Kew Gardens (Leases) (No. 3) Bill [Lords]

Debate between David Rutley and Stephen Pound

2nd reading: House of Commons
Monday 24th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

As the Minister in the House of Commons with responsibility for the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, I am delighted to present a Bill that will provide the ability to grant longer leases on Crown land there, opening new streams of revenue that will support the great British institution and enable it to flourish in the future.

Let me place on record, at the outset, my appreciation of the work of Members in this House—my hon. Friends the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger) and for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith)—who have promoted similar private Members’ Bills on Kew Gardens. I also note the keen interest of noble Lords in supporting Kew. A similar Bill was promoted by Lord True, and this Bill, before coming to this House, was amended by Lord Whitty so that he and others could be reassured in placing the duty to prevent inappropriate development at Kew unequivocally on the face of the Bill.

Indeed, I think it fair to say that the Bill has already received support from Members on both sides of the other place. Baroness Jones of Whitchurch considered the Bill, and Lord Whitty’s amendment, supported by the Government, provides a double lock on future extended leases. Baroness Kramer and Lord Rooker were pleased that the Bill strengthened the protection of Kew and allowed us to look to a future as distinguished as its proud history.

Kew is a scientific institution of the utmost importance, not only for the United Kingdom but as a global resource—the global resource—for knowledge of plants and fungi. We are facing immense challenges when it comes to the preservation of the natural world, and it is clear that there is an essential role for plants and fungi in that regard.

[Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman talks about Kew being a centre of scientific research. For those of us in west London not blessed with wide open spaces, Kew is a treasure house—an absolute treasure trove of delights. The recent exhibition of Dale Chihuly showed Kew Gardens at its absolute finest. I hope that I speak for everybody on the Opposition Benches when I say we entirely support the hon. Gentleman, but particularly those of us in west London who absolutely love this treasure so close to our hearts.

[David Rutley]

The hon. Gentleman speaks well for the west London posse. He speaks very assuredly and with great passion as always for Kew Gardens, and we are grateful for that. It is a wonderful institution. I assure him that people not just in west London but across the nation want to visit it, and I hope that that is a boost to the local economy.

We are facing immense challenges in preserving the natural world. Within the challenge it is clear that there is a central role for plants and fungi, and Kew can provide answers about how plants and fungi will help us and our planet not just thrive but survive. Kew is a custodian of world-renowned collections, including the Millennium Seed Bank at Wakehurst and the Herbarium at Kew itself. The restoration and digitisation of the Herbarium will need considerable investment and will make the collection accessible globally.

Kew scientific research leads the world. With more scientists than at any time, its research is crucial in solving the challenges facing humanity today. Kew plays an extraordinary global role, in partnership with scientists, educators and communities, promoting research, education and conservation.

Kew does so much to involve the public, as we have already heard. With over 2 million visits to Kew and Wakehurst each year and around 100,000 pupils on school visits, it is building a wider understanding of plants and fungi and why they matter to us. Across the spectrum of public engagement, Kew is fostering a wider understanding of plants and fungi and why they matter to us.

Kew is not only an extraordinary scientific institution; as visitors and scientists will know, the estate includes many special buildings and structures, more than 40 of which are listed. It is a huge challenge to ensure the maintenance of these structures, which due to their historical nature is undertaken at considerable expense. We have a duty to balance public spending against priorities, and Kew is no exception. In view of Kew’s important role, DEFRA has been able to maintain funding to Kew in cash terms over this spending review period, but a key part of that was to support Kew to develop its other sources of income to deliver its ambitions.

Kew has made great strides in improving its financial sustainability. Kew’s Government grant forms just over one third of its income—37% in the 2017-18 accounts—and its mixed funding model is proving hugely successful, for example by using Government funding to leverage significant philanthropic and grant funding for renovation of the Temperate House, which reopened in 2018. Nevertheless, parts of the Kew estate, including some listed residential buildings near Kew Green, badly need investment to maintain and enhance their condition and enable Kew to realise additional income.

Attracting capital investment to refurbish buildings within the boundaries of Kew is one of the big opportunities available, but the current 31-year limit on leases imposed by the Crown Lands Act 1702 has made this difficult to realise. The Bill will allow leases to be granted on land at Kew for a term of up to 150 years. Longer leases will enable Kew to realise additional income from land and property, and will reduce maintenance liabilities and running costs. The additional income generated will help Kew to achieve its core objectives, maintain its status as a UNESCO world heritage site, and prioritise maintaining and developing its collections as well as improving the quality of its estate.

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[David Rutley]

My right hon. and learned Friend makes a good point, and I am sure that these matters will be given due consideration. The car park that may be envisaged in the future would need to comply with planning regulations locally, so these things would have to be considered.

[Stephen Pound]

Will the Minister read into the record a fact that is known to many of us, but perhaps not to every one of the vast number of people paying attention to the debate? Anyone who emerges from the main gate at Kew and strolls less than 100 yards up the road will find themselves at Kew Gardens station, where they can take the elegant District line to almost any place that their heart desires. There is also the London Overground. No one actually needs to drive there. There are three buses that stop there and two tube stations very close by. Would he care to note that for the record?

[David Rutley]

Noted. The hon. Gentleman is well informed, and I thank him. Of course it makes sense to use sustainable transport whenever possible, particularly when visiting Kew.

Another element of protection that will continue under the Bill is that of Kew’s UNESCO world heritage site status, and other designations that offer protection under the planning system. These will apply to any lease granted under the provisions of the Bill. Once again, the Bill goes further, requiring that before granting any lease the Secretary of State must be satisfied that the lease and anything that the leaseholder is permitted to do with the property under its terms would not have any adverse impact on Kew’s UNESCO world heritage site status.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Rutley]

There we go. As the hon. Gentleman knows, I am a reasonable man, and I am trying my best to move forward with this legislation. With support from the Opposition, Government Members and those across the House, we are making progress. Hopefully we can make more.

The hon. Gentleman is right to say that it is appropriate to hold the Bill’s Second Reading ahead of the climate change debate. I wish to join him in welcoming the hon. Member for Midlothian (Danielle Rowley) to her place. It is also good to see my hon. Friend the Minister for Energy and Clean Growth in his place for what will be another important speech.

I want to respond to many of the points made in the debate. With characteristic enthusiasm and passion, the hon. Member for Ealing North (Stephen Pound) has persuaded people at Kew in no time at all that it is entirely appropriate for a group of MPs to come along. They would indeed like to extend that invitation to Members here, so I hope that he can join us on that occasion. It is rare for our suggestions to be put into action so quickly, but the hon. Gentleman has managed it.

My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for North East Hertfordshire (Sir Oliver Heald) mentioned low-carbon transport. Kew’s transport policy is, of course, not within the scope of the Bill, but we will pass on his comments to people there. My hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice) talked about extending the leases; I responded by saying that leaseholders could apply to replace the original lease with a new one of no more than 150 years. The hon. Member for Stroud also asked which properties would be included.

My hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith) made a very important speech; I say a huge thank you to him for his remarkable work and support for Kew over the years. He also does a huge amount on the wider debate about biodiversity and climate change, for which many Members—not least DEFRA Ministers—are extremely grateful.

Of the properties that we are talking about today, five are currently let on a one-year lease following renovation work, partly funded by a loan, and two are unoccupied and require substantial renovation to bring them up to a habitable condition or make them fit to become office accommodation. In the first instance, Kew would like to focus on that portfolio of properties, particularly the unoccupied properties. That portfolio can itself generate a capital sum or remove liability for renovation or maintenance works—a cost avoidance of about £15 million over a 10-year period.

The hon. Member for Stroud also asked about funding and what would be done with it. The Government’s intention is for Kew to receive the income to support its mission, including investment in its infrastructure and the quality of the world heritage site itself. Although I cannot prejudge the outcome of the forthcoming spending review, the importance of Kew’s mission and of securing the institution’s future means that my Department will be working closely with Kew to put forward the strongest possible case. That includes significant investment in digitising Kew’s herbarium collection, which the hon. Gentleman called for and which my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park said was so important, so that it can be conserved securely and be globally available.

Kew’s work is vital for our biodiversity and in tackling climate change. The hon. Gentleman can be assured that we will push hard to get the right funding for these tasks. It is vital that we get behind that work and further support Kew, because it is a global centre of knowledge about plants and fungi, and that should never come under any question. Given my remarks, I hope that the hon. Gentleman and other Members will be assured that we are in this for the long term. We need Kew to thrive and survive, and the Bill will help it do just that.

I hope that Members are now fully aware of the necessity of the Bill and the benefit that it will bring to the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and the wider role played by Kew generally. I also hope that hon. Members feel reassured that proposals under any new lease will be subject to scrutiny by trustees, the Secretary of State and through the planning process with the local planning authority, as well as being in line with Kew’s world heritage site management plan.

It is an honour to have participated in this debate. We care passionately about Kew, and we are grateful to the team there for their important work—I think everybody would echo that—and for their sheer enthusiasm.

[Stephen Pound]

Long may they flourish!

[David Rutley]

Long may they flourish, grow and prosper—absolutely. Their enthusiasm is infectious, and we are grateful for it. We want them to continue to succeed in the work they do. I hope the Bill will continue to make positive progress through Parliament, so that we can take this work forward.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between David Rutley and Stephen Pound

Thursday 18th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)]

8. What discussions he has had with Cabinet colleagues on UK participation in the European Food Safety Authority after the UK leaves the EU.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (David Rutley)]

After our departure from the EU, our priority will be to maintain the UK’s high standards of food safety. We are considering options for the future of risk assessment and scientific advice in the UK as part of the exit negotiations. We are seeking to retain the long tradition of close scientific collaboration with the EFSA. The Secretary of State meets Cabinet colleagues weekly at Cabinet, and through relevant Sub-Committees, where discussions take place on the future relationship that the UK will have with the EU and associated bodies.

[Stephen Pound]

I appreciate that the Minister has already addressed a similar question from the hon. Member for Glasgow East (David Linden), but this contribution should not be seen in any way as evidence of collusion between me and the Scottish National party. As we move from—to use Fintan O’Toole’s phrase—the “epic dream” of Brexit to the nightmare reality, we find ourselves having to deal with more and more aspects of minutiae. I implore the Minister not to forget the dairy farmers of Northern Ireland and, particularly in this area, to concentrate on discussions with Cabinet colleagues so that we do not let down those dairy farmers, who face a terrible future as a result of that disastrous decision of June 2016.

[David Rutley]

I had never really thought of the hon. Gentleman as colluding. He is incredibly independently minded—we respect him for that—and forthright in his views.

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. We will do all that we can to support dairy farmers across the UK, not least in Cheshire, where I also have many dairy farmers. Of course, we will be working across the board not only to ensure that the best possible standards of food safety are maintained, but to support agriculture as we move to a world outside the EU.

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Debate between David Rutley and Stephen Pound

Wednesday 8th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate. It is an even greater pleasure to speak with you in the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I welcome you to it. I also express my support for those who have given their maiden speeches today. My hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins) gave a fantastic speech, and I also congratulate the hon. Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Philip Boswell) on his splendid speech. No doubt he will be a great champion for his constituents.

Let me start where I finished at the end of my speech after the last Budget in March, when I noted that a lot had been done and that there was a lot more to do. I hoped that the voters of Macclesfield and across the country would vote for the Conservatives to carry on and do that important work. The good news from my perspective and that of Conservative Members is that voters delivered an historic victory for us. It is now down to us to deliver the long-term economic plan that those voters want us to deliver.

This Budget certainly delivers: spending is being controlled, the deficit is being reduced, taxes are being cut, and we are ensuring that work pays, as it must. Yet again we have a record overall employment rate—now at 73.4%—including a record employment rate for women at 68.6%. Two million extra jobs have been created under this Government. Our unemployment rate is half that of France—the socialist alternative that the Labour party presented as the blueprint for its plan B. We stuck with plan A, and—this is difficult for Labour Members to believe—the electorate stuck with us.

This Budget again shows the positive approach of Conservative Members. We are moving the British economy forward with more jobs and ever-greater success in creating the right economic conditions for balanced growth. Our GDP growth is leading the way in the developed world. Household spending is increasing, which I welcome. Even more welcome is the increase in business investment, which is up by 5.7% over the same year. Gross fixed capital formation in quarter 1 of 2015 was at its highest level ever recorded since the sequence was developed in 1997.

The right balance of policy measures is being put in place, from deregulation and incentives to work, to help to set up and grow a business and tax allowances for capital investment. All those things are creating the foundations for sustainable economic growth—something that the Labour party should learn more about.

There are now 4.5 million self-employed people in the UK. In Macclesfield, we have one of the highest levels of self-employment anywhere in the country. Those self-employed people are being supported and encouraged by the Government. I have worked with the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce and Demos to highlight the issues around self-employment. I am greatly encouraged that the Prime Minister recently announced—with Julie Deane, the founder of the Cambridge Satchel Company—that there will be a full review of self-employment under this Government. Many of the self-employed are first-time entrepreneurs. I hope they can be encouraged to go on to become first-time employers and first-time exporters, further boosting the enterprise culture that we on the Conservative Benches cherish and want to foster. The enterprise Bill will help us to go further in that direction.

We are making progress and we are continuing to make progress. We want to do so by trusting businesses, trusting local enterprise partnerships and trusting local civic renewal. In the north-west, we look to Manchester to see what lead it is taking. Sir Howard Bernstein, of Manchester City Council, recently called for

“giving…the local control and might that a powerhouse needs.”

It is the northern powerhouse, in which the Chancellor has invested so much time, on which I would like to address the remainder of my remarks.

It has been a long journey from the great recession, but at the end of the tunnel we can see the northern lights of the northern powerhouse ahead of us. The lights are so bright, in fact, they have attracted the so-called prince of darkness himself. Peter Mandelson, no less, put himself forward as a prospective chancellor of the University of Manchester. These are not my words, but Lord Mandelson’s:

“something very exciting is happening in this region as part of the Northern Powerhouse”

and

“the Labour Party, I’m afraid, has a long way to catch up.”

I wonder whether the Labour party is in the mood to listen to him. I do not think so, judging by the comments made today.

We are making great strides in the north-west, particularly in terms of gross value added per head, which has grown by an annual 3.4% according to the Office for National Statistics, a record unsurpassed by other regions in the country. On a sub-regional basis, Cheshire is the only county in the north of England to have higher GVA per hour than the UK average, outperforming such sub-regions as what might be called “Greater Bristol”.

We in the north-west accept there is a long way to go if we want to be the economic equal of the southern powerhouse, London. As Sir Howard Bernstein has said, there is an £8.2 billion productivity gap between Greater Manchester and the rest of Great Britain on a per capita basis. Correcting that gap, as our policies are designed to do, matters for Britain. It matters to the market towns around Greater Manchester, too, the most important of which is, of course, Macclesfield.

[Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)]

Maiden speech!

[David Rutley]

It is well beyond that, thank you. [Laughter.]

These towns play a key role in the future productivity of the north-west.

I want to focus on science. On 10 June, the Prime Minister said that we needed to increase our productivity

“by encouraging entrepreneurship, by making sure we invest in success”—

and, I wish to emphasise this bit—

“by investing in science—these are the things that we have been doing as part of a long-term economic plan, mostly opposed by the Labour party. ”—[Official Report, 10 June 2015; Vol. 596, c. 1187.]

Science, and in particular life science, is critical in our part of the world. Alderley Park, now owned by Manchester Science Partnerships, is key. AstraZeneca’s Macclesfield site alone accounts for 1% of UK goods exported; a driving force behind high-value, high-wage growth in Macclesfield, north-east Cheshire and south Manchester.

To play our part in future success across the north, we need to ensure that the Chancellor’s ambitions for science in Greater Manchester and beyond are fulfilled. Manchester has been selected as Europe’s city of science for 2016. There is plenty to showcase to academics and investors, not least Jodrell Bank Observatory, which is in part in the Macclesfield constituency. I am delighted that it has secured the Square Kilometre Array telescope project, and an additional £12 million of lottery funding to recognise the important and unique science heritage of the site.

In his speech on 14 May, the Chancellor said that Manchester was not yet as great as the sum of its parts, and the “Exploiting the Excellence” report by the very good North West Business Leadership Team supports that view. I am delighted that having recognised the problem, which Labour failed to recognise and act on, he is determined to do something about it. The Budget puts in place the conditions and key ingredients necessary for the northern powerhouse to evolve: leveraged investment in infrastructure, increased investment in science and other key industry sectors and a transfer of power away from Whitehall to the northern powerhouse itself. This is an important combination of factors and will have a multiplier effect.

In fact, we are seeing that already, with the promise of additional investment in the northern rail hub, HS2, HS3 and now the proposed £1 billion investment and 10-year transformation in Manchester’s international airport. Today, we also welcome the establishment of Transport for the North, a statutory body, and the £30 million of additional funding made available to assist with its duty of delivering a long-term transport strategy for the north. That is exactly what we need.

It is not just about the north or north-west, however; there are now devolution deals across the country, including in the Leeds city region, West Yorkshire, the Sheffield city region and Liverpool. Of course, success breeds success, and there are now reports of a powerhouse in the midlands too—the “midlands motor” or perhaps the “Mercian dynamo”. Whatever it ends up being called, I wish it every success.

I wish the Budget every success as well, because it is working to balance the books, to rebalance the tax burden, to rebalance the economy towards the enterprise economy we hold so dear and to rebalance our economic geography. I back that balance and I back this Budget.