Autumn Statement Resolutions

Richard Foord Excerpts

Monday 21st November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

In spite of what the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Anthony Browne) says about the Conservative mini-Budget from two months ago, the very least we can say about it was that it accelerated massively the pace at which the cost of borrowing went through the roof in this country. In my few minutes, I want to relate that to how, in Devon, the council services, the healthcare services and dentistry have been affected, according to some of my constituents.

Let me turn to the situation facing local councils. Facing rising costs and watching inflation erode their spending power, council leaders were looking to the Chancellor to throw them a lifeline last Thursday. What did he do? He left them to flounder. The Conservative Leader of Devon County Council, Councillor John Hart, recently highlighted the scale of the challenge facing the council as it struggled to deliver vital services. Facing a £75 million black hole, Councillor Hart told local media that, because of the measures announced last Thursday, he is forced to choose between hiking council tax, at a time when many can least afford it, or making deep cuts to services. He writes:

“Devon has always been known for its careful and prudent financial management, but the strain on us all is becoming intolerable.”

That is the Conservative Leader of Devon County Council, and I agree with him.

Across Devon, we are seeing the effects of these decisions play out, as functions such as children’s services, which were already teetering on the brink, will not be able to cope. The Chancellor cannot simply expect councils to keep raising council tax to fulfil their statutory obligations. That will hammer local people, but will never be enough to fill the gap. Many of these people are struggling to make ends meet as it is.

Just recently, I received an email from a 10-year-old constituent. Louis Lighthouse wrote that he is worried about how rising costs will see families struggle this winter, yet the Chancellor’s solution is that Devon families should see their council tax bill rise.

Secondly, I wish to highlight the pressure facing our NHS, particularly frontline ambulance and A&E services. We already know that winter is a time when the NHS comes under extreme pressure, and we are going into this winter woefully under-prepared. In Devon there are 158,000 people on NHS waiting lists, unable to get the care they need, and I am sure that number will increase in the months to come. This problem is compounded by a lack of social care provision, with vital capacity being absorbed by people who could be discharged if there was somewhere for them to go.

Our ambulance services are on the brink. Almost everyone I speak to in my constituency has a story of a loved one waiting hours, sometimes in agony, for an ambulance to arrive. We need to end the scandal of ambulances stacking up outside A&E, unable to discharge their patients. However, given that the word “ambulance” was mentioned just once in the autumn statement, I am not sure that this Government truly understand the scale of the challenge. Perhaps that explains why it has been reported in the press today that the Chancellor is keen to cut all but a handful of NHS targets.

The final thing to mention is NHS dental services. In September; the BBC reported that not a single dental practice in all of Devon was taking on new NHS patients, and earlier this year Honiton Dental Surgery was forced to cut back on the number of people it could see, due to a shortage of staff. Nor is the issue isolated to Devon; there were no dental practices in Wokingham taking on NHS patients during the summer, and only two practices in the whole of Gloucestershire.

Our hard-working NHS staff are working flat out to deliver the best care they can, but the situation is spiralling out of control on this Government’s watch. It is clear that this autumn statement is a façade for spending cuts that will be left to the next lot, from a Government who are out of touch and out of ideas. It fails to address the serious issues people face right now and will leave us all paying the cost of Conservative chaos for years to come.