Mobile Homes (Pitch Fees) Bill

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 3rd February 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Udny-Lister and congratulate him on sponsoring this small but very important Bill in this House. I thank other noble Lords for—in most cases—their total support for the Bill, which the Government will be supporting. I also thank my honourable friend the Member for Christchurch, who is behind the bar, I believe. I am grateful for his work in the other place as chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Park Homes. He has been a consistent champion of mobile home residents, and for that we are very grateful.

Mobile homes, also known as park homes, are a unique and important part of our housing sector. There are about 160,000 people in England living in mobile homes. Many, but not all, mobile home residents are older people on fixed incomes, for whom the rising cost of living is a real concern. The Government recognise this and provided support of up to £1,200 last year to those who needed it most. This Government are also committed to reforming the mobile homes sector to improve the lives of all residents and help responsible site owners.

We began these reforms with the introduction of the Mobile Homes Act 2013, important legislation which has made significant steps towards more effective and modern regulation of the sector. The 2013 Act strengthened the rights of residents and gave local authorities substantial enforcement powers, which I think answers some of the queries from the noble Lord opposite. In 2017, we carried out a review of the legislation and the evidence clearly showed that, overall, the Act had been effective and had made tangible improvements in the lives of many residents. However, there were issues that still needed further attention, including residents’ ongoing concerns about the impact on their finances from the continued use of RPI in annual pitch fee reviews. Having considered arguments and concerns about affordability for both residents and site owners, we concluded that the consumer prices index—the CPI—was the most appropriate index for annual pitch fee reviews. In our response to the review, we made a commitment to bring forward primary legislation, when parliamentary time allowed, to change RPI to the lower CPI. This is the Bill before us today.

The changes we are making will be an important contribution to easing pressures on residents. I am grateful to all noble Lords for their support and desire to get this Bill through as quickly as possible. This Bill, when enacted, will help residents with the cost of living pressures by changing the inflationary index used in pitch fee reviews from RPI to the lower CPI. With the incomes of many residents rising by CPI, the changes will mean that pitch fee increases and residents’ income will be subject to the same measure of inflation.

To conclude, mobile home residents may represent only less than 0.5% of the housing sector but some are among the most vulnerable in our society. There is more that can and must be done to address the problems they face; we fully understand why some residents would like to see additional measures included in the Bill. As was brought up by almost all noble Lords, there is more we can do to help these particular homeowners. I assure noble Lords that we will continue with the reforms to the sector that we have committed to introduce to improve the lives of residents. The priority for today is to ensure that this Private Member’s Bill, which is aimed at addressing the narrow but important issue of changing RPI to the lower CPI, goes through Committee swiftly, passing in time to make the much-needed changes to the lives of residents. The Government are proud to back this Bill and wish it a safe passage through its remaining stages.

Building Safety

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

Thursday 2nd February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, rightly reminded us of the 18th anniversary of the Stevenage tower block fire and the tragic deaths of two firefighters. From these Benches we too send our condolences to their families and co-workers. I declare my interest as a vice-president of the All-Party Group on Fire Safety and Rescue.

There is much to be positive about and to welcome in this Statement, but it has taken far too long. It is nearly six years since the terrible tragedy of the Grenfell Tower fire that cost 72 lives, among whom 40% of the disabled residents lost their lives. In that time, many thousands of leaseholders in high-rise blocks have had their lives completely on hold. Their insurance and service charges are skyrocketing, they are not able to move or sell and they are for ever living in fear of fire. So we welcome the elements of the Statement that are a step forward, in forcing the costs of remediation on to developers and building companies, with serious penalties for failure to do so—by removing the right to build. However, there are still big gaps in ensuring that all those blameless leaseholders and tenants are protected from the undue risk of fire and being penalised by freeholders and property agents.

Blocks that are under 11 metres tall are specifically excluded in the Building Safety Act. It was wrong to do so then, and it is wrong to do so now. The argument that the risk is smaller as the blocks are lower is valid except when you factor in the speed at which combustible cladding fires spread. I urge the Minister to continue talking to such leaseholders, to listen to their stories and then to help them. There is a further problem with blocks under 11 metres if there is only one staircase for people to escape down. That is a significant problem and will always impact on safe egress.

It is good to see some action being taken on skyrocketing service charges and insurance. More transparency on invoices is positive, but that fails to stop the charges being excessive. What do the Government plan to do about other egregious behaviour by letting agents? I know of one case in my area in which a tenant who has been without a shower for a year has been told that if she pushes it any further, she will receive an eviction notice. That behaviour is also absolutely unacceptable —it is from the letting agent and she cannot get hold of her landlord, even though she is entitled to under the law.

Some blocks are still paying for waking watch services, when there is a very high charge for a very limited and ineffective service. In fact, there was a fire before Christmas in a block of flats where there was a waking watch, but of course the waking watch was in the wrong place when the fire was discovered. There has been inadequate public funding to support social housing providers unwillingly caught up in this disaster whose ability to spend capital moneys is very curtailed. Where is the funding to help pay for the remediation that is needed?

My final issue relates to disabled residents. During the debate on the Statement in the other place on Monday, two MPs, Florence Eshalomi and Mike Amesbury, asked about PEEPs. I declare my interest as a disabled person. I have been caught in a hotel above floor 5 when a fire alarm went off. It is pretty scary if you are not quite sure what the arrangements are. Even if there is a PEEP, will people turn up? The Secretary of State said in reply to Florence Eshalomi:

“Critically, one recommendation from the inquiry—the need for personal emergency evacuation plans—is one that the Government have not yet met. I have been working with my colleagues in the Home Office to make sure that we do”.


In reply to Mike Amesbury, he said that the Home Office was

“working hard and I hope to update the House shortly”.—[Official Report, Commons, 30/1/23; cols. 56-57.]

On Wednesday, the All-Party Parliamentary Fire Safety and Rescue Group heard from Lee Rowley, who explained that the Government are thinking of giving the Home Office the lead on this. The APPG is very clear that these issues and those about fire safety in education are cross-department. At the moment, it feels to us in the all-party group that every time there is an issue it is passed from one department to the other and then to the other. We urge the Government to have one Minister in overall charge of fire safety, who will undertake to work with any other Ministers who also have responsibility for fire safety.

I know that the Home Office is currently consulting on PEEPs, but the consultation is on an extremely watered-down version presented after we had finished on the Building Safety Bill. That means that it has not been as well discussed, and it was certainly not discussed with me and the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson. We had both tabled amendments for a stronger version of PEEPs to be introduced. Can the Minister say whether only the watered-down version is being considered, or will the responses from disabled groups about the dangers of a watered-down version be listened to?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)]

My Lords, I add my condolences to those expressed to the families and friends of the firefighters from Hertfordshire. I had not realised that it was 18 years, but our thoughts are with them.

Following the tragedy of Grenfell Tower, we are determined as a Government to learn the lessons of the past. It is the past not just of this Government but of many Governments before us who did not look at and take as much note of building regulations as we should have done—all of us. This Government will learn lessons, but they are lessons not just for them. We must also make sure that this tragedy never happens again.

I want to start with Sophie, because it is important, and I have heard of many people like her from my own personal contacts. People talk about time and, yes, it has taken a long time for us to get here, but it was a very complex issue and I can assure the House that we have been working really hard. The Government are aware of the case of Sophie. They are taking action and working with her and others who are in the same position. That is important to say.

Ninety-five per cent of all high-rise buildings with unsafe, Grenfell-style ACM cladding have been remediated or have the remedial work very much under way. Importantly, 100% of buildings in the social rented sector that were affected have been remediated. We now have remediation funding routes for all affected buildings over 11 metres in England. However, we are not complacent, and we recognise that there is a lot more still to do.

Building owners have a legal responsibility to make sure that their buildings are safe. Where remediation work is required, they must take appropriate action without delay; that is what my right honourable friend the Secretary of State was saying in his Statement. It is unacceptable that, today, some are still deliberately holding up remediation works by refusing to sign legal agreements that would allow government funding—even government funding—to be used to make their building safe. That is why we have provided £8 million more of funding to local authorities to pursue building owners who are refusing progress remediation. We are also working closely with the regulators to make sure that building owners are held to account for their actions; where appropriate, we will take enforcement action.

We are confident that the developer remediation contract we published this week is entirely consistent with the letter and the spirit of the pledge that many of the major housebuilders signed last year. We work with potential signatories to make sure that the contract we are now asking them to sign is clear and is what the developers expected. However, it also codifies the pledge commitments to which the developers signed up earlier. We are making sure that developers are true to their word and sign that contract by 13 March. Leaseholders and residents in hundreds of buildings across the country expect no less than that. The contract makes it crystal clear that we expect developers to remediate their buildings as soon as possible. I think the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, asked whether this is going to be done. We expect them to carry that out as soon as possible. In fact, some developers are already assessing and remediating buildings in advance of the contract being finalised, which is very welcome.

When the work has been carried out, the residents in those buildings also need to know that it has been completed to a required standard. We cannot have shoddy remediation. The contract therefore also requires the developer to obtain a qualifying assessment from an independent fire safety expert when the work is done. If that assessment shows that the work has been shoddy and the building remains dangerous in any way, the developer will have to fix it under the contract; the department will have powers to audit those assessments and act if the building has not been property remediated. Developers will remain on that hook for two years after the works have been completed, which means that any shoddy work can be spotted straight away and we will make them put it right. Developers may also be held to account to make sure that they are completing work properly and at pace. They will be required to report quarterly to the department on their progress. I think noble Lords can see that we are keeping an eye on this—we are not letting developers get away with anything.

As I said, we expect every developer who has these buildings to sign the contract by 13 March. Anybody who refuses to sign will face significant consequences. That is the important thing. You have to have a bit of carrot to begin with and then you have to have the stick. In the spring, we will bring forward legislation for a responsible actors scheme, which will require eligible developers to sign and comply with the contract. Any developer who does not sign the contract and comply with the terms will not be permitted to join and remain in the scheme. If that happens, the developer will be prohibited from commencing developments for which they have planning permission and from receiving building control sign-off on construction that is already under way. In other words, those developers will not be allowed to build houses in this country until they deal with the issues and fix the problems of the past.

To do that, and to make sure that it is happening, we have set up a Recovery Strategy Unit, which will make it very clear to all those developers that we expect them, as the people who have contributed and profited from these affected buildings, to take responsibility and fix them. The unit is already set up and spearheading this work. It will pursue companies and individuals who fail to do the right thing and, if necessary, take them through the courts.

A number of questions outside this area were asked. The noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, asked about decent homes in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill. They are in the Bill, and we have announced that we will be exploring proposals for new minimum standards in the social rented sector. We have also set an ambition for non-decent homes in all rental sectors to be reduced by 50% by 2030. We will target the biggest improvements in the lowest-performing areas, which I think is important. We talked a lot about pace, and noble Lords can see through the contract that pace will be part of what we will be ensuring that developers deliver on.

The noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, asked about buildings insurance. This is another thing that has come up over and again. We are committed to acting on commissions and other payments and will be discussing this with those who represent land stewards, managing agents and freeholders and asking them to reconsider their charging mechanisms as a matter of priority. In the Statement, the Secretary of State said that he does not believe there should be any commissions on any of these insurances from the freeholder to the leaseholder. We will be taking that forward and looking at it in detail. The Financial Conduct Authority is currently undertaking its own review of high broker commissions, to be published in March this year. I have requested an update on any actions that will be undertaken following that review, and I will make sure that the House is updated on that.

The noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, also brought up the important issue of PEEPs. The Government have accepted in principle all the recommendations in the Grenfell Tower Inquiry: Phase 1 Report. We recognise the importance of listening to the concerns of disabled residents and the community in order to come to the right outcomes as quickly as possible. This is across two departments. We are working very closely with the Home Office, which is the responsible department in this area, and we recognise the need to move quickly to ensure that disabled people are safe. I feel strongly about this. Disabled people deserve to feel safe in their homes, and so we are listening and working very closely with the Home Office. I hope that we can bring forward changes as soon as possible. I will keep the noble Baroness informed about how we go with that.

Another thing I feel strongly about is single staircases. Every building has to meet the safety and performance requirements in the building regulations and the Government have reiterated to building control bodies, local authorities and the industry that robust evidence must be presented on the appropriateness of the means of escape from a tall residential building to demonstrate how it meets the building regulations. However, we have now published a public consultation outlining our clear ambition to make provision for a second staircase in all new blocks of flats above 30 metres. We very much welcome views on this important topic to inform future changes to approved document B in the building regulations, so I say to the noble Baroness, with her contacts, that it is important that we hear more about how important those second staircases are, particularly to disabled people.

I am sorry that I have gone a little bit over in that, but I had a lot of questions to answer and I note that there are not a lot of other noble Lords here to ask questions. Oh! My noble friend is behind me.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, I join others in warmly welcoming the Statement made earlier this week. As has been said, it marks an important milestone on the road to justice for the thousands of leaseholders whose lives have been on hold, as the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, said. I welcome what my noble friend has just said in updating us on the progress being made in making these blocks safer.

But, may I press my noble friend on two sentences in the Statement? The first is:

“Leaseholders should know that the law is on their side.”


The second is:

“When we were told that leaseholders must pay, we … protected”


them. However, there are two groups of leaseholders for whom, sadly, that is not the case, and who are not given protection under the Bill. The first is leaseholders who have enfranchised, following government encouragement, and become freeholders. When I raised this nearly a year ago in Committee, the words of my noble friend’s predecessor, my noble friend Lord Greenhalgh, gave me some assurance:

“They are effectively leaseholders that have enfranchised as opposed to freeholders.”—[Official Report, 28/2/22; col. GC 262.]


Sadly, after my amendment was rejected, they are effectively freeholders, and they do not have the protection extended to other leaseholders in the Bill.

The second category was touched on by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton: leaseholders in buildings under 11 metres, who are not covered by the Bill either, but they are confronted by the same problems as leaseholders in tall buildings. They are getting high service charges, they are living in buildings with defective cladding or other fire safety defects, and they are exposed to these costs. In both cases, I was promised consultation to remedy what I regard as a manifest injustice. Can my noble friend update me on the outcome of those consultations?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I thank my noble friend for reminding me that I have not spoken about buildings under 11 metres. I know the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, would never forgive me if I did not answer that question. I will start, though, with enfranchised leaseholders, which I do remember in the context of the Bill. The Government have published a call for evidence on leaseholders in buildings over 11 metres or five storeys, which closed on 14 November last year. We are analysing those responses and considering the feedback prior to finalising the policy. However, enfranchised leaseholders living in buildings covered by the developer remediation contract will be protected from the cost of remedying life-critical fire safety defects arising from buildings’ design and/or construction. Furthermore, leaseholders in buildings over 11 metres are protected from the costs of remediating unsafe cladding, even where the developer has not signed the contract, which is important. Costs may be met through the building safety fund or the new medium-rise fund. I think we are doing what my noble friend wants, although it might be a bit slower than he would have preferred.

On buildings under 11 metres, which I know have been a concern for many noble Lords in these debates, the Government are committed to understanding the full scale and nature of historical building safety issues facing leaseholders in these buildings. As such, we welcome further information. The department set up a dedicated inbox for leaseholders and managing agents of these buildings to contact the department about their specific buildings. We will work with them on that. We stress that the responsibility for the costs of fixing historical building safety defects should still rest with the building owners. They should not pass these costs on to the leaseholders but seek to recover costs from those responsible for building the unsafe buildings in the first place.

I would like to emphasise that the risk to life from historical fire safety defects is much lower in buildings under 11 metres. That is no excuse, but it is rare for these buildings to require building safety-related remediation works. The Government’s assessment therefore remains that extending the protection to buildings under 11 metres is probably neither needed nor proportionate, but we will work with leaseholders and agents of these buildings if they have specific issues.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, as the Minister referred to local government, I just need to declare my interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

Local Councils: 2023-24 Budgets

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage]

To ask His Majesty’s Government, given the impact of current levels of inflation on budget planning for local councils for 2023–24, what support they are providing to councils in setting balanced budgets and ensuring that local services are delivered.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)]

We recognise that councils are facing pressures, which is why, taking 2023 and 2024 together, we have increased the funding available to local government in England in real terms. The provisional local government finance settlement for 2023-24 makes available up to £59.5 billion for local government in England—an increase of up to £5 billion, or 9%, in cash terms on 2022-23—and includes a £2 billion additional grant fund for social care. We consulted on these proposals until 16 January, and will consider the responses prior to publishing the final settlement in early February.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her Answer. Those standing as councillors do not do so to cut services for their residents. The Local Government Association estimates a gap in funding of £3.2 billion this year, rising to £5.2 billion next year. Across the country, local councillors are taking awful decisions on closing libraries, swimming pools, children’s centres, domestic abuse services, nurseries, transport services for disabled children and more. Even Tory Hertfordshire says that it has exhausted all options for service cuts. Do His Majesty’s Government recognise that cutting local services puts pressure on other public services? Why has the fair funding review for local government ground to a halt?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, as I said, we recognise that councils are facing pressures but the 9% announced in the Autumn Statement is, in real terms, an increase in funding. Local government is having to meet pressures in the same way as every resident in this country is under pressure. As I said in answer to a question yesterday, we will look further at funding issues for local government in future—probably not in this Parliament but in the next.

[Lord Laming (CB)]

My Lords, the Minister will know that, in the decade from 2011, there was an estimated 22% real-terms reduction in local authorities’ purchasing power, despite that being a decade of considerable increase in demand for services. Does the Minister accept that it will be some years before local government will get back to the spending power that it had in 2011?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, local authorities across this country are doing some very creative things to make their money go further. They are working closely with others in their local areas to deliver the services that their residents deserve. I think that this will go on. Through the levelling-up Bill that has come here, we will see different ways in which local government can join together to make itself far more financially viable.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, allowing local authority expenditure to increase by 9.2% in cash terms seems reasonable to me against the background of the current economic challenges. However, if, pursuant to my noble friend the Minister’s reply, a local authority thinks that that is wrong for its area, it is free to spend more if it can persuade the local electorate to vote for that in a referendum. Is that not a more democratic way of approaching local government finance than the crude rate-capping that we had before?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I absolutely agree with my noble friend, not only on that point but that councils can look to a referendum. It is important that, if they look for a referendum, they say what they are going to spend the money on so that local people have a choice.

[Baroness Andrews (Lab)]

My Lords, is the Minister aware that, in the first few months of last year, 2.2 million hours of adult social care were lost? This year, we have half a million people waiting for a care assessment, a care package or to have some care sorted out. Does she agree that adult social care and the community basis for adult social care should be a priority in the Budget? The Health Secretary believed this when he was chair of the Health and Social Care Committee in the Commons. Will she remind him of his promise to increase funding and will she engage with her Treasury officials and her Ministers to make that happen?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, adult social care has been an issue to be solved for not just this Government but many Governments before them. The Government are putting more money into adult social care. They put £2 billion more into local authority funding this year for it, and we will continue to look for better ways of delivering adult social care, working with the NHS as well.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, according to LGA evidence, without further government intervention 74% of council areas are at risk of losing their local swimming pool or reducing leisure services due to rising fuel costs, and that is this year. Can the Minister explain why the Government’s energy bills discount scheme includes museums and libraries, which is very welcome, but surprisingly excludes public leisure facilities? Can she please check whether the Government were aware of this evidence when they drew up the recent scheme? Will they seriously reconsider classifying pools and leisure centres as energy intensive, as they surely are?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, the energy bill relief scheme this winter provides a discount on energy for councils whose bills have been significantly inflated. This scheme was to run until 2023, and in January the Government announced that the energy bills discount scheme would run for a further year, until March 2024. But the noble Baroness opposite is right; I have already asked that question, and when I get an answer, I will come back to her.

[Baroness Buscombe (Con)]

My Lords, on average, how much of all local authority expenditure is spent on public sector pensions?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I am very sorry that I cannot give my noble friend that answer from the Dispatch Box. I will look into it and come back to her.

[Lord Sahota (Lab)]

My Lords, councils up and down the country had to reduce just about every service to make ends meet. Because of the Government’s cuts for the last 13 years, many councils are on the edge of a financial cliff and have even considered a Section 114 notice. Can the Minister tell me when this nightmare will end for our local communities?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, there are also some councils doing extremely well in keeping services running. We continue to monitor the sector’s finances and stand ready to speak to any council and support it if it has concerns about its ability to manage its finances or faces pressures that it has not planned for. We are working with local authorities to do that so that they do not get to the point of an S114.

[Lord Shipley (LD)]

My Lords, when will the review of business rates take place?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I do not have a date for that.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, can the Minister tell the House what inflation figure was used when the local government settlement was made?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I cannot tell the noble Lord what inflation figure was used, but I think that 9% is a very reasonable figure in the economic situation that we are in at the moment, due to many things, such as Covid and the Ukrainian war.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe (Lab)]

Does the Minister agree that one of our problems is that the current council tax structure is well past its sell-by date and needs changing? In those circumstances, and building on the noble Lord’s suggestion about a referendum, would they permit a council to run a referendum for a restructuring of its council tax?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I do not think that there is anything in the rules that allows them to do that. As I said yesterday, we are looking at updating the local government finance system. It has been an issue to get right for a long time, under many different Governments. We have said that we will continue to look at it, carry out a review—particularly on relative needs and resources—and reset the cumulative business rates growth as well.

[The Lord Bishop of Durham]

My Lords, can I take the Minister back to social care? Yesterday, the archbishops’ report on re-imagining care was published. It suggested that we need a major rethink on how the whole care system works, not just with local authorities—though it notes that not enough is being put in. The noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, has welcomed the report and produced a fantastic report on this with her committee. Might this be an opportunity to completely rethink how we do social care in the future?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, as I have said, successive Governments have looked at the issue of social care. With an ageing population, it is something that we have to do; we have to change the way we deliver social care and the way it is funded. This Government are looking at this, and will continue to do so until we have a solution.

Local Government (Structural Changes) (Supplementary Provision and Amendment) Order 2023

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2023 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

That the draft Order laid before the House on 12 December 2022 be approved. Considered in Grand Committee on 23 January.

Motion agreed.

Levelling Up Fund

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

Tuesday 24th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper and in doing so declare an interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)]

My Lords, across both rounds, the levelling-up fund has awarded £3.8 billion to 216 successful areas. This will deliver vital infrastructure projects across the UK. The competitive nature of the fund plays an important role in driving up the quality of the bids. Only the strongest bids were shortlisted. In the second round, we prioritised high-quality bids in places that had not previously received LUF investment. This has maximised the spread of the funding, recognising that lots of places are in need of investment.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, four days ago, Andy Street, the Conservative Mayor of the West Midlands, called for an end to the “broken begging bowl culture”. Can the Minister explain why the begging bowl is one of the preferred delivery arms when it comes to levelling up?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, it is not a begging bowl culture; it is that we have a finite amount of money to spend on capital projects across this country. The only fair and transparent way of finding the best bids to deliver the most for the United Kingdom has to be through a bidding process.

[Lord Sahota (Lab)]

My Lords, some councils have spent millions on consultancy fees to make a bid for levelling-up funding. Some of those councils were unsuccessful and the consultancy firms were the winners. Does the Minister believe it is wise to get our communities to fight each other, where someone must lose?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, no, I do not, and I do not think it is necessary to employ expensive consultants to do the bidding. Local authorities know what is important in their areas and they have officers who can put forward bids. The Government will support them. It is a very clear and transparent process.

[Lord Deben (Con)]

Does my noble friend accept that local authorities spend a great deal of time working out bids right across the board, instead of seeking to use that money in the way that is needed locally? Although I agree with her argument, there is widespread dissatisfaction among local authorities with the way that it works at the moment. Would it not be a good idea if the Government looked at whether there was a better way of doing it?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I agree with some of my noble friend’s views. If I remember rightly, I answered a similar question yesterday from my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham and said that the Government are committed to reducing the complexities of local government funding, as set out in the levelling up White Paper.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, in response to a question earlier, the Minister said that the assessment was made by excluding those councils that had already received funding. Were those councils told before they spent huge sums of money to make bids that they would be excluded at the first step? Secondly, how many of the Government’s 139 council priority areas have not yet received any money?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I am afraid I cannot tell the noble Baroness; I have a list here, but I could not say how many have not had any funding. What I can say is that the officials dealing with this funding will discuss process issues in particular with local authorities before they put in bids.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, the Government claim that the bidding process is fair. Can the Minister explain to the House why Knowsley, one of the most deprived boroughs in the country, received nothing, yet the Prime Minister’s area received £20 million for a park scheme?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, no, I cannot, except to say that one bid must have been better than another. I understand that unsuccessful applicants will be disappointed, but I am pleased to say that we have confirmed that there will be a third round of the fund. Further details will be set out in due course.

[Lord Haselhurst (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend agree that a bid at this stage to improve access to our ports would be timely and should almost speak for itself in obtaining favour?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, my noble friend is probably correct in that. I would encourage any ports that need better access to make them even better, particularly if they are freeports, to look at the third round of bidding.

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My Lords, given that the Minister at least expressed some interest in the possibility of some kind of reconsideration of the process in response to the question from her noble friend, might it be in her mind to do so before the third round of levelling up?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

No, my Lords. Anybody who knows anything about local government funding knows that this has been looked at by many Governments over many years, but we are committed, in the levelling up White Paper, to look at the complexity of this and to try to make it a better system.

[Lord Wigley (PC)]

My Lords, I put on record my appreciation of the fact that the Government have helped the slate quarrying communities of north-west Wales, but can the Minister clarify whether the fact that the money allocated to that and other schemes has to be used within two years means that it has to be committed within two years or actually has to be spent? If it is the latter, there could be problems in meeting the timescale because of some of the constraints on availability and factors within the economy.

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

First, I say congratulations to Wales on getting the highest amount per capita out of this round. I am sorry; I will have to get an answer to that. I do not know the detail of the agreement, but I will make sure I get an answer to the noble Lord.

[Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)]

My Lords, the Minister did not answer one specific question. Were the no-hopers, those who had received money before, warned in advance that they had no chance and spared the effort of putting in a bid?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, I am sure that once they put in an expression of interest for the bids—because it is in two rounds—they would have been told the rules for that second round of bidding.

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

Can my noble friend the Minister tell us what thinking there has been in her department about local government finance in the long term? Has there been any investigation of, for example, encouraging local authorities in the longer term to raise more of their own revenue locally, rather than constantly relying on central government? We have seen centralisation over successive Governments over the years.

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, with some of the devolution deals that have been done, and will be done in future, that is one of the issues we are talking to local government about and encouraging it to do.

[Lord Rooker (Lab)]

How many rounds can there be before the next election? It is unclear to me, local government and those who watch what government does. The third round popped up after the complaints about the second round so, for transparency, should we not have a specific date for the third round to ensure there is no manipulation of the date, configured to the next general election? It is a sensible point to raise, because the allegations will be repeated each time. What is to stop a fourth found at the very last minute? Can the Minister please explain the techniques used?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, I am very sorry, but I cannot explain the techniques. All I am aware of—we have made it very clear—is that there will be a third round. It is best to note that 45% of all the awards so far have gone to opposition councils.

[Lord Stunell (LD)]

My Lords, on 21 December last year, the Minister told me in a Written Answer that the bid on behalf of Marple community hub was being “assessed”. Well, it failed to make the grade. Will she undertake to publish the assessments of both the failed and the successful schemes so that, as she said, a fair and transparent process can be seen by all?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, no, I cannot agree to do that because I think we would need to talk to those local authorities before we put anything like that out in the public domain. It is transparent. You can see on GOV.UK exactly how decisions are made and the processes for giving those grants.

Levelling Up: Funding Allocation

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

Monday 23rd January 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Liddle (Lab)]

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper, and I declare my interest as a member of Cumbria County Council.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)]

My Lords, levelling up is one of the driving missions of this Government. We are delighted to announce the outcome of the second round of the levelling up fund, which has seen £2.1 billion award to 111 bids that we know will stimulate growth and benefit communities across the United Kingdom. This builds on the success of the first round, which saw £1.7 billion award to 105 successful projects across the UK, to drive regeneration and growth in areas that have been overlooked and unappreciated for too long,

[Lord Liddle (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for her reply. I think many of us on this side of the House were delighted that the Government were making levelling up a priority to deal with the growing regional inequalities in our country. However, the Prime Minister made no reference to levelling up as one of his priorities in his new year speech. The announcement last week was slipped out without any Statement in the House of Commons, as though it was slipped out in shame. The grants awarded appear to have no coherence or consistency and owe much to political jobbery. Do the Government still believe in levelling up? If they do, what on earth do they mean by it?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, we absolutely still agree with the whole project of levelling up. I just need to say that, of all the bids, the north-west—this will please the noble Lord opposite—had the highest number of successful projects and was second in funding per capita; Wales was top and the north-east was third. I suggest that that is putting the money where it is required.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, I quite understand why the Government wanted to kick-start the levelling-up policy with these centrally allocated grants, but looking ahead, and given the commitment in the levelling-up White Paper to usher in a revolution in local democracy, should not these funds in future be added to the block grant given to the increasingly large local authorities set up under the Bill and then local people could decide what their priorities are, with local councillors accountable to their local electorate?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, competitive funding can be a very effective tool for protecting value for taxpayers’ money. Competitions such as the levelling-up fund can also support fair and transparent awards of funds and drive innovation, but I understand my noble friend’s concerns and the Government have committed, within the levelling-up White Paper, to reducing the complexities of local government funding.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

The Minister has just said that competitive funding is an effective way of accessing this funding pot. There were 525 bids in this latest round; only 111 were successful; that means 80% were not successful. Each bid is estimated to cost £30,000 to make; that is £12 million of hard-pressed council funding basically wasted on bids. Can the Minister not find a more effective way, such as devolving the money to local authorities, so that this money is not wasted when it is desperately needed?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, this is capital funding. There were 111 successful bids this time; before, there were 105 successful bids; and there will be a third round. If we added all this money and gave it to local authorities, I do not think there would be enough for the large infrastructure projects—projects that people are very happy to be delivering and projects that local authorities have put forward because they are important to their people. I think this is the way to do it.

[Lord Morgan (Lab)]

My Lords, is the problem here not so much a social one as a constitutional one? Is it not, in fact, an abuse of the power of prerogative that Governments should hand out money in this party-political way, a way that is not transparent?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, we give this money out in a very transparent way: it can all be seen on GOV.UK, and 45% of all funding from the first two rounds was given to local authorities run by the Opposition parties. I would have thought that was quite fair.

[The Lord Bishop of Durham]

My Lords, I welcome the new devolution deal that has been done for the north-east and look forward to the appointment of an elected mayor for the region. If this devolution deal goes ahead, which I trust it will, can His Majesty’s Government clarify what proportion of the estimated £4.2 billion of investment into the region will be truly new money that the local new mayor can allocate out?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I thank the right reverend Prelate for that question and I will have to give him a written answer: I do not have that information on the north-east devolution deal.

[Lord Lexden (Con)]

What are the implications for Northern Ireland? Is it receiving its fair and proper share of the funding? Will it be spent in Belfast and throughout the Province for the benefit of all sections of the community?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, a very fair amount of money went out to all the devolved authorities across the country and it will be up to the local authorities that put in a bid as to how that money is spent, according to the projects that they bid for.

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

My Lords, local authorities have recently complained about the Government’s proliferation of competitive funding pots creating a system beset by fragmentation, inefficiency and complexity. Does the Minister really think that the best way to do levelling up is to force struggling councils to constantly compete just to get the investment they desperately need?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, we do not know of a better method for capital funding. There is not just the levelling-up fund but a suite of funding going out to local authorities for capital projects, including the towns funds, the community ownership funds, the freeports and the UK shared prosperity fund, which is given out in terms of percentages.

[Baroness Armstrong of Hill Top (Lab)]

My Lords, many people see child poverty as the measure of where levelling-up funding should be targeted. Why then in the north-east did no authority north of the Tees get anything? What do authorities such as County Durham have to do to be recognised by the Government?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, the north-east got the third-highest level of funding per head of capital across the country. It is up to local authorities to bid for their priorities; I am sorry if they did not get them, but if they did not bid for them then I hope they will do so in the third round.

[Lord McLoughlin (Con)]

My Lords, the very fact that so many local authorities tried to bid for levelling-up funding shows that there is an appetite in the country for it and for these projects. Will His Majesty’s Government ensure that the successful schemes are shovel-ready and that we will see them delivered in a timely manner?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My noble friend is absolutely right. That is one of the issues that the Government will have looked at. We wanted projects that were ready to go so that services and infrastructure would be delivered for people as soon as possible.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords—

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, the devolution part of it is that local authorities have the money to put forward their specific issues for which they need funding. It is not necessarily Ministers; they are tested against criteria that have been set up, and those that come highest up against the criteria will get the funding.

Local Government (Structural Changes) (Supplementary Provision and Amendment) Order 2023

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

Monday 23rd January 2023 Grand Committee

Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

That the Grand Committee do consider the Local Government (Structural Changes) (Supplementary Provision and Amendment) Order 2023.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)]

My Lords, this instrument was laid before this House on 12 December 2022. If approved and made, it will complete the legislative requirements to implement the locally led proposals for unitarisation of Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Somerset. It will make certain provisions specific to the new unitary councils of Cumberland, Westmorland and Furness, North Yorkshire, and Somerset, so that in each there is a smooth transition from the predecessor councils to the successor councils and continuing effective local government in these areas.

This order will ensure that the necessary technical arrangements are in place and ready for these councils to go live on 1 April 2023. The SI relates to issues around ceremonial matters, local pension scheme arrangements, housing revenue accounts and a number of miscellaneous provisions to ensure that, where necessary, the new unitary councils are referenced in other legislation and have appropriate representation on important regional bodies or are referred in. If this order is approved, it will be a significant step towards ensuring that people and businesses across Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Somerset can have strong and sustainable local government delivering the high-quality local services they rightly expect and deserve.

In March 2022, following approval from Parliament, we passed the necessary secondary legislation to implement locally led proposals for local government reorganisation in Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Somerset and to create single principal councils in these areas. The new councils will go live on 1 April 2023. The draft order we are considering this afternoon is intended to be the final statutory instrument implementing the reorganisation in the areas. It will make all the final technical arrangements for the continuation of effective local government in those areas.

The then Secretary of State was satisfied that, if implemented, the successful proposals from the three areas would be likely to improve local government and service delivery across the area of the proposal, give greater value for money, generate savings, provide stronger strategic and local leadership, and be more sustainable structures that command a good deal of local support, as assessed in the round across the whole area of the proposal. The area of each unitary authority is a credible geography, consisting of one or more existing local government areas, with an aggregate population between 300,000 and 600,000. He took the decision to implement one proposal for each area and made secondary legislation, the structural changes orders, to give effect to his decisions.

I pay tribute to all the local leaders and their officers who have worked so hard to implement this restructuring in Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Somerset and work towards the successful launch of the new councils while faced with responding to many challenges.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, I thank both noble Lords for their interest in this debate. First, to answer the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, and the noble Lord, Lord Khan, who asked about pension funds, provision is made under the order to ensure that the properties, rights, assets and liabilities of the Cumbria Pension Fund transfer to Westmorland and Furness Council, because it is the new administering authority of the pension fund for the new councils of Cumberland and of Westmorland and Furness and the other employers which participate in the Cumbria Pension Fund.

The order will also provide that the pension assets and liabilities relating to the former district and county councils of Cumbria that are to be abolished transfer to the new unitary councils in proportions determined by Westmorland and Furness Council. This is to ensure that, as the noble Baroness quite rightly challenged, there is clarity on who is taking over the responsibility for funding existing pensions accrued and preventing exit payments arising under the regulations which would normally be triggered where an employer leaves the scheme. The key to all this is the advice of the actuary dealing with the transfers. Cumberland engaged its own actuary, and the provisions in the order were agreed by both shadow councils. The shadow councils did not want any further information; they were quite content with what came from the actuaries. That is important. This is about local leadership. There is no provision for an appeal on that.

As far as debt is concerned, the new councils will take on the debt of the predecessors and the order will set out how the technical details will be calculated. That will all be in the order, and we are happy to make sure that the noble Baroness sees that order so that she can see how that has happened. The consultations for this order involved very detailed discussions with the councils over a period of time. That is how we came to those agreements.

These provisions follow very closely the provisions made in previous reorganisations. To come back to the views of the noble Lord, Lord Khan, I was leader of one of the first larger county unitaries, and I know we all learned from each other. Further councils to go through this all came back to us—we who had done it in that early group—to get our advice and for us to help them through. There is certainly a local government family that will support and help, which is important. The Local Government Association also learns from that, as does the department and the team leading it. There is a senior officer here who was a senior officer who held my hand through Wiltshire negotiations in 2009. There is a lot of knowledge, both in local government and in the department, for dealing with this, and that certainly makes this whole process a lot easier than when I went through it.

The noble Lord, Lord Khan, asked when it is going to the Commons. We do not have a date yet, but it will hopefully be very soon. On whether we will bring any further legislation, the answer is no; this should be the end of it. Once this goes through the Commons, it should make sure that these authorities can start. The date for that is 1 April, which is coming up pretty quickly.

As for consultation with trade unions, I think that it is up to those local councils to do that with their shadow administrations.

I think that I have answered everything, but I will look to see if there are any further details that I can give.

In conclusion, the order will make a significant contribution to supporting and empowering local government to deliver public services to the local people of Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Somerset in an efficient and effective way. This order completes the legislative requirements necessary to implement a locally led proposal for unitarisation in Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Somerset. It ensures that necessary technical arrangements are in place around ceremonial matters, local pension scheme arrangements, housing revenue accounts and miscellaneous provisions including fisheries and conservation, Transport for the North, Workington harbour and the national park authorities.

The new local authorities undergoing reorganisation are making excellent progress towards their “go live” date, and I am confident that the new councils of Cumberland, Westmorland and Furness, North Yorkshire and Somerset will be successfully launched on 1 April 2023, bringing about improved local government and service delivery that the people of these areas need and deserve. As I finish, I wish those four councils all the very best for the future. I commend this order to the Committee.

Motion agreed.

The Union (Constitution Committee Report)

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

Friday 20th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Bolton, for securing this important debate on the committee’s report. I also thank her for her speech today; I look forward to reading it again in Hansard. I will consider some further responses to what she has said and will be in touch with her. I also thank the members of the Constitution Committee for their thoughtful inquiry into the union and subsequent report. I apologise that it has been a year before we have had the chance to debate it. I also thank all noble Lords for their contributions today. I welcome the noble Lord, Lord Verdirame—I probably got that wrong—to this House: he is very welcome, and after his maiden speech, I very much look forward to his further contributions in this House.

We share the spirit of optimism written into much of the committee’s report. As reflected by my noble friend Lord Howell of Guildford, while it may be positive, we do need to consider a modern union and continue to build a better union. That is important. I also welcome the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy, back to the House: it is very nice to hear him, and it is wonderful listen to his speeches—they are excellent, and I cannot say anything more than that. What stuck in my mind was that the noble Lord said that the union still has vitality. Yes, it does. It has vitality, but we need to continue to work on that vitality for the future, as my noble friend Lord Howell said.

However, we do share the spirit of optimism in the committee’s report, which I thank it for. The United Kingdom is the most successful political and economic union the world has ever seen, as mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, and is the foundation on which all our businesses and all our citizens are able to thrive. This is why the United Kingdom is committed to protecting and promoting the combined strength and values we share, building on hundreds of years of partnership and shared history. It is clear that when we work together as one United Kingdom, we are safer, stronger and more prosperous; we are better able to draw on the institutions that unite us, such as the National Health Service, the Armed Forces and our world-class education system. Crucially, as the committee noted, we are able to tackle the big problems, from supporting families with the cost of living, to leading the international responses to the illegal Russian war in Ukraine, and to being a world leader in offering the vaccine to our citizens. I do not agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, that Covid was not a good example of close working. I think that this Government worked strategically with the devolved Administrations to save jobs and support communities and to bring out the vaccine programme that helped our country get through the pandemic. That was at administerial but also at official level. So I actually think it was a good working of the union at the time.

The UK Government are committing to delivering the best possible outcomes for people in all parts of the UK, ensuring that all four corners of the UK feel the benefits of the union. This is what the people of the United Kingdom want and expect. From the £55 billion we are spending this year to help families and businesses across the UK with their energy bills to the ambitious vision that is set out in the levelling-up White Paper to improve living standards and create opportunities in every part of the UK and the spending review in 2021 setting the largest annual block grant in real terms of any spending review settlement since the devolution Acts in 1998, this Government’s commitment to ensuring all parts of the United Kingdom feel the benefits of the union is clear.

As the committee recognised, effective working across all levels of government in the United Kingdom is critical to our ability to deliver better outcomes for our people and our communities. Citizens rightly want their Governments working together to deliver for them. This is why the Government ensure that every department makes it a priority in their work; for example, new structures and processes for engagement—this was brought up by the noble Viscount, Lord Stansgate—agreed through the intergovernmental relations review provide solid foundations for continued constructive engagement. From January to September 2022, there were more than 200 ministerial meetings between the United Kingdom Government and the devolved Governments on a huge range of issues.

Somebody mentioned the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister made it his priority to speak to the First Ministers of Scotland and Wales on his first day in office. He also chaired the first meeting of the Prime Minister and heads of devolved Governments council on 10 November 2022, just three weeks after coming into office, focusing on critical issues such as the cost of living, the impact of rising inflation and our shared challenges in supporting the NHS.

We have worked constructively with the devolved Governments to deliver practical benefits for people across the United Kingdom. This includes welcoming Ukrainians through the Homes for Ukraine scheme and growing local economies through freeports and city and growth deals, investment ensuring that everyone, no matter where they live in this United Kingdom, has access to opportunities, skills and jobs for the future. We will continue to work together to deliver for all people of the United Kingdom.

As we set out in our response to the committee’s report, we share its ambition for informative, detailed reports on intergovernmental relations. We continue to evolve the regular transparency reports to allow more pertinent scrutiny and public engagement. We welcome opportunities, such as today, to discuss these relationships more. Co-operation across the United Kingdom is valuable in its many forms, and we will continue to support the interparliamentary forum and initiatives which facilitate collaborative working across devolved legislatures.

I welcome noble Lords’ ongoing support in strengthening the things that connect us across the United Kingdom. Our commitment to effective inter-governmental working exemplifies this Government’s commitment to devolution, a sentiment the committee shared in its report. Through devolution, policies can be tailored to support the needs and priorities of the different parts of the United Kingdom within the framework of the United Kingdom. It allows decisions to be taken closer to communities that they affect, all the while still benefiting from the broad shoulders that the union provides by drawing on a shared resources.

The committee noted the importance of the Sewel convention, and we recognise that importance. We remain fully committed to the convention and will continue to seek legislative consent and work with the devolved Administrations on all Bills that engage the legislative consent process. Our commitment is evident through the 28 legislative consent Motions secured across 17 Acts of Parliament during the last legislative Session, including the Health and Care Act 2022 and the Advanced Research and Invention Agency Act 2022.

A number of noble Lords talked about the governance of England, including the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, and the noble Lords, Lord Wallace and Lord Howell. We are bringing forward the levelling-up Bill—we have had its Second Reading, and we will have Committee after the Recess. Our commitment to devolution and our plans for further devolution are very clear. We have announced the biggest ever transfer of powers away from Westminster to local areas in England in that Bill and in the White Paper that preceded it, with devolution at the heart of our plans to increase economic growth and level up the whole country. We have made significant progress in recent months, including through an expanded deal for the north-east and the first county deals, which will establish directly elected leaders in Norfolk and Suffolk. These deals were not imposed by the Government; they were designed and set up with the local authorities involved. Taken together, deals signed last year will mean that 5 million more people can directly elect a mayor or leader to represent them about local issues in the future.

We are focused on ensuring that devolution works effectively across the United Kingdom, including making sure that an understanding of devolution and the union is core to all United Kingdom government departments. That is why we have progressed the recommendations made by my noble friend Lord Dunlop—I thank him for his positive contribution today—in his review of UK government capability to improve how the UK Government can deliver for all their citizens. For example, we have established and regularly convene a Cabinet committee focused on the union; Sue Gray was appointed as Second Permanent Secretary with responsibility for the union; and each UK government department now has a nominated non-executive director with responsibility for the union. In addition, we have an ambitious capability programme to enhance the devolution knowledge and intergovernmental working skills of civil servants, enabling them to deliver more effectively for the whole of the United Kingdom.

Before I finish, I want to respond to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leeds. His contribution was extremely interesting, and I would like to think on it further. Young people are the future—and they are the future of the union. Their views must be heard, and we must work with them. I thank him for his contribution, and I will give it some thought.

[Lord Howell of Guildford (Con)]

In my ignorance, I am not totally sure which department my noble friend is closest to; she seems to answer on every conceivable subject these days. Will she tell her friends in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office to give particular attention to the knotty problem of giving Scotland a greater voice in our external affairs, treaty arrangements and international repositioning with all the other countries of the world? That is where a lot of our fate will be decided. One of the most bitter feelings the committee heard from our witnesses was that Scotland was an ancient nation which did have an international footprint but appeared to have no real say in deciding our international position. Could she give a push in that direction, please?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I thank my noble friend for that, and I certainly will. I do not do anything with the Foreign Office, but I will certainly take that back. I am in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, but we also do some of the work on the union.

I thank noble Lords once again for their contributions today, and I particularly thank the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, for moving the debate and for her speech. I look forward to continuing this important discussion and working collaboratively on all the issues raised by noble Lords today.

International Holocaust Memorial Day

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

Thursday 19th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)]

My Lords, I start by conveying my thanks to my noble friend Lord Pickles, the United Kingdom Special Envoy for Post-Holocaust Issues, for securing this debate. I echo so many noble Lords in expressing thanks to him for everything he does in this area. I also send sincere condolences from myself and, I think, the whole House to the family and friends of Zigi. May he rest in peace.

I am grateful to noble Lords from all sides of this House for their valuable and moving contributions to this important debate. I thank especially the noble Lords, Lord Kestenbaum, Lord Glasman and Lord Young of Norwood Green, my noble friends Lord Polak and Lady Altmann, and the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton. They all looked into their heart and soul and told their stories. Those are what I will take away most strongly from today’s debate, so I thank them for doing that.

The United Kingdom can be proud of its record when it comes to Holocaust remembrance and education. We were one of the first signatories to the Stockholm declaration of 2000, which called on countries to recognise 27 January, the day Auschwitz-Birkenau was liberated, as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. We hosted our first Holocaust Memorial Day in 2001.

The Stockholm declaration is also the founding document of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance—IHRA. This year marks the 10th anniversary of the IHRA’s working definition of Holocaust denial and distortion, which will be a key focus for the IHRA member countries in 2023. The United Kingdom has the honour of chairing the IHRA in 2024.

Many noble Lords have mentioned this year’s theme for Holocaust Memorial Day: ordinary people. The Holocaust may have reached its barbaric climax in Treblinka, Auschwitz and Belzec, but it started in the hearts of ordinary men and women. We have seen it again: a madness that takes hold of individuals and then sweeps through peoples and whole nations. As we have heard, the killings in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur shock our conscience, but they are the awful extreme of a spectrum of ignorance and intolerance that we see every day; the bigotry that says another person is less than my equal—less than human. These are the seeds of hatred that we cannot allow to take root in our hearts.

We are all familiar with the stories of the ordinary people who were involved in extraordinary acts of bravery to save Jewish people. In the United Kingdom we have recognised 44 British Heroes of the Holocaust—15 of whom were women—who went beyond the call of duty to save members of the Jewish community and others. Jane Haining was one of them. Born on a farm in Dunscore in Dumfriesshire, Jane was deeply committed to her faith and sacrificed her life for her ideals. It was her calling that took her away from her native Scotland, first to Budapest and finally to Auschwitz, where she perished.

Jane was appointed matron of the girls’ home of the Scottish Mission in Budapest, Hungary, in 1932. Refusing to abandon her children in the face of the rising Nazi threat, Jane was eventually arrested by the Gestapo in April 1944. Charged with working among Jews, as well as other supposed crimes, Jane Haining was deported to Auschwitz, where she became prisoner number 79467. Her last message to friends was a postcard asking for food. She ended her letter with the words:

“There is not much to report here on the way to heaven.”


Haining succumbed to starvation and the terrible conditions in the camp and died, probably on 17 July 1944. She was 47 years old. She was declared Righteous Among the Nations in Israel in 1997 and received the British Hero of the Holocaust medal in 2010.

But ordinary people also planned and executed the Holocaust. We do ourselves a disservice when we think they were all monsters: they were ordinary men and women like us—mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers, with choices. Soldiers who participated in mass shootings of Jewish people in the east were not forced; they were not punished if they declined to participate. There was another group of ordinary people: bystanders—people who raised no objection to the horrors that befell their neighbours, who had no qualms when they bought the neighbours’ furniture and crockery or took over their homes. We all like to think that we would have stood up as one of the extraordinary, but it is important to realise that we all have the capacity to look the other way—or worse.

This will be one of the key themes explored in the planned UK Holocaust memorial and learning centre next to the Houses of Parliament. I have listened to a number of noble Lords on this issue, and there will be a time and a place to discuss it further in the future. We plan to provide visitors with what we believe to be a genuinely unique perspective by addressing the Holocaust through a British lens. While relating the whole story of the Holocaust in continental Europe, the exhibition will look particularly at what was known in Britain—far more than most people think—and what was done, or was not done, with that knowledge. It will look at the responses not only of the Government but of society, highlighting the power of communities’ and individuals’ choices to make a difference for good, or ill.

We remain committed to the creation of a new national memorial to honour the 6 million Jewish men, women and children murdered in the Holocaust, and all other victims of Nazi persecution. Sadly, there will come a time in the not-too-distant future when the Holocaust will pass from living reality and shared experience to memory and to history. That is why we have a duty to remember and why the new Holocaust memorial and learning centre is so important in keeping alive the memory of those murdered during the Holocaust and subsequent genocides.

We do Holocaust remembrance a disservice if we remember the dead and forget the present persecution of Jewish people across the world. The Community Security Trust—the CST—which we have heard about, particularly from the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, and which monitors anti-Semitism in the UK, recorded, as she said, 786 anti-Semitic incidents from January to June. May 2021 saw a record high of such incidents, partly due, we think, to the Middle Eastern war. Without that conflict or influences of other factors such as the pandemic, the latest figures show that the base level of anti-Jewish hatred remains far too high and may even be worsening among young people. The noble Lord, Lord Mann, who is our adviser on anti-Semitism, highlighted this in his most recent report and recommended that secondary schoolchildren should be taught about the wrongs and consequences of contemporary anti-Semitism.

The latest figures on anti-Semitic incidents underscore the need for government to continue working with the Jewish community to ensure that synagogues, Jewish schools and communal buildings are afforded maximum protection, and we have already supplied over £14 million of government funding to make sure that that work happens. I am proud of my department and the many others in government that are supporting the Holocaust Educational Trust to work with universities across the country in challenging the scourge of anti-Semitism. However, as we have heard from the noble Baroness, Lady Anderson, and others, we need to do more.

Like many previous speakers, I pay tribute to the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust and its CEO, Olivia Marks-Woldman OBE, and her team, who delivered the annual Holocaust Memorial Day ceremony and thousands of other local activities across the country. Similarly, like many other noble Lords I thank the CEO of the Holocaust Educational Trust, Karen Pollock CBE, who as we have heard works tirelessly to ensure that the next generation learn of the unspeakable horrors of the Holocaust and can visit Auschwitz-Birkenau as part of the very successful Lessons from Auschwitz programme. I want also to mention the UK Holocaust Map, an ongoing joint project with the Association of Jewish Refugees. The interactive map allows users to explore places relating to the victims, survivors and refugees of Nazism, as well as the rescuers, the liberators and the aid givers.

Despite our failure to learn the lessons of the past, we must not give up hope that one day we will see a world free from genocide, a world that fully grasps what happens when hatred, intolerance, prejudice and anti-Semitism is left unchecked and unchallenged. When we look at current conflicts across the globe, especially what is happening in Ukraine, it can be tempting to throw up our hands and resign ourselves to humanity’s endless capacity for cruelty. It is sometimes tempting to believe that there is nothing we can do and that all of us have those doubts; but it is also in those moments that we must remember all those murdered during the Holocaust and in subsequent genocides. We need to remember the survivors, the witnesses who have never given up, who continue to share their testimonies today. We owe it to all of them to remember.

Windrush: 75th Anniversary

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

Thursday 19th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)]

My Lords, I sincerely thank the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, both for bringing this debate to the House and for all the work she has done, and I know will continue to do, for the Windrush generation. I also thank all noble Lords who have taken part in the debate with some very informed but also passionate speeches. I know that they have been short but the passion has come through.

Before I get into my speech, I want to bring up a couple of things that I think will answer many of the questions asked. My noble friend Lord Kamall and the noble Lords, Lord Davies and Lord Khan, rightly asked about compensation. The Home Office has continued, and will continue, to listen and respond to the affected communities about how the scheme operates and its accessibility. We have published a redesigned claim form; I hope that it is now easier for people to complete it but I am sure that Home Office Ministers will be pleased, if there is anything that they can do better, to do it. We are now fully focused on reducing the time between the claim submissions and the decisions. We have put more people into those teams in order to do that. We expect to reduce the work in progress in the coming months. I hope noble Lords will hold us to account on that because it is extremely important.

Noble Lords also brought up progress on Wendy Williams’s recommendations. I assure them that the Home Office is making real progress in delivering against those recommendations. It is a work in progress; the Home Office is continuing to do so. I am more than happy to ask the Minister from the Home Office to keep us updated on this issue.

The noble Baroness, Lady Blower, asked about education. It is extremely important, particularly in some of our schools that do not see as many multiracial children and do not understand our history quite as well. The annual Windrush Day grant scheme has provided £2.75 million to communities to date. A number of those projects will be about doing that but I will take back to the Department for Education ideas on how we can get it further into the curriculum. I have spent many years working with communities in Wiltshire, which is not a very multicultural community, on Black History Month, which is a wonderful celebration of our diversity in this country.

Seventy-five years ago, the MV “Empire Windrush” arrived on the shores of Britain to help rebuild our nation after the Second World War. Thousands of men, women and children moved from the Caribbean to the United Kingdom in the decades that followed, and we are proud to say that they have contributed to every aspect of British life ever since.

The year 2023 is particularly significant because there are two 75th anniversaries. It is also the 75th anniversary of the NHS, which was created just two weeks after the arrival of the “Empire Windrush”. In fact, the two are inseparable. Many of the Windrush generation worked in the NHS to give us the health service of which we are also incredibly proud. Today, ethnic community employees make up almost a quarter of the NHS workforce, along with 42% of medical staff. The staff currently represent 200 nationalities. The NHS has served us all throughout our lives, and it would not have existed without the support of the Windrush generation. They played a vital role not just in our nation’s post-war efforts but in shaping who we are as a nation today. But they did not do so with ease—we accept that. Many of us are all too aware of the hardships they faced: from racial abuse and discrimination in the workplace, to being made to feel unwelcome in a country they came here to help. These wrongs shall never be forgotten.

While it is important that we recognise such challenges, both past and present, it is also important that we celebrate and commemorate the Windrush generation for their contribution to this country and for the aspects of their character that we all admire. It is for these reasons that we must honour the 75th anniversary of the Windrush generation’s arrival on our shores. It was in this light that the spirit of this generation was captured so beautifully by Basil Watson in creating the national Windrush monument, which pays tribute to the Windrush generation and their descendants, whose contribution to our society until that point had been overlooked for too long. At 12 feet tall, the national Windrush monument will stand testament to the pride and dignity that is the heart of the Windrush generation and will honour them for future generations who pass through Waterloo station—our country’s busiest railway station, which sees 41 million passengers each year. The monument was backed by £1 million of government funding as part of a manifesto commitment. Its unavailing on Windrush Day last year was a truly momentous day for our country, when our nation stood proud. I want to thank again the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, chair of the Windrush Commemoration Committee, for advising on its creation, as well as the many individuals, organisations and officials who worked so hard to create that fitting tribute—I think it is wonderful. People were moved to tears at the monument’s unveiling, at which the two surviving Windrush pioneers, Alford Gardner and John Richards, were joined by Their Royal Highnesses The Prince and Princess of Wales, who were then The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

At one point Alford Gardner and his family were the only mixed-race family in their neighbourhood, but today the Britain that his descendants grow up in is very different. His 16 grandchildren, 21 great-grandchildren and one great-great-grandchild will grow up in a Britain that is both diverse and inclusive. Another instance is the Commonwealth Games, which were held in Birmingham last year. The games were an incredible success and showcased a city where more than 50% of the population is from ethnically diverse backgrounds.

Much has been achieved since Alford Gardner and the Windrush generation arrived on our shores, and we still have much more to achieve, but we can be proud of how far our society has come in this momentous year. I am proud to say that, as part of the 75th anniversary celebrations, as of this week the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has committed £3.75 million towards the day’s celebrations and the National Windrush Monument; £2.75 million has been granted to charities, community groups and local authorities through the Windrush Day grant scheme since 2019; and 160 projects have been funded by the scheme across every region in England, with grants awarded directly to the community, allowing it to commemorate, celebrate and educate about the Windrush generation and the contributions it has made to British life.

One project, Inspiring Audio Ltd, worked with children in Nottingham, Birmingham, Manchester, Bristol and London to produce 10 free podcasts to explore the history and social context of the Windrush generation. Another project, Tilbury on the Thames, saw people sail on Windrush Day from Waterloo Pier to the dock where the “Empire Windrush” originally docked in Tilbury, mirroring the historic journey that took place all those years ago.

Without the funding from the grant scheme, many of the projects and celebrations would not have taken place and fewer people would have known about the contributions of this generation to our society. But this is not Windrush history; it is British history. It is vital that we empower communities up and down our country to commemorate and celebrate the important milestone in our history. For this reason I am especially pleased that, in light of the 75th anniversary, we have been able to announce this year’s grant scheme. It is now open to applications. In such an important year we have decided to increase the funding pot from £500,000 to £750,000 properly to mark Windrush 75. Communities in Northern Ireland will now be able to take part in the scheme for the first time.

I am happy to confirm that funding will be allocated to further developing the educational component of the Windrush Monument website in time for Windrush Day 2023. I can also confirm that my officials in the department have been asked further to explore what else we can do to make even more impact for these important celebrations.

As His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales said in his speech at the unveiling of the National Windrush Monument last year:

“Every part of British life is better”


for the half a million men, women and children from the Windrush generation. They have made

“our culture richer, our services stronger, and our fellow countrymen safer.”

For that they have our thanks.