Local Government Funding: Rural Areas
Debate between Sheryll Murray and Graham Stuart
Graham Stuart
On this side of the House, but, I am pleased to say, in all parts of the House. They are here because they want a system that is fair to all. Conservative Members represent rural areas, but we also represent suburban and urban areas. We do not want a system that is reverse-gerrymandered, an unfair mirror image of the previous system. We want a system that is demonstrably and objectively fair to all, as far as such a system can reasonably be delivered.
Mrs Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that the absence of representation on the other side of the House shows that this aspect of funding does not seem to affect different parts of the country in different ways? Labour Members representing urban areas do not feel the same concern, because their constituents do not have the same worries.
Graham Stuart
Historically, most of the Labour party’s support has come from the urban heartlands. That may have led it, when in government, always to use concentrated deprivation as an excuse for moving funds to those urban heartlands, at the expense of rural areas. As I said at the outset, it is important to bear in mind that people in rural areas are not part of an idyll. They are not richer; indeed, on average they are poorer.