Local Government Finance

Stephen Twigg Excerpts

Tuesday 5th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Twigg (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill), who made a thoughtful, reflective contribution to today’s debate.

The publication of the latest Centre for Cities report last week confirmed what my constituents in Liverpool already knew: the city has been hit hard by almost a decade of austerity, with massive cuts in central Government funding hitting not only the council but police and fire services. Benefit changes have also hit the poorest communities the hardest. My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Dame Louise Ellman) has already spoken about what the report says about Liverpool, but I will repeat one of the statistics she quoted because it is so powerful. Since 2010, Liverpool has lost £441 million in Government funding, which equates to a per-resident reduction of £816 a year. That is the largest per capita cut across the whole country. As she said, our directly elected Mayor Joe Anderson and the Labour city council have shown enormous leadership in taking the city though that period despite the cuts, and have been doing their utmost to protect services for some of the most vulnerable communities in our city.

To illustrate all that, the city council spent £222 million in 2010 supporting adults who need help in the community because of age, infirmity or disability. That has now reduced to £152 million despite demand rising by 15%. Such has been the pressure on Liverpool’s adult social care budget that the council has had to spend almost its entire reserves simply to support social care spending. We also have some of the highest levels of looked-after children in the country. As we know, those numbers have been going up across the country in recent years. As a consequence, the city council overspent last year on vital services for vulnerable children and young adults by £7 million.

Against that backdrop, and despite the pressures on its funding, the city council recently adopted a radical new approach to delivering social care. It has been able to find an additional £7.7 million investment to employ 160 new staff to cut the case load of children’s social workers by half, and I pay tribute to the city council for doing that even in these difficult circumstances. The council says that its new model will reduce the number of children for whom each social worker is responsible, allowing them more time to work with children, young people and families. I pay tribute to the council for that important work.

We had an excellent debate on maintained nursery schools last Thursday, in which I spoke about the two outstanding nursery schools in my constituency—East Prescot Road and Ellergreen. I know this is a matter for the Department for Education and, ultimately, the Treasury, but I echo what my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside said about the crucial role played by maintained nursery schools.

I also echo the call from our city council for a royal commission to ensure a fair funding formula for local services. We have heard different points of view in this debate, each of us representing our own constituency. A royal commission could provide an opportunity for this to be looked at in a full, comprehensive and independent manner.

The Government’s own figures on core spending power show that, had Liverpool been subjected to the average level of cuts over the past nine years, our budget would be £71 million better off. We have seen Liverpool’s spending power per household cut by over £700 during a period in which Surrey has seen its spending power per household increase by £65.

My hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne), the shadow Secretary of State, rightly said that the council tax base is crucial in determining what a local authority can actually spend. Liverpool City Council raises an average of £886 per chargeable dwelling. As such, we are in the bottom fifth of local authorities in the country. If we had the average tax base, we would have getting on towards £100 million more in council tax revenue. That is the basic injustice that hits the areas of the country with the greatest levels of poverty and inequality, which is why this settlement is unacceptable.

Local Government Funding: Merseyside

Stephen Twigg Excerpts

Tuesday 30th October 2018 Westminster Hall

[Stephen Twigg (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) on securing this debate and leading it so powerfully. Along with my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Dame Louise Ellman), she set out fully the impact of austerity on Liverpool City Council.

Last week in this Chamber, we had a debate led by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger) in which we shared the horrific stories from our constituents about the increased use of food banks, and the impacts of austerity and the changes to social security benefits. I strongly echo what my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood said about the efforts of Liverpool City Council, under the leadership of Mayor Joe Anderson, despite the scale of cuts in the support from central Government, still to deliver for the people, and in particular to deliver for some of the most vulnerable communities in our city. I second the idea of a royal commission to really address the issue of the fairness of local government funding. I also pay tribute to those who work in our public services who, despite austerity, do their utmost to deliver the very best services at local level.

I want to focus first on education, and secondly on crime and policing. As my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood rightly said, Liverpool City Council has done its utmost to protect its children’s centres, because we know how powerful the evidence is that investing in the early years of children’s lives makes the biggest difference. If we are serious about seeking a more equal and just society, investment in those early years is crucial. I ask the Minister to speak to his colleagues in the Department for Education about the importance of those early years.

Last week, I raised the issue of the important role that nursery schools play in our communities—I make no apology for raising it again. I have two brilliant nursery schools in my consistency, Ellergreen and East Prescot Road, both of which are rated outstanding by Ofsted. They are very concerned about their long-term funding, because of some of the considerations that the Department for Education is undertaking. We are all concerned that the adoption of a national funding formula poses a threat to our schools’ funding. Schools in my constituency and around the country will not be comforted by getting some money for the “little extras” as the Chancellor set out in his speech yesterday—that is frankly insulting. We need a serious, long-term settlement for schools funding.

I will finish by saying something about crime and policing, because that is an issue of massive concern to my constituents. I ask the Minister to share the issues that have been raised during the debate with his colleagues in the Home Office. Again, this speaks to the question of injustice in funding, which all three of my colleagues have spoken about. Funding cuts have hit all parts of the country, but they have hit some parts much harder than others, and it tends to be the areas with the greatest social and economic need, such as Merseyside, that have been hit the hardest. Merseyside police relies on central Government to provide 75% of its funding. In contrast, Surrey can raise most of its funding for its police locally. Therefore, an equivalent cut to both forces does not hit the two areas the same—it hits Merseyside much harder than it hits Surrey.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Ms Eagle) has just pointed out, since 2010 in Merseyside we have lost 1,700 staff and police officers—1,700 gone—and had a cut in the number of police community support officers of around 35%. Last year, the chief constable of Merseyside, Andy Cooke, warned that Merseyside police was reaching breaking point, as budgets are stretched to the limit.

Crime is going up, but officer numbers are at their lowest in years. Office for National Statistics figures show a 14% rise in crime in Merseyside in the year to September 2018. Of particular concern in my constituency are the 18% rise in robbery and the 16% rise in violent crime. I say to the Minister, who speaks for communities and who can lobby his Home Office colleagues, that that has to change. Surely dealing with crime and protecting the public are the most basic responsibilities of any Government.

I ask the Minister please to listen to our chief constable and our police and crime commissioner, Jane Kennedy. We need a fair deal for policing in Merseyside, alongside a fair deal for local authorities, about which my hon. Friends have spoken so eloquently.

Holocaust Memorial Day

Stephen Twigg Excerpts

Thursday 18th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Twigg (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab/Co-op)]

I join others in congratulating the hon. Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) on securing this important debate. As he reminded us, the theme for Holocaust Memorial Day this year is the power of words. Like him, I will speak about what I think are the most powerful words in this context: the testimony of the survivors of the holocaust.

Like others, I have experienced hearing survivors speaking, in particular to children at schools they have come to speak at in my constituency in Liverpool and to those who have gone on the visit to Auschwitz arranged through the Holocaust Educational Trust, and also in the work I did between 2005 and 2010 at the National Holocaust Centre and Museum in Laxton, Nottinghamshire. Nothing can compare to the impact that the words of survivors have in shaping the mind and educating children about the horrors of what happened during the holocaust.

Holocaust Memorial Day has a vital twin importance: remembering the Nazi holocaust—so appallingly denied by some—but also dedicating ourselves to challenging modern-day anti-Semitism, racism, genocide and other mass atrocities. Rudi Oppenheimer was 11 years old and living outside Amsterdam when the Nazis invaded. He and members of his family ended up in Bergen-Belsen, but he survived, as did his brother and sister. His testimony of his experience of the holocaust has educated children around the world. When he was asked in a school why he thinks his testimony is so important, his answer was:

“Because we haven’t learned the lessons yet at all”.

All of us have heard the voices of Tutsi from Rwanda, Muslims from Bosnia and young Yazidi women. These are just three examples; tragically, I could cite many, many others. On Monday, I hosted an event in Speaker’s House organised by War Child focusing on mental health and psychosocial support for children in conflict areas. We heard incredibly powerful first-hand testimony from two fantastic young refugees: Enana, who is originally from Syria, and Oscar, who is originally from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Their testimony about what their countries have been through, and what they personally have been through as refugees from conflict situations, was very powerful and reminds us why Holocaust Memorial Day has such huge contemporary relevance.

In Liverpool, Holocaust Memorial Day is marked annually. Tonight, the University of Liverpool Jewish Society is hosting an event with holocaust survivor Joanna Millan. Next week, the Lord Mayor of Liverpool will open the Fathers House holocaust exhibition in Liverpool town hall. On memorial day itself, the Mayor of Liverpool will join faith leaders in a special service at the town hall to pay tribute to all those who lost their lives in the holocaust and genocides around the world.

Let me finish with another quotation from Rudi Oppenheimer, because this was the theme for last year’s Holocaust Memorial Day, about which the hon. Member for Brigg and Goole spoke: “Nobody should stand by”. Nobody should stand by when we see anti-Semitism or any form of persecution or bullying. As my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham (Lyn Brown) rightly reminded us, we should not stand by when we see the awful persecution of the Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar/Burma. We should not stand by when we see the appalling humanitarian crisis in Yemen. And we should not stand by when we see rape used as a weapon of war, as it is in so many places, including against the Rohingya and in South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and elsewhere. Let us, on a cross-party basis, use the opportunity of today’s debate and Holocaust Memorial Day next week to say once again that we will not stand by. We will listen to the voices of the survivors—be they from the holocaust, be they from Syria, be they Yazidi women, or be they from the situations in Myanmar or Yemen—and that we will work together as colleagues to stop all forms of oppression and challenge all forms of racism and persecution wherever they rear their ugly head.