Debate on the Address

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Wednesday 21st June 2017 Commons Chamber

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

I am honoured to have been re-elected to represent the Brentford and Isleworth constituency. I congratulate the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford), who is no longer in the Chamber, on her maiden speech. She clearly has a deep love for her constituency. In respect of the four terrible events that have taken place since Dissolution, I share the sympathy expressed by hon. Members to people who have been bereaved and injured, gratitude to the emergency services, and concern that these outrages must not happen again.

During the election campaign, the voters of Chiswick, Brentford, Isleworth, Osterley and Hounslow made it clear to me that they were voting for hope and for change. Many people voted Labour for the first time, and my majority increased from 465 two years ago to 12,148. They voted against a hard Brexit and against the ongoing austerity policies of the Government. Many people in my constituency work in London’s enormous finance and services sector. Many of my constituents are EU citizens, or are married to EU citizens, or work alongside EU citizens, or live near EU citizens, so they know directly and personally what leaving the single market will mean. They know that the single market is important to retain their jobs; to be assured that their employers can remain in London; to protect and build the UK economy; and to ensure that their EU spouses, neighbours and work colleagues have some security and the promise of a future. There is nothing in the Queen’s Speech that gives comfort on those issues.

Many of my constituents told me that they wanted an end to austerity, because the NHS is going backwards, and there are still plans to cut major services at Charing Cross hospital. They can see how local services provided by Hounslow council and the local voluntary sector have been devastated in the past seven years of cuts, so that Hounslow council has lost 40% of its income in that period. My constituents want an end to austeritybecause they see how cuts to community policing have decimated the neighbourhood police teams that make them feel safe in these challenging times. They want an end to austerity because they have been denied adequate care services for themselves or for a loved one because of these cuts. People still working in the public sector want an end to austerity because after endless rounds of job cuts they are failing to do properly the work of the three or four posts that they are trying to cover. We need an end to austerity, which is a discredited ideology in all equivalent countries that not only decimates the public sector but exacerbates inequality and, incidentally, weakens the economy.

During the election, young people told me that they wanted an end to tuition fees that are saddling them with massive debts at the start of their working lives. They wanted an end to exploitative zero-hours contracts, which are usually the only jobs they can get for years, whether they are graduates or not. It is not surprising that there is nothing in the Queen’s Speech for young people, given that we know from an article in The Economist that Conservative party central office apparently told local campaigners in my constituency, and presumably most others, not to worry about seeking young people’s votes because

“They are not on the data set”.

Parents and sixth formers told me that they wanted their good and excellent schools to continue to thrive, so mention of fair funding in the Queen’s Speech gives them no comfort that the planned future cuts, entitled “fairer funding”, are not going to go ahead.

Those on average and low incomes told me about their problems in trying to find a home that they could afford to rent, let alone buy. There is nothing in the Queen’s Speech for people who need truly affordable housing. Those living or walking near our busy roads told me that they want robust legislation that addresses our appalling air quality that is so damaging to their health and that of their children—nothing about that in the Queen’s Speech either.

People who will live under the inevitable approach path to Heathrow’s runway 3 and those living under the approach paths to existing runways, where respite periods will be cut, are all hoping that runway 3 will not go ahead, but the Queen’s Speech was surprisingly silent on Heathrow. There is nothing for the escalating number of people forced to rely on food banks caused by the cuts to the housing allowance and by housing benefit cuts and sanctions. In the last year, the number of users at Hounslow Community FoodBox has tripled as a result of the roll-out of universal credit by the Department for Work and Pensions across the borough of Hounslow. In my view, that is a legalised form of enforced destitution.

I now want to address something that was in the Queen’s Speech: the supposed commitment to end the “burning injustice”, as the Prime Minister called it, of the treatment of people with mental health conditions. That very worthy aim is completely worthless if no additional funding is available in the NHS. It is hypocritical to promise specialist staff support in schools when this year heads have had to cut welfare support, counselling services and teaching assistants—the very people who were providing essential support to troubled children in our schools but whose posts are currently being whittled away under the current funding cuts.

Concern for mental health in the Queen’s Speech, and from the Prime Minister, is worse than useless given that we read that the DWP has been forced to reveal today that 200,000 people with chronic mental health conditions are set to lose their employment support allowance. Now we know that “parity of esteem” for mental and physical health actually means equality of austerity for all.

Although my constituents will be pleased that there is no further mention of means-testing winter fuel payments, of boosting fracking, of reviving foxhunting, of the ending of infants’ free school meals or of the roll-out of grammar schools, there is much that they would like to have seen. The Prime Minister said today that she has put fairness at the heart of the Government’s programme, but the Queen’s Speech has done nothing of the sort. Today, the pageantry was scaled down, and so was the Queen’s Speech. I now hope, for the sake of my constituents, that the five-year term of this Government is also scaled right back.