that I have. A constituent has written to me about neonatal care. She is a mother who gave birth 11 weeks early during the pandemic. That is so difficult, not least when her baby was moved to Middlesbrough, which is now in lockdown. She and her family need to be able to spend appropriate time to nurture and be with their baby. Bringing forward neonatal leave by two years would really assist her in that, and doing so now would help her even more. In the same way that the Government have moved at lightspeed to bring in so many measures during the pandemic, I ask that they bring in this important measure to support families in their time of need—April 2023 is too late.

As the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on adoption and permanence, the second issue I want to look at is the current inequality between adoptive parents and birth parents. Will the Minister take another look at that inequality, not least in the Government’s response to the Petitions Committee report? We know, for instance, that self-employed adoptive parents are not entitled to an equivalent to the maternity allowance that self-employed mothers can access. They can ask the local authority for support, but they may not get it, and it is means-tested, unlike for birth parents. The 2016 independent review of self-employment in the UK highlighted that disadvantage, yet four years on, there has been no redress. I ask the Government: why?

Special guardians are currently not entitled to any form of parental leave or pay, yet they fulfil a crucial parental role. That creates real inequality: research shows that around half of kinship carers have to give up work to care for their children. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell), who last week published an excellent report about the real hardship that kinship parents face. We need to see real change. Labour would have introduced a year of maternity pay and leave, following best practice, and we need to get that right for all parents.

I urge the Minister to bring forward proposals to ensure that there is no inequality between adopters and special guardians, and birth parents. For many of those parents, bonding with their child and addressing the issues of attachment are so important if their families are to succeed and thrive in future. Despite their response, I ask the Government to revisit those issues to ensure that we can create strong families in future.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Scully]

As I say, it is the overall aspect of the right balance, in terms of maternity leave, between the time and the money that we believe is both generous and fair—getting that right balance as a day one right.

The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North talked about what we are doing to look forward with care in the early years. The Prime Minister has asked my right hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire (Andrea Leadsom) to carry out a review on how to improve health outcomes for babies and children from disadvantaged backgrounds. That review will focus on the first 1,001 days of a baby’s life, from birth to age two and a half. [Interruption.] From a sedentary position, the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North says that she is on that committee, which is fantastic. I am looking forward to seeing what comes of that and what recommendations come forward.

On social groups for babies and children, I know how important baby and toddler groups are to new parents and babies, and how distressing it has been for parents to suffer through lockdown. My hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham talked about GPs and what they can and cannot do in terms of health visits. There is a contractual requirement from 1 April 2020 for GPs to offer maternal post-natal consultation at six to eight weeks after birth—live and stillbirth—as an additional appointment to the baby check in the first six to eight weeks. The Government gave an additional £12 million, invested through the GP contract, to support all practices to deliver that.

On mental health, clearly this is a concerning time for mothers. It is important, as we talk about giving mental health parity with physical health, that we are committed to supporting everyone’s mental wellbeing, especially during this unprecedented period. New parents can continue to access mental health services, including virtually, and the Department of Health and Social Care has released more tailored guidance to help people to deal with the outbreak.

[Rachael Maskell]

Will the Minister give way?

[Paul Scully]

I will not, because I have literally only a minute left and I want the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North to be able to respond.

There is no way I can talk about all hon. Members’ comments in the minute that I have left, but as I said in my response to the core of the petition, the Government believe that the entitlement to 52 weeks of maternity leave and 39 weeks of statutory maternity pay or maternity allowance is already very generous. I should perhaps add that those entitlements are provided to enable pregnant women and new mothers to prepare for and recover from birth and bond with their child.

We need to make sure that as we relax lockdown, there are new opportunities for new parents to spend their maternity, paternity, adoption and shared parental leave in the way that they envisaged prior to the pandemic. The recent relaxations have been possible only because we took the difficult decision to introduce stringent social distancing measures, including lockdown. In fact, as we are now learning, we still need to be vigilant at maintaining social distancing, to protect lives.

In conclusion, may I thank the petitioners? We will continue to work on those first early years, to ensure that parents and children can get the support that they want.

End of Eviction Moratorium

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Christopher Pincher]

I am obliged to my right hon. Friend, who is a doughty campaigner for her constituents in Chipping Barnet. I agree that we need to build upon the programme that she mentions. That is why, on 18 July, we announced the next steps accommodation programme, which I referred to earlier. At that point, it had spent about £263 million on 3,000 homes to help the long-term homeless. Dame Louise Casey is tasked with ensuring that we get people off the streets and keep them off the streets. As a result of the measures that we have undertaken, about 90% of those who were homeless at the start of the epidemic are now housed. We will continue to discharge our obligations. That is why, on 17 September, we announced further funds to the tune of £93 million to support the sorts of programme to which my right hon. Friend referred.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

York has one of the highest levels of private rent in the country. So many people are falling into rent arrears, and we do not have any capacity in our social housing provision. In fact, the waiting list has gone up by 300—over 20%—over the last six months. How will the Minister ensure that local authorities such as mine have sufficient resources in their discretionary grant to support constituents and stop them becoming homeless?

[Christopher Pincher]

As I have already described, we have disbursed £180 million in discretionary housing payments to local authorities to support them in supporting those in difficulty. We have spent several billion pounds on supporting local authorities through this pandemic, and we will keep our proposals under review, to ensure that we help everybody who is affected by this crisis, including the hon. Lady’s constituents in York. The measures put in place by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer—described by the shadow Chancellor as a “lifeline”—and by the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince), which to date have injected a further £9.3 billion into our welfare safety net, are designed to do exactly what we want to do: keep people off the street, keep them in their homes and keep them in their jobs as we move through this crisis.

Horizon: Sub-Postmaster Convictions

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Wednesday 10th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Paul Scully]

We have looked at the different options. I do not want something that is long, drawn out and costly for sub-postmasters, and which does not necessarily get any answers for years and years to come, if ever. Someone used to say to me, “Less haste, more speed.” Yes, we need to ensure that we can do this in a timely fashion, but that does not mean that we need to rush through the detail as the review is going ahead. We need to listen to the views of the sub-postmasters who have been wronged and put that alongside the findings of Justice Fraser to ensure that such things will never happen again.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

Happy birthday, Mr Speaker.

The Government speak as if there is nothing that they could have done as a special shareholder. Well, of course they could have done something. This situation has left communities in York, such as Clifton, bereft of a post office. The fact is that the Government sat on their hands and did not use their powers, and sub-postmasters and sub-postmistresses were thrown into jail and made bankrupt, and some took their lives. Do the Government not want a full, judge-led inquiry with the powers necessary to investigate and dig deep because a review does not hold those powers and will not expose their failings in this matter?

[Paul Scully]

The Post Office has said that it will comply fully with this review. I will push fully for that compliance, and I am sure that the independent chair will want to get right to the bottom of things, however long that takes. We need to get on with the review and get it started now.

On the Government’s actions over the past few years, this issue happened over 20 years, and with hindsight facts have come to light in the litigation that some of the advice received was flawed. However, we have pushed for many years to make sure that we can get a settlement, and I am glad that we are at the point at which we can start to get some answers.

Terms and Conditions of Employment

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

We are here today to debate the establishment of statutory parental bereavement leave and pay arrangements following Royal Assent to the Bill known as Jack’s law, in memory of Jack Herd. I pay tribute to his mother, Lucy, who will today see her work reach its concluding stages.

I am sure that Members on both sides of the House welcome the introduction of these measures, and I thank those from all parties who have advanced the need to establish bereavement leave and pay. Over the past few years, Members have recalled their own personal grief at the loss of a child or a stillbirth. The pain, the heartache and the impact are personal, but those who have had to face such sadness need a state that provides universal support to parents. In particular, I want to thank my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris), who has powerfully shared her own circumstances following the loss of her son and has forced Parliament to take a fresh look at bereavement, and the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake), my North Yorkshire colleague, who took the private Member’s Bill through the House.

I know that trade unions and businesses also welcome these measures. The Opposition believe that this is a first step, and one that we hope to build on as better understanding of grief and bereavement is acknowledged. While the provisions make adjustments for a period of two weeks, for those who have experienced loss, bereavement can last a lifetime. We need employers to look at what more can be done to support workers at difficult times.

I want to raise a number of issues regarding the regulations. The statutory instrument on pay applies only to employees. Clearly the measure is welcome, but it means that not all workers, as the Minister said, can access the provisions. Regulation 11 of the draft Statutory Parental Bereavement Pay (General) Regulations 2020 defines who would be entitled and who would be excluded, but will the Minister set out how he plans to address this inequality? Labour is clear: we would want to create a single status of “worker” to which all provisions would apply.

How will the Government ensure that bereaved parents in precarious work, including those on zero-hours contracts, can access two weeks’ statutory bereavement leave? While the provision for a statutory period of leave applies to all employees, the regulations that come into effect on 6 April 2020 make provision for statutory pay to apply only to those who have completed six months of service. However, bereavement and loss do not respect timelines. If someone loses their baby or child in their first six months of employment, the provisions should be extended to them. The loss is as great, and the need for leave and support as necessary.

The fact that the ability to take leave will, for some, be without pay means that those with the fewest means might not be able to afford to take it. Will the Minister set out why there is a limitation for those who have worked for less than six months and will he review it? While the regulations make provision for leave and pay for parents who lose a baby through stillbirth or who lose a child up to the age of 18, what provision has been made for parents who experience baby loss earlier in pregnancy? Further work should be done in this area.

[Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

I thank the hon. Lady for her kind comments earlier. She will acknowledge that, as the Minister said, this is a signal to employers. It is not simply a case of, “This is what you have to give.” She will agree that most employers are considerate in such circumstances and will go much further than the regulations require. This is the floor that we will work from, rather than the ceiling.

[Rachael Maskell]

I thank the hon. Member for his comments. He is absolutely right that this should be the beginning of a much broader conversation with all employers, whatever the circumstances in which they employ their staff.

It is believed that 10,200 parents each year will be eligible for statutory parental bereavement leave, with 9,300 eligible for statutory parental bereavement pay, meaning that about 1,000 parents a year will not be entitled to the pay provision. Will the Minister look again to see if day one provision could be extended specifically in that area?

I further seek to clarify that under the provisions of regulation 8 of the draft Parental Bereavement Leave Regulations 2020, two weeks’ statutory parental bereavement leave could commence following a completed period of maternity or paternity leave, provided that the two weeks’ allowance is used within 56 weeks of the loss of a baby or child. Labour believes that ensuring that all workers have day one rights would recognise that loss is loss and bereavement is bereavement. Arbitrary timescales should not come into this. While we would extend day one rights to all areas of employment law, it is important that the position is revisited for bereavement pay.

I also trust that employers will recognise the strength of these arguments and seek to go further when implementing these provisions. Good employment focuses on taking care of the holistic needs of the workforce, most acutely at the time of greatest need. We need to provide more time, time spread over a longer period, full pay, and support at key times, for instance on anniversary days. I trust that employers will be compassionate in making the fullest offer to staff, should they experience the loss of a baby or child.

Of course, bereavement brings its own patterns of grief, and time is necessary to come to terms with such loss. I hope that the Government will revisit this shortly, perhaps in the forthcoming employment Bill. The loss of a parent can often involve people having to take many additional practical measures to manage the parent’s estate or belongings, such as clearing a property. Bereavement leave could therefore be extended.

Research shows that not all parents are aware of their rights. For instance, 58% of those in low-paid work are not aware of what they are entitled to, and 63% are not aware of the right to unpaid parental leave, according to the TUC. Some have been found to use sick leave to address a family caring responsibility. That highlights the fact that from 6 April, not all parents will be aware of the changed provisions. Will the Government put in place a systematic approach so that parents can learn about these new measures? While we would hope that employers will inform their staff, may I suggest that NHS and hospice staff, as well as registrars for deaths, are briefed on the new provisions?

From 6 April this year, bereaved parents will have some time and support to manage the difficult days and weeks following the loss of their baby or child. This is a first step, and the Opposition will support the regulations today.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Scully]

I thank all hon. Members for their consideration of these SIs and for their valuable contributions to the debate. I hope that Members on both sides of the House can agree that they are essential to ensure that no employed parent faces the prospect of returning to work too soon after the tragic loss of a child, should they need time away to grieve.

We are giving parents an important choice through the SIs, allowing them to decide what is best for their needs. They might otherwise have been reliant on the good will of their employer—as we have heard, it has not always been the case that employers have shown that goodwill. The provisions in the SIs strike the right balance between the needs of bereaved parents and those of their employers, who will administer the new entitlement.

My right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne), who is no longer in his seat, withdrew his question, but it is important that people listening understand what we are doing for adoptive parents. He asked why someone who had applied for an adoption order but had their application rejected would not qualify. The grief experienced by an individual in such circumstances would affect them greatly, and an adoptive parent would qualify from the point at which the child was placed with them for adoption, irrespective of whether the application was rejected, if the child had been living with them for four weeks or more and had been cared for by them during that time. The four weeks is important because it covers other definitions as well so as to be as inclusive as possible.

The hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) asked about inequalities between different types of worker. The Government understand the challenges that the self-employed and other non-employees face following bereavement. These challenges are different from those faced by employed parents but clearly no less demanding. The parental leave and pay policy focuses on support for employed parents, as they have less autonomy and flexibility over the time they can take off work, but we continue to keep the differences in treatment between self-employed and employed people under review with respect to parental leave and pay. As she also mentioned, with the employment Bill coming up, we will soon be talking about wider issues relating to the different statuses of employment and working.

The hon. Lady asked about day one provisions for pay. The regulations seek to mirror the existing regime of parental statutory pay entitlements to ensure that the new entitlement is familiar to both employees and employers from day one. The provision is a statutory minimum, as we have heard; we would expect employers to go further whenever they can.

[Rachael Maskell]

Does the Minister agree that the bereavement measures relate to circumstances very different from those relating to other measures and that the regulations do not reflect the true nature of grief and the support people need, particularly if they have been employed for less than six months? Will he go back and review this please?

[Paul Scully]

We will keep all these matters under review and see how they are working. The hon. Member is right to say that bereavement is an incredibly difficult issue. We want to ensure a safety net, a bare minimum—employers should not see this as the benchmark; it is the bare minimum they should offer. Any reasonable employer should seek always to do what is best and to value their employees as human beings at every level in terms of pay and benefits.

The hon. Lady asked about extending these provisions in the upcoming employment Bill to cover the loss of a parent. As I say, the Government have been clear that this is a statutory minimum, but we hope it will trigger improvements in workplace support for all kinds of bereavement. I would encourage all employers to engage with the ACAS guidance that supports employers in these circumstances.

The hon. Lady asked about a systematic approach to ensuring parents are informed of their new rights, including by briefing NHS staff. I agree that it is important that any benefits are clearly signposted. The last thing parents will be thinking about at such a time will be their rights and responsibilities, so the easier it is to do the right thing the better. We have worked closely with stakeholders to make them aware of the new entitlement, including Sands, the charity, which already works closely with hospitals to provide support to parents following a stillbirth or neonatal death, and we will publish guidance on the new entitlement once the legislation is passed.

I pay tribute to the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson) for bringing her personal experience to bear and for seeking changes. I congratulate her on getting her amendment through to extend the provisions to include stillbirth. I hope she can take comfort from knowing that her experience has brought about real change to the lives of grieving parents and to our ability to address these matters further in years to come. She asked about extending the provisions to children over the age of 18. Clearly, bereavement is the same no matter the age—losing a child at any age is devastating—and the question of where to draw the line for the purposes of the parental bereavement leave and pay policy has been a difficult consideration. We have consulted with stakeholders representing bereaved parents and employers, and they recognised that the measure needed to be deliverable and affordable. It was accepted that 18 was the most natural threshold for the new entitlement. Moreover, grief affects all family members, not just parents, and so with ACAS and Cruse we will continue to explore the best way to encourage employers to act sympathetically to requests for leave in relation to any bereavement.

The Government are committed to supporting working parents, and to making this country the best place in the world in which to work and grow a business. These statutory instruments will ensure that bereaved parents have a minimum statutory provision on which to rely if they ever have to go through the unimaginable tragedy of losing a child or baby, and I hope that the House will approve them.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That the draft Statutory Parental Bereavement Pay (General) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 23 January, be approved.

Resolved,

That the draft Parental Bereavement Leave Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 23 January, be approved.—(Paul Scully.)

Oral Answers to Questions

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Monday 22nd July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

My right hon. Friend, with her usual skill, puts up a stout defence on behalf of her constituents. She is quite right that protections that would otherwise exist for neighbourhood plans recede where a local plan is not in place, particularly when there is not a five-year land supply. I would point out that having a five-year land supply is not a necessary condition of having a local plan. It is possible to have one without the other, and I hope that her local authority will seek to do so. We will shortly be issuing planning guidance on plan making, wherein I hope we will include measures to strengthen neighbourhood plans, either in the absence of a local plan or where they are not co-terminus.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

York has not had a local plan in place since 1954, despite being one of the worst cities for investment in economic and housing opportunities for my constituents and the council’s aspiration to build 20% affordable housing but developing just 4%. What steps will the Minister take to ensure that the plan developed for York will address not only the jobs needs but the housing needs in our city?

[Kit Malthouse]

I have been in this job for just over 12 months, and I have developed a sense that in some way people have an expectation that I should be planning the country from my desk in Whitehall. Fundamentally, the decisions about the local plan are for the local democratically elected representatives, and they should be examined by a planning inspector to make sure that they are compliant with national planning regimes. In the end, the fundamental arbiter of the local plan in York—whether there should be one and what it should it contain—is a decision by the people of York. I would urge them to vote for a council that will produce the kind of the plan to which the hon. Lady aspires.

Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

1st reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 2nd July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate, and I want to focus my remarks on housing. However, before getting on to that topic, I want to make a few other points, starting with the financing of local government as a whole, which my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Gareth Snell) described so well. We need to take a serious look at how we fund local authorities and at the demands we place on them. We know that the business rate system is broken, which harms businesses and means that we are not getting the local economic growth that we need to see business thrive. We are also seeing more and more online businesses, which also has serious consequences as well. We must review the business rates and council tax systems and seek a much fairer system of funding local authorities.

We also need to determine what local authorities are there to do. Over my short time in this place, more and more of that determination is being done at Westminster, but then powers have been taken away and councils have not been given the necessary resources. In effect, we have seen risk shifted on to local authorities, but they have not been given the resources to address their needs. That cannot be the right way forward, so we need a review ahead of the comprehensive spending review, because how can we have a spending review if we do not know what we are spending or how are we going to fund it? Time is short, and I say to the Minister we need to get a move on because local authorities are struggling. We can see that in how services are being cut in our areas, and we have heard about the severe impacts on local communities from right across the Chamber today.

I also urge the Minister to look at youth services. We do not have a statutory youth service, and that is having a massive knock-on impact on all sorts of other services. A place-based approach is important so that we can understand how to move prevention up local authority agendas. I urge the Minister to examine how we can fund a youth service, because we know that prevention makes such a difference and, ultimately, is cheaper than having to address the effects of things going wrong.

I also urge the Minister to look at the high-needs education budget within a wider scope, as we need to get this right. Local authorities are having to provide that resource, but my local authority is in deficit as a result—£760,000 last year, and a predicted £1.3 million this year and £1.9 million next year. This is about funding services for the most vulnerable people in our communities, our young people, to ensure they have the best chances in life. I therefore urge the Minister to ensure it is properly funded come the comprehensive spending review.

I am sure all hon. Members are frustrated that the Government have promised us so many times that they will address social care. After Dilnot in 2011, we were promised a Bill in 2012, but it never emerged. Seemingly on an annual cycle, we are promised Green Papers, White Papers and all sorts. We have to remember these are just discussion documents, not action plans, yet nothing has emerged. We have a real social care crisis.

I disagree with the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) on how we should approach social care, because I believe we need a much more therapeutic approach. The relationship with the health service is therefore important, and funding social care and providing security, particularly for older and vulnerable people, needs to be a priority for this Administration. We cannot wait.

I asked a question the other day, and we now know we will not have the Green Paper before the summer, which means we are just kicking the can further down the road. Of course, older people are struggling to fund their social care needs at the most vulnerable time in their life. That just cannot be right, so I urge the Minister to ensure social care is properly funded. Personally, I would prefer to see a more universal approach to social care, and I believe that joining it up with the national health service would be the best way to deliver it.

I return to housing through the prism of what is happening in York Central. It is fair enough that the Government have an ambition to build 300,000 housing units, not that it will be easy to deliver, but frankly their target is of no use whatsoever if those units will be second homes and assets for investors, not homes in which people can afford to live. It is a shame that the Minister is not listening, because this is crucial to the development and growth of our city.

The reality is that the housing being built at York Central will not be affordable to the residents of York. We have a housing crisis in our city because, over the years, successive councils have not built the houses our city needs. As a result, people who are desperate for a home are constantly coming to my surgery, and all I ever get back from the council—a Lib Dem administration—is a letter saying, “We do not have enough houses.” Yet, time and time again, the council passes planning applications to build luxury apartments worth £300,000 to £500,000, which nobody in my city can afford as it is 11 to 19 times the average wage.

We will therefore see all these housing units being ticked off on a chart, which the Government can quote and say, “Look at how many houses we have built.” But they are not homes in which people can afford to live, so they will move into the private rented sector or they will be assets or weekend homes. They are not the homes we need.

The imbalances we have in York are having a massive impact on our care sector, because care workers and people working in the NHS cannot afford to live in our city. We have more than 500 vacancies, which is skewing the whole economy in the private sector and the public sector. It is simply a broken system, and it has to be addressed.

The local authority has paid £10 million up front into the York Central site, with potentially another £35 million of borrowing—money the council will not see, but from which developers will benefit. This will therefore have a massive negative impact on people living in York. I understand the housing infrastructure fund was important for unlocking the site, because it is a rail-locked site, but what are we unlocking it for? The reality is that the plans were predicated on the local authority being able to generate resource from the enterprise zone, which is fair enough in itself, but when the size of the enterprise zone is reduced by a third, it is not going to be able to get its revenue from business rates, which was predicted at £133 million. Therefore, the income will be reduced, which means that the return to the local authority will be reduced and the maths simply does not work for anyone but the developers, who are clearly laughing at the Government’s decision to press ahead with this.

Ultimately, local authority money has been put into this site and will not be seen again by the people of our city. That cannot be right, so we have to look at how local authority money works together with other revenue streams to bring benefit to local people. Putting local needs at the heart of this is really important. Why is it so important for our city? I have already mentioned that this housing is unaffordable, but the impact of this is a reduction in the opportunity for the local authority to grow the economic base of our city. As a result, less revenue will come into our city, which will be seriously detrimental in the long term. We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to build York as a city for the future, so I urge the Minister to look at these funding streams once again.

Oral Answers to Questions

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Monday 17th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

6. What steps he is taking to ensure that planning applications (a) maximise economic opportunities and (b) tackle local housing needs.

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

The Secretary of State has issued a national planning policy framework that provides details on how economic opportunities should be included in applications that look to tackle local housing need.

[Rachael Maskell]

When a proposed economic development does not provide for sufficient good-quality jobs for our city, when proposed housing fails to address current and future need and when proposed car use only adds to an already gridlocked city, how will the Minister review planning so that ordinary residents have a real voice and so that councils and developers have to act on independent evidence to address local need, not their own interests?

[Jake Berry]

I believe the hon. Lady is referring to the planning application for the centre of York, on which she and I have met, and on which I have also met my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer (Julian Sturdy).

The hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) is aware that the Secretary of State is currently considering this application, so it would not be right for me to comment. It is also right for me to say that I have formally recused myself from making a decision on the application because of my meetings with her and others.

High Streets and Town Centres in 2030

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Thursday 13th June 2019 Westminster Hall

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I, too, welcome the Select Committee’s report. I thought it was outstanding, particularly in the light of the challenges that my city experiences on a day-to-day basis, on which I have advocated action in this place. Those who are familiar with our debates on these issues will know that I have made many contributions, particularly about business rates—an issue that the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) articulated so well and that I will return to shortly.

York provides an incredible high street experience for people visiting our city, but we also need to make the city work for local residents, who increasingly do not visit the city centre. We should reflect more on the experience of residents and on how communities engage with these issues, because communities can really make a high street. Although our city has 7 million visitors a year, we must give the residents—those who are there day in, day out—the opportunity to have both a real shopping experience and a wider experience. That is why I welcome the report’s suggestion that we should look at not just a retail opportunity but a whole community opportunity.

Bishy Road in York was, frankly, a dying high street. The post office had moved out and the street was struggling. However, it has been rejuvenated, to the point of winning a Great British High Street award, because it built its whole centre on the wider community. Traders’ engagement with the community means that it is now the go-to place in our city for a retail experience; there are lots of different types of outlets on the street.

However, the picture across the city is not universal. York has many exciting places for people to engage in, which very much attract the external community—I am thinking of Jorvik and the museums in our city centre—but local residents really struggle to be able to afford to benefit from them. Like so many places, York has seen a real hollowing-out of shopping centres, particularly on Coney Street, where shops are struggling, not least because of the huge pressure on business rates.

Before I move on to business rates, let me mention the great opportunities for innovation across our city. The report did not particularly reflect on markets, but they are a great place for businesses to develop and grow. We should look at the role of markets on our high streets, and at how they interact with the wider retail experience. Spark:York, a new development built in shipping containers, has enabled many businesses to start up. It has a real vibe about it and it provides great opportunities. Those kinds of initiatives will help to bring some regeneration. For example, Spark gives good, ethical businesses the opportunity to start up and then move out to benefit from opportunities on the wider high street.

I take slight issue with what the report says about transportation into urban centres. It focuses on car parking. In an age when many of our urban centres are so polluted and congested, we need to ensure that there is really good public transport infrastructure to bring people in. York has one of the best park and ride facilities in the country. Opening up opportunities for living streets, for active travel and for park and ride on public transport is a way of regenerating our urban centres. Of course, if people walk and cycle rather than just going to their cars, there is more engagement; it has been shown that businesses benefit more if people use public transport and active travel. I hope that the Minister will take that on board.

We also need to ensure that there are real community spaces in the heart of our cities. I am thinking about libraries—people used to go to city centres to visit libraries, but they have disappeared—swimming pools and green spaces. We must ensure that people can access community hubs. Because of the lack of facilities and space, and the cost, community hubs are often pushed out to the periphery of the city. If there were go-to places at the heart of the city for residents to congregate and attend events, residents would be drawn into the city again. We need to square that circle to ensure that we have good community spaces in the heart of our city centres.

Business rates have been a particular problem in York. The analysis of what has happened was worked through with Make It York and the York Retail Forum. Across the country, 29% of the high street is owned by international businesses. We might, at one level, argue that that is inward investment, but at the same time it leads to a detached relationship between landlords and local centres. Investors who own property in the city centre often have wider interests, including maintaining their share price and increasing the value of their assets. When an investor charges high rent on a property, that hurts the shop owner, but there is a wider, more important benefit to the investor. Higher rent increases the property’s valuation, which pushes up business rates, so people are hit by higher rents and higher business rates.

The false economy, or bubble, that that creates is forcing many of the independents in York, and many other shops, off the high street. We have to address the relationship between property owners and the city or town centre. Social clauses should be built into contracts to force that relationship back to a sensible place. If a property owner does not make the right decisions for the wider area then, frankly, they should not own space on the high street.

We must also look at new developments. In York, we are on the cusp of the exciting York Central development, which has been through many iterations in planning. It was going to be a full retail piece built into the city centre. That is no longer the case, but the plan is still to have retail outlets as part of the 400,000 square metres site. However, if the planning goes ahead, which sees the development in isolation from the rest of the city, there could be a serious detrimental impact on the city itself.

When we look at developing new sites, we need to take into account the broader impact. Sadly, that is not the case for the York Central development, where no appraisal was undertaken to see what its impact could be on the wider city. The plan is on the Secretary of State’s desk. There has been a request for a call-in, which we hope will be honoured to allow the plans to be revisited, not least because of the plan’s housing and limited wider economic opportunities.

I welcome the Government’s future high streets fund, which is a good start. Like many, I believe that it needs to grow and be dedicated to sharing good practice. York has an interest in benefiting from the fund to ensure that our city works for residents as well as visitors in future. It is also important for those people up and down our country who are working hard to try to make their high street businesses work for everyone’s benefit.

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Mrs Heather Wheeler)]

Absolutely, Mr Stringer. I am Heather Wheeler, just in case anyone had not worked that out. The other Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the hon. Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Jake Berry), should have been responding, but sadly he is at a funeral today. It is therefore my pleasure to respond to the debate. Clearly, my 16-minute speech is going to go nowhere, as I am leaving time for the Committee’s Chair to reply. As always, Mr Stringer, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship.

I thank all members of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee who are present for their cross-party report into high streets and town centres for working with the Government to support the sustainable transformation of our high streets. We are pleased that the report broadly recognises the Government’s measures to instigate structural change, and we agree with the diagnosis that local places are best placed to know what their local solutions are—with appropriate support from central Government. It is a helpful report and, as has been said, we have broadly accepted its recommendations. Although I cannot cover everything in the short time available, I hope that hon. Members present will see how the Government are pursuing a holistic package of measures to transform our high streets and town centres for the long term.

Last year was particularly challenging for UK retailers, bringing into question traditional success models for towns and high streets. Quick to respond, in July 2018 the Government commissioned an expert panel, bringing together a wealth of expertise from the retail, property and design sectors. Chaired by Sir John Timpson, it explored the question that brings us here today: how do we catalyse change and ensure that town centres across the country adapt and thrive for future generations?

Our package includes a £675 million future high streets fund to support local areas in England to invest in town centre infrastructure, to make a real difference to the underlying structure of the high street. This demonstrates our commitment to taking long-term action to help high streets and town centres evolve through investment to improve town centres. We thank the Committee for commending our work in this area and echo its sentiments. We are currently considering more than 300 expressions of interest, and we have placed significant weighting on local leadership, vision and strategic ambition when assessing the bids. The places progressing to the second stage of the fund and receiving revenue funding to support the development of their plans will be announced later this summer.

As the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) said, business rates are a bone of contention. Since the 2016 Budget, we have introduced a range of business rates measures in England worth more than £13 billion over the next five years. This includes the announcement in the 2018 Budget to take a third off eligible retailers’ bills for two years from April 2019, which is worth an estimated £1 billion alone. We have also doubled small business rate relief from 50% to 100% for eligible businesses, resulting in more than 655,000 small businesses —one third of occupiers—paying no business rates at all.

Alongside that we have committed to a £435 million package to support ratepayers facing the steepest increases following the 2017 revaluation. Finally, we switched the annual indexation of business rates from the retail prices index to the consumer prices index, representing a cut in business rates every year for all ratepayers. That alone will save all businesses almost £6 billion over the next five years.

[Rachael Maskell]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mrs Wheeler]

It will have to be very quick.

[Rachael Maskell]

I will be brief. Will the Minister commit to going back and scoping out the possibility of a turnover tax?

[Mrs Wheeler]

The hon. Lady is obviously prescient. When the Government concluded the last fundamental review of business rates, we decided to keep business rates as a property tax, following stakeholder responses. Respondents agreed that business rates are easy to collect, difficult to avoid, relatively stable and clearly linked with local authority spending. Some respondents suggested alternative tax bases. However, Select Committee members and others may wish to know that there was no consensus on an alternative base, and that even those respondents who put forward alternatives were clear that they were not without issues. To finish on business rates, the Government are committed to listening to views and will keep all taxes under review.

Jewish Community: Contribution to the UK

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Thursday 13th June 2019 Westminster Hall

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is always a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. I send my best wishes for a speedy recovery to my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford West (Naz Shah), who was due to respond to the debate. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson) for securing the debate. We have known each other for a significant amount of time—a couple of decades—and I can testify to how committed he is not only to celebrating diversity, but to furthering the rights and opportunities of all in society. He has done so today eloquently for our Jewish friends across the United Kingdom.

I was particularly moved by the family story of my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Ruth Smeeth), much of which I had not heard before. I have very fond memories of working with her mother, who was a tour de force in the trade union movement. My hon. Friend has proved to be that, too. Given the lineage from her grandmother, I can very much see where that comes from.

Today’s debate celebrates the incredible investment that the UK’s Jewish communities have made to our nation. If I may, for one moment I will highlight my own Jewish community in York. York’s Jewish community may be small, but it is fast-growing, and it is certainly growing in its impact on our city. Determined not to look back to the tragic massacre of Clifford’s Tower in 1190, the community is building a new story to be told in our city, marked by community action and an impressive contribution to York’s faith forum.

We heard earlier from the hon. Member for Glasgow East (David Linden) about the faith communities in Manchester and Glasgow, and the contribution that they can make to our communities. The work of the faith forum in York stands out across the country. This is not just about the Jewish community; the Muslim community is known for how they came out to greet the English Defence League with tea and biscuits when it marched in our city. They broke the anger and changed that situation, the like of which has not been seen in our city since.

Since I was elected, it has been a real honour to work with York’s Jewish community. In particular, Ben Rich has led significant dialogue in our city, not least when I approached him to provide training for our Labour party on antisemitism, and I was delighted that he accepted that. We have had positive feedback from the significant number of people who attended. I believe that again sets out best practice.

I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden) for highlighting, in his usual eloquent style, the real discourse about the political debate on identity, culture and faith. He is absolutely right that even one incident of antisemitism must be a cause of great concern. We have to know our history to know how crucial it is to be on top of the issue and to address it as a matter of urgency.

While I am still giving thanks, I pass on my thanks to the Jewish Leadership Council, which does outstanding work, especially on advancing good practice and taking forward so many initiatives across our country, particularly with its work on care for the elderly. We are reminded of the importance of that work today. It is so important that we have a real understanding of the diversity, identity, culture and innovations that come from all communities across the UK, and that we celebrate them in their own right, whether through our culture, our economy, our society or personally.

Many third-sector organisations, such as Jewish Care and Norwood, have made outstanding contributions to our country. I knew those organisations particularly well when I worked with them as a trade union official. Now, as a Member of Parliament, I work closely with the Holocaust Educational Trust as it leads the dialogue on remembering the past, addressing prejudice in society today and bringing the issue so close to home. It was a delight to hear from my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) about the incredible work that World Jewish Relief is doing with refugees. Again, that brings home the importance of the work across our communities, to welcome strangers and embrace all that they have to bring.

As a trade unionist—I refer hon. Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests—I have witnessed incredible contributions, not least from my hon. Friends, to advancing workers’ rights on behalf of the Jewish community. We are reminded of the important work contributed, across our trade union movement, towards anti-fascism. Like my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester, I highlight the amazing work that the Community Security Trust does in an interfaith context to ensure the safety and security of residents, particularly in the Jewish community.

On Mitzvah Day, people across the country make a phenomenal contribution: some 40,000 people from the Jewish community come out to serve their community. In York, that has expressed itself in recent years through tree planting to alleviate flooding issues, but that is just one of 1,000 projects to meet local needs in communities. I thank people for opening up their hearts and their doors to our communities and reaching out. While I am speaking about opening doors, I should also say that I have very much enjoyed visiting my local Jewish community on a number of occasions to share Shabbat and share fellowship with my friends in it.

It is not just a question of charity. Our economy thrives because of all that the Jewish community has contributed over time. The hard work and innovation of many people within the Jewish community has broadened our economic footprint in the UK and beyond. I enjoyed hearing my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester explain how fish and chips came to our country—I am sure that will feature in a future pub quiz. We also celebrate the Jewish community’s contribution to science, medicine, sport, literature and the arts in the UK. Whether they are Nobel prize winners or have simply made a contribution in their own right, we celebrate all who have participated in advancing our country.

As we mark the 75th anniversary of D-day, it is worth noting not only the 50,000 people from the Jewish community who served in our armed forces in the first world war, but the more than 60,000 who served in the second. We owe them a huge debt of gratitude.

I am thankful that many people from the Jewish community have served in this place. Our Labour party has been an important home to many from across the Jewish community over the years, with radical thinking about change and about how we want to shape and transform our society. We have supported the struggles that discrimination has brought and have stood in solidarity with those who face challenges. We are determined to rebuild that trust. It cannot be given; it must be demonstrated and earned.

At a time when we are seeing the rise of fascism across our nation, with people being othered because of their identity, culture or creed, it is vital that we unite and drive forward radical change across our communities to ensure that all feel safe and welcome in our nation. Together, we must celebrate the contributions that come clearly from the values that lie at the heart of the Jewish community in both culture and faith.

Local Government and Social Care Funding

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Wednesday 24th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Gwynne]

I remind the hon. Gentleman that the 2017 Labour manifesto said that we would put money back into our public services, something that he has failed to do in the almost three years since that general election.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend is making an incredibly pertinent speech. Does he not agree that it is completely perverse that public health budgets in York under the Tory-Liberal Democrat council have been slashed, when the NHS 10-year plan says we have to invest in public health?

[Andrew Gwynne]

It shows precisely the short-sighted way that the Government have approached funding local government. The fact that they passed on public health budgets to local government was, I think, a good move. It was one of the few things in the Lansley Act—the Health and Social Care Act 2012—that I thought was good, because it took back to local councils precisely what they were invented to tackle, which is to improve the health and wellbeing of the citizen. Of course, many councils started off their lives 150 or so years ago as local boards of health. Having that focus on public health and on health and wellbeing is absolutely right, but we cannot do that while cutting those budgets. That is the scandal: the areas that have seen the biggest cuts to their spending power, the areas that have seen the biggest cuts to the revenue support grant, and the areas that have seen the biggest cuts to the public health grant are the ones that need that resource the most.

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[James Brokenshire]

My hon. Friend makes his point in his inimitable style.

We have promoted a greater sense of devolution, and this comes back to my point about trusting communities, councils and people at the grassroots to get on and deliver for their communities. It is this Government who have given local authorities the tools and resources they need to do their vital work, and it is Conservative councils that are providing value for money and delivering quality services for their residents while keeping council tax lower than in Labour and Liberal Democrat council areas. This includes doing the right thing on recycling, with Conservative councils recycling, reusing or composting around 49% of their waste, compared with 36% under Labour councils. This is about local delivery, which is what much of the current campaign and the votes in the forthcoming local council elections will be about.

[Rachael Maskell]

One area in which the Secretary of State and the Government have failed to invest since 2010 is staff. The Government may offer warm words, but a 21% real-terms pay decrease for some of the worst paid workers is completely unacceptable. How is the Secretary of State going to address that issue?

[James Brokenshire]

I hope the hon. Lady will have noticed that, according to the latest figures, real wages are actually going up. I remind her of the fact that pay restraint across the public sector was a consequence of the mess that we inherited from the last Labour Government. I know that this has been difficult; it has been really tough and incredibly hard. Equally, we are determined to maintain the strong economic path for our economy and to ensure that our public finances are now back in the right space and not left in the fashion that the last Labour Government left them in. I am mindful of the essential role our local authorities play in helping the most vulnerable in our society, and I recognise the growth in demand in adult and children’s social care and the pressure that that brings.

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[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Emma Hardy) has summed up the importance of today’s debate. The reality is that care does not come for nothing; it costs money, and it is about where this Government’s priorities actually sit. We have heard the talk about millions and billions of pounds so many times, yet the very people in our society who need special care are so often overlooked.

I want to thank the staff of City of York Council for the incredible work they do for my city, as they have in very difficult times over the last four years. Decisions are often made that they do not agree with, yet they have complied with them as servants of our people, and that is against the backdrop of losing a fifth of their wages in real terms.

My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Laura Smith) highlighted how careworkers in particular are paid so poorly. Why? They are women. The fact is that this Government take it that women will not go out on strike and will not fight, but will care instead because they know how desperately people need their labour. They know how desperately people need them to visit and how, if they do not turn up that day, somebody will be worse off. That is why money is not put in: because they care and because they are women. The inequality that is now embedded so deeply in our system highlights to me how broken the funding system for local government is.

Beyond that, we know that local government itself does not get the investment, yet it is where change can really happen. We heard earlier about how Labour brought in a place-based system, looking at how to get the interconnectivity of different lines of funding. Now we see the fragmentation, the diktats from Government and the pulling apart of local communities, and I see that reflected in my local area as well. The whole system of funding is broken, and funding has not been spread out to where there is greatest need.

Returning to the issue of older people, I want to highlight this point. In this place, we talk about older people only with regard to social care and pensions, which are seen as financial burdens on the state. We do not talk about how the state can invest in these really precious lives and ensure that their rights are upheld right to the end. That is why the all-party group on ageing and older people, of which I am the chair, set up an inquiry into the human rights of older people, and the report came back saying that it is absolutely vital that there is a commission on the rights of older people.

I have written to both the Ministers sitting on the Front Bench—the Minister for Care and the Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, the hon. Member for Thurrock (Jackie Doyle-Price)—and I have to say that the response has been woeful. We are talking about the rights, voice, opportunity and future of older people, but they are just dismissed. I believe that is why we have seen the delay in the social care Green Paper, which, let us face it, is a discussion document and is not going to change anything. The prioritisation placed on the most vulnerable people in our society is wrong, and we have got to see change.

If we are talking about wider change, there is the funding of local authorities as well, and it is a broken system. When we look at business rates—I have debated them many times in this place—we see that, as the high streets are hollowed out, the business rates return even less, so local government’s dependency on business rates does not work. We have of course seen precepts, which are regressive, and the council tax, which at its concept was a stopgap for the failed poll tax system. We need to look at funding for local authorities in a very different way.

This is not just about funding, but about how funding interconnects with the social ambition of our councillors. I have to say that Labour’s vision in York is very different from that of the current administration, which has just let the market move in. Profit-obsessed developers are now building luxury apartments all over our city, which, quite frankly, people in York cannot afford. We are one of the lowest-wage economies in the north: wages fell in York by £66 last year, and pay is £80 a week lower than the national average.

We are a post-industrial city and we are struggling, yet people are exploiting our city. Just two weeks ago, the council agreed plans to put up 2,000 luxury flats in the middle of our city when we have a housing crisis. Eleven people died on our streets last year, and we have families—whole families—in cramped, one-bedroom box rooms, and they are damp as well. What is happening on the ground in local authority areas is completely unacceptable. It is the responsibility of Government to wake up to the reality. I do not want to hear platitudes; I want to see action.

York is the most inequitable city outside of London; the inequality and life expectancy there show that there is failure in the system. It may work for some, but it certainly is not working for the many. Labour’s vision for our city is very different. We want investment in people. We want to give them back their voice so that they can build their future. That is what we will do, should we come to power on 2 May.

People have exploited our city. The post office, Bootham Park Hospital and the barracks have been sold, but the money has not come back into our city. Those sites have been handed over to developers who, quite frankly, just want to make money; they do not want to invest in people. Our city is crying out for a change in approach. It looks shabby and dirty. Waste is not being addressed and recycling rates are falling. The issues that people care about in our communities are not being addressed.

The Labour party, however, is ambitious. We will put in place a transport commission to address air pollution, which is taking 150 lives a year in our city. We will make it a carbon-neutral city by 2030, which is more ambitious by far than this Government. We will ensure that we invest in green spaces, because that is a more holistic approach and better for people’s health. We will make those connections and join the dots.

Why do that in York? We only need look back 100 years, when Seebohm Rowntree carried out his studies of poverty in our city. We will also do that, should we get elected in May, and look at the real deprivation that exists in our city. The Rowntree family then built jobs and housing, put in education and pension systems, promoted the leisure and pleasure that people should enjoy in their everyday lives, and rebuilt York out of the slums. That is what Labour will do again, should we be given the opportunity on 2 May. We will not only analyse what has gone wrong—it is there for everyone to see—but give people the security they deserve and hope for their future so that they can join us on the journey to build a compassionate, humane city.