Cost of Living

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Thursday 9th June 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I have a confession: I do not know the noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, at all—I deeply regret that, obviously—but I thoroughly enjoyed his panoramic exposition of the Government’s failings. It occurred to me that we could carry on listening to them all day, and there would be a lot of fun in it for me, except that some of it is incredibly painful. For example, the damage that this Government have done to schools, social housing and the NHS really hurts me because those things had an enormous impact on me, growing up.

My father and my mother told me horror stories of the poverty they both grew up in. My father was born in 1905 in south Wales. He was fatherless at the age of eight because of the Senghenydd mining disaster. He walked all the way to London with one of his brothers to find a job. When I was growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, they told stories about living in a council house with an indoor loo, a bath and a larder that they could keep their food cool in. They could also go to hospital if they hurt themselves and I, and my older brother, were able to go to school to learn and then to go on to university. These things that the Government have damaged really make me angry.

What we hear again and again from this Government is that they put forward their ideas, some of them—I do not want to say “mad” because that almost diminishes it—stupid, incomprehensible and incoherent; for example, sending migrants to Rwanda or bringing back imperial measures, which we have never lost anyway. The noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, mentioned sewage discharges. We in this House amended a Bill so that not only would sewage discharges be illegal but companies would be forced to stop them. The Government took that out. They voted for illegal sewage discharges which damage our ocean. The economic cost of that is huge in terms of human and ecosystem health.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Desai, for mentioning basic income. I will be giving him an application for Green Party membership. It is an idea that has worked in other countries. It is not a particularly communistic idea; it is actually an incredibly sensible idea. However, the Government do not like sensible ideas. They have had all these ideas, and they say, “Nobody else has come up with an idea so these are the best we have.” I am going to give them three ideas. They are really simple, very basic and can be implemented moderately quickly, especially the first one.

The first is community energy projects. They are very fast to set up, they save people money and they can happen anywhere, from tiny, remote villages to urban neighbourhoods. They can involve anything from installing a wind turbine or solar-voltaic insulation and promoting energy efficiency. They save a lot of money and they can be done. The Government should do them quickly. They should make these things easy.

Secondly, all new housing developments should be set up as community energy schemes. Why are we not doing that? It is a simple measure and can be done; people are doing it all over the place. It would add about £9,000 to the price of homes but pay back within three or four years. That is good economics, and I urge it on the Government. Combine that with community land trusts and we could produce affordable housing that stays cheap to run—and stays affordable because it is owned by that community.

I mentioned earlier the damage that this Government have done to social housing. Right to buy was the most incredibly mad—I am using “mad” again, sorry; it was a very bad idea. I say that even though I live in a flat that somebody else bought under right to buy and it is great; it is in a 1950s council block, I still have loads of council tenants as my neighbours and it is a wonderful place to live because it is actually built quite well. However, right to buy was a disaster and we have to recognise that. Home ownership is not the be-all and end-all that the Tories seem to think it is.

I have given the Government three ideas. I would like to know why they will not implement them very quickly.