Economic Update

Tim Loughton Excerpts

Wednesday 8th July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Rishi Sunak]

I assure the hon. Lady that all relevant impact assessments are conducted at the time that they are required by legislation. As for the environmental impact, I gave a flavour of it earlier. The sum total of the green homes grant scheme and public sector decarbonisation fund will mean that about half a megatonne of carbon will be saved every year, which is the equivalent of about 270,000 cars taken off the road, and there will be about 140,000 new jobs. I hope she will welcome that.

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

Representing a coastal constituency, may I warmly welcome the hospitality industry measures, which are very practical? May I suggest that this should be, “Eat out, to help out, to work out”, for which we need our gyms open again?

I recognise that this is mostly about business, and I welcome the emphasis on young people, but may I ask my right hon. Friend not to forget the youngest people? Some 200,000 babies have been born during lockdown and we have seen a higher incidence of perinatal mental illness, with new parents unable to access extended family support and health visitors. What steps can he take to make sure that this cohort is helped to catch up as well?

[Rishi Sunak]

I thank my hon. Friend for that. I wholeheartedly agree with him about gyms, and have hope on that, as the Prime Minister has indicated previously that he is keen to see progress made there. On the issue of early years and children, my hon. Friend knows this better than many others—other than perhaps one colleague sitting behind me—and he is right in what he says. He will know the work we did on the troubled families programme, and I was grateful to him when I was a Local Government Minister for his advice and support on that. I know that the early years working group has put forward a range of suggestions that we can take forward into the spending review.