Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Rosie Cooper and David Mowat(7 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (David Mowat)
Social care continues to be a key priority for the Government. That is why local authorities in England will receive an uplift in the money available for social care over the next three years of 17% in cash terms. That significant uplift will allow councils to support more people and sustain a diverse care market.
Rosie Cooper
Does the Minister recognise that the figure he has just given—the additional £1 billion in the Budget—is just half of what is needed to fill the shortfall in social care? Will he tell the House what he is doing to ensure that the sector gets the additional money and to stop councils being bankrupted by their social care requirements?
David Mowat
The 17% cash uplift over the next three years exceeds what we have been asked for by a number of stakeholders in the sector. I have conceded at this Dispatch Box many times that the sector is under pressure. The additional moneys that we have come forward with will help to alleviate that and will make a big difference. In Lancashire, the figure is not 17% over three years; it is 18% over three years.
West Coast Main Line
Debate between Rosie Cooper and David Mowat(12 years, 3 months ago)
Westminster HallRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
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Rosie Cooper
The hon. Gentleman raises several of the points that I am about to discuss in more detail, but I absolutely agree with him.
Surely projections about the contract should score highly on the basis of value for money for the taxpayer and the commuter. There is a belief that passenger growth could continue to be 10% per annum. However, such growth figures were achieved at the top of the economy. Even for a non-economist such as me, it does not take a great leap of faith to think that such growth rates are not sustainable in an economy that is in the doldrums and with fears of a double-dip recession not having gone away.
David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)
The hon. Lady is quite right to say that all these projections for the future are estimates and guesses, that they may be too low or too high and that FirstGroup made very aggressive ones. However, is not the key point of a procurement process to ensure that the risk in respect of those projections is with FirstGroup’s shareholders and not with the passengers? The issue is how we manage that risk and not what the estimates were.
Rosie Cooper
Oh, I think there are a lot of Dick Turpin-type figures about.
I would very much like to hear from the Minister on this precise point: has the Department applied its own rules or not? Given the whole handling of the process, a judicial review has been applied for, which has left us in a position where re-nationalising the line is being considered. The new Secretary of State for Transport has stated that he would seek to re-nationalise the west coast main line if there is a failure to reach an agreement before 9 December.
David Mowat
The hon. Lady suggests that an operator might walk away from a franchise having made the money in the early years of the contract. Is it not key for the Government to make it clear at this point that if the operator did that—giving the keys back, as she said—it would do no further work with the Government in any other contract? Therefore, for all intents and purposes, they would be barred from any further procurement processes in the future. If the Government made that clear, they would be acting in a much more private sector-type mentality, in a way that Governments often do not do. Does she agree?
Rosie Cooper
I would agree that, initially, we need a proper figure to mitigate taxpayer risk, to ensure that taxpayer costs are covered in the eventuality. However, if we have any more shenanigans, those operators should be barred from Government contracts.