Hospitality Sector
Graham Stuart Excerpts(1 month ago)
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Andrew Griffith (Arundel and South Downs) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House regrets the combination of catastrophic choices made by the Government causing the closure, downsizing and lack of hiring by pubs, restaurants, hotels and hospitality businesses across the United Kingdom, with an estimated 84,000 job losses over the last 12 months and an average of two site closures per day in the first half of 2025; further regrets the Government’s policies that have led to this such as the omission of the hospitality sector from the Government’s industrial strategy, increases in the cost of pavement licences, the reduction in retail, hospitality and leisure business rates relief from 75 per cent to 40 per cent for 2025-26, the increase in employers’ National Insurance contributions to 15 per cent and the lowering of the secondary threshold to £5,000, and measures in the Employment Rights Bill which will make hospitality employers liable for the behaviour of customers and others; and calls on the Government to publish a dedicated strategy for the sector, to consult with hospitality employers prior to any future changes to the National Living Wage, to amend the Employment Rights Bill to protect seasonal and flexible employment practices vital to the sectors’ contribution in providing a ladder into employment for young and often excluded groups and to introduce targeted support measures to prevent further business closures, job losses and damage to local communities.
From the great British pub to the family-run restaurant, from the small seaside bed and breakfast to world-leading hotels, hospitality businesses are the beating heart of our communities, our high streets and our economy. Yet today, under Labour, they are hurting like never before. We were promised a Government for jobs, for opportunity and for prosperity. What have we got instead? A concoction of catastrophic choices causing a lack of hiring and the closure and downsizing of pubs, restaurants, hotels and hospitality businesses across the nation; a jobs tax that goes out of its way to savage the part-time, entry-level opportunities that hospitality offers in abundance; soaring business rates; and over 300 pages of additional job-killing red tape.
Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
My hon. Friend might have been like me: the first job I ever had was as a porter, and then a barman, at the Crown and Mitre hotel in Carlisle. These are opportunities for people who are coming into the labour market for the first time or trying to get back into the labour market. The hospitality sector offers opportunity to people who otherwise have none, and that opportunity has come under devastating attack from this Government.
Andrew Griffith
My right hon. Friend is exactly right. Opportunity is a word we are going to hear again and again, because of the huge contribution that the hospitality sector makes to the economy and to getting people on the ladder of opportunity with their first job in life.
Chris Bryant
Well, I am glad that people like me being here—that is very kind. I am not going to be kind for the rest of my speech, so the shadow Business Secretary, the hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs (Andrew Griffith), should not get used to that.
What an absolute joy it is to see the shadow Business Secretary up close. He must think that amnesia has hit the whole country. I mean, he was the business adviser to Boris Johnson—and we know what expletive Boris Johnson used when referring to business, don’t we? Did the shadow Business Secretary resign as a Minister when all the others were resigning, though? Oh no, he lashed himself to the Boris Johnson mast until the very end. In February of last year, still he was calling for the return of Johnson.
But that is not all, is it? When it came to the lettuce-defying catastrophe known as the Liz Truss premiership, the shadow Business Secretary was not just a casual supporter; he was the Financial Secretary to the Treasury. He actually helped to put together that disastrous Budget. He was not just in the room when it happened, to quote “Hamilton”; he held the pen! He was Kwasi’s amanuensis; he was Truss’s handmaiden. This is a man who could not see the writing on the wall even if it were spitting out fire 50 metres high. Even when the Bank of England had been forced to act to shore up the economy following the mini-Budget, he went out to defend it.
Graham Stuart
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I wonder whether you have any advice for those in the hospitality industry listening to the Minister, who is so afraid to deal with the issue at hand that he has to resort to this ad hominem attack on our Front-Bench colleague.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)
May I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his point of order, and perhaps encourage all Members to ensure that they stay on topic and in scope this afternoon?
Broadband and Mobile Connectivity: Rural Areas
Graham Stuart Excerpts(4 months, 2 weeks ago)
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Graham Stuart (in the Chair)
I will call Anna Sabine to move the motion and then the Minister to respond. I remind other Members that they may make a speech only with prior permission from both the Member in charge of the debate and the Minister. If anyone does not have that twin permission, they should not and may not speak. There will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up, as is the convention for 30-minute debates.
Anna Sabine (Frome and East Somerset) (LD)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered broadband and mobile connectivity in rural areas.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stuart. I represent the fairly rural constituency of Frome and East Somerset. In February this year, I conducted a survey asking residents in villages such as Lamyatt, Doulting, Alhampton, West Pennard and Witham Friary about their experiences with mobile and broadband signal. The number of responses was overwhelming, and there was a striking consistency to what they told me. The current arrangements for getting a mobile or broadband signal are mismatched, too expensive, frequently slow and, in many cases, simply not fit for purpose.
Access to a reliable internet and mobile signal is now a basic necessity of our lives. Whether for work, education, healthcare or simply staying connected, people rely on broadband and mobile coverage every single day. I heard from a number of brilliant rural businesses—wedding venues, farms, ironmongers—who battle with poor connectivity daily. For many, broadband remains one of the biggest obstacles they face as a business, in terms of both the quality and speed of the connection available and the frustrating experience that creates for their customers. One local farm, for example, was quoted more than £250,000 by Openreach just to connect a wire across a relatively short distance to secure full-fibre broadband.
Mr James Frith (Bury North) (Lab)
Openreach has changed its mind several times about the affected community of Affetside in my constituency. What advice would you give that resolute, resilient community as it tries to convince Openreach to honour not just its historical commitment, but the one that it made, through me, only in December, and has since reneged on?
Chris Bryant
Well, you often do give advice, Mr Stuart, but that is another matter.
We will have to take this conversation elsewhere, because I am not sure whether that is a Project Gigabit-delivered contract or whether Openreach is rolling out its own commercial decision—[Interruption.] I will not take another intervention because I do not have very much time.
Sometimes all those elements change because the commercial operators say, “Well, actually, we have realised that this business park”—which is outside a town and feels more rural even though it is sort of theoretically attached to a town—“isn’t going to be connected unless we connect another bit that is contiguous.” They constantly change their commercial decisions. We try to help them to make sensible decisions that fit with our subsidy plans, but it is not always easy. That also applies to the shared rural network, which obviously deals with mobile connectivity. A large number of masts have been put up through the shared rural network, including in large chunks of Wales.
Oral Answers to Questions
Graham Stuart Excerpts(10 months, 2 weeks ago)
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Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)
The Deputy Prime Minister
I know where the right hon. Gentleman is trying to go with this. While it is tempting—[Interruption.] What I will say to the right hon. Gentleman is that in the last four months our Chancellor has shown more competence than the last four Chancellors that were appointed by his Government.