Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alex Sobel and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 6th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Last Friday Lord Goldsmith resigned from the Government and his letter to the Prime Minister was absolutely devastating. If I may paraphrase it, it said that before taking office the Prime Minister assured party members via Lord Goldsmith that he the Prime Minister would continue to implement the action plan, including the Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill and measures such as ending the live export of animals for slaughter, banning keeping primates as pets and preventing the import of shark fins and hunting trophies from vulnerable species. Lord Goldsmith has been horrified as bit by bit the Government have abandoned those commitments, domestically and on the world stage. The Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill has been ditched, despite the Prime Minister’s promises; efforts on a wide range of domestic environmental issues have simply ground to a standstill; and, more worryingly, the United Kingdom has visibly stepped off the world stage. Lord Goldsmith and the Secretary of State served as DEFRA Ministers in the last Parliament. Does she agree with his devastating critique of the Prime Minister and her Department?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alex Sobel and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 12th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I raised this matter from the Dispatch Box back on 21 June 2022, when the official Government explanation was that the die-off was caused by algal bloom. The Government’s position has since shifted due to overwhelming evidence, but even yesterday the Prime Minister said that DEFRA

“concluded that natural causes were most likely responsible for some of the things that we saw.”—[Official Report, 11 January 2023; Vol. 725, c. 558.]

He also reiterated that

“an independent panel will be set up to report quickly.”

Will the Minister confirm that the independent panel has now been set up? His initial answer was very quick, so can he confirm that the panel will be reporting this month? The fishing industry in the Tees is dying off, and to continue it needs the certainty of that report.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alex Sobel and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 17th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the hon. Member for Taunton Deane (Rebecca Pow) back to her place.

The Environment Agency has a heavy responsibility for environmental protection, especially investigation and enforcement of pollution incidents such as sewage dumping. However, the Government more than halved the agency’s environmental protection budget from £170 million in 2009-10 to £76 million in 2019-20, and that included the three years in which the current Secretary of State was a Minister. Last year, the budget was only £94 million. I know that the Minister had some issues with the number, but that number was mainly around capital spending on flooding, and we have seen a fall in the budget for environmental protection, which is hugely important to people around the country, especially those who live near rivers and seas.

Morale is at rock bottom at the agency, and vacancy rates are as high as 80% in some teams, with many breaches not being investigated or enforced. How does the Secretary of State and the Minister plan to resolve crippling staff shortages and get us back to where we should be?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alex Sobel and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 13th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call Alex Sobel.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker: I was beginning to lose hope.

The previous Prime Minister made a promise on Northern Powerhouse Rail, but when the announcement came it did not include a new line. This Prime Minister has made a promise on Northern Powerhouse Rail, but will we see a new line between Leeds and Manchester via Bradford that is not an upgrade of the trans-Pennine line; when will the funding be delivered; and when will spades go in the ground? We need that line for the growth that the Government want to see.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alex Sobel and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 23rd June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call shadow Minister Alex Sobel.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Windermere is England’s biggest lake, and the beautiful weather this week has attracted huge numbers of swimmers to its shores, but people are being advised by conservationists not to swim or let their dogs in the water due to the amount of raw sewage being pumped into it by United Utilities. However, the official figures report that the Environment Agency claims that the amount of untreated sewage has reduced and there were no spills last year. Will the Minister admit that the reporting system is broken and take urgent steps to ensure that there is reliable monitoring so that people can enjoy beautiful Lake Windermere?

Education (Careers Guidance in Schools) Bill

Debate between Alex Sobel and Lindsay Hoyle

Report stage
Friday 14th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I very much welcome the hon. Member’s Bill and the speech that he is giving. Careers advice has come on a long way in the last 50 years. I am sure that we all remember the scene in “Kes” where my constituent, the former lord mayor of Leeds, Bernard Atha, played the careers teacher who gave Billy and all the boys and girls in the school exactly the same careers advice. Although that was a drama, it reflected what happened in the sort of communities that we represent.

The quality of careers guidance depends on the person giving it. We have NVQs at levels 4, 5, 6 and even 7 in higher education for careers guidance, so it is a profession in and of itself. It is not just an add-on or to be left to online quizzes, but that is what has happened to my child at school, so there is still a long way to go. We need to professionalise careers guidance and see it as something in and of itself, not just an add-on.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I think the hon. Member knows that an intervention is not meant to be a speech. You can speak—I will put you on the list—there is no problem there.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alex Sobel and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 9th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We now come to the shadow Minister and welcome him to the Dispatch Box in his new position. I call Alex Sobel.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker.

On Boxing day 2015, many town and city centres were devastated by floods. Spending on national flood defences is, in fact, 10% down on what it was in 2015. With increased storm events, how will the Minister defend residential and business properties with adequate climate adaptation this winter?

Local Government Funding

Debate between Alex Sobel and Lindsay Hoyle

Wednesday 28th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Like many colleagues, I will concentrate my speech on the effects of the cuts on my local council in Leeds. I must declare an interest: I am still a city councillor until 3 May.

I pay tribute to the imagination and innovation of our Labour administration and to our great set of council officers who have brought forward many new and radical ways of working despite the difficult circumstances. None the less, the depth of the cuts means that many services are at breaking point. The people of Leeds have borne the burden of maintaining services, which should be paid for from the local government grant. Leeds is a proud and compassionate city with a robust economy. I am incredibly proud of the council’s approach, which, in the words of our city leader, Judith Blake, is to

“put the needs of our most vulnerable residents first, to improve our communities and bring people together in a peaceful and cohesive society and to boost the life chances of our young people by giving them the best opportunities we possibly can.”

By 2020, Leeds City Council will have seen its grant cut, year on year, by £267 million, and the budgetary pressures are not just restricted to revenue budgets either. The city faces a gap in Government funding for capital school projects of approximately £71.7 million. To make matters worse, the Government leave it to the market of free schools and academies to choose where to build new schools. The city has responsibility for placing children in schools, but does not know where those schools will be placed.

I wish to move on to the legion achievements of Leeds City Council since its return to Labour control in 2010. The adoption of a civic enterprise approach paid dividends in the early years of the austerity Budgets, and brought with it the insourcing of housing and housing maintenance, school meals, fleet services, cleaning, catering and plant nurseries. The council also created Aspire, a staff-owned, not-for-profit social enterprise, which provides care and support services to people with learning disabilities; it is the largest co-operative in Leeds.

The council, under the most difficult of circumstances, has delivered new social housing, with a £108 million council house growth programme, which aims to deliver 1,000 new homes by 2020. Personally, I am delighted that the right-to-buy programme and the use of £3 million of prudential borrowing has meant that our great homeless charity, St George’s Crypt, is developing 45 affordable supported living units for people who are homeless or in housing need.

The Labour administration has had to make some hard political choices, but Leeds is the only local authority in England to keep all its children’s centres open. These are invaluable facilities, which helped my own children in their early years. The council has also removed charges for burials and cremations for children under 16. It is compassionate indeed. Leeds has by far the lowest funding for special educational needs of all core cities, with £378 per head against a core city average of £472. I call on the Minister to revisit that gross injustice.

I wish to concentrate my final remarks on the city’s work on climate change. As the deputy executive member for climate change and sustainability, I proudly played a part in the city’s work until my election to this place. Before the historic Conference of Parties 21, Leeds was the first authority to commit to 100% clean energy by 2050. The city has begun many projects to achieve that ambitious environmental goal. In my first few months in office, we installed more than 1,000 solar roofs on council homes and buildings, but we could not continue the programme owing to the Government’s cut in the feed-in tariff for solar. The council has had an extensive programme of replacing diesel with electric vehicles and now has a fleet of more than 70 electric vehicles.

The city is installing a district heat and power network after securing nearly £6 million in European funding. The network will heat 22,000 homes, including high-rise blocks, which are in fuel poverty. The city’s plans on clean air are ambitious, unlike those of the Government who have been dragged kicking and screaming through the courts four times by ClientEarth. Leeds has grasped the nettle and is the first city to go to consultation on a zone to cover all roads in the outer ring road, which is a very large clean air zone, and its proposals are already affecting behaviour, with First Bus investing in cleaner Euro 6 diesel vehicles.

The council needs to achieve much more on air quality, and cannot do so without Government support. I am still waiting for a real commitment from the Government to support us in Leeds. Leeds has done everything asked of it—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. I call Jim McMahon.

Clean Growth Strategy

Debate between Alex Sobel and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 12th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I have spent the morning reading the clean growth strategy. On first reading, it appears mainly to be a repackaging of old announcements, with only small packets of new funding and increased existing funding being spent over longer periods. I am glad that the Minister touched on electric vehicles. The gap with respect to the old plans that we already have is 12 megatonnes of CO₂. Today’s announcement does not bridge that gap, as can be seen in the chart on page 85 of the strategy. The gap remains. The funding for electric charge points is woefully inadequate, and I call on the Minister to look again at supporting large-scale electric vehicle charging funding, working closely with local authorities to ensure that EV charging points are in commercial and residential areas, not just on major roads. I ask her to commit to a minimum level of public EV charge points per head of population or per electric vehicle. I am glad she mentioned the Netherlands, because it has one public EV charge point—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. Members are meant to ask a succinct question.

[Alex Sobel]

I will just get the question—

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

Just give it now or else you will be sitting down.

[Alex Sobel]

The Netherlands has a charge point for every two to seven vehicles, whereas the figure in the UK is much higher. Are we going to have the same—

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

I think the Minister has got the gist.