Climate Change Assembly UK: The Path to Net Zero

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Thursday 26th November 2020 Commons Chamber

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

I, too, welcome Climate Assembly’s report and its 14 recommendations on aviation. As my hon. Friend the Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) said, this was a people’s assembly, not a politicians’ assembly. That is why its recommendations are so powerful.

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman) and my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood), the Chair and former Chair of the Transport Committee, on which I sit. As I sit on that Committee, and because I represent a constituency adjacent to Heathrow, I am particularly interested in the chapter on aviation.

The impact of covid, to return to the other key topic of the moment, has been devastating for my communities, affecting up to one household in three. We seek support from Government for aviation communities right now, but that support could go hand in hand with actions on the climate crisis. Air travel accounts for 22% of UK greenhouse gas emissions and 7% of total UK emissions. That proportion is growing.

Unlike countries such as France and Austria, the UK did not provide covid sector-specific support for aviation, so, to date, the Government have missed the chance to impose conditions, and therefore help to introduce changes, on climate emissions. Such conditions would have helped to support not only work to address our zero-emissions target, but aviation communities such as mine.

The Government should look at emissions from international aviation and shipping, and include those in the Climate Change Act 2008. The Climate Change Committee has also called for the Government to formally include those emissions, so doing so would really show the UK’s leadership on this issue, set a clear policy framework around emissions, and create a clear path to the future. It would also help to boost investment in carbon-saving technology in the aviation sector.

Mention has already been made of the Prime Minister’s 10-point plan for the green industrial revolution, but I do not feel that this plan goes far enough. For instance, there has been mention of the Jet Zero Council, led by industry leaders, but to date industry on its own has missed targets, such as that to get 10% of fuels from sustainable fuel sources by 2020. With the scale of the crisis facing our planet, and with the rapid need to make urgent changes, we cannot afford to just create more grandiose councils: we need action and leadership from Government.

I will now address two specific aviation issues. On surface transport, we really need the Government to put their money where their mouth is on the western and southern rail links into Heathrow, to get more cars off the road and encourage sustainable transport. We need to require airports to take action on airside vehicles, from coaches, ramps and luggage transport to pushback tugs. In the air, of course, we need the Government to fund research into zero-emission planes, and also to level the price differentials between plane and train journeys to the same destinations.

In conclusion, I welcome the work the Government have done to support walking and cycling, which helps to cut our personal climate emissions, and look forward to hearing the Government’s response to the Climate Assembly recommendations on aviation.

Oral Answers to Questions

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Tuesday 16th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kwasi Kwarteng]

I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend for the question. He will know that local consent and local support are absolutely key to the pot one auction, but he will also be aware that planning policy is a devolved matter in Scotland, and it is therefore for the Scottish Government to set up national planning policies and the approach to declining planning applications. He is well aware that this Government have been very focused on local consent right through this process.

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

I also concur with the remarks made about my friend and colleague Jo Cox. We remember her today and what she stood for. As a member of the Transport Committee, I stand by our description of British Airways as a “national disgrace” for the way it has effectively fired most of its staff and will rehire some of them on vastly cut pay and conditions. BA has done that under the cloak of the pandemic and gone way beyond any other major employer. The aviation sector will take longer to recover. When that does happen, I hope the Government will step in to support the sector. When they do so, will they ensure that employers cannot get away with the tactics of British Airways and also commit to delivering on climate change?

[Alok Sharma]

We appreciate that announcements about redundancies for British Airways staff have been incredibly distressing for the employees and their families. At the end of the day, the use of the Government’s job retention schemes is preferable to making redundancies. That is why we made them available. What I would say in this case is that it is a commercial decision. We expect British Airways and, indeed, all employers to treat employees fairly and in the spirit of partnership.

Post Office Network

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Tuesday 10th March 2020 Westminster Hall

[Marion Fellows]

I agree with my hon. Friend that that all matters. I am an old person—[Hon. Members: “No!”] I know everyone is shaking their head in amazement. I understand this issue. People who have been using those accounts should be able to continue to do so, and that seems to be happening. Those who are retiring later, thanks to other Government plans, should still be able to go into their post office and use it as others have been able to. Post offices are the focus and the heart of any town or small community, or anywhere rural.

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

The hon. Member makes an important point about people who are not digitally enabled, particularly older or disabled people. Does she agree that the closure of post offices also disadvantages small business owners, who frequently use post offices to collect and post parcels, and that that affects local economies?

[Marion Fellows]

I absolutely agree. When the Crown post office in Motherwell closed, one of the biggest lobbying efforts I had was from small business owners who could nip into Motherwell town centre to deposit their cash. With the closure of different banks, they now struggle and have to find somewhere else. The Motherwell Crown post office became a small retail business with two counters instead of six. That post office used to have queues out of the door at certain times of the week, and the town centre benefited from people withdrawing and spending cash. That does not happen now, because although the post office does an excellent job—I have used it—it does not have the required capacity.

The CWU has raised the loss of service and expertise that can occur when post offices are taken over by chains such as WHSmith. The employees are TUPE-ed over, but within a year their pay is cut and they leave, so the business no longer has the expertise to help and serve communities when they need it.

The Minister has been taking note of all my asks, and I hope that she will respond positively. Rest assured that if she does not, I will be back, along with many of the hon. Members who are present. I look forward to yet another debate about post offices in the main Chamber on 19 March, thanks to the work of the all-party parliamentary group on post offices, of which I am a proud member.

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

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I agree with the powerful opening remarks of the hon. Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Marion Fellows) and thank her for securing the debate. Other hon. Members have made important points about the significance of post offices for local communities and town centres, which I will focus on.

A tsunami of post offices and post office counters were lost in my constituency after 2011. We then had 10 post office counters—no Crown post office—of which we have lost three in the three years since 2017. The most important served Brentford high street, where the community has doubled in the past 10 years, to roughly 10,000 to 15,000 households.

The post office counter was in a shop in the middle of the town centre, where many buses passed. It served a large population and a large number of small businesses. There was a one-year notice period during which everyone knew that the parade building in which the post office was situated had to be emptied because it was due for redevelopment, so the post office could not remain in the premises. The building has subsequently been demolished. It also happened that the postmaster decided that he did not want to carry on the business, which is an issue in itself.

The good news is that a couple of months from now—18 months after the post office counter closed, during which time we have had no service in the whole of Brentford—we will get a new counter at Costcutter on the high street. We will have had 18 months without a service that many people feel is vital. We could have avoided the gap, because the Post Office, the local authority, I as the MP and the local councillors knew that there was a need to find new premises and probably a new postmaster. The Post Office sought applications, but in the first round there were only two applicants from the many businesses and organisations in Brentford that could have opened a counter. Neither fitted the criteria, so there was another application round. I am not sure whether Costcutter tipped over the bar in that round and was accepted or whether there was a third round.

Why are people not applying for or retaining counters? As the hon. Member for Motherwell and Wishaw and other hon. Members have mentioned, it is because the margins are so slim, the pay is too low, the requirements for only a qualified person to cover the post office counter make it restrictive in terms of leave and sickness, the increase in robberies and violence makes retail businesses physically risky, and the Horizon project has damaged the Post Office’s reputation. What is the Post Office doing about that? I understand that it has an element of a public sector duty as a fully Government-owned company that, as we all see, provides essential public services.

In my correspondence and meetings with the Post Office, frankly, I have found it very passive. I have received no coherent response from it or the former Minister—I have not had a chance to speak to the current Minister about it. From the response, it feels as though the Post Office is passive. A Post Office representative told me yesterday that, “If no one applies, what can we do about it?” That is not a proactive response from an important Government-overseen operation.

The Post Office access criteria require

“99% of the UK population to be within three miles of their nearest post office outlet”

and

“95% of the total urban population across the UK to be within one mile of their nearest post office outlet”,

but that does not make a lot of sense if the community, or the place that people can get to by bus, does not have a post office. There is a post office just over a mile from Brentford, but people cannot get there by bus and there is nowhere to park anywhere near it, because it is a tiny little shop. We should have one in Brentford town centre. The Post Office should recognise that. I have now been told that the Post Office has realised that Brentford is a priority and should have a main post office, but why did it not think Brentford was a priority two years ago, when we knew that there was going to be an issue?

I ask the Minister and the Post Office to work together to address the public sector duty and deliver a core service in all town centres, which we could define. We could use the PTAL—public transport accessibility level—grading used in planning to define the criteria for the quality of public transport access, parking and so on. We could also look at grants and the transaction costs.

The hon. Member for Motherwell and Wishaw talked about business declining in the Post Office’s core services, which is true, because many people use services online that they used to go to the post office for, but where is the Post Office looking at new business nationally, such as basic banking and new opportunities? Where is the entrepreneurial spirit to combine the best of private sector entrepreneurialism and new technology with the public sector duty—in a sense, the Government-perceived monopoly for services?

[Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)]

Does the hon. Member agree that part of the problem is that successive Governments have not looked at those issues? They seem to perceive the Post Office as a business of the ’90s and 2000s, rather than one for the current and future generations.

[Ruth Cadbury]

The hon. Member expresses exactly my feelings about dealing with the Post Office—it is passive; it is backward-looking; it is old-fashioned. There is an inherent benefit to post offices, both in terms of their brand reputation and the legal governance position.

The Post Office has a new chief executive, who has been in post for just six months. My understanding is that it will soon release a strategic review about its role. I am looking forward to hearing positive, forward-looking answers to my concerns, so that my constituency and my town centre, like so many other villages, town centres, suburbs and towns, is served properly by this important, Government-owned, public service.

--- Later in debate ---

[Amanda Solloway]

Apologies—that is one of the questions she was asking.

The hon. Lady asked about BEIS and Government oversight of the Post Office. BEIS has challenged the Post Office and, in fact, the new CEO and the chair personally to strengthen their relationship with postmasters and to take on board the lessons learned from the recent litigation. They have provided assurances that they will do so. BEIS has established, and chairs, a quarterly group with the National Federation of SubPostmasters and the Post Office.

The hon. Lady asked about Post Office card accounts. The POCA contract is a commercial matter for the Department for Work and Pensions and Post Office Ltd. It is no secret that the contract for the Post Office card account will come to an end on 30 November 2021, but the DWP is in the process of developing a replacement. The predecessor Minister with responsibility for small business, my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood (Kelly Tolhurst), wrote to her ministerial colleagues in the DWP in full support of a full and open tender process to ensure the delivery of the best possible service to citizens and value for money.

I turn to franchising. There is a widespread misunderstanding that franchising is a closure programme, leading to redundancies and the deterioration of services for consumers, but that is not the case. I appreciate that the proposed changes to the delivery of post office services can cause concern in the communities affected, and that some constituents have a strong emotional attachment to directly managed branches and their staff. However, the franchising model has endured to this day, and the vast majority—more than 11,300 post offices—are successfully run on a franchise or agency basis with large and small retailers as part of a thriving business.

Since January 2020, the Post Office and Payzone network have become exclusive bill payment providers for British Gas, bringing more footfall for businesses and revenue for postmasters. Although it is important not to be complacent and to recognise the challenges ahead, I encourage Members to look closely and objectively at the facts, which show unequivocally that the network is more sustainable today than it was in 2010. All that has been achieved notwithstanding the challenging trading conditions in the Post Office’s core markets and the wider sector.

Delivering post office services as part of a wider retail offer is a proven model that brings benefits to the community, the local economy, postmasters, consumers and, ultimately, taxpayers. Let me reassure hon. Members that as part of its ongoing monitoring role, Citizens Advice will continue to track the impact of post office changes on consumers and customer satisfaction with franchised post offices. Citizens Advice also has a formal advisory role in reviewing changes to the Crown post offices across Great Britain that are relocated and franchised.

I note hon Members’ concerns about temporarily closed branches. Let me reassure the hon. Member for Motherwell and Wishaw that Post Office Ltd is committed to maintaining the branch network, and there is no programme of closures.

[Ruth Cadbury]

Could the Minister could explain, now or subsequently, how the Government wish to retain the network? Our experience is that it is not being maintained.