Yorkshire (Tour de France)

Greg Mulholland Excerpts

Tuesday 18th December 2012 Westminster Hall

[Greg Mulholland (Leeds North West) (LD)]

I pay tribute to my colleague and neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon (Julian Smith), whose constituency I see every time I turn right out of my front door. For me, one of the great pleasures of living in Leeds North West is that it borders both the constituency of the right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn), where this historic event will start, and the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon. As he knows, when I stand on Otley Chevin, which is a famous hill for cycling, and look down Wharfedale, I can see the north Yorkshire moors, the white horse of Kilburn, the Yorkshire dales, the Yorkshire wolds and the Pennines—all the incredible and wonderful countryside that Yorkshire has to offer.

Friday 4 December is a special day that many of us will remember for a very long time. To win for Yorkshire the grand départ of the Tour de France has been an absolutely sensational coup and an incredible achievement. I want to add my thanks to the team that secured it for our region and pay tribute to their remarkable energy, grit and passion. In particular, I thank Gary Verity of Welcome to Yorkshire and his team, and Tom Riordan, the chief executive of Leeds city council, and his team. I also want to mention the support from all the councils, the chambers of commerce, the business community, the trade unions and the local people, 170,000 of whom “Backed le Bid” online.

As a Leeds MP, I am bursting with pride at the thought that this world-famous event—the biggest sporting event in the world—will start in our home city of Leeds. It is almost hard to take in. Leeds beat Florence, Barcelona and Edinburgh, and it was chosen because it would deliver a better grand départ 2014. That is quite remarkable.

I was delighted to be asked by Welcome to Yorkshire and Leeds city council to be one of the three MP ambassadors, working with my colleagues, my hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon and the right hon. Member for Leeds Central. As has been described, the three of us were asked to play a role in promoting the project here, on a political level, and to show that there was support from all the Yorkshire MPs. The turnout in Westminster Hall today reflects that support.

That is why I am delighted that we are to set up a new all-party group, so that we MPs do everything we can—and not only in Yorkshire; it is important to remember that le grand départ will, of course, go from Yorkshire to London. I noted that the Mayor of London rightly welcomed the fact that the Tour de France’s grand départ will have a stage in London. That is great for the capital, but he should have the grace to remember that it was Yorkshire that won that stage for London. It would be appropriate for him to thank the organisers for delivering a stage of the Tour de France in London, because it was Yorkshire that won this bid, and it won it alone.

Back in July, I went to dinner at the delightful Yorebridge house in Bainbridge to meet a legend, Brian Robinson, the first British man ever to complete the Tour de France—a Yorkshire man. He was also the first British man ever to win a stage of the Tour de France. His passion is still for cycling, and his drive—along with that of the other people who have already been mentioned—was inspiring. The scenery that people travel through in Yorkshire really speaks for itself. For a comparison, we might look at what the Commonwealth games did for Manchester. That is precisely what we believe we can achieve in Leeds and Yorkshire as a result of this event.

I am delighted to have a real cycling heritage in Leeds, which is a city with many cycling clubs. In my constituency, there is the Otley Cycle Club; Otley has developed a reputation as a national centre for cycling and as a famous British cycling town. Of course, that was cemented when the first British medal of London 2012 was won by Lizzie Armitstead from Otley in a road race. She became the first Olympic medallist ever from Otley. There is the Otley annual road race, Otley Sportive and a real sense that cycling is one of the main sports of the town.

Of course, MPs today will all be getting excited about what the route of le grand départ might be, and whether it will go through their constituency. The organisers will have to make the decision based on what works best for the race; that is right and proper. However, I am sure that they agree that it is really exciting to have this speculation, and we are all hugely excited. I have already had e-mails from people saying where the race should be; that is the excitement that winning the bid has already generated in Yorkshire. That excitement will only build as we approach 2014.

I need to ask a couple of questions of the Minister, because it is important to know that this bid was won entirely by Yorkshire on its own. As I said, that was a sensational coup, and as has already been said—I am sure it will be reiterated by us all—what we want to hear from the Minister, now that the Tour has been won for Yorkshire and the UK, including London, is that the Government, UK Sport and British Cycling will give a full and proper commitment, equalling that of the commitment that would have been made if Scotland had won the bid.

I am sure that the Minister has already passed his congratulations to the team from Yorkshire, and he might suggest to the Prime Minister that he write to the Back le Bid team about their incredible achievement. The Prime Minister may have done so already. I was pleased to see his tweet welcoming the successful Yorkshire bid. As a Yorkshire MP, the Deputy Prime Minister also welcomed it in a statement. Could the Minister share his letter of congratulations and that of the Prime Minister with the new all-party group, because we are keen to see congratulations being rightly given to Yorkshire for delivering something on its own to the UK?

[The Minister of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Hugh Robertson)]

Let me clear that one up straight away. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right; as soon as the result of the bid was announced at the end of last week, the Prime Minister was quick to add his congratulations, and we put out a press release that afternoon, congratulating the bid team.

Let me address another issue that I think one or two people have quite skilfully ducked around: financial assistance. We will come on to what the Government can do to assist the process in due course, but just be aware that the money—the £1.7 million—that was committed to the Scotland bid is national lottery cash. It is not within the gift of Government to allocate that money directly, because that would break the additionality principles under which the lottery was set up, and under which it has operated under successive Governments. It falls to the Government to set the general parameters. We were able to ask UK Sport to increase the amount of money in the major events pot, which it has done very successfully; now £27 million resides there. It is not up to the Government to allocate that funding directly.

[Greg Mulholland]

I thank the Minister; that is very helpful. I thank him again for his role in securing the funding for the rugby league world cup, which is the next major international sporting event on these shores. I am sure that, in his role and with his passion for sport, he can assist in securing such events. However, a lot of that is about having the formal backing of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, of the Government and of UK Sport.

I have one question to put gently to the Minister. When it was clear that the Yorkshire bid was an absolutely superb one, and as it emerged that it had a real chance of success for 2014, why did DCMS and UK Sport not decide to say, “We think this is looking very positive, and perhaps we should now look at supporting it publicly”? There are perhaps lessons there for the future.

However, what is important now is to go forward. I urge the Minister to use his role to speak with UK Sport. Some of its officials’ recollections of the meetings with Welcome to Yorkshire do not exactly tally with those of Welcome to Yorkshire officials, and it is important that we clarify that matter, so that we can find a way of using both organisations, because in the end this is a huge opportunity, as the Minister knows, for UK sport, for British cycling, for the sport of cycling, and—as my hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon has already said—for the economy of Yorkshire and the UK. Of course, a lot of that is to do with legacy. Legacy has already been mentioned; it is incredibly important. I believe that there will be a festival of cycling for Leeds at the time of the grand départ, which is a thrilling prospect; there will also be the bike bank. There is a huge opportunity, and we need to put that legacy plan in place now.

I will conclude, as I know that other colleagues wish to express their delight and add their congratulations on this historic win. I just want to put this in perspective: this is the first year that a British man has ever won the internationally famous blue-riband event that is le Tour de France. It was a remarkable achievement. For a team from Yorkshire to then secure the first ever staging of the Tour in the north of England, and only the second ever staging in the UK, in the same year is a remarkable and historic achievement. We want to make this event as big a success as possible, in terms of sport, health and the economy. We look forward to working very closely with the Minister, with UK Sport and with British Cycling, to ensure that this incredible event achieves everything that it can, and that we know it will.

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[Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)]

It is an absolute honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon (Julian Smith) on securing this important debate and on being instrumental in forming the all-party group, which will massively support this exciting venture. I add my thanks to Gary Verity, Peter Dodd and all the team at Welcome to Yorkshire, and also to Tom Riordan. They have had amazing vision, and determination to win the bid, against all the odds, for Yorkshire. This really is an exciting time for our part of the world.

I am not surprised by the interest shown here this morning. There are, I think, a dozen coalition Back Benchers here, and it is amazing to see so much support. The support and interest are not surprising, however, because we all know that cycling is the new rock and roll, and on Sunday evening I had a quick chat with its current lead singer, Bradley Wiggins, at the BBC sports personality of the year awards. I raised the prospect of his cycling in Yorkshire on the Tour in 2014. I will not repeat exactly what he said—we have to remember, of course, that he comes from Lancashire way—but he indicated that he is really looking forward to cycling in Yorkshire.

We have a great history and heritage of cycling in Yorkshire. For example, did Members know that the first British stage winner of the Tour was the now 82-year-old Brian Robinson from Mirfield near Huddersfield? When I announced to some people last week that the Tour de France was coming to Yorkshire, a number of them said, “Tour de France, coming to Yorkshire? How can that work?”, but this will not be the first time that it has come to the UK. The Tour has already visited England three times, and each time the event has got bigger and better. It all started in 1974 with one stage on the Plymouth bypass. In 1994 there were two stages on the south coast and, as many Members have already mentioned, the grand départ came to London in 2007, with a time trial plus one road stage. We now have the grand départ coming to Yorkshire in 2014. It is estimated that Ken Livingstone invested £3.5 million in the 2007 bid, and London got a financial return in excess of £85 million.

[Greg Mulholland]

I want to reiterate a point I made earlier that ties in perfectly with that. London will once again host the event, but it has not put a penny in. That is fine, because Yorkshire won the bid, but if that is not an argument for Yorkshire getting some investment from central Government in London, I do not know what is.

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[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to join in this debate under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I congratulate the hon. Member for Skipton and Ripon (Julian Smith) on securing the debate. As has been said, congratulations are due all round, including, obviously, to Yorkshire for pulling off a coup in winning the bid from under the noses of British Cycling and UK Sport.

I agree with the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Greg Mulholland) that it should not be forgotten that although the event will end in London—and the Mayor of London has welcomed that—this is very much Yorkshire’s bid and Yorkshire’s success. It is an example of what sport can achieve in generating economic activity away from the south-east. It is an enormous opportunity for Yorkshire—and the surrounding areas, as we have heard—to benefit from sport and bring in business, tourism and economic investment. Members who have spoken so far have shown no shortage of determination to achieve that, on the back of the bid.

Congratulations are due to Gary Verity, and to the chief executive of Leeds city council, who must be extraordinarily pleased that his city will host the grand départ of the Tour in 2014. I welcome the fact that there will be an all-party group, because the sporting event will gain enormously from Members of this House working together to maximise the benefits that the Tour can bring to Yorkshire and the surrounding areas. I hope that the group will be based on the Tour, rather than on Yorkshire, so that Members who want to participate and put their case can do so.

[Greg Mulholland]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. My colleague, the hon. Member for Skipton and Ripon (Julian Smith), and I had a meeting before this debate. As soon as the Tour details are announced on 7 January, we absolutely want people from all around the route to get behind the Tour being in the UK.

[Clive Efford]

I am grateful for those comments, which are reassuring. I assumed that that would be the case, and that we would all want to make the most of this tremendous sporting event, which comes on the back of not only an incredible year for British sport—I could spend the next half hour listing the successes in British sport in this golden year of 2012—with the Olympics and Paralympics, but outstanding success for cycling. Over the past decade, cycling has shown the way for other sports, as regards not only how to succeed at the elite end, thereby inspiring participation at all levels, but how to create a base of participation at grass-roots level.

In the Active People survey published two weeks ago, the figures for cycling stood out because of the success in steadily increasing weekly participation over a sustained period. Nearly 2 million people a week participate in regular cycling activity, which is a phenomenal achievement for cycling. Quite rightly, cycling has been recognised for that achievement in Sport England’s allocation of money, which was announced this week: there is to be a substantial increase to £32 million. That allocation recognises that cycling can deliver. Cycling has not only been successful in the past; the process of allocating money through Sport England is about what cycling intends to do in the future. The allocation is very much about all sports’ plans, and cycling clearly has something to contribute in the future, as regards increasing participation.

We have heard from hon. Members about the bid for the Tour to go to Yorkshire, and part of that bid was the proposal that cycling banks be set up across the community. I have been involved with a group that has got together entirely on its own initiative. In my constituency, people are enthusiastic about cycling, and the group will set up a cycling bank so that young people—indeed, people of any age—who do not have access to a bike can go cycling. More importantly, they are providing bikes adapted for people with disabilities, so that they, too, can enjoy the sport—sometimes with the assistance of other members of the club, cycling for them—on bikes that are specially adapted to take wheelchairs. Cycling is a growing area of sport, physical activity and community participation, and I am sure that the cycling banks played a significant part in the success of the Yorkshire bid.

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[Hugh Robertson]

I will come to that in a moment, but I want to ensure that people understand that the money that sits behind the backing of the bids is awarded by UK Sport, the lottery distributor on the Government’s behalf. As it is lottery money, it does not lie within the Government’s remit to allocate it directly. To do so would contravene the regulations in the National Lottery Act 2006. We can tell and have told UK Sport to increase the amount of money available—£27 million, financed by the changes to lottery shares introduced shortly after May 2010—but it does not lie in this or any other Government’s remit to then allocate that money to specific projects. To do so would break the additionality principle.

[Greg Mulholland]

I must bring the Minister’s attention to the worrying statement published yesterday by UK Sport that says, unless I have misunderstood it:

“UK Sport will consider providing Lottery funding towards the bidding costs”

and

“staging costs of strategically important major events with a clear and demonstrable financial need. Investment will only be considered prior to bids being submitted and investment is made at UK Sport’s discretion.”

That sounds as if UK Sport is saying, “Well, you’ve won it now; we’re not going to back it.” That cannot be right. It would be absurd.

[Hugh Robertson]

Let me explain it to the hon. Gentleman. It is not absurd. It is a different sort of event, because it is not run by the International Cycling Union, the governing body that regulates world cycling, but by a private company. That puts it on a slightly different footing. I will come in a minute to what we can do to help.

The reason why UK Sport does not allow a free-for-all is that if it did, people would just bid on their own and then turn around and ask Government to fund it. That policy has remained unchanged through successive Governments since the formation of the lottery, and there are good reasons for it. The major events panel at UK Sport is full of people who understand the issues, including David Collier, chief executive of the England and Wales Cricket Board, who knows his way around major sports, as the results this week show. The board considers events, prioritises them and then sees how much support it can give.

We just launched the gold event series, which contains all the rules. The rules are there for good reasons, and they have produced a record number of major events. For the year 2015 alone, apart from the rugby world cup, we have secured the world artistic gymnastics championships, the world canoeing championships, the European hockey championships, the European eventing championships, the world rowing championships and the International Paralympic Committee world swimming championships. It is a successful and well-tuned machine. Clearly, something did not go right this time around, but that does not mean that the whole system is broken.

Moving to what the Government can do, I will absolutely ensure that UK Sport engages proactively with the bid team. It would help if the all-party group and MPs here in the Chamber took that message back. There was some indication that for commercial reasons, the bid team did not want to open up its books and show people what it was doing. Now that the bid is won, it is time for everybody to come together and work to deliver a successful bid. For my part, as the Minister, I will ensure that UK Sport offers the necessary technical support to help the work and bring British Cycling on board. I am sure that there will be no problems worth noting with that. It also backed the other bid, but we will ensure that the British sporting landscape is lined up behind the Yorkshire bid, and we will consider what can be done further. It will not happen, though, unless the bid team is now prepared to share all its financial details and various undertakings with UK Sport.