Coalfield Communities

Stephen Hepburn Excerpts

Tuesday 28th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Hancock]

I welcome my hon. Friend’s tone. It was a pity and a surprise to hear the shadow Minister say he could think of nothing that Conservative Members could bring to this debate. That was deeply regrettable.

[Mr Stephen Hepburn (Jarrow) (Lab)]

The hon. Member for Sherwood (Mr Spencer) makes a good point about looking forward, but do not a Tory Minister’s recent comments on the value of disabled people and the Tories’ desire to make this country a tax haven for the rich show that they are still the same vindictive party that closed the pits in the ’80s?

[Matthew Hancock]

No, they do not. I think the hon. Gentleman is about three hours late for the previous debate. During my time in this role, I have secured the future of the existing pits, two of them in particular. I have personally worked with the Union of Democratic Mineworkers, the National Union of Mineworkers and the owners of those pits to make sure they have the financing necessary to stay open.

I will take no lectures from the Labour party, because I am from Nottinghamshire coal mining stock. The hon. Member for Barnsley East (Michael Dugher) spoke of his grandmother. My grandmother is also watching. She is 100 years old and was born in Bestwood in Nottinghamshire. They were a family of miners and all her brothers went down the pit.

Following on from the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood (Mr Spencer), I want to concentrate on the future, but the Labour party seems interested only in talking about the past.

--- Later in debate ---

[Matthew Hancock]

The hon. Gentleman may like to deny the figures, but I do not think of them only as figures; they are the livelihoods of individual young people, which are being given to them by this Conservative-led Government.

I want to talk about some of the specific actions that we have taken under the Government. I join the shadow Minister in paying tribute to the work of the Coalfields Regeneration Trust. Established in 1999 to support and improve communities at the grass roots, the trust has created and safeguarded more than 4,000 jobs and helped 125,000 to gain new skills. The trust’s funding has helped to put it on a long-term footing.

Against that background, the plan to give back power to local communities, using local plans and local enterprise partnerships, will allow us to focus support through growth deals and city deals to ensure that support from Government is tailored to individual, local need. Domestic coal production still contributes to our national coal consumption—about a quarter of our total needs—and continues to be an important employer, especially in areas of low employment, with 4,000 people being employed in the industry. We must support them, as I mentioned in my exchange with the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr Skinner).

[Mr Hepburn]

What does the Minister value more? He talks about new opportunities in this day and age. Does he value an apprenticeship with the old National Coal Board, with apprentices being well trained for four years and coming out as top engineers, or does he prefer and value more the apprenticeships that have been encouraged under this Government, such as the sandwich architect apprenticeship in Subway?

[Matthew Hancock]

The hon. Gentleman is mistaken if he is talking down apprenticeships. As the former apprenticeships Minister, I will have no truck with people talking down apprentices or attacking them. The previous Government said, “You’re not of value unless you went to university”, but our Government say, “We support people who go to university and we support people who go through apprenticeships.” We will not have some arbitrary target. We say, “We want to support you in the choices that you make.” We will not accept any lectures from the Labour party on the massive expansion of apprenticeships under this Government in the coalfields and beyond.

I want to place it on the record that we will support the collieries, especially those of Kellingley and Thoresby, and work with them to ensure that we help them as much as we can within the EU state aid rules. It is important to ensure that we support the coal mining that continues, but also that we put in place the broader partnership for a stronger economy that will help people across the coalfields and the whole country. Let us not return to the failed politics of the past, represented by the Opposition today, but continue to strengthen that economy for the nation’s future.