Local Government Funding

Debate between Paul Beresford and Caroline Flint

Monday 6th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Flint]

I am afraid that is rubbish. The Labour Government, in so many different ways, contributed not only to boosting the refurbishment of homes that had been left to languish for too many years under the Tory Government, but to ensuring that there were ways and means for local councils, with other housing providers, to provide more homes.

The National Housing Federation, I think I am correct in repeating, says that, once the homes that Labour funded in its last period in office have been built, under the coalition Government’s plans, no more homes will be built. In relation—[Interruption.] The Minister for Housing and Local Government says “nonsense”, but let us just wait and see, because even in a time of recession, it was Labour money that worked in partnership with others—[Hon. Members: “Taxpayers’ money”.] It was taxpayers’ money with which a Labour Government decided that we should promote the building of more social homes. Even in the teeth of recession, I think we built at least 55,000 homes to provide for people who could not afford a house on the private market.

We all know why that front-loaded package is happening: because the Secretary of State gives the impression of being more interested in trashing local councils, chasing cheap headlines, calling councillors stupid or lazy and telling local authorities to grow up. The hundreds of thousands of decent, honest, hard-working people who work in local government, and the millions of people who depend on the services and support that they provide, hardly seem to warrant a second thought, but they will be the ones who pay the price for this Government’s decisions.

To make matters worse, local councils are being forced to make deeper cuts than they expected and to do so much quicker, because the reductions in local government funding are front-loaded. As much as 50% of the cuts could fall in the first year. Councillors are looking at cuts of 14%, 16% or 18% to their budgets within weeks, but the Secretary of State still denies it. He says that it is a fiction, but he is about the only person left who still thinks so.

[Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con)]

I hope that the right hon. Lady will not forget that from 1997 onwards the then Deputy Prime Minister, the Secretary of State responsible for local government funding, changed the formulas three times, each occasion moving money north to Labour authorities and away from London and the south-east. In one year, the year-on-year effect in Surrey, for example, was a £39 million loss.