Retail Sector

I will.

I thank the shadow Minister. The point on business rates is one that small businesses in my const...

I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention and I completely agree. I will come on to business ra...

I welcome this debate. My hon. Friend may be aware of research by Revo and intu shopping centres ...

Yes, and I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention—I completely agree. Before I start the subst...

I really appreciate my hon. Friend giving way on such an important issue as business rates. Can s...

I completely agree, and now I will begin the substantive part of my comments, if I may.

The...

My home town of Stockton won the rising star award in the British high street awards, sponsored, ...

I agree with my hon. Friend, but the issue is twofold. It is not simply about imposing obligation...

Does my hon. Friend agree that another issue for high streets is that the banks have been leaving...

I completely agree, and interestingly historically RBS had a last-man-standing agreement to be th...

I agree with a lot of the challenges that the hon. Lady is outlining. My son works in the retail ...

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. Please will she congratulate her son on his recent pr...

The hon. Lady has been speaking for some time now, giving her analysis and talking about what the...

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments, and I do apologise for speaking for some time. If he...

One of my constituents who is directly affected by this has written to me. Her husband works in r...

My hon. Friend makes a vital point, and I shall come on to that shortly.

For some people, w...

Does my hon. Friend agree that the likes of Lidl, which has its senior management at Manor Park i...

My hon. Friend makes an important point about another key factor in improving productivity. This ...

I am a proud USDAW member, and will my hon. Friend join me in commending its “Freedom From Fear” ...

I thank my hon. Friend and support what she says.

Going back to Sainsbury’s, staff will no ...

Coming from a family of shopkeepers and as a former co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group...

With the hon. Gentleman’s knowledge of the sector, I am surprised that he says that, given that b...

I have listened carefully to the hon. Lady, who has accused British retailers of lacking innovati...

I have not in any way, shape or form suggested that any business lacks the capacity or drive to i...

Does my hon. Friend recognise that the retail sector suffers from offshore landlords charging exo...

I referred earlier to the commercial retail property market, and the Government must recognise th...

To answer the question from the hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Rebecca Long Bailey) about pe...

The retail sector in the centre of Sheffield has been greatly strengthened by the establishment o...

I agree with the hon. Gentleman on the positive effect of BIDs. When I was a local councillor in ...

I echo my right hon. Friend because the hostility shown by the shadow Minister towards retail doe...

My hon. Friend is right. We all want to celebrate the success of retail in Britain and we all wan...

When I went to talk to my local jobcentre, it complained about the way the supermarkets treat the...

The hon. Lady raises an interesting question. She will be interested to know that the trend over ...

Would the Secretary of State care to comment on a practice I see weekly at my advice surgery? Lar...

I was not aware of that, and my colleagues and I would be happy to meet the hon. Lady to discuss ...

Of course I regret that Marks & Spencer is pulling out of Redditch, but is it not the case that t...

I agree. We want to make sure that our retail sector is dynamic and provides value and choice for...

The Secretary of State says that retailers are not failing, but the empty shops in Grimsby town c...

Across the country, from time to time, businesses will close. I am familiar with Grimsby, as the ...

The Secretary of State rightly refers to the fact that towns have to look at change. Does he agre...

My hon. Friend is exactly right about that. Of course many of our towns acquired shopping centres...

I cannot dispute what the Secretary of State says about the changing patterns of online shopping....

The hon. Lady makes an excellent point, and this was one of the reasons we commissioned the Matth...

Does my right hon. Friend agree that, as well as working at a national level to recognise the cha...

My hon. Friend is right about that. The hon. Member for Salford and Eccles referred to local indu...

Will the Secretary of State provide some more detail about how the Government are going to reform...

I do not want to incur the wrath of my fierce hon. Friend, the Member for Stirling (Stephen Kerr)...

It is always a genuine pleasure to follow the shadow Secretary of State and, indeed, the Secretar...

The hon. Gentleman is talking about the Scottish Government’s assistance for small businesses. In...

I would love to give the hon. Gentleman a direct answer, but I have not come across that situatio...

rose—

Oh, Madam Deputy Speaker, have I ever refused the hon. Member for Stirling (Stephen Kerr)?

And the hon. Gentleman maintains his record of giving way, so I thank him. He says that the bigge...

Of course, if the hon. Gentleman wants to trade in higher authorities, let us see if we can find ...

I hope that in a good-natured debate of this kind, we can get through the afternoon without a for...

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I will reduce my speech to 40 pages now that you have said that....

I am really pleased to have the opportunity to speak in this debate on the retail sector because ...

I appreciate and understand the point that the hon. Lady is making, but does she also acknowledge...

I recognise what the hon. Gentleman says. There are jobs in different areas, but that does not ta...

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist). As we are all sharing our ret...

Order. The hon. Gentleman did very well in keeping to his seven minutes, but I am now imposing a ...

I will aim not to disappoint, Madam Deputy Speaker.

As the name of my constituency suggests...

Thank you for the welcome opportunity to contribute to this important debate, Madam Deputy Speake...

I am afraid I must now reduce the time limit to six minutes.

2.59 pm

Some 21,000 jobs in the retail sector were lost in the first three months of 2018 alone. In that ...

It is a delight to speak in this debate. Ironically, if I was not here, I would be back in Torbay...

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No, I will not, because the hon. Lady was not present for almost the first two hours of the debat...

I am very pleased to be able to speak in this debate, because 4,000 of my constituents work in re...

On the high street, there are very few things sadder than a boarded up storefront. It is the sign...

I confess I had not intended to speak in this debate, but I realised that week in, week out my co...

It is a great privilege to follow all the other Members who have spoken.

May I take you, Ma...

Of course she has. It is a marginal. [Laughter.]

I am sure that you went there back in 2010, Madam Deputy Speaker. Those were happy days, with for...

The motion before us today is somewhat rambling, dare I say. It has three parts. It is about sque...

It is, however, about the balance between the two. In relatively successful towns or very success...

I thank the hon. Lady. Today’s debate is about the retail sector and wages. I was going to say th...

I used a travel agent in the centre of Grimsby in April.

Well done to my hon. Friend; I am afraid I am not as reliable in buying my travel tickets on the ...

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No, as we are nearly at the end of the debate.

The high street simply needs to redefine its...

The retail sector faces a challenging and testing environment. The high cost of business rates al...

Would my hon. Friend accept that one of the problems in market towns is that the ownership is oft...

That is a very good point, and it has also been made by other Members today. Where is the strateg...

There isn’t one!

Indeed; as my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland also said in the debate, there is no suc...

Will the shadow Minister give way?

No.

The Government need to make up their mind, stop negotiating with themselves and start n...

It is a delight to get to the Dispatch Box at last, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I hope that you wil...

Will the Minister give way?

I know the points the hon. Gentleman will make, so I hope he will forgive me if I do not allow hi...