Policy for Growth

Sheila Gilmore Excerpts

Thursday 11th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab)]

It is always interesting to listen to such Back-Bench debates because there is a high degree of consensus, but we also sometimes hear some of the things that people really think. My colleagues and I were berated from those on the Government Front Bench for our apparent failure to do more to tackle inequality, but we then heard an interesting speech suggesting that the only reason we raised taxes was to redistribute income. Government Members perhaps have to decide what line they want to propagate.

What I really want to do, however, is to tell a story about a city. In the 1980s, it was a bit of a backwater. It was notorious for its holes in the ground in very prominent areas. It was run by a council that called itself progressive; its members were Conservatives, but they called themselves progressives—we have had that again more recently. They took a hands-off view of how to run a city and saw themselves purely as some sort of administrators.

After that, the council changed political hands and was controlled by a Labour majority administration for the first time in its history. A great deal of effort was put into building up the economy. Those holes in the ground were filled. Infrastructure was put into a whole development on the west side of the city. That allowed the financial services industry in the city of Edinburgh to flourish, and the city became an important financial centre. However, it was the council—the public sector—that put the land deals together and made it possible for places to expand and to create the private sector jobs that have been so important to our city.

The holes in the ground were filled. We built a conference centre. There was some criticism of that at the time, and people asked, “Why is the council doing that?” but the criticism since has been that we were not ambitious enough—that the conference centre was not big enough to put on the kinds of exhibitions that go with conferences nowadays.

I regret to say that in the past few years, even in advance of the change of national Government, there has been some real contraction. The arm’s length company that we set up that got financial services off the ground in Edinburgh has been almost wound up. There is a reluctance to fund a transport project in Edinburgh that would make a big difference to our economy—the trams, which I was challenged to mention by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh South (Ian Murray). The hon. Member for Battersea (Jane Ellison) spoke of her hope that the Government would fund a tube extension to Battersea. That is an acknowledgment that such transport spending is hugely important as an economic generator.

Contraction has already begun. School building has almost ceased, and construction workers have consequently been put out of work. It is important to recognise the role that the public sector plays in growth.