Christmas Adjournment

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Southport (Dr. Pugh) and also the hon. Member for Blaydon (Mr. Anderson), whose speech showed the passion with which he represents his constituency. I, too, could speak with passion for mine, but I shall focus on one challenge among many facing my constituency in the London borough of Hillingdon—the task of caring for and funding asylum seekers who have recently arrived in the UK. The hon. Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay) is right. We must think long and hard about that, especially at this time of year. I know the subject is of interest to many hon. Members, but it particularly interests us in Hillingdon because of the strategic location of Heathrow within the borough. Having spoken to the officers of the London borough of Hillingdon, I know that they do not resent in any way the responsibility that we have to look after those people. The local authority provides crucial support services for some extremely vulnerable people, some of whom are fleeing persecution and others who have been forced to travel to the UK for illegal purposes. Our particular problem with Heathrow relates to the unaccompanied children coming in, whose care involves schooling, accommodation and disability support. The children arriving in Hillingdon have suffered traumatic experiences. Many have travelled to Britain to become involved in drug trafficking, prostitution, domestic service and so on. Hillingdon social services receives dozens of calls each week from the airport authorities, asking them to come and collect unaccompanied children from the airport. I take this opportunity to pay tribute to the local authority and its staff, who are doing tremendous work in caring for these vulnerable people. The Government’s new mantra for children is ““Every Child Matters””, and I applaud those sentiments. However, it is time to remind Ministers that that includes asylum-seeking children in Hillingdon. It has become apparent that despite providing those vital services, Hillingdon council receives inadequate funding support from central Government. That is placing a huge financial burden on us. The council is effectively being punished for implementing the Government’s own policies on asylum. As I said, I know that this is common to many areas, but Hillingdon’s situation is unique because no other local authority has a comparable gateway, particularly for the children. The budgetary pressures have been caused by recent Government decisions. Most worrying to the local authority are cuts in funding for post-18 asylum seekers who are leaving care but require ongoing support. Previously, boroughs supporting more than 44 asylum-seeking care leavers aged between 18 and 24 received between £100 and £140 a week from the Department for Education and Skills to provide support services, with the first 44 being provided for entirely by the local authority. However, in October last year and January this year the Government issued circulars stating that that would fall to £100 a week for boroughs with more than 25 asylum-seeking care leavers. Certain local authorities with a handful of asylum-seeking care leavers might benefit from that move, but for Hillingdon it has caused acute budgetary challenges. The problem was compounded by the fact that the cuts were to apply retrospectively. This was announced at a time when Hillingdon had already set its budgets and planned council tax levels. It must be incredibly unsound and unjust to set out grant rules that significantly change practice some 10 months after the financial year has started. The impact of those Government cuts was substantial and unplanned for. Hillingdon had to find an extra £1.6 million for the financial year 2004-05 and £3.7 million for the financial year 2005-06, and there will be an estimated ongoing future annual impact of £4.8 million. I must stress that that money was already set aside for other services. As a result, earlier this year the council was forced to set its budget and council tax levels for 2006-07 with the above deficiencies in its budget, and it is now having to do exactly the same for the forthcoming year. The council faces several unpalatable options, including a significant number of staff redundancies, all of which are being caused by the disingenuous approach of the DFES. Interestingly, and rather worryingly, the Minister formerly responsible for the matter refused to meet council officials to discuss it. I am pleased to say that the council is not taking this lying down, and has successfully applied to the High Court for permission to proceed with a judicial review, which we hope will take place in January. The issue attracts cross-party support locally, with the leader of the Labour group and both Liberal Democrats supporting the Conservative administration’s stance. The hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) and my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Hurd), who is in his place now, share my concerns. They, like me, will have heard from their constituents about the strain that the underfunding is placing on local support services. A significant number of people living in Hillingdon have been through the official asylum process but were rejected and have subsequently exhausted all appeals. The Government have decreed that such people should no longer be living in the UK. However, arrangements for their removal lie in the hands of the Home Office, and until it undertakes its responsibility in that regard, the burden of financial support remains with the local authority. The London borough of Hillingdon currently supports, at an annual cost of £1.2 million, some 155 asylum seekers who have exhausted all appeals. Officers have told me that as a result, pressure is already being placed on services such as refuse collection, libraries, parks, street cleaning and housing. Ultimately, it is the local council tax payers who are having to pay, because the Home Office is not doing its job. What galls me particularly is learning that officials in the Home Office contacted council offices in Hillingdon in September asking for a full list of those asylum seekers who had exhausted all appeals. It seems incredible that the Home Office did not know who those people were or where they lived. Three months down the line, no action has been taken. The fact that the Home Office had to come and ask the local authority who those people were, and where they were, gives me little faith that it has any idea at all what it is doing. It is just incredible. I want Ministers to understand and recognise the unfairness of the situation. As long as the Home Office has problems dealing with that group of people, Hillingdon should be reimbursed for the full cost of providing support services. The most worrying aspect of the issue is the threat to community cohesion. I have lived in Hillingdon all my life, and we have a proud tradition of good community relations, which everyone is keen to retain. However, if we see council tax rises or service cuts in Hillingdon, I am afraid that certain people may try to attribute them to the cost of those asylum seekers. Underfunding from central Government is to blame, but extremist parties may wish to exploit the situation. The dangers of walking blindly into such a situation have already been seen in Barking and Dagenham, with the election of 12 British National party councillors. I do not want to see the BNP or the National Front doing anything in Hillingdon. In May, National Front candidates stood in two wards and received considerable support. Thankfully, they were beaten convincingly by the Conservatives, but in Harefield ward, the National Front came second to the Conservatives, beating the Labour candidates, who had held the ward in previous years, and the Liberal Democrats. I do not want to overplay the threat of extremism, nor should we understate it. It is one of the reasons why we have a strong cross-party consensus in Hillingdon. I hope that Ministers will recognise and understand those concerns. Government cuts are not the only pressures on our budgets in Hillingdon. The financial crisis in Hillingdon primary care trust, which has had a staggering five executives in 18 months, is putting health and social care services in the borough at risk. The Government’s insistence that the PCT balance its books within a short time scale is making it increasingly likely that the recovery plan will impact on the extent and quality of local health and social care services. In addition, it is clear that the PCT is attempting to shunt a lot of the NHS costs on to the local authority, on the highly questionable basis that the support being provided to extremely vulnerable service users could be regarded as social rather than health care. That course of action is being followed despite the fact that those costs have been met by the NHS for many years. Given the huge scale of the problem at Hillingdon PCT, it is clear that the cost shunt being sought by the PCT will run into many millions of pounds. That impression is confirmed by our contact with the PCT, which has stated that a PCT cut of at least £3 million per annum is required in jointly commissioned services for people with learning disabilities. A similar cost reduction appears to be the aim for a range of other patients with continuing care assessments, as the means of transferring historical NHS costs to the local authority. The PCT has also cut £500,000 from its grants and voluntary agencies, which provide essential support to people with significant health problems. As many of those services are preventive and supportive in nature, the council will have to pick up some of that funding liability, thereby avoiding further demand on primary health and care services. All that represents a considerable cost pressure, which could amount to between £5 million and £10 million per annum if simply transferred to the local authority. That would be completely unacceptable to council tax payers in the borough and to the local authority, which cannot afford to meet a cost pressure of such magnitude. I am sorry to bring such a tale of woe from Hillingdon when we should be looking forward to Christmas and the new year. However, because at heart I am basically an avuncular and jolly person, I have some good news, too. The council’s excellent record of sticking up for some of the most vulnerable members of our community was proved again only last week when Hillingdon became the first London borough to announce a council tax discount scheme for pensioners. The proposal, for a 2 per cent. reduction in next year’s council tax increase for pensioners, was approved by the council’s cabinet at its meeting last week. Those aged 65 and over will be eligible for the discount, and there are approximately 18,500 such households in my borough. My admiration for the scheme is only increased by the fact that it was achieved when the council faces the budgetary challenges that I described. It cannot be right that the London borough of Hillingdon—my rate payers and my fellow residents—are being penalised for implementing the Government’s asylum policy. I am sure that Hillingdon and the Government can work together on that. I ask the Deputy Leader of the House to take note of my points and pass them on to the appropriate Ministers. I can assure them that I and my fellow MPs in the London borough of Hillingdon, with a cross-party consensus, will not give up our campaign to get fairness for my fellow Hillingdon residents. On that note, as a retailer who has mixed views about Christmas, I wish everyone a very happy Christmas and a prosperous new year.