Local Government Finance

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following motions:

That the Report on Refere...

Strong, vibrant, resilient communities are, more than ever, key to unlocking a brighter future fo...

Does the Secretary of State recognise that children’s services are now at crisis point and that t...

We are spending around £1 billion more than at the start of this Parliament. Some £84 million is ...

I welcome the £2.7 million extra for the Isle of Wight. More than that, I am delighted that, for ...

My hon. Friend is a fine champion of the interests of the Isle of Wight and I commend him for his...

The Secretary of State talks about the additional cash for local authorities. I spoke to a collea...

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will recognise that East Sussex is part of the business rates pilo...

Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating Ian Hudspeth and Oxfordshire County Council o...

I pay tribute to Oxfordshire and to all councils that have been working hard to provide services ...

I will take one more intervention and then I will seek to make some progress.

Harrow Council is not unique in having had most of its revenue support grant axed over the past s...

I am looking carefully at sustainability and issues relating to local government finance more bro...

I will take one final intervention, but then I will make some progress, because I know that a lot...

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the measures he is outlining will help Leicestershire County...

I commend the Conservative authorities in my hon. Friend’s area for their work, and I commend him...

I welcome the extra funding that is going into social care, notwithstanding reductions over the p...

My hon. Friend will recognise the work of the better care fund and some of the positives outcomes...

I will give way to the hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) and then take a couple more intervention...

I thank the Secretary of State for giving way. A new study by the Centre for Cities shows that Sl...

The hon. Gentleman will recognise the need for us to look carefully at relative needs and resourc...

Nottinghamshire County Council, which is run by an exceptional Conservative group, has had its fu...

I pay tribute to the work that councils such as Nottinghamshire have done over the past few years...

I am terribly grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. West Sussex is thankful for the ad...

I am a strong supporter in the troubled families programme, and I have been a strong believer in ...

I need to make some progress due to the time available for this debate.

To do more, it is c...

I thank the Secretary of State for including West Sussex in the business rates retention scheme a...

I congratulate my hon. Friend on the way in which he has championed his local area. As a former l...

The Secretary of State rapidly skipped over the funding review. Will he confirm that the consulta...

Obviously we will look at all the representations that continue to be made during the review of r...

Can it be right that prior to the new fairer funding formula central Government grants for inner ...

My hon. Friend makes the case clearly for undertaking this review and looking at this properly. W...

I will give way one last time but then I really must conclude.

While mindful of the intervention from the Chairman of the Select Committee—of course it is right...

My right hon. Friend makes an important point about rurality, the impact it can have and the cost...

I must make some progress.

I know that local authorities were also pleased to hear that we ...

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I have tried two or three times to draw the Secretary ...

Order. The Secretary of State has the right to take as many or as few interventions as he wishes....

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I know that a number of Members wish to speak this afternoon. I ...

We expected better from this Secretary of State and wanted to see better from this Government. I ...

We just had a debate on the police settlement grant. Does my hon. Friend agree that local authori...

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The fact is that councils are the lynchpin of the provision o...

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way. I was rather surprised that the Secretary of State did not...

My hon. Friend, who is a doughty champion of the people of the city of Coventry, is absolutely ri...

The hon. Gentleman talks about the revenue support grant. How can it be right that a person in Lo...

I will answer that: a third of the services are more expensive to deliver in urban areas. That is...

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No, I am answering the hon. Gentleman, if he will do me the courtesy of listening.

Every lo...

rose—

I will give way later if the hon. Gentleman will allow me.

According to the Local Governmen...

My hon. Friend is making a very powerful speech. On the issue of child poverty, we have high debt...

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. This is what Government Members really need to get about some...

When the Conservatives were in government in the early ’90s and they had to consign the community...

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Scandalously, council tax now equates to 7% of the income of ...

The hon. Gentleman has spoken a great deal about pressures on urban areas, but in my constituency...

I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman has fallen into the trap that has been set by his own Ministe...

I thank my hon. Friend for making the excellent point that this is not a dichotomy between rural ...

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and she is also right that it should not be about urban versu...

My hon. Friend is making a most powerful argument. Local authorities like Slough are currently ho...

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I pay tribute to his council for all the hard work that it is...

rose—

rose—

I will give way in a little while.

I have talked about the shift of resources out of some o...

It is even worse than that. This ever diminishing cake has now been subject to the Prime Minister...

Order. [Interruption.] Order. Mr Skinner. Just one second. We cannot use the word “bribes”.

This will come out of local government—

Order. One of us has to sit down, and unfortunately I just need to say this. We have to make our ...

This money will come out of local government—make no mistake—even though it is a bribe. That is w...

Order. Mr Skinner, please.

If you don’t understand, you shouldn’t be in the job.

I am sorry that we have got to that level. I said that Members cannot use the word “bribes”, beca...

That is what it is.

I am explaining that that is not the case.

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. Communities that need help and assistance after nine years...

Order. May I say that we have a lot of speakers to get in? I am going to put in a limit of six mi...

Before I make my general comments, may I gently remind the House of the economic mess of 2010 and...

I probably agree with most of the points about devolution made by the hon. Member for Carlisle (J...

The hon. Gentleman is right about the financial crisis, but does he agree that Labour balanced th...

That is quite a good record. If the hon. Gentleman looks back, he will find that one of the probl...

My hon. Friend is making a fabulous speech. I really appreciate what he says about culture and th...

Absolutely right. We hear people start to say, “What is my council doing for me? What am I gettin...

I have the utmost respect for the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) and it was good...

Liverpool has received yet another poor local government settlement, but that is no surprise; it ...

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Dame Louise Ellman), for who...

Order. We now have to go down to five minutes.

6.21 pm

It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Rugby (Mark Pawsey). It is a particular ple...

It is a pleasure, as always, to follow the hon. Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson).<...

Will my hon. Friend give way?

Of course I will give way to my borough neighbour.

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is time we had an adjustment to our local authority’s baseline,...

I very much agree with my hon. Friend.

I will now deal with the specifics. Bromley has hist...

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill), who made a...

I welcome most of the local government settlement for 2019-20 and its recognition of the work don...

The hon. Gentleman has made his point with considerable force and clarity, and it will have been ...

Let me start with a couple of facts: there has been a 49.1% reduction in Government core funding ...

Earlier this afternoon, in your absence, Mr Speaker, we had a striking contrast in both the style...

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No, let me make this point first.

I remember how Labour grew the cake in Gloucester: by shr...

indicated dissent.

The hon. Gentleman should listen to this. It was the last Labour-run city council in Gloucester t...

Like other Members, I want to remind Ministers what the places that they have cut so savagely act...

I speak in two capacities: as a Member of Parliament representing a coastal constituency with war...

The past few years have seen the deliberate and systematic destruction of local government. It is...

The funding challenges facing East Sussex County Council are well documented. It has had to make ...

I want to start by associating myself with the remarks of the shadow Secretary of State, my hon. ...

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate, and I warmly welcome the Secretary of State’s remarks. ...

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake), a fellow Nor...

Four-minute speeches are now preferable—much more preferable.

7.23 pm

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Redcar (Anna Turley).

I rise to put on recor...

In Derbyshire, we have seen a 60% reduction in our revenue support grant since 2010. Instead, we ...

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for High Peak (Ruth George). She described the challen...

I draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

I am delighte...

We have not heard a great deal today. We expected, perhaps, a rabbit to be pulled out of a hat. W...

If the Government were serious about helping women and bringing an end to austerity, they could h...

The Government have been very good at shifting money from those who need it most to areas that wi...

It is a pleasure to close the debate. I start by joining my predecessor, my hon. Friend the Membe...

Order. I need to hear what the Minister has to say. I am sure that he is nearly at the end.

We heard a lot about Liverpool and a lot about Surrey. Members of this House should know that hou...

I remind the House that the motion is subject to double-majority voting: of the whole House and o...