Non-Domestic Rating (Nursery Grounds) Bill

Debate between Rebecca Pow and Matt Warman

2nd reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 5th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Matt Warman]

My constituency also contains a village called Old Leake, which is in the same ward as Wrangle. “Wrangle and Old Leake” surely has some comic potential as well. I agree with my right hon. Friend that businesses that have paid out—I should say that I do not believe that Fountain is in that position—should be entitled to the refund that the Minister suggested, and the Government should consider establishing such a fund if compensation is due.

Having been exempted from rates since 1929, the businesses to which I have referred were faced with a number of factors that they had previously never even had to consider incorporating in their business models. I understand that glasshouses, which are obviously of huge concern to a constituency such as mine, have been exempted since the 1990s. An issue on which businesses throughout this section of the economy have been entirely predicated was upended by the courts almost overnight.

I agree with the hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton (Jim McMahon) that the Government deserve some credit for seeking to clarify what might have been an important issue had the system been allowed to persist. There was real concern—not just among businesses in my constituency—when it became obvious that the Valuation Office Agency was going down this path. I began by saying that the issue was about brassicas and flooding, but in fact it is about the jobs that would have been at stake. If the Government had not intervened to clarify the position, people would undoubtedly would have found themselves out of work.

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Nuneaton (Mr Jones), who at the relevant time had ministerial responsibility for these matters. Having visited those at R. Fountain & Son and reassured them that I was confident that such an extreme situation could only be the result of a mistake rather than Government policy, I had the extraordinary and delightful experience of mentioning that to my hon. Friend in a Lobby—he may not even remember it—and being told that the Government were already looking into the matter. It was a pleasure to be able to go back to businesses in my constituency and say that the Government would not be daft enough to increase their business rates so suddenly and massively.

To be honest, however, it was an even greater pleasure to go back to the drainage board. While I obviously care greatly about businesses throughout my constituency, the work of drainage boards in Lincolnshire is particularly and enormously valuable. They do huge service to the broader economy, and provide a great deal of reassurance through their work with the Environment Agency across the broader flooding landscape. Given that, according to the Association of British Insurers, my constituency is at greater risk of flooding than any other, I am particularly alive to that.

As I have said, my constituency is largely agricultural, and we are grateful for the business rates retention pilot. The Department is obviously aware of what must be done to ensure that business rates retention works for the areas to which it is applied, and that we do not end up losing out overall and accidentally giving more money back to the Treasury. I know that it does not intend that to happen in any circumstances.

I hope that Members will bear in mind that the Bill represents a useful endeavour to fix a problem that would have had a real impact not only on the local economy and jobs in my constituency, but on the availability of cabbages throughout the country, about which I know the House cares deeply. I also hope that, while accepting my praise for his swift action, the Minister will bear in mind that it highlights what business rates retention may well look like as we proceed with what I consider to be a worthwhile and popular policy.

[Rebecca Pow]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is heartening that although people often think that we in Parliament are powerless and are not listened to, when my hon. Friend went to the Minister about his cabbages, the Minister listened and we have done something that will help? That is a positive message. It might be a small thing to many people, but this is a positive message that, with cross-party work, we can make something happen.

[Matt Warman]

I agree with my hon. Friend, and this shows the power of my hon. Friend the Member for Nuneaton, and now the power of the two current Front Benchers. I agree with the Opposition spokesman that it is of course a good thing to work cross party on such an issue, which relates to not an intentional decision taken by the Government, but a decision by the courts that risked upending a long-standing principle.

I pay tribute to the work of my hon. Friend the Member for Nuneaton and those who have continued his work. I hope that the one wrinkle in the potential of the excellent notion of business rate retention will be considered in the context of these sorts of decisions. Such decisions could of course come up again, because people do go to courts, and courts do produce judgments that perhaps surprise all of us. In this case, the decision certainly surprised my drainage board and farmers such as Fountains. I praise the Government and hope we can get on with this as soon as possible.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Rebecca Pow and Matt Warman

Tuesday 5th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con)]

5. What steps the Government are taking to improve offenders’ access to education and employment.

[Matt Warman (Boston and Skegness) (Con)]

16. What steps the Government are taking to improve offenders’ access to education and employment.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Sam Gyimah)]

Education and employment opportunities are crucial to help offenders to turn around their lives. In line with our reforms, every prisoner will have a personal learning plan linked to their sentence plan. To make this reform effective, we are giving governors control over their education budgets to organise courses that fit prisoners’ needs.

Broadband

Debate between Rebecca Pow and Matt Warman

Wednesday 8th March 2017 Westminster Hall

[Matt Warman]

Absolutely. We need to end up in a position where at least half the people to whom a service is advertised—the distribution of advertising, particularly postal advertising, is often based on postcodes—should be able to receive the service that they are invited to pay for.

[Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Matt Warman]

I should have said no at the beginning, but since I have been so consistent, I shall give way.

[Rebecca Pow]

I thank my hon. Friend—I am trying to make it up to 100% on the Government Benches. Does he agree that this whole thing is a minefield? We have just had more money for connecting Devon and Somerset. We all thought that everything would be fine and everyone would get the right broadband speed, but a minefield of confusion has transpired. Should not we have much clearer labelling, adverts—everything, really?

[Matt Warman]

Yes. As I understand it, we could have a separate debate about the broadband roll-out in Devon and Somerset, so let us park that.

We need to end up in a situation where at least half of the people who are offered a service can receive it. On the one hand, that would be a fivefold increase on what is currently offered; on the other, the half of people who, by implication, could not receive that service would still be let down. So a starting point for the ASA to consider would be not only that 50% of people can receive the advertised speed but that a certain amount either side of the average can also receive within a certain percentage of that speed. Let us say that 50% receive the advertised speed and 20% either side can receive within 10% of that. That way, customers would basically know what they were getting.

That would be a revolution compared with the shambles we have at the moment. It would restore consumers’ confidence that the service they were paying for was what they were getting. I hope it would also encourage some businesses to adopt the good practice that, to be fair, BT has adopted of trying to provide each individual customer at the point of signing up with a personalised suggestion of what their speed will be. We should not pretend that the industry has not tried to make progress, but we should certainly acknowledge that the ASA guidelines do not compel it to do so, and that is a position that we would like all to get to.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Rebecca Pow and Matt Warman

Thursday 10th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Matt Warman (Boston and Skegness) (Con)]

5. How many flood defences the Government plan to build under their six-year flood defence programme.

[Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con)]

12. How many flood defences the Government plan to build under their six-year flood defence programme.