Oral Answers to Questions
Oliver Letwin Excerpts(13 years, 2 months ago)
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Margot James (Stourbridge) (Con)
12. What steps he is taking to make Government procurement simpler for small and medium-sized enterprises.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
My hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) is right to ask this question. We attach a huge amount—
Mr Speaker
Order. I apologise for interrupting the right hon. Gentleman, but I think he seeks to group the question with a number of others: Nos. 9, 11 and 12.
Mr Letwin
I do indeed, Mr Speaker; I am very grateful to you.
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to ask this question because we attach a huge amount of importance to trying to open up contracts to small and medium-sized enterprises. We have launched the Contracts Finder website, which is of enormous advantage to them, and we are getting rid of vastly burdensome pre-qualification materials. Opposition Members may be interested to know that a document such as the one I am holding is what small and medium-sized enterprises had to fill out over and over again in pre-qualification. We are now reducing that and eliminating it in many cases.
John Glen
I thank my right hon. Friend for his reply. A business in my constituency offers a proven low-cost solution to helping individuals back to work, but it is finding it impossible to get access to Government. Can my right hon. Friend advise Gary Roberts of Cavendish Films how he can open a dialogue and ensure that these potential huge savings are given a fair hearing?
Mr Letwin
I would be delighted to welcome my hon. Friend and his constituents from Cavendish Films to discuss that very issue. The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my right hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), has constructed the Work programme in a way that enables the main contractors to deal with the vast range of subcontractors on a payment-by-results basis, and I am sure there is plenty of opportunity for my hon. Friend’s constituents to be introduced to the participants in that programme.
Alec Shelbrooke
My constituency of Elmet and Rothwell has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the country, which is due mainly to a very successful SME base. Is the drive to procure from SMEs intended as a way of subsidising them, or is it the most efficient way for the Government to procure?
Mr Letwin
My hon. Friend raises another extremely important question. It is emphatically not the Government’s intention to subsidise small and medium-sized enterprises through the contracting process, but rather to enable Government to be more efficient by promoting the kind of innovation that SMEs so frequently bring to the work they do. Our feeling is that if we get locked into contracts merely with very large suppliers, we often lose that innovation, and we are determined to avoid that result.
James Morris
SMEs are vital to the black country economy. What is the Minister doing to ensure that small and medium-sized companies in places such as the black country can compete for Government contracts on a level playing field?
Mr Letwin
Again, that is an enormously important question. One of the purposes behind our move to spread contracting to SMEs is precisely to ensure that we do not get such an unbalanced economy. We want to reach out to firms that have the best propositions—often, small and medium-sized firms—in parts of the country where there are not major contractors who do much business with Government. We believe that that is a good way of helping to build the economies, and enterprise and innovation, in those areas of our country.
Margot James
Government procurement officers have been very risk-averse in the past and associate large companies with security. Does my right hon. Friend agree that a change in culture is required, as well as these excellent new policies?
Mr Letwin
In a word, yes. We are determined to achieve a change in culture, and the dictum that nobody ever got sacked for hiring IBM is one that my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office is putting to the test. We are determined to go for innovation and excellence, and we will do that on a wide scale. Looking at the figures for contracting, I see that we have already achieved an enormously wide spread in the past few months.
Mr Speaker
Order. There are really far too many noisy private conversations taking place in the Chamber. I want to hear the questions and, indeed, the good doctor’s answers.
Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)
What proportion of Government contracts were won by small and medium-sized enterprises in Yorkshire, and what are the Government doing to ensure that small companies in the north of England get a proportionate share of Government contracts?
Mr Letwin
I will write to the hon. Gentleman with the figures for Yorkshire. I can tell him that we have set a presumption that all Government Departments will be moving towards 25% of contracts being in the hands of small and medium-sized enterprises, giving a vast range of opportunity not just in one part of the country but all parts of the country. Indeed, we intend to ensure that people throughout the country have ample opportunity to get into this market, which is why we are making it so much easier to participate.
Anas Sarwar (Glasgow Central) (Lab)
8. What assessment he has made of the progress of the work of the big society ministerial group.
Oral Answers to Questions
Oliver Letwin Excerpts(13 years, 4 months ago)
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Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)
4. What progress his Department’s behavioural insight team has made in its work.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
I am glad to be able to tell my hon. Friend that the behavioural insight team is now well established. It is beginning with work on three areas: improving the nation’s health; empowering consumers and encouraging people to give money; and protecting our environment.
Damian Collins
“Nudge” author, Richard Thaler, has said that he believes that groups of friends can reduce their alcohol consumption by ordering from a bar tab rather than buying rounds of drinks. What savings from the national tab is the Minister making by applying behavioural economics at the heart of Government instead of creating yet more legislation?
Mr Letwin
I am glad that my hon. Friend asks that extremely interesting and important question. Of course, there has to be legislation about some things, but legislation has strict limits. The Opposition should be well aware of that, as they wasted £1.1 billion on ID card legislation—a totally ineffective example of authoritarianism. They also proposed to engage in bin taxes, and the evidence is now very clear: those measures would have increased fly-tipping and burning at home and have had counter-productive effects. The comparison with the RecycleBank initiative that Windsor and Maidenhead council and others are taking up, which nudges people into successfully recycling, is very striking. My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the fact that we can do—[Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. May I just very gently say to the right hon. Gentleman, whose mellifluous tones I always enjoy—
Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)
Has the insight team considered an independent think tank’s judgment that the Government’s health reforms are like trying to resuscitate a corpse, which has not been done successfully since the time of Lazarus? How will the Government’s reforms help the nation when they are imposing chaos on the health service?
Mr Letwin
I do not think that the national health service is anything like a corpse at all; it is a living, breathing body that does a fantastic amount of good for our nation, and we are trying to improve it. The behavioural insight team has, as a matter of fact, been involved with the Department of Health—I was hearing about it just this morning—in thinking through ways in which we can nudge improvements in the health service, too, and try to make it more effective without imposing additional regulation on it.
Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)
5. What recent discussions he has had with the civil society organisations on the implementation of the big society initiative.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
All Cabinet Office Ministers meet civil society organisations regularly. I was present recently with the Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General, my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Mr Maude), the Prime Minister and other members of the Government at a round-table meeting with a cross section of voluntary and community groups and their representatives. We had extremely fruitful conversations about the new opportunities opening up for the sector and the way in which we can encourage those.
Mr Slaughter
Yesterday, my local Tory council announced that 22 well-regarded voluntary organisations would be evicted from their home in Palingswick house, which they have been in for 25 years, to provide a site for a free school run by the self-publicist Toby Young, most of whose pupils will come from outside the borough. Will the right hon. Gentleman extend his deliberations and come to Hammersmith to sort out the broken big society there?
Mr Letwin
I have of course heard about the Palingswick house events, but it is hugely in the interests of the hon. Gentleman’s constituents that there should be a free school there, as it will improve education standards, I have no doubt. That is of course entirely a matter for the local council, not for the Government, because we believe in localism, but I understand that the council intends to find other ways to house the voluntary and community groups that are involved, and I am sure that it will do so with his help.
Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)
May I draw your attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, Mr Speaker, and ask the Minister what the likely timetable will be for local voluntary organisations to access the big society bank?
Mr Letwin
My hon. Friend has a distinguished record in financing voluntary and community groups, and the big society bank will make a difference to that area. The bank is a quite a complicated proposition, and we have to organise it and find the funding for it, but my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General is at work on that at the moment. Although we hope to be able to progress it at a reasonable rate, I certainly do not want to give my hon. Friend the impression that it will happen overnight, but I anticipate it being up and running in the not too distant future.
Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)
What reassurance has the Minister given civil society organisations that the big society agenda is being driven not by marketisation principles and the desire to see the voluntary and community sectors bid for public sector contracts simply to reduce costs, but by the desire to enable genuine community empowerment?
Mr Letwin
If the Speaker will permit a little essay, I would say two things in response to the hon. Lady’s important question. First, this is not all about money, in any dimension. The Localism Bill that we are bringing before the House has a huge effect on building social capital, and it does it by empowering people to make decisions about really important things such as their neighbourhood planning. That has nothing to do with saving money and everything to do with building social capital and empowering people.
Secondly, I fear that the hon. Lady shares the error that many of her colleagues have exhibited in thinking that the issue is one of services versus money. We are actually trying to find ways of getting more for less, and we believe that the innovation, enterprise, intelligence and social capital in the voluntary sector will enable us to do that.
Mr Ben Bradshaw (Exeter) (Lab)
6. What savings have been achieved under the Government's programme of rationalisation and abolition of public bodies to date.
Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
11. What assessment he has made of the likely effects on the social enterprise sector of reductions in Government expenditure.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
There is no doubt that the cuts that we have had to make as a result of the huge deficits that were piled up in government by the colleagues of the hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Sheila Gilmore) have made and, in the immediate future, will make life difficult for some voluntary and community sector bodies, contrary to the way in which I was misrepresented by the hon. Member for Hemsworth (Jon Trickett). However, we have put in place measures that will vastly increase the opportunities for voluntary and community bodies to participate in public service delivery and earn money by doing so, and we have established a £100 million transition fund.
Sheila Gilmore
Will the Minister explain to the House what discussions he has had with his Treasury colleagues about extending and reforming community interest tax relief, which many social enterprises want to happen? That might be a way to enable social enterprises to flourish, despite the reductions that are contemplated.
Mr Letwin
Tax relief is, of course, an issue for the Chancellor of the Exchequer at Budget time, and I would not dream of trampling on his front lawn. The hon. Lady should recognise two important facts. First, charities already receive about £3 billion in tax relief, including a VAT exemption for trading activities for their main purposes and gift aid. Secondly, we are reluctant to create an unlevel playing field between social enterprises that are not charities and the private sector, because we want to ensure that there is a fair contest between the two and that social enterprises are fully involved in competing for public service delivery.
Tom Blenkinsop
I take note of the Minister’s reply. In opposition, he said that the creation of a social investment bank was a priority, and last July the Government said that such a bank would be making loans by this April. We now know that that will not happen until the end of 2011. Is he frustrated by the Government’s dithering?
Mr Letwin
It is certainly true that we would like that to happen as fast as possible. We would have been much assisted in that if the previous Administration had not spent three years talking about it without setting up anything and without allocating any money to it. We have made arrangements for the bank to have some money. We hope to get more into it and to set it up in the very near future.
Mrs Glindon
Given what has been said by my two colleagues and the Minister, will he explain more fully what immediate help the Government will give to the voluntary sector to help it create more social enterprises?
Mr Letwin
I hope that the hon. Lady has already gathered that we are trying to do two things. The first is to provide immediate assistance to voluntary and community groups that have had a tough time because of the spending review. The transition fund of £100 million is open. We are waiting for the bids to be completed, and they will then be judged and money will be handed out. Secondly, we are opening a wide terrain of public service delivery functions that can be carried out by voluntary and community groups, resulting in a huge potential for them to earn.
Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)
10. What steps he is taking to ensure that young people from disadvantaged backgrounds participate in the national citizen service.
Lindsay Roy (Glenrothes) (Lab)
12. What assessment he has made of the effects on the big society initiative of the outcomes of the comprehensive spending review; and if he will make a statement.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
The hon. Gentleman was a distinguished head teacher in Scotland, I believe, and if his question relates to the effects in Scotland, he should of course address it to Scottish Ministers, as we do not have responsibility in that field.
For England, £470 million a year has been allocated to the Office for Civil Society, a considerable amount in light of the spending review. We have also allocated £100 million to the transition fund, and as I have mentioned repeatedly, there are huge new opportunities for voluntary bodies.
Lindsay Roy
I thank the Minister for his answer. Can he reassure me that ultimate responsibility for providing a safety net for the most vulnerable people in society still rests with the state?
Mr Letwin
Of course responsibility for ensuring that people are cured, taught and protected from criminals rests with the Government and the state. The question is how that responsibility is best fulfilled. In our view, there are some areas in which things should be done by innovative and enterprising voluntary and community groups, rather than being delivered directly by public authorities.
Oral Answers to Questions
Oliver Letwin Excerpts(13 years, 5 months ago)
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Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
4. What assessment he has made of the likely effects of the outcomes of the comprehensive spending review on voluntary sector organisations over the spending review period.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
Our programme of structural reform is opening up huge new opportunities for all sorts of voluntary and community sector organisations to take part in the delivery of public services. In the hon. Lady’s constituency, City Health Care Partnerships—which, I understand, is an employee-led spin-out from the health service—is providing health visitors, district nurses, pain clinics and a range of other services. That is an admirable example of what can be done, and we hope that it will be replicated in other parts of the country.
Diana Johnson
What message would the Minister send to the Hull Families Project, which is based in Orchard Park, given that £160 million of regeneration funds were stripped from that community on Monday, and to the Hull Churches Home from Hospital Service, which fears that the local authority and the NHS will cut its budget? What message does that send about the coalition Government’s real approach to disadvantaged communities?
Mr Letwin
The hon. Lady knows that the coalition Government have protected the NHS budget, for the very reason that we regard it as a priority. She may also know that the public health White Paper, which is on the way, will announce our proposals—already well foreshadowed—on the health premium. The health premium will specifically benefit those who are improving public health locally, and will organise funding so that it most benefits the most disadvantaged parts of the country, thus dealing with the precise points that the hon. Lady raises.
Mr Mark Williams (Ceredigion) (LD)
There are increasing pressures on independent citizens advice bureaux throughout the country. Debt management issues are an ever-present feature of their work. What assurances can the Minister give that expertise and resources will be available to CABs locally so that they can undertake their invaluable work?
Mr Letwin
The coalition Government certainly agree that citizens advice bureaux form a fantastically important part of the fabric of the big society and support for people locally, and I believe that Members throughout the House recognise the value of their services. We will support them in every possible way, and I should be delighted to talk to the hon. Gentleman about any specific issues in his constituency.
Mr Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab)
I believe that strengthening civil society is a common cause between us. Labour is certainly very proud that the sector doubled when we were in government. Now, however, charities are saying that they face cuts of a little over £3 billion during the next couple of years. How many jobs does the Minister expect to be lost in charities that do not have Conservative advisers at their helms or on their boards? To the untrained eye it seems that, worryingly, some charities are now more equal than others.
Mr Letwin
The right hon. Gentleman is well aware that more than three quarters of charities receive no Government money, and therefore will not be affected. He ignores the opportunities presented by the new public service reforms. The Work programme, for example, is creating huge opportunities for the voluntary and community sector, and there will be increased funds from that source. There will be more funds for drug prevention, rehabilitation and recovery, and for the rehabilitation of prisoners. Payment-by-results contracts will be available for a huge range of new voluntary and community sector operators. I expect the right hon. Gentleman to see an expansion, not a reduction, in the sector and its activities.
Michael Ellis (Northampton North) (Con)
5. What plans he has to encourage opportunities for small and medium-sized enterprises to apply for Government contracts.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
15. What plans he has to encourage opportunities for small and medium-sized enterprises to apply for Government contracts.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
On 1 November, my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office announced a package of measures to help small and medium-sized enterprises to obtain public sector contracts. They include halving the length and breadth of the pre-qualification process for small firms, and creating a single website called Contracts Finder, where small businesses can locate all the contracts that are available from Government.
Michael Ellis
Given that 95% of people in my constituency are employed by small and medium-sized enterprises and that some companies would relish the opportunity of a fair playing field in bidding for Government contracts, will my right hon. Friend make suitable changes to the bureaucratic burden that they currently bear, thanks to the previous Government, as soon as possible?
Mr Letwin
The short answer is yes—and abundantly so. The measures I just described are intended to do that. In addition, we are looking at the causes of delay in the procurement process because, as was mentioned earlier, that is often part of the problem. We are also requiring suppliers to pay their subcontractors within 30 days, and encouraging them to pass those payments right down the line to the smallest businesses.
Julian Smith
These are great measures for small business, but may I impress upon the ministerial team the need to move forward with them now, because British small business is desperate for access to these contracts? So—please, please, please—get on with it now.
Mr Letwin
I am happy to be able to tell my hon. Friend that that is precisely what we are doing. That is why we are publishing every contract for tender of over £10,000 on a website, enabling people to see the opportunities. It is also why we have put in every Department’s business plan the requirement to report on the percentage by value of contracts they have let to small and medium-sized enterprises. We shall measure the extent to which Departments fulfil that requirement. [Interruption.]
Damian Collins
Will the Minister consider organising an event or exhibition at which small businesses could show what they can offer to Government procurement? Perhaps we could have a street fair in Downing street, and invite people out of their offices to come and see for themselves?
Jason McCartney
Perhaps we could have a street fair in Colne Valley. SMEs in my constituency will certainly welcome the measures, which will make it easier for them to do business with the Government, but can the Minister assure them that the process will be more accountable and transparent?
Mr Letwin
Yes, indeed, I can; in fact everything I have been describing tends to that end. We are going to make sure SMEs know what contracts are available; we are going to make sure they get a proper account of what is awarded; and we are going to make sure that Departments are held to account in awarding to SMEs. We want transparency all the way through the process because that is what will drive Government to let contracts to SMEs.
Mr Michael McCann (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) (Lab)
Now that Lord Young has gone, does the Minister agree that SMEs have never had it so good in respect of their share of Government procurements given the scale of cuts announced in the spending review?
Mr Letwin
Lord Young has resigned. My personal view is that the longest and deepest recession since the war, and the vast fiscal deficits that the Labour party bequeathed to us, have left not only SMEs but the entire country, and, of course, the Government, with an enormous challenge that we are now trying to meet.
Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)
Some of the enterprises of relevance in this context are third sector or voluntary sector organisations, for which the operation of the compact is important. How will the Minister respond to the concerns expressed by a number of those organisations that the compact is not working and that the new compact’s accountability mechanisms are not robust enough? The reality is that voluntary sector organisations are first in line for cuts, and this Government are doing nothing to address that.
Mr Letwin
Let us be clear: the compact is not about the level of expenditure but about the extent to which, in each contract, the Government play fair by those with whom they are contracting. We absolutely accept that the operation of the compact under the previous Government was not adequate. We are introducing new measures to make it more transparent, and the entire structures of our payment by results contracts will be totally transparent and in line with the spirit, as well as the letter, of the compact.
Mr Brian H. Donohoe (Central Ayrshire) (Lab)
Will this include Scottish enterprises?
Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)
The cuts in public expenditure will put enormous pressure on construction industry firms, and the smaller and medium-sized firms will be particularly badly hit. What are the Government going to do to protect those companies so that when the economy improves they will still be there to do the construction that is needed?
Mr Letwin
The greatest protection for small and medium-sized enterprises in the construction sector and elsewhere is, of course, a macro-economic framework that enables them to survive the recession, prosper and grow. That is why my right hon. Friend the Chancellor has taken the steps that have led the world in providing a solid macro-economic framework and low interest rates that enable—
Mr Speaker
Order. I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. I call Mr David Amess.
Departmental Business Plans
Oliver Letwin Excerpts(13 years, 6 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
Today, we are publishing business plans, publicly setting out how and when Government Departments will achieve the radical structural reforms needed to deliver the coalition’s programme for Government.
Taken together, these plans will change the nature of Government. They represent a power shift, taking power away from Whitehall and putting it into the hands of people and communities; and an horizon shift, turning Government’s attention towards the long-term decisions that will equip Britain for sustainable social success and sustainable economic growth.
The publication of these plans will bring about a fundamental change in how Departments are held to account for implementing policy commitments; replacing the old top-down systems of targets and central micromanagement with democratic accountability. Every month, Departments will publish a simple report on their progress towards meeting their commitments.
In addition, the second part of each business plan explains how Government will give people unprecedented access to the data they need—in a simple, easily accessible format—to scrutinise how we are using taxpayers’ money and what progress we are making in improving society through our reforms.
These transparency sections of the plans are being published in draft to allow Parliament and the wider public to say whether each Department is publishing the most useful and robust information to help people hold the Department to account.
Select Committees will of course play a vital role in the task of holding the Government to account. Government Departments are contacting Select Committee chairmen to inform them of the new processes and to invite them to discuss the business plans in more detail.
Our reforms will give people the power to improve our country and our public services, through the mechanisms of democratic accountability, competition, choice and social action. By 2015, we will have made the structural changes set out in the programme for Government that are needed to secure the long-term prosperity and sustainability of our country.
The business plans are available on departmental websites and on the No.10 website at: http://www. number10.gov.uk/transparency.
Copies have been placed in the Libraries of both Houses and are also available in the Vote Office and Printed Paper Office.
Departmental Business Plans
Oliver Letwin Excerpts(13 years, 6 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I wish to make a statement on today’s publication of departmental business plans. When we formed the coalition in May, we committed to a programme of fundamental structural reform that would change the nature of government. Of course, I recognise that it was the aim of the Labour Government to improve public services, to get value for money and to deliver their stated aims. The problem lay in the fact that, to achieve those laudable aims, they set up a system of bureaucratic accountability in which almost everything was judged against a set of centrally mandated, politically determined performance targets. They then used a succession of short-lived bureaucratic interventions to try to make people fulfil the targets.
Alas, the evidence of the past 13 years shows that targets and short-term bureaucratic interventions simply do not work. Despite all the new learning strategies in schools, the gap in educational achievement between the richest and the poorest widened; despite all the NHS targets, cancer survival rates in Britain were among the lowest in Europe; despite all the police form-filling and bureaucracy, there were more than 100,000 incidents of antisocial behaviour every day; and, as the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne) has famously remarked, the money ran out.
So, we have argued for a power shift that will take power away from Whitehall and put it into the hands of people and communities, rebalancing the relationship between the citizen and the state. We recognise that Britain can make progress only if the Government establish frameworks that help people to come together to make life better. We have also argued for an horizon shift—[Hon. Members: “Hooray!”] Opposition Members will hear a lot of that term over the next four years, so they should get used to it. We have argued for an horizon shift, moving away from short-term bureaucratic interventions towards governing for the long term, establishing the right frameworks of incentives in the public services, sorting out the public finances and investing where it counts to create sustainable economic growth.
The publication of our departmental business plans is a significant part of achieving both that power shift and that horizon shift. In June, the Prime Minister launched a series of draft structural reform plans, in which Whitehall Departments publicly set out their reform priorities and the actions that they will take to achieve them, with a specified timetable. In July, August, September and October, we issued monthly reports on the draft plans, setting out the actions that had been completed or started, and giving explanations of any missed deadlines. Today, taking into account the results of the spending review, we are publishing the final departmental plans, setting out the vision, priorities and structural reforms of each Department.
These plans are a key part of our transparency agenda. They do not set out hopes for what we might achieve by micro-managing all the public services. They set out what we need to do, to manage the Government properly. That is, after all, our business, and we expect to be judged on whether we do it properly. The publication of the plans will bring about a fundamental change in how Departments are held to account for implementing policy commitments, replacing the old top-down systems of targets and central micro-management with democratic accountability. Every month, Departments will publish a simple report on their progress towards meeting their commitments—[Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. In a way, it is a good thing that the House is in a jocular mood. I realise that the right hon. Gentleman is no longer a philosophy tutor, but I feel sure that he is accustomed to a slightly more cerebral response and deferential hearing than he is getting.
Mr Letwin
I am grateful, Mr Speaker, for that help, but I have to say that I had not anticipated anything better than I received, because Labour Members presided over a Government who acted like a magazine and we intend to preside over a Government who act like a Government. That is a profound difference and I recognise that it is very uncomfortable for Opposition Members.
Before I go on, I should correct myself as I believe I slipped into referring to 100,000 incidents of antisocial behaviour when I meant 10,000. I apologise to the House. That is an example of transparency and straightforwardness, which I hope will be replicated as we move forward.
In addition, the second part of each business plan explains how Government will give people unprecedented access to the data they need—in a simple, easily accessible form—to scrutinise how we are using taxpayers’ money and what progress we are making in improving society through our reforms. These transparency sections of the plans are being published in draft to allow Parliament and the wider public to say whether each Department is publishing the most useful and robust information to help people hold each Department to account.
Select Committees will, of course, play a vital role in the task of holding the Government to account. My Cabinet colleagues are therefore contacting Select Committee Chairmen to inform them of the new processes and to invite them to discuss the business plans in more detail in their Committees.
Once the reforms described in these business plans are fully implemented and the transparency reports are fully in place, we will have a real people power revolution— where people themselves are equipped with the power and information necessary to improve our country and our public services, through the mechanisms of democratic accountability, competition, choice and social action. I commend this statement to the House.
Mr Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab)
I start by welcoming the new Minister for milestones to the House. I could tell that he was the right Minister for this job when I received his statement three hours before he stood up. I thank him for that and urge the same habit on his hon. and right hon. Friends.
I also welcome the thrust of the Minister’s statement. When Labour came to power in 1997, we discovered that the Conservatives had run public services into the ground. Now, thanks to Labour’s investment—and, yes, Labour’s management—crime is now down 43%, hospitals have the shortest waiting lists on record and our schools and teachers are delivering record results for our children aged 11, 16 and 18, with 70,000 a year achieving good results.
The question was always going to be: what was the way forward after Labour’s job of repair? I am glad that the Government have seized on some of the principles set out in our White Paper, “Smarter Government”, published last year. It was described at the time as
“a radical dispersal of power to patients, parents and citizens”.
Today, however, the Minister tells us that his first step is to make departmental plans transparent. May I tell him that the only revolution he has delivered this afternoon is to make bad plans transparently bad plans? There will be no power shift if he is going to destroy the power of NHS patients to be treated within 18 weeks; the power of parents to get one-to-one tuition for their children if they are falling behind at school; the power of citizens to summon police officers to talk about issues of local concern.
I have only one question: if the Minister is serious about improving government—and I believe he is—will he review the ending of basic rights to high-quality public services across this Government? When it comes to public services, the public want guarantees, but all he has offered them this afternoon is an online gamble.
Mr Letwin
First, I should welcome the welcome. As I think the right hon. Gentleman knows, I am one of the longest-term proponents of consensus not only between members of the coalition but across the whole House. If the right hon. Gentleman is in effect saying that the Opposition will now back the general principle of having a clear timetable for actions, input measures, outputs—
Mr Letwin
Mr Speaker, perhaps you will forgive me if, to avoid further confusion in the hon. Gentleman’s mind, I explain the difference between a target and a milestone. A target is an effort by a Government, of which there were many under the previous Government, to determine what the whole of the public service would achieve through micro-management. Such targets were often not met. What we are talking about are actions that lie under the direct control of Government and which it is absolutely right that we should manage ourselves.
To return to the point I was trying to make, if the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne) is welcoming the idea that we should set these things out clearly and he is going to sponsor that as an approach to government, that would be in the interests of the nation, because we could continue that process over many years and that would be a huge advance.
The right hon. Gentleman asked whether we can achieve a power shift if we do not do certain things, and he mentioned citizens talking about policing with police officers.
Mr Letwin
Yes, summoning police officers to talk about that. We propose something very different, which goes beyond that. Yes, we will have beat meetings, but we will also allow people to vote for police commissioners so that they actually have accountability. That is what we mean by choice and power, as opposed to the mere window dressing of the ability to talk.
Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)
May I make a suggestion? My right hon. Friend says in his statement that every month Departments will publish a simple report on the progress they have made towards meeting their commitments. On the day each month when ministerial colleagues from different Departments come to the House to answer oral questions, might they not also make a written statement that all of us can see? I confess that I find it difficult to keep my own website up to date, so watching the websites of 22 Government Departments will be quite challenging. However, we are all focused once a month on each Department’s oral questions, and a written statement coinciding with that would be very helpful.
Mr Letwin
As so often, my hon. Friend makes an extremely valuable suggestion, which I shall discuss with my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and others. I see no reason whatever that we should not be able to do that to assist the House, at the same time as we assist the general public by publishing the information on the website.
Mr Gerry Sutcliffe (Bradford South) (Lab)
Will the Minister explain what the process will be when the public disagree with a ministerial decision that changes the business plan? That question comes to mind because of the decision to cut school sports partnerships, which will affect sports provision in schools throughout the country. The public have not had the opportunity to have any say on that.
Mr Letwin
That is a very sensible question, and I am happy to explain that to the hon. Gentleman. The point of laying out these plans is so that people can see what we intend to do. Manifestly, as we move through time, external circumstances may change and decisions may be taken to change this or that—I hope not very much, but that could occur. Where it does, we are forcing ourselves to explain that, because it will become apparent—in the House in written statements, as my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry) suggested, and also on the website—that something we said we would do by a certain date we are not doing because we are doing something instead. We will have to explain that, and Select Committees and others will be able to interrogate us on it. That is what I mean by transparency.
Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
Is not the danger that this “Yes Minister” Sir Humphrey language of horizon shift will disguise the real need for change? We should not just publish more reports that will go straight into the waste paper bin. We should, for instance, give professionals in our schools real power to manage the schools in the way they want, in hiring and firing staff, setting the curriculum and selecting pupils if they want. That would produce real change, not just more words from Whitehall.
Mr Letwin
I very much agree with my hon. Friend that it is only by making the kinds of changes that he describes that we can really improve public services. That is why I have the good news for him that under the programme laid out in the Department for Education business plan my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education will do exactly what my hon. Friend requests. That is why we have a programme of academies and free schools which gives those kinds of powers locally to the professionals on the ground. By doing that we enable parents and pupils, by choosing the schools of their own desire, to create real competitive pressure for excellence in the system. Combining that with the efforts to create a proper pupil premium means that the least advantaged will be most advantaged in our system, and the combination of those effects will be to give excellence and improvement for all.
Mr Kevin Barron (Rother Valley) (Lab)
The Minister says that Departments will publish a simple report on their progress towards meeting their commitments. What will happen if those commitments are often not met?
Mr Letwin
What will happen is a series of things that are inconvenient for the responsible Ministers, rising to something that is rather more than inconvenient. In the first place, a report will be made, which will be available to everybody—no Minister likes to see such a thing appear in public. Secondly, the Minister involved will find himself having a discussion with my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary and me to explain what has occurred—[Interruption.] I do not know whether Labour Members want to know about this, but I am trying to explain it. The second thing that will happen is that the Minister will meet the Chief Secretary and me, and the permanent secretary will have a conversation with the head of the civil service. Finally, if the problem is still not resolved, the Secretary of State in question will have a meeting with the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister. This is a serious set of incentives; if one thinks about what it was like under the previous Government, or any previous Government, one realises that Ministers do not wish to go through that process and will therefore try to meet their objectives.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
As a member of the Public Administration Committee I welcome the plans to shift some of this on to Select Committees. Will my right hon. Friend set out how the reports could be judged by those Committees and how their powers could be increased, so as to increase further the power of the legislature over the Executive?
Mr Letwin
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that the Select Committees play a vital role in that respect. This approach puts vastly more power in the hands of the Select Committees, because the biggest obstacle to their power is, of course, lack of information—and this approach opens the whole thing up. This is not just a question of the structural reform plans and the dates, on which of course Committees can interrogate, as they can interrogate explanations when things go wrong; it is also about the details of the input costs—what we are putting in—the things that have been achieved on the ground and the outcomes, by which I mean how good it is for the final customer. That gives a Select Committee the ability to haul the relevant Secretary of State up before it and say, “Look, you said you were going to do this.” The Committee could then say: “You did not do it”; “You did it, but at a greater cost than you said”; “You did it at the cost but it did not turn out to produce things”; or “It did produce things but the outcomes were not good enough.” That is a very powerful interrogative tool. Hon. Members may ask why we would subject ourselves to this. The answer is because we think that it is how we will produce a better Government.
Mrs Louise Ellman (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab/Co-op)
A very strong partnership between central and local government, with targets and with dedicated funding, has brought about a vast reduction in the number of people killed on our roads. Does this statement mean that such a successful partnership, with its targets, will be abandoned?
Mr Letwin
No. As I think the hon. Lady knows, because she has great expertise in this area, one of the decisions that we made centrally during the spending review was to focus a very large part of total capital investment on the roads. That was done to reduce congestion, improve safety and achieve the kind of goals that she was describing. These plans are consistent with the spending review and with that focus on the need to improve our transport systems.
Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that the only way of achieving a movement of power from the top to the sharp end and a movement of the money from the Government monopoly out to the voluntary sector, which can very often deliver better value, is by very strong and transparent political direction?
Mr Letwin
Yes, my hon. Friend is of course absolutely right. Part of the purpose of these plans is to ensure that we hold ourselves to fulfilling that vision. We recognise that there will be all sorts of pressures on the Government to recentralise, to re-control and to lunge for immediate interventions that will ostensibly achieve a particular result, and we know that we need to be kept to the straight and narrow of the vision of the transfer of power in this country from the centre out to the people.
Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (PC)
Does the Minister not agree that today’s trumpeting of the transparency agenda will ring hollow in Wales considering the actions of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport on S4C? The decision to fund the channel in future via the BBC was made without informing the S4C authority, the Welsh Government or even the Secretary of State for Wales on the eve of the comprehensive spending review.
Mr Letwin
No, I do not accept that at all. This set of departmental plans will enable people to see on the face of it what we are going to do and when we are going to do it. Of course, there will be times when there are decisions involved in those plans that particular hon. Members do not like and there will be debate. We welcome that, we accept that and we are providing the means for people to have such debates.
Miss Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)
May I welcome the opportunity for Select Committees to scrutinise the business plans? This year in particular there is a lacuna with the annual departmental reports not being published. What will be the relationship of the business plan to such annual departmental reports in future?
Mr Letwin
These business plans are a vastly superior document to the annual reports. Of course, there will continue to be the publication of the accounts of each Department, but I hope my hon. Friend will forgive me the indelicacy if I say that on some occasions the previous Government’s annual reports from particular Departments contained a load of guff. One could not tell what the thing was about. I remember in opposition desperately struggling to find out what particular Departments were doing, and all I could get was a load of jargon. In these reports, one will be able to see the information—we are going to this, we will do it by this time, and this is the effect that we expect it will have. That is a jolly useful thing.
Michael Connarty (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (Lab)
I am afraid that the Minister will have to go back to his drawing board for me. It would appear that he is so close to the ground that his horizon is very short indeed, and he might want to raise the stakes. On the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), in local government there is the power to vote people out on close-to-the-ground programmes. What has he put in this plan to give local government real power to deliver, apart from a promised freeze in their council tax?
Mr Letwin
I have such good news for the hon. Gentleman that it might lead to his crossing the Floor. Everything that he could desire is about to come in the localism Bill. We are going to give local government eye-watering increases in power that are stipulated in these proposals and that will be seen when the localism Bill is introduced. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will consistently argue and vote with us as we transfer powers of competence and powers of retention of business rates, as we transfer powers over planning to local neighbourhoods, as we transfer powers to keep council tax and as we transfer a series of additional powers to new mayors. The hon. Gentleman will have a dream day when he comes to grips with the localism Bill.
Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)
In view of the fact that removing old regulations is necessary to boost economic growth, will the Minister confirm that, if a Department introduces a new regulation, it will be required to publish clearly which old regulation has been repealed?
Mr Letwin
My hon. Friend can also have an early Christmas. We have instituted from 1 October the one in, one out rule. I should explain that it is more powerful than the rule that a regulation should be eliminated when a new one is introduced—it is that a regulation of equivalent cost to business should be eliminated, or indeed a collection of them with an equivalent cost to business. I want to take this opportunity to tell my hon. Friend and the House that since we introduced the one in, one out rule, the large flow of domestic regulation that was crossing my desk and others before that has somewhat diminished. Since 1 October, there has been one proposal.
Mr Michael McCann (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) (Lab)
May I add my name to the list of Members who are mesmerised by the use of the language of horizon shifts? On the question of monthly reports, the Government have announced that about 500,000 public servants will lose their jobs under their plans. How many of those jobs will be saved in order to support the initiative that the Minister has announced today?
Mr Letwin
The first thing that I should say is that the Government have not made any such announcement; the Government accept the Office for Budget Responsibility’s forecast about the net effect on public sector employment. That does not mean anything like that number of current employees losing their jobs—nothing of the kind. Secondly, of course, had this initiative been introduced now by a Labour Government —to judge by what the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne) said it might have been, and that is a delightful prospect—it would have been accompanied by various things. Large numbers of consultants would have been hired to set up complicated websites and there would have been large reviews, huge expenditure and so on—and probably great expenditure on advertising. The total that we have spent on this exercise to date is zero. We have not employed a single consultant, we are constructing the websites ourselves and we are not advertising, because we are a Government and not a magazine.
Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)
Let me invoke the spirit of “Dragons’ Den” and ask my right hon. Friend which Department has done the best business plan?
Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)
I welcome greater transparency in government. However, is the Minister aware that no business plan for the Law Officers’ Department is available on the transparency website, and that members of the public cannot see details of ministerial and special adviser meetings, hospitality, gifts and foreign travel for the law officers? As shadow Solicitor-General, I should like to hear why the Solicitor-General and Attorney-General appear to be exempt from such requirements?
Mr Letwin
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her general welcome. I shall ask my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General to look into the declaration, which should apply universally. The reason there is no structural reform plan for the Law Officers’ Department is that we do not intend to bring about any structural reforms in the Department, because it is not possible to give its powers to someone else. It is one of the irreducible minima of Government activity, and it will continue with business as usual. These are plans not for business as usual but for fundamental structural reforms. Therefore, the hon. Lady will see no reference to the Law Officers’ Department.
Nadhim Zahawi (Stratford-on-Avon) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend the Minister agree that the greatest challenge to the coalition reforms is motivating people to behave in the right way? One of the ways in which we get people to compare and contrast how the coalition is delivering is by having this sort of transparency.
Mr Letwin
I totally agree with my hon. Friend. It is all about people and the choices that they make. The fundamental failing of the method of doing business that prevailed for many years was not that it was ill-intentioned, because it was well intentioned, nor that it lacked energy, because it had a good deal of energy, but that it did not look into the reaction one can get from individuals when one does certain things in relation to them. This whole programme is founded on the presumption that when we trust people and give them power and make them accountable, they do the right thing, and that is what we are trying to do here.
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his statement, but will he have it translated into plain English and place a copy in the Library of the House? A milestone tells someone how far they have to go to reach a target destination, even if it is on a moveable horizon.
Mr Letwin
The hon. Gentleman’s plain English is wonderful to behold. I do not think that anyone has ever accused me of being any good at speaking English [Laughter.] I do not intend to try to cure my ways now. I am trying to assist this Government to carry out the most important programme of structural reform that has happened in this country for many years so that they can improve our public services and make life better for our citizens, which matters an awful lot. The point about horizon shift is that it is serious. The previous Government caught themselves repeatedly on the hook of trying to achieve a result on Wednesday that they could show the public by Thursday. Often, the upshot was to achieve nothing whatsoever. We are saying that we will try to achieve things in the long term without trying to achieve publicity goals on the way, which is an important change.
Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that if we want to increase numeracy and literacy standards in our schools and reduce the gap in educational attainment between the rich and poor, we need to reduce bureaucracy, micro-management and targets and increase real local accountability?
Mr Letwin
My hon. Friend is completely right, and that is the plan that is set out here. It applies not just to schools, but to hospitals and many of our other public services. The only way in which we can improve such services is to give the professionals the ability to get on with the job without micro-managing them through bureaucracies, and to hold them to account for the actions that they take and the successes that they achieve.
Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)
Will the Minister explain how he squares taking power away from Whitehall and putting it in the hands of peoples and communities with the Government’s plan to increase the number of Ministers by 10% relative to the size of the legislature, which is the representative of peoples and communities? Is this not the old Tory centralist state at work?
Mr Letwin
The hon. Gentleman is clearly an apprentice of the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Mr Watson), because that was the most marvellous manipulation of statistics. We propose to reduce the number of Members of Parliament, but the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt) describes that as an increase in the proportion of Ministers to the number of Members of Parliament. That is a very strange way of describing the situation. We are keeping the number of Ministers constant in order to ensure that we can impose political will on the machine to get the fundamental reforms that give power out to the people of this country. That goal is far more important than particular numbers of Ministers.
Mr Andrew Love (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op)
Following on from that question, the Minister has said several times this afternoon that he wants to increase power locally, yet the Government have just published a report on waste that implies that if they want to do something serious, they will need to recentralise powers, such as by forcing primary care trusts to act together and forcing local authorities to act together. Is there not a contradiction in those two things?
Mr Letwin
In brief, no: we are not attempting to do what the hon. Gentleman describes. We believe that by placing the power of commissioning in the hands of general practitioners, by giving GPs and patients genuine choice over where patients go, and by making hospitals accountable on those choices by transforming them into foundation trusts, we can achieve the efficiencies that are needed in our health service through the medium of competition, which leads to the excellence that can be generated when professionals are able to run their own show. We are moving in exactly the opposite direction from that which the hon. Gentleman describes.
Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)
As the only time in nature when horizons actually shift is when a tsunami is on the way, can the House and the country expect to be inundated—the Minister gave an example today—with more bureaucracy, more gobbledegook and more management-speak?
Mr Letwin
I respect the hon. Gentleman for his long work in areas such as drugs, but if he reads the plans he will find that they include serious efforts to change things for the better, such as through a payment by results-based drugs rehabilitation programme, for which, I think, he has long argued. That is not gobbledegook, bureaucracy or micro-management. It says to providers, “You know how to provide and we will pay you if you get people off drugs and back into the mainstream,” and nothing could be more important to the people of our country than that.
Mr Tom Watson (West Bromwich East) (Lab)
I think I understand what the Minister has announced: a series of tough, demanding and transparent moving-horizon, non-target, milestone reports. If he has, I fully support him, but to build on the point made by the hon. Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry), may I point out that publishing those reports on 22 websites will make things almost incomprehensible to citizens who wish to hold the Government to account? It would be better to place them in a single spot—perhaps directgov, the Cabinet Office website or data.gov.uk. Will the Minister also consider placing ministerial diaries and details on special advisers’ hospitality in a single place on the same site?
Mr Letwin
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his brilliant translation. Incidentally, I have no doubt that he understood everything that I said because he understands everything that anyone says—he is very clever. Unfortunately, he is not very well informed because, as a matter of fact, we will enable people to go to a single place to get hold of all this stuff. Moreover, it will be put in a format that will enable people to mash it up and easily produce their own charts, and their own comparisons and analyses of everything that we issue. I anticipate that we will make more things transparent, including contracts for Government Departments right across the board, as well as all expenditure down to £25,000—and in local authorities down to £500 per item.
Oral Answers to Questions
Oliver Letwin Excerpts(13 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Richard Fuller (Bedford) (Con)
5. What assessment he has made of the likely effect on social enterprises of reductions in Government expenditure.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
Of course, social enterprises will be affected by the spending review. However, as part of our structural reform programme, we are bringing forward huge new opportunities for the social enterprises of this country—indeed, for the voluntary and community sector as a whole—to participate in the delivery of public services.
Richard Fuller
I am heartened by my right hon. Friend’s response. He may be aware of the current uncertainty surrounding Foxgloves residential home, which provides respite care for families of children with epilepsy and autism. It is working well with the council to find a solution, but other solutions should come from the community. Are there are any plans to bring forward the use of unclaimed assets so that social enterprises can draw on them to provide alternatives, and the parents at Foxgloves can continue to use it and secure its future?
Mr Letwin
The sort of case that my hon. Friend raises is relevant to our concerns, and we are very focused on that. It is one reason for our introducing the big society bank, which will be partly funded in just the way that he describes, and can, in turn, fund social enterprises and voluntary and community service organisations that require funding in the interim.
Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)
According to research by the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, third sector organisations that provide education and training opportunities could be the most imperilled by public spending cuts. What is the Minister doing to ensure that training opportunities in the third sector remain? Has he pressed the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Treasury on that?
Mr Letwin
I think that the reverse will turn out to be the case, in the sense that the Government are planning a huge and terribly important Work programme, which will focus heavily on not only getting people into jobs, but training them for jobs. We are also greatly enlarging the programme of apprenticeships, and there are various other elements, about which hon. Members will hear in the spending review announcement. Consequently, we anticipate more, not fewer opportunities for voluntary and community organisations to participate in training and employment.
Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)
6. What recent progress has been made in delivering his Department’s policies on Government commissioning and procurement.
Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)
9. What recent assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the use of third sector organisations by local authorities in delivering public services.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
As I mentioned in my response to my hon. Friend the Member for Bedford (Richard Fuller), the Government believe that the voluntary and community sector has a huge role to play in providing public services. Indeed, our intention is vastly to enlarge the potential for that to occur.
Catherine McKinnell
Newcastle city council has reassured me of its commitment to using the voluntary sector, but what will the Minister do to ensure that the severe cuts to local authority funding do not mean that the big society is just an underfunded big con?
Mr Letwin
We are extremely conscious of the fact that there may be a gap between when we introduce the new reforms that I described and when the effect of the expenditure cuts is felt. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor will have very much to say on that when he makes his statement, and I would not want to pre-empt what he will say on how we will handle that situation.
Ben Gummer (Ipswich) (Con)
Suffolk county council was recently part of the body that commissioned drug and alcohol treatment services in Suffolk. Unfortunately, a very small, excellent charity in my constituency—the Iceni Project—was excluded from that process because of its size. What can the Minister do to ensure that the Iceni Project will be included, and will he agree to meet it and me?
Mr Letwin
I would of course be delighted to meet my hon. Friend and the charity in question. As we restructure contracts in the way in which my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office mentioned—away from hugely prescriptive tender contracts and into payment by results—I hope we will find that there are huge opportunities for charities such as the small one in my hon. Friend’s constituency to participate and deliver excellent results. We should not have the huge bureaucratic burdens that prevent the smaller voluntary and community organisations from participating.
Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)
I am sorry to say that the Minister sounds rather naive. I went to visit Crisis in Sunderland. Three quarters of its money comes from a combination of housing benefit and local government grant. When both those are cut, how can it maintain its services?
Mr Letwin
I think the hon. Lady is ignoring the extent to which our programme of structural reform will enlarge opportunities for people to participate in services from the voluntary and community sector—[Laughter.] Opposition Members may not believe that, but that is because they did not try to find ways to deliver services on the basis of payment by results, or to find ways that actually work. We know that voluntary and community organisations are capable of that. When they do it, they will find that there is access to a large amount of revenue that is currently denied to them.
“Common Sense, Common Safety”
Oliver Letwin Excerpts(13 years, 7 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
In June this year the Prime Minister appointed Lord Young of Graffham to undertake a review into the rise of the compensation culture over the last decade coupled with the current low standing that health and safety legislation now suffers and to suggest solutions.
His intention in doing this was to bring about a return to proportionality and common sense in the application of both health and safety rules and to the payment of compensation for those victims of genuine accidents.
With the publication of Lord Young’s report “Common Sense, Common Safety” on Friday 15 October 2010 we are a step closer to achieving this. His proposals include measures to curtail the promotional activities of claims management companies and the compensation culture they perpetuate; clearer guidance for small businesses, schools and the police and fire services—freeing them from unnecessary bureaucracy and the fear of litigation; greater professionalism and transparency for those working in and with the health and safety industry; and a system where those wanting to hold events in their local communities are not hamstrung by red tape and over-prescriptive application of regulations.
The Government fully support this report and Lord Young will remain as the Prime Minister’s adviser. He will work with Departments, the devolved Administrations, and all those with an interest in seeing his recommendations put into effect.
Lord Young’s review “Common Sense, Common Safety” can be downloaded from the No.10 website, www.number10.gov.uk. Copies of the document have also been placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
Oral Answers to Questions
Oliver Letwin Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Mrs Helen Grant (Maidstone and The Weald) (Con)
12. What plans he has to reduce the regulatory burden on the voluntary and community sector.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
We thoroughly accept the implication of the question. Voluntary organisations are subject to much too much regulation and monitoring. That is why, in addition to the important work that Lord Young is doing on reducing the impact of health and safety legislation and the compensation culture on those organisations, we are about to launch a specific taskforce to examine the impact of regulation on small organisations. We hope to announce the chair of that taskforce very shortly and that it will complete its work by next spring.
Fiona Bruce
I thank the Minister for his answer. One of the key areas of the Government’s big society project is to encourage volunteering. However, it is accepted that in many disadvantaged areas there are lower levels of volunteering. For example, school governor places remain vacant. Will he consider how we can break down the barriers, whether regulatory or otherwise, that deter a broader number of people from coming forward to volunteer, particularly in disadvantaged areas?
Mr Letwin
The short answer to my hon. Friend’s question is yes. She is absolutely right that we need to break down those barriers, and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education is currently looking at how we might do that.
It is important to note that the accusation that is sometimes made that school governors will need to have Criminal Records Bureau checks is not correct. Unless those governors are involved in working with children in school on a day-to-day basis, all that needs to be checked is the list 99 bar. We are, of course, also looking at how we can reduce CRB checks to a common-sense level and at the vetting and barring regime. I hope that all those things will help persuade people that it is well worth doing important voluntary work.
Jane Ellison
All over the country this Sunday there will be “big lunch” street parties, and Battersea is no exception. In my area it has been greatly facilitated by the council issuing a flat-rate charge for street closures with an easily completed form, and generally being accommodating and encouraging. Does my right hon. Friend agree that we should encourage all councils to do that?
Mr Letwin
I congratulate my hon. Friend on her part in getting that to happen, and her council on taking that admirable attitude. One reason why we are so keen to decentralise and to give councils much more responsibility and power is precisely that they can then take sensible local initiatives of that kind to encourage local and community groups to flourish, which of course is part of our big society agenda.
Mr Speaker
Order. May I just appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to face the House so that we can all enjoy his mellifluous tones?
Mr Letwin
I should say, Mr Speaker, that no one has previously accused me of having a mellifluous tone.
My hon. Friend is on to something enormously important. It is not just that we need to extend additional funding—it is much more than that. We need to involve the voluntary sector in a whole range of massive reform programmes. We hope to see it involved in schools, in the rehabilitation revolution, in the Work programme, in drug and alcohol rehabilitation and in much else besides. We are moving away from the micro-management of processes in contracts and towards a very exciting new world of payment by results, so that voluntary organisations can use their talents and initiative to achieve real results.
Albert Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab)
One of the biggest barriers to volunteering and volunteer groups is taxation, not just the increase in VAT that was voted through last night but the level of taxation that volunteer drivers have to pay on their mileage. Will the Ministers please talk to HM Customs and the Chancellor about the increase in that taxation, in line with the petrol duty increase over the past decade?
Mr Letwin
The hon. Gentleman tempts me to do something that a ministerial career cannot long survive—speak for the Chancellor of the Exchequer on tax matters. I certainly undertake to continue the discussions with the Chancellor, which I have on all occasions, about how he can further our general programme to favour community groups in the voluntary sector. That is high on his agenda as well as ours.
Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)
Does the right hon. Gentleman believe that increasing the rate of VAT for charities will help them deal with the real difficulties of over-regulation?
Mr Letwin
It appears that there is a combined effort on the Labour Benches to persuade me to adopt the role of a Treasury Minister, which I am not and cannot do. Of course, we are conscious of the burdens that fall on the voluntary sector. However, for many people in that sector, a framework that enables them to do what they do best, in a way that achieves results, is what really counts. My response to my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) is the response to that.
John Glen (Salisbury) (Con)
4. What progress he has made in establishing the Big Society bank.
Oral Answers to Questions
Oliver Letwin Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
2. If he will discuss with ministerial colleagues proposals to strengthen Cabinet government.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
First, I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman, who in marked contrast to the previous Prime Minister and his predecessor, long campaigned for Cabinet government to become a reality. I am delighted to tell him that I do not have to answer his question in the future; I can answer in the present, because in the last three weeks we have already taken enormous strides to create proper Cabinet government through the formation of a small number of effective decision-making Cabinet committees that will look across the whole range of Government business, make decisions collectively and not resort to the kind of sofa government that caused so many problems, for example, in the entry to the Iraq war.
Kelvin Hopkins
I thank the Minister for his answer. The British constitution has sometimes been characterised as a time-limited elective dictatorship and the Prime Minister as an elected monarch. In an era of sofa government, the Cabinet was downgraded to cipher status. Is it not time for really radical change—perhaps with the Cabinet elected by Members of Parliament?
Mr Letwin
The trend towards elections is indeed one that the Government have in general sponsored, as the hon. Gentleman is well aware. Many Members have put themselves forward and are in the course of being elected for many important posts in the House. But the reality of Cabinet government does not depend on elections, it depends on whether the Prime Minister of the day and, indeed, in the coalition Government, the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister of the day are willing to see collegiate decision making rather than elective dictatorship. They are not only in this instance willing, but keen to do so. If I may point it out to the hon. Gentleman, one of the advantages of the new politics of coalition Government is that it enforces on us collective decision making, because we have to agree between the two parties in the coalition as well.
Mr Speaker
Order. I do not wish to be unkind to new Ministers, but answers are, frankly, too long. They need to be shorter.
John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)
11. What recent assessment he has made of the contribution of Cabinet Committees, Sub-Committees and working groups to the work of his Department.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)
I am very conscious of your admonition to be brief, Mr Speaker, so I shall just say to the hon. Gentleman that we have a rather more modest ambition, which is not to ask what the Cabinet can do for our Department, but what our Department can do for the Cabinet.
Mr Letwin
I am happy to tell the hon. Gentleman that I am actually the unofficial bag carrier to the Prime Minister; I do not even qualify as the official one. We have organised ourselves in a way that means that we have cut to the bare minimum the number of groups that we operate. We have a far tighter Cabinet Committee system than that which was operated under the previous Government, because, as I said to the hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins), who asked an earlier question, we are absolutely determined that our Cabinet Committees be genuine decision-making bodies, not merely a dignified part of the constitution.
Mr David Anderson (Blaydon) (Lab)
12. If he will ensure that trade unions are involved in the work of his Department’s efficiency and reform group.