Local Government Funding: Rural Areas

Greg Knight Excerpts

Monday 11th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered local government funding for rural areas.

I begin by thanking the Backbench Business Committee for selecting this motion for debate this evening and for rescheduling the debate to a time when more colleagues could attend. I also thank my co-sponsors, the hon. Member for Workington (Sue Hayman) and the right hon. Member for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb). Their support is testament to the fact that this policy area crosses all party divides.

In my 10 years in the House, I have raised local government funding of rural areas on many occasions, but it would be fair to say that progress has been slow. Somehow, those in the countryside are expected to put up with less, whether it is poorer connectivity with broadband or mobile signals, the availability of neighbourhood policing, or affordable and convenient transport links. Indeed, in most aspects of Government expenditure, rural areas get a raw deal.

[Sir Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con)]

Going back to my hon. Friend’s first point, does he agree that more and more people are accessing local government services via the internet? That should be a boon to rural areas, but it has not been, because broadband in some areas does not exist, while in other rural areas it is patchy, and overall it is rather slow. He and I have worked together locally on this issue. Will he confirm that there is no reason whatever why an area that is geographically isolated should be, or should remain, digitally isolated?

[Graham Stuart]

My right hon. Friend is quite right. That is not the main focus of today’s debate, but that is the context in which it takes place.

We are here today because the situation I have described is also true in local government, which provides so many of the public services on which our constituents depend. The central facts for the debate are these. Urban residents receive 45% more in central Government grant than their rural counterparts and pay £81 less in council tax per head. One may say, “Well, that’ll be because rural residents are better off. They can afford it. It’s reasonable. Their needs are less”, but the Government’s own average earnings figures show that residents in urban areas enjoy higher earnings than their rural counterparts, whereas those living in areas of significant rurality are the very poorest paid. So how can it be fair for poorer rural residents to pay higher council taxes than their richer urban cousins while receiving fewer services? This central unfairness is why, in 2012, along with Liberal Democrat and Labour colleagues, I set up the Rural Fair Share campaign. For many years, rural councils have been underfunded by central Government because of historic political choices and the formidable lobbying power of metropolitan authorities.

--- Later in debate ---

[Graham Stuart]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is why so many colleagues are here tonight—

[Sir Greg Knight]

On this side of the House.

[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.