Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Robin Walker and Neil Parish

Thursday 20th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union (Mr Robin Walker)]

The UK has been a leading player on environmental policy, setting the international agenda on climate change, as demonstrated by the Prime Minister’s commitment to ratify the Paris agreement as soon as possible. As recently announced, Britain will take back control of its laws through the great repeal Bill. Any changes to our environmental regulations after that time will be for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and this House to decide. The UK will continue to be a leader on international environmental co-operation.

[Neil Parish]

The European directive on bathing water has actually been part of a very good environmental law—water companies have cleaned up our beaches throughout the country, including the south-west—so can we rest assured that we will not row back on environmental laws that are good? Not all environmental laws from Europe are bad.

[Mr Walker]

I can see my hon. Friend’s point that it is in the UK’s interest to ensure that we have the cleanest possible bathing water. That issue will be something for future debates perhaps with DEFRA, but we will ensure that we maintain at least the standards that we have maintained in the past. I remind him of our manifesto commitment to be the first generation to leave the environment in a better state than we inherited.

School Funding Formula

Debate between Robin Walker and Neil Parish

Tuesday 10th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Walker]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We have seen the gap between the best and worst-funded authorities continue to widen long after the flaws which caused it were acknowledged.

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for leading this debate. In Devon, we have now seen £193 in extra funding per pupil. That is great news, but there is still a big gap to fill, especially with so many small rural schools and a sparse population. We do a very good job with very poor funding. I look to the next Parliament to do better.

Funding for Local Authorities

Debate between Robin Walker and Neil Parish

Thursday 10th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Neil Parish]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. However, the Government that he supported had 13 years to change that and chose not to. The problem with opening up the issue of council tax banding is that it is probably a very big can of worms. I understand why successive Governments have not gone there, but that does not necessarily mean that one day we will not have to do it.

One of the biggest obstacles to providing services to a dispersed rural population is the high cost of transport, which has a knock-on effect on nearly all other areas of local government responsibility, such as adult and social care services, refuse and recycling, and ground maintenance. In 2009, 42% of households in the most rural areas had regular bus services close by, compared with 96% of urban households. These rural bus links are often the only way for many residents, particularly pensioners, disabled people and the unemployed, to access public services. I think I am right in saying that some 20-odd per cent. of the population of Devon has to go to work on buses, and if there are no buses, it is very difficult for them to do so.

[Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Does he agree that that also has a massive affect on education and the cost of getting children to school in rural areas, which is not part of the education funding formula but is part of local authority funding?

[Neil Parish]

My hon. Friend makes a good point about the distances involved in getting children to school. Also, in rural areas we have many smaller schools, which are very good schools but are more expensive to run.

Despite the fact that rural areas have been underfunded, I would highlight the very good services that education authorities, schools and those across the piece have managed to deliver in very difficult circumstances. However, that does not mean that we should sit here and allow the Government not to give us a fair share. I want to put it on the record that I believe that we have very good services, despite the meagre amounts being spent on them.

High-cost Credit

Debate between Robin Walker and Neil Parish

Thursday 5th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Mr Bain). He made an interesting point, especially when he talked about some payday loan companies charging up to 5,000% interest, for which there is simply no justification. However leafy our constituencies might be—mine is quite a leafy one—there are pockets of deprivation in them and people who really need credit, but they need it at a competitive rate.

I would like to go back to the basics. For three or four years, we have had a 0.5% base rate, and the Governor of the Bank of England is hopeful that that may well stay at that level for another three years. How can anybody, legally or illegally, offer loans at 5,000% or 6,000% interest? That has got to be wrong. The old adage that we can have an umbrella if the sun is shining but that it will be taken away from us if it starts to rain is, as far as finance is concerned, correct.

I feel hugely passionate about this issue. I welcome the comments of the Second Church Estates Commissioner, my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Sir Tony Baldry) about the involvement of the Church of England and the Archbishop of Canterbury. One thing that the Church of England certainly has got is a great deal of assets. If people have assets, they can borrow money at a very competitive rate. I would say in all honesty to the Church of England that there is a real role for it in credit unions and community banks because they can borrow money at an effective rate, and if they lend it out at a much more competitive rate, that will help people in need.

Many Members, certainly including my hon. Friend the Member for North Swindon (Justin Tomlinson), have spoken about the need for a levy on the industry, and I agree that we need such a levy so that people can have proper financial advice, as they often go from company to company and shop to shop, being charged enormous amounts as they do.

[Mr Robin Walker]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. Does he agree that it is extraordinary, indeed outrageous, that there has to date been a levy on banks and a levy on credit unions, but not a levy on payday lenders? Does he not find that situation impossible to explain?

[Neil Parish]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. I would have thought that this wonderful Government of ours must be looking at such a levy—and if they are not, I am sure that they will do so immediately. We have got to do something about this problem. Yes, some might argue that we are saving people from themselves, but in this case, we have to do that. If people are in dire need of a loan to see them through to the end of the week or month, they should not be charged two or three times the value of that loan.

Of course, it is not just a question of whether the loan is repaid. People may reach a stage at which they are unable to repay it, and charges will then be levied for non-payment. The loan will be rearranged, another fee will be added, and they will end up paying five or six times the amount that they originally borrowed, or perhaps even more. That cannot be right. In any sort of capitalist system—or whatever system we have—there is a need for profit, but there is no need to extract money in a way that almost constitutes extortion. Someone who arrived in this world for the first time and observed that it was possible to charge such amounts of interest, or indeed—let me be blunt—to steal such amounts of money from people, would say that those who did that should be locked up. We must do something about it.

As well as the people who cannot repay their loans, there are people—although not so many—who are addicted to borrowing money, not just from payday loan companies but from, for instance, store cards that they can use in shops. They must be given more access to advice, and restrictions must be placed on the amount that they can borrow. If people are such a credit risk that they must be charged enormous amounts of interest because companies believe that that is the only way in which they can get their money back, we should ask whether we are helping those people by giving them the money.

A number of Members have rightly pointed out that, in this day and age, people need to be able to gain access to money online and from their mobile phones. Members may tell me that I am a little bit old-fashioned, but I am not certain that the ease with which credit can be obtained at any time of day or night, and regardless of people’s state of mind, is helpful. I think that it merely drives people deeper and deeper into debt.

I respect where the Government are coming from. When I last spoke about this issue, I went for the payday companies big time, and I still have them in my sights because I believe that they are making enormous profits at the expense of the very poorest members of society, but I also understand that there is a role for them. Nevertheless, they must be controlled. Their wings must be clipped.