Debate on the Address

Stephen Pound Excerpts

Wednesday 4th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

I beg to move,

That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, as follows:

Most Gracious Sovereign,

We, Your Majesty’s most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, in Parliament assembled, beg leave to offer our humble thanks to Your Majesty for the Gracious Speech which Your Majesty has addressed to both Houses of Parliament.

This might be a Queen’s Speech, but I am only the second woman to propose the Loyal Address in Her Majesty’s long reign. Fifty-seven years ago, Lady Tweedsmuir, the then Member for Aberdeen South, had the double pressure of proposing the Loyal Address and making her maiden speech. What she said deserves our consideration for its relevance today. She started by extolling the strengths of Scotland in the United Kingdom. She then set out the challenges facing the country, including the forging of a new relationship with Europe based on trade and co-operation, the creation of a new defence able to respond to Russian aggression and the growing of the economy, fusing the gigantic resources of the old world to the new. She then discussed the cost of living and the reform of the upper House, and finished by advocating the advantages of having more women parliamentarians.

It is a shame that the response Lady Tweedsmuir received from the then Leader of the Opposition is less able to stand up to contemporary scrutiny. Mr Gaitskell—with gallant intent, I am sure—replied to a nodding Commons that she had probably made some good points but that, alas, he had been unable to respond to any of them, such had been the distraction of her soft, attractive voice. So struck was he that he felt that, despite being a grandmother, she was rather easy on the eye, and he had found it impossible to concentrate on anything she said.

I realise that, in recounting this, I might have left the present Leader of the Opposition with a modern man’s dilemma. Should he now risk insulting me by concentrating solely on the issues raised, and failing to mention that I am also a softly-spoken charmer? Or, if he were to compliment me, would he risk incurring the wrath of the Labour party’s women’s caucus, potentially triggering the newly introduced power of recall? These are perilous times for a chap. Whatever he decides to do, I hope that this will mark the end of the parliamentary leap year. Women parliamentarians should be allowed to propose more than once every 57 years.

Lady Tweedsmuir’s first husband, Major Sir Arthur Lindsey Grant of the Grenadier Guards, was killed 70 years ago in Normandy, aged 32, in the aftermath of D-day. It was from Portsmouth that he and other heroes of that blood-red dawn of 6 June 1944 set sail, and it will be Portsmouth that will provide the focal point for our national commemoration of that blow for freedom that does indeed live in history. At 70 years’ distance, the invasion of Normandy is almost impossible to comprehend in its scale and industry. I have been able to understand it through speaking to the people who were there, many of whom it is my privilege to represent. This most remarkable war-time episode was made possible only through the blood, sweat and tears of so-called ordinary people.

The anniversary is a chance to reflect on what the people of this country can achieve when we are united in a common cause. I am proud that this Parliament has recognised the unique service of our armed forces and enshrined a covenant in law; proud that we have seen the injustices of the past addressed by the striking of the Arctic Star and the Bomber Command clasp; proud that we have introduced the Mesothelioma Act 2014, by which those dockyard workers in my city who would otherwise be left without assistance will receive support; and that we are now to create an armed forces ombudsman further to protect the interests of service personnel.

I am pleased too that the Defence Secretary has abandoned the unfortunate tradition of outlining the number of ships required in a defence review and then ordering precisely half of them. Since the strategic defence and security review three extra warships have been commissioned: a former Member for Portsmouth and Admiral of the Fleet, Sir Hedworth Meux, would have approved. In 1917, he seconded the Loyal Address in his number 1b uniform, and in the course of his remarks, advised that the naval service was better praised by an outsider than one who belongs to it. I, in contrast, am not in my uniform. Alas, Chamber protocol and concerns for the blood pressure of my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) prevent it. As hon. Members who have come within earshot of me during the past four years will know, I am very happy to praise the senior service from within.

Since King Alfred, whose name my reservist unit bears, first fitted out the fleet at Portsmouth, she has been the crucible for our maritime nation’s considerable accomplishments—the battles of the Solent, Solebay, Trafalgar and the Falklands to name but a few. In 1902, she was home to the Navy’s first submarines, a capability dismissed by some Admirals at the time as

“underhand, unfair and damned un-English”.

Four years later, she hailed the awesome step-change in fire power brought by the Dreadnought. Today, the Type 45s, the most sophisticated and capable warships in the world, call Portsmouth home, and so too will the Queen Elizabeth class carriers, the first of which will be named exactly one month from today after our sovereign. [Hon. Members: “ Hear, hear.”] Their arrival in Portsmouth will see more tonnage in the harbour than at any time since Lady Tweedsmuir was on her feet, and 1,000 extra naval personnel. These ships, the largest ever commissioned by our Navy, will ensure an awakening for our nation of a golden maritime age. It is because of the skill and dedication of the men and women who built that ship that her launch marks not the end of the order book, but the beginning of a new chapter for Portsmouth’s shipyard—£1 billion of investment, assisted area status, a maritime taskforce, the defence growth partnership, and our very own Minister, enabling business to transform Portsmouth and the Solent into the maritime heart of the United Kingdom. In mentioning the new office of Minister for Portsmouth, I must pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Michael Fallon) for the sterling work that he is doing to deliver this for my city and the nation. My advice is: if one wants a job doing, ask a busy Minister.

Such is my city’s confidence that we have never sought progress at the expense of our sister base ports of Plymouth, home of the amphibious fleet, and of Faslane, home to the deterrent submarines. I pray that a year from now, the Royal Navy will still have all three bases and those submarines remain damned un-English. I pay tribute to the achievements of the best navy in the world and to 350 years’ service of the Royal Marines.

The Prime Minister recently spoke about the UK being a small island with a big footprint in the world. That could apply equally to Portsmouth, the only island city in the UK. From the top of Portsdown hill, whose Palmerston forts point their guns inland as that was the only way the city was considered vulnerable to attack, one can see the whole of Portsmouth’s few square miles. However, the city’s reach stretches far out of sight. Our goods and services are exported around the globe, our satellites circle the heavens above and our citizens fuel the imagination. We are the city of Brunel, Dickens and Conan Doyle, who, when not writing prescriptions and detective novels, was keeping goal for Portsmouth FC.

Portsmouth football club is now owned by its fans. Pompey has blazed a trail for other clubs and given supporter involvement in football governance the legitimacy and momentum it deserves. That triumph was a wonderful expression of the Pompey spirit: determination, resilience and a close community bond. There are other examples, too. We have organised and fundraised to give the Hilsea lido a new lease of life—a project for which I have gladly sacrificed money, time and almost all my dignity.

In Wymering, we have come together with Highbury college to save for community use a Tudor manor in the middle of a housing estate—left to decay by the council, but now rescued by residents. Touchingly, the manor’s gardening group has christened its hedgehog mascot in honour of the man who enabled community asset transfer to become the norm: his name is Eric Prickles. Elsewhere in the city, the Lime Grove CAPE forum, the Beneficial Foundation, the Baffins Pond Association, Southsea Greenhouse and many other community groups work hard to improve their communities. We love our city and we love our country, too.

It has been said that Portsmouth is peopled by those who express their patriotism in their lives, the ultimate expression of which is to serve in our armed forces. I am proud that the Government are to review the roles in our services currently barred to women, to make sure that we make use of the best talent. In doing so, there must be no compromise of standards, but we must recognise that we cannot set women up to fail. Training must be tailored to enable us to be our best. I have benefited from some excellent training by the Royal Navy, but on one occasion I felt that it was not as bespoke as it might have been. Fascinating though it was, I felt that the lecture and practical demonstration on how to care for the penis and testicles in the field failed to appreciate that some of us attending had been issued with the incorrect kit.

Give us the opportunity and the training and women will embrace the challenge—that has certainly been Portsmouth’s experience. There were the all-women crew who beat all comers in the Portsmouth regatta of 1824 and there was Hertha Ayrton, suffragette and inventor of the Ayrton fan, who spoiled her 1911 census paper thus:

“How can I answer all these questions if I have not the intelligence to choose between two candidates for parliament?”

There were also the girls in the war, such as the now 96-year-old Mary Verrier, whose experiences are the subject of a new play “Tender Loving Care”, and those who learned a trade while coping with motherhood, widowhood or both. Today there are the first women submariners and the first female commanders of our warships. I look forward to other such firsts for women who serve. The review sends a strong message not only to them but to nations where women’s rights and talents are accounted too cheaply.

I am proud today that we have a parliamentary first—an all-women double act to propose and second the Loyal Address. I am delighted to serve as the warm-up act for the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke).

[Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)]

No pressure, then.

[Penny Mordaunt]

My hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) is concerned about the consequence of the coalition running its full course. He might see us as the Thelma and Louise of the parliamentary Session, driving at top speed to the Grand Canyon of electoral defeat. Let me reassure him that this will not be the case, because, unlike a 1966 Thunderbird, this coalition is right-hand drive. [Laughter.] He must guard against being like those Palmerston forts on Portsdown hill, our default position introspection. We must turn and face the horizon and face those issues of which Tweedsmuir spoke.

Before the next Queen’s Speech, the future of at least one Union will be decided, and possibly two. We will have withdrawn our troops from Afghanistan. We will have moved towards greater energy self-sufficiency, grappled with Russian aggression and the Syrian crisis, fought the evil that is modern slavery, further paid down the deficit, and continued with our long-term economic plan. If we are to be successful in these endeavours, then we must draw from the same sources as our forebears as D-day dawned. We must take confidence from our heritage. We must be willing to serve a cause greater than ourselves. We must show unity of purpose and the dual belief in the right of our cause and our ability to achieve it. If we ever doubt that our nation’s best days lie ahead and that our country can accomplish all it sets out to do, and lose sight of our duty and the principles and values that underpin it, then 60 miles and 220° south-west of this Chamber lies our inspiration.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

I apologise to Members of the House for not being present for the whole debate. I enjoyed the important speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne (Mr Walker), but I think that he will forgive me for saying that the best speech today was by my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth North (Penny Mordaunt). By keeping a straight face, she was able to make some serious remarks and some very entertaining remarks. She just about matched the hon. Member for Ealing North (Stephen Pound), who has been known to keep the House entertained on occasion.

One reason I have not been here for the whole debate is that I have been considering issues of leasehold. If I may, I will read out a paragraph from “UK Over 50s Housing” entitled “Vincent Tchenguiz – Apology” from 19 May 2014. It states:

“On 1 May 2014, we published an article entitled ‘Peverel to be pursued in compensation claim.’ We suggested that Vincent Tchenguiz owned, controlled and was involved in the day to day affairs of property company Peverel. We now accept that there is no truth whatsoever to this suggestion. Prior to going into administration, Peverel was owned by the Tchenguiz Family Trust of which Vincent Tchenguiz is a beneficiary. Peverel always had an independent board of directors. Vincent Tchenguiz never had any day to day involvement in the management of Peverel. In particular, he had no knowledge of or involvement in any collusive tendering. We also accept that we have no basis for the claim that Mr Tchenguiz subjected Peverel residents to ‘constant financial clipping.’ We apologise to Mr Tchenguiz for the distress and embarrassment caused.”

I received that quotation from a man called David Leslie of New Century Media. I responded to him, saying:

“I have read the attached piece. A copy of this response goes to the magazine editor. Has your client ever made an apology on any leasehold issue or action?

Can you kindly help on some issues?

May I see in detail any and all exchanges with UK Over 50s Housing Weekly? As you mention them, I copy this to them and I can make it available to others interested.

Please let me know when you or your firm were first engaged to represent or to advise your client.

May I be sent a chronology of Tchenguiz links, including of influence, control, ownership and benefit in by and from Peverel and anything associated with it?”—[Interruption.]

If the hon. Member for Ealing North is asking why this matter is relevant, it is because the Queen’s Speech refers to Bills that are carried over, including the Consumer Rights Bill, which has to finish its Report stage in the Commons and has to go on to the House of Lords. In my meeting, I discussed the matter with Lord Best. If we cannot do so, I hope that he, probably with Baroness Gardner, will have the opportunity to add to that Bill provisions for the protection of leaseholders, who in many ways have been brutally abused, financially challenged and often intimidated.

What we know about collusive tendering is that when people complained to the economics crimes unit of the police, to the Serious Fraud Office and to the Office of Fair Trading, because Peverel declared that they had been involved in collusive tendering, when it turned out that they had obtained through their subsidiary Cirrus all the work for new calls systems, which were often not needed and almost always at prices which were unjustified, there was no penalty. That is relevant to what Mr David Leslie has told me about Mr Vincent Tchenguiz not being involved at all.

I have asked for a chronology of the Tchenguiz links of influence, control, ownership and benefit in and from Peverel and anything associated with it. I continued:

“If relevant, I anticipate being told who established and who controlled the body that did control and had influence on Peverel when so many bad things were done to so many.

Who was responsible for selecting the professional advisors and others associated with the valuations of properties bought, the loans obtained, the audits of and the responses to leaseholders when presenting valid questions and challenges to the way they were treated.”

I offered to meet these people. I went on to say:

“My intention is to lay out in Parliament the details of problems of the past, of the present and how life can be better in the future.”

I added that I have an interest in a leasehold flat in Worthing, where our managing agent was good, our freeholder was good, and I have had no problems whatsoever.

One thing that the Government should think of doing is asking the professional standards bodies whether they believe they should be disciplining their members—chartered surveyors, valuers, accountants or bankers—when they go along with valuations created apparently out of thin air by the owners of freehold blocks. For example, at Charter quay in Kingston a trust bought a freehold for about £700,000. It revalued it at over £3 million and borrowed £2 million against it, and when eventually the leaseholders managed to get the prospect of having a court decide what the value was, it turned out to be £900,000.

A company cannot have a valuation trebled or quadrupled in its company accounts without a valuer putting their name to it, an accountant doing the accounts, and auditors and bankers getting involved. I believe that all the professional standards bodies should be saying, “We’re going to find an example that we can make a decision on which will terrify the life out of others who go along with clients who say, ‘I can arbitrarily increase the value.’”

The only way a freeholder can put up the value is to have an income stream that goes way beyond the ground rents in the original leases. If, for example, they get insurance commissions of 40% or 60%, and if they can take exit fees that have been decided by the OFT and Peverel to be unjustified, we have an opportunity of saying that unfair contracts terms law can be imposed by the Competition and Markets Authority or the OFT saying that these things will not happen.

As it happens, virtually every Member of Parliament in England has some of these blocks of leasehold properties in their constituencies. I know that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has them in Witney. I know that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor has in them his constituency. I could probably go through each Member present from an English constituency, but I will not do that as that would be extending the courtesy of the House in listening to me, but I declare, and if necessary, I warn that this is an issue that does not just affect my constituents; each individual constituent may be old, elderly, vulnerable or poor, and without good advice cannot stand up against the big people.

I am glad that the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership is going to turn itself into a charity. Carlex, the campaign against retirement leasehold exploitation, is doing well. I ask the Department for Communities and Local Government and the Ministry of Justice, if necessary, together with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to get together an interdepartmental group, to ask what are the simplest things we can do to make the lives of leaseholders simpler.

[Stephen Pound]

The hon. Gentleman has quite rightly and properly mentioned his own possible interest in this matter. Does he feel that the House should be made aware of the gigantic sums of money that the Tchenguiz family give to the Conservative party?

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

That is true. Certainly it should be known. I am a great believer in transparency. I believe that if things can be said in the open and justified or criticised, we are much better off.

I had not intended to make this speech against the Tchenguiz family. I want to spell out what is happening, and if members of the Tchenguiz family say that by getting a newspaper to produce a paragraph, their hands are clean, by all means discuss that in public. All I am trying to say is that leaseholders deserve protection, I am here to help to protect them, and I am glad that other Members are interested as well.

Ordered, That the debate be now adjourned.— (Mr Gyimah.)

Debate to be resumed tomorrow.