Leamside Line

Debate between Sharon Hodgson and Philip Hollobone

Tuesday 8th February 2022 Westminster Hall

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

Before we begin, I would like to remind Members that Mr Speaker encourages us all to observe social distancing and to wear face-masks.

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the potential merits of reopening the Leamside Line.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I thank all Members in attendance. I can say that there are colleagues here today just as passionate as I am on this subject, and I look forward to hearing their contributions. It is important to emphasise from the outset the unity on this issue in the north-east from those on all sides of the political spectrum, and from the business community, the transport sector, local authorities and the general public.

I would like to outline the vision for the Leamside Line. It has three key purposes. The first is local: it would allow for an expansion of the Tyne and Wear Metro through the South of Tyne and Wearside loop, which would connect Washington’s 70,000 residents to the system. The second is regional: it would open up passenger rail services for the whole Leamside corridor and its population of 124,000 people, from Ferryhill to Pelaw. It connects that population, and the 1 million people with indirect access to the line, to Tyneside, Wearside, Durham and Teesside. It would revolutionise transport across the region. The final is national: it would support east coast main line capacity for passenger and vital freight services, as well as national rail connectivity. Those three aspects form the overall strategic ambitions for the reopening of the line.

I am incredibly happy to have secured this very timely debate, following a huge event on Friday 4 February 2022, in which I visited three strategic points along the line to visualise where it will one day run, along with colleagues who are present today, local authority leaders, and representatives from: Transport North East, led by Tobyn Hughes; the Northern Powerhouse Partnership; the North East local enterprise partnership; and the North East England chamber of commerce.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Hodgson]

I absolutely agree. As someone who has travelled up and down that line for almost 17 years, I know that when something goes wrong on that stretch and trains are stuck higher up the line, the trains cannot get to Newcastle. The whole thing then falls apart, as all of us who travel down that line know.

There is a comprehensive need for the Leamside line to be reopened—for national, regional and local purposes. Again, I stress the north-east unity—the Minister will hear that unity today—and the joint voice calling for the Leamside line to be reopened. When I took my seat in 2005, I quickly got to grips with this campaign, its importance, and the word “conurbation”. Washington is one of the largest conurbations in the UK without a rail or rapid transit link—I constantly mention that small fact.

I have presented five petitions to the House over 17 years, sent countless letters to the Department for Transport and the Minister’s predecessors, submitted evidence following a call for evidence on light rail, and recently co-sponsored three bids to the restoring your railway fund with the hon. Member for Sedgefield (Paul Howell), so it is fair to say that this means a lot to me. I am very proud of the cross-party nature of this campaign, both at local authority level and here in this House.

Where are we now? Leamside has featured as a significant element of previous local and current regional transport plans, including the 2021 North East transport plan and Transport for the North’s statutory advice. While the disappointing integrated rail plan in effect ruled out Government investment in the Leamside line for east coast main line purposes, the case remains strong.

I appreciate that the integrated rail plan indicated that the reinstatement of the Leamside line could be part of a devolution deal, but I believe it absolutely should be part of any forthcoming devolution deal. The hon. Member for Sedgefield and I discussed this with the Minister when we met earlier. However, until that deal is on the table, I do not want to see those promises used to kick the can down the road. I want Government co-operation in making the Leamside line a reality in the meantime. That means listening, as working with others, and, ultimately, financially helping with the steps needed to get there.

The north east joint transport committee has taken on the Government’s feedback, and is developing the umbrella strategic business case in phases. It has secured £100,000 in funding and is commissioning a strategic outline business case for the Metro loop element of the line.

We are taking matters into our own hands; the north-east is taking steps to achieve its ambitions, but it can only take itself so far, because our local authorities continue to be starved of cash. A project as significant and game-changing as the Leamside line will eventually need to be funded by central Government. Let us not beat about the bush: this is a very expensive piece of infrastructure, but it is needed and very much wanted.

I hope this debate shows the weight behind the will for the reinstatement of the Leamside line. I hope that, ultimately, the Government will listen to the north-east and match their rhetoric on levelling up with their commitment. The north-east is making inroads on reaching its ambitions. We hope that the Government will work with us to realise the potential of the Leamside corridor communities, secure a better future for the north-east, and future-proof national infrastructure by supporting the reopening of the Leamside line as soon as possible.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

The debate will continue until 4 o’clock. I am obliged to call the Front Benchers no later than 3.37 pm, and the guideline limits are 10 minutes for Her Majesty’s Opposition, 10 minutes for the Minister, and then Sharon Hodgson will have three minutes at the end of the debate to sum up the proceedings. In the meantime, I hope to get everybody in. We have just over 45 minutes, so if Members could moderate their speeches, everybody will be able to contribute. We will have an excellent example to start us off with from Peter Gibson.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Hodgson]

I express my warm thanks and appreciation to all hon. Members who have taken part in this very important debate, to the excellent shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi), and to the Minister. We have heard from Government and Opposition Members from across the whole region—from Newcastle down through Gateshead, South Tyneside, Sunderland, Durham and Darlington. As we have heard, the issue unites the whole region—all politicians, local authorities and agencies from business and transport—in one endeavour: to reopen the Leamside line for all the reasons that we have heard.

Passions can run deep on why we are at this point, but we all agree that we need to look forward with one united voice, and use that passion to achieve what we all desire: the reopening of the Leamside line to the benefit of all who would use it, across all our communities, for generations to come. We acknowledge that this would be a huge investment, but it is one that people of the north-east are long overdue. The return on that investment will be huge. We do not have that figure yet, but it is being worked on as we speak, as we discussed with the Minister earlier, and I am told that we will have it soon.

I hope that the Minister has been left in no doubt about our collective passion for this endeavour. I am sure that she will expect to find herself back here, perhaps in the not-too-distant future, for further such debates once we have further evidence and figures from our feasibility studies, and as we expand our case for the reopening of the Leamside line. I hope that this Minister—although my hon. Friend the Member for Slough may be the Minister when this happens—will be there to cut the ribbon. I very much look forward to that day.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

Maybe it is a good omen for the Leamside line that we have pulled into the platform earlier than scheduled.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the potential merits of reopening the Leamside Line.

Health Inequalities

Debate between Sharon Hodgson and Philip Hollobone

Wednesday 20th March 2019 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Mr Hollobone.

This has been an excellent debate, and I start by thanking the hon. Member for Telford (Lucy Allan) for securing it and for her excellent contribution. Sadly, many areas across the UK face similar issues to those affecting Telford, as we have heard. As we know, our NHS was built for everyone. The original leaflet explaining the NHS to households across the country read:

“Everyone—rich or poor, man, woman or child—can use it or any part of it.”

Seventy years on, we cannot forget that ethos, which is why this debate is so important. I also thank all other hon. Members for their contributions to the debate. Due to time, I will not name them all.

Health inequalities are avoidable, but they still persist so clearly, both nationally and locally, within our communities, as we have heard. It cannot be right that in England men and women from the most disadvantaged 10% of areas on average now die 9.3 and 7.3 years respectively sooner than those in the 10% least disadvantaged areas. And those living in the most deprived areas not only die much earlier than those living in the most affluent areas but they also live much longer in bad health. For example, between 2014 and 2016 women in the most deprived areas could expect to live for 51.8 healthy life years, meaning that their remaining 27 years would be spent in bad health. That is compared, for instance, to women in the least deprived areas, who could expect to live for 70.7 healthy life years, with only 15.5 years in bad health.

It has to be said that there is also a persistent north-south divide in both life expectancy and healthy life expectancy, with people in the southern regions of England on average living longer and with fewer years in poor health than those living further north. For example, 2015-17 figures show that men and women in the north-east—my region—have the lowest life expectancy at birth in England, at 77.9 years and 81.6 years respectively. That is compared to the south-east, where men can expect to live for 80.6 years and women for 84 years.

However, health inequalities also exist within local authorities. For example, the longest life expectancy in the country is in the richest borough, Kensington and Chelsea; I am not surprised. Nevertheless, the most disadvantaged people in that London borough can expect to live for 14 years less than their most advantaged counterparts. Such a stark difference is completely unacceptable.

Also, children living in poverty are more likely to die before the age of one, become overweight, have tooth decay or even die in an accident. Parents living in poverty are also more likely to smoke, experience mental health difficulties, be a young parent, be a lone parent, experience domestic violence and other negative outcomes, all of which also increase adverse childhood experience risk factors that impact children’s health, too.

So, after a century of decline the number of deaths in childhood in the UK has risen for two consecutive years, with the highest mortality rates evident in the poorest communities. Life expectancy in the UK had always increased slightly, year on year, for over a century, largely due to improvements in nutrition, hygiene, housing and control of infectious diseases. However, it seems that that is not happening any more.

What are we going to do? Labour is committed to a new health inequalities target, to improve life expectancy, mortality rates and children’s health. The target would be independently assessed, and as the hon. Member for Telford called for, the Health and Social Care Secretary would be held accountable to Parliament and would produce an annual health inequalities report.

The four biggest risk factors that affect health—smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, poor diet and lack of exercise—also affect the poorest in our communities. Public health services support those people. However, there have been public health cuts to the tune of £800 million between 2015 and 2021, and local authorities have been put in untenable positions, where they have to make difficult decisions.

I believe that the Government already have a moral duty to ensure that health inequalities are reduced, but unfortunately they have not taken that duty seriously enough, so I would like the Minister not only to set out her commitment to reducing health inequalities but to lay out details of how the Government will reduce them, and I urge her once again to reverse the cuts to public health budgets.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

If the Minister concluded by 5.28 pm, that would allow Lucy Allan time at the end of the debate to sum up.

Free School Meals/Pupil Premium: Eligibility

Debate between Sharon Hodgson and Philip Hollobone

Tuesday 6th February 2018 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Hodgson]

The hon. Lady might not be aware, because I do not think that she was a Member at the time, but after the right hon. Member for Surrey Heath commissioned the school food plan, he agreed with all 17 of its recommendations. He put money to 16 of them straight away and the 17th one was for universal free school meals; he accepted the arguments for that recommendation and said he would provide money for it when it could be found. Money was found for universal infant free school meals, under the coalition agreement with Nick Clegg, and those meals were introduced.

The point has already been made; it has been proved. The money can be found, because universal free school meals more than pay for themselves, and the benefits that we get from them outweigh the initial costs, including the amount saved on administration because they are universal. There are a whole host of arguments around this issue, but in a sense I am detracting from what this debate is about, so I will conclude.

I hope that the Minister has been listening intently; in fact, I am sure he has, because he has looking at me and I have seen he is. I hope he will do the same with other speakers. The new system was presented as a way to eradicate poverty, but instead the introduction of the measure that we have been discussing could cement poverty in our society, and at worst there could even be a rise in poverty among “working poor” families. If that happens, we would go through all these changes for naught, and children would be just as badly off in the future—maybe even worse off—and that would be at the behest of the Government. I am sure that is not what they want, so I hope that the Minister will look at this issue seriously and perhaps think again, for the sake of the children out there who we are all here to support.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

I have to call the first of the Front-Bench speakers no later than 5.36 pm. Eight Members are seeking to catch my eye, one of whom had not informed the Speaker’s Office beforehand that they wished to speak in this debate. If we are going to get everyone in, I am afraid that there will have to be a short limit on speeches of two minutes and thirty seconds.

O’Neill Review

Debate between Sharon Hodgson and Philip Hollobone

Tuesday 7th March 2017 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) on bringing this important debate to the House. He gave an eloquent and knowledgeable speech clearly setting out the issue and the matters to be discussed following the O’Neill review. I thank him for that.

An estimated 50,000 deaths occur every year due to untreatable infections, rising to 700,000 globally. That is why it is only right that we do all we can to address antibiotic resistance. It is believed that the number of deaths will rise to 10 million a year by 2050 if no significant action is taken. As we have heard from a number of Members, deaths from drug-resistant infections could exceed deaths from cancer.

This is an incredibly timely debate. Only a couple of weeks ago, the World Health Organisation published a list of 12 bacteria for which new antibiotics are now needed. Some strains of bacteria have built-in abilities to find new ways to fight off treatments that can then be passed on to other bacteria via genetic material to make them drug-resistant too. I find it a bit scary to consider what we are up against. This is a battle that we have to win.

I also thank other hon. Members who have spoken in this debate. My hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) gave a very knowledgeable speech about the use of antibiotics in farming; other hon. Members touched on the subject as well. I really think we need to get a firm grip on it internationally, with the UK leading the way. Ten other Members spoke in this very active debate: my right hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley (Sir Kevin Barron), my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr Sharma), the hon. Members for Erewash (Maggie Throup), for Bosworth (David Tredinnick), for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady), for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Dr Johnson), for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford), for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy), and the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Martyn Day), who speaks for the Scottish National party. Their speeches were all thoughtful and knowledgeable, albeit brief because of time constraints.

I will touch on two key points: raising public awareness, and supporting research and innovation to combat antibiotic resistance. It is generally accepted that antibiotic resistance is a natural process—bacteria naturally evolve to become resistant to certain drugs used to fight them off—but it has been exacerbated by humans. As Dr Hsu of the Singapore Infectious Diseases Initiative has said, the causes come down to

“a single axiom—abuse and overuse of antimicrobial drugs.”

Concerns have also been raised that the development of new antibiotic drugs has dried up, contributing to the situation. According to the World Health Organisation, we are left in a precarious position. The WHO’s director general, Dr Margaret Chan, describes antimicrobial resistance as

“a crisis that must be managed with the utmost urgency.”

That urgency applies here in the UK, too. In 2014, the chief medical officer, Dame Sally Davies, said that

“we could be taken back to a 19th century environment where everyday infections kill us as a result of routine operations.”

We could be taken even further back: as the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton said, this could be the new black death. That is not as melodramatic a statement as people may first think. Antimicrobial resistance is a really serious problem that we need to address here and now, so that those predictions do not come true.

I do not always do this, as I am sure you have noticed, Mr Hollobone, but I must give credit to David Cameron’s coalition Government, who were global leaders when they announced Lord O’Neill’s review into antimicrobial resistance. The review’s 10 recommendations show just how complex and multifaceted the issue is and how wide-scale the actions needed to address it are. The review’s final report was published in May 2016 and the Government responded at the end of last year, so now is a good time to ask the Government for an update.

One of the review’s key recommendations was to introduce a large-scale global awareness campaign to reduce the demand from patients to be prescribed antibiotics when they are diagnosed with an illness. I am a firm believer in public awareness campaigns relating to health issues, especially cancer. My hon. Friends and I fully support such a campaign for antimicrobial resistance and we want to see the Government working hard to achieve it. The review’s recommendation was for an international awareness campaign, but what does the Minister plan to do here in the UK to complement that international work? That is a pertinent question because a 2015 Wellcome Trust study found that people in the UK did not fully understand antibiotic resistance and how it affects their health. They did not understand that antibiotic resistance is to do with the bacteria in people’s bodies, rather than a lack of antibiotics or the cost of them; it is not just a case of doctors being awkward. I would therefore be grateful if the Minister told us what relatable public awareness campaigns she is planning to ensure that people understand more about the problem and about what they can do personally.

I have already mentioned the problems with combating antibiotic resistance caused by the drying up of innovative developments in drug technologies. The O’Neill review identifies that the low commercial return on research and development for antibiotics makes them less attractive to pharmaceutical companies and reduces the chance of new drugs being developed. To reverse that situation, it recommends considering market entry rewards to encourage companies to develop new or improved drugs, especially in areas of urgent need. I hope the Minister will explore that issue further in her reply.

Public and private funding is being made available to help to combat these issues. On 20 December, the Minister referred to

“international programmes to tackle AMR, including the Fleming fund and the Global AMR innovation fund, which represent more than £300 million of investment over the next five years.”—[Official Report, 20 December 2016; Vol. 618, c. 1294.]

There is also the incredible work of the Longitude Prize, which is in the middle of its competition to develop

“a cheap, accurate, rapid and easy-to-use point of care test kit for bacterial infections”

to help to address antibiotic resistance. That is important work and we support it.

In summary, we cannot afford to get antimicrobial resistance wrong. Millions of lives depend on our tackling it. It is not far away; it is happening right here, right now, and it affects us all, so it is important that we do all we can to address this growing problem, both in the UK and internationally.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

If the Minister will be kind enough to finish just after 4.30 pm, that will give Mr Hollinrake time to sum up the debate.

Gypsies and Travellers (Local Communities)

Debate between Sharon Hodgson and Philip Hollobone

Wednesday 10th June 2015 Westminster Hall

[Mr Hollobone]

The name of my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer (Julian Sturdy) is well known in my constituency, because he is a hero to the horse-owning community as a result of his pioneering legislation to combat fly-grazing. That legislation has been widely welcomed in Kettering and throughout the land. Am I surprised by what he tells us from his own constituency? I am not surprised. Am I disappointed? Yes, I am, because the law is working against the settled community and in favour of Gypsies and Travellers.

Many of my hon. Friend’s constituents and many of mine who do not come from a Gypsy or Traveller background actually do far more travelling than the supposed Travellers themselves. Many of my constituents travel down to London and back every day for work. They do far more travelling than the supposed Travellers in the illegal encampments, but the law is biased in this respect, and this is something that the Minister could deal with as his second initiative in the Department. The guidance that his Department gives local authorities means that they need to make provision for a 3% annual increase in Gypsy and Traveller household numbers. That growth rate is far too big, yet by law local authorities are required to draw up assessments to provide pitches for that rate of growth. So not only is the number of Gypsies and Travellers as a baseline too high; the annual growth rate that the Department requires local authorities to respond to is also too great.

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)]

I was going to let this go, but I just cannot; I refer to the hon. Gentleman’s earlier point about whether Travellers travel as much as people from his constituency. He surely realises that Gypsies and Travellers are a known ethnic group and whether or not they travel does not take away from the fact that they are an ethnic group. Whether or not they are actually travelling does not matter in order for them to be recognised as a Gypsy or a Traveller.

[Mr Hollobone]

The romantic notion of Gypsies wandering through the countryside, entertaining people as they go, is a myth from long ago, because many of these supposed Travellers are self-declared Travellers; they are not from any kind of Gypsy heritage at all. However, they are using, on a self-declared basis, their nomenclature as Travellers to get special privileges in the planning system. When they then use those privileges not to travel but to get planning permissions for permanent sites so that they can settle down, it is an absolute abuse. Now that we have got the first Conservative Government elected for 23 years, it is time that Her Majesty’s Government acted to stamp out that abuse in the countryside. The current system is also forcing local authorities such as mine to identify sites where pitches can be provided for that supposed growth rate in Travellers.

For example, Kettering Borough Council has to find 25 pitches by 2022. It has identified 17 so far and has another eight to find. Local constituents have been brought to tears because sites near their own homes have been identified as potential pitches. Only when there are determined local councillors, acting on behalf of their local constituents in their wards, who stand up and say, “No, we don’t want Traveller sites in our communities,” can these things be stopped. In Kettering, there was a proposal for a Traveller site near the Scott Road garages in the town itself, and it caused uproar among the local community, who knew that if permission were granted for Traveller pitches on that site, local crime levels would go through the roof. The idea that these provisions in the planning system are helping community cohesion is completely wrong; they are stirring up resentment and hatred between one community and another, and it is time that the new Government did something about it.

Let me give the House further evidence. This is a typical response I have had from a settled dweller in the countryside:

“Since moving to our current address in Braybrooke we have endured fly tipping, theft, many instances of intimidation, and fly grazing.

Since having”—

Travellers’—

“horses removed from our land we have encountered almost daily instances of defecating in our gateway, known to be carried out by this family”.

I am talking about human defecation. That is as disgusting as it gets. The response continues:

“I caught one of them in the act one day. We dare not do anything about it for fear of reprisals.

We cannot leave anything lying around outside as approximately once a week a van with travellers in drives into our yard and out again without stopping, presumably to intimidate or for opportunist theft…My wife and her family can relate…many, many more instances over the last 30 years including hare coursing, theft of equipment, intimidation, fly grazing, dumping of caravans etc. They have given up reporting instances long ago as nothing has ever been done about it and it just seems futile.”

I hope you can see, Mr Davies, the despair and frustration of my constituents, who are really beginning to resent the Gypsy and Traveller community in Northamptonshire, because they are bending the rules of the planning system, which are skewed in their favour, to allow them to get permissions to set up encampments in the countryside. When the local authority refuses those applications, they go to appeal, and all too often the pathetic planning inspectorate allows permission—sometimes temporary permission. When the temporary permission expires after two years, five years or whatever, the local authority is unable to enforce the removal of those encampments, because they cite the Human Rights Act and the provisions therein to protect so-called family life. Also, the Department for Communities and Local Government has issued guidelines to local authorities that they cannot pursue such enforcement if the cost is excessive or disproportionate. It ends up with my village of Braybrooke, in a beautiful part of Northamptonshire and with 145 dwellings, surrounded by 67 inappropriate pitches and a further 27 legal pitches within a further three miles. The whole thing has got completely out of control. In Braybrooke, the primary school has closed, but when it existed, it was made up 100% of children from the Traveller community, because the Traveller children moved into the area and moved into the school, and parents from the settled community moved their children out of the school to go to other schools. Now, the school has closed down, yet in the Department’s own guidelines it says that the scale of such Gypsy and Traveller sites should not dominate the nearest settled community. That might be the wording in the guidance, but it is not having the appropriate impact to save villages such as Braybrooke.

It is only thanks to the good work of residents such as Karen Stanley and the North Northamptonshire Residents Against Inappropriate Development group, who are fearlessly championing the cause of the settled community against threats of intimidation from Gypsies and Travellers, that local residents feel they have any say in this matter at all. Yet it lies in the gift of the Minister to listen to those concerns from the heart of middle England, because he has the power to do something about them. I suggest that section 225 of the Housing Act 2004 should be at the top of his priority list. If he can abolish it, there is every chance that relative peace could return to the countryside, and we could start to rebuild relationships between the settled community and Gypsies and Travellers.