Westminster Hall
Wednesday 2nd September 2026
Skip to latest contribution
This debate has concluded
(began 22 hours, 24 minutes ago)
Watch LiveSkip to latest contribution
This debate has concluded
09:30
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
Ten years of the Brexit referendum, I really thought there would be tripping over themselves to try and ensure that they could give us this debate, to tell us all the wonderful things that has happened since we had that referendum some ten years ago. It was the opportunity to go wandering through those sunlit uplands to celebrate this dynamic political and economic growth, the political stability that was secured, immigration under control, and all the wonders of our new found freedoms.
Do you remember, Miss Butler? We were going to have our cake and eat it. We were going to secure the easiest trade deal in history. And of course, we were going to take back control. And from these lofty heights up there in those sunlit uplands, we could peer down and admire all these shiny new hospitals that we'd managed to build because of the £350 million we had saved weekly from the evil and wicked EU.
And perhaps in a more reflective moment, we could think back and wonder, why did we ever put up with those bendy bananas, vacuum cleaners that lacked that extra Brexit suction, EU light bulbs that would not even light. And of course, Mr. Butler, thank goodness the existential threat to the great British sausage has now been removed. Thank goodness Brexit has saved us from all these barmy Brussels bureaucrats. But I suppose, Miss Butler, there are anniversaries that we look forward to birthdays, weddings, births and there are some anniversaries that invite solemn reflection.
The end of wars, the passing of great men and women, great historic events. And then, of course, there's the Brexit referendum anniversary. And somehow it just feels so much different to all other things that we mark and we pass. Because Brexit is a rather extraordinary anniversary to celebrate because it's ten years. I'll just I'll just finish this point because it's ten years since we embarked upon what has turned out to be one of the most self-defeating exercises in political and economic self-harm, ever self-inflicted in modern political history.
A bizarre, destructive and economically illiterate political project that has made everybody in this country so much worse off. And on that note, I give way to the honourable gentleman. Thank you. I thank the honourable gentleman for giving way. I'm very confused. Madam chairman, the honourable member seems passionate about independence for Scotland. Why doesn't he believe in independence for the whole of the United Kingdom? I can assure the honourable gentleman within his second that I am all for independence in this bizarre notion that they keep on coming away with the membership of the European Union means you automatically use your independence.
Tell that to the French, the Germans, the Italians, all the members of the European Union, as far as I'm concerned, pretty much enjoy their own independence. And that's what we want to do in Scotland. But since Brexit, Mr. Butler, we have had seven Prime ministers. In the ten Brexit years, there has been seven prime ministers, even a new Labour government, with a majority of 172, has not been immune from the instability of the Brexit era, barely making it to the two year mark before they've had to replace their first prime minister.
But let us first turn to the economy, because I'm grateful, as always, to the House of Commons library, who produced an excellent briefing for this debate this morning, and I really encourage colleagues to have a look at this. And it's remarkably clear about the broad economic evidence. There is now substantial and significant consensus that agrees that the UK economy is smaller than it would otherwise have been had we remained in the European Union. The estimates, yes, of course, give way to the Honourable lady.
Do you remember, Miss Butler? We were going to have our cake and eat it. We were going to secure the easiest trade deal in history. And of course, we were going to take back control. And from these lofty heights up there in those sunlit uplands, we could peer down and admire all these shiny new hospitals that we'd managed to build because of the £350 million we had saved weekly from the evil and wicked EU.
And perhaps in a more reflective moment, we could think back and wonder, why did we ever put up with those bendy bananas, vacuum cleaners that lacked that extra Brexit suction, EU light bulbs that would not even light. And of course, Mr. Butler, thank goodness the existential threat to the great British sausage has now been removed. Thank goodness Brexit has saved us from all these barmy Brussels bureaucrats. But I suppose, Miss Butler, there are anniversaries that we look forward to birthdays, weddings, births and there are some anniversaries that invite solemn reflection.
The end of wars, the passing of great men and women, great historic events. And then, of course, there's the Brexit referendum anniversary. And somehow it just feels so much different to all other things that we mark and we pass. Because Brexit is a rather extraordinary anniversary to celebrate because it's ten years. I'll just I'll just finish this point because it's ten years since we embarked upon what has turned out to be one of the most self-defeating exercises in political and economic self-harm, ever self-inflicted in modern political history.
A bizarre, destructive and economically illiterate political project that has made everybody in this country so much worse off. And on that note, I give way to the honourable gentleman. Thank you. I thank the honourable gentleman for giving way. I'm very confused. Madam chairman, the honourable member seems passionate about independence for Scotland. Why doesn't he believe in independence for the whole of the United Kingdom? I can assure the honourable gentleman within his second that I am all for independence in this bizarre notion that they keep on coming away with the membership of the European Union means you automatically use your independence.
Tell that to the French, the Germans, the Italians, all the members of the European Union, as far as I'm concerned, pretty much enjoy their own independence. And that's what we want to do in Scotland. But since Brexit, Mr. Butler, we have had seven Prime ministers. In the ten Brexit years, there has been seven prime ministers, even a new Labour government, with a majority of 172, has not been immune from the instability of the Brexit era, barely making it to the two year mark before they've had to replace their first prime minister.
But let us first turn to the economy, because I'm grateful, as always, to the House of Commons library, who produced an excellent briefing for this debate this morning, and I really encourage colleagues to have a look at this. And it's remarkably clear about the broad economic evidence. There is now substantial and significant consensus that agrees that the UK economy is smaller than it would otherwise have been had we remained in the European Union. The estimates, yes, of course, give way to the Honourable lady.
09:34
Speaker 2
-
Speaker 2
Giving way . In my constituency of this morning, we have one of the busiest roll on roll off ports in Holyhead. And now there's been an announcement made regarding passports requirements between the UK and the Republic of Ireland. A local tour company has warned me of the serious economic impact on such short notice announcements. Does the member agree with me that the Brexit agreement hasn't worked for the people of Venice or Wales, and has a negative impact on the on the economy?
09:34
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
The honourable member, more than agrees with honourable lady thoroughly endorses what she says because it is not just in this one. In Wales it is every section, every part of this United Kingdom that has been impacted and hurt by this crazy project. And I'll give and I'll give you I'll give way to. Honourable friend.
09:35
Speaker 3
-
Speaker 3
I thank the member for giving way. And my friends are making a very humorous speech about bananas and sausages, and it's making me hungry. But yesterday the new Prime Minister spoke of wrong turns going back as far as the 1980s. But there's a wrong turn that he could do something about because the EU reset that the previous prime minister promised was a disaster. He gave away 12 years access to our waters in Scotland in return for very little.
In fact, when we saw how the Coastal and Fishing Growth Fund was being dispersed a pittance for Scotland, so does he agree that if the Prime Minister is serious about undoing these wrong turns? Can I now have the courage to do something about Brexit?
In fact, when we saw how the Coastal and Fishing Growth Fund was being dispersed a pittance for Scotland, so does he agree that if the Prime Minister is serious about undoing these wrong turns? Can I now have the courage to do something about Brexit?
09:35
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
I'm grateful to my hon. Friend, because he brings us right up to date about where we exactly are in the debate about Brexit. And I listened very carefully to the Prime Minister yesterday and what he had to say about European Union membership. I want to come on to this because we are at an important juncture. We've got new opportunities to go forward here, and I hope that this new Labour UK government makes the right choice, and I am going to come on to that.
So I just bear patience for my honourable friend, which I know he will be able to supply me with. But I want to get back to the economics, if that's all right, Miss Butler, because what we're finding now is that the estimates range from anything between 2% to 8% lower GDP than had we remained in the European Union. The office for Budget Responsibility suggests a 4% reduction in productivity, and Goldman Sachs has estimated that the UK economy is around 6% smaller than it would otherwise have been.
Now I want to be clear about this. This doesn't suddenly mean that Britain became 8% poorer in the morning of June 24th, 2016. Of course, Britain continued to grow and we have seen and experienced some economic growth. But the argument is that the UK has grown less than it otherwise would have done. Brexit is not was never going to be a spectacular economic crash. If anything, it's something just a little bit more insidious than that.
Brexit is more akin to a slow puncture. The economy keeps growing, the car keeps moving forward, but just the driving just gets tougher and tougher as we negotiate a new, harsher environment. Yes.
So I just bear patience for my honourable friend, which I know he will be able to supply me with. But I want to get back to the economics, if that's all right, Miss Butler, because what we're finding now is that the estimates range from anything between 2% to 8% lower GDP than had we remained in the European Union. The office for Budget Responsibility suggests a 4% reduction in productivity, and Goldman Sachs has estimated that the UK economy is around 6% smaller than it would otherwise have been.
Now I want to be clear about this. This doesn't suddenly mean that Britain became 8% poorer in the morning of June 24th, 2016. Of course, Britain continued to grow and we have seen and experienced some economic growth. But the argument is that the UK has grown less than it otherwise would have done. Brexit is not was never going to be a spectacular economic crash. If anything, it's something just a little bit more insidious than that.
Brexit is more akin to a slow puncture. The economy keeps growing, the car keeps moving forward, but just the driving just gets tougher and tougher as we negotiate a new, harsher environment. Yes.
09:37
Speaker 4
-
Speaker 4
Thank you, honourable member, for giving way. Just on the economy. Would he agree with me? And does he remember, as I do , the weeks before the referendum, when we were told, amidst all the different types of scaremongering, that, number one, if we voted to leave house prices would decline by 28% and they didn't. We were also told that unemployment would rise and it didn't. Does he recall those scaremongering headlines?
09:37
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
And did I do. And it would almost slightly as ridiculous as some of the claims that were made for if we left the European Union, which were just simply extraordinary, from £350 million saved per week to bendy bananas and sausages. It was absurd. And it was a poor, poor debate. And the honourable gentleman. But he cannot disagree with the evidence from the House of Commons Library. From all of the major financial institutions.
Brexit has been an economic disaster, and I don't think anybody could possibly disagree with that basic statement. I will come on to trade because trade is equally as important. The OBR assumes that Brexit will ultimately reduce UK imports and exports by around 15% relative to the scenario had we remained in the European Union. But again, Mr. Butler, that doesn't mean that our exports have literally fallen by 15%. It just means that the additional barriers created by Brexit mean we trade less than we otherwise would have done.
And that matters because the European Union is still by far our largest trading partner. In 2025, the EU accounted for 41% of our exports of goods and services in around half of our imports. So much for this idea that we would effortlessly turn our backs on Europe and replace all that trade with new trade deals around the world. Yes, of course, there's been trade deals useful good trade deals with the likes of New Zealand, Australia and India.
And they are benefits, of course. True, but they barely touch the sides of the trade relationship we already had with the European Union. We left yesterday with the Honourable Lady.
Brexit has been an economic disaster, and I don't think anybody could possibly disagree with that basic statement. I will come on to trade because trade is equally as important. The OBR assumes that Brexit will ultimately reduce UK imports and exports by around 15% relative to the scenario had we remained in the European Union. But again, Mr. Butler, that doesn't mean that our exports have literally fallen by 15%. It just means that the additional barriers created by Brexit mean we trade less than we otherwise would have done.
And that matters because the European Union is still by far our largest trading partner. In 2025, the EU accounted for 41% of our exports of goods and services in around half of our imports. So much for this idea that we would effortlessly turn our backs on Europe and replace all that trade with new trade deals around the world. Yes, of course, there's been trade deals useful good trade deals with the likes of New Zealand, Australia and India.
And they are benefits, of course. True, but they barely touch the sides of the trade relationship we already had with the European Union. We left yesterday with the Honourable Lady.
09:39
Speaker 5
-
Speaker 5
Stourbridge, Brierley Hill, Netherton. We've been very negatively impacted by the effects of the steel strategy and the measures brought in by the EU, such as tariffs and quotas. Does he agree that if we had a closer trading relationship with the EU, that constituencies like mine and likely his would be far better off?
09:39
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
Most definitely. And I thoroughly agree with the honourable lady. It's hard to think of any sector that hasn't suffered as a result of leaving the European Union. She's quite right to reference the steel sector. It could be anyone, and I'm pretty certain that today we're going to hear quite a lot about how EU leaving the EU has impacted and disastrously impacted and affected so many sectors throughout the United Kingdom. But I want to get on to immigration.
Immigration. How do you how do you start to deal with the subject of immigration? It's perhaps the saddest, funniest part of the whole immigration saga, because immigration was supposed to be the one thing that Brexit was going to fix it. As far as I was concerned, it seemed to be the whole point of it wasn't. It was about take back control, stop and uncontrolled immigration. But what did we find? Immigration skyrocketed and it reached extraordinarily high levels of 1.47 million in the year to March 2023.
Now, without a doubt, leaving the EU closed the door to EU immigration. Net migration from the EU has been negative since June 2022. What it did was stop that conveyor belt of talent that had been coming to the UK for the best part of the last two decades, and what we quickly discovered by closing off Europe was that we actually quite liked having EU people working in all our different sectors from hospitals, from farms, hotels, restaurants, universities, care services, businesses, the city, our creative sector.
We all found that we actually needed people from the EU and people quite liked employing them. I'll give way to the honourable gentleman.
Immigration. How do you how do you start to deal with the subject of immigration? It's perhaps the saddest, funniest part of the whole immigration saga, because immigration was supposed to be the one thing that Brexit was going to fix it. As far as I was concerned, it seemed to be the whole point of it wasn't. It was about take back control, stop and uncontrolled immigration. But what did we find? Immigration skyrocketed and it reached extraordinarily high levels of 1.47 million in the year to March 2023.
Now, without a doubt, leaving the EU closed the door to EU immigration. Net migration from the EU has been negative since June 2022. What it did was stop that conveyor belt of talent that had been coming to the UK for the best part of the last two decades, and what we quickly discovered by closing off Europe was that we actually quite liked having EU people working in all our different sectors from hospitals, from farms, hotels, restaurants, universities, care services, businesses, the city, our creative sector.
We all found that we actually needed people from the EU and people quite liked employing them. I'll give way to the honourable gentleman.
09:41
Speaker 6
-
Speaker 6
I thank the honourable gentleman for giving way. As Secretary of the Germany Appg, I spent a lot of time meeting with German businesses that want to invest in this country. One of the issues that comes up time and time again is exactly that point that the honourable gentleman has made around business mobility about persuading German boards to invest in British companies and to grow the economy. And one of the constraints on doing that is allowing German professionals to come here.
Does he recognise that point? And will he join me in paying tribute to Ulrike Hopper, the director general at the German-British Chamber of Commerce and Industry, who does formidable work trying to resolve some of these issues to support the British economy.
Does he recognise that point? And will he join me in paying tribute to Ulrike Hopper, the director general at the German-British Chamber of Commerce and Industry, who does formidable work trying to resolve some of these issues to support the British economy.
09:42
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
I join him overwhelmingly and enthusiastically, and he's absolutely right. It's hard to think again of a sector that's remained untouched by the fact that we cannot access European talent, constituencies in mind and hospitality and restaurant businesses to the city, where many dynamic figures helped build some of the success stories that we see just a few miles away from this debate today, but also when we get to immigration. Before Brexit, there was barely a small boat sighted in the channel.
There was barely a small boat seen. And now we're told that this is perhaps the single biggest issue that confronts this country in various PMS and home secretaries have come up with a variety of different wheezes to try and stop these small boats coming to the UK. All hampered, all hampered because we left the one international agreement that might have actually dealt with the turning some of these people to the European Union.
When we left the European Union, we also left the Dublin II regulation. The one thing that might have achieved some of the ambition that people had about small boats was gone. And then there's the irony, of course, Mrs. Butler, that Brexit didn't just make it harder for Europeans to come here. It made it harder for us to move around Europe to. British citizens are now third country nationals in their own continent.
We could still travel across Europe. Of course we can, but there's now a 90 day limit on a rolling 180 day period for ordinary holidaymakers who have been away enjoying the sun, this might just mean nothing more than those huge queues that we've seen in some of the airports across Europe. The minor inconvenience, perhaps, but that doesn't apply to businesses. It means for them it means more red tape, more restrictions, more unnecessary difficulties. For my former profession, Mr.
Butler, and music for musicians, performers and other creative professionals, it can mean a bewildering collection of different rules about work permits, visas, carnies and documentation. Brexit has been such a destructive and invidious political project that has even managed to stop the music moving freely. Now, this Labour government gave a commitment that they would fix this and resolve it. And we're talking about ambitious, ambitious. So come on Minister, stop the Brexit and position on music.
Let the music move freely again. Let this current generation of musicians enjoy the opportunities that I had as a musician. And who knows, we might even have the Prime Minister on a European tour if he manages to get it fixed out. Yes.
There was barely a small boat seen. And now we're told that this is perhaps the single biggest issue that confronts this country in various PMS and home secretaries have come up with a variety of different wheezes to try and stop these small boats coming to the UK. All hampered, all hampered because we left the one international agreement that might have actually dealt with the turning some of these people to the European Union.
When we left the European Union, we also left the Dublin II regulation. The one thing that might have achieved some of the ambition that people had about small boats was gone. And then there's the irony, of course, Mrs. Butler, that Brexit didn't just make it harder for Europeans to come here. It made it harder for us to move around Europe to. British citizens are now third country nationals in their own continent.
We could still travel across Europe. Of course we can, but there's now a 90 day limit on a rolling 180 day period for ordinary holidaymakers who have been away enjoying the sun, this might just mean nothing more than those huge queues that we've seen in some of the airports across Europe. The minor inconvenience, perhaps, but that doesn't apply to businesses. It means for them it means more red tape, more restrictions, more unnecessary difficulties. For my former profession, Mr.
Butler, and music for musicians, performers and other creative professionals, it can mean a bewildering collection of different rules about work permits, visas, carnies and documentation. Brexit has been such a destructive and invidious political project that has even managed to stop the music moving freely. Now, this Labour government gave a commitment that they would fix this and resolve it. And we're talking about ambitious, ambitious. So come on Minister, stop the Brexit and position on music.
Let the music move freely again. Let this current generation of musicians enjoy the opportunities that I had as a musician. And who knows, we might even have the Prime Minister on a European tour if he manages to get it fixed out. Yes.
09:44
Speaker 7
-
Speaker 7
I thank him for giving way, and I had a constituent in with me over the summer celebrating the UK government's recent music strategy, but recognising exactly the point that he makes that the challenge of getting into Europe is significant. And I think it's 59% of UK musicians that say that touring Europe has become unviable. So does he agree with me that it's unacceptable that British musicians and other touring artists are facing barriers that they didn't have pre-brexit and would encourage the minister to look seriously at accelerating improvement in this area?
09:45
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
Absolutely. I mean, it's only been, I think, 7 or 8 years that we've had this issue. And I remember securing the first statement an urgent question on that. When this was first recognized as a problem, they've had a long time to fix it. There is a commitment. So maybe one thing he's taking notes here. This is one thing that he could reassure this house was the music will move, get it moving, because there's no reason why it should be stopped and stuck behind the English Channel.
But we are told, Mr. Butler, that all this is happening, and I'm pretty sure that we're going to hear it again today, because it's the wrong type of Brexit. We knew the wrong type of Brexit. Apparently it was the wrong deal. Variously it was the wrong government, the wrong everything. But Madam, Miss Butler, the hard Brexiteers got everything they wanted, everything that they asked for and more. No customs union, no freedom of movement, no single market, no European court jurisdiction, no institutions, no going back.
What we have got just now isn't an accidental form of Brexit. It just happened to emerge out of the ashes. It was everything that they fought decades for to secure and achieve. And the thing is the conclusion to all of this there is no magic Brexit, there is no Brexit where we get all the benefits of membership. Without the obligation. There is no Brexit where we have frictionless trade without accepting the rules necessary for frictionless trade.
There is no cake and eating it. And lastly, there's the extraordinary position of this Labour government. Now I know, I know that they know Brexit is an absolute and utter disaster. They know it. There's no getting away from the evidence is right in front of them. I listened to the Prime Minister yesterday and he was absolutely right to reference Brexit as perhaps one of the biggest issues that's damaged this country in the last ten years.
They know that our relationship with our largest trading partner is fundamentally broken, but they've tied themselves up in knots with these unnecessary and useless red lines. So what do they do instead of actually fixing? The problem is that they continue to tinker around the edges. A little veterinary agreement here, a little customs improvement there, a bit of mutual recognition, a bit of youth mobility, a bit of this, a bit of that, a bit of a big fat nothing because that's what it is.
And they've got the reset plans for which I'm pretty certain that's what the minister will almost exclusively tell us about. But looking at them, it is nothing more than the same old tinkering. None of this solves I've given to them already. No, no no no, sorry. There's lots of people want to get in, but they're just more of this. Now, none of this solves the real problems, which is getting back into the EU.
And the British public are so far ahead of them. This is almost unbelievable. Rejoining the EU is by far the most popular option when presented to the British public 58%, according Ipsos. Mori of voters would back rejoining the bloc, with almost half supporting a new referendum after the next general election. Only 33% think the UK should stay out. If only they had that in the past, it would be an absolute shoo in to be continuing in government, not just for the next Parliament, for the one after that.
Now I want to finish this by saying that not everything that's gone wrong in the UK in the last ten years has been due to Brexit. Of course it's not. We've had Covid, we had the war in Ukraine, the energy crisis, inflation and 40 years of the chaotic Tories. To help make matters much worse in the last ten years. But as I said, Brexit is a slow puncture rather than a spectacular crash. What we have had to do since 2016 and all these international difficulties, is navigate increasingly difficult terrain.
With a flat Brexit tire. Brexit was sold as a moment when we would open our doors and regain. All we've done is secure more paperwork. We were told that we would take back control, but immigration has skyrocketed to record levels. We were told that Brexit would free us from Brussels bureaucracy, only to create our own UK bureaucracy to deal with leaving the Brussels bureaucracy. So today, perhaps the best thing that we could do is to remember.
Remember what was promised. Remember what was achieved in Scotland. Most definitely remember. We remember back in another referendum, the referendum for Scottish independence, being told that the only way that Scotland's EU future was secure was if we voted to stay within the UK Union. What happened to that? Brexit has been an utter disaster. It has been a shameless project that has made everybody worse off.
Let us reflect this again and hopefully in ten years time, we will be back in the European Union and join the prosperity that we deserve.
But we are told, Mr. Butler, that all this is happening, and I'm pretty sure that we're going to hear it again today, because it's the wrong type of Brexit. We knew the wrong type of Brexit. Apparently it was the wrong deal. Variously it was the wrong government, the wrong everything. But Madam, Miss Butler, the hard Brexiteers got everything they wanted, everything that they asked for and more. No customs union, no freedom of movement, no single market, no European court jurisdiction, no institutions, no going back.
What we have got just now isn't an accidental form of Brexit. It just happened to emerge out of the ashes. It was everything that they fought decades for to secure and achieve. And the thing is the conclusion to all of this there is no magic Brexit, there is no Brexit where we get all the benefits of membership. Without the obligation. There is no Brexit where we have frictionless trade without accepting the rules necessary for frictionless trade.
There is no cake and eating it. And lastly, there's the extraordinary position of this Labour government. Now I know, I know that they know Brexit is an absolute and utter disaster. They know it. There's no getting away from the evidence is right in front of them. I listened to the Prime Minister yesterday and he was absolutely right to reference Brexit as perhaps one of the biggest issues that's damaged this country in the last ten years.
They know that our relationship with our largest trading partner is fundamentally broken, but they've tied themselves up in knots with these unnecessary and useless red lines. So what do they do instead of actually fixing? The problem is that they continue to tinker around the edges. A little veterinary agreement here, a little customs improvement there, a bit of mutual recognition, a bit of youth mobility, a bit of this, a bit of that, a bit of a big fat nothing because that's what it is.
And they've got the reset plans for which I'm pretty certain that's what the minister will almost exclusively tell us about. But looking at them, it is nothing more than the same old tinkering. None of this solves I've given to them already. No, no no no, sorry. There's lots of people want to get in, but they're just more of this. Now, none of this solves the real problems, which is getting back into the EU.
And the British public are so far ahead of them. This is almost unbelievable. Rejoining the EU is by far the most popular option when presented to the British public 58%, according Ipsos. Mori of voters would back rejoining the bloc, with almost half supporting a new referendum after the next general election. Only 33% think the UK should stay out. If only they had that in the past, it would be an absolute shoo in to be continuing in government, not just for the next Parliament, for the one after that.
Now I want to finish this by saying that not everything that's gone wrong in the UK in the last ten years has been due to Brexit. Of course it's not. We've had Covid, we had the war in Ukraine, the energy crisis, inflation and 40 years of the chaotic Tories. To help make matters much worse in the last ten years. But as I said, Brexit is a slow puncture rather than a spectacular crash. What we have had to do since 2016 and all these international difficulties, is navigate increasingly difficult terrain.
With a flat Brexit tire. Brexit was sold as a moment when we would open our doors and regain. All we've done is secure more paperwork. We were told that we would take back control, but immigration has skyrocketed to record levels. We were told that Brexit would free us from Brussels bureaucracy, only to create our own UK bureaucracy to deal with leaving the Brussels bureaucracy. So today, perhaps the best thing that we could do is to remember.
Remember what was promised. Remember what was achieved in Scotland. Most definitely remember. We remember back in another referendum, the referendum for Scottish independence, being told that the only way that Scotland's EU future was secure was if we voted to stay within the UK Union. What happened to that? Brexit has been an utter disaster. It has been a shameless project that has made everybody worse off.
Let us reflect this again and hopefully in ten years time, we will be back in the European Union and join the prosperity that we deserve.
09:50
Speaker 8
-
Speaker 8
I remind members that they need to stand if they'd like to participate in the debate. I'm going to try for a very hard three minute time limit. Please be mindful of your comrades if you're going to take interventions. And the question is that this House has considered the impact of the 2016 EU membership referendum in the UK. Brian Leishman.
09:51
09:51
Speaker 10
-
Speaker 10
It's a pleasure to serve on you today, and my thanks go to the honourable member for Perth and Kinross for securing this debate. Now, the behaviour of the right wing media outlets that peddled the views of their billionaire owners regarding the Brexit referendum was the perfect example of the wealthy and powerful, influencing our politics and ultimately striving to maintain the existing class structure of our country. Because much of the multi-millionaire and billionaire class saw the Brexit referendum as a business opportunity, and through the media, they latched on to and exploited the despair that many working class communities felt.
Miss Butler, I do find it so incredibly frustrating that politicians refuse to accept why millions of working class people voted for Brexit. It really shouldn't take too much analysis. Communities felt demoralised. Desperate people needed something to change, so much so that they grasped on to the notion that leaving the European Union was the answer to improving their lives. And I don't blame them, because places have been asset stripped, abandoned, and MPs now arrogantly preaching to people that they were wrong to vote for.
Brexit will not cut through to marginalised communities. It only drives people into the political extremes of the right. I give way.
Miss Butler, I do find it so incredibly frustrating that politicians refuse to accept why millions of working class people voted for Brexit. It really shouldn't take too much analysis. Communities felt demoralised. Desperate people needed something to change, so much so that they grasped on to the notion that leaving the European Union was the answer to improving their lives. And I don't blame them, because places have been asset stripped, abandoned, and MPs now arrogantly preaching to people that they were wrong to vote for.
Brexit will not cut through to marginalised communities. It only drives people into the political extremes of the right. I give way.
09:52
09:52
Speaker 10
-
Speaker 10
I thank the honourable member for his intervention. I think that that's a reasonable, candid assessment and an honest one to make, and I would be in agreement with that. But it's up to us now that we are in government to raise living standards, give people faith and hope. If we do that, then the spouse and speculators of reform and restore, then they will be rejected. So I say to the minister, can we properly analyse why right wing parties are convincing people that they are the ones that will turn people's lives around because they are conning people again, even after the lies that they told in Brexit.
Now Miss Butler, in finishing referendums, have a vital place in our democracy and with referendums. Let us also acknowledge that they can create uneasy bedfellows, awkward alliances. The impact of that is clear when I look at the fortunes of my Scottish Labour Party, because Scotland, I am afraid, is still dominated by the constitutional question. Painting. Everyone is either nationalist or unionist , has distracted Scots from the real political issue that affects us, that whether you're from Alloa or Aldershot or Stenhousemuir or Stoke, that politics is always is always about class.
Class must be put back on the political agenda. Because when I listen to people back home, many do not know what we in Scottish Labour now stand for or who we stand with. We must appreciate that by campaigning alongside Tories who did so much damage to Scotland, that that was seen as a betrayal of our class. If we ever want a Scottish Labour Government in Holyrood again, then we must appeal to what was once a large chunk of our Scottish Labour vote that has found its political home now in SNP.
Do we not see that by competing just for a small, diminishing Unionist vote? Is swimming in shallow waters and will never lead to us ever being in government again? Now, Miss Butler, I am not saying that we should back independence, but what I am saying is that we should lay out the democratic route to having another referendum, and if we do that, then we will be back. Speaking to a huge number of Scots that left us.
You never know. They might even listen to us again. Scotland needs to break the constitutional deadlock, and Scottish Labour needs to shift from our position of dogged inflexibility. Otherwise we are heading for the irrelevance of perpetual opposition. And we know that means that we will never be able to put the Labour values into government that Scotland so desperately needs.
Now Miss Butler, in finishing referendums, have a vital place in our democracy and with referendums. Let us also acknowledge that they can create uneasy bedfellows, awkward alliances. The impact of that is clear when I look at the fortunes of my Scottish Labour Party, because Scotland, I am afraid, is still dominated by the constitutional question. Painting. Everyone is either nationalist or unionist , has distracted Scots from the real political issue that affects us, that whether you're from Alloa or Aldershot or Stenhousemuir or Stoke, that politics is always is always about class.
Class must be put back on the political agenda. Because when I listen to people back home, many do not know what we in Scottish Labour now stand for or who we stand with. We must appreciate that by campaigning alongside Tories who did so much damage to Scotland, that that was seen as a betrayal of our class. If we ever want a Scottish Labour Government in Holyrood again, then we must appeal to what was once a large chunk of our Scottish Labour vote that has found its political home now in SNP.
Do we not see that by competing just for a small, diminishing Unionist vote? Is swimming in shallow waters and will never lead to us ever being in government again? Now, Miss Butler, I am not saying that we should back independence, but what I am saying is that we should lay out the democratic route to having another referendum, and if we do that, then we will be back. Speaking to a huge number of Scots that left us.
You never know. They might even listen to us again. Scotland needs to break the constitutional deadlock, and Scottish Labour needs to shift from our position of dogged inflexibility. Otherwise we are heading for the irrelevance of perpetual opposition. And we know that means that we will never be able to put the Labour values into government that Scotland so desperately needs.
09:55
09:55
Speaker 11
-
Speaker 11
Your chair. A big thank you to the honourable gentleman for Perth and Kinross Shire for bringing this forward. He and I know that we will not agree in this subject matter, but we do. And we are good friends. We're Gaelic cousins. We're part of that. So I appreciate his point of view. My point of view will be very, very different. Ten years ago, the people of the United Kingdom made a historic and sovereign decision to leave the European Union.
They voted to take back control of our laws, our borders and our cash. But as a proud unionist and a staunch Brexiteer, I stand here today to declare the impact of the referendum is uncertain because the job is not yet finished. Still work to be done and I'll outline some of those issues for us in Northern Ireland. The winter framework does not fix the problem. It institutionalizes it. It leaves a border in the Irish Sea, dividing us from the biggest market and tearing at the economic and constitutional fabric of our country.
How can we say we have fully left the EU when Northern Ireland is still subject to laws? It has no say in making judged by a foreign court, how can we say we have taken back control when our hard working farmers face losing half of their vital veterinary medicines, simply because Brussels dictates what can and cannot cross the Irish Sea? This is a fundamental denial of democracy. How can we talk about the result of the vote, when it's a constitutional outrage that our own government's ability to support British businesses in Northern Ireland is legally handcuffed by European competition codes through a ban on state aid? How can we talk, Madam Chair, about the vote in the UK, when every time a consumer in my constituency, Strangford picks up a pint of milk stamped with not for the EU, they're looking at a badge of foreign interference in our internal UK market through Brexit means Brexit for the whole of the United Kingdom, not just for Great Britain.
Mainland. We've been trapped in a dynamic alignment. If the mainland innovates and cuts red tape, Northern Ireland is legally forbidden from joining that because we are chained to the EU customs code. That's not the best of both worlds. It's an economic partition. Madam chair, the.
They voted to take back control of our laws, our borders and our cash. But as a proud unionist and a staunch Brexiteer, I stand here today to declare the impact of the referendum is uncertain because the job is not yet finished. Still work to be done and I'll outline some of those issues for us in Northern Ireland. The winter framework does not fix the problem. It institutionalizes it. It leaves a border in the Irish Sea, dividing us from the biggest market and tearing at the economic and constitutional fabric of our country.
How can we say we have fully left the EU when Northern Ireland is still subject to laws? It has no say in making judged by a foreign court, how can we say we have taken back control when our hard working farmers face losing half of their vital veterinary medicines, simply because Brussels dictates what can and cannot cross the Irish Sea? This is a fundamental denial of democracy. How can we talk about the result of the vote, when it's a constitutional outrage that our own government's ability to support British businesses in Northern Ireland is legally handcuffed by European competition codes through a ban on state aid? How can we talk, Madam Chair, about the vote in the UK, when every time a consumer in my constituency, Strangford picks up a pint of milk stamped with not for the EU, they're looking at a badge of foreign interference in our internal UK market through Brexit means Brexit for the whole of the United Kingdom, not just for Great Britain.
Mainland. We've been trapped in a dynamic alignment. If the mainland innovates and cuts red tape, Northern Ireland is legally forbidden from joining that because we are chained to the EU customs code. That's not the best of both worlds. It's an economic partition. Madam chair, the.
09:57
Speaker 4
-
Speaker 4
Member agree with me that the classic one of the classic examples of what he's talking about was some time ago , whenever companies here in in GB that sell plants and seeds, they don't supply them to Northern Ireland. But you could buy them here and take them on the plane to Northern Ireland, all down to the Windsor framework and the subsequent hash that governments have made of the Brexit vote. Yeah,
09:57
Speaker 11
-
Speaker 11
absolutely agree with them. And that's another one I wanted to say. But he's done it for me and I'll leave it at that. Madam chair, the debate proposer and the honorable member is a friend of mine. But we fundamentally cannot agree on this issue because I believe in accepting a Democratic vote and not ignoring it. When we believe we know better than the people, it is no longer a democracy, but it is instead a dictatorship.
Members in this House are allowed to hate that result, but they're not allowed to overrule it without due process. We need to finish the job that the people voted for in 2016. That means removing the Windsor framework, stripping away the remaining vestiges of EU interference, and fully restoring the internal market of the United Kingdom. We must solidify our precious union. We are undeniably stronger together. I'm sure my friends in the SNP and probably play comrade will take note of that.
Our economic, cultural and political bonds are what make this nation great. Our focus must be on strengthening the ties between Belfast, Edinburgh, Cardiff and London. Not managing an artificial barrier forced upon us by Brussels. Let us stand firm, deliver on the promise of 2016 and secure a truly United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland for generations to come. Always, Madam Chair, better together.
Members in this House are allowed to hate that result, but they're not allowed to overrule it without due process. We need to finish the job that the people voted for in 2016. That means removing the Windsor framework, stripping away the remaining vestiges of EU interference, and fully restoring the internal market of the United Kingdom. We must solidify our precious union. We are undeniably stronger together. I'm sure my friends in the SNP and probably play comrade will take note of that.
Our economic, cultural and political bonds are what make this nation great. Our focus must be on strengthening the ties between Belfast, Edinburgh, Cardiff and London. Not managing an artificial barrier forced upon us by Brussels. Let us stand firm, deliver on the promise of 2016 and secure a truly United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland for generations to come. Always, Madam Chair, better together.
09:59
09:59
09:59
09:59
Speaker 12
-
Speaker 12
On your chair. And before I start, can I just echo my friend from Allawi's comments on the media's conduct in the referendum? I just want to briefly touch on on the issue of music. I was speaking to an orchestra member who's active in my local party over the weekend about the issues he's experienced with touring, but also a local venue operator who used to welcome musicians from Europe to Northumberland. It supported our tourism sector.
It supported the exchange of ideas. It enhanced opportunities for young people to see the world beyond the North east, and it is a crying shame that we've not just lost the ability for our musicians to go abroad. We've also lost the ability to welcome people into into areas to play . In some of the iconic venues of the North East. I'm going to focus my remarks, given the time allowed on the issue of trade deals and the way that, particularly the agricultural community has been treated in those trade deals, but in particular , the impact of leaving the EU on the complete absence now of scrutiny on those deals, we no longer have any amount or any appropriate amount of Democratic input into how those terms of reference are agreed into how civil society can properly feed into them.
When a member of the European Parliament, we at least had an imperfect methodology for for agreeing those terms of reference, for bringing forward and making sure that farmers had a seat at the table when those trade deals were being agreed. When one looks at the Australian trade deal, the New Zealand trade deal that disadvantaged sheep farmers in my constituency, there is no way that, had there been a meaningful vote or meaningful parliamentary consultation, that the constituency MP for this, for my constituency, would be able to vote for that deal with a clean conscience.
And it's to his shame that he never raised his voice in opposition to it. I also want to touch on the issue of of trade movements. It's been referenced before in the honourable member's introductory speech. I just want to thank him for securing the debate. Apologies for forgetting to goods moving into Europe, goods when the EU brings in bans on products, and those goods are then immediately diverted into the UK, because we do not have the consistency of policy.
It's a real risk. I've heard it from manufacturers in my constituency making furniture who see lower quality, lower quality wood products from China coming in that were originally destined for the EU. But because of a policy shift from the EU, they have then been redirected while en route into the UK market at the risk consistently of decimating jobs and constituency MPs have to have to run to. Ministers, ask for these exemptions, ask for us to to catch up to Europe.
We do need to ensure that we have that consistency of approach in order not just to safeguard jobs, but to grow economies and to give business the the impetus and the confidence to invest in the long term. So this is a shorter speech than I intended to give, but I would just be really grateful if the minister can come back on those two points on scrutiny and on consistency of application of trade protection measures.
It supported the exchange of ideas. It enhanced opportunities for young people to see the world beyond the North east, and it is a crying shame that we've not just lost the ability for our musicians to go abroad. We've also lost the ability to welcome people into into areas to play . In some of the iconic venues of the North East. I'm going to focus my remarks, given the time allowed on the issue of trade deals and the way that, particularly the agricultural community has been treated in those trade deals, but in particular , the impact of leaving the EU on the complete absence now of scrutiny on those deals, we no longer have any amount or any appropriate amount of Democratic input into how those terms of reference are agreed into how civil society can properly feed into them.
When a member of the European Parliament, we at least had an imperfect methodology for for agreeing those terms of reference, for bringing forward and making sure that farmers had a seat at the table when those trade deals were being agreed. When one looks at the Australian trade deal, the New Zealand trade deal that disadvantaged sheep farmers in my constituency, there is no way that, had there been a meaningful vote or meaningful parliamentary consultation, that the constituency MP for this, for my constituency, would be able to vote for that deal with a clean conscience.
And it's to his shame that he never raised his voice in opposition to it. I also want to touch on the issue of of trade movements. It's been referenced before in the honourable member's introductory speech. I just want to thank him for securing the debate. Apologies for forgetting to goods moving into Europe, goods when the EU brings in bans on products, and those goods are then immediately diverted into the UK, because we do not have the consistency of policy.
It's a real risk. I've heard it from manufacturers in my constituency making furniture who see lower quality, lower quality wood products from China coming in that were originally destined for the EU. But because of a policy shift from the EU, they have then been redirected while en route into the UK market at the risk consistently of decimating jobs and constituency MPs have to have to run to. Ministers, ask for these exemptions, ask for us to to catch up to Europe.
We do need to ensure that we have that consistency of approach in order not just to safeguard jobs, but to grow economies and to give business the the impetus and the confidence to invest in the long term. So this is a shorter speech than I intended to give, but I would just be really grateful if the minister can come back on those two points on scrutiny and on consistency of application of trade protection measures.
10:01
10:02
Speaker 9
-
Speaker 9
Thank you, Mr. Butler. I'd like to thank the member for Perth and Kinross Shire for allowing us to debate this issue. Ten years on from the sovereign decision of the people of the United Kingdom to leave a political union, and that is the important message that seems to evade most people in this room today, that we were not part of a simple trading arrangement under the Maastricht treaty, that the conservative government of John Major signed us up to without a referendum, our sovereignty was handed away to a political union.
When my parents voted to join a common market or to stay in a common market in the 1970s. That was about free trade, that was about co-operation, that was about working together as neighbours. But over the years it became a political union. So our laws, the laws that we are elected to make, were overridden by this massive unelected bureaucracy in Brussels. Our trade has to be global, a parliament which had no real power as as the honourable member knows.
So our democracy are historic. Constitutional rights and liberties were gradually being eroded. I want this country to be prosperous. The real prosperity in the world today doesn't come with a diminishing market in the content. It's a diminishing market. The global market is there for us to grab if we take that opportunity. But unfortunately, the political establishment of this country has failed in the last ten years to grab the opportunities that being independent have given us.
So those in the civil service, those in government at the time under the government of Theresa May and the establishment in this country, did everything it possibly could to derail Brexit so that we would have been under Theresa May's agreement. We would have been half in and half out of the European Union. That would have been a disaster. Fortunately, those of us, the honourable member for Essex North and myself and others voted against that deal which gave us a Brexit which actually meant something.
The opportunities, Madam Chairman, are there for Britain to take if we choose to do so. The alternative is to go back into a political union, be subjected to rules, laws, regulations, euro and all the things that come with being in the European Union and free movement. If the people of Iceland had the good sense to say no, then we should have the good sense to think to the long term future of our country, retain our independence, never go back to the European Union, but retain good relations and trade cooperation with our neighbours.
When my parents voted to join a common market or to stay in a common market in the 1970s. That was about free trade, that was about co-operation, that was about working together as neighbours. But over the years it became a political union. So our laws, the laws that we are elected to make, were overridden by this massive unelected bureaucracy in Brussels. Our trade has to be global, a parliament which had no real power as as the honourable member knows.
So our democracy are historic. Constitutional rights and liberties were gradually being eroded. I want this country to be prosperous. The real prosperity in the world today doesn't come with a diminishing market in the content. It's a diminishing market. The global market is there for us to grab if we take that opportunity. But unfortunately, the political establishment of this country has failed in the last ten years to grab the opportunities that being independent have given us.
So those in the civil service, those in government at the time under the government of Theresa May and the establishment in this country, did everything it possibly could to derail Brexit so that we would have been under Theresa May's agreement. We would have been half in and half out of the European Union. That would have been a disaster. Fortunately, those of us, the honourable member for Essex North and myself and others voted against that deal which gave us a Brexit which actually meant something.
The opportunities, Madam Chairman, are there for Britain to take if we choose to do so. The alternative is to go back into a political union, be subjected to rules, laws, regulations, euro and all the things that come with being in the European Union and free movement. If the people of Iceland had the good sense to say no, then we should have the good sense to think to the long term future of our country, retain our independence, never go back to the European Union, but retain good relations and trade cooperation with our neighbours.
10:05
10:05
Speaker 13
-
Speaker 13
Thank you, Mr. Butler, and it's an honour to serve under your chairmanship. Today, I'm going to talk about the impact of the EU referendum on my part of the UK on Cornwall in 99, Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly was recognised as a region in its own right in the EU and granted objective one status, reflecting the fact we were one of the poorest areas, not just in the UK but in Western Europe, and we received over a billion in EU funding between 2014 and 2020.
Our economy wouldn't have grown as much as it did over those 20 years without EU money, but the impact went far beyond economic growth. To give some examples, trains, we had a passing loop and points put onto our train service, which made it much quicker and better buses. We had a park and ride cars. We had dualling of the A30, we had an airport funded that's now floundering. Renewables you now United Downs meant our first geothermal power plant happened.
Culture Hall for Cornwall Healthcare. We had dental and medical schools. We have a university combined campus in Cornwall for the first time. The. The impacts were huge and we lost a great deal because of that. Almost everywhere you go in Cornwall you'll see a distinctive but far too small blue sign signifying that a building or something was funded by the EU. It was transformational for US 2016 and the leave campaign promised Cornwall and the UK as a whole would not be worse off.
That has fallen short. We did get shared prosperity funding from the government afterwards and along with the other for the other Cornish Labour MPs, I helped to secure the Kernow Industrial Growth Fund for economic growth. But there is a gap because of that funding, other government support did dwindle. So now we are, as the Prime Minister mentioned yesterday, looking forward to a devolution deal to make sure some of that capacity and that growth is restored.
The impact has been significant. As my friend from Hexham pointed out, on our rural communities, particularly for our fishers who were sold out by the leave campaign and our farmers who had a rocky and uncertain road out of cap and very unhelpful trade deals which we then had to deal with. Fortunately, now we have a new land use strategy. We have the Elms deal, we are working our way out of that and with export we are looking.
This government is looking at a new EU trade and veterinary deal as well. Young people, I will.
Our economy wouldn't have grown as much as it did over those 20 years without EU money, but the impact went far beyond economic growth. To give some examples, trains, we had a passing loop and points put onto our train service, which made it much quicker and better buses. We had a park and ride cars. We had dualling of the A30, we had an airport funded that's now floundering. Renewables you now United Downs meant our first geothermal power plant happened.
Culture Hall for Cornwall Healthcare. We had dental and medical schools. We have a university combined campus in Cornwall for the first time. The. The impacts were huge and we lost a great deal because of that. Almost everywhere you go in Cornwall you'll see a distinctive but far too small blue sign signifying that a building or something was funded by the EU. It was transformational for US 2016 and the leave campaign promised Cornwall and the UK as a whole would not be worse off.
That has fallen short. We did get shared prosperity funding from the government afterwards and along with the other for the other Cornish Labour MPs, I helped to secure the Kernow Industrial Growth Fund for economic growth. But there is a gap because of that funding, other government support did dwindle. So now we are, as the Prime Minister mentioned yesterday, looking forward to a devolution deal to make sure some of that capacity and that growth is restored.
The impact has been significant. As my friend from Hexham pointed out, on our rural communities, particularly for our fishers who were sold out by the leave campaign and our farmers who had a rocky and uncertain road out of cap and very unhelpful trade deals which we then had to deal with. Fortunately, now we have a new land use strategy. We have the Elms deal, we are working our way out of that and with export we are looking.
This government is looking at a new EU trade and veterinary deal as well. Young people, I will.
10:07
10:07
Speaker 7
-
Speaker 7
I think we just need to be really explicit about the impact on farmers, because it's £200 for health certificates on each consignment of physical checks on dairy, fish and red meat. She does a huge amount of work on behalf of her farmers. But would she agree with me that that that amount, that £200 figure should not be forgotten from these debates because it is a significant burden on our farmers?
10:08
Speaker 13
-
Speaker 13
My hon. Friend makes a good point that I was rushing through because of lack of time. The impact on farmers have been huge in so many ways, particularly with exports and imports, and it's really, really important that the SPS agreement takes that into account. We are lucky in that we are hoping for a very fast outcome to that agreement, to try and fix and mend some of the terrible damage that has been done to our food sector.
Just to finish off, though, perhaps the most pernicious, maybe even more than the financial tremor, was the way that the Brexit vote split us as a society and hardened and coarsened our discourse, families fell out. We're still polarised and quick to anger and less tolerant politicians. The media and all of us really had a part to play in that. And that's taking even longer to fix. Yeah.
Just to finish off, though, perhaps the most pernicious, maybe even more than the financial tremor, was the way that the Brexit vote split us as a society and hardened and coarsened our discourse, families fell out. We're still polarised and quick to anger and less tolerant politicians. The media and all of us really had a part to play in that. And that's taking even longer to fix. Yeah.
10:08
10:08
Speaker 14
-
Speaker 14
It's a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Butler. And I thank the honourable member for Perth and Kinross for securing this debate. The conservatives botched Brexit deal, backed by Nigel Farage, continues to burden the UK economy. Back in 2016, Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson and others told us that Brexit would lead to a stronger, more prosperous economy. Today we're confronting the reality that those promises were misleading.
With no substance behind them, the botched Brexit deal cost the Treasury billions of pounds in revenue and held back British business, and left our young people without the opportunities they need to begin their careers and working lives. As the honourable member for Perth and Kinross said, Britain's GDP is 6% smaller as a result of Brexit. This is a disaster for families across the country. In my constituency of Wokingham, I have heard from businesses that once exported successfully to the EU but have since seen their profits reduced.
It is. It is small and medium sized businesses that have suffered as a result of Brexit. The botched Brexit deal has created almost 2 billion extra pieces of paperwork for British businesses since we left the EU, enough to wrap around the earth nearly 15 times. This is certainly not the freedom from bureaucracy that Farage, Johnson and others promised. Speaking with businesses in Wokingham, I know that they are eager to grow again and rebuild businesses and partnerships with European businesses.
That's why the government should listen to the Liberal Democrats call for growth and defence partnership with Europe. Such a partnership would cut trade barriers, reduce red tape and help grow businesses. It would boost jobs and incomes while giving the government more money to tackle the costs of living, strengthen the armed forces and invest in our NHS workforce and hospitals. It may even help fund a new Royal Berkshire hospital, which serves my constituency.
Beyond the economic benefits, the new partnership with the EU would bring much needed stability and security. Trump has proved and proved himself an unreliable and erratic partner on the global stage, while Putin has shown no signs of halting his expansion plans in Europe, now is the time for the government to show ambition and rebuild security ties with our dependable European allies. Thank you, thank you.
With no substance behind them, the botched Brexit deal cost the Treasury billions of pounds in revenue and held back British business, and left our young people without the opportunities they need to begin their careers and working lives. As the honourable member for Perth and Kinross said, Britain's GDP is 6% smaller as a result of Brexit. This is a disaster for families across the country. In my constituency of Wokingham, I have heard from businesses that once exported successfully to the EU but have since seen their profits reduced.
It is. It is small and medium sized businesses that have suffered as a result of Brexit. The botched Brexit deal has created almost 2 billion extra pieces of paperwork for British businesses since we left the EU, enough to wrap around the earth nearly 15 times. This is certainly not the freedom from bureaucracy that Farage, Johnson and others promised. Speaking with businesses in Wokingham, I know that they are eager to grow again and rebuild businesses and partnerships with European businesses.
That's why the government should listen to the Liberal Democrats call for growth and defence partnership with Europe. Such a partnership would cut trade barriers, reduce red tape and help grow businesses. It would boost jobs and incomes while giving the government more money to tackle the costs of living, strengthen the armed forces and invest in our NHS workforce and hospitals. It may even help fund a new Royal Berkshire hospital, which serves my constituency.
Beyond the economic benefits, the new partnership with the EU would bring much needed stability and security. Trump has proved and proved himself an unreliable and erratic partner on the global stage, while Putin has shown no signs of halting his expansion plans in Europe, now is the time for the government to show ambition and rebuild security ties with our dependable European allies. Thank you, thank you.
10:11
10:11
Speaker 15
-
Speaker 15
Thank you, Madam Chair. See you in the chair. The first week of a new term. And congratulations to the member for Perth and Kinross Shire for securing this debate today. Brexit has been an unmitigated failure. Our economy is smaller. Thousands of UK businesses have stopped exporting to the EU altogether and our position in the world was diminished. I want to put on record my thanks to the former Prime minister and Chancellor for all the work they did on a repair job in the first two years of this government.
But in the brief time I have today, I want to focus on what comes next, and I'm pleased to see the minister in his position welcoming him to his role. I want to talk about the importance of a youth mobility deal, because a visa based scheme for 18 to 30 year olds to allow them to travel freely between the United Kingdom and the European Union, is something that I have advocated for since the first few weeks that I've been in this place, and publicly did so from April 2025, and the government is in an active negotiation with the EU about a youth mobility scheme as we speak.
It's a deal that has proven popular with the public. Every poll consistently says that there is broad support for a youth mobility deal, but I think this is a moment to be courageous and ambitious, because we read in the media that there is a live debate about the numbers of people that will be subject to a youth mobility scheme, whether that be 100,000 or slightly more than 100,000. And we're in a context where net migration to the United Kingdom has fallen from a record high of over 800,000 to less than 200,000.
I hope and believe that should give ministers the space and the confidence to agree an ambitious youth mobility deal. I would also say that this is a test of our government's ability to secure an agreement. Lots of pro-Europeans watching this debate, engaging with the subject, want to see our government engage in something that meaningfully moves our relationship forward. Youth mobility can be that test. So, Madam Chair, I admire the courage of the Prime Minister in saying that he's going to walk towards difficult issues with respect to the European Union and an opportunity for a youth mobility deal.
I think he and the minister have the can walk towards an opportunity and hope he can secure that this year.
But in the brief time I have today, I want to focus on what comes next, and I'm pleased to see the minister in his position welcoming him to his role. I want to talk about the importance of a youth mobility deal, because a visa based scheme for 18 to 30 year olds to allow them to travel freely between the United Kingdom and the European Union, is something that I have advocated for since the first few weeks that I've been in this place, and publicly did so from April 2025, and the government is in an active negotiation with the EU about a youth mobility scheme as we speak.
It's a deal that has proven popular with the public. Every poll consistently says that there is broad support for a youth mobility deal, but I think this is a moment to be courageous and ambitious, because we read in the media that there is a live debate about the numbers of people that will be subject to a youth mobility scheme, whether that be 100,000 or slightly more than 100,000. And we're in a context where net migration to the United Kingdom has fallen from a record high of over 800,000 to less than 200,000.
I hope and believe that should give ministers the space and the confidence to agree an ambitious youth mobility deal. I would also say that this is a test of our government's ability to secure an agreement. Lots of pro-Europeans watching this debate, engaging with the subject, want to see our government engage in something that meaningfully moves our relationship forward. Youth mobility can be that test. So, Madam Chair, I admire the courage of the Prime Minister in saying that he's going to walk towards difficult issues with respect to the European Union and an opportunity for a youth mobility deal.
I think he and the minister have the can walk towards an opportunity and hope he can secure that this year.
10:14
Speaker 16
-
Speaker 16
Thank you, Mr. Blair. It's a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. Brexit has clearly been a disaster for Britain and the sooner we acknowledge that, the better our conversations will be because we will then be able to move forward. It's been economically disastrous, a slow puncture, as the honourable member said, but a really huge slow puncture, four, six, 8% off our GDP . That costs every household in the country hugely. In real terms.
It makes all of us much worse off. Businesses in my constituency of North Herefordshire have talked about the additional barriers they face trading with Europe, the admin created by the supposed reduction in bureaucracy. This has been an economic disaster, but not just economic. Environmentally, we're diverging from Europe in 28 areas of law. We now have less strong protection for our natural environment and socially, politically, culturally, Brexit has been poisonous.
It's catalysed and reinforced a toxic political debate. Polarisation, the the proliferation of disinformation, short termism in politics, a discounting of the rights and opportunities and needs of young people in particular. So the UK is now poorer, weaker, more isolated in a context in which we have a completely unreliable and unstable partner in the US president. And we have war on the eastern border of Europe with Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine. Plus, I'm sorry, because of time I won't.
Plus we are facing the climate crisis barreling down towards us. All of these areas require stronger cooperation with our closest neighbours. And so in that context, ten years on and more from this disastrous wrong turn in British politics, this monumental act of self-harm, it is time to change course. Now. I welcome the noises that the government has made about resetting. That is certainly a start, but we need to be honest about what what we have lost.
We need to recognise the importance of cooperation, working together politically as well as economically. We need to recognise that actually the majority of the British people think we would be better off back in the European Union, and that is why I believe we need to set out a path to rejoin. The best future for the UK lies within Europe. I hope that the Minister, with the summit coming forward quickly, will set out a path to do that, to be genuinely ambitious and deep in setting.
Out
It makes all of us much worse off. Businesses in my constituency of North Herefordshire have talked about the additional barriers they face trading with Europe, the admin created by the supposed reduction in bureaucracy. This has been an economic disaster, but not just economic. Environmentally, we're diverging from Europe in 28 areas of law. We now have less strong protection for our natural environment and socially, politically, culturally, Brexit has been poisonous.
It's catalysed and reinforced a toxic political debate. Polarisation, the the proliferation of disinformation, short termism in politics, a discounting of the rights and opportunities and needs of young people in particular. So the UK is now poorer, weaker, more isolated in a context in which we have a completely unreliable and unstable partner in the US president. And we have war on the eastern border of Europe with Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine. Plus, I'm sorry, because of time I won't.
Plus we are facing the climate crisis barreling down towards us. All of these areas require stronger cooperation with our closest neighbours. And so in that context, ten years on and more from this disastrous wrong turn in British politics, this monumental act of self-harm, it is time to change course. Now. I welcome the noises that the government has made about resetting. That is certainly a start, but we need to be honest about what what we have lost.
We need to recognise the importance of cooperation, working together politically as well as economically. We need to recognise that actually the majority of the British people think we would be better off back in the European Union, and that is why I believe we need to set out a path to rejoin. The best future for the UK lies within Europe. I hope that the Minister, with the summit coming forward quickly, will set out a path to do that, to be genuinely ambitious and deep in setting.
Out
10:16
10:16
10:16
10:16
10:16
Speaker 17
-
Speaker 17
Miss Butler. It's a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. And may I thank, as we all have, the honourable member for Perth and Kinross for securing this debate. There is simply no argument whatsoever that Brexit has been one of the most disastrous decisions that the UK has taken in modern times. This extraordinary moment of self-harm has irreparably damaged the British economy and society. And for what longer? Queues at airports, bureaucracy, at ports and hundreds of thousands of boats crossing the channel every every year.
Let us never forget there were no small boats before Brexit. Ten years on, Brexit has has had a. Perhaps one of the greatest impacts on Cornwall. As my. As my hon. Friend from Truro and Falmouth has mentioned. Thanks to the tireless campaigning of the late member for Falmouth and Camborne, Candy Atherton, Cornwall secured an objective one status from the EU and by all metrics greatly supported our economic development.
As has been mentioned, Cornwall received over £100 million a year that included support for the Eden Project, Newquay Airport, a combined universities, superfast broadband, broadband and improvements to the A30. A transformational programme vote Leave. The The Vote Leave campaign promised that not a penny of that funding would be lost. They said that money we sent to Brussels would be reinvested back into Cornwall, but that promise never materialised and we are now looking to government to reinstate our economic development funding .
In the devolution deal that the Prime Minister alluded to at the despatch box yesterday. We've lost not only our objective one funding, but also the common sense free trade which we once had with our closest neighbours and allies. All told, Brexit has been an unmitigated disaster and the time has come to rethink and renegotiate a relationship with our nearest trading partners, our allies, our friends in the European Union. Thank you.
Let us never forget there were no small boats before Brexit. Ten years on, Brexit has has had a. Perhaps one of the greatest impacts on Cornwall. As my. As my hon. Friend from Truro and Falmouth has mentioned. Thanks to the tireless campaigning of the late member for Falmouth and Camborne, Candy Atherton, Cornwall secured an objective one status from the EU and by all metrics greatly supported our economic development.
As has been mentioned, Cornwall received over £100 million a year that included support for the Eden Project, Newquay Airport, a combined universities, superfast broadband, broadband and improvements to the A30. A transformational programme vote Leave. The The Vote Leave campaign promised that not a penny of that funding would be lost. They said that money we sent to Brussels would be reinvested back into Cornwall, but that promise never materialised and we are now looking to government to reinstate our economic development funding .
In the devolution deal that the Prime Minister alluded to at the despatch box yesterday. We've lost not only our objective one funding, but also the common sense free trade which we once had with our closest neighbours and allies. All told, Brexit has been an unmitigated disaster and the time has come to rethink and renegotiate a relationship with our nearest trading partners, our allies, our friends in the European Union. Thank you.
10:18
10:18
10:18
Speaker 18
-
Speaker 18
Miss Butler. And as a rather lone voice in this debate, I don't complain that it's not going to be a balanced debate, but somebody has to make the case. Indeed, there are a few of us, but the what we are hearing is a group of aggrieved. Remain supporters who have never come to terms with their grief and remain ideologically committed to rejoining. And that and if anybody wants to have another referendum, I don't say bring it on, because I think it's the last thing the public really wants.
But I tell you, we would win it again, because when it comes down to the crunch, the British public do not want to hand back control of our laws to the European Union. And all the polls show that if you ask them in polls, do you want Westminster to control farming policy or Brussels to control farming policy or whatever policy it is? People always vote for Westminster to maintain control. And if I can, no, I will give way.
Yes. All right, I will. I
But I tell you, we would win it again, because when it comes down to the crunch, the British public do not want to hand back control of our laws to the European Union. And all the polls show that if you ask them in polls, do you want Westminster to control farming policy or Brussels to control farming policy or whatever policy it is? People always vote for Westminster to maintain control. And if I can, no, I will give way.
Yes. All right, I will. I
10:20
Speaker 19
-
Speaker 19
thank the honourable member for giving way. He will no doubt recall the pleasant experience we had in Odessa recently with the Russian drones literally almost falling on our heads. And reports from Germany suggest that the recent drone attack on Leipzig airport was indeed coming from Moscow. So will he not agree with me that dealing and having a good relationship with our nearest allies is actually the safest route to our national security?
10:20
Speaker 18
-
Speaker 18
I totally agree, defence is a reserved matter to the member states within the European Union. The European Union doesn't have any troops. The NATO is the forum through which we operate, and it's NATO to which we should be committed, not setting up a rival defence organisation in the European Union. But I was also just going to point out about the contributions. Here is the table from the House of Commons library. We were contributing, pushing, pushing gross 16 or 17 billion a year.
But with the rebate, the net was 9.4 billion. In the last year of membership. We. And our latest contribution was 303 million. So all those people who are going to advocate rejoining, including the reset, where is the money going to come from? It's going to come out of defence. Is it going to come out of welfare , or is there going to be more taxation to generate this extra revenue that once we start making increased contributions to the European Union? But the myth making I mean, the myth that there were no small boats until Brexit, what rubbish.
The small boats started increasing. Start started in 2018 before we left. And by by by by 2020. By 2020, there were eight and a more than 8500 crossings. This is not due to Brexit and the Dublin convention was useless. We had. The Dublin Convention was in force during those years. It was never. It was never enforced. But finally, I just wish to finish up on this whole question of forecasts.
The forecasts are all conjectural. They're all based on what a basket of economies might have looked like, what the British economy might have looked like compared to a basket of other economies, including the United States that's had a huge fiscal stimulus, an AI boom. And of course, it's got much more free enterprise policies. The fact is, when we left the European Union, Wolfgang who who somewhat reluctantly voted to remain. But he has made it clear that leaving the EU was an economic non-event.
We were growing at about the same rate as France and Germany, and we're still growing at about the same rate as France and Germany. There's been no smashing, smashing disaster in the economy. There is a disaster in Scotland where the SNP is campaigning against reopening the North Sea, where the SNP supports the high energy costs imposed by this ridiculous dash to net zero. And the government's doing that too. But the fact is we are better off outside the EU in the long.
But with the rebate, the net was 9.4 billion. In the last year of membership. We. And our latest contribution was 303 million. So all those people who are going to advocate rejoining, including the reset, where is the money going to come from? It's going to come out of defence. Is it going to come out of welfare , or is there going to be more taxation to generate this extra revenue that once we start making increased contributions to the European Union? But the myth making I mean, the myth that there were no small boats until Brexit, what rubbish.
The small boats started increasing. Start started in 2018 before we left. And by by by by 2020. By 2020, there were eight and a more than 8500 crossings. This is not due to Brexit and the Dublin convention was useless. We had. The Dublin Convention was in force during those years. It was never. It was never enforced. But finally, I just wish to finish up on this whole question of forecasts.
The forecasts are all conjectural. They're all based on what a basket of economies might have looked like, what the British economy might have looked like compared to a basket of other economies, including the United States that's had a huge fiscal stimulus, an AI boom. And of course, it's got much more free enterprise policies. The fact is, when we left the European Union, Wolfgang who who somewhat reluctantly voted to remain. But he has made it clear that leaving the EU was an economic non-event.
We were growing at about the same rate as France and Germany, and we're still growing at about the same rate as France and Germany. There's been no smashing, smashing disaster in the economy. There is a disaster in Scotland where the SNP is campaigning against reopening the North Sea, where the SNP supports the high energy costs imposed by this ridiculous dash to net zero. And the government's doing that too. But the fact is we are better off outside the EU in the long.
10:23
10:23
Speaker 14
-
Speaker 14
Thank you very much, Miss Butler. It's a pleasure to share under your chairmanship. And also thank you to the honourable member for Perth and Kinross Shire for securing this debate. The impact of the 2016 EU EU referendum is felt particularly sharply in our fields, glass houses and farming communities for agriculture and horticulture. Leaving the EU has fundamentally changed access to labour. The end of free movement has effectively ended dependable flow of workers from the EU, on which many growers relied to plant, tender and harvest their crops.
The result has been a greater complexity and greater cost, and those costs are what many farmers and growers cannot afford. We have also replaced the Common Agricultural Policy with the environmental Land Management Schemes and sustainable farming incentive. I strongly support paying farmers to look after the countryside, but we must be honest about the consequences of an all or nothing approach. Global shocks have driven up energy costs, fertiliser costs, feed and other inputs.
As a result, there are crops that are simply no longer profitable to grow. What happens then? Either farms are amalgamated into larger operations, potentially owned by distant multinational corporations, or crops simply stop being grown in the UK. Neither outcome is good for our food security. I believe we need a mixed system, one that rewards farmers for producing the food that we need, whilst also supporting them to protect and improve our land.
Brexit has brought new trade barriers. Tariffs, paperwork and non-tariff barriers have disrupted what were once smooth trading relationships with our nearest market. While new trade deals bring both opportunities and uncertainties more than happy. To
The result has been a greater complexity and greater cost, and those costs are what many farmers and growers cannot afford. We have also replaced the Common Agricultural Policy with the environmental Land Management Schemes and sustainable farming incentive. I strongly support paying farmers to look after the countryside, but we must be honest about the consequences of an all or nothing approach. Global shocks have driven up energy costs, fertiliser costs, feed and other inputs.
As a result, there are crops that are simply no longer profitable to grow. What happens then? Either farms are amalgamated into larger operations, potentially owned by distant multinational corporations, or crops simply stop being grown in the UK. Neither outcome is good for our food security. I believe we need a mixed system, one that rewards farmers for producing the food that we need, whilst also supporting them to protect and improve our land.
Brexit has brought new trade barriers. Tariffs, paperwork and non-tariff barriers have disrupted what were once smooth trading relationships with our nearest market. While new trade deals bring both opportunities and uncertainties more than happy. To
10:24
10:24
Speaker 14
-
Speaker 14
So I thank the honourable gentleman for that. So what we have to look at is, as I said, non-trade barriers as well. So I would just say to the honourable gentleman, as he was a member of the government that signed up to the dodgy trade deal with Australia and New Zealand, which sold our farmers down the river. He has undermined single handedly the sheep and cattle industry within the UK, something he can be very proud of. That is why I welcome the government's reset relations with the EU and pursue an SPS agreement.
But I have one further warning to the minister in seeking closer alignment. We cannot lose Britain's first mover advantage on precision breeding in south Norfolk. Our scientists and growers are leading the way. Precision breeding is already showing enormous promise, including with sugar, beet and other crops. Climate change, pests, diseases, drought and flooding are already threatening our food security. If we are serious about producing more food here at home, we must allow our farmers to use every tool in the chest.
We must learn from the impact of Brexit, address its consequences honestly, and build a system that backs British farmers, growers and give us our food security we need. But on a wider issue, Brexit has been an unmitigated disaster for many of my constituents in south Norfolk. It has led to a division within
But I have one further warning to the minister in seeking closer alignment. We cannot lose Britain's first mover advantage on precision breeding in south Norfolk. Our scientists and growers are leading the way. Precision breeding is already showing enormous promise, including with sugar, beet and other crops. Climate change, pests, diseases, drought and flooding are already threatening our food security. If we are serious about producing more food here at home, we must allow our farmers to use every tool in the chest.
We must learn from the impact of Brexit, address its consequences honestly, and build a system that backs British farmers, growers and give us our food security we need. But on a wider issue, Brexit has been an unmitigated disaster for many of my constituents in south Norfolk. It has led to a division within
10:26
10:26
Speaker 6
-
Speaker 6
Is led to a division within families. It has led to businesses not being able to thrive as much as they want, and a tidal wave of red tape which has harmed the UK economy. And I urge the minister and his wind up remarks to explain how Labour will be pushing forward to remove these red tapes and to remove these so we can have a faster and more productive economy for all.
10:26
10:26
10:26
Speaker 15
-
Speaker 15
a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this morning. And can I thank the honourable member for Perth and Kinross for bringing this important debate today. So Brexit means Brexit, we were told. But what. What does that mean? I mean we've heard a lot about sausages this morning. Perhaps Brexit means breakfast. I mean it certainly makes a lot more sense than that three word slogan. But a decade on from EU membership referendum, we face higher costs, slower growth and less influence.
Brexit has made the UK poorer, more isolated and less competitive. The promised trade deal with the US has failed to materialise, and instead Trump has threatened the UK with crippling tariffs. The post-Brexit trade agreements negotiated by the previous conservative government, with Australia and New Zealand, delivered only marginal economic benefits, while the deal with Singapore merely rolled over the arrangements that we previously enjoyed prior to Brexit. And as for Canada, after years of negotiations, the UK has still been unable to secure an enhanced agreement.
So rather than unlocking a new era of prosperity, these deals have largely fallen short of the promises since Brexit. Trade with our largest market has become slower, costlier and more bureaucratic, and British exporters now face customs checks. Regulatory barriers that did not exist before to export goods to the EU, which remain below their pre-brexit levels, and the OBR estimates that UK trade will ultimately be around 15% lower than it would have been had we remained in the EU.
Brexit's worst effects can and must be reduced, and that is why this government's efforts to rebuild relationship with the EU does matter. And by pursuing closer cooperation, greater regulatory alignment where it serves our national interest, the government is helping to make trade easier. But we need to go much further. Europe remains our biggest trading partner, and a pragmatic relationship with our closest neighbours is not an ideological choice. It is an economic necessity.
We cannot erase the damage and costs of Brexit overnight, but we can reduce them to help British business and industry to thrive.
Brexit has made the UK poorer, more isolated and less competitive. The promised trade deal with the US has failed to materialise, and instead Trump has threatened the UK with crippling tariffs. The post-Brexit trade agreements negotiated by the previous conservative government, with Australia and New Zealand, delivered only marginal economic benefits, while the deal with Singapore merely rolled over the arrangements that we previously enjoyed prior to Brexit. And as for Canada, after years of negotiations, the UK has still been unable to secure an enhanced agreement.
So rather than unlocking a new era of prosperity, these deals have largely fallen short of the promises since Brexit. Trade with our largest market has become slower, costlier and more bureaucratic, and British exporters now face customs checks. Regulatory barriers that did not exist before to export goods to the EU, which remain below their pre-brexit levels, and the OBR estimates that UK trade will ultimately be around 15% lower than it would have been had we remained in the EU.
Brexit's worst effects can and must be reduced, and that is why this government's efforts to rebuild relationship with the EU does matter. And by pursuing closer cooperation, greater regulatory alignment where it serves our national interest, the government is helping to make trade easier. But we need to go much further. Europe remains our biggest trading partner, and a pragmatic relationship with our closest neighbours is not an ideological choice. It is an economic necessity.
We cannot erase the damage and costs of Brexit overnight, but we can reduce them to help British business and industry to thrive.
10:28
Speaker 20
-
Speaker 20
Thank you, Mr. Butler, for chairing and the member for Perth and Kinross for securing this debate. If you ask the wrong questions, don't be surprised by the consequences. This was about the politics of the time within the Conservative Party, not about the economic future of our country. Let's remember the history and the poor deal which David Cameron Lord Cameron tried to secure ahead of then going to the country with this referendum.
So our country now is more fractious, poorer trade, more challenged. And as we see queues at our border horizons closing to our young people and migration levels up. We have got to ask the value of the deal that was struck subsequently from 2016. As a country, we are weaker now, significantly weaker on the global stage , in a more unstable world where we should be taking the lead as we took the lead in Europe, but also locally, we know the consequences are significant.
Our constituents are 300 £0 poorer as a result, and they are now faced with the cost of living challenge. So we have got to dig deep into where we move to next and ask the questions that should have been asked in 2016. How do we have a stronger and safer economy? How do we have good trade? How do we best control migration, collaborate in a destabilized planet, and ensure that our interactions abroad impact the people here at home with better job security, financial security, and , of course, a hope for the future as we move forward? Yes, pragmatism, but boldness too.
And I ask the minister to really consider, as he enters the fray of negotiations ahead of him, that he will look at building that economic union again with Europe, that will be of value to our constituents, ensuring that trade will bring the jobs, the good quality jobs that we can enjoy. Research will be powered by that relationship with Europe, which will drive our economy forward. And on the issue of immigration, I ask them to consider the Asylum and migration management strategy, which Europe has adopted, looking at a risk share approach so that we can have that balance built back into our system.
Instead of pointing at vulnerable people, ensuring that we are supporting in the right way, it will help our communities, it will help our country, and ultimately our leadership will help our world.
So our country now is more fractious, poorer trade, more challenged. And as we see queues at our border horizons closing to our young people and migration levels up. We have got to ask the value of the deal that was struck subsequently from 2016. As a country, we are weaker now, significantly weaker on the global stage , in a more unstable world where we should be taking the lead as we took the lead in Europe, but also locally, we know the consequences are significant.
Our constituents are 300 £0 poorer as a result, and they are now faced with the cost of living challenge. So we have got to dig deep into where we move to next and ask the questions that should have been asked in 2016. How do we have a stronger and safer economy? How do we have good trade? How do we best control migration, collaborate in a destabilized planet, and ensure that our interactions abroad impact the people here at home with better job security, financial security, and , of course, a hope for the future as we move forward? Yes, pragmatism, but boldness too.
And I ask the minister to really consider, as he enters the fray of negotiations ahead of him, that he will look at building that economic union again with Europe, that will be of value to our constituents, ensuring that trade will bring the jobs, the good quality jobs that we can enjoy. Research will be powered by that relationship with Europe, which will drive our economy forward. And on the issue of immigration, I ask them to consider the Asylum and migration management strategy, which Europe has adopted, looking at a risk share approach so that we can have that balance built back into our system.
Instead of pointing at vulnerable people, ensuring that we are supporting in the right way, it will help our communities, it will help our country, and ultimately our leadership will help our world.
10:31
10:31
Speaker 8
-
Speaker 8
Thank you very much, Mr. Butler. It's a pleasure to serve with you in the chair, and I congratulate the honourable member for Perth and Kinross Shire on securing the debate and for the vim and vigor with which he introduced it. Ten years on, we can now see the devastating impacts this referendum had on this country, not just to our economy, but to the integrity of our democracy and to political debate. Since June 2016, we have had seven prime ministers, seven in a decade.
We've had a Parliament that could not resolve the question in front of it, a government that prorogued this House unlawfully to get round it, and a public that has watched the whole spectacle and drawn the obvious conclusion that our political system is broken. The conservatives put a question to the country that they had not thought through. They lost control of the answer, and then spent years arguing amongst themselves about what it meant while the rest of the country paid for it.
And into that vacuum walked the people who benefit from it. The member for Clacton has built an entire career on a promise he never had to deliver, and now takes no responsibility for. He and others like him, told the public that leaving would let us take back control of our borders. Since then, over 200,000 people have crossed the channel in small boats. Before the referendum, there were no small boat crossings.
They created the conditions and they now travel to Dover to be photographed pointing at the result. British GDP is between 6 and 8% smaller than it would on whether 2016 was before 2018. I will willingly give way.
We've had a Parliament that could not resolve the question in front of it, a government that prorogued this House unlawfully to get round it, and a public that has watched the whole spectacle and drawn the obvious conclusion that our political system is broken. The conservatives put a question to the country that they had not thought through. They lost control of the answer, and then spent years arguing amongst themselves about what it meant while the rest of the country paid for it.
And into that vacuum walked the people who benefit from it. The member for Clacton has built an entire career on a promise he never had to deliver, and now takes no responsibility for. He and others like him, told the public that leaving would let us take back control of our borders. Since then, over 200,000 people have crossed the channel in small boats. Before the referendum, there were no small boat crossings.
They created the conditions and they now travel to Dover to be photographed pointing at the result. British GDP is between 6 and 8% smaller than it would on whether 2016 was before 2018. I will willingly give way.
10:33
10:33
10:33
10:33
Speaker 8
-
Speaker 8
And the point I made in my remarks was that there were no small boat crossings before 2016, before the referendum, and I think he's agreeing with me on that. British GDP is between 6 and 8% smaller than it would otherwise have been. Investment has been reduced by 12 and 18%. Employment and productivity are each down by 3 to 4%. And estimates from the House of Commons Library. Those well known doughty remain campaigners put the cost to the Exchequer at somewhere in the region of £90 billion a year in tax revenue that is simply not there.
Every minister who stands at the despatch box and says that money is not available is describing a hole that has been enlarged as a result of Brexit. That's £90 billion a year that could instead be supporting projects across the country to support our constituents. It could instead be used to fund renovations to my own Stepping Hill hospital into the rail services my constituents wake for every morning, or into cleaning up our waterways so that sewage doesn't keep being pumped into the Goit or the Mersey.
Now, my hon. Friend the member for Wokingham mentioned the nearly 2 billion extra pieces of paperwork that now sit on British firms, enough to wrap around the world 15 times tighter border restrictions with our European neighbours devastated our hauliers with over double the number of insolvencies seen between 2021 and 2025 and the five years before that. And that's not to mention our food and farming sector, where exports to the EU have fallen by 22% since 2018, close to £4 billion in lost trade.
So the question for this House is what we do now. Ministers know that the relationship with Europe is the biggest lever available to them. Their response so far has been to make small adjustments around the edges of a bad deal. They've ruled out the single market. They've ruled out a customs union. They've drawn red lines around two things that would make a material difference. And on fisheries, the government has made things worse.
The EU came asking for a five year extension to the arrangements in the 2020 Trade and Co-operation agreement, and this government agreed to 12. That is a loss worth around £6 billion over the period at today's prices, not only down to the previous government but also to this Labour government, because being timid is a political choice and it has political consequences, because when mainstream parties refuse to name the cause of a problem, the field is left to those who offer easy answers and no substantive solutions at all.
The Lib Dems are offering something different. We want a growth and defence partnership with Europe, and that would mean joining the single market and a UK EU customs union so that our businesses can trade again without drowning in red tape. It means a proper UK EU defence pact. We currently sit outside EU decision making and outside funding streams like the European Defence Fund and Safe Loan Program. At the precise moment when Vladimir Putin is testing this continent's resolve and the white House reneges on international commitments, we want a new European Security Council, British participation in safe and a European rearmament bank to support collective rearmament.
Our security does not stop at Dover and it never has. We're also calling for the UK to join the EU's migration and asylum pact so that we can return people who arrive by small boat to the first EU country they entered. And so that we can see the biometric data that tells us whether someone has already been refused asylum elsewhere. That's how you actually take control back of a border rather than shouting about it on a beach. Finally, we should fix the politics that produce this, a system that hands total power to a party with a minority of the vote, and then dares it to govern for everyone, will keep generating exactly this kind of instability.
The Liberal Democrats want proportional representation through the single transferable vote for local and general elections. We want a second chamber with a democratic mandate. We want the big money taken out of politics. We want the Electoral Commission protected from ministerial direction and serious measures against foreign interference in our elections, including referendums from the cost of living to our broken public services. It stands in the way of making things better, and we have to fix it.
Ten years on, it is clear that the result of the 2016 EU referendum has negatively impacted the UK, and I'd be really grateful if the Minister could tell us today just what it would actually take for this government to move its red lines.
Every minister who stands at the despatch box and says that money is not available is describing a hole that has been enlarged as a result of Brexit. That's £90 billion a year that could instead be supporting projects across the country to support our constituents. It could instead be used to fund renovations to my own Stepping Hill hospital into the rail services my constituents wake for every morning, or into cleaning up our waterways so that sewage doesn't keep being pumped into the Goit or the Mersey.
Now, my hon. Friend the member for Wokingham mentioned the nearly 2 billion extra pieces of paperwork that now sit on British firms, enough to wrap around the world 15 times tighter border restrictions with our European neighbours devastated our hauliers with over double the number of insolvencies seen between 2021 and 2025 and the five years before that. And that's not to mention our food and farming sector, where exports to the EU have fallen by 22% since 2018, close to £4 billion in lost trade.
So the question for this House is what we do now. Ministers know that the relationship with Europe is the biggest lever available to them. Their response so far has been to make small adjustments around the edges of a bad deal. They've ruled out the single market. They've ruled out a customs union. They've drawn red lines around two things that would make a material difference. And on fisheries, the government has made things worse.
The EU came asking for a five year extension to the arrangements in the 2020 Trade and Co-operation agreement, and this government agreed to 12. That is a loss worth around £6 billion over the period at today's prices, not only down to the previous government but also to this Labour government, because being timid is a political choice and it has political consequences, because when mainstream parties refuse to name the cause of a problem, the field is left to those who offer easy answers and no substantive solutions at all.
The Lib Dems are offering something different. We want a growth and defence partnership with Europe, and that would mean joining the single market and a UK EU customs union so that our businesses can trade again without drowning in red tape. It means a proper UK EU defence pact. We currently sit outside EU decision making and outside funding streams like the European Defence Fund and Safe Loan Program. At the precise moment when Vladimir Putin is testing this continent's resolve and the white House reneges on international commitments, we want a new European Security Council, British participation in safe and a European rearmament bank to support collective rearmament.
Our security does not stop at Dover and it never has. We're also calling for the UK to join the EU's migration and asylum pact so that we can return people who arrive by small boat to the first EU country they entered. And so that we can see the biometric data that tells us whether someone has already been refused asylum elsewhere. That's how you actually take control back of a border rather than shouting about it on a beach. Finally, we should fix the politics that produce this, a system that hands total power to a party with a minority of the vote, and then dares it to govern for everyone, will keep generating exactly this kind of instability.
The Liberal Democrats want proportional representation through the single transferable vote for local and general elections. We want a second chamber with a democratic mandate. We want the big money taken out of politics. We want the Electoral Commission protected from ministerial direction and serious measures against foreign interference in our elections, including referendums from the cost of living to our broken public services. It stands in the way of making things better, and we have to fix it.
Ten years on, it is clear that the result of the 2016 EU referendum has negatively impacted the UK, and I'd be really grateful if the Minister could tell us today just what it would actually take for this government to move its red lines.
10:37
10:38
Speaker 13
-
Speaker 13
Thank you, Mr. Butler, and it's a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this morning and to respond on behalf of His Majesty's official opposition. And I congratulate the honourable member for Perth and Kinross Shire on securing this debate, but I'm sure it will come as no surprise to hear more other honourable members that we see the legacy of the 2016 referendum and indeed, the path forward for our country through very different lenses. Listening to the honourable gentleman, one might almost assume that the United Kingdom was a sunlit, frictionless economic Shangri-La until a single ballot paper cast us into eternal ruin.
And we're told, and echoed by several other honourable members, that leaving the European Union uniquely our economy, and that our only salvation lies in somehow surrendering sovereignty through the government's grandly titled EU reset. Or perhaps further, that entire narrative collapses under the weight of hard economic reality. First, let us examine the great myth of the EU single market as an automatic engine of export growth. Ministers speak of the single market as if it were a place where magic happens.
But if there was magic, the UK was firmly in the audience, wondering when the rabbit would emerge from the hat. As former Trade and Industry Secretary Lord Lilley demonstrated in his policy exchange paper earlier this year. During our entire 28 year membership of the single market from 1992 , UK goods exports to our EU partners grew by less than 1% per year. But over that exact same period, our goods exports to the 111 countries with which we traded generally on standard WTO terms grew by 87%.
In fact, according to the European Commission's own single market scoreboard, the UK was the single member state least benefiting from the goods single market, rejoining that regulatory straitjacket in pursuit of export growth is a pure triumph of hope over experience. Secondly, we must address the sheer statistical alchemy deployed by advocates of rejoining. Several speakers have brandished an UN peer reviewed NBER working paper that claimed that Brexit cost the UK up to 8% of GDP.
But let's look at how the model is constructed. That parallel universe. They created a statistical doppelganger proxy, which was dominated by the United States and Estonia. They provided between them almost three quarters of the entire rate, waiting for alternative. Apparently proxies for where the UK could have been without Brexit. And it assumed that had we remained in the EU, the UK would have miraculously mirrored the American economic performance.
Now, to attribute that divergence to Brexit requires an extraordinary leap of imagination. It requires one to pretend that there was no US artificial intelligence boom, no massive American fiscal stimulus. That was possible. Possible because the dollar is the world's reserve currency. No transatlantic shale gas price advantage, no differing pandemic shock, and no North Sea oil rundown. In fact, Germany also felt 88% behind that same arbitrary index under that model.
So unless German departure from the EU has passed us by unnoticed. Blaming that divergence on Brexit is simply economic nonsense. When we examine the actual data rather than the econometric fairy tales, the evidence is clear. Between 2016 and 2025, the UK economy grew by 12.2% and by 5.3% since we formally left, outpacing the European G7 average. And since Brexit, British economic growth has averaged 1.1% per annum, compared to just 0.1% in Germany.
The office for Budget Responsibility did previously. As honourable Gentleman honourable members have mentioned, assume an implausible 15% collapse in total UK global trade openness. Yet as the Obr's own November 2025 briefing conceded, UK trade intensity has remained stable at around 65% of GDP and has continued to track peer economies like France. Miss Butler The single market was overwhelmingly designed for goods, whereas over 80% of the UK economy is based on services.
Our services exports continue to boom globally. Even the dire predictions of a mass exodus from the City of London proved dramatically overblown. Institutions like JP Morgan, which had threatened to move thousands of jobs abroad, have instead been transferring staff back from Paris to London. While business investment was undeniably delayed during the post 2016 , political paralysis dragged out by those who tried to overturn the referendum, fixed investment to GDP rebounded, reaching 19.6% by the end of last year.
So please.
And we're told, and echoed by several other honourable members, that leaving the European Union uniquely our economy, and that our only salvation lies in somehow surrendering sovereignty through the government's grandly titled EU reset. Or perhaps further, that entire narrative collapses under the weight of hard economic reality. First, let us examine the great myth of the EU single market as an automatic engine of export growth. Ministers speak of the single market as if it were a place where magic happens.
But if there was magic, the UK was firmly in the audience, wondering when the rabbit would emerge from the hat. As former Trade and Industry Secretary Lord Lilley demonstrated in his policy exchange paper earlier this year. During our entire 28 year membership of the single market from 1992 , UK goods exports to our EU partners grew by less than 1% per year. But over that exact same period, our goods exports to the 111 countries with which we traded generally on standard WTO terms grew by 87%.
In fact, according to the European Commission's own single market scoreboard, the UK was the single member state least benefiting from the goods single market, rejoining that regulatory straitjacket in pursuit of export growth is a pure triumph of hope over experience. Secondly, we must address the sheer statistical alchemy deployed by advocates of rejoining. Several speakers have brandished an UN peer reviewed NBER working paper that claimed that Brexit cost the UK up to 8% of GDP.
But let's look at how the model is constructed. That parallel universe. They created a statistical doppelganger proxy, which was dominated by the United States and Estonia. They provided between them almost three quarters of the entire rate, waiting for alternative. Apparently proxies for where the UK could have been without Brexit. And it assumed that had we remained in the EU, the UK would have miraculously mirrored the American economic performance.
Now, to attribute that divergence to Brexit requires an extraordinary leap of imagination. It requires one to pretend that there was no US artificial intelligence boom, no massive American fiscal stimulus. That was possible. Possible because the dollar is the world's reserve currency. No transatlantic shale gas price advantage, no differing pandemic shock, and no North Sea oil rundown. In fact, Germany also felt 88% behind that same arbitrary index under that model.
So unless German departure from the EU has passed us by unnoticed. Blaming that divergence on Brexit is simply economic nonsense. When we examine the actual data rather than the econometric fairy tales, the evidence is clear. Between 2016 and 2025, the UK economy grew by 12.2% and by 5.3% since we formally left, outpacing the European G7 average. And since Brexit, British economic growth has averaged 1.1% per annum, compared to just 0.1% in Germany.
The office for Budget Responsibility did previously. As honourable Gentleman honourable members have mentioned, assume an implausible 15% collapse in total UK global trade openness. Yet as the Obr's own November 2025 briefing conceded, UK trade intensity has remained stable at around 65% of GDP and has continued to track peer economies like France. Miss Butler The single market was overwhelmingly designed for goods, whereas over 80% of the UK economy is based on services.
Our services exports continue to boom globally. Even the dire predictions of a mass exodus from the City of London proved dramatically overblown. Institutions like JP Morgan, which had threatened to move thousands of jobs abroad, have instead been transferring staff back from Paris to London. While business investment was undeniably delayed during the post 2016 , political paralysis dragged out by those who tried to overturn the referendum, fixed investment to GDP rebounded, reaching 19.6% by the end of last year.
So please.
10:43
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
To the honourable gentleman, I think refuses to accept the reality. The House of Commons did us a great favour, bringing together all the evidence which clearly suggests that there has been a fall in GDP and the performance of the UK economy since we left the European Union. It's incredibly standing there and telling this House that there has been no impact whatsoever of us leaving the EU. . On
10:43
Speaker 13
-
Speaker 13
almost every economic chart you look, if you chart it over the last two decades, it would be almost against particularly against German performance. It would be almost impossible to pick out the point at which the UK left the European Union. It's impossible to say that, looking at those charts, that our economy has grown more slowly than Germany is because it hasn't. It's grown more quickly. The trade hasn't been disrupted more than Germany's because it really hasn't.
They track almost identically across that chart. So thirdly, Miss Butler, where Britain is succeeding, we are doing so precisely because of our post-Brexit freedoms. The UK digital and tech flat white economy now represents about 15% of GDP larger than the entire domestic goods sector. As the Growth Commission highlighted, our tech sector is flourishing and leading Europe in artificial intelligence precisely because it is unburdened by Brussels heavy handed Digital Markets Act, Digital Services Act and restrictive AI act.
But instead of backing British enterprise, the government is proposing to pursue unilateral dynamic alignment, shackling the 92% of British firms that do not trade with the EU to Brussels . Rulebook surrendering our precision breeding advantages hiking domestic carbon costs by linking our emissions trading scheme, which threatened to add up to £100 per tonne to fertiliser prices at a time when high fertiliser prices are already crippling British farmers and paying administrative fees to Brussels for the privilege.
This is an astonishingly one sided bargain, a masterclass in the art of the bad deal. Miss Butler. The lesson of the past ten years is that national prosperity is built by businesses working across the UK, not subcontracted to the EU. The economic catastrophe prophesized in 2016 simply did not occur, and His Majesty's opposition will. Very briefly, I am drawing to a close.
They track almost identically across that chart. So thirdly, Miss Butler, where Britain is succeeding, we are doing so precisely because of our post-Brexit freedoms. The UK digital and tech flat white economy now represents about 15% of GDP larger than the entire domestic goods sector. As the Growth Commission highlighted, our tech sector is flourishing and leading Europe in artificial intelligence precisely because it is unburdened by Brussels heavy handed Digital Markets Act, Digital Services Act and restrictive AI act.
But instead of backing British enterprise, the government is proposing to pursue unilateral dynamic alignment, shackling the 92% of British firms that do not trade with the EU to Brussels . Rulebook surrendering our precision breeding advantages hiking domestic carbon costs by linking our emissions trading scheme, which threatened to add up to £100 per tonne to fertiliser prices at a time when high fertiliser prices are already crippling British farmers and paying administrative fees to Brussels for the privilege.
This is an astonishingly one sided bargain, a masterclass in the art of the bad deal. Miss Butler. The lesson of the past ten years is that national prosperity is built by businesses working across the UK, not subcontracted to the EU. The economic catastrophe prophesized in 2016 simply did not occur, and His Majesty's opposition will. Very briefly, I am drawing to a close.
10:46
Speaker 19
-
Speaker 19
I thank the honourable friend. He's making a very powerful and correct speech, offering the facts. But does he not regret the fact that under all those years of conservative government, after we left the EU, we didn't seize those opportunities and be more radical in actually making sure that the benefits of Brexit were properly realised. And as he also repudiate what John Major's government did in bringing in the Maastricht treaty, which created political union in the first place.
10:46
Speaker 13
-
Speaker 13
Well, I mean, I think it's one thing to be looking back over the last ten years. I hope he'll excuse me if I if I plead that I was doing my GCSEs in 1992, rather than paying too much attention to what John Major was or wasn't doing at that point. But the next conservative government should certainly look at how we can better take advantages of the freedoms available within outside the European Union. And that.
And there are certainly many opportunities. But His Majesty's opposition will continue to champion our regulatory freedom to back British innovation and to resist any attempt to drag this country back into the EU's regulatory orbit.
And there are certainly many opportunities. But His Majesty's opposition will continue to champion our regulatory freedom to back British innovation and to resist any attempt to drag this country back into the EU's regulatory orbit.
10:47
10:47
Speaker 7
-
Speaker 7
It's an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Butler, and I would like to extend gratitude to the honourable member for Perth and Kinross Shire for, on our second day back, a very rich opportunity indeed. Much history has been discussed. Two referendums. What should have been in our manifesto. I was disappointed to see colleagues from the right unwilling to enter into that debate about Maastricht and John Major into greater detail.
Once again, I must confess, I must confess that I suspect my constituents and yours are slightly less interested in going through the entrails of the history. I think it is very important that we focus on the future. Let me say three quick things about my overall position in relation to the negotiations to come. I'll try and answer some of the specifics that have been raised. I suspect some of you will wish some honourable and honourable members will wish to intervene upon me, which they're very welcome to do, but I'll try and just cover a little bit of ground initially.
Firstly, I want to pay an enormous tribute to my predecessor, who did incredibly important work in resetting our relationship with the European Union. I will resist in the spirit of unity. I will resist the temptation. I think the language was a masterclass in the art of a bad deal was what I was accused of doing. Now my predecessor came to truly a masterclass. Bad deal left by him, left to him by the previous government.
And he did incredible work in setting out a reset. I want to be clear on three points. The first is I want to go further and faster even than my predecessor. There is great urgency to address the shortcomings in our arrangements. The second point I would make is that there are real challenges facing Europe. They are challenges of security and defence, but economy as well. Those are challenges I was discussing with my European counterparts in Austria this week.
We are, and this is my third point. Britain is part of Europe. We are Europeans. European security is British security. We must be a close part with our European friends in dealing with these shared challenges. And I will give way.
Once again, I must confess, I must confess that I suspect my constituents and yours are slightly less interested in going through the entrails of the history. I think it is very important that we focus on the future. Let me say three quick things about my overall position in relation to the negotiations to come. I'll try and answer some of the specifics that have been raised. I suspect some of you will wish some honourable and honourable members will wish to intervene upon me, which they're very welcome to do, but I'll try and just cover a little bit of ground initially.
Firstly, I want to pay an enormous tribute to my predecessor, who did incredibly important work in resetting our relationship with the European Union. I will resist in the spirit of unity. I will resist the temptation. I think the language was a masterclass in the art of a bad deal was what I was accused of doing. Now my predecessor came to truly a masterclass. Bad deal left by him, left to him by the previous government.
And he did incredible work in setting out a reset. I want to be clear on three points. The first is I want to go further and faster even than my predecessor. There is great urgency to address the shortcomings in our arrangements. The second point I would make is that there are real challenges facing Europe. They are challenges of security and defence, but economy as well. Those are challenges I was discussing with my European counterparts in Austria this week.
We are, and this is my third point. Britain is part of Europe. We are Europeans. European security is British security. We must be a close part with our European friends in dealing with these shared challenges. And I will give way.
10:50
Speaker 3
-
Speaker 3
First of all, can I thank the Minister? I will always try and answer the questions I have in my contribution, which is very specific to Northern Ireland. Has the Minister had an opportunity to consider the issues and the impact on the through the winter framework on us in Northern Ireland and how it affects our trading with the United Kingdom and indeed with Europe. If he has. I'm just to thank him as well for coming back from his honeymoon to his new position.
10:50
Speaker 7
-
Speaker 7
I'm glad that someone was grateful for me coming back. And I'm grateful for the courteous tone. Of course, the Windsor framework is a vitally important. And as he and many people across this House know, an incredibly complex arrangement which seeks to preserve the delicate balance in Northern Ireland. I've heard comments from all sides of the debate. I look forward to visiting Northern Ireland soon. It is absolutely vital that the people of Northern Ireland get the benefits of both.
I understand the criticisms that he made during his remarks, but it is at the moment the one party in the UK that benefits from both, and I want to see that benefit maximised to the absolute fullest. I was saying a little about European challenges as the Prime Minister was clear yesterday. There are challenges for our economy as there are challenges for other European economies as well. During my time in Austria, and the Foreign Secretary will be discussing this with his counterparts.
Now, there are, of course, real conversations to be had with our European friends on the whole range of issues that have been discussed. I want to confirm a few things. Firstly , to my colleagues, particularly speaking up for their farmers. I understand the pressures on British farmers. I understand in particular the support that I've heard this morning for concluding an SPS deal. I intend to do so with British farmers interests at their very heart.
I heard some of the specifics, including the the barriers and costs that have accrued when seeking to export. I don't like to disagree with my honourable friend, but there was some suggestion that sausages were not the most important thing. As a Lincolnshire MP, I would like to say they are and there is. Export is a priority for me, which would benefit not just Lincolnshire and Europe, but indeed the whole of the UK.
I heard also some of the important points that were made. I will again try to strike a brief moment of unity with the opposition. We have great strengths in services. There are many European firms that look to the UK for those strengths. It is a shame, I think, that those arrangements and services remain as immature as they are. That was a frustration before 2016 and it remains a frustration afterwards.
It is in the whole of Europe's interest to free up the services trade within Europe, and I was discussing that with my counterparts just this week.
I understand the criticisms that he made during his remarks, but it is at the moment the one party in the UK that benefits from both, and I want to see that benefit maximised to the absolute fullest. I was saying a little about European challenges as the Prime Minister was clear yesterday. There are challenges for our economy as there are challenges for other European economies as well. During my time in Austria, and the Foreign Secretary will be discussing this with his counterparts.
Now, there are, of course, real conversations to be had with our European friends on the whole range of issues that have been discussed. I want to confirm a few things. Firstly , to my colleagues, particularly speaking up for their farmers. I understand the pressures on British farmers. I understand in particular the support that I've heard this morning for concluding an SPS deal. I intend to do so with British farmers interests at their very heart.
I heard some of the specifics, including the the barriers and costs that have accrued when seeking to export. I don't like to disagree with my honourable friend, but there was some suggestion that sausages were not the most important thing. As a Lincolnshire MP, I would like to say they are and there is. Export is a priority for me, which would benefit not just Lincolnshire and Europe, but indeed the whole of the UK.
I heard also some of the important points that were made. I will again try to strike a brief moment of unity with the opposition. We have great strengths in services. There are many European firms that look to the UK for those strengths. It is a shame, I think, that those arrangements and services remain as immature as they are. That was a frustration before 2016 and it remains a frustration afterwards.
It is in the whole of Europe's interest to free up the services trade within Europe, and I was discussing that with my counterparts just this week.
10:53
10:53
10:53
Speaker 7
-
Speaker 7
My. The honourable gentleman will understand. I can't provide much comment on the structures of parliamentary scrutiny, which are obviously not a question for me, but I can confirm that if we are able to conclude the ambitious deal that I hope we will be able to in the months ahead, then of course, I would return to Parliament and there would be a full scrutiny process. He refers to changes in the law that happens in this place, and I would expect to be put through the proper scrutiny processes of any legislation that was required to enact the bills in question.
I was talking just now about services, and I pay tribute to the musical talents in this place. It's not just the Prime Minister who I know knows how to play a guitar, and it is a great shame for Europe and for Britain that touring is not easier for British bands into Europe. I was discussing those issues this week. It's a source of frustration to me that it has not been possible to make faster progress. I heard from the Liberal Democrats some advice to change our manifesto commitments.
I would caution the political wisdom of doing so. It is a manifesto commitment for us to make progress on this, and we will continue to do so. There are a range of complex issues being raised by the European Union about securing the changes that we want to see. It is, I'm sure, a sentiment shared right across this House, that music should flow freely, that the UK and Europe benefit from the closeness of those relationships.
There were some questions also raised about the timing of the summit and the negotiations. Obviously, this is a timing that we will need to agree with our friends in Europe and announce in the usual way. But I want to be clear to the House that I am ambitious to move quickly, and I would like to see progress within the coming months. There was much else, Madam Chair, upon which I could touch. I'm going to leave to the opposition spokesperson the debate about the statistical doppelganger proxy method by which you might check whether or not the British economy could have grown quicker or less quickly than other European economies.
All I will say is our relationship with Europe, Madam Chair, is absolutely, vitally important for our economy. We will all have that as an experience in our own constituents, in our own constituencies business who are finding export harder, recruitment harder. A whole range of issues have been made more difficult by the poor deal that we were left. I would just like to reassure the House that it is my intention, in my time in this role, to make that easier for the whole of the UK.
Thank you very much.
I was talking just now about services, and I pay tribute to the musical talents in this place. It's not just the Prime Minister who I know knows how to play a guitar, and it is a great shame for Europe and for Britain that touring is not easier for British bands into Europe. I was discussing those issues this week. It's a source of frustration to me that it has not been possible to make faster progress. I heard from the Liberal Democrats some advice to change our manifesto commitments.
I would caution the political wisdom of doing so. It is a manifesto commitment for us to make progress on this, and we will continue to do so. There are a range of complex issues being raised by the European Union about securing the changes that we want to see. It is, I'm sure, a sentiment shared right across this House, that music should flow freely, that the UK and Europe benefit from the closeness of those relationships.
There were some questions also raised about the timing of the summit and the negotiations. Obviously, this is a timing that we will need to agree with our friends in Europe and announce in the usual way. But I want to be clear to the House that I am ambitious to move quickly, and I would like to see progress within the coming months. There was much else, Madam Chair, upon which I could touch. I'm going to leave to the opposition spokesperson the debate about the statistical doppelganger proxy method by which you might check whether or not the British economy could have grown quicker or less quickly than other European economies.
All I will say is our relationship with Europe, Madam Chair, is absolutely, vitally important for our economy. We will all have that as an experience in our own constituents, in our own constituencies business who are finding export harder, recruitment harder. A whole range of issues have been made more difficult by the poor deal that we were left. I would just like to reassure the House that it is my intention, in my time in this role, to make that easier for the whole of the UK.
Thank you very much.
10:56
10:56
10:56
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
For having these couple of minutes. Just to sum up what I think has been an excellent debate with some fantastic contributions. I secured this debate because I couldn't believe that in June of this year, no one had made any attempt to even recognise the fact that we had left the European Union ten years ago. There was no carrying of the honourable member from Clacton down the mall and ticker tape processions. There was nothing in the way of any sort of celebration rather than mark the events, so I found that a bit unusual.
Miss Butler. This is why I secured this debate, and I'm really pleased that I did, because I think we've heard some pretty scary things today. And there's two words that came out loud and clear from practically every contribution, unmitigated disaster, because I think that that is the conclusion that any sane and rational person , looking back in the last ten years would have to make. When they look at what has happened since we have left the European Union.
Now, listen very carefully to my conservative colleagues just about the history of all of this and the fact that they don't seem to be able to accept the forecasts, which are clearly laid out in the House of Commons briefing from the House of Commons Library. And maybe it's got the wrong time with Brexit, the wrong type of government, the wrong type of deal. Maybe we've got the wrong type of House of Commons library. I don't know what the real issue is, but the failure to accept and to recognise that this is not even a mixed response.
That was quite alarming from the honourable member who spoke for the official opposition, who can't even acknowledge that there has been difficulties in the course of the past ten years. And my last word to this, to the government is, yes, make progress. And I think we've all been looking very, very keenly and will be supporting the government in order to try and improve the relationship with the European Union. But unless they're prepared to reconsider joining the European Union, which is what the vast majority of the people of this country want, I am afraid they are not going to be able to make much progress, and it will just be more tinkering.
It will just be making slight progress at the very edges of a very clear and distinct problem. So I urge this government have a look at the benefits of rejoin the EU, even some sort of paper in some sort of examination and some sort of inquiry about what this could do if we were to rejoin, to just blithely say that we are not looking at this and we're sticking to our red lines, it is not good enough. And I do not think that's what the people of this country want.
They want to be back in the European Union, the sensible place to be and end this unmitigated disaster that we have experienced in the last ten years.
Miss Butler. This is why I secured this debate, and I'm really pleased that I did, because I think we've heard some pretty scary things today. And there's two words that came out loud and clear from practically every contribution, unmitigated disaster, because I think that that is the conclusion that any sane and rational person , looking back in the last ten years would have to make. When they look at what has happened since we have left the European Union.
Now, listen very carefully to my conservative colleagues just about the history of all of this and the fact that they don't seem to be able to accept the forecasts, which are clearly laid out in the House of Commons briefing from the House of Commons Library. And maybe it's got the wrong time with Brexit, the wrong type of government, the wrong type of deal. Maybe we've got the wrong type of House of Commons library. I don't know what the real issue is, but the failure to accept and to recognise that this is not even a mixed response.
That was quite alarming from the honourable member who spoke for the official opposition, who can't even acknowledge that there has been difficulties in the course of the past ten years. And my last word to this, to the government is, yes, make progress. And I think we've all been looking very, very keenly and will be supporting the government in order to try and improve the relationship with the European Union. But unless they're prepared to reconsider joining the European Union, which is what the vast majority of the people of this country want, I am afraid they are not going to be able to make much progress, and it will just be more tinkering.
It will just be making slight progress at the very edges of a very clear and distinct problem. So I urge this government have a look at the benefits of rejoin the EU, even some sort of paper in some sort of examination and some sort of inquiry about what this could do if we were to rejoin, to just blithely say that we are not looking at this and we're sticking to our red lines, it is not good enough. And I do not think that's what the people of this country want.
They want to be back in the European Union, the sensible place to be and end this unmitigated disaster that we have experienced in the last ten years.
10:58
Speaker 18
-
Speaker 18
The question is that this House has considered the impact of the 2016 EU membership referendum on the UK. As many as are of that opinion, say I. I of the contrary. No, I think the ayes have it. The ayes have it. Order, order. Good. Order. I will call Michelle Welsh to move the motion, and I will then call the minister to respond. I remind other members that they may only make a speech with prior permission from the member in charge of the debate and the minister.
There will not be an opportunity for the member in charge to wind up as the convention, as is the convention for 13 minute debates. Order, order! Michelle Welsh to move the motion.
There will not be an opportunity for the member in charge to wind up as the convention, as is the convention for 13 minute debates. Order, order! Michelle Welsh to move the motion.
11:00
Speaker 5
-
Speaker 5
Thank you, and it's a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. It is right and fitting that I start this debate where it all began for me. And that is with dear Mabel, a brave, kind, clever, funny four year old girl that lives in my constituency and a tenacious mum. Rachel. When I was first elected to Parliament, I met with my constituent Rachel as she wished to share her experience with her daughter Mabel, who was sadly diagnosed with cancer aged four years old.
Mabel was diagnosed with Wilms. A form of kidney cancer, after a horrifying six months, including two major operations and a tough course of chemotherapy, the family received the news that Mabel was free of cancer. Now, age six, Mabel is attending a local school where I was fortunate enough to meet her and she's enjoying her life as a young child should, and I know you will all join me in wishing Mabel well. Following Mabel's diagnosis, Rachel made an application for Disability Allowance DLA, which consisted of completing a 40 page questionnaire which includes asking questions such as if the four year old needs help monitoring their blood oxygen levels.
Disability allowance is supposed to support families with children with disabilities and serious conditions such as cancer. It can provide a lifeline of financial support at a time when it's most needed. Yet the current system requires families to wait three months with a qualifying period. Then, before families can receive any support, they must go through and oh, sorry, it says it again. Sorry. Let me be clear. The financial impact of cancer does not begin after three months.
It is instant. Rachel shared with me that Mabel being diagnosed with cancer was the toughest time of their lives yet despite this, she felt that in comparison, there were people in a more fortunate position than many of the other families on the ward. Rachel's employer gave her six months off work, a sick leave, and her partner was able to work flexibly so they could both spend time with their daughter at hospital time. That allowed Mabel to have the support and care from her loved ones, allowing for the support from their family.
Chairman. I can not even begin to imagine the anguish families face with such a diagnosis, no more so than when it is your child. Unfortunately, not every employer is able to offer this or willing to this. This disparity should leave us asking the question that if we cannot be there from when a child is diagnosed with cancer, then what are we doing? I will.
Mabel was diagnosed with Wilms. A form of kidney cancer, after a horrifying six months, including two major operations and a tough course of chemotherapy, the family received the news that Mabel was free of cancer. Now, age six, Mabel is attending a local school where I was fortunate enough to meet her and she's enjoying her life as a young child should, and I know you will all join me in wishing Mabel well. Following Mabel's diagnosis, Rachel made an application for Disability Allowance DLA, which consisted of completing a 40 page questionnaire which includes asking questions such as if the four year old needs help monitoring their blood oxygen levels.
Disability allowance is supposed to support families with children with disabilities and serious conditions such as cancer. It can provide a lifeline of financial support at a time when it's most needed. Yet the current system requires families to wait three months with a qualifying period. Then, before families can receive any support, they must go through and oh, sorry, it says it again. Sorry. Let me be clear. The financial impact of cancer does not begin after three months.
It is instant. Rachel shared with me that Mabel being diagnosed with cancer was the toughest time of their lives yet despite this, she felt that in comparison, there were people in a more fortunate position than many of the other families on the ward. Rachel's employer gave her six months off work, a sick leave, and her partner was able to work flexibly so they could both spend time with their daughter at hospital time. That allowed Mabel to have the support and care from her loved ones, allowing for the support from their family.
Chairman. I can not even begin to imagine the anguish families face with such a diagnosis, no more so than when it is your child. Unfortunately, not every employer is able to offer this or willing to this. This disparity should leave us asking the question that if we cannot be there from when a child is diagnosed with cancer, then what are we doing? I will.
11:02
Speaker 3
-
Speaker 3
Remind us of of our job as MPs and what to do. And I congratulate her on bringing this forward, but does not agree that when a family receives a devastating diagnosis, whether it's terminal illness, severe disability or an aggressive childhood cancer, the financial shock and the caring responsibilities are felt immediately. And when it comes to that three month qualifying period, sometimes families can have up to £5,000 in additional debt debt during the most agonising months of their lives.
While can I say this respectfully, Madam Chair, while government drags its hills, will the honourable lady join me in pressing the Minister to be in the way that is compassionate and understanding, and government recognises that a child suffering does not wait 90 days to become real, and to ensure that crucial financial support is delivered from the very point of diagnosis.
While can I say this respectfully, Madam Chair, while government drags its hills, will the honourable lady join me in pressing the Minister to be in the way that is compassionate and understanding, and government recognises that a child suffering does not wait 90 days to become real, and to ensure that crucial financial support is delivered from the very point of diagnosis.
11:03
Speaker 5
-
Speaker 5
Thank you, and I absolutely agree. Thank you. Too often, the final financial impacts of a cancer diagnosis are forgotten. People think about the hospital visits, the sickness and the endless tablets. But a disability or serious condition like cancer impacts on every single part of your life. Following a diagnosis, families immediately have to deal with the financial impact. It is a sad fact of life that bills do not care if your child has cancer, they will still be due.
But we can care. We can cross-party care, we can unite and we can do the right thing for families with children with disabilities or serious conditions have to wait, on average seven months before receiving a single Disability Living Allowance payment. This is months and months of rent, mortgage payments, electricity bills, council tax and weeks and weeks of food shopping. This is compounded by the fact that at this time, household income drops by an average of £6,000 per year, and for 1 in 3, this can reach over £10,000.
In addition to all of this, because it sadly does even get worse, the delay in receiving DLA means a parent's ability to claim any carer's allowance as an additional or an alternative further impacts that. That financial strain. I also feel it's important to note that parents in work are obviously unable to apply for Universal Credit, cutting out other potential streams of support. All this leaves parents with an impossible choice, a cruel choice, a choice that no parent should have to make.
Do they leave their child alone in hospital to face this battle by themselves or not go to work? Do they skip bills? Do they run the risk of losing their home? Do they not eat? Do they turn the heating off? This is the reality. These are decisions that families should never have to make. Yet it is happening daily for families up and down this country. During my meeting with Rachel, she told me about a young boy aged just six years old, who was also on the ward.
His parents were left with no option but to carry on working as a. Nurses were unable to provide around the clock care. Rachel helped him use the toilet, helped dress him and helped him eat. It is heartbreaking to think of the many children who have no one beside them, not just for the children, but for the mothers and the fathers being left with no choice. Chairman, I missed my son's first day back at school today and I've cried about it.
This is nothing in comparison of having to leave a child in a hospital bed who is suffering from cancer. So let me be clear DLA is not designed to act as a source of income, but it's there to help with the extra costs of looking after a child with a health condition. Yes.
But we can care. We can cross-party care, we can unite and we can do the right thing for families with children with disabilities or serious conditions have to wait, on average seven months before receiving a single Disability Living Allowance payment. This is months and months of rent, mortgage payments, electricity bills, council tax and weeks and weeks of food shopping. This is compounded by the fact that at this time, household income drops by an average of £6,000 per year, and for 1 in 3, this can reach over £10,000.
In addition to all of this, because it sadly does even get worse, the delay in receiving DLA means a parent's ability to claim any carer's allowance as an additional or an alternative further impacts that. That financial strain. I also feel it's important to note that parents in work are obviously unable to apply for Universal Credit, cutting out other potential streams of support. All this leaves parents with an impossible choice, a cruel choice, a choice that no parent should have to make.
Do they leave their child alone in hospital to face this battle by themselves or not go to work? Do they skip bills? Do they run the risk of losing their home? Do they not eat? Do they turn the heating off? This is the reality. These are decisions that families should never have to make. Yet it is happening daily for families up and down this country. During my meeting with Rachel, she told me about a young boy aged just six years old, who was also on the ward.
His parents were left with no option but to carry on working as a. Nurses were unable to provide around the clock care. Rachel helped him use the toilet, helped dress him and helped him eat. It is heartbreaking to think of the many children who have no one beside them, not just for the children, but for the mothers and the fathers being left with no choice. Chairman, I missed my son's first day back at school today and I've cried about it.
This is nothing in comparison of having to leave a child in a hospital bed who is suffering from cancer. So let me be clear DLA is not designed to act as a source of income, but it's there to help with the extra costs of looking after a child with a health condition. Yes.
11:06
Speaker 20
-
Speaker 20
I'm really grateful for the incredibly powerful speech that my hon. Friend is making, and she is right that this is not a necessity, that this can be addressed. So does she agree with me that the DWP needs to ensure that parents get that support from day one, and ensure that they can then obviously address the increased financial costs that they face from the beginning of somebody's diagnosis and that real need for parents to be present to support their child.
Absolutely, absolutely.
Absolutely, absolutely.
11:06
Speaker 5
-
Speaker 5
And cancer is actually one of the most clear diagnoses that you can get from day one. And the cancer does not wait yet. Families have to. The three month qualifying period does not reflect the realities families face. In Mabel's case, the family was informed that they would not qualify for any support as Mabel's condition did not last more than six months. In other words, she didn't have cancer long enough. This is despite her undergoing multiple operations, chemotherapy and to this day still must attend regular hospital appointments.
It is my understanding that the qualifying period is meant to establish that a health condition is long standing in nature, but with cancer, a diagnosis with cancer, surely that should be from the offset? Yes.
It is my understanding that the qualifying period is meant to establish that a health condition is long standing in nature, but with cancer, a diagnosis with cancer, surely that should be from the offset? Yes.
11:07
Speaker 21
-
Speaker 21
Thank the honourable member for giving way and congratulate her on securing this debate. The member would probably agree with me that there is a strong case for greater flexibility in rapidly diagnosed cases, where a clinician has already identified a strong and serious, long lasting condition, and a qualifying period can be unnecessary, bureaucratic and indeed insensitive. With the member. Agree with that?
11:08
Speaker 5
-
Speaker 5
Absolutely, absolutely. The bureaucratic system is, is, is failing families, but these issues could be easily resolved if medical evidence could be used instead of the qualifying period, and I'd urge the minister to look in ways. Medical evidence and research can be used in DLA to make this system better. For those who are relying on it, there are all ready provisions that allow the use of medical evidence, such as a special rules cases when someone is approaching the end of life, which can be used to bypass this qualifying period.
The qualifying period is outdated and does not reflect the complexities of lifelong conditions. I'm aware that the government does know the does not know the cost of removing the qualifying period, but I do not think there is any cost that is worth more than the ability for parents to be there for their child when they have cancer. As it stands, we cannot cure childhood cancer. We cannot spare families the fear, the sleepless nights, or the heartbreak of watching a child undergo surgery and chemo chemotherapy.
But we can ensure that when the worst happens, the government stands beside them. Rather than placing further barriers in their way. Families should not have to prove their desperation for three months before receiving support. They should not have to navigate mountains of paperwork whilst sitting beside a hospital bed, and they should never be forced to choose between earning a wage and being there for their child. Mabel's story is one of hope.
Today, she's back at school, enjoying the childhood that every parent wishes for their son or daughter. But her family's experience exposed a system that is failing too many in this country. The question before us is a simple one when a child is diagnosed with cancer or another serious condition, do we respond with bureaucracy or with compassion? I believe we should choose compassion. I therefore urge the minister to work with families, clinicians and charities to remove the three month qualifying period and replace it with a system that recognises medical evidence.
From the outset, let us ensure that no parent is forced to leave a child alone on a hospital ward because they cannot afford to be there. Let us build a system worthy of the families who rely upon it, and let us act now, because cancer does not wait, and neither should the support those families so desperately need. Thank you.
The qualifying period is outdated and does not reflect the complexities of lifelong conditions. I'm aware that the government does know the does not know the cost of removing the qualifying period, but I do not think there is any cost that is worth more than the ability for parents to be there for their child when they have cancer. As it stands, we cannot cure childhood cancer. We cannot spare families the fear, the sleepless nights, or the heartbreak of watching a child undergo surgery and chemo chemotherapy.
But we can ensure that when the worst happens, the government stands beside them. Rather than placing further barriers in their way. Families should not have to prove their desperation for three months before receiving support. They should not have to navigate mountains of paperwork whilst sitting beside a hospital bed, and they should never be forced to choose between earning a wage and being there for their child. Mabel's story is one of hope.
Today, she's back at school, enjoying the childhood that every parent wishes for their son or daughter. But her family's experience exposed a system that is failing too many in this country. The question before us is a simple one when a child is diagnosed with cancer or another serious condition, do we respond with bureaucracy or with compassion? I believe we should choose compassion. I therefore urge the minister to work with families, clinicians and charities to remove the three month qualifying period and replace it with a system that recognises medical evidence.
From the outset, let us ensure that no parent is forced to leave a child alone on a hospital ward because they cannot afford to be there. Let us build a system worthy of the families who rely upon it, and let us act now, because cancer does not wait, and neither should the support those families so desperately need. Thank you.
11:10
11:10
Speaker 22
-
Speaker 22
Well, good morning and thank you, Miss Butler. I'm delighted to be serving under your chairmanship today. And I want to begin by congratulating my honourable friend for Sherwood Forest on securing this important debate. She's made a particularly valuable, thoughtful and passionate contribution this morning, and of course, I join her in wishing Mabel, her mum, Rachel and their whole family well. My honourable friend called this debate to discuss the qualifying period for disability Living allowance for children.
Now, as we've already heard, DLA contributes to the extra costs that may arise as a result of a disability or health condition and for some can provide a total of just over £10,000 a year. It's usually paid to the child's parent or guardian, and it can help with the overall family finances and be used as they see fit to meet their needs. It continues to be paid in full to children and young people under the age of 18 when they're in hospital.
DLA is available if a child's condition or illness is both of a long term nature and gives rise to care or mobility needs, payment begins once the three month qualifying period has been satisfied. This helps establish that the disability and resulting needs are of the long standing nature that this benefit is designed to offer. Support for the qualifying period provides a sensible division between short and long term disability, but does not, importantly, begin with the date of claim.
It starts with the beginning of the needs in care and or mobility that make the child eligible for DLA. This period can start before the date of claim, and the question of when the need started will be taken into account by decision makers. What this means is that consideration will always be given to whether the qualifying period has already been partly or fully completed prior to the date of claim. Of course.
Now, as we've already heard, DLA contributes to the extra costs that may arise as a result of a disability or health condition and for some can provide a total of just over £10,000 a year. It's usually paid to the child's parent or guardian, and it can help with the overall family finances and be used as they see fit to meet their needs. It continues to be paid in full to children and young people under the age of 18 when they're in hospital.
DLA is available if a child's condition or illness is both of a long term nature and gives rise to care or mobility needs, payment begins once the three month qualifying period has been satisfied. This helps establish that the disability and resulting needs are of the long standing nature that this benefit is designed to offer. Support for the qualifying period provides a sensible division between short and long term disability, but does not, importantly, begin with the date of claim.
It starts with the beginning of the needs in care and or mobility that make the child eligible for DLA. This period can start before the date of claim, and the question of when the need started will be taken into account by decision makers. What this means is that consideration will always be given to whether the qualifying period has already been partly or fully completed prior to the date of claim. Of course.
11:12
Speaker 3
-
Speaker 3
What the minister is saying, and I'm reading it correctly, then if a consultant or a GP or a doctor sends in a letter to confirm that this started a way before they actually applied for the application, would that be the qualifying period? And that would be done by a medical person, is that right? AM I reading it right, Minister?
11:12
Speaker 22
-
Speaker 22
So I think if I've I thank the honourable member for his contribution. So it starts with the issue of needs. So when did when did the child become eligible for Disability Living allowance? That marks the start of the qualifying period, even if that precedes the point at which parents make a claim. And understandably, I think, you know, when parents are in very difficult circumstances, their first thought is probably not applying for disability living allowance for children who are severely disabled at birth, their qualifying period can start and can begin at birth.
The date of claim, I should add, is usually the date the request for a claim pack is received, provided the customer returns the claim form within six weeks, the date of claim will be treated as the date the claim form was requested, but the Secretary of State also has the discretion to extend that period beyond six weeks. If it's considered the delay was reasonable and in these sorts of circumstances that my honourable friend has described, we can understand how those issues can, of course, arise.
If a child sadly has an end of life diagnosis. There are rightly special rules in place for this. These claims are always fast tracked, and the three month qualifying period does not apply. The highest rate of the DLA care component will be paid from the date of the claim. Now, my officials are currently exploring options to enhance bereavement support for parents through the Social Security system, and will continue to engage with stakeholders as this work develops.
Now, given this debate stems from concerns around how quickly families get the support they need, I think it's worth highlighting that we've recently made significant improvements to waiting times for new child DLA claims, so people are not waiting nearly as long as they did for their claim to be processed, and my hon. Friend rightly highlighted the need to address long waits. I will give way.
The date of claim, I should add, is usually the date the request for a claim pack is received, provided the customer returns the claim form within six weeks, the date of claim will be treated as the date the claim form was requested, but the Secretary of State also has the discretion to extend that period beyond six weeks. If it's considered the delay was reasonable and in these sorts of circumstances that my honourable friend has described, we can understand how those issues can, of course, arise.
If a child sadly has an end of life diagnosis. There are rightly special rules in place for this. These claims are always fast tracked, and the three month qualifying period does not apply. The highest rate of the DLA care component will be paid from the date of the claim. Now, my officials are currently exploring options to enhance bereavement support for parents through the Social Security system, and will continue to engage with stakeholders as this work develops.
Now, given this debate stems from concerns around how quickly families get the support they need, I think it's worth highlighting that we've recently made significant improvements to waiting times for new child DLA claims, so people are not waiting nearly as long as they did for their claim to be processed, and my hon. Friend rightly highlighted the need to address long waits. I will give way.
11:14
11:15
Speaker 22
-
Speaker 22
Well, I thank my honourable friend for her question, and I'll perhaps come on to later in my speech about what the government is planning to do. So I'm pleased to tell colleagues that between October 2024 to March 2025, the department recruited and redeployed in excess of 100 case managers to improve clearance times for child DLA. New claims and between the 1st of August 2025 and the 31st of March this year, the department cleared around 185,900 child dla, new claims, of which 68.3% were cleared within 45 working days.
And in this time, the percentage of claims cleared within these planned timescales rose from 4.4%, 4.7% to 90.7%. So I hope colleagues will recognise that that's a significant improvement and a necessary improvement. The Social Security system exists to provide opportunity and security. It's there to help people to navigate those difficult circumstances which any of us can find ourselves in. And there can, of course, be few circumstances more exceptionally difficult than those faced by seriously ill children and their parents.
Along with the emotional strain, parents can understandably experience a significant impact upon work and household income, as well as facing extra costs. As my hon. Friend very ably set out, and it's understandable that many parents in this situation are likely to need additional support through the Social Security system. So I think it's worth reiterating that beyond the support that DLA provides in and of itself, it can also passport to a range of additional support. This includes premiums in income related benefits, Carer's Allowance, the Motability Scheme and exemption from the benefit cap that's providing that comprehensive help for families.
For those who qualify, financial support is available through Universal Credit, including for those who are in work but on lower incomes and if needed, this support can be available on day one through an advance now alongside the Universal Credit Standard Allowance. Additional amounts such as child element, disabled child addition, carer element or housing costs are added as appropriate, while Universal Credit is means tested and therefore not available to households that are better off financially, it is there as a safety net.
Should those financial circumstances change, the Social Security system will always be a cornerstone of our support for unpaid carers and parents of disabled children. But it is not the only way we can help. And this is rightly something that we've been thinking about across government. And indeed this government has recognised precisely the issues that my hon. Friend for Sherwood Forest and indeed my hon. Friend for York have raised today, as I'm sure they're aware.
Only yesterday the Department for business, innovation, Science and Trade closed its make work pay consultation on employment rights for unpaid carers and parents of seriously ill children. This included seeking views on a possible new statutory entitlement to leave and pay for parents of seriously ill children, often referred to as Hughes Law, a term in recognition of the campaigning undertaken by the family of Hugh Menai Davies, who died aged six from cancer in 2021.
Very sadly but an important legacy, I think, and I know that my colleagues will be looking carefully at the submissions to that consultation and will respond to it in the coming months, and I'm sure honourable friends present today will be looking to colleagues in the Department for business, innovation, Science and Trade for the work that they do now. My hon. Friend for Sherwood Forest rightly highlighted the importance of parents being able to support their children at these incredibly distressing times.
And furthermore, in April last year, the government introduced a new element of up to 12 weeks of neonatal care leave and pay for parents of babies in neonatal care to ensure they have appropriate support during this time. The National Cancer Plan for England was published in February this year and warmly received, not least for its introduction of a Children and Young People's Travel Fund, backed by £10 million, and its recognition of the specialist approach that is needed for cancer in children and young people.
And, of course, our goal across government remains to relentlessly work towards improving outcomes and experiences for children and young people with serious illnesses and supporting their families. I can give that commitment to my colleagues today. In conclusion, Miss Butler, caring for a child who is seriously ill must be one of the most worrying and stressful situations a parent can experience. And that's why I'm so glad that we've had the opportunity to discuss this today.
Whilst there are no current plans to remove the three month qualifying period from Disability Living Allowance for children, there is already a significant amount of work and support offered by my department. I can assure my honourable friend that we will continue to search for the right levers across government to further strengthen support for parents in these terrible circumstances, and will always approach these issues with compassion. Once again, I'd like to thank the honourable member for calling this debate on an important and sensitive subject and for all members who have contributed.
Thank you.
And in this time, the percentage of claims cleared within these planned timescales rose from 4.4%, 4.7% to 90.7%. So I hope colleagues will recognise that that's a significant improvement and a necessary improvement. The Social Security system exists to provide opportunity and security. It's there to help people to navigate those difficult circumstances which any of us can find ourselves in. And there can, of course, be few circumstances more exceptionally difficult than those faced by seriously ill children and their parents.
Along with the emotional strain, parents can understandably experience a significant impact upon work and household income, as well as facing extra costs. As my hon. Friend very ably set out, and it's understandable that many parents in this situation are likely to need additional support through the Social Security system. So I think it's worth reiterating that beyond the support that DLA provides in and of itself, it can also passport to a range of additional support. This includes premiums in income related benefits, Carer's Allowance, the Motability Scheme and exemption from the benefit cap that's providing that comprehensive help for families.
For those who qualify, financial support is available through Universal Credit, including for those who are in work but on lower incomes and if needed, this support can be available on day one through an advance now alongside the Universal Credit Standard Allowance. Additional amounts such as child element, disabled child addition, carer element or housing costs are added as appropriate, while Universal Credit is means tested and therefore not available to households that are better off financially, it is there as a safety net.
Should those financial circumstances change, the Social Security system will always be a cornerstone of our support for unpaid carers and parents of disabled children. But it is not the only way we can help. And this is rightly something that we've been thinking about across government. And indeed this government has recognised precisely the issues that my hon. Friend for Sherwood Forest and indeed my hon. Friend for York have raised today, as I'm sure they're aware.
Only yesterday the Department for business, innovation, Science and Trade closed its make work pay consultation on employment rights for unpaid carers and parents of seriously ill children. This included seeking views on a possible new statutory entitlement to leave and pay for parents of seriously ill children, often referred to as Hughes Law, a term in recognition of the campaigning undertaken by the family of Hugh Menai Davies, who died aged six from cancer in 2021.
Very sadly but an important legacy, I think, and I know that my colleagues will be looking carefully at the submissions to that consultation and will respond to it in the coming months, and I'm sure honourable friends present today will be looking to colleagues in the Department for business, innovation, Science and Trade for the work that they do now. My hon. Friend for Sherwood Forest rightly highlighted the importance of parents being able to support their children at these incredibly distressing times.
And furthermore, in April last year, the government introduced a new element of up to 12 weeks of neonatal care leave and pay for parents of babies in neonatal care to ensure they have appropriate support during this time. The National Cancer Plan for England was published in February this year and warmly received, not least for its introduction of a Children and Young People's Travel Fund, backed by £10 million, and its recognition of the specialist approach that is needed for cancer in children and young people.
And, of course, our goal across government remains to relentlessly work towards improving outcomes and experiences for children and young people with serious illnesses and supporting their families. I can give that commitment to my colleagues today. In conclusion, Miss Butler, caring for a child who is seriously ill must be one of the most worrying and stressful situations a parent can experience. And that's why I'm so glad that we've had the opportunity to discuss this today.
Whilst there are no current plans to remove the three month qualifying period from Disability Living Allowance for children, there is already a significant amount of work and support offered by my department. I can assure my honourable friend that we will continue to search for the right levers across government to further strengthen support for parents in these terrible circumstances, and will always approach these issues with compassion. Once again, I'd like to thank the honourable member for calling this debate on an important and sensitive subject and for all members who have contributed.
Thank you.
11:20
Speaker 18
-
Speaker 18
The question is that this House has considered the potential merits of removing the qualifying period for disability living allowance for children, as many as are of that opinion, say I. Of the contrary. No, I think the ayes have it. The ayes have it. Order, order! The sitting is suspended until 230. Thank you.
14:30
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
Transport and urban centric perceptions which misunderstand the nature of rural life, are holding rural areas back, are underfunded and overstretched. Lamentably low, slow digital connectivity, lack of public transport and they are limiting our children's futures. The last local government finance settlement lays bare this neglect in financial terms, and is a stark admission from this government that its plan is to strip funding from rural areas in order to improve services in urban ones. The Rural Services Network has calculated that urban councils will receive 32% more funding per head next year than rural councils.
Meanwhile, to plug this gap, rural residents pay on average 17% more council tax per head than urban ones out of lower than average wages. Yet the cost of delivery means they are receiving a poorer public service. For Shropshire Council, the funding situation is particularly grave. Following 16 years of catastrophically poor management by shropshire's conservatives, when the Lib Dem administration took over in May 2025, Shropshire was in the most difficult financial position of any council in England. The recently released Cipfa report into the huge challenge facing Shropshire reveals the details of the conservatives poor management, unrealistic budgets and constant overspends that burn through all of the remaining reserves and obsession with unaffordable vanity projects, such as the purchase of Shrewsbury's shopping centres and millions spent on unaffordable road.
A sloppy workforce restructure in 20 1425, which drove out the talented managers needed to transform the financial situation and the legacy impact of five years of consecutive council tax freezes were all a parting gift left for the new administration to pick up. The report describes the direction of the council under their new recently appointed chief executive and 4 to 5 year improvement plan as a positive step, and a peer review by the LGA praised the significant strides made so far.
But the financial position remains perilous and the challenge to restructure the council is a huge one. 80% of Shropshire Council's budget is spent on social care, an issue which the Liberal Democrats have long called for urgent action on the cost of delivering social care in a rural area with a demography of North Shropshire, where 25% of the population are over 65, means this pressure is only set to rise. Adult social care spending has already been rising by about 5.8% a year, more than could have been generated by council tax increases.
This is because people are living longer, needs are becoming more complex, workforce costs are rising and care providers are consequently charging more. Demand for education, health and care plans or CPS has risen even faster. Shropshire now has 3016 active CPS, a 21% increase in one year. National growth was 11% since before the pandemic. The number of school aged children with CPS has increased by 78%. This puts more pressure on specialist education, school transport and family support.
Now, last year, the council put up council tax by 8.99%, which brought in a massive £21 million a year, which only covered about a third of the extra cost from demand and inflation alone. Amid this financial turmoil, the government has cut funding per head in Shropshire. It is projected to fall well below 90% of 2024 funding by 2028, while the national average is set to rise to around 118%. The exceptional financial support provided to balance the books bears interest and must be paid back.
It worsens the prospects for the future and for a considerable time. And under the government's new devolution plans, there is a risk that the gap between mayoral and non mayoral authorities could increase further. I ask the Prime Minister in his statement yesterday about the importance of power and resourcing being made available to all authorities, not just those that have formed a combined authority or have a mayor. Now, his answer was in some ways encouraging and in other ways bothered me.
He said that when he could stand on its own two feet, then Shropshire would be able to access devolution. But at the same time as this government's own three year financial settlement, forcing austerity on rural areas has made that self-sufficiency far less likely to be achieved.
Meanwhile, to plug this gap, rural residents pay on average 17% more council tax per head than urban ones out of lower than average wages. Yet the cost of delivery means they are receiving a poorer public service. For Shropshire Council, the funding situation is particularly grave. Following 16 years of catastrophically poor management by shropshire's conservatives, when the Lib Dem administration took over in May 2025, Shropshire was in the most difficult financial position of any council in England. The recently released Cipfa report into the huge challenge facing Shropshire reveals the details of the conservatives poor management, unrealistic budgets and constant overspends that burn through all of the remaining reserves and obsession with unaffordable vanity projects, such as the purchase of Shrewsbury's shopping centres and millions spent on unaffordable road.
A sloppy workforce restructure in 20 1425, which drove out the talented managers needed to transform the financial situation and the legacy impact of five years of consecutive council tax freezes were all a parting gift left for the new administration to pick up. The report describes the direction of the council under their new recently appointed chief executive and 4 to 5 year improvement plan as a positive step, and a peer review by the LGA praised the significant strides made so far.
But the financial position remains perilous and the challenge to restructure the council is a huge one. 80% of Shropshire Council's budget is spent on social care, an issue which the Liberal Democrats have long called for urgent action on the cost of delivering social care in a rural area with a demography of North Shropshire, where 25% of the population are over 65, means this pressure is only set to rise. Adult social care spending has already been rising by about 5.8% a year, more than could have been generated by council tax increases.
This is because people are living longer, needs are becoming more complex, workforce costs are rising and care providers are consequently charging more. Demand for education, health and care plans or CPS has risen even faster. Shropshire now has 3016 active CPS, a 21% increase in one year. National growth was 11% since before the pandemic. The number of school aged children with CPS has increased by 78%. This puts more pressure on specialist education, school transport and family support.
Now, last year, the council put up council tax by 8.99%, which brought in a massive £21 million a year, which only covered about a third of the extra cost from demand and inflation alone. Amid this financial turmoil, the government has cut funding per head in Shropshire. It is projected to fall well below 90% of 2024 funding by 2028, while the national average is set to rise to around 118%. The exceptional financial support provided to balance the books bears interest and must be paid back.
It worsens the prospects for the future and for a considerable time. And under the government's new devolution plans, there is a risk that the gap between mayoral and non mayoral authorities could increase further. I ask the Prime Minister in his statement yesterday about the importance of power and resourcing being made available to all authorities, not just those that have formed a combined authority or have a mayor. Now, his answer was in some ways encouraging and in other ways bothered me.
He said that when he could stand on its own two feet, then Shropshire would be able to access devolution. But at the same time as this government's own three year financial settlement, forcing austerity on rural areas has made that self-sufficiency far less likely to be achieved.
14:34
Speaker 2
-
Speaker 2
Will the honourable. I really thank her for giving way on this point. I am sure that some of those issues she mentioned in Shropshire are very much the ones that we in Cornwall have also experienced. But does she agree with me that in the move to a mayoral share of income tax, rather than it representing a detriment to non-marital areas like ours, it actually represents an opportunity to reset this model that we have seen, whereby we have had integrated settlements, money being thrown at mayoral regions.
It actually represents an opportunity to turn those taps off for those regions and start to turn them back on. For areas like ours that have not proceeded with a mayor. Hear, hear.
It actually represents an opportunity to turn those taps off for those regions and start to turn them back on. For areas like ours that have not proceeded with a mayor. Hear, hear.
14:35
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
Well, he raises a really good question. I think I would need to see the detail of that proposition and what that would mean, but for areas like Shropshire at the moment which have which, because they are already a unitary authority and are essentially at the bottom of the list for a devolution plan that seems too far off and there seems no prospect of of stabilising the financial situation until there is a firm plan to ensure that the the powers needed to turn the area around and the resources to go with it are firmly in place, and we need clarity urgently on that.
Now, this hardship and austerity in rural areas has largely come about through the removal of remoteness as a factor when calculating what it costs for a rural authority to deliver services across a vast area. The county councils network estimates this has removed £300 million from its members budgets, an amount which the government expects to be made up for by increased council tax. Now Shropshire Council has been squeezed at both ends, first by years of conservative maladministration and then by Labour cutting their funding despite obvious need.
And it is far from alone in being in that situation. Rather than tackling the problem head on, government underfunding of rural councils has continued to perpetuate rural deprivation. This is particularly acute where people lack access to services and it is hidden, unlike urban deprivation. While door knocking in my constituency, I met a delightful elderly gentleman living in a small cottage, and I was astonished to also meet his grandson, who was apparently living in his shed in his garden because he was unable to find anywhere else to live.
Cases like these go unnoticed in homelessness statistics because family and communities look out, look out for their own solutions and wrap around those individuals. But no one thinks that a shed is an appropriate accommodation for this young man, and they should not. He should not have been allowed to fall through the net. Lack of funds for local transport perpetuate isolation and lead to a vicious cycle, stunting economic growth and creating further challenges for the councils provision of services such as social care.
When the commission came to Shropshire to talk about the challenges of delivering social care in a rural area, they were astonished by the notion that carers must have a car because there is no transport on an evening or a Sunday. The Prime Minister yesterday spoke of the importance of local transport and publicly provided services, and I think we would all agree with him. But Shropshire's bus allocation has been cut, despite it having lost more bus miles than anywhere else, with revenue funding due to 175,000 for 2728.
The Secretary of State for transport has, in an answer to me about step free access at Whitchurch Station, implied that funds will be spent where the people are, not the need. She said when we are investing in the accessibility of stations in the future, we need to get maximum benefit for the travelling public. Previously, this has meant that the funds go in the most densely populated areas, not those where there are no real alternative forms of transport.
With the patchy public transport network across north Shropshire. It is almost impossible for most residents to manage without a car, bringing with it further associated costs. Those who cannot access a car, whether they are young or old, become isolated and unable to access opportunities, education and services. Similar patterns of deprivation are reinforced through government funding for education in rural areas, even though they already often struggle with teacher recruitment and retention. Schools in North Shropshire receive an average of £6,460 a head last year, compared with a national average of around £7,910.
But outcomes at GCSE and key stage four are consistently lower than the national average and indeed the West Midlands average. How can the government justify lower funding where the outcomes are already lower? Surely every child deserves the opportunities provided by a properly funded education, and it applies to capital spending in education as well. The shocking example in my constituency, or one shocking example in my constituency, is a primary school in one of the most rural parishes, which still has outside toilets in their original Victorian red brick building.
A lady told me during my summer tour this year that her granddaughter was too afraid to use these toilets because they are full of spiders and had an accident at school. School as a result. And this is unacceptable. This is the kind of thing that you remember when you're 50. If it happened to you when you were seven at school, young people in rural areas are having their horizons limited as a direct result of government policy.
It needs to change and it needs to change urgently. In what way is the government tackling inequality? Tackling inequality if rural and coastal areas are persistently underfunded, despite worse outcomes? My constituents perceive rightly an entirely broken system in which every year they pay more and receive less. It is obviously unfair, and it is opening the door wide to those populists and extremists who exploit this situation with divisive messages to divide our community and simple but unworkable solutions.
Now the new Prime Minister has given us all hope by promising growth in every postcode. Now he will fail in rural areas if he does not address the obvious unfairness that government policy, combined with the pressures of ever increasing demand for social care, are delivering now. Proper devolution, I believe, will help rural communities. Rural councils tailor public services to the areas that they serve, but there must be acknowledgement of the need for a fair allocation of resources to go with those theoretical powers.
I hope the Minister can provide us with some details in his response. Thank you.
Now, this hardship and austerity in rural areas has largely come about through the removal of remoteness as a factor when calculating what it costs for a rural authority to deliver services across a vast area. The county councils network estimates this has removed £300 million from its members budgets, an amount which the government expects to be made up for by increased council tax. Now Shropshire Council has been squeezed at both ends, first by years of conservative maladministration and then by Labour cutting their funding despite obvious need.
And it is far from alone in being in that situation. Rather than tackling the problem head on, government underfunding of rural councils has continued to perpetuate rural deprivation. This is particularly acute where people lack access to services and it is hidden, unlike urban deprivation. While door knocking in my constituency, I met a delightful elderly gentleman living in a small cottage, and I was astonished to also meet his grandson, who was apparently living in his shed in his garden because he was unable to find anywhere else to live.
Cases like these go unnoticed in homelessness statistics because family and communities look out, look out for their own solutions and wrap around those individuals. But no one thinks that a shed is an appropriate accommodation for this young man, and they should not. He should not have been allowed to fall through the net. Lack of funds for local transport perpetuate isolation and lead to a vicious cycle, stunting economic growth and creating further challenges for the councils provision of services such as social care.
When the commission came to Shropshire to talk about the challenges of delivering social care in a rural area, they were astonished by the notion that carers must have a car because there is no transport on an evening or a Sunday. The Prime Minister yesterday spoke of the importance of local transport and publicly provided services, and I think we would all agree with him. But Shropshire's bus allocation has been cut, despite it having lost more bus miles than anywhere else, with revenue funding due to 175,000 for 2728.
The Secretary of State for transport has, in an answer to me about step free access at Whitchurch Station, implied that funds will be spent where the people are, not the need. She said when we are investing in the accessibility of stations in the future, we need to get maximum benefit for the travelling public. Previously, this has meant that the funds go in the most densely populated areas, not those where there are no real alternative forms of transport.
With the patchy public transport network across north Shropshire. It is almost impossible for most residents to manage without a car, bringing with it further associated costs. Those who cannot access a car, whether they are young or old, become isolated and unable to access opportunities, education and services. Similar patterns of deprivation are reinforced through government funding for education in rural areas, even though they already often struggle with teacher recruitment and retention. Schools in North Shropshire receive an average of £6,460 a head last year, compared with a national average of around £7,910.
But outcomes at GCSE and key stage four are consistently lower than the national average and indeed the West Midlands average. How can the government justify lower funding where the outcomes are already lower? Surely every child deserves the opportunities provided by a properly funded education, and it applies to capital spending in education as well. The shocking example in my constituency, or one shocking example in my constituency, is a primary school in one of the most rural parishes, which still has outside toilets in their original Victorian red brick building.
A lady told me during my summer tour this year that her granddaughter was too afraid to use these toilets because they are full of spiders and had an accident at school. School as a result. And this is unacceptable. This is the kind of thing that you remember when you're 50. If it happened to you when you were seven at school, young people in rural areas are having their horizons limited as a direct result of government policy.
It needs to change and it needs to change urgently. In what way is the government tackling inequality? Tackling inequality if rural and coastal areas are persistently underfunded, despite worse outcomes? My constituents perceive rightly an entirely broken system in which every year they pay more and receive less. It is obviously unfair, and it is opening the door wide to those populists and extremists who exploit this situation with divisive messages to divide our community and simple but unworkable solutions.
Now the new Prime Minister has given us all hope by promising growth in every postcode. Now he will fail in rural areas if he does not address the obvious unfairness that government policy, combined with the pressures of ever increasing demand for social care, are delivering now. Proper devolution, I believe, will help rural communities. Rural councils tailor public services to the areas that they serve, but there must be acknowledgement of the need for a fair allocation of resources to go with those theoretical powers.
I hope the Minister can provide us with some details in his response. Thank you.
14:40
14:41
Speaker 4
-
Speaker 4
Thank you very much to serve under your chairmanship, and I'd like to thank the honourable member for North Shropshire for securing this important debate. And like the honourable member, I am very passionate about local government. I find myself in Cornwall Corner here today, but I am very proud to be a member from Norfolk and I actually stood for Norfolk County Council way back in 2009. I lost it was a bad year for my party.
I stood again in 2013 and I lost, albeit by a single vote on that occasion. But there was a by election some six weeks later, and I was delighted to be elected. And I actually served on Norfolk County Council for 13 years and only resigned when I was elected as an MP. And it gave me a real understanding about the complexity and the difficulty involved in delivering services across a wide geographical area , such as Norfolk.
The London borough of Islington is the smallest upper tier authority in the country, and it has statistics that are not too dissimilar from other urban upper tier councils. It has a population of about 223,000 people, covers less than six miles and has a population density of 15,000 people per km. Now, I say that because when you contrast that with Norfolk, where my south west Norfolk constituency is based, we are home to 940,000 people, nearly four times as many.
We cover more than 2000mi², and we have a population density of 175 people per square kilometre versus 15,000 people in Islington. And on top of that, the median age of the population in Islington is 33. In Norfolk it is ten years higher. And that is because I'm slightly in danger here. Norfolk is, of course, the most beautiful county in the country, and many people choose to retire to Norfolk, and rightly so.
But this again does put additional strain on public services, and there is a lower percentage of the working age population contributing tax when that is combined with years of underfunding. As the honourable member mentioned from the previous conservative government, rural residents are inevitably paying more for their services out of a lower than average wages in our county. As is the case for several rural upper tier authorities, Norfolk receives faces higher costs for service provision across a dispersed population and that disparity causes many challenges, many challenges.
But it actually weakens our economic growth potential. And this is the key point I want to get across to the minister today. Today, rural upper tier authorities who often do not have the funds available to invest in those services that would drive economic growth, limited investment available, for example, rural infrastructure, transport, housing skills and broadband. If the government wants to see rural communities contribute more to national economic growth, and I really believe it does.
Growth in every postcode, it needs to recognise that funding local councils would be a good place to start, and I would therefore ask the Minister to consider three particular measures. Firstly, the future local government settlements need to include much stronger and more transparent rural sparsity components, taking account of not just population but road mileage, travel times, population age and the number of communities that the council has to serve. Of course, I'm.
I stood again in 2013 and I lost, albeit by a single vote on that occasion. But there was a by election some six weeks later, and I was delighted to be elected. And I actually served on Norfolk County Council for 13 years and only resigned when I was elected as an MP. And it gave me a real understanding about the complexity and the difficulty involved in delivering services across a wide geographical area , such as Norfolk.
The London borough of Islington is the smallest upper tier authority in the country, and it has statistics that are not too dissimilar from other urban upper tier councils. It has a population of about 223,000 people, covers less than six miles and has a population density of 15,000 people per km. Now, I say that because when you contrast that with Norfolk, where my south west Norfolk constituency is based, we are home to 940,000 people, nearly four times as many.
We cover more than 2000mi², and we have a population density of 175 people per square kilometre versus 15,000 people in Islington. And on top of that, the median age of the population in Islington is 33. In Norfolk it is ten years higher. And that is because I'm slightly in danger here. Norfolk is, of course, the most beautiful county in the country, and many people choose to retire to Norfolk, and rightly so.
But this again does put additional strain on public services, and there is a lower percentage of the working age population contributing tax when that is combined with years of underfunding. As the honourable member mentioned from the previous conservative government, rural residents are inevitably paying more for their services out of a lower than average wages in our county. As is the case for several rural upper tier authorities, Norfolk receives faces higher costs for service provision across a dispersed population and that disparity causes many challenges, many challenges.
But it actually weakens our economic growth potential. And this is the key point I want to get across to the minister today. Today, rural upper tier authorities who often do not have the funds available to invest in those services that would drive economic growth, limited investment available, for example, rural infrastructure, transport, housing skills and broadband. If the government wants to see rural communities contribute more to national economic growth, and I really believe it does.
Growth in every postcode, it needs to recognise that funding local councils would be a good place to start, and I would therefore ask the Minister to consider three particular measures. Firstly, the future local government settlements need to include much stronger and more transparent rural sparsity components, taking account of not just population but road mileage, travel times, population age and the number of communities that the council has to serve. Of course, I'm.
14:44
Speaker 5
-
Speaker 5
Grateful to him, and he's making an excellent speech on the point that he makes about road mileage. I think he's absolutely right. Devon has over 8000 miles of road to maintain that, the largest of any upper tier authority in the country. Can he see that by partitioning Exeter from the rest of Devon from from from the rural Devon hinterland? What that's doing is stripping away the tax base from Devon Council, meaning they're just simply not able to provide other services that they would otherwise use to power growth.
14:45
Speaker 4
-
Speaker 4
I thank the honourable member for his intervention, and I do understand the Devon Road network very similar to Norfolk. We were paired as a council with Devon and there are obvious challenges with that. But as regards to local government reorganisation, I'm afraid I'm sure the minister has heard this point, but I won't comment. I can barely understand Norfolk's proposals that Devon's. But road mileage, travel times, population age and the number of communities that council serve is crucial.
I have 72 different villages in my constituency, three market towns and they are all different. Have unique challenges, but also unique opportunities. Second, the government needs to do more around the crisis, and I appreciate this is somewhat out of the minister's brief, but actually it's crucial in councils like ours trying to meet the growing cost of staying whilst delivering other services. And thirdly, more Norfolk specific. There needs to be sufficient funding for the reorganisation of Norfolk local government structures.
The objective should be to ensure that the money spent on creating new authorities does not come at the expense of the services that the authority is currently providing. I'm a huge supporter of devolution and local government reorganisation in Norfolk, but it is expensive, it is time consuming and the councils frankly have enough to worry about at the moment. Thank you.
I have 72 different villages in my constituency, three market towns and they are all different. Have unique challenges, but also unique opportunities. Second, the government needs to do more around the crisis, and I appreciate this is somewhat out of the minister's brief, but actually it's crucial in councils like ours trying to meet the growing cost of staying whilst delivering other services. And thirdly, more Norfolk specific. There needs to be sufficient funding for the reorganisation of Norfolk local government structures.
The objective should be to ensure that the money spent on creating new authorities does not come at the expense of the services that the authority is currently providing. I'm a huge supporter of devolution and local government reorganisation in Norfolk, but it is expensive, it is time consuming and the councils frankly have enough to worry about at the moment. Thank you.
14:46
Speaker 6
-
Speaker 6
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Pleasure to serve under your chairship. After admittedly a bit of a break since the last time, and I'd like to thank my hon. Friend the member for North Shropshire for setting out the case, so well as to the funding challenges facing upper tier councils. She quite correctly articulated the challenges in relation to special educational needs provision. I could also add home to school transport and, in our case of Oxfordshire, not just an ageing population, but also a growing population.
And with social care accounting for 52% of Oxfordshire County Council's budget in 2024 2025. But I want to focus on my remarks on perhaps the most visible public service that councils provide, and that's highways. And for this current financial year, Oxfordshire's government allocation for highway maintenance is £33.5 million. Now, this funding must maintain all highway assets, including 3009 miles of carriageway, nearly 2000 miles of footways and cycleways, 3500 bridges and public rights of way structures, 168,000 drainage assets and 124,000 electrical assets such as street lighting, traffic signals and safety infrastructure.
Now Oxfordshire County Council was graded green for the spend category of the Department for Transport's recent exercise, as part of the government ratings for local road maintenance road maintenance, meaning that the council invests significantly into maintaining its roads and goes beyond what the government funds. Independent modelling shows that in Oxfordshire, around £50 million per year is needed simply to maintain the network in its current condition, and that means that government funding falls short by around £16 million per year.
Now. Ideally, the county council would want to go even further to improve the condition of the roads rather than just maintain steady state. And then the figure would be even higher at £60 million per year in terms of the funds needed now. As a result, Oxfordshire consistently, consistently spends significantly more than it receives from government and highway maintenance, but it is still a long way off the amount required, and the council estimates that there is a maintenance funding backlog of over £700 million across the county's highway network, much of which is part, part of which is to do with the previous conservative administration.
And they've managed their stated managed decline policy. Now, this will only worsen with prolonged underfunding from central government. Now, Mrs. Barker, this is a national issue. We have members here from across the country, and whenever we discuss the subject of road surfaces, we have people from across the country. But without sustained funding, local authorities remain locked into a reactive cycle where potholes re-emerge faster than they can be eliminated.
Now, Oxfordshire County Council, despite these challenges, is trying to do things differently to get on to a proactive and preventative footing in relation to highways maintenance, the council has significantly improved its programme of gully clearance and delivered the largest programme of surface dressing in at least 20 years, investing £14.5 million and treating around two two point 2,000,000m² of carriageway to prevent potholes forming in the first place. In the last year alone, the council repaired over 57,000 defects, including 37 37,000 potholes.
The council is spending £8 million on new surface dressing programme this calendar year to tackle long term, long term road maintenance and prevent the formation of potholes. 87 roads across the county were treated between April and June, covering more than 1,000,000m² of carriageway across 62 towns and villages in Oxfordshire. Now, amidst these challenges, the changes to government funding formulae is going to mean a cut of £24.1 million over three years to Oxfordshire County Council's budget, which will further undermine its ability to do more preventative work.
And like so many councils, if government continues to make unwise decisions, we risk seeing a vicious spiral of cuts and deterioration, both to highways and wider services. Now, I feel it's important that we don't pit different parts of the country and different geographies and demographics against each other. Every part of the country has a need in one form or another. And of course, our new prime Minister has said this himself with the idea of good growth in every postcode.
And that's certainly something that the government has talked a lot about in Oxfordshire, with the Oxford to Cambridge Growth Corridor being so pivotal to scientific research and accommodating housing targets. But a new funding formula is needed, which clearly can't simply be based on the number of people alone. There are different challenges in urban and rural areas, and indeed those which fall between the two, as much of my constituency does. And there there remains a question of how we can work together to properly design, build and proactively maintain our roads and highways.
Individual councils acting alone cannot, cannot hope to solve that problem by doing their own thing in isolation of others. Now, Oxfordshire County Council will soon cease to exist as part of London local government reorganisation. So the question now remains what of the future? And I will conclude just by emphasising that those Oxford to Cambridge growth corridor aspirations are certainly not going to be achieved. If our councils are starved of funding and our highways further deteriorate.
And with social care accounting for 52% of Oxfordshire County Council's budget in 2024 2025. But I want to focus on my remarks on perhaps the most visible public service that councils provide, and that's highways. And for this current financial year, Oxfordshire's government allocation for highway maintenance is £33.5 million. Now, this funding must maintain all highway assets, including 3009 miles of carriageway, nearly 2000 miles of footways and cycleways, 3500 bridges and public rights of way structures, 168,000 drainage assets and 124,000 electrical assets such as street lighting, traffic signals and safety infrastructure.
Now Oxfordshire County Council was graded green for the spend category of the Department for Transport's recent exercise, as part of the government ratings for local road maintenance road maintenance, meaning that the council invests significantly into maintaining its roads and goes beyond what the government funds. Independent modelling shows that in Oxfordshire, around £50 million per year is needed simply to maintain the network in its current condition, and that means that government funding falls short by around £16 million per year.
Now. Ideally, the county council would want to go even further to improve the condition of the roads rather than just maintain steady state. And then the figure would be even higher at £60 million per year in terms of the funds needed now. As a result, Oxfordshire consistently, consistently spends significantly more than it receives from government and highway maintenance, but it is still a long way off the amount required, and the council estimates that there is a maintenance funding backlog of over £700 million across the county's highway network, much of which is part, part of which is to do with the previous conservative administration.
And they've managed their stated managed decline policy. Now, this will only worsen with prolonged underfunding from central government. Now, Mrs. Barker, this is a national issue. We have members here from across the country, and whenever we discuss the subject of road surfaces, we have people from across the country. But without sustained funding, local authorities remain locked into a reactive cycle where potholes re-emerge faster than they can be eliminated.
Now, Oxfordshire County Council, despite these challenges, is trying to do things differently to get on to a proactive and preventative footing in relation to highways maintenance, the council has significantly improved its programme of gully clearance and delivered the largest programme of surface dressing in at least 20 years, investing £14.5 million and treating around two two point 2,000,000m² of carriageway to prevent potholes forming in the first place. In the last year alone, the council repaired over 57,000 defects, including 37 37,000 potholes.
The council is spending £8 million on new surface dressing programme this calendar year to tackle long term, long term road maintenance and prevent the formation of potholes. 87 roads across the county were treated between April and June, covering more than 1,000,000m² of carriageway across 62 towns and villages in Oxfordshire. Now, amidst these challenges, the changes to government funding formulae is going to mean a cut of £24.1 million over three years to Oxfordshire County Council's budget, which will further undermine its ability to do more preventative work.
And like so many councils, if government continues to make unwise decisions, we risk seeing a vicious spiral of cuts and deterioration, both to highways and wider services. Now, I feel it's important that we don't pit different parts of the country and different geographies and demographics against each other. Every part of the country has a need in one form or another. And of course, our new prime Minister has said this himself with the idea of good growth in every postcode.
And that's certainly something that the government has talked a lot about in Oxfordshire, with the Oxford to Cambridge Growth Corridor being so pivotal to scientific research and accommodating housing targets. But a new funding formula is needed, which clearly can't simply be based on the number of people alone. There are different challenges in urban and rural areas, and indeed those which fall between the two, as much of my constituency does. And there there remains a question of how we can work together to properly design, build and proactively maintain our roads and highways.
Individual councils acting alone cannot, cannot hope to solve that problem by doing their own thing in isolation of others. Now, Oxfordshire County Council will soon cease to exist as part of London local government reorganisation. So the question now remains what of the future? And I will conclude just by emphasising that those Oxford to Cambridge growth corridor aspirations are certainly not going to be achieved. If our councils are starved of funding and our highways further deteriorate.
14:51
14:51
Speaker 7
-
Speaker 7
Whereas. Thank you, Miss Barker, and it's an honour to serve under your chairmanship. And I would also like to congratulate the member from North Shropshire for this important debate. I want to focus my comments specifically around send and home to school transport on Send. Cornwall is the 11th lowest funded of 151 local authorities, receiving less than half per pupil funding of Kensington and Chelsea. Over the last eight years.
The number of our pupils with an ehcp has almost doubled, but the delays in issuing EHC are far longer than average . In Cornwall, two thirds of those waiting for an ehcp wait over 20 weeks, compared with about 50% in England, meaning more stress, more uncertainty for Cornish children and their parents being a very large and long and remote coastal region, the additional costs of transport show up persistently in every aspect of Cornish life.
Cornwall Council's expenditure on home to school transport has increased by nearly 300% over the last seven years, a far steeper rise than for our urban counterparts. And when it comes to funding more broadly, being a coastal community with some of the UK's finest beaches is actually a double edged sword. In fact, it could be argued that we are damned by our natural beauty. Significant in-migration from wealthy English retirees does not only place additional pressures on healthcare and on our housing market, it also masks the true extent of deprivation within Treasury funding models.
In my constituency of Camborne-redruth and Hayle alone, the average weekly wages are nearly £100 less than the national average, and child poverty currently is at 35%. And whilst our remote coastal costs were recognised and we're very thankful that they were recognised in the local government funding settlement for adult social care, the. These cost pressures for home to school transport were not reflected . And I respectfully say to the minister, you cannot half apply a principle.
I will give way.
The number of our pupils with an ehcp has almost doubled, but the delays in issuing EHC are far longer than average . In Cornwall, two thirds of those waiting for an ehcp wait over 20 weeks, compared with about 50% in England, meaning more stress, more uncertainty for Cornish children and their parents being a very large and long and remote coastal region, the additional costs of transport show up persistently in every aspect of Cornish life.
Cornwall Council's expenditure on home to school transport has increased by nearly 300% over the last seven years, a far steeper rise than for our urban counterparts. And when it comes to funding more broadly, being a coastal community with some of the UK's finest beaches is actually a double edged sword. In fact, it could be argued that we are damned by our natural beauty. Significant in-migration from wealthy English retirees does not only place additional pressures on healthcare and on our housing market, it also masks the true extent of deprivation within Treasury funding models.
In my constituency of Camborne-redruth and Hayle alone, the average weekly wages are nearly £100 less than the national average, and child poverty currently is at 35%. And whilst our remote coastal costs were recognised and we're very thankful that they were recognised in the local government funding settlement for adult social care, the. These cost pressures for home to school transport were not reflected . And I respectfully say to the minister, you cannot half apply a principle.
I will give way.
14:54
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
To him for giving way, because he's making a really, really important and fundamental point is that everything costs more when it is spread out. So, for example, if you're a unitary authority, the bin collections cost a huge amount more in the home to school transport isn't just for send, it's for children who can't catch a bus to school because there's no bus. Everything costs a vastly significant quantity, more than it would do if you were just living down the road.
And it's really important that that is reflected in government funding formula, because it is absolutely crippling our councils at the moment. Would you agree with me on that point?
And it's really important that that is reflected in government funding formula, because it is absolutely crippling our councils at the moment. Would you agree with me on that point?
14:55
Speaker 7
-
Speaker 7
I thank her for her intervention, and I and I do agree. And, you know, in the 21st century, I cannot believe it's beyond the wit of man or woman that we cannot calculate some of these costs, some of these major costs that affect our rural and remote coastal areas compared with our urban counterparts. What I'm really conscious of is that we're not we're not trying to deprive the services that are available in urban areas.
It's about raising the level to the same standard as urban areas for our remote coastal and rural communities. And this brings me back to my central point. Despite these rising costs and demand, Cornwall is being asked to do far more with far less. And this is why we need a comprehensive non mayoral Cornwall only devolution deal that allows us to overcome some of the challenges of life in the Duchy.
It's about raising the level to the same standard as urban areas for our remote coastal and rural communities. And this brings me back to my central point. Despite these rising costs and demand, Cornwall is being asked to do far more with far less. And this is why we need a comprehensive non mayoral Cornwall only devolution deal that allows us to overcome some of the challenges of life in the Duchy.
14:56
14:56
Speaker 8
-
Speaker 8
A real pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. A big thank you to the Honourable Lady for North Shropshire for setting the scene so incredibly well. And it's good to see the honourable lady fighting for her constituents. And here's another supreme example of just that. As a member of Parliament for Strangford, a largely rural, I'm acutely aware of the challenges that face those in our rural communities, and I know the minister is responsible for that, but I'm here to support the honourable lady as she puts forward her case on behalf of her constituents to the minister, and I look forward to the answer from the Minister as well.
Can I say, Madam Chair, it's nice to see the minister back in position again, Minister, before an active backbencher and back again as a minister, and it's well done to him. For all his efforts, there are growing concerns about the level of support being provided to upper tier rural authorities in England. Excuse me. England's largest councils are expected to receive just £2 in government funding for every £1 of their rising costs over the next three years.
This comes as funding is increasingly being directed towards the urban areas and leaving local rural authorities facing an estimated some £11 billion funding gap. The consequences of this could be significant, with rural councils in particular likely having to reduce and to make cuts to everyday services such as libraries or community social care. Just some of the things that other honourable members have spoken about before and others will speak about afterwards. Analysis by the county Council network shows that county and large rural councils will face an additional £7 billion a year in service costs by 2029.
This follows on from their warnings at the beginning of the year. The government cuts are being severely felt in rural areas, with around 4 in 5 rural local authorities stating that they felt they were in a worse position following the autumn budget. Under the local government finance settlement, the network is called for a reinstatement of remoteness in the local government funding formula. Perhaps there is a case to be made which the Honourable Lady made exceptionally well. That remoteness must be part of a priority, part of a of a scoring card when it comes to funding to properly recognise that delivering services across sparsely populated areas costs considerably more.
The impact on rural communities. Madam chair, as always, I give a Northern Ireland perspective , not because the Minister has any answer to do for it, because he hasn't. But just to give an example where some of the things that honourable lady and others have said that we can relate to back home in Northern Ireland, when Northern Ireland does not have a two tier local government system, as our 11 councils are single tier authorities, only our rural councils face many of the same challenges.
Some of their challenges are as follows our councils play a much wider role than simply delivering standard local services. That is why it is of great concern to me that local community initiatives in rural areas are increasingly vulnerable to having their funding withdrawn. Some of those things that affect us in Northern Ireland are things that are affect the Honourable East constituency. Here in the mainland, for example, just one in March, concerns were raised about the potential closure of a youth forum in the Londonderry area due to funding difficulties.
This forum highlighted that rural isolation and social exclusion are precisely the types of issues these services are trying to address. Very things that the honourable Lady and others have said to seen and have requested, specifically in my own constituency of Strangford, elected their MP in 2010, but in 2015 the Ards and North Down were. Partnership was established to act as the administrative and financial lead for the Northern Ireland Rural Development Programme, an excellent programme that did great work in my constituency and indeed across the whole of Northern Ireland.
The programme was completed in 2022, but work must be allowed, must not be allowed to stop there. We must build on our success with sustained investment and that very Ards and North Down Rural Partnership is still working, still doing good things, and government back home has recognised that the rural isolation and the rural needs are specific. The Ards and North Down Rural Partnership demonstrates the difference and targeted investment can make in our rural communities. From improving the local play parks, from the green spaces, the harbour areas to supporting community centres.
Just a question to the Minister. Does the Minister agree that a quality does does not always mean treating every area the same, and that rural areas should receive funding that recognises the additional costs of delivering services across the countryside and in the rural community. The Prime Minister in his statement yesterday, which we all welcome, by the way, and be churlish for anyone not to welcome it, but he said, has seen a positive, seen a where he sees the United Kingdom a vision.
And he mentioned about hope. And that was one of the words that I took out of his statement. I wasn't there for. I was there for all of the statement. I wasn't there for, for all the answers to, to members, because there's other things to do. But we must ensure that policies are rural proofed. And my real fear is that we are not doing this and that the losers are the most vulnerable and isolated communities, and the economies of scale and isolation issues must be weighed when balancing the books.
So I look forward very much to to the Minister's response to address this for rural area. And again, I thank the Minister for his response to this debate. And just how will the government deliver support for the upper tier local authorities? That's the question I put forward. That's the one that I'm asking as well. Thanks so much.
Can I say, Madam Chair, it's nice to see the minister back in position again, Minister, before an active backbencher and back again as a minister, and it's well done to him. For all his efforts, there are growing concerns about the level of support being provided to upper tier rural authorities in England. Excuse me. England's largest councils are expected to receive just £2 in government funding for every £1 of their rising costs over the next three years.
This comes as funding is increasingly being directed towards the urban areas and leaving local rural authorities facing an estimated some £11 billion funding gap. The consequences of this could be significant, with rural councils in particular likely having to reduce and to make cuts to everyday services such as libraries or community social care. Just some of the things that other honourable members have spoken about before and others will speak about afterwards. Analysis by the county Council network shows that county and large rural councils will face an additional £7 billion a year in service costs by 2029.
This follows on from their warnings at the beginning of the year. The government cuts are being severely felt in rural areas, with around 4 in 5 rural local authorities stating that they felt they were in a worse position following the autumn budget. Under the local government finance settlement, the network is called for a reinstatement of remoteness in the local government funding formula. Perhaps there is a case to be made which the Honourable Lady made exceptionally well. That remoteness must be part of a priority, part of a of a scoring card when it comes to funding to properly recognise that delivering services across sparsely populated areas costs considerably more.
The impact on rural communities. Madam chair, as always, I give a Northern Ireland perspective , not because the Minister has any answer to do for it, because he hasn't. But just to give an example where some of the things that honourable lady and others have said that we can relate to back home in Northern Ireland, when Northern Ireland does not have a two tier local government system, as our 11 councils are single tier authorities, only our rural councils face many of the same challenges.
Some of their challenges are as follows our councils play a much wider role than simply delivering standard local services. That is why it is of great concern to me that local community initiatives in rural areas are increasingly vulnerable to having their funding withdrawn. Some of those things that affect us in Northern Ireland are things that are affect the Honourable East constituency. Here in the mainland, for example, just one in March, concerns were raised about the potential closure of a youth forum in the Londonderry area due to funding difficulties.
This forum highlighted that rural isolation and social exclusion are precisely the types of issues these services are trying to address. Very things that the honourable Lady and others have said to seen and have requested, specifically in my own constituency of Strangford, elected their MP in 2010, but in 2015 the Ards and North Down were. Partnership was established to act as the administrative and financial lead for the Northern Ireland Rural Development Programme, an excellent programme that did great work in my constituency and indeed across the whole of Northern Ireland.
The programme was completed in 2022, but work must be allowed, must not be allowed to stop there. We must build on our success with sustained investment and that very Ards and North Down Rural Partnership is still working, still doing good things, and government back home has recognised that the rural isolation and the rural needs are specific. The Ards and North Down Rural Partnership demonstrates the difference and targeted investment can make in our rural communities. From improving the local play parks, from the green spaces, the harbour areas to supporting community centres.
Just a question to the Minister. Does the Minister agree that a quality does does not always mean treating every area the same, and that rural areas should receive funding that recognises the additional costs of delivering services across the countryside and in the rural community. The Prime Minister in his statement yesterday, which we all welcome, by the way, and be churlish for anyone not to welcome it, but he said, has seen a positive, seen a where he sees the United Kingdom a vision.
And he mentioned about hope. And that was one of the words that I took out of his statement. I wasn't there for. I was there for all of the statement. I wasn't there for, for all the answers to, to members, because there's other things to do. But we must ensure that policies are rural proofed. And my real fear is that we are not doing this and that the losers are the most vulnerable and isolated communities, and the economies of scale and isolation issues must be weighed when balancing the books.
So I look forward very much to to the Minister's response to address this for rural area. And again, I thank the Minister for his response to this debate. And just how will the government deliver support for the upper tier local authorities? That's the question I put forward. That's the one that I'm asking as well. Thanks so much.
15:01
15:01
Speaker 9
-
Speaker 9
Thank you. It's an honour to serve under your Chairship and thank you to the member for North Shropshire for bringing this debate, which is important and relevant to me. I will probably shorten my speech a little as the minister is getting a double dose of Cornwall this afternoon. I apologize for that. We went underwent major local government consolidation early in Cornwall, so we became a unitary from a county council and six districts in 2009.
And we're now the third largest unitary in the country by population, fourth largest by area, but the 12th least densely populated of the 62. So that creates quite unique opportunities, but challenges as well. I wanted to talk a bit about third tier councils, because the establishment of our large unitary coincided with austerity, and the council withdrew from quite a lot of our services, all but the most statutory really, which meant that those third tier town and parish councils, they stepped up and took the reins and prevented the sell off and closure of all sorts of things like green spaces, toilets, libraries, leisure centres, so much of that infrastructure that made our town special.
That's great . Having the services run by the people who live in them and use them works. But there are issues about that that do need sorting out. So third tier councillors, when their councils grow, they still get no pay or expenses. We have conduct issues that clog up upper tier council monitoring officers desks who don't have the teeth to sort them out. Precepts in towns have grown significantly larger than those in rural parishes, so you get the situation where you can live across the road and be paying £30 for your precept, and then the other side of the road, you're paying for everything in the town.
So it could be a £400 plus per year. And those parish residents obviously still rely on those services. And the third tier councils, although they are now big in Cornwall and have big budgets of 5 or 6 million, are still not recognized or trusted to get external funding. Everything has to come through the unitary, which can lead to a bit of a parent child relationship. So in the previous white paper and we did have the support of the previous and the current Mhclg secretary about sorting some of these issues out and things like remote voting and meetings for tier councillors as well.
So I really hope that the department will pick that up again for those third tier councils. On devolution, we've obviously had the Prime Minister make a statement yesterday which was very, very welcome. The focus on further devolution and growth in every postcode is very welcome to those of us in places like Cornwall. We did have a devolution deal back in 2015. That was the first non-metropolitan Devo deal, and we got a level two deal in 2023.
And there have been a number of of situations that we've benefited, benefited quite a lot. Public transport, for example, we got the power to franchise buses and make enhanced partnerships back in 2015. So far, we've gone into enhanced partnerships, but we're now running a pilot to see how Enfranchising could work in rural areas because it's much more difficult to make it work in rural areas. But we did pick that up and run with it.
We were the first rural area to introduce smart ticketing, for example, so it will be interesting. US and North Yorkshire, I think it is to see how franchising could be possible in a rural place. Housing devolution could be really important there. We're working towards an MoU with Homes England, but that full strategic partnership would also be really helpful and important to US economic growth. We lost all our EU funding in 2020, of course, which put a real slowdown on our growth.
We did get obviously SPF, but that's now finished. We have had some industrial growth fund, which was fantastic, but we still continue to need that economic growth support in those emerging areas, which actually chime and align very well with the government's industrial strategy. And of course, the Prime Minister has been talking a lot about devolution of post 16 skills, which is something in Cornwall where we know our businesses, the council knows the Fe providers. That could work really well for us as well.
So I'm really excited about talking about a future devolution deal with the Prime Minister and going up to number ten North and making the epic trip to Manchester two days. But of course, while devolution is progress and exciting, it still can't overcome those financial pressures, pressures that face us more rural councils. Now, you've had some examples of about the things that cost more. Cornwall's core spending power has fallen between 2010 and 2018, obviously because of austerity and that conservative government and funding has improved since then, and the government has made efforts to create a fairer funding settlement.
But we're still below our real level terms. We have also used the second Homes Council tax premium, which brought in, I think, £23 million. But even with that, we're still in that position. So that Rurality and Peripherality makes things costs more. So we've had some examples. I'll just raise temporary accommodation, £50 in a Travelodge in the summer, over 100 sorry, in the winter, over 100 in the summer. Home to school transport is crazy expensive.
We don't have the we can't use buses. You end up using taxis. There are long distances. It's very, very difficult. And those contracts for emergency accommodation, which again go through the roof in the summer, and children's social care, when there are very few providers and the contracts get very few bidders. So it's very, very difficult. And we end up having people placed out of Cornwall, which is it's a very long way to go and is not good for the population.
Plus, of course, the population increase in the summer. So we get about 4 million visitors. This is fantastic. It's good for our economy, but it increases demand on those vital services, particularly things like environmental health, waste collection, emergency services and those public amenities, which of course may be something like an overnight visitor levy could be used, could be used for in that public realm. So we're obviously quite excited about the potential for that to be devolved as well.
So in conclusion, I think Cornwall kind of highlights the opportunities and the challenges of those very rural upper tier authorities. We are in a further down the line than a lot of other authorities and that we've had we've had a unitary for a long time, and we've seen where that takes us, particularly having lost services and then picked up being picked up by the third tiers. And devolution will be good for us because it will mean that those decisions are taken locally.
But for rural authorities to really thrive, that funding needs to reflect the additional costs and pressures of where we are in those sparsely populated areas. And the fact that transport particularly, particularly, is such a difficult thing for us.
And we're now the third largest unitary in the country by population, fourth largest by area, but the 12th least densely populated of the 62. So that creates quite unique opportunities, but challenges as well. I wanted to talk a bit about third tier councils, because the establishment of our large unitary coincided with austerity, and the council withdrew from quite a lot of our services, all but the most statutory really, which meant that those third tier town and parish councils, they stepped up and took the reins and prevented the sell off and closure of all sorts of things like green spaces, toilets, libraries, leisure centres, so much of that infrastructure that made our town special.
That's great . Having the services run by the people who live in them and use them works. But there are issues about that that do need sorting out. So third tier councillors, when their councils grow, they still get no pay or expenses. We have conduct issues that clog up upper tier council monitoring officers desks who don't have the teeth to sort them out. Precepts in towns have grown significantly larger than those in rural parishes, so you get the situation where you can live across the road and be paying £30 for your precept, and then the other side of the road, you're paying for everything in the town.
So it could be a £400 plus per year. And those parish residents obviously still rely on those services. And the third tier councils, although they are now big in Cornwall and have big budgets of 5 or 6 million, are still not recognized or trusted to get external funding. Everything has to come through the unitary, which can lead to a bit of a parent child relationship. So in the previous white paper and we did have the support of the previous and the current Mhclg secretary about sorting some of these issues out and things like remote voting and meetings for tier councillors as well.
So I really hope that the department will pick that up again for those third tier councils. On devolution, we've obviously had the Prime Minister make a statement yesterday which was very, very welcome. The focus on further devolution and growth in every postcode is very welcome to those of us in places like Cornwall. We did have a devolution deal back in 2015. That was the first non-metropolitan Devo deal, and we got a level two deal in 2023.
And there have been a number of of situations that we've benefited, benefited quite a lot. Public transport, for example, we got the power to franchise buses and make enhanced partnerships back in 2015. So far, we've gone into enhanced partnerships, but we're now running a pilot to see how Enfranchising could work in rural areas because it's much more difficult to make it work in rural areas. But we did pick that up and run with it.
We were the first rural area to introduce smart ticketing, for example, so it will be interesting. US and North Yorkshire, I think it is to see how franchising could be possible in a rural place. Housing devolution could be really important there. We're working towards an MoU with Homes England, but that full strategic partnership would also be really helpful and important to US economic growth. We lost all our EU funding in 2020, of course, which put a real slowdown on our growth.
We did get obviously SPF, but that's now finished. We have had some industrial growth fund, which was fantastic, but we still continue to need that economic growth support in those emerging areas, which actually chime and align very well with the government's industrial strategy. And of course, the Prime Minister has been talking a lot about devolution of post 16 skills, which is something in Cornwall where we know our businesses, the council knows the Fe providers. That could work really well for us as well.
So I'm really excited about talking about a future devolution deal with the Prime Minister and going up to number ten North and making the epic trip to Manchester two days. But of course, while devolution is progress and exciting, it still can't overcome those financial pressures, pressures that face us more rural councils. Now, you've had some examples of about the things that cost more. Cornwall's core spending power has fallen between 2010 and 2018, obviously because of austerity and that conservative government and funding has improved since then, and the government has made efforts to create a fairer funding settlement.
But we're still below our real level terms. We have also used the second Homes Council tax premium, which brought in, I think, £23 million. But even with that, we're still in that position. So that Rurality and Peripherality makes things costs more. So we've had some examples. I'll just raise temporary accommodation, £50 in a Travelodge in the summer, over 100 sorry, in the winter, over 100 in the summer. Home to school transport is crazy expensive.
We don't have the we can't use buses. You end up using taxis. There are long distances. It's very, very difficult. And those contracts for emergency accommodation, which again go through the roof in the summer, and children's social care, when there are very few providers and the contracts get very few bidders. So it's very, very difficult. And we end up having people placed out of Cornwall, which is it's a very long way to go and is not good for the population.
Plus, of course, the population increase in the summer. So we get about 4 million visitors. This is fantastic. It's good for our economy, but it increases demand on those vital services, particularly things like environmental health, waste collection, emergency services and those public amenities, which of course may be something like an overnight visitor levy could be used, could be used for in that public realm. So we're obviously quite excited about the potential for that to be devolved as well.
So in conclusion, I think Cornwall kind of highlights the opportunities and the challenges of those very rural upper tier authorities. We are in a further down the line than a lot of other authorities and that we've had we've had a unitary for a long time, and we've seen where that takes us, particularly having lost services and then picked up being picked up by the third tiers. And devolution will be good for us because it will mean that those decisions are taken locally.
But for rural authorities to really thrive, that funding needs to reflect the additional costs and pressures of where we are in those sparsely populated areas. And the fact that transport particularly, particularly, is such a difficult thing for us.
15:09
Speaker 10
-
Speaker 10
To serve with you in the chair, and I'd like to congratulate my hon. Friend the member for North Shropshire for securing this important debate. My very good friend the member for Didcot and Wantage warned earlier against pitting different parts of the UK against each other , and the risk of flying in the face of that advice and angering the member for South West Norfolk. I would just say that West Dorset is the most beautiful place to live, but like everyone else here, my rural community shares a lot of the same difficulties.
My constituents are spread across small towns and villages. Distances are longer, there are fewer service providers, and councils have fewer opportunities to achieve economies of scale. Almost half of Dorset's residents live in areas that are among the 20% most deprived nationally for access to services. That means access to GPS, to dentists, to post offices, to shops, to primary schools, all of which are much more difficult than in urban areas. And waste collection has been highlighted is difficult.
Vehicles have to travel further. Highways teams has highlighted have to cover more miles. Social care workers have to spend more time travelling between patients, and a child with special educational needs has to travel larger distance to reach the right school. At the same time, Dorset has one of the oldest populations in the country. 31% of residents are aged 65 or over and although I have repeated it many a time and it may well not be true, my favourite fact about West Dorset is that if we were a country, we would have the oldest population in the world.
We would be older than Japan. That matters because an ageing population creates additional demand for adult social care and other council services. The government has increased funding for local government and that is welcome. But our councils are still dealing with years of financial pressures and cuts alongside inflation, demographic change, the national living wage and increased national insurance costs. This was compounded by the change in the grant formulas to remove rurality in all our adult social care in the fair funding formula 2.0, the cost of providing home to school transport for children with special educational needs has risen 33% since 20 1617.
Dorset has the seventh highest weekly cost for children with send of any authority. In England, children can live a long way from the specialist provision they need, with less available capable specialist providers. Transport costs more. The same applies to adult social care. There are fewer providers willing to operate across rural areas because travelling between clients takes longer. Those providers that do operate in rural areas can charge more to cover the additional time and transport costs.
The council has more roads to maintain, more miles to travel and more dispersed communities to serve. So a funding formula that treats rural and urban areas the same does not produce a fair outcome. As has been highlighted in West Dorset, bus frequency has fallen by an astonishing 62% since 2010. Ten of Dorset's 14 towns have been identified as transport deserts or at serious risk of becoming one. Just over 1 in 5 people in large parts of rural Dorset cannot reach the town centre within 30 minutes by public transport.
Yet Dorset received just 3.8 million in the bus Services Improvement Plan funding, compared with 11.6 million for our neighbours , Dorset. The funding formula needs to recognise Rurality population, age, visitor number increases and accessibility needs. We also need to look at the future of Dorset and the wider Wessex region. Since 2025, Dorset Council has been working with Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council, Somerset and Wiltshire councils through the Wessex Partnership.
Wessex has a population of almost 2 million people. It already works together across areas including defence, clean energy, digital and life sciences. The partnership has developed a shared regional vision and is preparing to take on greater devolved responsibility. The government's current devolution framework will create different levels of opportunity depending on which model an area achieves. It is estimated that mayoral strategic authority status could provide around 460 million in additional funding each year across the Wessex region, that is about £245 per resident.
It is also estimated around 16 billion of additional economic output over 30 years. If other parts of the country receive powers and greater flexibility and greater funding than Wessex needs to be able to compete on a level playing field, I would ask that the minister agree to meet with the Wessex Partnership to discuss devolution for Wessex. If the government wants economic growth in every postcode, funding formulas need to recognise the real cost of rurality ageing populations.
The cost of providing services across large geographical areas. Rural communities should not receive less because delivering services just costs them more.
My constituents are spread across small towns and villages. Distances are longer, there are fewer service providers, and councils have fewer opportunities to achieve economies of scale. Almost half of Dorset's residents live in areas that are among the 20% most deprived nationally for access to services. That means access to GPS, to dentists, to post offices, to shops, to primary schools, all of which are much more difficult than in urban areas. And waste collection has been highlighted is difficult.
Vehicles have to travel further. Highways teams has highlighted have to cover more miles. Social care workers have to spend more time travelling between patients, and a child with special educational needs has to travel larger distance to reach the right school. At the same time, Dorset has one of the oldest populations in the country. 31% of residents are aged 65 or over and although I have repeated it many a time and it may well not be true, my favourite fact about West Dorset is that if we were a country, we would have the oldest population in the world.
We would be older than Japan. That matters because an ageing population creates additional demand for adult social care and other council services. The government has increased funding for local government and that is welcome. But our councils are still dealing with years of financial pressures and cuts alongside inflation, demographic change, the national living wage and increased national insurance costs. This was compounded by the change in the grant formulas to remove rurality in all our adult social care in the fair funding formula 2.0, the cost of providing home to school transport for children with special educational needs has risen 33% since 20 1617.
Dorset has the seventh highest weekly cost for children with send of any authority. In England, children can live a long way from the specialist provision they need, with less available capable specialist providers. Transport costs more. The same applies to adult social care. There are fewer providers willing to operate across rural areas because travelling between clients takes longer. Those providers that do operate in rural areas can charge more to cover the additional time and transport costs.
The council has more roads to maintain, more miles to travel and more dispersed communities to serve. So a funding formula that treats rural and urban areas the same does not produce a fair outcome. As has been highlighted in West Dorset, bus frequency has fallen by an astonishing 62% since 2010. Ten of Dorset's 14 towns have been identified as transport deserts or at serious risk of becoming one. Just over 1 in 5 people in large parts of rural Dorset cannot reach the town centre within 30 minutes by public transport.
Yet Dorset received just 3.8 million in the bus Services Improvement Plan funding, compared with 11.6 million for our neighbours , Dorset. The funding formula needs to recognise Rurality population, age, visitor number increases and accessibility needs. We also need to look at the future of Dorset and the wider Wessex region. Since 2025, Dorset Council has been working with Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council, Somerset and Wiltshire councils through the Wessex Partnership.
Wessex has a population of almost 2 million people. It already works together across areas including defence, clean energy, digital and life sciences. The partnership has developed a shared regional vision and is preparing to take on greater devolved responsibility. The government's current devolution framework will create different levels of opportunity depending on which model an area achieves. It is estimated that mayoral strategic authority status could provide around 460 million in additional funding each year across the Wessex region, that is about £245 per resident.
It is also estimated around 16 billion of additional economic output over 30 years. If other parts of the country receive powers and greater flexibility and greater funding than Wessex needs to be able to compete on a level playing field, I would ask that the minister agree to meet with the Wessex Partnership to discuss devolution for Wessex. If the government wants economic growth in every postcode, funding formulas need to recognise the real cost of rurality ageing populations.
The cost of providing services across large geographical areas. Rural communities should not receive less because delivering services just costs them more.
15:14
Speaker 11
-
Speaker 11
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It's a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I also congratulate the honourable member for North Shropshire on securing this debate, and I also declare my interest as chair of the all party parliamentary group for the rural, powerhouse and rural business. This government has rebuilt the local government funding formula and launched an ambitious devolution agenda, both in the name of fairness and moving power closer to closer to the people.
I question how that's working. Ministers say that the new funding formula matches money to need, and that by the end of this settlement, the most deprived places will receive 45% more funding per head than the least deprived. Nobody disputes that deprivation matters, but measuring deprivation in rural areas is not straightforward. According to the county councils network, county authorities will receive only £345 per head in grant funding, against a national average of 526, and will therefore have to find over 90% of any budget increase from council tax alone.
That means they will receive roughly 2% of any additional government money for every pound of new cost pressure, while metropolitan boroughs receive £0.42. That is an enormous difference. While individual councils vary, the Rural Services network shows that rural residents already pay 70% more council tax per head than urban residents, despite lower wages on average. And that gap is projected to widen every year of this settlement. As others have pointed out, the government removed the remoteness indicator from every part of the funding formula except adult social care.
How does a remote child cost less to reach than a remote adult? Part of the current recovery grant is also still allocated using 2019 deprivation figures, even though updated 2025 data already exists and is even used elsewhere in the very same formula. This makes no sense, and perhaps the minister can explain. There is an unspoken assumption here that needs correcting. Rural does not necessarily mean rich research into so-called pretty poverty in Cornwall shows real deprivation, but it's hidden behind a scenic view.
Measures built to track deprivation in cities simply fail to spot it. The government's new devolution devolution programme has the same design fault evidence I have heard this year from rural bodies and local leaders is consistent combined authority structures, funding pools and business rates. Growth incentives were all built around city region. Economics first and don't necessarily work the same way in rural areas. One flagship funding tool, which is full retention of business rates growth, was piloted in Greater Manchester.
So will the minister say whether that model has been tested, where the business rate base is small and slow growing, as it typically is in rural England? And again, in honor of my Cornish colleagues corner Sorry, Cornwall tried a version of full retention in 2018 and they had to give up its Rural Services grant as the price of entry. I would not want rural authorities steered towards a tool that only rewards growth, but will lack the tax base to successfully generate it.
If this government is serious about devolution, it has to mean something for parish and town councils, not just mayors and unitary authorities. There is no proper funding settlement and no training offer for the clerks and officers, who will increasingly be asked to take on responsibilities that have been devolved down from a disappearing district tier, as in my area of Horsham, with the best will in the world, they're not properly equipped for this. The fundamental assumption of the fair funding formula is that more deprived, mainly urban authorities, have had a raw deal compared to rural shire counties.
But the clear fact is that every type of council has been struggling over a long period. My own County Council of West Sussex is carrying out almost 200, is carrying almost 200 million of debt under its dedicated schools grant, as in special educational needs. So even with the proposed 90% reduction in deaths, which is welcome, that still leaves 20 million to be stripped out of a general budget that is, frankly, already buckling under the strain.
The government's policy risks forcing yet more cuts on services that have already been cut too far. Two thirds of spending in West Sussex is ring fenced, which means portfolios like highways or buses transport have to bear the whole burden of any savings. This new funding formula risks condemning councils across the country to failure. But they're mostly not Labour councils, and it is hard not to see a political angle to this. Does a pothole cost more to fix in a deprived area than a wealthier one? No, it does not.
The cost of many council services is not related at all to deprivation, so it's wrong to build an entire funding formula around that one criteria. Local councils aren't the main cause of deprivation, and neither can they be the main fix. This government promised to help working people and to devolve power. Rural authorities are still waiting. I hope the minister will commit today to using 2025 data consistently to reinstating remoteness across the whole formula, and to properly funding and training parish and town councils.
So devolution reaches the communities it is meant to serve. Thank you, Mr..
I question how that's working. Ministers say that the new funding formula matches money to need, and that by the end of this settlement, the most deprived places will receive 45% more funding per head than the least deprived. Nobody disputes that deprivation matters, but measuring deprivation in rural areas is not straightforward. According to the county councils network, county authorities will receive only £345 per head in grant funding, against a national average of 526, and will therefore have to find over 90% of any budget increase from council tax alone.
That means they will receive roughly 2% of any additional government money for every pound of new cost pressure, while metropolitan boroughs receive £0.42. That is an enormous difference. While individual councils vary, the Rural Services network shows that rural residents already pay 70% more council tax per head than urban residents, despite lower wages on average. And that gap is projected to widen every year of this settlement. As others have pointed out, the government removed the remoteness indicator from every part of the funding formula except adult social care.
How does a remote child cost less to reach than a remote adult? Part of the current recovery grant is also still allocated using 2019 deprivation figures, even though updated 2025 data already exists and is even used elsewhere in the very same formula. This makes no sense, and perhaps the minister can explain. There is an unspoken assumption here that needs correcting. Rural does not necessarily mean rich research into so-called pretty poverty in Cornwall shows real deprivation, but it's hidden behind a scenic view.
Measures built to track deprivation in cities simply fail to spot it. The government's new devolution devolution programme has the same design fault evidence I have heard this year from rural bodies and local leaders is consistent combined authority structures, funding pools and business rates. Growth incentives were all built around city region. Economics first and don't necessarily work the same way in rural areas. One flagship funding tool, which is full retention of business rates growth, was piloted in Greater Manchester.
So will the minister say whether that model has been tested, where the business rate base is small and slow growing, as it typically is in rural England? And again, in honor of my Cornish colleagues corner Sorry, Cornwall tried a version of full retention in 2018 and they had to give up its Rural Services grant as the price of entry. I would not want rural authorities steered towards a tool that only rewards growth, but will lack the tax base to successfully generate it.
If this government is serious about devolution, it has to mean something for parish and town councils, not just mayors and unitary authorities. There is no proper funding settlement and no training offer for the clerks and officers, who will increasingly be asked to take on responsibilities that have been devolved down from a disappearing district tier, as in my area of Horsham, with the best will in the world, they're not properly equipped for this. The fundamental assumption of the fair funding formula is that more deprived, mainly urban authorities, have had a raw deal compared to rural shire counties.
But the clear fact is that every type of council has been struggling over a long period. My own County Council of West Sussex is carrying out almost 200, is carrying almost 200 million of debt under its dedicated schools grant, as in special educational needs. So even with the proposed 90% reduction in deaths, which is welcome, that still leaves 20 million to be stripped out of a general budget that is, frankly, already buckling under the strain.
The government's policy risks forcing yet more cuts on services that have already been cut too far. Two thirds of spending in West Sussex is ring fenced, which means portfolios like highways or buses transport have to bear the whole burden of any savings. This new funding formula risks condemning councils across the country to failure. But they're mostly not Labour councils, and it is hard not to see a political angle to this. Does a pothole cost more to fix in a deprived area than a wealthier one? No, it does not.
The cost of many council services is not related at all to deprivation, so it's wrong to build an entire funding formula around that one criteria. Local councils aren't the main cause of deprivation, and neither can they be the main fix. This government promised to help working people and to devolve power. Rural authorities are still waiting. I hope the minister will commit today to using 2025 data consistently to reinstating remoteness across the whole formula, and to properly funding and training parish and town councils.
So devolution reaches the communities it is meant to serve. Thank you, Mr..
15:20
15:20
Speaker 12
-
Speaker 12
It's a pleasure to serve with you in the chair. And I would like to thank my hon. Friend the member for North Shropshire for securing this important debate before moving to rural South Devon in 2007. I had spent all my life living in and around major cities Edinburgh, Sheffield and then London, and after nearly 20 years living in the rural South west, I can honestly say that I had previously not understood rural life because I hadn't lived it.
I have since come to realise that the rural urban divide is possibly one of the deepest divides in our country, and one that is too often overlooked, especially by governments made up of city and urban MPs who just simply don't understand the reality of rural communities, and fail to see the deprivation that lurks behind the hedgerows, communities that are so often forgotten when spending decisions are taken, despite the set of circumstances that mean we desperately need the government's financial backing, incomes are lower due to the older average age.
Jobs are often seasonal and low waged. People in rural areas travel almost twice as far as those in urban areas, there's often no public transport. Health care is a challenge because community services are cut, hospitals are miles away and hospital transport has all but disappeared. High speed internet is crucial when services are scarce, yet broadband connectivity lags far behind urban areas. Banks, pubs and post offices are closing, hollowing out communities, increasing rural isolation and a high number of second homes.
As the honourable member members, all of them from Cornwall, have have have said, the high number of second homes, high house prices and low wages massively exacerbates the affordability crisis when it comes to housing, and in Devon, the house price to full time salary ratio is 10.6, well above the England average of 8.7. And yet, despite all of this, funding is persistently driven into urban areas while rural communities are left behind. The previous conservative government forced councils to do more with less their policy to force rural, to force local authorities to use their reserves to subsidise their revenue.
Expenditure was deeply wrong and as a result, six rural upper tier local authorities are on the brink of issuing section 114 notices, which would effectively declare them bankrupt. The current government have committed to providing multiyear funding settlements for local authorities, which we welcome. But for rural communities, the 26 7 to 28 nine settlement falls well short. The withdrawal of the Rural Services delivery grant was a huge blow to councils in Devon, costing about £14 million, and no rural councils benefited from the replacement funding or recovery grant.
The new formulas mean that local authorities in cities will have higher spending power than in previous years, while rural shire districts will have less to spend under the local government finance settlement for this year, urban councils will receive 32% more per head than rural councils in government funded spending. Devon County Council will receive £1,056 in core spending power per head, compared to Hackney councils, £1,645, or Liverpool City Councils 1598. It doesn't cost 50% more to provide services in Hackney or Liverpool than in Devon.
In fact, I would argue potentially it costs less because of the rurality. Furthermore, the government's 26 to 29 local government finance settlement does not include any explicit support for rural upper tier authorities. The new formula has included remoteness only as an uplift in the formula for adult social care. And as my honourable friend said, a rural child is not easier to service than a rural adult. It is utterly shocking that the government does not believe that remoteness is relevant to the delivery of any other service, like school transport or waste collection, and it goes way beyond just the additional time it takes to travel.
Rural councils have several other considerations that Urban council simply don't have to contend with, including requiring more service centres due to the spread out population. More professionals to cover visits across a rural area receiving fewer responses to contract tenders, perhaps only from the incumbent provider, which leads to a market with increased prices for services. Physical constraints, especially in Devon, near where I live, with the narrow lanes such as needing to use smaller refuse vehicles simply to get down the lane, which then have to return to base more often to be emptied, rather than using larger vehicles and having multiple depots for equipment and vehicles, and thus needing more equipment to service the streets and more drivers.
Pockets of deprivation, often hidden by prettiness, are particularly hard hit. Social mobility for young people living in deprived rural areas is one of the lowest in the country, and none of this is considered in the new funding formula outside of adult social care, and I urge the minister to review this. Quite simply, the new system of allocation does not recognise that the sparse and isolated nature of rural areas drives higher costs for the delivery of essential services, creates challenges in recruitment of staff for key services, and requires local authorities to provide a greater public subsidy for the provision of public transport.
This is very much in keeping with a Labour government that has persistently failed to acknowledge that every service is harder to deliver across rural areas, and let me use Devon to illustrate why this service delivery is so tough. Rural Devon Is Over is a drive of over 100 miles from north to south. It would take me ten hours to walk just across my constituency, which is a fraction of the county and nowhere near the biggest.
I'm not sure how Manchester tourism will translate to rural areas, but you cannot apply the same principles to a city of 3 million people and villages with just ten houses, and expect to see the same results . And the trajectory for rural councils over the next three years is deeply concerning. The very limited increase in government funding will require service reductions or significant increases in council tax or business rate income to maintain core spending power. And, as has been said, rural residents will pay 17% more in council tax per head compared to urban residents this year.
And yet government funding will be directed towards urban authorities. The government is relying on a regressive council tax to fund services in rural areas that it was never meant to. As a result of this funding settlement, by 2829 urban councils will have seen a 20% increase in government funded spending power, compared to only 2% for rural councils. How can that be fair? These aren't just numbers on a spreadsheet. It's people's lives we're talking about.
From the growing number of children with Send who can't access the support they need, to the closing of vital community spaces like libraries and leisure centres. This lack of funding has a real impact on people. We are concerned by the government's decision to allocate additional funding within the local government finance settlement on a need and demand basis. It will jeopardise the sustainability of rural local councils and the Liberal Democrats oppose the three year local government finance settlement, which doesn't go far enough in providing a truly fair funding settlement to all local authorities across the board.
So we urge the government to provide rural councils with a funding settlement that reflects the true impact of rurality and sparsity of the areas they serve, through the application of the fair funding formula, the ability to provide services to people in my constituency and across rural Devon is only going to be made worse by the proposal for four unitary authorities that the government has recently chosen for the local government reorganisation in Devon, and I urge the Minister to bear with me on this.
A proposal from Labour run Plymouth and Exeter that will see these two cities massively expanded to the great delight of their Labour MPs and a new urban growth area based around Torbay, leaving a fourth authority which were the bits that were simply left behind when
I have since come to realise that the rural urban divide is possibly one of the deepest divides in our country, and one that is too often overlooked, especially by governments made up of city and urban MPs who just simply don't understand the reality of rural communities, and fail to see the deprivation that lurks behind the hedgerows, communities that are so often forgotten when spending decisions are taken, despite the set of circumstances that mean we desperately need the government's financial backing, incomes are lower due to the older average age.
Jobs are often seasonal and low waged. People in rural areas travel almost twice as far as those in urban areas, there's often no public transport. Health care is a challenge because community services are cut, hospitals are miles away and hospital transport has all but disappeared. High speed internet is crucial when services are scarce, yet broadband connectivity lags far behind urban areas. Banks, pubs and post offices are closing, hollowing out communities, increasing rural isolation and a high number of second homes.
As the honourable member members, all of them from Cornwall, have have have said, the high number of second homes, high house prices and low wages massively exacerbates the affordability crisis when it comes to housing, and in Devon, the house price to full time salary ratio is 10.6, well above the England average of 8.7. And yet, despite all of this, funding is persistently driven into urban areas while rural communities are left behind. The previous conservative government forced councils to do more with less their policy to force rural, to force local authorities to use their reserves to subsidise their revenue.
Expenditure was deeply wrong and as a result, six rural upper tier local authorities are on the brink of issuing section 114 notices, which would effectively declare them bankrupt. The current government have committed to providing multiyear funding settlements for local authorities, which we welcome. But for rural communities, the 26 7 to 28 nine settlement falls well short. The withdrawal of the Rural Services delivery grant was a huge blow to councils in Devon, costing about £14 million, and no rural councils benefited from the replacement funding or recovery grant.
The new formulas mean that local authorities in cities will have higher spending power than in previous years, while rural shire districts will have less to spend under the local government finance settlement for this year, urban councils will receive 32% more per head than rural councils in government funded spending. Devon County Council will receive £1,056 in core spending power per head, compared to Hackney councils, £1,645, or Liverpool City Councils 1598. It doesn't cost 50% more to provide services in Hackney or Liverpool than in Devon.
In fact, I would argue potentially it costs less because of the rurality. Furthermore, the government's 26 to 29 local government finance settlement does not include any explicit support for rural upper tier authorities. The new formula has included remoteness only as an uplift in the formula for adult social care. And as my honourable friend said, a rural child is not easier to service than a rural adult. It is utterly shocking that the government does not believe that remoteness is relevant to the delivery of any other service, like school transport or waste collection, and it goes way beyond just the additional time it takes to travel.
Rural councils have several other considerations that Urban council simply don't have to contend with, including requiring more service centres due to the spread out population. More professionals to cover visits across a rural area receiving fewer responses to contract tenders, perhaps only from the incumbent provider, which leads to a market with increased prices for services. Physical constraints, especially in Devon, near where I live, with the narrow lanes such as needing to use smaller refuse vehicles simply to get down the lane, which then have to return to base more often to be emptied, rather than using larger vehicles and having multiple depots for equipment and vehicles, and thus needing more equipment to service the streets and more drivers.
Pockets of deprivation, often hidden by prettiness, are particularly hard hit. Social mobility for young people living in deprived rural areas is one of the lowest in the country, and none of this is considered in the new funding formula outside of adult social care, and I urge the minister to review this. Quite simply, the new system of allocation does not recognise that the sparse and isolated nature of rural areas drives higher costs for the delivery of essential services, creates challenges in recruitment of staff for key services, and requires local authorities to provide a greater public subsidy for the provision of public transport.
This is very much in keeping with a Labour government that has persistently failed to acknowledge that every service is harder to deliver across rural areas, and let me use Devon to illustrate why this service delivery is so tough. Rural Devon Is Over is a drive of over 100 miles from north to south. It would take me ten hours to walk just across my constituency, which is a fraction of the county and nowhere near the biggest.
I'm not sure how Manchester tourism will translate to rural areas, but you cannot apply the same principles to a city of 3 million people and villages with just ten houses, and expect to see the same results . And the trajectory for rural councils over the next three years is deeply concerning. The very limited increase in government funding will require service reductions or significant increases in council tax or business rate income to maintain core spending power. And, as has been said, rural residents will pay 17% more in council tax per head compared to urban residents this year.
And yet government funding will be directed towards urban authorities. The government is relying on a regressive council tax to fund services in rural areas that it was never meant to. As a result of this funding settlement, by 2829 urban councils will have seen a 20% increase in government funded spending power, compared to only 2% for rural councils. How can that be fair? These aren't just numbers on a spreadsheet. It's people's lives we're talking about.
From the growing number of children with Send who can't access the support they need, to the closing of vital community spaces like libraries and leisure centres. This lack of funding has a real impact on people. We are concerned by the government's decision to allocate additional funding within the local government finance settlement on a need and demand basis. It will jeopardise the sustainability of rural local councils and the Liberal Democrats oppose the three year local government finance settlement, which doesn't go far enough in providing a truly fair funding settlement to all local authorities across the board.
So we urge the government to provide rural councils with a funding settlement that reflects the true impact of rurality and sparsity of the areas they serve, through the application of the fair funding formula, the ability to provide services to people in my constituency and across rural Devon is only going to be made worse by the proposal for four unitary authorities that the government has recently chosen for the local government reorganisation in Devon, and I urge the Minister to bear with me on this.
A proposal from Labour run Plymouth and Exeter that will see these two cities massively expanded to the great delight of their Labour MPs and a new urban growth area based around Torbay, leaving a fourth authority which were the bits that were simply left behind when
15:27
Speaker 4
-
Speaker 4
That were simply left behind when the urban areas were gouged out. Stretching 70 miles from Ilfracombe in the north to Salcombe in the south, about 100 miles by road. An authority that will have to maintain a road network not dissimilar to the whole of Luxembourg, with no major town to offer opportunities for growth and regeneration, and the deprived area of Devon to support.
15:28
15:28
15:28
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
It's a really interesting point, isn't it? Because the the point of having combined authorities is that you derive economies of scale from having urban areas and rural areas placed together. And so some of those economies of scale can be driven by the density and the urban area. It makes no sense to split out the urban and rural areas in the way that she describes. Does she agree with me?
15:28
Speaker 4
-
Speaker 4
I absolutely agree with the honourable member. It makes no sense to any of us in Devon. I have spent the entire summer listening to constituents who are deeply distressed about what has happened, leaving them in a rump rural local authority with no option for economic growth or regeneration. I will give way.
15:28
Speaker 13
-
Speaker 13
I thank the honourable member for giving way and as a part, Devon Member of Parliament. Obviously, the other part of my constituency is in Somerset. I entirely agree with what the honourable member is saying. My constituency in Devon is 800 miles square, and it's just going to form a part of an enormous rural authority which doesn't have the fiscal power to sustain itself. Will you does the honourable member agree with me?
15:29
Speaker 4
-
Speaker 4
Absolutely. Absolutely agree. The government ignored local voices, went with the proposal that came fourth out of fifth in a public consultation, but was backed by Labour council leaders and Labour MPs who had the minister's ear and wanted to expand their cities. None of my constituents want it. I've spent the whole summer listening to distressed residents, as has my neighbour, the member for South West Devon. It was a blatant prioritisation of economic growth for the cities of Plymouth and Exeter, at the expense of the economic and social cohesion of rural Devon.
How does the government expect this council to be financially viable when it deems remoteness irrelevant to the delivery of every service except adult social care? And no one can even work out where this authority could be based. How can rural Devon expect growth in every postcode when there is clearly no consideration of the economic growth potential for rural Devon? In the chosen proposal very nearly finished, the Prime Minister talked yesterday about supporting rural areas and not creating a two tier country, but the government have created a two tier Devon, so I urge the Minister to listen to many of the Devon MPs, to the local people, to go back to the drawing board on the reorganisation.
Devon, look at the alternative options that were on the table and pick one that will not leave rural communities struggling even more than they are now. If we're going to have any hope of bridging the urban rural divide, a fair funding settlement for rural councils and local government reorganisation that works for rural areas must be the start. And if the Prime Minister wants a political system and economy that works for every person in the country, then the government must change the way it values and recognises rural communities.
Thank you.
How does the government expect this council to be financially viable when it deems remoteness irrelevant to the delivery of every service except adult social care? And no one can even work out where this authority could be based. How can rural Devon expect growth in every postcode when there is clearly no consideration of the economic growth potential for rural Devon? In the chosen proposal very nearly finished, the Prime Minister talked yesterday about supporting rural areas and not creating a two tier country, but the government have created a two tier Devon, so I urge the Minister to listen to many of the Devon MPs, to the local people, to go back to the drawing board on the reorganisation.
Devon, look at the alternative options that were on the table and pick one that will not leave rural communities struggling even more than they are now. If we're going to have any hope of bridging the urban rural divide, a fair funding settlement for rural councils and local government reorganisation that works for rural areas must be the start. And if the Prime Minister wants a political system and economy that works for every person in the country, then the government must change the way it values and recognises rural communities.
Thank you.
15:30
15:30
Speaker 14
-
Speaker 14
a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, and I'd like to welcome the minister back to his place. I commend the honourable member for North Shropshire for securing this important debate and giving us the opportunity to speak about the rural areas that this Labour Government are neglecting. Whilst my constituency of Broxbourne might not be the most rural, although it is home to a handful of farms and the beautiful Lee Valley Regional Park, I am well aware of the pressures faced by rural communities, and that is clear from honourable members from across this chamber today.
Having started off with the infamous family farm tax, the government are now moving on to implement the unfair funding review. This change in the funding formula for local government seems to have been designed with the express purpose of stripping away funding from rural areas, just to hand it to urban ones. Many rural. Yes, I will get.
Having started off with the infamous family farm tax, the government are now moving on to implement the unfair funding review. This change in the funding formula for local government seems to have been designed with the express purpose of stripping away funding from rural areas, just to hand it to urban ones. Many rural. Yes, I will get.
15:31
15:32
Speaker 14
-
Speaker 14
There were. There were lots of difficult decisions that have to be made, not just slightly. Politely say to him, his party is now in government. Now we will see the metal that they're made of, with the difficult decisions that they will have to make in the coming months when they produce their budget. And we'll see how that goes down with the British people outside. As I was saying, many rural councils face real challenges across the board, and now they're expected to cope with even fewer resources.
In my own area of Hertfordshire, a semi-rural local authority, the county council is facing a reduction of funding of around £50 million a year. This is thanks to this Labour government. This is despite its already being under extreme pressure by an unfavourable Send funding formula. Under this formula, Hertfordshire receives one of the lowest funding allocations per head and would receive millions more if it was funded at the same rate as other areas.
When it comes to send, it is rural authorities that lose out. Inner London boroughs receive thousands of pounds more in high needs block funding per pupil. For example, a child in Camden is allocated four times as much as a child in Yorkshire. It shouldn't matter where you are born in this country. Children with special educational needs deserve the same resources. I'm sure all honourable members from right across this House can agree with that.
Similarly, rural authorities have been ignored throughout the local government without throughout this government, top down local government reorganisation, as we have seen in Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and other areas. It is rural towns and villages that are now being absorbed into new unitary authorities dominated by cities. This will only result in rural areas being more marginalised and left even further behind. On that point, I will give way.
In my own area of Hertfordshire, a semi-rural local authority, the county council is facing a reduction of funding of around £50 million a year. This is thanks to this Labour government. This is despite its already being under extreme pressure by an unfavourable Send funding formula. Under this formula, Hertfordshire receives one of the lowest funding allocations per head and would receive millions more if it was funded at the same rate as other areas.
When it comes to send, it is rural authorities that lose out. Inner London boroughs receive thousands of pounds more in high needs block funding per pupil. For example, a child in Camden is allocated four times as much as a child in Yorkshire. It shouldn't matter where you are born in this country. Children with special educational needs deserve the same resources. I'm sure all honourable members from right across this House can agree with that.
Similarly, rural authorities have been ignored throughout the local government without throughout this government, top down local government reorganisation, as we have seen in Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and other areas. It is rural towns and villages that are now being absorbed into new unitary authorities dominated by cities. This will only result in rural areas being more marginalised and left even further behind. On that point, I will give way.
15:33
15:33
15:34
Speaker 14
-
Speaker 14
I thank the honourable member for his point. Now, I did think someone might make that point throughout this debate today, and we've all been in debates where I've been in debates, where there's been no Labour MPs turn up or no Liberal Democrat MPs turn up. As I as I speak, when I go out and speak to my. When I go out and speak to my constituents, I explain. When you turn on the TV and you see the chamber and it's not full.
There are many calls upon members of Parliament's time, and I just gently say to the honourable member, there will be some constituents watching debates that he is not in attendance in that they will be unhappy with. So maybe we could just think about that before we make interventions on that topic. As I was saying, this government's top down local government reorganisation has seen rural communities left behind. Rural communities and rural authorities have also been hugely hit with high increase housing targets, forcing them to build over the green belt and ruin the character of their areas.
These have increased by up to 487%, while many Labour run urban areas have seen their targets decrease, the new prime minister likes to talk about devolving power to every postcode. But the only changes people in rural areas have seen is money and power being taken away from them. These are the people that this Labour government should be championing. The hard working people who have too often been left behind, but instead they are being sidelined and ignored.
The government need to take time to actually listen to the rural community and protect their way of life. I may not represent most of the rural parts of this country. Like other honourable members in this room who have so passionately spoken about their rural areas. But it does not take much to work out the forced local government reorganisation, increases in taxes, reduced funding formulas and are the exact opposite of how the government should be supporting rural local authorities.
There are many calls upon members of Parliament's time, and I just gently say to the honourable member, there will be some constituents watching debates that he is not in attendance in that they will be unhappy with. So maybe we could just think about that before we make interventions on that topic. As I was saying, this government's top down local government reorganisation has seen rural communities left behind. Rural communities and rural authorities have also been hugely hit with high increase housing targets, forcing them to build over the green belt and ruin the character of their areas.
These have increased by up to 487%, while many Labour run urban areas have seen their targets decrease, the new prime minister likes to talk about devolving power to every postcode. But the only changes people in rural areas have seen is money and power being taken away from them. These are the people that this Labour government should be championing. The hard working people who have too often been left behind, but instead they are being sidelined and ignored.
The government need to take time to actually listen to the rural community and protect their way of life. I may not represent most of the rural parts of this country. Like other honourable members in this room who have so passionately spoken about their rural areas. But it does not take much to work out the forced local government reorganisation, increases in taxes, reduced funding formulas and are the exact opposite of how the government should be supporting rural local authorities.
15:36
15:36
15:36
Speaker 7
-
Speaker 7
It's a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship and also to hear the debate and the passion that members have for their areas. I quite like the county competition play for the most beautiful part of England, but I'm sure we can agree that coast to coast England in itself is magnificent and we should all celebrate that. I'll respond to the debate in due course, but I do want to maybe start by kind of grounding some of the differences here, because I think we are using common language for things that are very different.
I think we are conflating in places devolution and the powers that are going to be devolved with the fair funding review and the funding that goes to local authorities. I think in some cases, there isn't clarity on what a subregional authority will do going forward to the local authority, to community governance, whether that's neighbourhood governance in some councils or town and parish councils either, I think in this debate has become one and the same. Now, I don't criticize that.
And actually I say I recognise why that happens, because we're all here to represent places, not units of government in itself. And so what we care about is whether or not our communities are getting the resources that are needed. But it is important to. Yeah, of course.
I think we are conflating in places devolution and the powers that are going to be devolved with the fair funding review and the funding that goes to local authorities. I think in some cases, there isn't clarity on what a subregional authority will do going forward to the local authority, to community governance, whether that's neighbourhood governance in some councils or town and parish councils either, I think in this debate has become one and the same. Now, I don't criticize that.
And actually I say I recognise why that happens, because we're all here to represent places, not units of government in itself. And so what we care about is whether or not our communities are getting the resources that are needed. But it is important to. Yeah, of course.
15:37
15:37
Speaker 10
-
Speaker 10
Giving way. Just on that specific point, I think part of the reason why there is a conflation between devolution and local government funding settlement is that if you take something like the visitor levy, because our local councils are so deprived in some areas in terms of funding, they're going to have to use funding that wasn't wouldn't typically be allocated from from resources from something like a visitor levy in order to supplement those, those, those services that they need to provide. And that's why there's potentially this mix of, of, of, of views across devolution and local government funding settlement.
Does he recognise that point?
Does he recognise that point?
15:38
Speaker 7
-
Speaker 7
Yeah, I in a sense, I recognise that there will be differences of opinion depending on which local authority and where in the country members are present, on whether the fair funding review fully picks up all the particular circumstances, there might be maybe more agreement on the sufficiency of local government finance on that point. And I think what the fair funding review is intended to do is to say, whatever the allocation across the board, to distribute it in the fairest possible way, in a way that is transparent and that members and council can see where that money is going to.
Now, since coming to power, the Labour government has delivered long overdue reforms to council funding through the first multi-year local government settlement in a decade. And in doing so, we've delivered transformational changes in how councils are funded, changes that the public, our local government , partners and Parliament have long called for. We have delivered on our commitment to give councils greater certainty and flexibility over their funding, ensuring that resources are fairly aligned to local need, and simplifying the funding landscape by ending wasteful competitive bidding, which we all recognise.
Pitch one area against another. The government also has a very important role to play as the equalizer for local government income, and can I say that there is, and I heard during the course of the debate, referenced the amount of grant that individual councils get and comparing one grant total to another grant total. And I want to be clear, the fair Funding review is not intended to give every council the same central government grant. The central Government grant is intended to act as an equalizer to the system, so that in the end, all councils have the resources to deliver the public service need in their local area.
Recognising that there are wild differences in England on the local tax bases, on council tax and business rates and other places. So that's the role of of that. Now, as a result of our reforms, 9 in 10 councils will receive funding that broadly matches their assessed relative need by the end of the multi-year settlement, up from around a third before these reforms. Now we do recognise the different drivers of demand for services, the cost of providing them in different places and the different ability of areas to raise council tax , and therefore making funding available in such a way as to enable all local authorities to provide the same level of services to their residents.
For rural communities, the 2627 settlement was a key step in delivering a fairer system, addressing the issues that matter to local communities across England. This included recognising local circumstances, including differences in the cost of delivering services between rural and urban areas and using the best available data and most up to date data. The latest indices of multiple deprivation to ensure that deprivation in rural areas is captured accurately. And I'll explain a bit more just on that.
Now, I did hear a number of references that the fair funding review didn't take account of the differential cost of delivering services in rural areas, but to be clear, we do account for rural costs through the area cost adjustment, and that's applied to all formulas. That adjustment captures the variation in wages, in property rates, in journey times, and a range of other factors that do pick up that local variation that takes place. And on top of that, we have a remoteness adjustment in social care.
I do hear, though, representations that say, well, hang on, if it's cost more to deliver adult social care in these areas, surely children's services and another type of services like waste collection and other things ought to be included to. But the area cost adjustment does pick up that general difference of delivering a service in those areas. But there's a balance here, isn't there? You know, we want a simplified system that can be scrutinised and understood.
The more that we adapt and change and really drill down on that, the more complicated that becomes, the more it has to be updated and the more that changes. And there's always a balance to be had about simplicity to be understood and given certainty over that multi-year settlement. Recognising those differences at a local level. Of course.
Now, since coming to power, the Labour government has delivered long overdue reforms to council funding through the first multi-year local government settlement in a decade. And in doing so, we've delivered transformational changes in how councils are funded, changes that the public, our local government , partners and Parliament have long called for. We have delivered on our commitment to give councils greater certainty and flexibility over their funding, ensuring that resources are fairly aligned to local need, and simplifying the funding landscape by ending wasteful competitive bidding, which we all recognise.
Pitch one area against another. The government also has a very important role to play as the equalizer for local government income, and can I say that there is, and I heard during the course of the debate, referenced the amount of grant that individual councils get and comparing one grant total to another grant total. And I want to be clear, the fair Funding review is not intended to give every council the same central government grant. The central Government grant is intended to act as an equalizer to the system, so that in the end, all councils have the resources to deliver the public service need in their local area.
Recognising that there are wild differences in England on the local tax bases, on council tax and business rates and other places. So that's the role of of that. Now, as a result of our reforms, 9 in 10 councils will receive funding that broadly matches their assessed relative need by the end of the multi-year settlement, up from around a third before these reforms. Now we do recognise the different drivers of demand for services, the cost of providing them in different places and the different ability of areas to raise council tax , and therefore making funding available in such a way as to enable all local authorities to provide the same level of services to their residents.
For rural communities, the 2627 settlement was a key step in delivering a fairer system, addressing the issues that matter to local communities across England. This included recognising local circumstances, including differences in the cost of delivering services between rural and urban areas and using the best available data and most up to date data. The latest indices of multiple deprivation to ensure that deprivation in rural areas is captured accurately. And I'll explain a bit more just on that.
Now, I did hear a number of references that the fair funding review didn't take account of the differential cost of delivering services in rural areas, but to be clear, we do account for rural costs through the area cost adjustment, and that's applied to all formulas. That adjustment captures the variation in wages, in property rates, in journey times, and a range of other factors that do pick up that local variation that takes place. And on top of that, we have a remoteness adjustment in social care.
I do hear, though, representations that say, well, hang on, if it's cost more to deliver adult social care in these areas, surely children's services and another type of services like waste collection and other things ought to be included to. But the area cost adjustment does pick up that general difference of delivering a service in those areas. But there's a balance here, isn't there? You know, we want a simplified system that can be scrutinised and understood.
The more that we adapt and change and really drill down on that, the more complicated that becomes, the more it has to be updated and the more that changes. And there's always a balance to be had about simplicity to be understood and given certainty over that multi-year settlement. Recognising those differences at a local level. Of course.
15:42
Speaker 4
-
Speaker 4
I thank the Minister for giving way. So he's saying that there's an area cost adjustment, and yet the leader of Devon County Council says that Devon lost £14 million because of the Rural Services delivery grant, which was removed. So how can those two things be true? If you're removing a grant which takes takes account of the fact that it's more expensive to deliver services in a rural area and the council is £14 million shorter of money, then surely you haven't recognised the extra cost of rural service delivery?
15:42
Speaker 7
-
Speaker 7
Well, it has. I mean, we have always taken the view that the Rural Service Delivery Grant had a, and I'll put this mildly, a weak evidence base to support it. There was a decision made, I think, a political decision when the coalition government came in that the the grant that was given to largely urban authorities was taken away with almost no notice at all, and it was replaced by the Rural Service Delivery grant, but without the evidence base to support where it went to.
Now, whatever criticism is applied at the fair funding review, what can't be criticised is the evidence base that sits beneath it, because it is on the most available data. Now we are laying the foundations for reform more broadly with the multi-year local government finance settlement, and that allows for £4.6 billion of additional funding to be available for adult social care in 2000 829, compared to 2526, including 500 million for the first ever fair pay agreement. The government is driving the biggest transformation in children's social care in a generation, with the Families First Partnership Programme backed by nearly £3 billion of investment over four years, including a historic £2.4 billion over the multi-year settlement.
This will support local authorities, police and health partners to provide families with the right support at the right time, shifting the system from expensive statutory prevention towards early intervention and prevention services. The government recognises the current system is not working for families, for children or for local authorities, and we set out plans to reform the system, backed by £4 billion of investment over three years, to deliver expertise without the need for statutory processes and embed new practice into the system.
We have also heard calls for a solution to send deficits, and all local authorities with a deficit will receive a grant covering 90% of their high needs related deficit. This grant is projected to be worth over £5 billion nationally and is subject to each local authority submitting and securing approval for their local reform plan. We recognise the spending pressures from home to school transport in recent years, particularly in rural areas. At the fair funding Review, we introduced a bespoke home to school transport formula that estimates local transport need for 16 home to school transport based on pupil numbers and home to school distances.
Furthermore, following consultation on the design of the formula, government increased the distance cap to 50 miles rather than the original 20 miles that was proposed. This change will see only 0.4% percent of pupil journey distances capped, and will avoid unfairly penalising local authorities where children travel further to get to school. We know the cost of delivering homelessness services is also causing challenges in areas to, and that homelessness in rural areas can present in quite a unique way.
This is why we are providing more than £4 billion of funding for homelessness and rough sleeping services over the next three years, with new flexibility for area to shape services to meet local needs, including £442 million launched last month, the government is committed to making the changes necessary to transform public services and put local back on its feet by realigning funding with need and reforming the services that put pressure on. Local government will empower local leaders to deliver for their communities in rural areas and right across the country, as we have promised.
And if I might just quickly just return to the matter of devolution, which I know for Cornish colleagues and for other places, it is a live issue. I mean, first of all, I give credit to the the representations that MPs have made for Cornwall and for other areas. The truth is devolution can only happen with local consent. We need areas to come forward to get those local partnerships in place to rally to the support of local authorities, local level.
And we also recognise that a time of change in local government, where areas are also then dealing with local government reorganisation, that is a lot for area to step up to, which is why we have provided the level of support for local government reorganisation areas in the way that we covered this week in another Westminster Hall debate. Now we want that devolution to be rolled out to every area, and we also recognise that different areas will be at different stages, that those local partnerships.
And I do think there is an active discussion which we should welcome about what the role of community and neighbourhoods ought to be in that new settlement, because devolution should go hand in hand with localism and empowerment, what the role of a local authority is and what the added value above and beyond that that can be achieved if areas do go towards a mayoral model. But to be clear, if areas aren't ready yet for a mayoral model, that is not the position is not that they cannot have devolution and more can't be given.
And I hope that members here and in local government do continue to do what they've always done, which is to rally for their local areas. Thank you. Helen Morgan.
Now, whatever criticism is applied at the fair funding review, what can't be criticised is the evidence base that sits beneath it, because it is on the most available data. Now we are laying the foundations for reform more broadly with the multi-year local government finance settlement, and that allows for £4.6 billion of additional funding to be available for adult social care in 2000 829, compared to 2526, including 500 million for the first ever fair pay agreement. The government is driving the biggest transformation in children's social care in a generation, with the Families First Partnership Programme backed by nearly £3 billion of investment over four years, including a historic £2.4 billion over the multi-year settlement.
This will support local authorities, police and health partners to provide families with the right support at the right time, shifting the system from expensive statutory prevention towards early intervention and prevention services. The government recognises the current system is not working for families, for children or for local authorities, and we set out plans to reform the system, backed by £4 billion of investment over three years, to deliver expertise without the need for statutory processes and embed new practice into the system.
We have also heard calls for a solution to send deficits, and all local authorities with a deficit will receive a grant covering 90% of their high needs related deficit. This grant is projected to be worth over £5 billion nationally and is subject to each local authority submitting and securing approval for their local reform plan. We recognise the spending pressures from home to school transport in recent years, particularly in rural areas. At the fair funding Review, we introduced a bespoke home to school transport formula that estimates local transport need for 16 home to school transport based on pupil numbers and home to school distances.
Furthermore, following consultation on the design of the formula, government increased the distance cap to 50 miles rather than the original 20 miles that was proposed. This change will see only 0.4% percent of pupil journey distances capped, and will avoid unfairly penalising local authorities where children travel further to get to school. We know the cost of delivering homelessness services is also causing challenges in areas to, and that homelessness in rural areas can present in quite a unique way.
This is why we are providing more than £4 billion of funding for homelessness and rough sleeping services over the next three years, with new flexibility for area to shape services to meet local needs, including £442 million launched last month, the government is committed to making the changes necessary to transform public services and put local back on its feet by realigning funding with need and reforming the services that put pressure on. Local government will empower local leaders to deliver for their communities in rural areas and right across the country, as we have promised.
And if I might just quickly just return to the matter of devolution, which I know for Cornish colleagues and for other places, it is a live issue. I mean, first of all, I give credit to the the representations that MPs have made for Cornwall and for other areas. The truth is devolution can only happen with local consent. We need areas to come forward to get those local partnerships in place to rally to the support of local authorities, local level.
And we also recognise that a time of change in local government, where areas are also then dealing with local government reorganisation, that is a lot for area to step up to, which is why we have provided the level of support for local government reorganisation areas in the way that we covered this week in another Westminster Hall debate. Now we want that devolution to be rolled out to every area, and we also recognise that different areas will be at different stages, that those local partnerships.
And I do think there is an active discussion which we should welcome about what the role of community and neighbourhoods ought to be in that new settlement, because devolution should go hand in hand with localism and empowerment, what the role of a local authority is and what the added value above and beyond that that can be achieved if areas do go towards a mayoral model. But to be clear, if areas aren't ready yet for a mayoral model, that is not the position is not that they cannot have devolution and more can't be given.
And I hope that members here and in local government do continue to do what they've always done, which is to rally for their local areas. Thank you. Helen Morgan.
15:47
15:47
Speaker 1
-
Speaker 1
Very much, Mr. Speaker. Can I thank everybody who came along and made excellent speeches, particularly at team South-West, who have turned out in force, and they have all highlighted the difficulties in delivering services over sparsely populated areas with vast different distances to travel. The impact on highways funding, the importance of generating economic growth, the cost of delivering send, the issues around the kind of proxy creation of of district councils by Re-empowering town and parish councils to deliver things that the unitary council can no longer afford to deliver because it's not a statutory requirement.
Really, really good speeches. And then the minister has wound up with a speech that kind of has told us everything is actually fine. So I'm very disappointed in the minister's response. On the day that the local government finance settlement was announced, I sat on the opposition benches without a clue of what my local authority had been awarded, along with all of my colleagues, because it wasn't findable. We hadn't been told it couldn't be googled. And yet everyone on the Labour benches appeared to know what their settlement had had been, and was very pleased to to congratulate the minister on its delivery.
And it's symptomatic of a pattern of this government, of telling rural areas that everything is fine. It looks pretty go away and stop worrying. And actually we're going to focus on urban areas, which we all recognise need investment, and that they're not thriving in the way that they should be. This isn't about a pitching one area against another, but we need to recognise that rural areas need fair funding and they also need devolution, because in a council that has stripped back every single employee that it can, there is no capacity to generate economic growth or to transform the underlying financial structure of the council, because nobody has the time in the day to do it, and they need that devolution funding to be able to rethink how they deliver services in a sustainable way for the future.
And I hope the minister will take these points on board.
Really, really good speeches. And then the minister has wound up with a speech that kind of has told us everything is actually fine. So I'm very disappointed in the minister's response. On the day that the local government finance settlement was announced, I sat on the opposition benches without a clue of what my local authority had been awarded, along with all of my colleagues, because it wasn't findable. We hadn't been told it couldn't be googled. And yet everyone on the Labour benches appeared to know what their settlement had had been, and was very pleased to to congratulate the minister on its delivery.
And it's symptomatic of a pattern of this government, of telling rural areas that everything is fine. It looks pretty go away and stop worrying. And actually we're going to focus on urban areas, which we all recognise need investment, and that they're not thriving in the way that they should be. This isn't about a pitching one area against another, but we need to recognise that rural areas need fair funding and they also need devolution, because in a council that has stripped back every single employee that it can, there is no capacity to generate economic growth or to transform the underlying financial structure of the council, because nobody has the time in the day to do it, and they need that devolution funding to be able to rethink how they deliver services in a sustainable way for the future.
And I hope the minister will take these points on board.
15:50
Speaker 6
-
Speaker 6
Question is that this House has considered government support for rural upper tier local authorities, as many as are of that opinion, say I. Of the contrary. No, I think the ayes have it. The ayes have it. Order, order! Order, order. I will call Alex Brewer to move the motion, and I will then call the minister to respond. I remind other members that they may only make a speech with prior permission from the member in charge of the debate and the minister.
They will not be an opportunity for the member in charge to wind up, as is the convention for 30 minute debates. Alex Brewer to move the motion. I beg to move that the House has considered the impact of changes to employer National Insurance contributions on small businesses in Hampshire, and it is an honor to serve with you in the chair, Miss Barker, I am equally privileged to be joined by a number of local business owners from North East Hampshire.
Today in the public gallery, soaring energy costs, a business rate system in desperate need of overhaul and perhaps the most damaging of them all a rise in employer National Insurance contributions. Individually, any one of these changes is hard for a small business to absorb, but together they are too much for many small businesses across Hampshire, when a small businesses costs rise, that cost moves on to workers through stagnant wages on to customers, through higher prices, and on to the business owners in lower profits.
And when the numbers simply can't add up, the cost also moves on to local communities through weaker local economies and hollowed out high streets. In Hampshire, where almost 98% of businesses are small businesses, that is felt by an entire county. Small businesses cannot design their way around these changes. A big national chain can negotiate volume discounts or restructure its HR or draw on a financial buffer. A beauty salon in Church Crookham or a care home in Ewshot cannot.
And that is why 35% of small firms say they are planning to close or significantly scale back this year. And why? This is, in plain terms, a jobs tax. This matters because these are precisely the employers we need. The government's own research has warned that without urgent action, 1 in 6 young people could soon be a neat. That is, those not in education, employment or training. Yet hospitality, retail, personal care and customer service.
The sector is facing. The steepest rise in. Labour costs are the very sectors that traditionally give young people their first vital experience in the world of work. I will give way.
They will not be an opportunity for the member in charge to wind up, as is the convention for 30 minute debates. Alex Brewer to move the motion. I beg to move that the House has considered the impact of changes to employer National Insurance contributions on small businesses in Hampshire, and it is an honor to serve with you in the chair, Miss Barker, I am equally privileged to be joined by a number of local business owners from North East Hampshire.
Today in the public gallery, soaring energy costs, a business rate system in desperate need of overhaul and perhaps the most damaging of them all a rise in employer National Insurance contributions. Individually, any one of these changes is hard for a small business to absorb, but together they are too much for many small businesses across Hampshire, when a small businesses costs rise, that cost moves on to workers through stagnant wages on to customers, through higher prices, and on to the business owners in lower profits.
And when the numbers simply can't add up, the cost also moves on to local communities through weaker local economies and hollowed out high streets. In Hampshire, where almost 98% of businesses are small businesses, that is felt by an entire county. Small businesses cannot design their way around these changes. A big national chain can negotiate volume discounts or restructure its HR or draw on a financial buffer. A beauty salon in Church Crookham or a care home in Ewshot cannot.
And that is why 35% of small firms say they are planning to close or significantly scale back this year. And why? This is, in plain terms, a jobs tax. This matters because these are precisely the employers we need. The government's own research has warned that without urgent action, 1 in 6 young people could soon be a neat. That is, those not in education, employment or training. Yet hospitality, retail, personal care and customer service.
The sector is facing. The steepest rise in. Labour costs are the very sectors that traditionally give young people their first vital experience in the world of work. I will give way.
16:02
Speaker 15
-
Speaker 15
Honourable friend, for giving way. A couple of weeks ago I visited a business called Squeaky Clean, run by Sam in Winchester, and the thing that was very striking about that business is the number of students and young people and sixth formers that were employed and giving them their first job, getting them a CV, teaching them, you know what it's like to work, turn up on time responsibility before they go on to university and do other things. And Sam told me that the single biggest difficulty she's facing in keeping that business going is this rise in National insurance.
So he agree with me that we should be looking at this as a matter of urgency, not just for those businesses, but for young people's opportunities.
So he agree with me that we should be looking at this as a matter of urgency, not just for those businesses, but for young people's opportunities.
16:03
Speaker 6
-
Speaker 6
I thank my honourable friend for his intervention and I wholeheartedly agree. That is the the crux of the issue, and it's borne out in the data. So the Bank of England decision Maker panel revealed that 46% of firms nationally have cut staff because of these changes, and 20% have paid lower wages than planned. Nationally, small businesses account for 60% of private sector employment, so when they pull back, this is not a footnote to the labour market.
It is the labour market. Nowhere is that clearer than in the hair and beauty sector. Kerrie Mather has run K.j.m salons in fleet for 36 years, employing around 20 people, including six apprenticeships training a new generation in a key town centre location . In the past decade, apprenticeships in hair and beauty industry in the UK have dropped from nearly 19,000 to 3000. If we're not careful, there soon won't be any apprenticeships left.
The pressure. I will give way.
It is the labour market. Nowhere is that clearer than in the hair and beauty sector. Kerrie Mather has run K.j.m salons in fleet for 36 years, employing around 20 people, including six apprenticeships training a new generation in a key town centre location . In the past decade, apprenticeships in hair and beauty industry in the UK have dropped from nearly 19,000 to 3000. If we're not careful, there soon won't be any apprenticeships left.
The pressure. I will give way.
16:04
Speaker 11
-
Speaker 11
Can I commend Honourable Lady for Hampshire for bringing this forward? And to echo what the Honourable Lady has put forward and the honourable gentleman and his intervention. It's the same for me in Northern Ireland as well. According to the Northern Ireland Inter-Departmental Business Register, small and micro businesses make up a vast majority of Northern Ireland local economy, some 90%, almost 83,000 registered businesses employing fewer than ten people. They're not faceless conglomerates, they're family run corner shops, local butchers, small builders across my city and across the honourable ladies.
To echo the honourable lady's opinion, the FSB in Northern Ireland has explicitly warned that these surging costs are forcing independent retailers to slash staff hours, cut back open times, put growth on ice. And will the honourable lady agree with me that this lies on the shoulders of government, of the Minister in particular, and this anti-business policy must stop before it pushes vital high street traders to the wall. Sir.
To echo the honourable lady's opinion, the FSB in Northern Ireland has explicitly warned that these surging costs are forcing independent retailers to slash staff hours, cut back open times, put growth on ice. And will the honourable lady agree with me that this lies on the shoulders of government, of the Minister in particular, and this anti-business policy must stop before it pushes vital high street traders to the wall. Sir.
16:05
Speaker 6
-
Speaker 6
I thank the honourable member for his intervention and and I do agree this is a matter for government and which is why, of course, I and we are raising this today. The pressure compounds, of course, where workforce is already stretched, vehicle repair already loses around 1700 workers a year. The industry of Motor Institute said that the protecting the workforce isn't just a matter for body shops and garages, it's a matter for insurers, fleet operators and ultimately for every driver who needs their vehicle repaired.
Foster and Haines, a well known name in north east Hampshire for Mots and repairs, sits squarely in the path of that shortfall and where there are no staff available to repair a vehicle, the consequences ripple out to every tradesperson who needs a van back on the road. Every local supply chain that depends on vehicles moving on time, and in a constituency with limited bus infrastructure, it's the school run too. For many families here, there is no alternative but to use the car, and these business challenges are, as the honourable members have raised, of course, felt.
Across the country, 69% of businesses cite employer National Insurance contributions as one of the top three cost threats to UK labour market competitiveness. While business confidence has fallen even since the market turmoil of autumn 2022, a really damning indictment of this policy. A quarter of firms cut back investment the very quarter these changes took effect, making it no surprise that under this government, growth has never crept, never once crept above 0.6%. The policy is just so hard to understand in terms of the rhetoric used by this government.
Talk of growth, talk of apprenticeships, talk of opportunities for young people. But the action seems to be the opposite fewer jobs, fewer apprenticeships and less business investment and a continued stagnant economy. Small business owners need to understand how the government can justify this policy, and nowhere is it harder to defend than in health and social care. Independent care providers have been billed an extra £940 million this year alone. Ministers point to additional social care funding, but for providers on the ground, this is little more than a consolation prize because this government voted down every single Lib Dem amendment tabled in the House of Lords to exempt care and early years providers from this rise.
This lands on a sector that is already in profound crisis and simply can't reduce its workforce to cope. Hundreds of thousands of people are currently waiting for care, many stranded in hospital beds simply because they care they need is not available, piling more strain onto the NHS. Liberal Democrats analysis found almost 900,000 people had their request for care denied in the last financial year, while a further 6000 tragically died while waiting for their care to be approved.
This policy does not simply squeeze care providers margins. It deepens a crisis with a real human cost, and this gets to the very heart of the matter at the centre of this, as local business owners in north east Hampshire have told me, are people good employers who pay their staff a fair wage, who train and invest in their teams and who contribute to the communities in which they operate, are being squeezed to breaking point. Having barely recovered from the Covid years, service and retail businesses no longer have the financial buffers they once had.
This means their staff lose out not just on a pay rise, but on a Christmas party or a team training day. Maybe their equipment isn't replaced as regularly or they don't get a bonus. Whatever the consequence, it's the people who are impacted, the ones this government claims it wants to support. Hampshire's experience and the national picture are one and the same story. None of this was inevitable. The office for Budget Responsibility itself says firms will pass on 60% of the higher costs, whether through reduced wages or higher prices, coupled with five consecutive years of falling living standards.
The changes to NICs are nothing short of regressive. There is no doubt that our public services need funding and our country's infrastructure needs urgent repair, and I am the first to call for those things. But there is a fair way to do this, and one that won't strangle the UK's economic growth. The government must focus on taxing those with the broadest shoulders to contribute more through a higher digital services tax, overhauling the broken business rates system, ensuring enormous multinational corporations are paying their fair share for doing business in the UK and reversing the conservatives banking tax cuts.
Positive change is possible. The government steps towards cross-party discussions on social care, and the 20% cut in business rates for pubs, clubs and music venues are absolutely welcome, but we must go further and any relief to these sectors cannot leave NICs off the table today and every day I represent brilliant North East Hampshire business community. Small businesses are the engine room of the British economy, so I am calling on the government to give them the certainty they need to invest, grow and create jobs.
Our businesses should be should be thriving, not barely surviving.
Foster and Haines, a well known name in north east Hampshire for Mots and repairs, sits squarely in the path of that shortfall and where there are no staff available to repair a vehicle, the consequences ripple out to every tradesperson who needs a van back on the road. Every local supply chain that depends on vehicles moving on time, and in a constituency with limited bus infrastructure, it's the school run too. For many families here, there is no alternative but to use the car, and these business challenges are, as the honourable members have raised, of course, felt.
Across the country, 69% of businesses cite employer National Insurance contributions as one of the top three cost threats to UK labour market competitiveness. While business confidence has fallen even since the market turmoil of autumn 2022, a really damning indictment of this policy. A quarter of firms cut back investment the very quarter these changes took effect, making it no surprise that under this government, growth has never crept, never once crept above 0.6%. The policy is just so hard to understand in terms of the rhetoric used by this government.
Talk of growth, talk of apprenticeships, talk of opportunities for young people. But the action seems to be the opposite fewer jobs, fewer apprenticeships and less business investment and a continued stagnant economy. Small business owners need to understand how the government can justify this policy, and nowhere is it harder to defend than in health and social care. Independent care providers have been billed an extra £940 million this year alone. Ministers point to additional social care funding, but for providers on the ground, this is little more than a consolation prize because this government voted down every single Lib Dem amendment tabled in the House of Lords to exempt care and early years providers from this rise.
This lands on a sector that is already in profound crisis and simply can't reduce its workforce to cope. Hundreds of thousands of people are currently waiting for care, many stranded in hospital beds simply because they care they need is not available, piling more strain onto the NHS. Liberal Democrats analysis found almost 900,000 people had their request for care denied in the last financial year, while a further 6000 tragically died while waiting for their care to be approved.
This policy does not simply squeeze care providers margins. It deepens a crisis with a real human cost, and this gets to the very heart of the matter at the centre of this, as local business owners in north east Hampshire have told me, are people good employers who pay their staff a fair wage, who train and invest in their teams and who contribute to the communities in which they operate, are being squeezed to breaking point. Having barely recovered from the Covid years, service and retail businesses no longer have the financial buffers they once had.
This means their staff lose out not just on a pay rise, but on a Christmas party or a team training day. Maybe their equipment isn't replaced as regularly or they don't get a bonus. Whatever the consequence, it's the people who are impacted, the ones this government claims it wants to support. Hampshire's experience and the national picture are one and the same story. None of this was inevitable. The office for Budget Responsibility itself says firms will pass on 60% of the higher costs, whether through reduced wages or higher prices, coupled with five consecutive years of falling living standards.
The changes to NICs are nothing short of regressive. There is no doubt that our public services need funding and our country's infrastructure needs urgent repair, and I am the first to call for those things. But there is a fair way to do this, and one that won't strangle the UK's economic growth. The government must focus on taxing those with the broadest shoulders to contribute more through a higher digital services tax, overhauling the broken business rates system, ensuring enormous multinational corporations are paying their fair share for doing business in the UK and reversing the conservatives banking tax cuts.
Positive change is possible. The government steps towards cross-party discussions on social care, and the 20% cut in business rates for pubs, clubs and music venues are absolutely welcome, but we must go further and any relief to these sectors cannot leave NICs off the table today and every day I represent brilliant North East Hampshire business community. Small businesses are the engine room of the British economy, so I am calling on the government to give them the certainty they need to invest, grow and create jobs.
Our businesses should be should be thriving, not barely surviving.
16:10
16:10
Speaker 17
-
Speaker 17
Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to serve on this committee with you as chair, and I'd like to thank the honourable member for North East Hampshire for raising this issue today and indeed, for bringing with her representatives of businesses from her constituency to Parliament to listen to this debate about an issue which is so important. As the honourable member mentioned, this government is prioritising growth. And indeed, in the first half of this year, we were the fastest growing economy in the G7, and this government's mission is to make sure that growth is felt in every community, in every high street and in every postcode.
And of course, small and medium sized businesses we know are central to that ambition because they are the ones who play such an important role in every community across the country, creating jobs, supporting local economies and helping to drive better living standards. We also know that sustainable economic growth depends on stable public finances. And of course, fiscal discipline has to be therefore the bedrock of economic stability. That stability is essential and necessary to support investment , confidence and long term growth.
As honourable members will know, the government has taken decisions on tax, welfare and spending precisely in order to repair the public finances, to protect economic stability and to fund the public services on which families and businesses rely and for which the honourable member for North East Hampshire called for greater investment in. As part of that, wider fiscal consolidation changes have been made to employer National Insurance contributions, and they were introduced from April 2025. Those changes were accompanied by significant protections for smaller employers, including more than doubling the employment allowance to £10,500.
This means that around 900,000 employers, around 40% will have no employer national insurance liability at all. In north east Hampshire alone, around 2300 employers benefited from the employment allowance in 2526 and overall across the country, the employment allowance was estimated to be worth around £7.4 billion last tax year. In addition, Miss Barker businesses can also claim employer national insurance reliefs, including those for under 21 seconds and under 25 apprentices worth around £2.5 billion a year.
This means that employers pay no employer national insurance contributions for apprentices under 25 or for employees under 21 on earnings up to £50,270. Madam chair, the UK's 5.7 million small and medium enterprises are central to growth across the country. The government is backing them to succeed, supporting entrepreneurship and helping people to live well in every part of the country. Once again, I thank the honourable member for calling this debate today.
And of course, small and medium sized businesses we know are central to that ambition because they are the ones who play such an important role in every community across the country, creating jobs, supporting local economies and helping to drive better living standards. We also know that sustainable economic growth depends on stable public finances. And of course, fiscal discipline has to be therefore the bedrock of economic stability. That stability is essential and necessary to support investment , confidence and long term growth.
As honourable members will know, the government has taken decisions on tax, welfare and spending precisely in order to repair the public finances, to protect economic stability and to fund the public services on which families and businesses rely and for which the honourable member for North East Hampshire called for greater investment in. As part of that, wider fiscal consolidation changes have been made to employer National Insurance contributions, and they were introduced from April 2025. Those changes were accompanied by significant protections for smaller employers, including more than doubling the employment allowance to £10,500.
This means that around 900,000 employers, around 40% will have no employer national insurance liability at all. In north east Hampshire alone, around 2300 employers benefited from the employment allowance in 2526 and overall across the country, the employment allowance was estimated to be worth around £7.4 billion last tax year. In addition, Miss Barker businesses can also claim employer national insurance reliefs, including those for under 21 seconds and under 25 apprentices worth around £2.5 billion a year.
This means that employers pay no employer national insurance contributions for apprentices under 25 or for employees under 21 on earnings up to £50,270. Madam chair, the UK's 5.7 million small and medium enterprises are central to growth across the country. The government is backing them to succeed, supporting entrepreneurship and helping people to live well in every part of the country. Once again, I thank the honourable member for calling this debate today.
16:13
16:29
16:29
Speaker 2
-
Speaker 2
Thank you, Miss Barker. And it is an honor to serve under your chair once again for such an important debate, not just in terms of the UK's domestic energy security, but also for global climate change. And I have to admit, Miss Barker, when colleagues thought that this was a Tinder debate, we were expecting more numbers. But when I explained that it was a tin debate, the numbers dropped off slightly.
Now, the ill informed may assume that associate tin with cans, when in fact our cans are almost exclusively made of aluminium, aluminium and contain no tin. However, more learned colleagues will know that tin, which is used in virtually every single electrical device, is increasingly indispensable in the technologies that underpin modern industries the digital economy, the green economy, the AI economy, tin is foundational to each. But as with other critical minerals, the overconcentration of processing and supply against.
Amongst a small number of countries, a long, long way from Western Europe presents massive economic and geopolitical risks. While debates about critical minerals are often focused on lithium, tungsten, nickel, and rare earths, tin is so often inexplicably overlooked. Now I do have to declare an interest not only as an officer of the Appg on critical minerals, but also as the MP in the constituency of the last tin mine in the country to close in 1998.
However, it is not only in Camborne and Redruth that the stirrings of excitement are almost palpable. Every single Cornishman and woman across the globe will celebrate the return of an industry that goes way beyond just a job. Cornish tin may evolve, invoke something far more visceral and emotional. But before becoming a little starry eyed about the return of Cornish tin mining, I felt it incumbent on me to highlight tins new practical applications.
The strategic case for it, and the opportunity that we have in this country to rise to the challenges of global supply constrictions. About half of all tin consumption is used as solder for electronics. It is simply unrivalled in connecting components on circuit boards, enabling electrical conductivity whilst preventing oxidising oxidation. And as a result, tin is integral to almost every piece of modern technology every smartphone, every laptop, every data centre, server, semiconductors, telecommunications networks and advanced manufacturing systems.
They all totally rely on tin. Without tin, there are no circuit boards, and without circuit boards there is no new industrial strategy. The 21st century growth sectors, those at the global technological cutting edge are increasingly demand, increasingly driving demand for tin. Skywards electric vehicles require up to three times the tin of a combustion engine vehicle. Tin demand for solar panels has trebled over the last five years.
Tin is required in 5G infrastructure, emerging battery technologies, renewable energies and, interestingly, is increasingly important in the development of AI. AI is often discussed in terms of software and algorithms, less so the vast physical infrastructure that sits behind it, from the racks to the power modules and networks networking switches, tin is essential to the physical architecture itself. In the fabrication of advanced AI chips. Molten tin droplets are fired thousands of times per second into high powered lasers as part of the extreme ultraviolet lithography process used to manufacture cutting edge semiconductors.
And so as governments and companies invest billions in data centres and computational capacity, demand for tin in the UK is soaring just for the growth driving sectors in our industrial strategy. Just for those those , I say eight sectors alone, demand is expected to grow at an average 19% year on year until 2035. Between now and then, a cumulative total of more than 27,000 tonnes of tin is required. However, and this is the crux of this debate whilst demand is rapidly expanding, huge questions remain about the security and resilience of global supply.
Extraction and processing are currently heavily concentrated in six countries the Democratic Republic of Congo, China, Indonesia, Myanmar, Bolivia and Peru. These. These countries currently supply over 90% of primary production, while Chile alone refines over half of global tin. And with that comes blindingly obvious risk we have seen in the Straits of Hormuz what happens when a state weaponizes its control of a chokepoint in a global supply.
The ramifications spread rapidly through the entire through entire economies. With Tin, the UK is even more exposed to such global shocks because we currently produce none. We have already seen what happens to pricing with localised disruptions over the last few years. Myanmar's 2023 while state mining ban the export licensing issues in Indonesia and military conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and because the tin market is is relatively small in volume compared with other metals, it is the least traded by volume on the London Metals Exchange.
These modest disruptions have fuelled massive price increases . In 2025, the tin price surged 40% and has rallied a further 34% in this in this year to date, rising to nearly 400 £0 a tonne. Come 2035, there will be an expected 85,000 tonnes per year shortfall in global supply. And I'll say that again come 2035, there is expected to be an 85000 tonne per year per year shortfall in global supply.
But the challenge with tin is also one of geology and ethics. Many producing regions are experiencing declining all grades, often between 0.3 and 0.8%, and I'll come on to it later. But South Crofty, it's well over 1% such that greater volumes of material must be processed to achieve the same output, which inevitably increases costs. At the same time, there are legitimate concerns about environmental impacts, labour standards and illegal mining activity throughout the global supply chain.
So I asked the government to recognise the following. First, that Tin is a is fundamental to our advanced economy. Secondly, demand for tin will continue to far outstrip the inherently risky global supply chain and therefore. Thirdly, that tin production and processing should be considered a of strategic national importance and an investment case for a tin smelter based on UK economic security should be developed in the UK as a priority .
When it comes to UK critical minerals, I have to say we are falling well behind competitive states such as the United States, Canada, France and Australia. The US has announced over £40 billion in funding for critical minerals projects since 2022, alongside major equity stakes in some of their various domestic mines. Whilst our friends and neighbours, the member States of the European Union have committed over €6 billion to critical minerals critical mineral projects in this year alone, the UK has committed a tiny fraction of this sum.
It is in this context that I turn back, turn back west to Cornwall for for millennia Cornwall has supplied tin to Britain and the wider world. Tin mining is woven into our history, our identity, our DNA. Nowhere is this more so than in my constituency of Camborne and Redruth and Hayle, where the old engine houses still grace our landscape. And today tin once again, is one of Cornwall's greatest opportunities, anchored by.
By £28 million of investment in from the National Wealth Fund, Cornish Metals Limited are on course to reopen. That South Crofty mine that shut 30 years ago. Hopefully this will be achieved in 2028. South Crofty has the highest grade unmined tin in the world is. It is expected to produce up to 4700 tonnes annually, equivalent to up to 1.6% of globally mined tin production, and which could meet the demand for Britain's growing is eight sectors, that is, from one mine in Cornwall.
There are hundreds of mines across Cornwall with critical minerals, the range of critical minerals that is yet to be defined. But there is an awful lot of exploration going on at the moment. Nationally, it offers an opportunity to strengthen domestic supply resilience, reduce dependence on overseas extraction and support the development of strategic industries. For Cornwall South Crofty could be transformative. My constituency of Camborne-redruth and Hayle contains some of the most deprived neighbourhoods in the country.
Weekly median wages are £95 less than the average, and the number of young people claiming unemployment benefit has risen by 26% in this year alone. Yet the opening of South Crofty will support hundreds of direct skilled jobs and thousands more within the wider supply chain. You multiply this by mine, and you can start to see the importance of critical minerals to the Cornish economy. So we are, if we are serious about good growth being felt in every postcode, we must champion this kind of investment.
I have previously raised concerns in the House about the UK's domestic processing and refining capacity. At present, tin mined in Britain would need to travel to East Asia for processing before returning in a form that British manufacturers can use that is economically geostrategically and environmentally dire. I therefore ask the minister what steps the government will take to strengthen domestic critical mineral supply chains, what progress has been made in implementing the Critical Minerals Strategy? What consideration has been given to supporting domestic processing and refining capacity, and whether energy support schemes like the British Industrial Competitiveness Scheme can play a greater role in ensuring that our critical mineral projects remain international competitive, internationally competitive and I look forward to the minister's response.
Now, the ill informed may assume that associate tin with cans, when in fact our cans are almost exclusively made of aluminium, aluminium and contain no tin. However, more learned colleagues will know that tin, which is used in virtually every single electrical device, is increasingly indispensable in the technologies that underpin modern industries the digital economy, the green economy, the AI economy, tin is foundational to each. But as with other critical minerals, the overconcentration of processing and supply against.
Amongst a small number of countries, a long, long way from Western Europe presents massive economic and geopolitical risks. While debates about critical minerals are often focused on lithium, tungsten, nickel, and rare earths, tin is so often inexplicably overlooked. Now I do have to declare an interest not only as an officer of the Appg on critical minerals, but also as the MP in the constituency of the last tin mine in the country to close in 1998.
However, it is not only in Camborne and Redruth that the stirrings of excitement are almost palpable. Every single Cornishman and woman across the globe will celebrate the return of an industry that goes way beyond just a job. Cornish tin may evolve, invoke something far more visceral and emotional. But before becoming a little starry eyed about the return of Cornish tin mining, I felt it incumbent on me to highlight tins new practical applications.
The strategic case for it, and the opportunity that we have in this country to rise to the challenges of global supply constrictions. About half of all tin consumption is used as solder for electronics. It is simply unrivalled in connecting components on circuit boards, enabling electrical conductivity whilst preventing oxidising oxidation. And as a result, tin is integral to almost every piece of modern technology every smartphone, every laptop, every data centre, server, semiconductors, telecommunications networks and advanced manufacturing systems.
They all totally rely on tin. Without tin, there are no circuit boards, and without circuit boards there is no new industrial strategy. The 21st century growth sectors, those at the global technological cutting edge are increasingly demand, increasingly driving demand for tin. Skywards electric vehicles require up to three times the tin of a combustion engine vehicle. Tin demand for solar panels has trebled over the last five years.
Tin is required in 5G infrastructure, emerging battery technologies, renewable energies and, interestingly, is increasingly important in the development of AI. AI is often discussed in terms of software and algorithms, less so the vast physical infrastructure that sits behind it, from the racks to the power modules and networks networking switches, tin is essential to the physical architecture itself. In the fabrication of advanced AI chips. Molten tin droplets are fired thousands of times per second into high powered lasers as part of the extreme ultraviolet lithography process used to manufacture cutting edge semiconductors.
And so as governments and companies invest billions in data centres and computational capacity, demand for tin in the UK is soaring just for the growth driving sectors in our industrial strategy. Just for those those , I say eight sectors alone, demand is expected to grow at an average 19% year on year until 2035. Between now and then, a cumulative total of more than 27,000 tonnes of tin is required. However, and this is the crux of this debate whilst demand is rapidly expanding, huge questions remain about the security and resilience of global supply.
Extraction and processing are currently heavily concentrated in six countries the Democratic Republic of Congo, China, Indonesia, Myanmar, Bolivia and Peru. These. These countries currently supply over 90% of primary production, while Chile alone refines over half of global tin. And with that comes blindingly obvious risk we have seen in the Straits of Hormuz what happens when a state weaponizes its control of a chokepoint in a global supply.
The ramifications spread rapidly through the entire through entire economies. With Tin, the UK is even more exposed to such global shocks because we currently produce none. We have already seen what happens to pricing with localised disruptions over the last few years. Myanmar's 2023 while state mining ban the export licensing issues in Indonesia and military conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and because the tin market is is relatively small in volume compared with other metals, it is the least traded by volume on the London Metals Exchange.
These modest disruptions have fuelled massive price increases . In 2025, the tin price surged 40% and has rallied a further 34% in this in this year to date, rising to nearly 400 £0 a tonne. Come 2035, there will be an expected 85,000 tonnes per year shortfall in global supply. And I'll say that again come 2035, there is expected to be an 85000 tonne per year per year shortfall in global supply.
But the challenge with tin is also one of geology and ethics. Many producing regions are experiencing declining all grades, often between 0.3 and 0.8%, and I'll come on to it later. But South Crofty, it's well over 1% such that greater volumes of material must be processed to achieve the same output, which inevitably increases costs. At the same time, there are legitimate concerns about environmental impacts, labour standards and illegal mining activity throughout the global supply chain.
So I asked the government to recognise the following. First, that Tin is a is fundamental to our advanced economy. Secondly, demand for tin will continue to far outstrip the inherently risky global supply chain and therefore. Thirdly, that tin production and processing should be considered a of strategic national importance and an investment case for a tin smelter based on UK economic security should be developed in the UK as a priority .
When it comes to UK critical minerals, I have to say we are falling well behind competitive states such as the United States, Canada, France and Australia. The US has announced over £40 billion in funding for critical minerals projects since 2022, alongside major equity stakes in some of their various domestic mines. Whilst our friends and neighbours, the member States of the European Union have committed over €6 billion to critical minerals critical mineral projects in this year alone, the UK has committed a tiny fraction of this sum.
It is in this context that I turn back, turn back west to Cornwall for for millennia Cornwall has supplied tin to Britain and the wider world. Tin mining is woven into our history, our identity, our DNA. Nowhere is this more so than in my constituency of Camborne and Redruth and Hayle, where the old engine houses still grace our landscape. And today tin once again, is one of Cornwall's greatest opportunities, anchored by.
By £28 million of investment in from the National Wealth Fund, Cornish Metals Limited are on course to reopen. That South Crofty mine that shut 30 years ago. Hopefully this will be achieved in 2028. South Crofty has the highest grade unmined tin in the world is. It is expected to produce up to 4700 tonnes annually, equivalent to up to 1.6% of globally mined tin production, and which could meet the demand for Britain's growing is eight sectors, that is, from one mine in Cornwall.
There are hundreds of mines across Cornwall with critical minerals, the range of critical minerals that is yet to be defined. But there is an awful lot of exploration going on at the moment. Nationally, it offers an opportunity to strengthen domestic supply resilience, reduce dependence on overseas extraction and support the development of strategic industries. For Cornwall South Crofty could be transformative. My constituency of Camborne-redruth and Hayle contains some of the most deprived neighbourhoods in the country.
Weekly median wages are £95 less than the average, and the number of young people claiming unemployment benefit has risen by 26% in this year alone. Yet the opening of South Crofty will support hundreds of direct skilled jobs and thousands more within the wider supply chain. You multiply this by mine, and you can start to see the importance of critical minerals to the Cornish economy. So we are, if we are serious about good growth being felt in every postcode, we must champion this kind of investment.
I have previously raised concerns in the House about the UK's domestic processing and refining capacity. At present, tin mined in Britain would need to travel to East Asia for processing before returning in a form that British manufacturers can use that is economically geostrategically and environmentally dire. I therefore ask the minister what steps the government will take to strengthen domestic critical mineral supply chains, what progress has been made in implementing the Critical Minerals Strategy? What consideration has been given to supporting domestic processing and refining capacity, and whether energy support schemes like the British Industrial Competitiveness Scheme can play a greater role in ensuring that our critical mineral projects remain international competitive, internationally competitive and I look forward to the minister's response.
16:43
16:43
Speaker 13
-
Speaker 13
Thank you, Madam Chair, and I really thank my neighbour and honourable friend for Camborne and Redruth, the Tin Man himself, for securing this important debate. If I can concentrate our focus and no pun intended on on a really important part of the supply chain, which Cornwall is, of course at the cornerstone of. I'd like to draw our focus to the midstream and downstream applications of Tin in a bit more detail, and some of the blockers to securing that supply that my honourable friend talked so eloquently about.
It's not to say I don't worry about the upstream, the the mining opportunities, but I think it's fair to say that Cornwall's riches are there in abundance on that front. And yes, there will be bumps in the road. Yes, there will be successes and failures, as there have always been in the sort of relatively high risk business that is mining. But where I really worry is about securing that midstream processing.
And in the case of tin, that's crucial smelting process that will enable us to keep our supply chain onshore. I will give a brief nod to to Cornwall's other, perhaps less famous, but equally as important critical minerals that we have underneath our feet today, namely tin, namely lithium and tungsten. On top of that, there are so many more. But I think it's fair to say that the big three, if I can use that term as it stands today, are tin, lithium and tungsten.
And it's imperative across each of those three mineral resources where we have absolute clarity and visibility. I would say now on on the security of supply upstream, that we now start to think about the next stage, and that's building those supply chains. So to be very practical, what do we believe government can do to ensure that that happens? Let me just start with a sort of, I guess, a question of why. Why should government be involved in such.
It is it is high risk business. What market failure are we trying to to resolve here that fundamental question? I think it's fair to say that no matter what your ideology or political perspective on this, we have to accept that there is no way to build a supply chain like this from scratch, just leaving it to the whim of the market. The Chinese example is perhaps an extreme one that's that's leant on where there has been huge state involvement, but there is quite simply no way to build a supply chain of of this kind from essentially from scratch domestically by simply leaving it to the whim of individual firms to go out and do the right thing.
And that is why government involvement is so crucial. There is no trick here that we're trying to to solve. It's it's basic economics, in my view, that government has a role to play in ensuring that we nurse the development of those supply chain projects through from nascent idea or something that that various firms are thinking about on the side, but it's not perhaps core to their business. These these junior miners already have a proper job on their hands.
And, and it's not reasonable that that government expects that they will just snap their fingers. And some of these processing opportunities come about. That's where government support is really is really valued. We already have the Kernel Industrial Growth Fund, and I'm hugely grateful to the to both the former Chancellor and to ministers in my hon. Friend's Department for for the work they they undertook to help us secure that investment, which is already being put to work on a pipeline of projects across not just this most promising of industries, but many other Cornish industries besides.
That will create those jobs that are so desperately needed and help us secure our industrial supply chains. So. So what can government do? I think it's imperative that we involve ourselves wholeheartedly in the upstream development of those projects, work with those credible industrial sponsors, source the financial capital needed. It's not to say we do it all alone. It's that private and public partnership that I think we're already seeing through partners like the National Wealth Fund, through the Industrial Growth Fund.
It's that partnership that needs to thrive to ensure that we that we create the conditions for success. Of course, there are many blockers, too. And it's it's important that the the department works with colleagues across government where there are, for example, challenges to getting a grid connection or to securing appropriate transport links to unblocking planning barriers that that we have that joined up cross-government approach. I'm really proud to say in Cornwall that I think the groundwork has been done.
We have a visibility, the makings of a plan on how we might build that supply chain out. We've done the substantive work, the number crunching worked out what the capital need is worked out, how much of that can be privately invested versus versus publicly capitalized in. So I asked the minister to continue his his work with us. I know it's it's already begun, and I'm incredibly grateful for his time and interest in this sector, but I.
I implore him to bring colleagues from across government to, to meet this challenge, to help us secure that vital tin smelter, to help us solve the energy energy costs issue, which I know is probably the immediate need there. And I implore him to go further beyond that to see how much of that homegrown supply chain in this industry where I know Britain can succeed and where Cornwall can be at the forefront of it, I implore him to to work across government to get this to the top of our agenda and to make a success of it for everyone in Cornwall and Britain.
It's not to say I don't worry about the upstream, the the mining opportunities, but I think it's fair to say that Cornwall's riches are there in abundance on that front. And yes, there will be bumps in the road. Yes, there will be successes and failures, as there have always been in the sort of relatively high risk business that is mining. But where I really worry is about securing that midstream processing.
And in the case of tin, that's crucial smelting process that will enable us to keep our supply chain onshore. I will give a brief nod to to Cornwall's other, perhaps less famous, but equally as important critical minerals that we have underneath our feet today, namely tin, namely lithium and tungsten. On top of that, there are so many more. But I think it's fair to say that the big three, if I can use that term as it stands today, are tin, lithium and tungsten.
And it's imperative across each of those three mineral resources where we have absolute clarity and visibility. I would say now on on the security of supply upstream, that we now start to think about the next stage, and that's building those supply chains. So to be very practical, what do we believe government can do to ensure that that happens? Let me just start with a sort of, I guess, a question of why. Why should government be involved in such.
It is it is high risk business. What market failure are we trying to to resolve here that fundamental question? I think it's fair to say that no matter what your ideology or political perspective on this, we have to accept that there is no way to build a supply chain like this from scratch, just leaving it to the whim of the market. The Chinese example is perhaps an extreme one that's that's leant on where there has been huge state involvement, but there is quite simply no way to build a supply chain of of this kind from essentially from scratch domestically by simply leaving it to the whim of individual firms to go out and do the right thing.
And that is why government involvement is so crucial. There is no trick here that we're trying to to solve. It's it's basic economics, in my view, that government has a role to play in ensuring that we nurse the development of those supply chain projects through from nascent idea or something that that various firms are thinking about on the side, but it's not perhaps core to their business. These these junior miners already have a proper job on their hands.
And, and it's not reasonable that that government expects that they will just snap their fingers. And some of these processing opportunities come about. That's where government support is really is really valued. We already have the Kernel Industrial Growth Fund, and I'm hugely grateful to the to both the former Chancellor and to ministers in my hon. Friend's Department for for the work they they undertook to help us secure that investment, which is already being put to work on a pipeline of projects across not just this most promising of industries, but many other Cornish industries besides.
That will create those jobs that are so desperately needed and help us secure our industrial supply chains. So. So what can government do? I think it's imperative that we involve ourselves wholeheartedly in the upstream development of those projects, work with those credible industrial sponsors, source the financial capital needed. It's not to say we do it all alone. It's that private and public partnership that I think we're already seeing through partners like the National Wealth Fund, through the Industrial Growth Fund.
It's that partnership that needs to thrive to ensure that we that we create the conditions for success. Of course, there are many blockers, too. And it's it's important that the the department works with colleagues across government where there are, for example, challenges to getting a grid connection or to securing appropriate transport links to unblocking planning barriers that that we have that joined up cross-government approach. I'm really proud to say in Cornwall that I think the groundwork has been done.
We have a visibility, the makings of a plan on how we might build that supply chain out. We've done the substantive work, the number crunching worked out what the capital need is worked out, how much of that can be privately invested versus versus publicly capitalized in. So I asked the minister to continue his his work with us. I know it's it's already begun, and I'm incredibly grateful for his time and interest in this sector, but I.
I implore him to bring colleagues from across government to, to meet this challenge, to help us secure that vital tin smelter, to help us solve the energy energy costs issue, which I know is probably the immediate need there. And I implore him to go further beyond that to see how much of that homegrown supply chain in this industry where I know Britain can succeed and where Cornwall can be at the forefront of it, I implore him to to work across government to get this to the top of our agenda and to make a success of it for everyone in Cornwall and Britain.
16:49
16:49
Speaker 18
-
Speaker 18
And it's a pleasure to serve under your chairship. I thank my honourable friend and Cornish colleague for securing this important debate, as my hon. Friends from Cornwall know and speak about so powerfully. Cornwall has a proud mining heritage and is a key part of Britain's first industrial revolution. We now have an opportunity to revitalize that in a way that serves our future aspirations, and it's fantastic that this Labour government has recognised this through the Kernow Industrial Growth Fund, local projects such as Cornwall Resources.
Read more tungsten and tin project can bring crucially needed investment to areas in my constituency like Callington and opportunities throughout south east Cornwall. We need to make sure the benefits of these are felt by my local community and that means local skills, apprenticeships and good quality jobs. I strongly believe that our young people shouldn't feel that they have to leave the place that they're from in order to get on in life and to succeed, and tin and the mining opportunities of Cornwall is a significant factor of how we build their future hope and aspirations.
Demand for tin is increasingly being driven, as my hon. Friend mentioned by electronics, AI and clean energy, South East Cornwall can contribute both its natural resources and in its hard working and talented people to these growing industries, and I would therefore welcome the Minister's thoughts on how the Critical Minerals Strategy connects with the government's wider industrial strategy and its skills agenda. I'm sure he remembers fondly his visit to south east Cornwall previously, and I'd really like to put on record my thanks for his visit and extend another invitation to join me in the future.
We also need to develop these resources responsibly, and I'm so proud that South East Cornwall is playing a role in securing this, and Cornwall contains some of our country's most important landscapes and ecosystems. It draws millions of tourists each year. We care about it and value it hugely, so we must ensure that that environmental protection and restoration is built into mineral extraction from the outset. Being part of that heritage, we know how to do this well.
It's sited in areas that were doing it previously, very supportive and have their expertise. I think we can really lead the way, both domestically and internationally, and show how this is done without relying on imports. So there's a real economic opportunity. And as the government's own critical minerals strategy recognises, the gap in our supply chain, with extracted tin currently exported for refining before refined tin is imported again, given today's tin price is almost £15,000 today, higher than this point last year, we can see that there's a growing strategic importance of this specific mineral.
So can we use this opportunity to close that gap while creating, processing and manufacturing jobs here in the UK, alongside the mining jobs already established? As my colleagues have mentioned, this industry is of national importance , and it's strategically crucial for the country that must be recognised as we look in this in more detail. So we need to be strategic about Britain's natural resources. We should learn from our experience with oil and gas, and think carefully about how we capture long term value from the resources that we have.
I've previously made the case for thinking differently about national natural wealth and our national resources, including the value of our data, and I see similar principles to be applied here. These are national assets. They're also local assets. And we can create long term wealth if strategically managed and thought about in a public good. As long as we're working with the incredibly important businesses who are doing such vital work in this area. But can the minister therefore set out how the government will ensure that that value created from the private sector and based on public wealth from critical minerals, is captured through things like skills, innovation, domestic supply chains, future economic growth? These opportunities that the people of Callington and other areas in south east Cornwall and across Cornwall will really highly value.
Cornwall can help power the industries of tomorrow, while ensuring today's benefits of the community are felt today and in the future. The opportunities are really significant. South East Cornwall is ready to play its part once again, as in this national push towards good economic growth, and we look forward to working with the minister to do so.
Read more tungsten and tin project can bring crucially needed investment to areas in my constituency like Callington and opportunities throughout south east Cornwall. We need to make sure the benefits of these are felt by my local community and that means local skills, apprenticeships and good quality jobs. I strongly believe that our young people shouldn't feel that they have to leave the place that they're from in order to get on in life and to succeed, and tin and the mining opportunities of Cornwall is a significant factor of how we build their future hope and aspirations.
Demand for tin is increasingly being driven, as my hon. Friend mentioned by electronics, AI and clean energy, South East Cornwall can contribute both its natural resources and in its hard working and talented people to these growing industries, and I would therefore welcome the Minister's thoughts on how the Critical Minerals Strategy connects with the government's wider industrial strategy and its skills agenda. I'm sure he remembers fondly his visit to south east Cornwall previously, and I'd really like to put on record my thanks for his visit and extend another invitation to join me in the future.
We also need to develop these resources responsibly, and I'm so proud that South East Cornwall is playing a role in securing this, and Cornwall contains some of our country's most important landscapes and ecosystems. It draws millions of tourists each year. We care about it and value it hugely, so we must ensure that that environmental protection and restoration is built into mineral extraction from the outset. Being part of that heritage, we know how to do this well.
It's sited in areas that were doing it previously, very supportive and have their expertise. I think we can really lead the way, both domestically and internationally, and show how this is done without relying on imports. So there's a real economic opportunity. And as the government's own critical minerals strategy recognises, the gap in our supply chain, with extracted tin currently exported for refining before refined tin is imported again, given today's tin price is almost £15,000 today, higher than this point last year, we can see that there's a growing strategic importance of this specific mineral.
So can we use this opportunity to close that gap while creating, processing and manufacturing jobs here in the UK, alongside the mining jobs already established? As my colleagues have mentioned, this industry is of national importance , and it's strategically crucial for the country that must be recognised as we look in this in more detail. So we need to be strategic about Britain's natural resources. We should learn from our experience with oil and gas, and think carefully about how we capture long term value from the resources that we have.
I've previously made the case for thinking differently about national natural wealth and our national resources, including the value of our data, and I see similar principles to be applied here. These are national assets. They're also local assets. And we can create long term wealth if strategically managed and thought about in a public good. As long as we're working with the incredibly important businesses who are doing such vital work in this area. But can the minister therefore set out how the government will ensure that that value created from the private sector and based on public wealth from critical minerals, is captured through things like skills, innovation, domestic supply chains, future economic growth? These opportunities that the people of Callington and other areas in south east Cornwall and across Cornwall will really highly value.
Cornwall can help power the industries of tomorrow, while ensuring today's benefits of the community are felt today and in the future. The opportunities are really significant. South East Cornwall is ready to play its part once again, as in this national push towards good economic growth, and we look forward to working with the minister to do so.
16:53
16:53
16:53
Speaker 16
-
Speaker 16
Thank you, Mr. Barker. It's a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, and I would like to congratulate the honourable member for Camborne and Redruth for securing this debate. Tin is one of those materials that most people will never really think about, but all of our every day lives depend on it, because it's the material that physically holds all of our devices, together with soldering being one of the most significant uses worldwide, it's the component on our circuit boards.
It's in almost every single device that we own, from smartphones that we all own, to the computers and the data centres that are powering the AI revolution. So today's debate isn't about a niche commodity. It's a debate about key component of our everyday lives. One of the problems, however, is scale, because globally mined tin output this year or last year is about 294,000 tonnes, which is absolutely tiny in comparison to copper or aluminium.
But it's because that scale is so small that the market is acutely sensitive to any disruption in any single place, and the supply of tin, as we know, is extraordinarily concentrated, with China being the largest single or one of the largest single producers , accounting for about a third of the global tin supply Indonesia, Myanmar, Democratic Republic of the Congo holding much of the rest. And when several of these jurisdictions that mine the majority of tin are currently affected by either an international conflict, by resource nationalism or simply by geographical decline, geological decline.
The result is that since 2025, has seen the strongest price rally of any major industrial metal in the UK. Now, the government already recognises this, which is why tin sits on the UK's critical mineral lists. But just because it's on the list, it doesn't necessarily mean that we get anything that follows from that recognition. Now, we know that many other countries know exactly what critical minerals they have in the ground. Kananga is specifically good at this, knowing exactly its critical mineral map across the nation.
The UK government doesn't have that critical mineral map for the entire of the United Kingdom. So I would like to ask the minister if there is a plan within his department to try and see what critical minerals we actually have in the ground in the United Kingdom, but we know that tin is in the ground in Cornwall. It is not a new idea to extract tin from the ground in Cornwall. It's one of the oldest industries on these islands, because Cornish tin was being carted to the coast and shipped to the Mediterranean even before Britain, even before Rome ruled Britain under the Romans, the extraction significantly increased from the late Roman period to the late medieval period.
Britain had realistically a monopoly on the tin trade. 2000 years later, we import almost all of our tin. Cornwall remained one of the most significant tin producing regions for over 400 years, where now Cornish metals are doing work to try and re-establish that long history. De-watering has reached around 350m in the tin mines that we are looking to reopen, and the old pumping infrastructure has found in nearly three decades after it had closed.
We are glad that we've seen flagship project status on the government's critical mineral strategy, and that the National Wealth Fund has invested £28 million in equity as part of its wider project. Because if we manage to reach production targeted for 2028, South Crofty could create 300 direct jobs, hundreds more indirect jobs in the Cornish economy, in an area which we do know is economically disadvantaged in comparison to large parts of the country. So this is incredibly important.
But it wouldn't only be important just for the UK, because this would be the only primary tin mine in Europe or in North America, not one of the largest, but the only one. And that's why it's so significant, because we have the chance here in the United Kingdom and down in Cornwall, to be one of the only tin production facilities on this side of the world. And that's something we really need to take into account when we're considering how the Critical minerals strategy will move forward.
So I do have a few questions for the minister specifically on this topic. Firstly, I want to try and find out what practical steps the government is taking to make sure that the 28 target is met, particularly on permitting, on skills and on grid connection. Secondly, I'll ask the Minister what assessment has been made about a strategic tin stockpile, particularly from the recovery of electronic waste, so that we reduce demand for imports rather than simply redirecting it.
Thirdly, I'd like to know what's being done on due diligence, given that tin comes from some regions where trade is entangled with armed conflict. And fourthly, what is the government's plan for critical mineral partnerships with reliable partners around the world in the European Union, but also in Commonwealth countries? Because an alternative supply chain can exist. But as the United Kingdom, we are not large enough to be able to do that on our own. However, the coalition of the willing with other partners around the world, we would be able to bring that forward.
And that's something we really need to be able to work for. Because resilience can't be ordered at short notice. It has to be built. But that building needs to start now with our friends and neighbours.
It's in almost every single device that we own, from smartphones that we all own, to the computers and the data centres that are powering the AI revolution. So today's debate isn't about a niche commodity. It's a debate about key component of our everyday lives. One of the problems, however, is scale, because globally mined tin output this year or last year is about 294,000 tonnes, which is absolutely tiny in comparison to copper or aluminium.
But it's because that scale is so small that the market is acutely sensitive to any disruption in any single place, and the supply of tin, as we know, is extraordinarily concentrated, with China being the largest single or one of the largest single producers , accounting for about a third of the global tin supply Indonesia, Myanmar, Democratic Republic of the Congo holding much of the rest. And when several of these jurisdictions that mine the majority of tin are currently affected by either an international conflict, by resource nationalism or simply by geographical decline, geological decline.
The result is that since 2025, has seen the strongest price rally of any major industrial metal in the UK. Now, the government already recognises this, which is why tin sits on the UK's critical mineral lists. But just because it's on the list, it doesn't necessarily mean that we get anything that follows from that recognition. Now, we know that many other countries know exactly what critical minerals they have in the ground. Kananga is specifically good at this, knowing exactly its critical mineral map across the nation.
The UK government doesn't have that critical mineral map for the entire of the United Kingdom. So I would like to ask the minister if there is a plan within his department to try and see what critical minerals we actually have in the ground in the United Kingdom, but we know that tin is in the ground in Cornwall. It is not a new idea to extract tin from the ground in Cornwall. It's one of the oldest industries on these islands, because Cornish tin was being carted to the coast and shipped to the Mediterranean even before Britain, even before Rome ruled Britain under the Romans, the extraction significantly increased from the late Roman period to the late medieval period.
Britain had realistically a monopoly on the tin trade. 2000 years later, we import almost all of our tin. Cornwall remained one of the most significant tin producing regions for over 400 years, where now Cornish metals are doing work to try and re-establish that long history. De-watering has reached around 350m in the tin mines that we are looking to reopen, and the old pumping infrastructure has found in nearly three decades after it had closed.
We are glad that we've seen flagship project status on the government's critical mineral strategy, and that the National Wealth Fund has invested £28 million in equity as part of its wider project. Because if we manage to reach production targeted for 2028, South Crofty could create 300 direct jobs, hundreds more indirect jobs in the Cornish economy, in an area which we do know is economically disadvantaged in comparison to large parts of the country. So this is incredibly important.
But it wouldn't only be important just for the UK, because this would be the only primary tin mine in Europe or in North America, not one of the largest, but the only one. And that's why it's so significant, because we have the chance here in the United Kingdom and down in Cornwall, to be one of the only tin production facilities on this side of the world. And that's something we really need to take into account when we're considering how the Critical minerals strategy will move forward.
So I do have a few questions for the minister specifically on this topic. Firstly, I want to try and find out what practical steps the government is taking to make sure that the 28 target is met, particularly on permitting, on skills and on grid connection. Secondly, I'll ask the Minister what assessment has been made about a strategic tin stockpile, particularly from the recovery of electronic waste, so that we reduce demand for imports rather than simply redirecting it.
Thirdly, I'd like to know what's being done on due diligence, given that tin comes from some regions where trade is entangled with armed conflict. And fourthly, what is the government's plan for critical mineral partnerships with reliable partners around the world in the European Union, but also in Commonwealth countries? Because an alternative supply chain can exist. But as the United Kingdom, we are not large enough to be able to do that on our own. However, the coalition of the willing with other partners around the world, we would be able to bring that forward.
And that's something we really need to be able to work for. Because resilience can't be ordered at short notice. It has to be built. But that building needs to start now with our friends and neighbours.
16:58
Speaker 19
-
Speaker 19
Well, it's a great pleasure seeing the Chair Thank you very much for keeping us all in order. Let me first congratulate the honourable member for Camborne and Redruth on securing this debate. I'm pleased, he clarified. This is not a debate on Tinder for clarification for the entire room. I did know it was a debate about tin and not Tinder, but it is clear that he is a perfect match for this subject because I didn't know this actually, that he is known as the Tin Man.
But unlike Wizard of Oz, he does not need to search for a heart because it is clear that he cares deeply about this subject and is a great advocate for tin his constituents and I very much enjoyed and was partly educated by his excellent speech, and he will recognise elements of my speech or his speech in my speech, because of the excellent points that he made. Now, unlike lithium, it is rarely treated. Tin is rarely treated to the big headlines and Gigafactory photo opportunities, but it quietly plays, as we've been hearing today, an indispensable role in our economy.
Half the tin we consume goes to electronic solder, supporting our entire electronics industry. As the honourable gentleman pointed out so eloquently, and demand is only increasing as solar panels, electronic vehicles, AI data centres now compete for the same limited global supply, and it's no surprise that prices have soared to nearly $50,000 as a result of the demand. The honourable gentleman was right to highlight the new investment. I think as of May 2026 in the South Crofty mine, opening it up for the first time in decades, this is excellent news for the country.
It's excellent news, obviously, for his constituency. It would be remiss of me to point out that the National Wealth Fund, obviously, is an organisation that has existed for quite some time since my right hon. Friend for Richmond created the UK infrastructure Bank. It's now been renamed the National Wealth Fund under the new Labour government. But the construct, the purpose of that organisation remains and. And I'm very grateful for that, as I'm sure are the people of Cornwall, because back in 2023, the UK Infrastructure Investment Infrastructure Bank invested in Cornish lithium, which you'll be aware of.
And this is not a subject that is alien to the Conservative Party. We care deeply about this. The honourable gentleman didn't mention it, but he'll be aware, as will the minister, that it was the last government that created the first Critical Minerals Strategy, recognising tin as one of 18 essential minerals, and it is vital that we do have a critical minerals strategy and we welcome the investment that has been made. But you've got to make sure that, you know, one investment, you know, doesn't just get celebrated by everybody.
And we don't talk about the overall issues and the strategy as a whole. And, you know, I look at the existing the current government's existing critical minerals strategy. It doesn't even mention China once, which I take issue, I'm afraid, with with the government. Despite China's near monopoly on processing critical minerals, as the Liberal Democrat spokesman said, this is not just an omission in the government's strategy. It's a hole in the middle of the plan, roughly the size of the South Crofty mine shaft.
So it will be no surprise to the hon. Gentleman that I have a few questions for him. First of all, smelting tin is extremely energy intensive, but we know that the UK industrial energy prices are around 50% higher than our friends in France and in Germany. So can I ask, how is the government squaring its clear critical mineral ambitions with these very clear rising energy costs? Secondly, I recognize the honourable gentleman is not a Foreign Office minister, and as tempting as it is, I won't ask him to solve international conflicts today from the despatch box.
But global tin supply has depreciated due to unrest in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the restrictions in my own state. As the honourable gentleman pointed out, so will he tell us what conversations he has had directly with his Foreign Office counterparts about the security of the supply routes for the subject we're talking about today? And lastly, how does the government recognise, sorry, reconcile such enthusiasm for critical minerals that he will clearly demonstrate in a minute with the National Insurance Rise and Employment Rights Act that will cost this very industry some £50 million? Exactly.
At the moment, foreign investors are voting with their feet and taking money. Unfortunately, outside of our country, South Crofty will not produce its first tonne of tin until 2028 at the earliest. And it's my belief that between now and then we must back British businesses in the critical minerals sector and oppose the economic pressures that the government is unrelentingly piling on the industry. I hope the Minister can provide some of the answers to the questions that I've asked today, because right now, frankly, his strategy has all the substance of a fool's tin.
Thank you , Minister.
But unlike Wizard of Oz, he does not need to search for a heart because it is clear that he cares deeply about this subject and is a great advocate for tin his constituents and I very much enjoyed and was partly educated by his excellent speech, and he will recognise elements of my speech or his speech in my speech, because of the excellent points that he made. Now, unlike lithium, it is rarely treated. Tin is rarely treated to the big headlines and Gigafactory photo opportunities, but it quietly plays, as we've been hearing today, an indispensable role in our economy.
Half the tin we consume goes to electronic solder, supporting our entire electronics industry. As the honourable gentleman pointed out so eloquently, and demand is only increasing as solar panels, electronic vehicles, AI data centres now compete for the same limited global supply, and it's no surprise that prices have soared to nearly $50,000 as a result of the demand. The honourable gentleman was right to highlight the new investment. I think as of May 2026 in the South Crofty mine, opening it up for the first time in decades, this is excellent news for the country.
It's excellent news, obviously, for his constituency. It would be remiss of me to point out that the National Wealth Fund, obviously, is an organisation that has existed for quite some time since my right hon. Friend for Richmond created the UK infrastructure Bank. It's now been renamed the National Wealth Fund under the new Labour government. But the construct, the purpose of that organisation remains and. And I'm very grateful for that, as I'm sure are the people of Cornwall, because back in 2023, the UK Infrastructure Investment Infrastructure Bank invested in Cornish lithium, which you'll be aware of.
And this is not a subject that is alien to the Conservative Party. We care deeply about this. The honourable gentleman didn't mention it, but he'll be aware, as will the minister, that it was the last government that created the first Critical Minerals Strategy, recognising tin as one of 18 essential minerals, and it is vital that we do have a critical minerals strategy and we welcome the investment that has been made. But you've got to make sure that, you know, one investment, you know, doesn't just get celebrated by everybody.
And we don't talk about the overall issues and the strategy as a whole. And, you know, I look at the existing the current government's existing critical minerals strategy. It doesn't even mention China once, which I take issue, I'm afraid, with with the government. Despite China's near monopoly on processing critical minerals, as the Liberal Democrat spokesman said, this is not just an omission in the government's strategy. It's a hole in the middle of the plan, roughly the size of the South Crofty mine shaft.
So it will be no surprise to the hon. Gentleman that I have a few questions for him. First of all, smelting tin is extremely energy intensive, but we know that the UK industrial energy prices are around 50% higher than our friends in France and in Germany. So can I ask, how is the government squaring its clear critical mineral ambitions with these very clear rising energy costs? Secondly, I recognize the honourable gentleman is not a Foreign Office minister, and as tempting as it is, I won't ask him to solve international conflicts today from the despatch box.
But global tin supply has depreciated due to unrest in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the restrictions in my own state. As the honourable gentleman pointed out, so will he tell us what conversations he has had directly with his Foreign Office counterparts about the security of the supply routes for the subject we're talking about today? And lastly, how does the government recognise, sorry, reconcile such enthusiasm for critical minerals that he will clearly demonstrate in a minute with the National Insurance Rise and Employment Rights Act that will cost this very industry some £50 million? Exactly.
At the moment, foreign investors are voting with their feet and taking money. Unfortunately, outside of our country, South Crofty will not produce its first tonne of tin until 2028 at the earliest. And it's my belief that between now and then we must back British businesses in the critical minerals sector and oppose the economic pressures that the government is unrelentingly piling on the industry. I hope the Minister can provide some of the answers to the questions that I've asked today, because right now, frankly, his strategy has all the substance of a fool's tin.
Thank you , Minister.
17:04
Speaker 20
-
Speaker 20
Thank you, Mrs. Barker. It's a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. It's a pleasure also to respond and to congratulate my hon. Friend the member for Camborne and Redruth on securing this debate, and also a pleasure to be at least momentarily taken back to my summer holiday in the constituency of my hon. Friend the member for Saint Austell and Newquay. I will not say where I would rather be at this particular moment.
Can I also say scientists had previously said that the shortest, scientifically measurable period of time was 247 zepto seconds, and I can confirm that my own research has found that there is a shorter, measurable period of time for that, and it is the period in between you being appointed as the Minister for Critical Minerals and all three Labour MPs from Cornwall contacting you to ask for meetings and conversations about the potential for critical minerals in that part of the world, perhaps appropriately, for a debate on mining, they are stuck in their work effort on this issue.
It is timely, as has been said, to have this debate on global tin availability. It is not always, as has been said, the mineral that attracts the big headlines, but I. To respond to my hon. Friend's first request, I can confirm that we absolutely, as a government recognise that it is central and fundamental to modern economic life. It's the solder that connects circuit boards, semiconductors, data infrastructure, automotive, electrics and of course, defence technologies.
And when global tin supply is tight, the impact can be felt far beyond mining markets, as has been said, and manufacturing costs, supply chain resilience, investment decisions and ultimately in the UK's ability to deliver growth, energy security and national security. My hon. Friend's constituency is absolutely central to that discussion and to meeting those challenges. It is home to significant tin deposits, including the South Crofty tin mine.
As has been mentioned, with a high grade tin resource and the potential to re-establish meaningful primary tin production in the UK. That matters has been said not only for Cornwall's proud mining heritage. I was going to say going back to the Bronze Age, but given that tin is one of the constituent parts of it, perhaps it predates the Bronze Age. It's the Tin Isles mentioned by Herodotus. But has been said the future of tin mining is of much more immediate importance and a source of excitement.
So the question before us is therefore not simply whether we can mine more tin. Again, it is how secure, responsible and diverse tin supply can support jobs, industrial competitiveness, clean energy deployment and economic resilience. I'm happy to.
Can I also say scientists had previously said that the shortest, scientifically measurable period of time was 247 zepto seconds, and I can confirm that my own research has found that there is a shorter, measurable period of time for that, and it is the period in between you being appointed as the Minister for Critical Minerals and all three Labour MPs from Cornwall contacting you to ask for meetings and conversations about the potential for critical minerals in that part of the world, perhaps appropriately, for a debate on mining, they are stuck in their work effort on this issue.
It is timely, as has been said, to have this debate on global tin availability. It is not always, as has been said, the mineral that attracts the big headlines, but I. To respond to my hon. Friend's first request, I can confirm that we absolutely, as a government recognise that it is central and fundamental to modern economic life. It's the solder that connects circuit boards, semiconductors, data infrastructure, automotive, electrics and of course, defence technologies.
And when global tin supply is tight, the impact can be felt far beyond mining markets, as has been said, and manufacturing costs, supply chain resilience, investment decisions and ultimately in the UK's ability to deliver growth, energy security and national security. My hon. Friend's constituency is absolutely central to that discussion and to meeting those challenges. It is home to significant tin deposits, including the South Crofty tin mine.
As has been mentioned, with a high grade tin resource and the potential to re-establish meaningful primary tin production in the UK. That matters has been said not only for Cornwall's proud mining heritage. I was going to say going back to the Bronze Age, but given that tin is one of the constituent parts of it, perhaps it predates the Bronze Age. It's the Tin Isles mentioned by Herodotus. But has been said the future of tin mining is of much more immediate importance and a source of excitement.
So the question before us is therefore not simply whether we can mine more tin. Again, it is how secure, responsible and diverse tin supply can support jobs, industrial competitiveness, clean energy deployment and economic resilience. I'm happy to.
17:08
Speaker 3
-
Speaker 3
Can I commend honourable gentleman in sponsoring an event next door and as a sponsor, had to speak so I couldn't be here and I intend to be here. And I spoke to the Madam Chair beforehand to ask for permission to ask a question, because it's much more than the honourable gentleman is really a fantastic spokesman for Cornwall, and every subject has to do with Cornwall. He's there and I congratulate him on that there. But for Northern Ireland, because we want to see this, adding our support to what the honourable gentleman is doing as well, the issues of particular significance, as we have no major domestic source of tin and rely upon imported supplies, making businesses vulnerable to international supply chain disruption.
Businesses in Northern Ireland also face additional complex regulatory requirements to ensure that has not been linked to conflict or illegal mining. But the point I want to make does us from Northern Ireland myself, as a representative for Strangford, want to add our support to Cornish Metal's plans to establish a production at the Crofty mine in Cornwall, which could support the securing of the supply for the West and ensure that Northern Ireland has accessible tin at an affordable price and there could be no EU interference in this trade.
I commend the honourable gentleman. I look to the Minister for supporting the honourable gentleman, because we certainly support him in Northern Ireland as well.
Businesses in Northern Ireland also face additional complex regulatory requirements to ensure that has not been linked to conflict or illegal mining. But the point I want to make does us from Northern Ireland myself, as a representative for Strangford, want to add our support to Cornish Metal's plans to establish a production at the Crofty mine in Cornwall, which could support the securing of the supply for the West and ensure that Northern Ireland has accessible tin at an affordable price and there could be no EU interference in this trade.
I commend the honourable gentleman. I look to the Minister for supporting the honourable gentleman, because we certainly support him in Northern Ireland as well.
17:09
Speaker 20
-
Speaker 20
Thank you for that. That offer of support for the effort. I know that in Northern Ireland , one of the key economic strengths is advanced manufacturing and the importance of tin runs from top to bottom through that sector. It underpins so much advanced manufacturing. As I said, automotive production, aerospace, clean energy technologies, data centres, telecommunications, defence, all of which is important for Northern Ireland, but also the UK at large.
And if tin is scarce, if it's volatile, if it's increasingly concentrated in those few countries that honourable members have mentioned, those pressures can affect investment, confidence, productivity and our competitiveness in the sectors within the industrial strategy. As has been said, it's not enough. Simply, as the member for Saint Austell and Newquay and the member for South East Cornwall has said simply to leave this alone to the market and we have a responsibility to make sure that local people benefit from it.
And as the member for South East Cornwall spoke about, this is essential to our ability to deliver on the industrial strategy as a whole, and critical minerals in themselves are essential part of the UK economy, but they underpin everything else that we are trying to achieve. And that is why the Critical Minerals strategy is focused on resilience, on improving our understanding of demand, supporting domestic capability where it is viable and environmentally responsible, as well as increasing recycling and working with international partners so that UK businesses are not dependent on fragile or overly concentrated sources of supply.
We cannot onshore every part of the supply chain, but where we have those resources and we clearly do within Cornwall, where we have capable companies, the environmental protections and the community support here in the UK, and we can make a contribution to that resilience. And that is why, for example, we have supported South Crofty tin project through £20 million of equity investment. It's why last week we announced the £71 million investment into Tungsten West.
But as honourable members have said, exploration is great, mining is great, but we also want to see more processing, more refining, more recycling in the UK and as well, it's why we have put in place the £25 million Critical Minerals Accelerator to help viable projects get over that hump and get into the market, and it's why we are introducing Bics to make the energy costs for potential refining projects more affordable in dealing with things like grid connections, the Liberal Democrats have also been asked particularly about intelligence.
So we've instituted the growth minerals list to get a sense of what our demand is. We have introduced the demand aggregator so we can get a sense with allies of that. But also the Critical Minerals Intelligence Centre has published our Prospectivity report, which sets out exactly what he asked in terms of the potential resources that are there. And we work with the British Geological Survey on that basis. And as I said, we are working with international partners to make sure that we have reliable prices, diverse sources and materials produced to the high standards that the modern economy requires.
Madam chair, in conclusion, ten has a major economic footprint. It connects the technologies that power our homes, vehicles, factories and communications. The global availability of tin therefore matters to prices, productivity, resilience and good growth. The government's approach is clear support responsible domestic production where we can recover more value through recycling, build better data on demand, mobilise finance and work with international partners to diversify supply. By doing so, we can reduce vulnerability, support British industry, create skilled jobs and ensure that the UK economy has access to the critical minerals it needs for the future.
I look forward to working with Hon. Friends to that end, and as I am the only one that did not mention Tinder, let me finish by saying I will always swipe right for the honourable gentleman.
And if tin is scarce, if it's volatile, if it's increasingly concentrated in those few countries that honourable members have mentioned, those pressures can affect investment, confidence, productivity and our competitiveness in the sectors within the industrial strategy. As has been said, it's not enough. Simply, as the member for Saint Austell and Newquay and the member for South East Cornwall has said simply to leave this alone to the market and we have a responsibility to make sure that local people benefit from it.
And as the member for South East Cornwall spoke about, this is essential to our ability to deliver on the industrial strategy as a whole, and critical minerals in themselves are essential part of the UK economy, but they underpin everything else that we are trying to achieve. And that is why the Critical Minerals strategy is focused on resilience, on improving our understanding of demand, supporting domestic capability where it is viable and environmentally responsible, as well as increasing recycling and working with international partners so that UK businesses are not dependent on fragile or overly concentrated sources of supply.
We cannot onshore every part of the supply chain, but where we have those resources and we clearly do within Cornwall, where we have capable companies, the environmental protections and the community support here in the UK, and we can make a contribution to that resilience. And that is why, for example, we have supported South Crofty tin project through £20 million of equity investment. It's why last week we announced the £71 million investment into Tungsten West.
But as honourable members have said, exploration is great, mining is great, but we also want to see more processing, more refining, more recycling in the UK and as well, it's why we have put in place the £25 million Critical Minerals Accelerator to help viable projects get over that hump and get into the market, and it's why we are introducing Bics to make the energy costs for potential refining projects more affordable in dealing with things like grid connections, the Liberal Democrats have also been asked particularly about intelligence.
So we've instituted the growth minerals list to get a sense of what our demand is. We have introduced the demand aggregator so we can get a sense with allies of that. But also the Critical Minerals Intelligence Centre has published our Prospectivity report, which sets out exactly what he asked in terms of the potential resources that are there. And we work with the British Geological Survey on that basis. And as I said, we are working with international partners to make sure that we have reliable prices, diverse sources and materials produced to the high standards that the modern economy requires.
Madam chair, in conclusion, ten has a major economic footprint. It connects the technologies that power our homes, vehicles, factories and communications. The global availability of tin therefore matters to prices, productivity, resilience and good growth. The government's approach is clear support responsible domestic production where we can recover more value through recycling, build better data on demand, mobilise finance and work with international partners to diversify supply. By doing so, we can reduce vulnerability, support British industry, create skilled jobs and ensure that the UK economy has access to the critical minerals it needs for the future.
I look forward to working with Hon. Friends to that end, and as I am the only one that did not mention Tinder, let me finish by saying I will always swipe right for the honourable gentleman.
17:14
17:14
Speaker 2
-
Speaker 2
Thank you, Madam Chair. I want to thank everybody that's contributed to this to this debate. Perhaps next time I should advertise it as a Tinder debate and we can educate people while they're here. But I do want to thank and make a few quick thanks if I if I may, given time, I'd like to thank my honourable friend from Saint Austell and Newquay, who's very knowledgeable in particularly in the areas of midstream and downstream.
He talked about processing supply chains. Both my colleagues mentioned Industrial Growth Fund, which right now is being used for exactly what it was designed to do, which is to support some of those exploratory mining opportunities amongst other commercial opportunities within within Cornwall. But he also mentioned unblocking planning and permitting issues. And that is something that we do need to take on on board going forward. My my honourable friend from South east Cornwall is a superb champion for Cornwall Resources who are doing amazing things at at maximising the opportunity in tungsten.
She talked very importantly and insightfully around the local benefits that skills agenda, which we really need to tie in with our devolution deal that we're that we're that I know the Prime Minister has mentioned several times in the last 48 hours that skills agenda for us in Cornwall is going to be critical, excuse the pun, in order for us to maximise the opportunities in this in this particular area. The Liberal Democrat spokesman, I totally agree with him in terms of the exploration that's urgently needed where we have these critical minerals.
I hear what the minister has has said, but we're not just talking about tin, tungsten and lithium, which are the three that we know about at the moment. We have, you know, we know from from previous records, we've got nickel, we've got cobalt, we've got uranium, we've got silver, we've got many more. But we need that data, we need that exploration, and we need support getting that there. And the Opposition Minister I'm clearly grasped the importance of of Cornish Tin Tin mining.
He mentions energy costs if perhaps for a debate for another day. But because of our cornubian batholith, the granite formation on which Cornwall sits, we have vast geothermal opportunities. And what we're looking to do is to try and see if there is a commercial case to make the. Make use locally of that geothermal to drive some of our industrial regeneration. And, you know, I've talked about aligning to the to the devolution deal. Really this debate was more a clarion call to, to government to, to really focus very closely on, yes, lithium, yes, tungsten, but also on a huge opportunity within the tin sector across the whole of of Cornwall.
And finally, I would like to warmly extend an invitation to him to visit us at the South Crofty tin mine.
He talked about processing supply chains. Both my colleagues mentioned Industrial Growth Fund, which right now is being used for exactly what it was designed to do, which is to support some of those exploratory mining opportunities amongst other commercial opportunities within within Cornwall. But he also mentioned unblocking planning and permitting issues. And that is something that we do need to take on on board going forward. My my honourable friend from South east Cornwall is a superb champion for Cornwall Resources who are doing amazing things at at maximising the opportunity in tungsten.
She talked very importantly and insightfully around the local benefits that skills agenda, which we really need to tie in with our devolution deal that we're that we're that I know the Prime Minister has mentioned several times in the last 48 hours that skills agenda for us in Cornwall is going to be critical, excuse the pun, in order for us to maximise the opportunities in this in this particular area. The Liberal Democrat spokesman, I totally agree with him in terms of the exploration that's urgently needed where we have these critical minerals.
I hear what the minister has has said, but we're not just talking about tin, tungsten and lithium, which are the three that we know about at the moment. We have, you know, we know from from previous records, we've got nickel, we've got cobalt, we've got uranium, we've got silver, we've got many more. But we need that data, we need that exploration, and we need support getting that there. And the Opposition Minister I'm clearly grasped the importance of of Cornish Tin Tin mining.
He mentions energy costs if perhaps for a debate for another day. But because of our cornubian batholith, the granite formation on which Cornwall sits, we have vast geothermal opportunities. And what we're looking to do is to try and see if there is a commercial case to make the. Make use locally of that geothermal to drive some of our industrial regeneration. And, you know, I've talked about aligning to the to the devolution deal. Really this debate was more a clarion call to, to government to, to really focus very closely on, yes, lithium, yes, tungsten, but also on a huge opportunity within the tin sector across the whole of of Cornwall.
And finally, I would like to warmly extend an invitation to him to visit us at the South Crofty tin mine.