Steel Industry

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and Iain Wright

Thursday 3rd November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mr Iain Wright (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

May I say what a pleasure it is to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts? I pay tribute to and express my admiration for my hon. Friends the Members for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland (Tom Blenkinsop) and for Redcar (Anna Turley), who have made moving, passionate and eloquent speeches that demonstrated their experience. They are huge champions of the steel industry and I am very proud to call them my friends.

We have discussed steel many times in the past few months, but many of the issues—the threat to domestic producers as a result of global overcapacity, subsequent steel price reductions and Chinese dumping—remain. We have also heard about how business rates, energy costs and procurement requirements undermine the competitiveness of the sector. The uncertainty about the ownership of much of the British steel industry and the increasing fragmentation of the sector remain important issues, not to mention the impact of Brexit and the lack of clarity about what our trading relationship with the rest of the European Union will be. However, my speech today will focus on how the steel industry can have a sustainable and prosperous future in the long term. I am not downgrading, by any stretch of the imagination, the importance of the short term or how the industry remains in crisis mode, but we need to think about how steel needs to make an important and growing contribution to our manufacturing sector in the decades to come.

Several hon. Members have mentioned changes in the Tata group. The sacking of Cyrus Mistry as chairman in the past ten days obviously raises greater uncertainty, which is never a positive for business, but it could lead to a change in strategy that could boost and safeguard Tata Steel’s operations in the UK. Last week, the Financial Times reported

“a person with direct knowledge of Tata’s plans”

as

“saying that…Port Talbot…was ‘virtually safe’ following Mr Mistry’s ousting, and that the company would invest ‘whatever it takes to make it efficient’.”

Those words are very welcome, but where do they leave the steel industry or Tata Steel’s footprint in our country? What about other parts of Tata Steel, such as the speciality products and the pipe mills in Hartlepool?

I am not expecting the Minister to provide a running commentary—a fashionable phrase at the moment—on the changes at the top, but does he accept that since putting the assets up for sale earlier this year, important parts of our steel industry remain in a state of limbo? That is bound to have an adverse effect on the recruitment and retention of skilled workers, whose skills are essential to the ongoing competitiveness of our steel industry. It will also have an impact on suppliers and customers of steel products, who may be concerned about getting paid and having the orders delivered.

With this additional uncertainty on top of global pressures, will the Minister—who I very much welcome to his place—take this opportunity to set out the discussions he has had with Tata, and can he say whether further reassurances and commitments about ongoing operations have been made?

[Tom Blenkinsop]

In addition to the removal of Cyrus Mistry and the return of Ratan Tata to the board, there is the issue of ThyssenKrupp’s sale of assets in Brazil. Its removal from the South American economy is happening at the same time as Tata’s change at the top. Will that have any effect and will the Government investigate that in conversations during the trade visit to India by the Prime Minister next week?

[Mr Wright]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. He has also mentioned the importance of a proper industrial strategy. Everybody who has contributed to this afternoon’s debate has mentioned that, so what are the Government doing to put in place a proper industrial strategy—this is very important to us on the Select Committee on Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy—and how does the steel industry fit in with such a strategy? How will the Minister’s departmental responsibilities help the steel industry? Joining business, energy and industrial strategy into one Department provides a better degree of co-ordination and should help sectors such as steel by providing consistency and the co-ordination of policy, but how will that work in practice?

Just over a year ago, on 15 October 2015, a steel summit was held. Three working groups, on competitiveness and productivity, international comparisons, and public procurement, were set up to address some of the challenges facing the industry. What is the current status of those groups? Did they survive the new Government and the change in the business Department? What are the findings arising from the work and how are they being incorporated into a proper industrial strategy? The universally well respected Community union, which has the long-term interests of the steel industry at its very heart and its core, and which is not prone to hysteria or exaggerated pronouncements, recently stated:

“After an initial flurry of activity and plenty of rhetoric we are becoming increasingly frustrated at the lack of urgency demonstrated by the UK government. To date very little meaningful support has actually been delivered—certainly we have not seen the game-changing intervention our industry desperately needs.”

That is a crucial quotation from an important stakeholder in our steel industry. Where is that meaningful support? Given the policy co-ordination under one departmental roof, how will Ministers take forward action on the energy costs that undermine the competitiveness of our industry? Crucially—this has been mentioned several times —will Ministers resolve to address the concerns raised about the business rates that disincentivise manufacturers, not just steel manufacturers, from investing in more efficient plant and machinery by raising what is essentially a tax bill?

Procurement is also a major way in which a co-ordinated industrial strategy can provide meaningful support for the steel industry. We have heard already about the hulls of the Trident submarines being built with French steel. That is immensely disappointing and really does not show a joined-up, co-ordinated Whitehall approach to industrial strategy. What lessons are being learnt from this to ensure that the British industry is able to address the needs of the customer, in this case the Ministry of Defence, and that local steel content can be increased?

On commercial operations, many hon. Members have quite rightly mentioned last week’s welcome decision that Nissan is to build the new Qashqai and bring the manufacture of the X-Trail to the factory in Sunderland. That should also provide more opportunities for local British-based steel producers.

We found in our Select Committee inquiry last year that Nissan, one of the most productive car plants anywhere in Europe, used British-made steel for three quarters of the steel content needed for the Qashqai. Vauxhall buys 50% of the steel it needs for production of the Astra at its factory in Ellesmere Port from Port Talbot. Given the strength of the UK automotive industry, what active steps are the Government taking to ensure that more of that successful sector’s requirements in metals are being provided in a competitive manner by British-based firms?

The UK automotive industry currently consumes about 17% of British manufactured steel. There is surely scope for a successful and winning automotive sector to take more of a growing pie. How are the Government identifying commercial opportunities for British steel? How are they encouraging and incentivising investment in technology and innovation and in the higher quality, higher value steel required in the automotive and aerospace industries? I hope the Minister will respond directly. The Materials Processing Institute can provide the means by which technology, innovation and support can be given to producers to make sure they can move up the value chain. That is vital.

This is not only about automotives; this week is offshore wind week. Offshore wind currently generates about 5% of the UK’s electricity needs. This will double to a tenth of electricity generation in five years. Firms in my constituency such as JDR Cables are winning great big orders in this field. The steel content for offshore wind is immense, but it is often imported from France and the Netherlands. How will we ensure that British-based and British-made steel provides steel content for the offshore wind industry? Are the Government working in the proactive and collaborative way needed in the modern industrial age to ensure that as much of the value in the offshore wind supply chain—more than £18 billion of new projects in the pipeline in the next five years—is captured by domestic content?

The steel industry remains a vital and essential part of our manufacturing base. It cannot and must not be viewed by anybody as a sunset industry. I hope we will see the implementation of a proper industrial strategy to ensure that the opportunities arising in the next few years are captured as much as possible by our British steel industry and that the barriers preventing a proper level playing field are addressed and resolved. That is possible only through active work by the Government, in close collaboration with the industry. With the greatest of respect, that work seems to have gone off the boil in recent months, at a time when we need it more than ever to sustain the long-term viability and prosperity of the British-based steel industry. I hope the Minister will use the opportunity today to state that the Government recognise the importance of the steel industry and will act accordingly, not only to save steel but to make sure it has a proper and fitting future in our manufacturing sector.

Tees Valley Inward Investment Initiative

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and Iain Wright

Wednesday 15th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

Lord Heseltine’s report “Tees Valley: Opportunity Unlimited” was written to explore the possibilities of transforming the SSI steelworks site and attracting internal investment into Teesside. Unfortunately, I do not believe it offers the comprehensive plan that was promised. Instead, it recycles many proposals that have already been published or suggested by the combined authority and the local enterprise partnership. I hope the Government will pay more attention to those aspirations now that they have been endorsed by the former deputy leader of Conservative party, but few marks can be given for originality.

As we all know, the SSI steelworks closed in autumn 2015, and as a result 5,000 jobs were lost directly or indirectly. Government inaction over the Chinese dumping of cheap steel in the UK market, high energy costs and a lack of infrastructure helped contribute to the steel crisis that made the report necessary. From reading it, however, we would think that the economic impact of the closure had all but been dealt with. Specifically, Lord Heseltine claims that employment levels have recovered since the closure of the steelworks. Not in my constituency: unemployment has increased by 23%. In the constituency of Redcar, where the steelworks were located, unemployment has increased by a staggering 43% since September 2015. It is not acceptable to ignore those facts, or to deny the reality that many of my constituents are facing in trying to find a job. I believe it is right that Lord Heseltine paints a positive picture of Teesside’s future, but he cannot gloss over the fact that the heart of Teesside’s economy, the steelworks at Redcar, has stopped beating on this Government’s watch. Nor must we forget Caparo in Hartlepool or Air Products or the many redundant offshore workers returning to the Teesside conurbation.

Lord Heseltine’s report talks about the steel industry solely in the past tense, as if it was some relic rather than the industry with huge potential that we know it to be. Thankfully, the remaining steel mills in Teesside, including Skinningrove in my constituency, still produce high-quality long products. With the right Government backing, the steel industry has a genuinely long-term future on Teesside and in the UK.

Unfortunately, the report offers no serious recommendations to secure the future of the steel industry in Teesside and the UK, and this at a time when the future of the 25, 42 and 84-inch tube mill in Hartlepool is still uncertain. The Government are now finally attempting to respond to the steel crisis, in part due to the hard work of Teesside MPs. I hope that the remaining steel mills on Teesside that still have uncertain futures are not neglected by the Government in the way the works in Redcar were, and I urge Government action to secure the long-term future of the remaining works, despite the fact that the report fails to suggest any.

[Mr Iain Wright (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the fantastic work that he has done to ensure a viable future for the steel industry. He was kind enough to mention the pipe mills in my constituency. Can he reassure me that we will be talking up the steel industry in the north-east to make sure that it has a viable future we can be proud of as part of a modern, dynamic manufacturing supply chain?

[Tom Blenkinsop]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising that point. The Greybull deal for long products, which covered Skinningrove in my constituency, the beam mill in Redcar and of course Scunthorpe, took 18 months of hard work and negotiations to help the Government help the industry come to a deal. It meant assisting Tata in releasing the assets so that we could get not just a buyer but a responsible buyer. As we know, the initial purchaser was seen in a suspicious light in Government circles, as well as in Opposition circles, but eventually, given time, we were able to get Greybull in and formulate a new British steel company. Something similar needs to be done for strip and speciality steels as well as for tubes, for Hartlepool and, further down the road, for Corby. There has to be a national strategy that interacts with local agencies.

Although SSI TCP has gone through a hard closure, much related industrial expertise remains in the region. Specifically, the Materials Processing Institute in Grangetown uses world-leading research to develop innovative approaches in the materials processing and energy sector. Last week, the MPI welcomed representatives from the Slovakian steel industry who wanted to learn how to improve and innovate in their steel industry. That came after recent similar visits from Swedish and German Government representatives.

Another institute harnessing the UK’s expertise in this area is TWI, which not only exports knowledge and experience but trains more than 25,000 students each year in testing and researching welding and inspection technologies. Those are, of course, linked to the tube mills. TWI has offices around the UK, including in Middlesbrough. If the Government were to invest to unite and strengthen those institutes, steel in the UK could leap ahead of our global competitors. I have previously advocated the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills taking advantage of that expertise as a way to secure investment and harness expertise to give our industries the edge over competitors, which would make the term “northern powerhouse” more than just words.

I turn to the site itself. Lord Heseltine recommends that responsibility for it be passed to the mayoral development corporation as soon as possible. There are significant costs associated with reclaiming the site, and I am concerned that without additional funding from central Government, much of the corporation’s budget will be consumed by those costs. The clean-up costs at previous sites, such as Ravenscraig and Corby, ran into the tens of millions. I note that the report requests that Her Majesty’s Treasury pay for any further assessment needed on the site. Will the Minister outline what the Government contributions to the costs of regenerating the site will be? A cast-iron guarantee of long-term regeneration funding from the Government is necessary to secure private and commercial investment in the site.

We also need funding for an investigation into whether the existing blast furnace has a future—that has to be nailed down—and into the existing mills on the SSI site, whether the continuous casting plant or the basic oxygen steelmaking plant, because those assets could be reused. At the moment, under the official receiver, their future is unclear. For example, I know from local knowledge that the locos on the site, without which nothing can be moved on a 3 square mile site, have been cut up and sold off. We want a potential buyer to come forward to reuse the site for industrial purposes—hopefully steel, but we are not choosy as long as it is used for some form of industry. Removing the assets, cutting them up and selling them off undermines its ability to be resurrected.

That leads me on to the future use of the site. Helpfully, a large part of the former steelworks, earmarked for a second blast furnace and plate mill in the 1970s, is still empty and relatively clean. In my view, the prairie, as it is known, should be earmarked for job-creating development early in the process.  With good access and links to the still existing deep-water terminal, it could be a prime area for warehousing and distribution. Indeed, it could have a manufacturing dimension if the Government were to revisit an earlier but rejected proposal by the combined authority, which was for the whole area around Teesport, including the SSI site, to be designated as a free port. That could mean tax-free status for the land, allowing the importing of raw or semi-finished materials that could then be fashioned into final products for possible re-export. The idea was turned down flat, as I understand it, by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs. If there is the will, it is one suggestion that the Chancellor could prioritise.

I turn to the recommendations that Lord Heseltine makes about boosting investment in the Tees valley. He rightly highlights the importance of transport to building the economy, but Government action does not seem to be aligned with his thinking. In answer to my question on the report’s recommendation to extend the trans-Pennine electrification scheme to include the Northallerton to Teesport line, the Minister confirmed that the line would not be included in the scheme and that its electrification would not be considered until after 2022. On top of that, on the day after the report’s publication, a clause was added to the Government’s Bus Services Bill limiting the ability of councils to run their own bus services, despite the fact the report states explicitly that local leadership is the key to boosting transport infrastructure.

We are therefore presented with the absurd situation of a Conservative Lord publishing a review commissioned by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, which makes proposals on transport, yet within days the Department for Transport contradicting or ignoring the report. I hope the Minister and the Department for Transport will present a united response to the report that provides Teesside with the infrastructure it needs to boost investment.

On the energy economy, Lord Heseltine rightly praises the work done so far to build the industry in Teesside. I hope that the Department of Energy and Climate Change will continue to work with local partners, in line with the approach outlined in the devolution deal. Lord Heseltine also rightly asks the Government to clarify their position on the carbon capture and storage industry. Their decision not to proceed with the CCS commercialisation competition has left a lot of uncertainty about the future of the industry. I asked for clarification of that point in April, and my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) received an answer as recently as 1 June stating that the Government would set out their approach to CCS “in due course”. That is not good enough for Lord Heseltine; it is not good enough for me and my constituents; and it is certainly not good enough for potential CCS investors in Teesside, including existing energy-intensive industries. I hope a statement on the Government’s approach to the industry, which will only grow in importance in my constituency, will be presented soon.

I will finally highlight areas that I believe are vital to Teesside but are not touched upon by the report. As on steel, the report fails to make serious recommendations on mining, which employs hundreds of people in my constituency. Unfortunately, at one mine in my constituency, up to 250 of the 1,000 strong workforce were made unemployed at the beginning of this year. People are losing jobs that are vital to the east Cleveland economy, leading to some terrible and tragic consequences, with redundancy processes happening in the lead-up to Christmas last year. There is nothing in the report to help those people or to promote investment in a new mine, despite the fact that new mining locations are being developed by Sirius, for example. Logistics is another growing industry based around Teesport that is neglected in the report. I hope that Government action will extend to supporting that sector, too.

Put simply, the report is not good enough. It asks the Government to “consider”, to “make assessment for” and to “take account of” all sorts of things, but it does not call for clear action and Government support to keep our steel industry alive, regenerate the SSI site and make us the world leader that we know we can be. Without the action that is needed, I am afraid that under this Government and with these empty recommendations, the Hercules of Teesside will remain an infant.

Perhaps the Minister will be able to assuage my fears and commit the Government to the following: providing additional resources to the mayoral development corporation to ensure that its role in not limited to maintaining the SSI site but includes renewing its potential; re-evaluating the free port proposal for an area including the SSI site; acting to support the remaining works in Teesside and actively exploring how skills in institutes such as the MPI can give the industry a secure footing; setting money aside to fund an additional road crossing over the Tees; re-examining the proposal to include the electrification of the Northallerton to Teesport line in the trans-Pennine scheme; prioritising the Tees valley in the roll-out of the national teaching service, given Lord Heseltine’s criticism of educational establishments in the area—that should include addressing parity of school funding not just for Teesside schools, but for schools throughout the north that are not receiving as much as those in the south; continuing to commit resources and support from the Department of Energy and Climate Change to the energy sector in Teesside; and developing a new plan to support carbon capture and storage in the Tees valley.

If the Government cannot even commit themselves to implementing the recommendations in the report, it will have been a complete waste of time and money. Can the Minister tell us how much it has cost the taxpayer to produce a report that is full of proposals on which, apparently, the Government do not currently wish to act?

I hope that the review, and the comments that I have made today, will not be forgotten as a result of their proximity to next week’s referendum. Whatever choice the people of the Tees valley make on the European Union, Teessiders will need to see more action from their Government than they have seen so far.

UK Steel Industry

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and Iain Wright

Monday 29th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Tom Blenkinsop]

In 2004, the Bush Administration imposed tariffs of more than 20% on European steel going into the US market. That level was eroded through negotiation. At this moment, China imposes tariffs on our products—British and European—that are already going into its market. So that tit-for-tat has already started. China already imposes huge tariffs on EU products going into its market. Why we are not protecting our own market and the European market—which, I might add, is the largest in the world—is beyond comprehension. I repeat that this is not about protectionism. It is about levelling the playing field to give British steel a domestic safe place to trade, within the European Union and externally. At this time, however, China is not abiding by World Trade Organisation rules, which must surely affect its future market economy status, which will be debated by the European Union.

This brings me to the point about market economy status. Currency manipulation by China has also acted as a subsidy to its exports to EU member states and other countries, while China reciprocates by taxing EU exports. This, along with direct export subsidies, support policies and the rapid growth of planned investments in leading and pillar industries in China’s five-year development plans, has led to sustained, deliberate overproduction and substantial excess capacity throughout Chinese manufacturing.

Even without MES, China has dramatically increased its exports to Europe by a remarkable 11.1% annual rate over the past 15 years—they rose from €74.6 billion-worth to €359.6 billion-worth in 2015. Put simply, the Government support Chinese MES, whether Britain is within the EU or outside it. I would argue that we may negotiate internally or externally, but we are in a far more difficult position as a population of 70 million than as the largest economic bloc in the world. The forecasts suggest that whether this is done inside or outside the EU, Chinese imports will rocket by between 25% to 50% in the next three to five years if MES is granted. That is devastating for not only steel, but every other industrial manufacturing sector. I come from the Teesside area and we do not just make steel there. We must not write off steel in our area, because we still have the beam mill in Redcar, Skinningrove in my constituency—

[Mr Iain Wright]

And Hartlepool.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

We have Hartlepool tube mill. We have a fantastic story to tell and we want further investment there. By granting MES, we are putting at risk not only steel, but our vast chemical processing industry in the Tees area. Energy-intensives, be they ceramics, chemicals or steel, are at real risk. We cannot afford to be duplicitous on any potential contract, be it a defence, construction or export one, but that requires a Government to make policy that defends their own British steel industry.

UK Steel Industry

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and Iain Wright

Thursday 21st January 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mr Wright]

That is an absolute disgrace. We should all, regardless of where we sit and to which party we belong, be identifying steel as a major and important foundation industry for the British manufacturing base and having a co-ordinated approach to ensure that we can safeguard and retain those assets and, crucially, those skills as much as possible. If we are moving towards the high-value-steel end, where we are producing steel, metals, and materials that are stronger, more flexible and lighter, we need the skills to be able to do that. The 2,000 people in Redcar are not coming back to the steel industry. The 750 people in Port Talbot will in all likelihood not come back to the steel industry. And the hundreds of jobs in the steel industry that have been lost in my constituency will not come back. That is to the detriment of the British manufacturing base and the future competitiveness of the UK steel industry.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

My hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock) has said that if I was ever on “Mastermind”, my specialist subject would of course be blast furnaces, given that I dealt with the mothballing of the Redcar blast furnace back in 2010. That was mainly down to the expertise of the area and people such as Dave Cox, who is a constituent of my hon. Friend the Member for Redcar (Anna Turley). The real issue now—this sticks in the throat of most people—is the costs of having to maintain that site, which are about a quarter of a million pounds a week. Over the period of a year, that would have been approximately the same amount of money as it would have taken to pay for the three grades of coke that were sitting on a vessel just outside Teesport and which could have been brought in to save the Redcar coke ovens.

[Mr Wright]

Despite the fact that my hon. Friend says that his specialist subject would be blast furnaces, he is still a great colleague to go for a pint with. He makes a very important point, and I do worry about this. It is not just this Government but successive Governments who have placed short-term cost considerations over long-term value for our economy and society. That is incredibly important. For an industry that has been deemed to be strategic by the Minister, who has been a champion of this sector, the process seems to be one of chaotic yet managed decline. Can the Minister outline how much further she thinks the British steel industry will slide and what, for a strategic industrial sector such as steel, the right level of employment, capability and production is, both now and in the future?

We on the Select Committee acknowledged that the Government had recently woken up to the crisis and begun to take action, but today, exactly a month after the publication of our report and over three months after the closure of SSI and the steel summit on 16 October, no concrete steps have been taken. I am not suggesting that a silver bullet—or a steel bullet—could be fired to withstand the massive global forces affecting world steel demand and production, but swift action on the five asks from the steel industry could have provided a buffer for British-based steelmaking plants. I therefore have specific questions for the Minister with regard to some of the five asks. Can she outline how much extra cash has been provided to steel firms since the steel summit, in the light of the decision made on energy-intensive industries compensation? If steel is a strategic industry, why can a special exemption not be given for steel manufacturers in relation to business rates to retain some capacity?

UK Steel Industry

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and Iain Wright

Wednesday 15th July 2015 Westminster Hall

[Tom Blenkinsop]

My hon. Friend is correct. The employees in the industry know that things could be shifted at any moment. In a globalised economy where capital can move in seconds, there is an understanding and a traditional trade union ability to get round the table and negotiate. Michael Leahy, the former general secretary of Community, always said that we believe in the force of argument not the argument of force. However, when an employer, or indeed a Government, tries to deny the democratic rights of employees in the workplace, it has to be taken into account. I hope the Minister will take that point back to her ministerial colleagues.

I mention pensions because when we are debating issues such as energy prices, productivity, emissions targets and so on, it is easy to forget that many of the communities we represent have been built from the hard work of steelworkers over generations. In the previous Parliament, I, alongside hon. Members here, pledged to stand up for steel, and that includes defending its workers, who have contributed a huge amount of their lives and expect a decent pension at the end. I do not think that is too much to ask.

The APPG members here have asked to meet the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, and I believe that the vice-chair of the group, the hon. Member for Corby (Tom Pursglove), repeated that request in Business, Innovation and Skills questions. We would love to meet the Minister, if an audience with the APPG would be acceptable to her. We have also written to the Select Committees on Business, Innovation and Skills, which my hon. Friend the Member for Hartlepool (Mr Wright) chairs, and on Energy and Climate Change, as well as the Treasury Select Committee, asking them to investigate matters.

[Mr Iain Wright (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend, the chair of the APPG, for sending the Select Committee that letter. The Committee has not discussed it yet, but may I say on the record that I believe that the steel industry is vital to the future of manufacturing and the prosperity of this country? We must do all we can to ensure that it is innovative, competitive and viable for the long term. I will certainly push that point in the Committee.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

I thank my hon. Friend for that response.

We know that companies in the steel industry have already put in place future budgets for the compensation mechanism that will come through as a result of the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s previous commitments to a compensation mechanism. We need clarity and evidence to show that the Government are acting upon it. We also need the Select Committees to look into business rates, EU ETS decarbonisation, and the future of the industry in relation to skills. We have a workforce who are predominantly in their late 40s and early 50s. The issue might not be the lack of capital; it might be the age profile of the workforce. We need to take that on board and be serious about it.

We also need to look at the time it takes to train someone, whether in the processing or on the craft side. For example, I recently talked to Roy Rickhuss, the general secretary of Community, which is my trade union, and he said that it takes nearly three years to train a waterman who works in a blast furnace. That is probably the most important job in the plant: he is the guy who keeps the molten iron away from the water. Anyone who has ever witnessed a breakout, which is an unfortunate and serious event, knows how dangerous it can be. That job takes two to three years to train for. We need industrial activism, which does not just go to companies as urgent investment and does not just have public funding that supports that investment, but that looks at how we ensure that there is a succession plan for skills in the industry.

Flood Risk (North-East England)

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and Iain Wright

Wednesday 4th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this evening, Mr Speaker, for this important debate on flooding and flood risk in the north-east of England, and to speak in the first Adjournment debate of this Session.

Although I appreciate that the issue affects much of the region, I should like to start by highlighting some recent floods in my constituency before commenting on the broader issue. On 6 September, large areas of my constituency were flooded after days of steady rain on waterlogged ground, which channelled large volumes of water into already swollen waterways. That then combined with a high tide, causing vast areas of the coast to be affected by once-in-100-years flood levels.

[Mr Iain Wright (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing an important debate for our region. He mentions the once-in-100-years frequency, but does he accept that such incidents are occurring much more frequently as a result of climate change and other factors, and that the infrastructure is struggling to cope with flash flooding? People in areas of my constituency such as Arkley crescent, the wider West View area of Hartlepool and slightly further afield in Seaton Carew are all being affected by more frequent flash flooding. What else does he think can be done to help people such as my constituents and, no doubt, his?

[Tom Blenkinsop]

My hon. Friend touches on a point that I will come to later—how the flood risk in the north-east and other northern areas is assessed compared with that in other areas of the country, and the funding and protection that exist.

As we would hope, where flood defences were in place in my constituency, they generally reduced the amount of floodwater damage. In the seaside village of Skinningrove, flood defences were installed after the floods in 2000, and damage to property in September was thankfully minimised. However, that was only down to the work of local residents who volunteer as flood wardens, who monitor the river levels and man the floodgates when there is a risk of flooding. Yet Skinningrove did not escape unscathed. A bridge on the main road into the village was undercut by the fast-flowing river, causing a lengthy road closure while the bridge was repaired, much to the detriment of local residents and, particularly, local businesses.

Further upstream in Loftus, the floods affected Handale beck, where large volumes of water struck Gaskell bridge, causing structural damage and its eventual collapse earlier this year and cutting off a small community from the rest of the town. The water surged over the bridge, taking down two substantial sandstone walls, and flowed straight into the garden and home of my constituent, Mrs Himsworth, completely devastating the ground floor of her listed building. It was the second time that Mrs Himsworth’s home had been devastated by flooding since 2000, yet as her home is not in a high-risk area she is unable to secure any funding and has consequently had to pay for her own flood defences.

The bridge is in private ownership, and finding someone to take financial responsibility for it has proved difficult. There are three agencies with stakes in the bridge: Redcar and Cleveland borough council, the Environment Agency and Northumbrian Water. Nearly a year later, there may thankfully be some progress towards the restoration of the bridge, thanks to a generous contribution from Northumbrian Water, which is responsible for a pipe within the bridge. However, that has taken far too long for the residents of Gaskell lane, many of whom are elderly pensioners.

Another town that suffered from floods last September was the Victorian seaside resort of Saltburn-by-the-Sea, where I live.

[Mr Wright]

Nice part of the world.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

A very nice part of the world.

[Mr Wright]

Not as nice as Seaton Carew.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

I would have to differ from my hon. Friend about that.

Saltburn was badly affected by the combination of high tides and swollen rivers. Saltburn Gill expanded, almost filling the entire valley floor, covering car parks, ruining much of the town’s Valley gardens and harming tourist attractions and businesses. Thankfully, the council has now repaired the damage along the sea front and, with the exception of the amusement arcade on the pier, the majority of businesses are trading again in time for the busy summer season.

Elsewhere in East Cleveland, the former mining village of North Skelton was hit, with water cascading down from higher farmland to the south and finding its new course by inundating homes in the terraced streets and the nearby A174 main road. The tragedy there was that many of the families affected were private renters, and relied for building insurance on their landlords’ ability to repair the structural damage. For them, it was not easy to get redress, which has led to casework that I am still pursuing.

Thankfully, for flood prevention in North Skelton the local council and principal landowner are working together on schemes that will involve breaking up the current prairie-like fields with new tree and hedge planting—an effective way of reducing and controlling flash floods and run-off. Such work takes time, however, and over the coming year I feel that affected North Skelton residents will still worry in periods of long and heavy downpours. One consolation would be to put in place effective measures to ensure that private landlords have sound and reliable building insurance—something that would benefit everyone in the long term. Such things cannot be left to the discretion of the market because we are talking about people’s homes where they raise their families.

Redcar and Cleveland council has spent more than £24,000 on council tax relief for people affected by the September 2013 floods, in addition to money spent via social fund grants and loans. After the Prime Minister’s “money is no object” claim I wrote to the Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth (Brandon Lewis), regarding the Government’s highly publicised council tax relief for flood victims, only to be told that my constituents would not qualify as it covered only

“severe weather in December, January and February 2014.”

That seems wholly unfair to me, to local councillors of all parties, and to local residents. The Government are refusing to support local residents by providing centrally funded council tax relief for the sole reason that—in their eyes—those people were flooded three months too early. Such cases prove that the north-east is still at risk from flooding.

Although flooding is a threat in much of England, research by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation in a 2011 paper, “Climate change, justice and vulnerability”, demonstrates that there is a clear north-south divide in terms of socio-spatial flood disadvantage, and that the north-west, north-east, and Yorkshire and the Humber have neighbourhood social flood vulnerabilities that on average are above the English mean. That risk has not been met by Government investment in the north-east. As of January 2014, Government funding for flood defences was forecast to be lower in both nominal and real terms during the current spending period than during the previous spending period, and the Committee on Climate Change has calculated that that represents a real terms cut of around 20%. Although the Government have brought forward money that was already set aside to improve sea defences in Skinningrove, there has been little investment in other more rural areas of the north-east.

Since climate change is expected to increase the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events in the UK, we must have a joined-up, nationwide strategy on flood prevention. The effects of flooding last long after the water has subsided, and as many of my constituents know, the effects can last almost indefinitely causing lasting financial and emotional damage. The Government must act to protect all households from the damaging effects of flooding, not just in urban areas or where there is a high media presence. I urge them to extend the support and emphasis that they gave to areas hit by flooding last winter to places such as East Cleveland that were hit earlier in the year.

Finally, I thank the hard-working and dedicated emergency services, in particular the firefighters of Cleveland fire brigade who responded to around 300 calls in three hours when flooding occurred last September. That included a call from me, as the flat where my wife and I live was flooded. Without the assistance of Cleveland fire brigade we would have been in a fairly sticky situation, given that at midnight that evening I was in my shorts trying to bale out my neighbours in their living room.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

Exactly.

[Mr Iain Wright]

And not a pleasant one.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

Not a pleasant image, no. However, I am sure that MPs from across the north-east can provide examples of where the fire service has helped to reduce damage caused by flooding. Flooding is already a significant problem and is likely to increase in future, yet there is no statutory duty on the fire and rescue service to respond to flooding in England and Wales. I ask the Government to reconsider their decision not to introduce a statutory duty on fire and rescue authorities to respond to flooding as recommended in the Pitt review, and I urge them to ensure that fire authorities are sufficiently resourced to meet such an additional responsibility.

Ambulance Resources and Response Times

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and Iain Wright

Wednesday 14th May 2014 Westminster Hall

[Mr Wright]

We should have that system already, but it is simply not working in the north-east and in other parts.

Let me cite another case. A constituent of mine from the Headland part of Hartlepool, which is an urban area, contacted me to say:

“My dad has kidney failure and has only 12% of his kidneys working. Just over three weeks ago, my mam rang me concerned about dad. When I arrived at their house, I could see he was very, very ill. I rang immediately for an ambulance. A nurse rang me back for an assessment of dad. No ambulance. I rang again, another assessment, no ambulance. I rang again, another assessment, (the 4th one), this time stressing that I was angry because he was dying and the family would be driving dad to the hospital if they didn’t come, even though this was impossible. After two hours ten minutes, the ambulance finally arrived. In each phone call that I made, I stressed the fact that dad had kidney failure, which results in potassium build up, which results in a heart attack.”

Thankfully, my constituent’s father went to hospital and, almost against the odds, is slowly improving. As my constituent stated to me:

“He is still weak but my dad has always been a hard worker and a tough, strong man. He is at home but missing going to his allotment! There is no doubt the wonderful nurses and doctors saved dad’s life.”

I want the Minister to respond to and take action on a number of points raised by the examples that I and my hon. Friends have given. First and foremost is that stark admission from a manager within the NEAS that the service does not have the resources to meet demand, and that that is a national problem. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford East (Mr Smith) said, demand is clearly rising. Since the 2010 general election, emergency calls to ambulance services in England have increased by about 12%, and calls in the north-east have gone up by about 13%. An ageing population will only increase demand further. In the next decade, this country will need more ambulance resources, not less.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend has secured an excellent debate. We know from the NEAS itself that it had an expectation of 415,000 call-outs in the financial year 2012-13, yet it was funded for only 376,000 calls. Also, the use of private ambulances has gone up ninefold, with an initial cost of £96,000 in 2009-10 rising to £754,461 in 2012-13.

[Mr Wright]

I know that my hon. Friend has spoken in the House about this issue before, and I praise him for that. The use of private ambulances is taking resources away from our having a sustainable public service, which all our constituents want. As a result of that, the ambulance services are not able to invest in their work force, and something needs to be done about it. I hope that the Minister will respond directly to my hon. Friend about that issue, because the use of private ambulances is simply unacceptable.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Wright]

As a north-east collective, we work closely to ensure that our constituents get the best possible services.

Let me move on to average response times. In the north-east, the average response time increased from five minutes and 16 seconds in 2011 to five minutes and 48 seconds last year. The east of England saw a 90-second increase in response times. Only one ambulance trust actually reduced the average emergency response time. Those figures reinforce what the senior management from the North East Ambulance Service confirmed at Mr Gouldburn’s inquest, namely that ambulance services do not have the resources to meet demand, that it is a national problem and that response times are suffering as a result. There has been an admission from a senior manager in the ambulance service that resources are not keeping up with demand. Response times, in particular for more serous cases, are deteriorating and lives are being threatened, if not tragically lost. Will the Minister therefore pledge this afternoon to provide more resources to ambulance services in Hartlepool, the north-east and across England to meet rising demand?

I also want to question the assessment process used to screen calls and prioritise response times. Given Mr Gouldburn’s history of heart problems, his age and the fact that he had recently undergone surgery and had seen the doctor that same day, why on earth was he not prioritised as an emergency case and provided with an eight-minute response time? Why did it take seven calls to escalate the case to an emergency? The Minister must accept that that is simply unacceptable. Is there pressure from the Government to downgrade the priority of emergency calls due to inadequate resources?

This week, I received a letter from the Health Minister Earl Howe stating in response to Mr Gouldburn’s case that

“the 999 call was triaged correctly, although some of the questioning could have been better.”

Why was it not better? Why is the questioning not relevant and efficient in every case? The constituent whose father had kidney problems said to me:

“Phone assessments should be changed. In each assessment they asked me did dad have a rash and could he put his chin on his chest! Words like kidney failure and potassium should be taken note of. Because I’m not a rude person I didn’t react angrily, but wish I had because dad could have died. We realise that there is a shortage of ambulances and this can’t go on. We are a rich country. Shortages of ambulances are something you read about in poor countries. It shouldn’t be happening here.”

Assessment and prioritisation seem to be failing and the right questions are not being asked during initial screening. What will the Minister do to address that?

The third issue is that ambulances were delayed because of a problem in admitting patients to North Durham hospital due to a lack of available beds. That seems to show both a lack of joined-up thinking on hospital admissions and the fact that ambulance and NHS resources are hanging by a thread. Is it really acceptable, as seems to have happened in Mr Gouldburn’s case, that because of a delay at a single hospital in County Durham due to insufficient beds, the whole ambulance service for the north-east, or certainly the south of the region, grinds to a halt? The Minister surely cannot find that acceptable. Are resources being spread so thinly that services are not being provided to my constituents?

Hospital services in my area have gone through dramatic changes in the past few years, as my hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Grahame M. Morris) knows all too well. Hartlepool’s A and E closed in August 2011, much to the town’s concern, on the grounds of clinical safety and the specialisation and centralisation of appropriate medical skills. There is a mismatch between the Momentum programme of centralising services and the Government’s failure either to commit to funding a new hospital or to provide resources to reinstate services at the existing Hartlepool hospital. If there are fewer A and Es across the country and ambulances have to travel greater distances to a smaller number of centres, will that not increase the handover and turnaround times of patients between the ambulance service and hospital staff? Ambulance crews—my hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland (Tom Blenkinsop) has been strong on this—are queuing up outside fewer hospitals, making handover and turnaround times worse. Does that not reduce the amount of time for which ambulance staff can be in a position to respond to emergency calls?

[Tom Blenkinsop]

Such cases will only increase in my constituency, where it is proposed to close two minor injury units and the walk-in centre in Skelton. That all comes on the back of a recent development at the South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, which could have a £50 million deficit. My main problem is that we have been refused meetings with Health Ministers to discuss such matters.

[Mr Wright]

It is wrong for any Minister to refuse a meeting request from a Member of Parliament, in particular on something as important as ambulance response and handover times.

Will the Minister respond to my point about the trade-off between the specialisation and centralisation of services, which is how the NHS is going, and the impact on the distances travelled by ambulances and their subsequent response and return-to-road times? Those are links in the chain that will ensure a seamless and high-quality NHS service, but they do not seem to be as locked together as they should. What is the Minister doing to address that? Will she commit to monitoring handover times to ensure a better and more responsive service for all patients?

At times of emergency and crisis for themselves or their loved ones, the public expect a responsive and professional ambulance service, but as we have heard from those working at a senior level within the North East Ambulance Service, resources are not matching demand, response times are worsening and lives are being threatened. Will the Minister act to ensure that in Hartlepool, the north-east and across the country we have ambulance provision that meets demands, is professional and is the best in the world?

Cleveland Fire Authority

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and Iain Wright

Monday 13th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Tom Blenkinsop]

We understand that, under the recent regulations introduced under the Government’s own Health and Social Care Act 2012, the TUPE regulations are worth about 90 days in practice. As for the hon. Gentleman’s claim that the Labour authority is pushing the proposal, the Labour chair actually said “If we were properly funded, we would not even consider going down this route.” As I shall make clear, this is a devolved blame game initiated by Ministers to thrust a mutilation of the concept of mutualisation on the people in Cleveland.

[Mr Iain Wright (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

That is very good. Very clever, at 10 o’clock at night.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

Thank you very much.

Many operational issues arise from the proposals, relating to, for instance, local, regional and national resilience. I understand that the Fire Officers Association, the Chief Fire Officers Association and the Fire Brigades Union have raised them with officials in the Department for Communities and Local Government. I shall focus on four specific concerns. The first is the apparent lack of employee support for the proposals, and the uneasy lack of public awareness. The second is the sheer lack of transparency on the part of both the Government and the fire authority's senior officers. The third is the question of whether a spun-out brigade would raise additional revenue. If so—as a caveat—would such a spin-out have an adverse impact on existing local economy arrangements? Finally, and most importantly, I want to discuss the real risk that these proposals could lead to the privatisation of front-line fire services on Teesside.

I am a member of the Co-operative party, and a supporter of co-operatives and mutuals. I believe that if a mutual is to function effectively, it will require the support of its members, and that measures should not be forced on a work force. I am not at all convinced that that would be the case in Cleveland, given that the proposals appear to be very much management-driven. The only letters I have received from firefighters in my constituency about this matter strongly oppose the proposals. Indeed, at a single meeting attended by more than 250 firefighters, approximately half the uniformed service in Cleveland, there was unanimous opposition to them. The FBU, which represents some 85% of uniformed fire service workers, has identified a total lack of demand from staff for employee ownership in the fire sector. Instead, there has been “overt hostility”, except from a “smattering of principal managers”. Indeed, I doubt whether there is support even among principal managers, with 40 English chief fire officers and fire chief executives adding their names to the CFOA’s pre-consultation response, which highlighted major concerns with these proposals.

Even the language used by those promoting the model seems to have been redefined to address the level of employee support. According to the FBU, the model was originally promoted as a John Lewis-style, employee-owned mutual. However, that was only until it became apparent that employees did not want ownership, and nor would they be afforded shares as per that model. The title changed to an “employee-led” mutual, until the vast majority of employees indicated that they did not support the model, and that the only employees who did were a select group of senior managers. The latest title employed is a “locally led” mutual, which in effect acknowledges employee opposition and in doing so employs the term “mutual” as a misnomer.

Interestingly, one senior local manager has indicated that 51% work force support is the threshold required, although FBU legal advice suggests the fire authority has the ultimate say. It is difficult even to assess the extent to which any spun-out fire brigade would in fact be a mutual, with the authority’s senior officers showing a total disregard for transparency in these proposals. In the authority’s meetings, just about everything related to the proposals has been transacted under “confidential business”, making it impossible for me, my hon. Friends, the media or the public to scrutinise them. Although I believe that the authority will be putting out a business plan to public consultation in due course, I fear it may be presented as a fait accompli. It is indeed remarkable that the authority’s officers, prior to spending tens of thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money, did not consult stakeholders to ascertain the appetite for these proposals or involve them in setting the terms of reference for the creation of any business plan.

The Minister may want to say that the authority’s integrated risk management planning has previously stated that it would explore alternative business models, which it did, but only in the most generic terms. What it has not done so far is consult in detail the people of Cleveland. It has not even indicated whether this would be subject to detailed consultation as part of the ongoing IRMP process.

The Government are doing all they can do to prevent us from analysing these proposals. The fire authority’s senior officers are also providing the bare minimum they can under freedom of information legislation. When my office requested copies of these briefings and their assessment of procurement options for spinning out the brigade, they declined to provide a copy. Amazingly, they argued that it was not in the public interest to do so.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend, who himself has had to get FOIs and put those letters of information into the House of Commons Library, due to the lack of transparency.

One of the main genuine reasons why some members of the fire authority are even considering going down this route is their belief that it would mitigate some of the cuts, due to the spun-out body’s ability to bid for private contracts. Also, one of the chief fire officer’s stated aims is job creation. The areas the CFB is exploring are not related to core FRS activity; indeed, these are services currently provided by other sectors. The CFB proposals seek to replace these “others” by providing the same service with their existing work force, thus removing other workers from employment. That in no way can be described as job creation; in fact, it is the very opposite. However, nor do I believe that this would raise any further revenue.

[Mr Iain Wright]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing what is a vital debate for our area. Can he confirm that there is nothing to prevent the community interest company from bidding for existing work? Can he think of anything that, in an effort to secure additional revenue streams, would prevent the current situation from continuing, compared with what a mutual or private model can do?

[Tom Blenkinsop]

At the meeting mentioned by the hon. Member for Stockton South (James Wharton), the main thrust of the chief fire officer’s argument for seeking a mutual model was to avoid corporation tax. If that is the sole purpose of pursuing the mutual model, one has to assume that the mutual is making a profit, but I want to go into that in more detail. Spending £198,000 from the Department of Health’s social enterprise investment fund, the brigade created an arm’s length company, the Cleveland Fire Brigade Risk Management Services community interest company, to bid for contracts from the private and public sector, with any profits to be given to the brigade. However, it operated at a loss of £38,000 in its first year and has already lost a major telecare contract that it had secured six months previously. I am no mathematician, and I do not know what the corporation tax yield would be for the Treasury on a community interest company running at minus £38,000, but with the CIC struggling to make a profit as it is, I fail to see how spinning out the brigade would generate any more contracts or revenue than the current arrangement.

The most important reason I, along with my hon. Friends the Members for Stockton South, for Hartlepool (Mr Wright) and for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald), object to the proposals is the scope for privatisation that they permit. I cannot confess to being an expert on the technicalities of European public procurement law, but if the brigade were to be spun out, it would seem almost inevitable that once the initial contract has expired, the authority, as a commissioner, would be obliged to open the process up to competitive tendering, with social value legislation offering little protection. The authority’s senior officers have refused to provide my office with information about the procurement routes it is considering, but none of the “no market”, “joint venture”, “in-house incubation” or “competitive tender” options discussed on the Cabinet Office’s mutuals taskforce website offer protection from competitive tendering in the medium or long term.

There does not appear to be an appetite from senior officers in anywhere but Cleveland for spinning out the brigade, but the necessary changes to the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004, which the Minister attempted to push through the Regulatory Reform Committee in a legislative reform order, would, in his own words,

“enable fire and rescue authorities in England to contract out their full range of services to a suitable provider”.

Unemployment (North-east)

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and Iain Wright

Wednesday 20th June 2012 Westminster Hall

[Mr Wright]

My hon. Friend is right. I will come to the terrible issue of youth unemployment in a moment. Let me just mention further unwanted, gloomy news on the jobs front in recent months.

The closure of the Rio Tinto Alcan plant, with the loss of 515 jobs directly and the threat to 3,000 jobs in the supply chain, is a major blow to the economy of south-east Northumberland. My hon. Friend the Member for Blyth Valley (Mr Campbell) is in attendance and I have spoken to my hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery) today, who wanted to attend, but is hoping to catch Mr Speaker’s eye in the debate on Remploy.

The closure of the BAe factory on Scotswood road in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) brings to an end a century of remarkable industrial innovation on the banks of the Tyne. The factory was started by that astonishing, underrated Victorian entrepreneur, William Armstrong. However, far from looking to the past, the closure undermines the vital links between British military capability and manufacturing and industrial capacity.

The growth in long-term unemployment and youth unemployment is of particular concern. I have mentioned that to hon. Friends. The north-east has far too often been permanently scarred by people being on the dole for many months and years, or by young people leaving school or college unable to find work. That was so in the 1980s, when the closure of the steelworks, shipyards and coal mines left an unwanted and enduring legacy of poor health, lower life expectancy, poverty and family breakdown, making it more difficult for the economy to bounce back into prosperity once the recovery starts.

The longer a person is out of work, the easier it is for them to lose skills and experience, and the more difficult it is to get back into work. That is especially true when more and more people have more recently lost their jobs, and therefore have more recent experience in the job market.

In Hartlepool, the number of people who have been claiming JSA for more than 12 months has risen in the past year by more than 245%. One in four young men under the age of 24 are out of work in Hartlepool. Such figures are not sustainable economically, socially or ethically. I fear that we are repeating the policies and mistakes of the 1980s and that there will, once again, be a lost generation of young people unable to fulfil their massive potential, believing that the only way they can get a proper career is by leaving the north-east altogether.

We have had good news. Only this week a new retailer announced the creation of 150 jobs in Hartlepool, but overall the job situation is gloomy and set to get worse. The Centre for Economics and Business Research forecasts that unemployment in the north-east will rise to 12% this year and to 13% by 2016, largely as a result of further and deeper public sector redundancies.

Government policy is making the unemployment situation in the north-east much worse. The Government’s insistence that public sector redundancies are necessary and that private sector employment will somehow bloom in the face of these cuts is naive and economically ignorant at best, or is cynically and deliberately driven for ideological and political purposes. If Ministers—or Whips—genuinely believe that the public and private sectors are separate and distinct entities, and never the twain shall meet, that shows a profound misunderstanding of how the modern economy works.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend makes a compelling argument. In my area of the north-east, in Teesside and East Cleveland, three areas worry me: cuts in Army, Navy and Royal Air Force troop numbers—mine is a big recruitment area for them—the three-year zenith in the contraction of manufacturing, which affects the north-east more than other regions, and public sector cuts.

As my hon. Friend just mentioned, the Government’s ideological view that there is a private sector and a public sector goes against every piece of economics since Galbraith in the 1960s and undermines any economic recovery that we have desperately fought for.

[Mr Wright]

My hon. Friend is right. I know that he remembers Galbraith in the ’60s.

Some 84,000 jobs have been lost in the construction industry, in part due to stopping the schools building programme, road schemes and social housing, which were all socially and economically necessary, because they boost productivity, efficiency and economic capability in the long term and, in the short term, in the worst and most severe global financial crisis ever, help to provide skills and capacity in the construction sector.

The Government fail to accept the basic economic point that, for every £1 of public money spent on construction activities, almost £3 of private sector money is generated back into the local economy, in terms of jobs, the supply chain and construction.

BBC (Proposed Cuts)

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and Iain Wright

Thursday 1st December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Iain Wright (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

I thank the long list of Members who have put pressure on a tight time scale to enable us to debate this important issue. In my brief speech I shall highlight, as others have already, the important and valuable local identity and distinctiveness—a phrase to which I shall return time and again—of the BBC’s output. I shall focus on local radio, but I shall also say something about the importance of local investigative journalism on television.

As part of its Delivering Quality First project, BBC local radio is expected to find savings of some 12%, but for some reason BBC Tees, my local radio station, is expected to find savings of 20%. There is no transparency and no rationale for the disproportionate cuts that my local station is expected to absorb, which will pose a severe risk to its link with its listeners and the local identity and distinctiveness that are rightly cherished.

Delivering Quality First states that the BBC Trust wants to

“protect the five editorial priorities that the Director-General has identified: news; children’s programming; UK drama and comedy; knowledge programming; and the coverage of events of national importance.”

I certainly agree that the corporation should concentrate its licence fee expenditure on the output that most people expect from it, but I also believe that local radio is the section of its output that seems most personal to, and most owned by, the licence fee payer. Many people have diligently paid their licence fees year in year out, and do not use other parts of the BBC’s service such as iPlayer or BBC 3. Local listeners feel very close to local presenters, and I think that BBC radio is the best broadcasting example of localism in action. That is certainly true of BBC Tees, as is reflected in its record listening figures and the fact that its audience satisfaction rates are at an all-time high.

I am not sure that the BBC’s actions comply with the trust’s wish to ensure that it

“continues to improve the extent to which its services resonate with all the UK’s nations, regions and communities.”

If anything, its proposals for BBC Tees drive a coach and horses through the special and distinctive service offered by local radio. I see that my hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery) is present. I must point out, with the greatest respect to my hon. Friend, that communities in Teesside often have little in common with communities in Tyneside and Wearside. I predict that if the cuts go ahead and programming is shared between my area and, for instance, his, the listener engagement and interaction that constitute an important part of any local radio station’s activity will cease.

The corporation has stated that staple programmes such as the breakfast show and the early evening drive-time show will be protected. That seems to suggest that teams, indeed armies, of people are allocated to specific local radio programmes, which is certainly not the case at BBC Tees. I am struck by the amount of multitasking that is involved in producing, presenting, and investigative journalism. It is not unusual for Ali Brownlee, for example, to present a football show on, say, a Tuesday evening, reporting on what is invariably a defeat for Middlesbrough, and then to serve as anchor for the breakfast show a few hours later.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Wright]

I will give way to my hon. Friend, who I believe is the only season ticket holder left at Middlesbrough football club.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

I second my hon. Friend’s support for Ali Brownlee. I also pay tribute to Mark Drury, another member of the BBC Tees sport team. However, given the record-setting losing form of Hartlepool this season, I should have thought that my hon. Friend would be much more appreciative of the station’s coverage of Middlesbrough and, indeed, Guisborough Town football clubs.

May I now strike a serious note, and ask my hon. Friend whether it is not rather dangerous that northern BBC stations such as BBC Tees are being subjected to cuts of more than 20% while their southern counterparts are being subjected to cuts in single figures?

[Mr Wright]

I admire and respect my hon. Friend’s championing of Guisborough Town, of which I understand he is the president, but I should prefer to draw a veil over Hartlepool United’s appalling home record of seven defeats in a row. I think it best not to talk about that.

I agree with my hon. Friend’s point about access to local sport provision. My only criticism of BBC Tees is that it gives far too much coverage to a local non-league team called Darlington.

I am not sure that such practices as the sharing of afternoon or evening shows will ensure that those 20% savings are achieved. The excellent John Foster show, which is broadcast between 2pm and 4pm, benefits from the resources of a presenter and a producer who doubles up as a broadcast assistant. There is hardly a huge amount of fat or inefficiency in BBC local radio, at least in my area. I fear that the loss of jobs and expertise will inevitably result in a deterioration in programme quality, not through the fault of BBC staff, but simply because they will have too much to do. Audiences will decline because they will no longer experience that sense of local identity and distinctiveness.