Non-Domestic Rating (Preparation for Digital Services) Bill

John Redwood Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons
Monday 13th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Rishi Sunak)]

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

This Government are committed to ensuring that the tax system is fit for the 21st century, that it is designed around the needs of the taxpayer and that we minimise as far as possible the administrative burden for businesses paying their taxes. The Government are also clear that this system should reflect and take full advantage of modern technology, and use that to make the process as simple and efficient as possible for taxpayers.

This very narrow Bill will support those aims in the context of the administration of business rates. This extremely short and simple measure will simply allow us to start exploring future digital reform of the business rates system. The same clauses appeared in the 2017 Local Government Finance Bill and passed through Committee without Division. The hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton (Jim McMahon) was present during those debates, and I hope the clauses will receive the House’s support again today.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

Can the Minister give an idea of the cost involved and what sort of efficient and better system might emerge?

[Rishi Sunak]

The measure is even narrower than that; it is simply a paving measure, which I will come on to, that enables that exploratory work to start so that future Ministers will be able to come to this House with firmer proposals, with costs attached, depending on the eventual design of the system that is ultimately decided to be appropriate after extensive consultation with the sector. If my right hon. Friend bears with me, I hope his question will be answered later. If not, I will be happy to have him intervene again.

In the lead-up to the 2016 Budget, the Government undertook a wide-ranging review of the business rates system, in response to public calls to reform. As well as seeking views on the business rates tax itself, the review invited specific feedback on the administration of the rates system, including how business rates are collected.

Responding to the review, business groups called for a number of changes to the way the system is run, including switching the annual indexation of the business rates multiplier to the consumer prices index, rather than the retail prices index; implementing more frequent valuations; and modernising the billing and collection of business rates. I am pleased to say that the Government have already begun reforming the system to implement those changes.

Ratepayers are already benefiting from the change to the annual indexation of business rates from RPI to CPI, which was brought forward by two years, to April 2018. That measure alone is worth almost £6 billion to businesses over the next five years. The Government have also committed to increase the frequency of business rate revaluations from every five years to every three. To ensure that businesses benefit from that change at the earliest point, the Government have further announced that the next revaluation will be brought forward from 2022 to 2021. That will ensure that, as requested, business rates bills more accurately reflect properties’ up-to-date rental value and any relative changes in rents.

The Bill will enable us to begin exploring how to modernise the billing and collection of rates. Businesses in this country are of course already banking, paying bills and making sales online. Our tax system needs to keep pace.

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[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

I have declared my business interests in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, but I am not speaking for them of course; I wish to speak on behalf of the retail businesses in my constituency, as others have already done.

While I am sure it is well intended and necessary to develop a digital payment system for this tax, can the Minister reassure us that it will not be used as a device by the Treasury and others to accelerate payments and to damage further the cash flow of the shops and other businesses that have to pay it? There is the temptation to use the power of digital technology to have real-time information and then to knock the money off for the tax rather more quickly, when the timing of tax payments may be an important part of cash-flow planning, particularly of retail businesses.

I hope that Ministers are sensitive to the current position in many high streets up and down the country. Large chains and other sizeable independent shops are struggling because their cost base is very high, and they are competing with online retailers who have nothing like the same cost base in terms of property and staff numbers. They are finding it difficult to manage, and another hit on their cash flow from the Government would not be welcome.

Rents are now falling in shops generally in England and Wales, the area covered by the Bill. Some retailers are talking about reductions of 25% or 30% as and when the rents on various shop properties become due for review. That relief is welcome to some extent, but it takes time, because many of the leases are for several years and have to mature before renegotiation is possible. Some retailers must go through the agony of a voluntary administration to secure a change in their rents. Another problem is the fact that rents can go down through market processes, but rates never go down, except in the case of very small shops that benefit from one of the exemptions. So the total property cost does not fall at anything like the percentage that the market is suggesting that it should, because the Government element is very fixed. I hope that Ministers will be sensitive to that.

I realise that this is not the occasion—much as many of us would like it to be—for a proper debate on the balance of business rate taxation and its impact on the retail sector. However, in Wokingham, a lot of money has just been spent on refurbishment and the provision of new and more attractive space in the town centre. Securing the first lettings is an important part of promoting a more active town, but over-avaricious taxation, speedier payments and other changes in how the business rate is handled could offset what will otherwise, we hope, be a good-news story.

That is my prime concern, to which I hope the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Jake Berry), will respond. I am delighted that he will be winding up the debate, because I know that he is very conscious of and sensitive to the need to do more to help retailers, and I am sure that he will mention that.

I should like to follow up my earlier intervention on the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Rishi Sunak). It would be good, at some point—it may not be possible today—to have a better idea of the scope of the survey and of the costs that might be involved. Will it be conducted by our own Government officials, or will there be consultancy contracts? If there are consultancy contracts, will we get value, and will we be consulting people who actually know what they are talking about, so that we can end up with something that we are proud of?

The Government have a duty to taxpayers to ensure that money is well spent. It would be useful to have any more information that the Minister can give about the kind of sums that the Bill might authorise, and what the purpose is. What more can they learn that Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs does not already know from running perfectly good systems for a range of taxes on people and businesses? A fair amount of them are now handled electronically, so presumably there is quite a lot of in-house experience and expertise that could be drawn on. We always want to make the best possible use of the talent that the Government already have and the information that they have already gleaned both through their own researches and by buying it in through consultancies. I hope that Ministers will have some ability to discipline that work and to ensure that it is timely and provides value for money.

Local Government and Social Care Funding

John Redwood Excerpts

Wednesday 24th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Gwynne]

The right hon. Gentleman has made the case for me. Let me dumb it down for him—I do not wish to appear condescending, but it really is as simple as this: there has always been a recognition by Governments of all colours that not every area has the same baseline. Some areas have greater need and often those areas have less of an ability to raise income locally. Because of that, there has been a mechanism, or a formula—for example, whether that was the rate support grant that became the revenue support grant—to ensure that resources from the centre followed need. What we have seen under his Government is a 60% cut to the revenue support grant. Sixty pence in every £1 for the two councils in my constituency, Stockport and Tameside, is a lot of money. A 60% cut to a very small revenue support grant is different—a number of Conservative Members’ councils have only small revenue support grants, or no revenue support grants in some cases. Sixty per cent. of nothing is nothing and that is the unfairness. A 60% cut to my area cannot be filled in by council tax rises, so it means rises in council tax for poorer services. Cuts are cuts—it is as simple as that.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

My area is one that got a really bad deal under past Governments and is still getting a bad deal. Let me build a bit of cross-party support. It is obvious that the Government have to find more money for social care for future year budgets, and it needs to go to my area and some areas represented by Opposition Members. It needs to be done fairly, but what is Labour’s current thinking on how much individuals and families should contribute, because in social care, one of the big issues is how much of the family asset and income is at risk? Does it have any new thinking on that?

[Andrew Gwynne]

Of course, individuals and families are taking the hit from all the cuts, and they are having to step in.

Increasing Choice for Rail Passengers

John Redwood Excerpts

Wednesday 11th July 2018 Westminster Hall

[John Penrose]

I completely agree; Network Rail has all the wrong incentives. I plan to lay out how we might be able to improve them in future. If it had the right incentives to find and to build more capacity, it would be better for Network Rail, the travelling public and rail firms.

If franchising is bust, I will come on to what I think is an alternative in a second. Before I do so, at the risk of perhaps annoying some of my friends in the Labour party, I must pause to say that I am afraid I do not think renationalisation is a valid option as an alternative at the moment. That is not because of the staff, the ownership models or anything like that; it is because politicians, people such as us in this room, no matter whether we are from the political left or right, are generally useless managers of a complicated operation such as a rail system. We take short-term decisions based on elections rather than proper investment cycles, we meddle in details we know little about and we frequently cave in to the vested interests of management or staff at the expense of customers. Anyone who remembers the bad old days of British Rail will know it was a disaster: an uncomfortable, unreliable service with few passengers, starved of investment and with shockingly bad industrial relations. It is pretty hard to argue that it represented some long-lost golden age of rail that we ought to return to.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that there is a lot of misunderstanding in the debate about rail? The fact is that all the track, signals and stations are nationalised and publicly provided, and the small amount of competition is just a competition, once in a while, to run to a timetable that is state approved and controlled, and to standards that are laid down by the state. We effectively have a nationalised monopoly at the moment.

[John Penrose]

I completely agree with my right hon. Friend. I fear that renationalisation is trying to answer the wrong question when we are starting from a position where we, as taxpayers, own the track and network in the first place. It is time to stop obsessing about the failed and stale old-fashioned options of yesterday, whether franchising or nationalisation, and instead to try a new, better alternative that puts passengers first. Open access rail breaks up the franchises so passengers have a choice of different train companies on their local route. If they do not like one, they do not have to wait 10 years or more for the next franchise to be signed, because a different firm’s train will be along in a few minutes.

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[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

I strongly support the proposition of my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose)—that we could do with more competition and choice on the railways. The Hull example is great, and I am pleased that it has cross-party support. That city was not well served by the existing monopoly system. It allowed competitive challenge and granted an extra service, and everybody seems happy with it.

That example demonstrates that it is possible to introduce competitive challenge into what is effectively a nationalised monopoly system at the moment. We had rather more competition and choice in the early days of franchising, when it shook things up and improved services, but it is clearly not doing that to any great extent anymore, because successive Governments have wanted more control and authority over the detail and specification of the franchises. In the only competition that there has been, one or two bidders have bid too enthusiastically, and we have then had the embarrassment of their walking away. People rightly ask what they added and whether they were genuinely at risk if they were able to walk away. They would say, “Well, Network Rail didn’t deliver the capacity we were promised, so we weren’t able to deliver the services,” and they would say that the rest of the structure—the controls over timetabling and specification down to the kind of minutiae that my hon. Friend mentioned—made it impossible for them to achieve the changes or innovations that might have led to a profitable service for them and a better service for the customer. There is, therefore, quite a lot of common ground between the parties that the existing system needs considerable change. As my hon. Friend rightly said, we have all had experiences of broken and bad services in recent months, and our constituents have been let down all too often when they have tried to make the journey to work.

My own experience is that I often visit cities and towns around our country, because I love our country and I wish to stay in touch with more of it than just my constituency, and often when I am trying to get back to London to do the rest of my job, I book myself on a fast train and some previous service has been delayed. There may have been a driver problem with a slow train; more often, there will have been a big signalling problem earlier in the day. Then, not only is our service delayed when it arrives, but it gets progressively more delayed into London, depending on how far out we started, because it gets stuck behind stopper services that are themselves delayed, and then everyone is extremely frustrated and the businesses are in the dock for failure to deliver. That is particularly hard for the franchise company if it is indeed a Network Rail failure. It is more fitting that it should get the anger of the travellers if the issue was its own inadequacy at managing.

I therefore have a lot of sympathy with what my hon. Friend says, but I want to explore the most difficult part of his proposition. I am all in favour of open access and different competition. I agree with him that if people can offer services that the public actually want, rather than having to accept a managed best guess—probably over-managed by the Government—that would be better. I am just a bit concerned about how the network monopoly would still operate. My hon. Friend makes a very good point: he says that if there were open access to the network, presumably it would still be a public sector monopoly, but it would have an incentive to provide more capacity, because obviously the more open-access services it ran on its tracks, the more revenue it would gain. We would hope that it would behave in a positive way, even though it was a public monopoly, and would see that that was its main aim, and we presume that a Minister would instruct it that it needed to provide more capacity.

We first need to ask ourselves how we could get the extra capacity in our current system at a sensible price, whatever model of ownership and running the railways we might want, and then we need to look at how a particular model might operate. It seems to me that there are two relatively good-value and straightforward fixes for capacity that we need to do more of. I do not myself think that we can carry on with the idea that we will simply build new railway lines. The High Speed 2 expenditure is a very wasteful way of doing that and it will also do quite a lot of commercial damage to the routes that it takes on when it opens up, so we will have excess capacity on that particular set of routes and still be chronically short of capacity everywhere else. We are chronically short of capacity particularly at peak times into main cities, and the best thing the railway can do is move an awful lot of people at roughly the same time, when it has a clear advantage over the roads. We chronically lack capacity when it could do a really good job and provide an answer for people who are prepared to pay very high sums of money for a season ticket in order to carry out a job that often is not that well paid. They expect, in return for that, reliability and a seat on a train, which is a luxury that many of them do not get under the current system.

As I have said, there are two ways in which we can expand capacity more quickly. The most important, which the Government are now experimenting with—I urge them to go further and faster—is the wholesale adoption of digital signalling. According to my understanding of the technology and the expertise in the industry, it would be quite easy to get a 25% increase in capacity by introducing digital signalling. If we fly in a light aircraft over Britain at the peak time in the morning or evening, we will see completely clogged main roads into and out of the cities and largely empty railway track into and out of the cities because there is typically a 2-mile gap between the trains, for very good safety reasons. But with digital technology, it would be possible to run a really safe railway and have fewer gaps between the trains. Of course I want a very safe railway, and largely we have a very safe railway; we want to be able to take that for granted. However, given that the trains should all be going in the same direction on the same piece of track, and given that through the signalling system they should not be intersecting with one another in the way road traffic does, it should be possible to run more trains on a continuous piece of track with clear visibility, a satellite system and a digital communications system, which would act as a restraint were two trains to get into the wrong place. They would be able to see each other electronically, and there could even be automatic override, although I think drivers are quite capable of keeping the trains safe, and that is one of their main functions in such a situation.

I therefore urge the Minister to roll digital signalling out more quickly, and we may be able to go on from a 25% capacity uplift to a rather bigger capacity uplift, because the tracks remain remarkably empty when one is standing in quite a busy station, waiting for a train. It can be a very long wait, and not much else happens. We think to ourselves, “If this were a main road, I would have seen a thousand cars by now,” and we have seen two trains. We think to ourselves, “This is crazy. We have these fabulous routes. There must be a safe way of developing them.” And the great news is that there is, because digital technology, satellites in skies and the ability to know exactly where things are give us that capacity.

The other thing that I think is needed, to deal with the problem of the people going long haul needing a different pace of train on a single piece of track that also has to take stopper trains, which go much more slowly, is a bit more investment in bypasses. We do not need very long sections of track; we just need regular sections of track where we have double-tracked where there was a bit of spare land—there is quite a lot of waste and spare land around the railway system—so that the fast trains know that they have to go only another 3 or 4 miles down the track and there will be a short bit of track, with appropriate signalling, where they can get past the slow train without any problem. Then we would undo some of the damage that has been done by the timetable disruption through the absent driver, broken signal, broken rail or whatever it is that has caused the problem that day.

You will be pleased to know that this will be a short speech, Mrs Moon. In conclusion, open access, competition and choice can make a difference, but we need to tackle the capacity problem. Perhaps my hon. Friend is right to say that we can do that with a monopoly provider, or perhaps we have to look at models whereby individual dominant players on a route network with open access take responsibility for the capacity provision with the regulator, because we need to ensure what whoever holds the track not only has a theoretical incentive to provide more capacity, but actually wants to provide more capacity. We may need a market model for that, because up to this point Network Rail has been bitterly disappointing, very backward looking and slow at answering what the public want, which is a lot more peak-time capacity into our towns and cities.

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[Joseph Johnson]

To some extent but not entirely— I think that is the answer to my hon. Friend’s question. An integrated ticketing system enables people to buy a ticket for any journey anywhere in the country; it does not necessarily enable them to buy a ticket that is fungible across operators.

My hon. Friend also mentioned the east coast main line, where there are no fewer than 11 passenger operators, including the two open access operators, Hull Trains and Grand Central, which have delivered huge benefits for the communities they serve. Alternatively, take the west coast main line, where Great North Western Railway has recently been granted rights to run open access services between London and Blackpool alongside the franchised operator. That will offer passengers a choice of operators and up to six extra direct services to Blackpool per day, on top of the franchised services already available to them.

My hon. Friend the Member for Henley (John Howell) mentioned the new east coast railway. It is right that we consider all options for that new railway, which is under development, so that we deliver the best outcome for passengers and taxpayers, but we must also deliver all types of service, which a free market on its own would not do. So unless they can make a profit, franchises can get this balance right for everyone.

I am clear that open access is an important part of the railway, and can play a greater role in offering greater choice, in the right circumstances.

[John Redwood]

One day when I was trying to get back from Birmingham to London, I had pre-booked on service A to terminus A and that service was up the spout, so service A very kindly said that I could go on service B—a different company on a different route to a different terminus—and it just honoured the ticket. So there is clearly a way of making these tickets interoperable if the companies wish.

[Joseph Johnson]

My right hon. Friend has made an important observation. We can certainly look at ways to make tickets more fungible, but the purpose of the present integrated smart ticketing system is to enable passengers to “turn up and go”, to use the latest technology and so on. As yet, it has not focused on making tickets fungible between operators, and I am sure that is something that, as the open access policy develops and as open access develops as a feature of our system, will become more prevalent.

As the CMA recommended, however, a greater role for open access requires robust reforms to create a level playing field between different types of operator. At present, as my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare knows, open access operators do not pay towards the fixed costs of the network on which they operate, nor do they contribute towards the vital social services that the franchised operators that they compete with deliver. That distorts the incentives of operators and means that we cannot realise the full benefits of competition for passengers.

That is why we are now working closely with the Office of Rail Regulation on its proposals for reforming track access charges in the next rail control period, from 2019 to 2024. These reforms will see open access operators pay an appropriate amount towards the fixed costs of the network where they are able to. We support this move as a vital step in creating the level playing field between open access and franchised operators.

We have also consulted on a possible public service obligation levy. Such a levy would complement track access charging reform, so that open access operators would also pay towards the social services that franchises deliver to many stations. Those stations would not have the levels of service they do today if left entirely to the free market, and the Government offer greater passenger choice through the franchising system to deliver social as well as economic benefits.

Rating (Property in Common Occupation) and Council Tax (Empty Dwellings) Bill

John Redwood Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 15th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

Let me say to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, that the papers I have here are just a few of my brief speaking notes.

I am being very serious in all this. I know there can be a little bit of banter about English votes for English laws—how embarrassing, unworkable, stupid and ridiculous it all is—but this is a serious Bill that requires attention. The thing that surprises me more than anything else is the lack of interest from my English colleagues. We will do this job on their behalf. If they are not prepared to get to their feet to speak to this fine Bill, it will be left to Scottish National party Members—

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

rose—

[Pete Wishart]

But here is the genuine voice of England. I think the House awaits the right hon. Gentleman’s pronouncements with great interest.

[John Redwood]

I am grateful for the introduction from the hon. Gentleman. His misguided mockery serves his cause ill and serves this House ill. He well knows that we have had a proper constitutional debate about how some symmetry can be put into the asymmetric arrangements that we inherited so that each part of the United Kingdom can make its own decisions on its own measures, and this is the result. England now has the right to veto a measure that the Union Parliament wishes to impose on England if it does not meet with the approval of England. It is the weakest form of devolution of any of the four countries in our Union. The reason there are not English Members queuing up to speak on this measure is that we agree with it. We like this measure and we wish it to go through. If the hon. Gentleman is a true friend of England, he will now sit down and let this Bill pass.

[Pete Wishart]

I think I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. I would describe his intervention as half-hearted at best. His heart was not really in it, I do not think. He is one of the great defenders of the tradition of an English Parliament and English rights. Is he really satisfied with these woeful arrangements for this House? I am all for English democracy and making sure that English Members get the opportunity to design and progress their own legislation, as is required by their constituents, but to describe what we are doing today—this embarrassing mess—as a solution is below the right hon. Gentleman.

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[John Redwood]

indicated dissent.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil]

The right hon. Gentleman shakes his head—one principle for England, and another for Scotland.

[Pete Wishart]

My hon. Friend hits the nail right on the head. In this wonderful institution—the quasi-English Parliament—it seems to be all right for English Members to demand that they get their way and that they determine their legislation. But I remember the Scotland Bill 2015, as the right hon. Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) will too. I remember something like 97% of all Scottish Members of Parliament tabling amendments to that Bill, only for them to be overwhelmingly and comprehensively rejected because of the Government majority. It seems to be all right for English Members to get their own Parliament when it comes to these things, but when we have our say on important reserved issues in this House, it is completely and utterly ignored.

[John Redwood]

The hon. Gentleman must know that his colleague, the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil), has completely misconstrued the arrangements. No member country of the Union has a veto over Union matters such as withdrawal from the EU. Scotland not only has a complete veto over Scottish legislation but is in sole possession of Scottish legislation in a way that we English Members are not for English legislation.

[Pete Wishart]

I will leave the right hon. Gentleman to take that up with my good friend from Na h-Eileanan an Iar, who I have to say I find much more convincing when it comes to some of the great constitutional issues of the day. I am more than persuaded by my hon. Friend’s eloquence.

Secure Tenancies (Victims of Domestic Abuse) Bill

John Redwood Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 8th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Melanie Onn]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention and concur with his remarks. Other issues raised by hon. Members have prompted assurances during the Bill’s progress, and I take the Minister at her word and hope the Government live up to her words.

New clause 1 would ensure that cross-border travel does not negatively affect the rights in the Bill. People who flee domestic abuse end up in all parts of the country, but an unevenness in legislation means that domestic abuse victims in the devolved nations are subject to different rights and protections. The new clause seeks to protect the rights of domestic abuse victims countrywide and ensure that travelling from one council area in one country to another in another country does not impede the rights of a domestic abuse victim.

Domestic abuse victims often have little time to plan when fleeing an abusive partner and are unlikely to think that a move to their nearest large town or city might change their circumstances as a victim of domestic abuse, yet that is the reality in places such as Chester and Wrexham. It should be unequivocal that the rights in the Bill travel with the victims. In Committee, the Minister informed me that this matter would be brought up at the devolved Administration roundtable last month in the hope of agreeing a memorandum of understanding between the Administrations.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

I understand what the hon. Lady is trying to do, but I do not think her new clause does it, because it says that the Government should “review” the situation. What powers would she want the Government to take to override devolved Governments?

[Melanie Onn]

The purpose of the new clause is not to override the devolved Administrations, which is why it calls for a review. If the right hon. Gentleman listens to the remainder of my speech, perhaps it will clarify things for him.

I am pleased to see action to improve cross-border collaboration, but I have not seen any such memorandum. In any event, domestic abuse victims need more than a memorandum of understanding, and we have the opportunity to give them just that right now. I am aware of the sensitivities surrounding devolution, so the new clause does not seek to impose Parliament’s desires on the devolved Administrations, but would instead commit the Government to publishing a review of the domestic abuse policies of each Administration and to working towards ensuring that victims of domestic abuse are treated equally when they move from one nation to another.

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[Mrs Wheeler]

That will certainly be part of the package, yes. I will read out the letter as well, because that is the killer punch.

It is likely that most victims who flee from one part of the UK to another to escape domestic abuse and who are in need of housing would apply to a local authority for assistance on the basis that they were homeless. Homelessness legislation will provide a safety net for victims fleeing domestic abuse, even when they flee across national borders, but Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own homelessness legislation. That means that there may be differences of approach in accordance with the requirements of each devolved area. For example, local authorities in Wales, as in England, may discharge their duty to rehouse using the private rented sector.

The purpose of the Bill is to remove an impediment that might prevent someone who suffers domestic abuse from leaving their abusive situation in England when the provisions under the Housing and Planning Act 2016 come into force. The Act applies only to England. A victim of abuse in another part of the UK will not face the same impediment to fleeing their situation for fear of losing their lifetime tenancy. For example, if someone in Scotland were to flee to another council district within Scotland, the second local authority would grant them a lifetime tenancy if and when they were rehoused.

[John Redwood]

When I asked the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Melanie Onn) whether there was a way of overriding the devolved Administrations, she did not seem to understand the question properly, so I am glad that the Minister is explaining that that cannot be done. It is interesting that the Opposition’s amendment 3 expressly states that it applies only to England; whoever drafted their amendments probably did understand the point that the Minister is making.

[Mrs Wheeler]

Parliamentary drafting is not an easy task, which is why people with greyer hair than mine do the job and I do not. I thank my right hon. Friend for making the situation quite clear.

The commencement of the Housing and Planning Act 2016 does not change the situation. I do not believe that it would be appropriate to include a duty in the Bill—which applies in England only—to consider the potential for amending legislation in other parts of the UK. Parliament has already decided that this area of law should be devolved, so it does not seem right to have an amendment that appears to assume that the Secretary of State has some responsibility for it in relation to the devolved Administrations. Clearly, victims of domestic abuse seeking to move from one part of the UK to another is a common issue in which all parts of the UK have an interest. However, owing to the differences in housing legislation across England and the devolved Administrations, a UK-wide provision in a Bill that is based on an Act that applies to England only is not the correct approach—I am getting to the nub of things now.

During the passage of the Bill in the other place, my hon. Friend the Minister gave a commitment to raise with colleagues in the devolved Administrations the concerns that have been expressed. I can confirm that Lord Bourne met his counterparts in the devolved Administrations on 19 April, and I am pleased to inform Members that he has since written to me to let me know that the devolved Administrations were supportive of the Bill. They have committed to reviewing the impact of the Bill once it comes into force and to let us know about any issues or concerns for victims of domestic abuse should they arise. The letter states:

“I am pleased to be able to inform you that the devolved administrations were supportive of the Bill and could find nothing in it to concern them. This is because they took the view that the Bill had no impact on the ability of social landlords to continue to grant tenancies in their own countries, and they will review the impact of the Bill, together with officials.”

I think that that says it all.

On a more technical note, new clause 1 would not work as currently drafted, because social housing is provided not through local authorities in Northern Ireland but through the Northern Ireland Housing Executive. For that and all the other reasons I have given, I do not consider the new clause to be appropriate or necessary, and I ask that it be withdrawn.

Amendment 1 aims to ensure that the requirement to grant a lifetime tenancy—should a new tenancy be offered—would still apply where the victim of domestic abuse applies to another local authority district to be re-housed. I sympathise entirely with the motivation behind the amendment, and I well understand that victims of domestic abuse may wish or indeed need to put a considerable distance between themselves and their abuser. The Bill is intended to protect all lifetime tenants who are victims of domestic abuse, not only those who need to move from their current home to escape abuse, but those who have already fled from their home. I entirely agree that it is vital that the Bill protects victims who have applied for housing assistance in another local authority district. That is partly why we amended the Bill in the other place to extend it to apply to those who, having fled their homes, may have lost their tenancy or their security of tenure.

We recognise that that may be particularly problematic for those who seek assistance in another local authority area, and I assure the shadow Minister that the Bill has been drafted with that issue in mind. Where the Bill refers to “a local housing authority”, it means that it applies to any and to every local authority in England, just as in the same way it applies to any tenant who has a lifetime local-authority or housing-association tenancy of a dwelling house anywhere in England and who needs to move from that house to escape domestic abuse. That is standard in legislative drafting practice, so local authorities should have no difficulty in understanding what it means. Any amendment to spell that out in the Bill would therefore be unnecessary and redundant.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Miller]

I thank the Minister for those comments. These interventions are driven by that inconsistency in provision of services and by Members of Parliament wanting to get the best for the people they represent. The Minister is entirely right. By knowing how we can better provide a more equal service across the country, I hope that we will provide reassurance to those who support these amendments.

[John Redwood]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the hon. Members for Great Grimsby (Melanie Onn) and for Birmingham, Yardley (Jess Phillips) have made powerful points about family break-up and the role that the legislation could play in all that? Is not this a case where discretionary payments are very important because if the family can be kept together or brought together again, that would surely be where we would want discretion exercised?

[Mrs Miller]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. That discretion at local level is so important. I have had one or two cases where the local authorities have not necessarily been on the front foot in the use of local discretionary housing payments. Perhaps the Minister could urge local authorities to understand their duties, particularly to families that have broken up and that are at risk of domestic violence, and to really understand the importance of delivering services using these payments.

Rating (Property in Common Occupation) and Council Tax (Empty Dwellings) Bill

John Redwood Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons & Ways and Means resolution: House of Commons
Monday 23rd April 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Housing (Dominic Raab)]

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

The Bill takes forward two important measures to promote fairness derived from the autumn Budget: fairness for hard-pressed businesses that face an unjustified tax hike because of the so-called staircase tax; and fairness for the families, young people and many others who see properties lying empty while they struggle to find somewhere to live. On the first issue, we are determined to support the occupiers of business premises in multiple occupation and to ensure that they do not face unfair penalties. For more than 50 years, businesses that operated in adjoining units or rooms accessed from a common corridor staircase received one rates bill. That applied, for example, if a business occupied three consecutive floors in an office block or if a business occupied two rooms separated, let us say, only by a wall.

The rule was widely understood and accepted among all ratepayers, rating professionals and the Valuation Office Agency. No one was looking to change that approach. However, as a consequence of a Supreme Court decision in 2015 concerning an office block occupied by the accountancy firm Mazars, the situation was put in some doubt. After considering the Supreme Court judgment, the Valuation Office Agency concluded that it had to change its long-standing practice. As a result, each unit of property accessed from common parts has to have its own rating assessment, regardless of whether the properties are adjoining or associated with the same business. So, for an office block housing more than one business, each floor will now typically need to have its own rating assessment, even if successive floors are occupied by the same business.

We are not criticising the Supreme Court for reaching that judgment or the Valuation Office Agency for changing its practice as a result, but we have monitored the impact of the changes and it is clear that they have had troubling and damaging implications for ratepayers. First, moving from rating assessments that cover several floors to individual floors has increased some rateable values and rates bills, even when there has been no change to the property or locality. That is because the rateable value per metre squared is sometimes lower for larger properties, reflecting the normal practice in the market whereby landlords will offer discounts on rents for occupiers willing to take more space. This left some ratepayers suddenly facing a backdated increase in their overall rates bill.

Secondly, some businesses have lost small business rate relief as a consequence of the changes. That is not what we wanted to see, given its role in supporting the small independent businesses that are vital contributors to local economies and communities. As hon. Members will be aware, small business rate relief is a generous measure providing relief for ratepayers of property up to £15,000 in rateable value, and as a result more than 600,000 small businesses, occupiers of a third of all properties, pay no business rates at all. It is targeted at ratepayers with only one property and one rates bill to ensure that it benefits small independent businesses, which are very much the lifeblood of our local economy.

As a result of the change in practice that has seen some single rating assessments split in two, some ratepayers who were previously eligible for small business rate relief have lost some or, in some instances, all, of that relief. We understand that the number of small businesses affected by the loss of relief is relatively low, at fewer than 1,000, but that is still about 1,000 too many.

These businesses already pay their fair share. They deserve our support and this Bill will make sure that they get it. That is why we have decided to restore the previous practice of the Valuation Office Agency under clause 1. This will again see adjoining properties that are part of the same business receiving one rating assessment and paying one rates bill. We have decided to do this retrospectively. It is important that we get the process right, so we carried out a technical consultation on draft provisions over eight weeks after Christmas, supported by workshops held by my officials with the ratings sector. Indeed, there were meetings with expert valuation surveyors, too.

The Minister for Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Rishi Sunak), answered detailed questions from the Chair of the Select Committee. I am pleased to say that a good response to the consultation has helped us to improve some of the draft provisions. We published a summary of those responses and an explanation of the improvements on the Ministry’s website. I want to take this opportunity to express my appreciation on behalf of my Department and the Valuation Office Agency for the help we received from the Rating Surveyors’ Association, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and the Institute of Revenues Rating and Valuation in this work. It is probably worth saying that the Federation of Small Businesses supports the measure, too. As a result of this work, I am confident that the provisions we are introducing in clause 1 are technically sound and meet the Government’s aims, and that they will be welcomed not just by ratepayers but by everyone who wants to see British businesses thriving, especially small businesses and those on our precious high streets.

We are also determined to deliver a fairer deal for the many people who want and need decent, secure and affordable homes. We are straining every sinew to build more homes. Last year, we saw 217,000 new homes delivered, the highest number in all but one of the past 30 years.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

I am a strong supporter of what the Minister is trying to do but, on the question of a more penal tax on empty properties, will he assure me that, if a property is empty pending permissions for subdivision or improvement to get it into a better state so that it can be enjoyed as a home, there will be some flexibility so that people are not being taxed while they are trying to do that work?

[Dominic Raab]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right, and that is precisely why we have a minimum period of two years, to ensure that we strike the right balance and encourage the use of existing resources in our housing stock without penalising those who want to get their housing stock on to the market but are taking a bit of time to do so, for whatever reason—perhaps because of renovations or the challenges of the local market.

--- Later in debate ---

[Eddie Hughes]

My hon. Friend brings me to a point that I had neglected to cover so far: the flexibility that is allowed because we absolutely do not want to penalise people who have genuine reasons for a having a property empty for an extended period. Those people should fear nothing from this Bill. My understanding—I may be incorrect; if so, I am sure that hon. Members will correct me—is that the Bill would not apply, Madam Deputy Speaker, if you were serving in our armed forces overseas and your property was therefore left empty for an extended period. Similarly, should you unfortunately need to go into hospital or respite care, leaving your property vacant for a two-year period, there would be the flexibility to ensure that this measure was not applied.

[John Redwood]

Does my hon. Friend agree, though, that quite a few of these empty homes are owned by the public sector, which may not respond to this incentive? If only my council had lots of empty homes, it would be much easier, but it does not, and we are under enormous pressure. Does he agree that where that is the case, we need something else as well in order to end the scandal of empty public-owned housing?

[Eddie Hughes]

This is dangerously close to becoming a debate with great interaction. I look forward to more comments from my right hon. Friend, because my understanding is that there was previously a tool that allowed compulsory purchase of properties that had been left empty for an extended period. Some might think that this Government would not apply such rules, which perhaps seem draconian.

National Planning Policy Framework

John Redwood Excerpts

Monday 5th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

The hon. Lady started by saying that many communities do not have the homes that they need—I agree. I have been saying that for a long time, which is why we have been taking action on many fronts and why we have announced this action today. Let us explore what the hon. Lady meant, because she cannot ignore the huge role that the Government of which she was a part, formed by the party that she supports, played in the housing crisis facing this country.

From 1997 to 2010, the average house price rose from three and a half times average earnings to seven times such earnings. That is Labour’s legacy. Labour, more than anyone else, has created that crisis of unaffordability. When the shadow Secretary of State was Housing Minister, house building fell to its lowest level in our peacetime history since the 1920s, and social housing fell by 421,000 units. We will not take any lectures from the Opposition about how to deal with a housing crisis that they helped to create. Their policies are about rent controls and the requisition of private property. They have no ideas.

The hon. Lady is right that there is an issue with resources in planning departments, but she is also wrong, because we have already dealt with that issue. Perhaps she did not notice that local authorities are able to increase their planning fees by at least 20% as long as that money is put back into their planning departments. That measure has been welcomed not just by local authorities, but throughout the industry.

The hon. Lady says that the planning process is not part of the problem, but she has clearly not been listening to what the problem is. She has not been out there talking to local authorities and developers, or finding out what communities actually think. If she had, she would know that local authorities in England are together planning for 169,000 houses a year, which is nowhere near the number that we need. We need a change in the formula, so that we get the right number of homes in the right places.

The hon. Lady talked about the importance of giving communities a greater say. That is great, because this is the first time that I have heard that she is supporting our neighbourhood planning process—thank you very much. She also talked about garden cities, towns and villages, and she was right, so I thank her again for supporting our policy, as that is exactly what we are proposing up and down the country. Lastly, she mentioned that brownfield land must be the priority. Again, that is our policy—thank you very much for your support.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

Wokingham Borough Council, the unitary authority in my area, has issued a very large number of planning permissions—well above its five-yearly amounts under the plan—but the build rate has not always been high enough. Will the Secretary of State help such local authorities through experiments to find ways of increasing the build rate, so that homes are built where they are agreed to be built, rather than granting on appeal houses elsewhere where there would not be the same infrastructure contribution and the same ability to fit in with the plan?

[Sajid Javid]

My right hon. Friend raises a real and important issue, which he knows I have discussed with his local authority. The measures subject to the consultations that we are announcing today will certainly help with that problem. I hope that my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset will provide further help when he reports back on the work that he is doing.

Department for Transport

John Redwood Excerpts

1st reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 27th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

This debate will, I am sure, unite the House in wanting more transport investment. We are chronically short of capacity of transport of all kinds in our country. That is true in the north as well as the south; in the east as well as the west. Many MPs will make good cases for their own requirements.

I am particularly optimistic about the UK economy once we leave the European Union—above all, because I look forward to spending the £12 billion a year that we currently have to send abroad. Spending that money at home will mean that jobs and activity come from it. That generates more tax revenue but also, above all, takes some of the intense pressures off the public budgets that have been particularly acute since the banking crash and the big cuts made at the end of the previous decade. Those cuts by the outgoing Government were particularly harsh on capital investment in things like transport. We all look forward to these budgets easing a bit and to the extra tax revenue that growth would bring.

But growth also brings the need for more transport investment. We are very conscious of that in my own area of the country, Berkshire. We need investment in road and rail capacity to catch up with all the additional houses, jobs and business investment that there has been over the past 20 years. We particularly need more road capacity, because in the first half of that 20-year period we had practically no road capital or road schemes approved by the then Government. Only now are we beginning to get a bit of the investment that we need to catch up. We will need substantial further investment because the Government look to parts of the country like Berkshire to carry on with very fast rates of growth in housing development and business development, which in turn will require that extra capacity.

Looking first at rail capacity, I urge the Minister to spend what are obviously limited budgets on two particular priorities. The first is digital signalling. We run only about 20 trains an hour on the very good track networks that we already have. We could easily get up to 25—a 25% increase in capacity—with modern digital signalling, and probably go well above that if we developed and improved the technology. We could also put in a few bypass links of track where we need more of those because we run a mixed railway and it would be better to have more places where fast trains could safely overtake slow trains providing a local service. That would deal with a lot of the capacity problem. Producing extra capacity by building new tracks is expensive and causes environmental problems, and people are not keen to have new tracks going past their front windows or back doors. I urge the Minister to concentrate his money on where we can get the quickest and cheapest results, which is through much better control systems and new types of rolling stock with the right ratio between carriage weight and braking capability so that we can run many more trains an hour.

We then come to road capacity. In my local area we particularly welcome the idea that councils are being invited to establish, with the Government, local strategic highway networks. Those council-controlled roads will be part of a wider scheme that allows access to bigger sums of money so that the roads can provide some kind of back-up or alternative to the main national highway network of motorways and trunk roads. My councils are working on that and are keen to be part of the bidding process, because we need local networks of main A-roads that have more capacity, better junctions, safer junctions and more ability to route cars and vans from place to place so that people can get their children to school, go about their business and carry on their work by using road-based transport to make their day more efficient.

We also need to ensure that the main highway network is well managed by the state, and I hope future smart motorway programmes can be done a bit faster and a bit cheaper. The current programmes are clunky. They are desirable, but it seems to take rather a long time to get the extra lane of a smart motorway into use.

I also hope the Minister and his colleagues will look at sea transport. We have some potentially great ports—they are good ports already—so let us have a free ports scheme for those who would like to promote more industry and development adjacent to the ports. Let us make sure there are better road links into the leading ports, and let us see what we can do about coastal shipping. That could be a good way of relieving some of the intense pressures on the coastal highways, which leave a lot to be desired on many parts of our beautiful coastline.

Please, Minister, we need much more capacity. Let us try to spend the money more wisely, and let us move quickly to a world in which we have more money to spend.

Local Government Finance

John Redwood Excerpts

Wednesday 7th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

I very much agree with the point that my hon. Friend makes about looking at the fairness of the distribution, and I know that he has spoken powerfully about that in the past. We are looking at it, and I will come to it shortly in my speech.

A world of constant change, involving big shifts in demographics, lifestyles and technology, demands an updated and more responsive way of distributing funding. That means that we have to question the fairness of the current system, which is why I was pleased to launch a formal consultation on a review of councils’ relative needs and resources in December. This is not just a paper exercise. We have an unparalleled opportunity to be really bold and ambitious, and to consider with the sector where the most up-to-date evidence and data lead on drivers of local authority costs and to create a whole new system that gives councils the confidence to face the opportunities and challenges of the future.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

That is an excellent idea. Can the Secretary of State reassure the unitaries in my part of Berkshire that he does not envisage them going into negative grant, as it is called—in other words, getting no help at all?

[Sajid Javid]

I can give my right hon. Friend some reassurance on that matter. I will come to it in more detail in a moment, and I hope that he will be genuinely reassured.

Housing, Planning and the Green Belt

John Redwood Excerpts

Tuesday 6th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Robertson]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend and Gloucestershire neighbour. That is exactly the point that I was seeking to make.

Why are there so many proposals to build houses on the green belt, particularly in my area? In the joint core strategy that is being drawn up by the Tewkesbury, Cheltenham and Gloucester planning authorities, Tewkesbury is looking to cover the unmet need of Cheltenham and Gloucester. However, contrary to planning guidance, the green belt is being compromised to satisfy the undoubted duty to co-operate, and this is creating confusion.

Why is Tewkesbury Borough Council doing this? It is because it feels that it must, and I have some sympathy with its position when I read the details of the planning inspector’s report, which again illustrates anomalies in the planning guidance. The inspector states in her report:

“Taking full account of constraints and the outcomes of cross-border exploration, removal of land from the green belt is needed, so far as is justified, to contribute to housing provision and the five-year supply”.

She goes on to say:

“I find that the adverse impacts of removing land from the green belt would not significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits of contributing towards housing and other development needs”.

Here we see clear evidence of the confusion in the planning guidance with regard to protection of the green belt. The inspector is insisting on building on the green belt and on the floodplain to meet housing numbers, yet the planning guidance clearly states that unmet housing need is unlikely to outweigh harm to the green belt in importance. I am aware that local planning authorities have the right to change the designation of the green belt at the plan-making stage, but that is not the point. The point is that there is a contradictionin the planning guidance.

I am aware that the Government have introduced a White Paper to consider the housing crisis and the broken housing market, but having read through it, I do not think that it is likely to address the problems of the market or the inconsistencies, contradictions and confusions in the planning system. Nor do I think that it will restore a sense of democracy to the planning process. Indeed, the wishes of a significant proportion of my constituents have been completely disregarded in the outcome of this process. We often hear the Government referring to the importance of local decision making, but the existence of the Planning Inspectorate makes a mockery of that, and does not help us to provide the houses that we need.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend have the same problem that we have in Wokingham and west Berkshire, where a large number of planning permissions are granted but the builders do not build enough homes? On appeal, extra homes are then granted in places that do not fit in with the local plan or the infrastructure provisions.

[Mr Robertson]

I am not familiar with the situation in my right hon. Friend’s area, but I know that the appeals system does not seem to work to the benefit of local communities.