Dame Meg Hillier
MP for Hackney South and Shoreditch · Labour (Co-op) · United Kingdom
“The hon. Gentleman anticipates a further area of my speech. I believe very firmly in devolution, but there are some caveats. That is something that we may consider.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Overall, I think we must see cross-party support for the approach to support households in these challenging international times, when a lot of the things that buffet the Government are very difficult for them to control. We must support small businesses. Quite rightly, we all are lobbied a lot by our small businesses.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As the hon. Gentleman rightly highlights, I have not had time in the moments since the Chancellor sat down to go through every graph in the Red Book or, indeed, the OBR’s forecast. Obviously, the Chancellor laid out the figures very clearly at the Dispatch Box, and we will be raising these issues in the Committee.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I look to the reputation of my predecessor in this role, who took her job very seriously but would still make a point. It would be very difficult for me to stand up and, from the Government Back Benches, not react to those in the Conservative party who crashed the economy in 2022 and left a lot of the mess that we are now dealing with.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Yesterday, I was with the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions in my constituency of Hackney South and Shoreditch. We met with Scope, which is doing amazing work with disabled people. Some 72% of the recent cohort supported into work were still in work 26 weeks later—people who had been written off by the system.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The right hon. Member for North West Essex (Mrs Badenoch) needs to have a tough look at the reputation of her Government. She talks about welfare and she talks about defence, but it was her Government who crashed the economy.”
House of Commons28 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“Once again, my hon. Friend highlights that it is not just about the building, but about the events that take place and the conversations that happen, as he refers to obliquely. Major historic moments have happened in public houses—some of them were, of course, coffee shops at the time—so does he have any examples of such historic moments that he might like to expand on?”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Now our Prime Minister talks about things in every postcode, and with the internet we have moved on from pram-pushing distance, but local devolution to the most appropriate level is right, and it is still a challenge. We want to devolve responsibility, but we want to make sure that planning is not held up unnecessarily. Nevertheless, we have permitted development rights, and proposals to demolish or change the use of a pub are already excluded from that.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“To start with, proposals to demolish or change the use of a pub already require a planning application, and pubs are deliberately excluded from the relevant permitted development rights that various Governments have introduced to make it easier for development to happen. Of course, this Government have been a champion of making it easier to develop, while also trying to maintain protections. That is the challenge, and we have a Prime Minister who rightly wants to see more devolution. When I started as a baby councillor, quite a long time ago—over 30 years ago—I inherited a seat on Islington council from Baroness Hodge, formerly of this place. Under her leadership of the council, there was an excellent councillor called Maurice Barnes, who wanted neighbourhood services—services delivered within pram-pushing distance.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“There are new buildings—new entrants to the market, as it were, as my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Adam Jogee) eloquently put it—and heritage can mean different things, depending on where we are in the age range. Some of us will remember things because we have been around a long while, but for some people, because of the zeitgeist, the pub of the moment is what will become the heritage venue of the future. I also want to touch on assets of community value, which plays into my first point—why this Bill, when we already have a mechanism? We already have many mechanisms in the planning system to protect pubs and other heritage buildings.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Sometimes it is quite odd to walk down a major road in the City of London and see a little gap where there is a pub surrounded by high-rise glass-fronted office blocks. Sometimes we need to think about what we mean by heritage. Is it the pub building or the history of the site, and how does that fit in with modern planning applications? I will touch on that in more detail later. In simple terms, this is quite a long Bill for what it seeks to achieve. I want to cover three areas. What is the Bill adding to the existing landscape to protect our heritage assets? What is the definition of a heritage pub? Although there is a definition outlined in the Bill, I think it is a bit unambitious, if I may say so to the hon. Gentleman, because, as I have already highlighted a couple of times, heritage is wider than just the physical building.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire (Mike Wood) not only for bringing forward what is a complex, multi-clause Bill—it is quite brave of him as usually only the short ones are successful—but for the passion with which he spoke about the outrageous demolition of the Crooked House pub. I do not know his constituency, but I vividly remember the outrage that I and many people I met in the constituency felt about that being allowed to happen—that people could be that brazen and get rid of a major cultural asset. The hon. Gentleman also highlighted pubs and planning in his speech. I will touch on that in a moment, but it is worth highlighting that in the City of London, on the edge of my constituency, there are many pubs that have been preserved through planning applications.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Absolutely. I am tempted to get into the second part of my speech, but I will touch on this because our railway arches in Hackney South and Shoreditch are becoming a real hub of diverse businesses. A lot of the breweries in my constituency are based there—I will not go through them all now—brewing on site and providing wonderful venues in a historic environment, but they would not count as heritage pubs under the Bill because they have not been around as a pub for 150 years.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“To fill that gap, the Government of the day sold off the family silver, selling the railway arches that Network Rail owned—in my area, we also have ones owned by Transport for London—including a large percentage of them in my part of London and in parts of south London, including maybe in the Minister’s constituency. The Arch Company has a job as a landlord, and it inherited some very interesting businesses, which I will touch on in a moment.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I make a heartfelt commitment to the hon. Gentleman that if his Bill progresses today, I will certainly work with him on that. Let us wait and see what happens in that respect. The challenge of a Bill of this length is that is quite complex to amend, because there are a lot of moving parts that already cut across, as I have touched on briefly. I will go into a bit more detail on that, but I will come back to the point about the vibrancy of modern pubs and breweries as they are making a really big difference in my constituency and up and down the country. In planning terms, we had arches that were, unfortunately, sold off under the previous Government. When Network Rail was classified as a public body and therefore came under public spending rules, there was a gap in funding that previously would have been raised from private markets.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Crooked House, sadly, was a breach of planning control, and the fine did not resolve the problem, so there is a gap in current planning law. I am sure we all have examples in our constituencies of mysterious fires or things happening, whether in our time or in a predecessor’s time, because the penalty is not enough of a deterrent to somebody with deep pockets, who can simply pay that penalty and then go ahead and continue with the redevelopment. With the Crooked House, there were clearly people who had no regard for the punishment that might fall on them.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When the building was developed, the very ground where Shakespeare—the bard himself—trod, was preserved under glass. That shows that buildings move and change. So, without swaying too much into the detail, the definition is really important. It may be that the tramshed in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Anna Dixon) would qualify, but if some of the old tramshed trappings have been removed, with the change of use, it may not, so there is an interesting point there. I will turn back to the point I was trying to make about planning and the existing measures, which is why I think this Bill may be over-layering that unnecessarily. Local planning authorities do, of course, have powers to use an enforcement notice for a breach of planning control, with the maximum penalty being an unlimited fine.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It also states: “has been most recently used as a public house and the local planning authority deems its building or interior to have a degree of heritage significance meriting consideration in planning decisions”. That is a debatable point, when a tram shed may have gone through further changes—different eras of planning may change things. I remember that there was one warehouse in the heart of Shoreditch that, very unusually, had not been basemented in the Victorian era and had been in sole ownership for many, many years. As a result, when development occurred on that site, the fantastic Museum of London, now renamed the London Museum, brought in its archaeology department—as it is in London for every planning development—which discovered that there was land there where Shakespeare himself had performed one of his first plays.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. With your indulgence, Madam Deputy Speaker, I do not want to get too much into every clause of the Bill, because this is a debate about its principles, but the important principle my hon. Friend highlights is that we can have heritage buildings that might or might not quite meet the definition. To be clear to the House, the definition the hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire rightly highlighted is that a pub must be “at least 150 years old and…used as a public house in the past ten years”. There is still a debate there about something that maybe was a pub 11 years ago, so I think there is also a gap there.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In many cases, they are working hard to bring in heritage hops, and some of my microbreweries have relationships with Kent farms. They are trying to create British beers with British hops. They are really working through how to retain the heritage of the beer industry, not just the venue. They are groundbreaking, but also looking backward historically. I think that that heritage is important, too. There could be challenges that mean that those pubs, bars and breweries find it hard to survive. We know all of the challenges that face our high streets, from business rates to energy prices—things that are putting hospitality businesses under great pressure. I mentioned Hackney Church Brew Co., which is also under an arch, in Hackney central, near to the church itself— Proceedings interrupted (Standing Order No. 11(4)).”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I think about the pubs that are emerging in my constituency; they are our modern heritage. I lose count of the number of microbreweries I have in my constituency—I would be very happy to arrange a visit to some of them. We are the crucible of craft brewery. At one point, there were five craft breweries in one ward in Hackney Central, although the famous Five Points brewery—named after the five-point roundabout in Hackney Central, where the Pembury Tavern is based—has now moved to another part of Hackney. It is now based in Victoria ward, I think, where it has a wonderful premises and a brewery on site. It was originally set up by Ed Mason. These modern spaces are not just about the space and what they are brewing.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Again, I ask the Minister whether the sanctions are enough where there is wilful action to interfere with buildings—the Crooked House is a terrible example of what can happen here—whether listed, as I have highlighted, or not. I think we need to consider whether there are any tweaks that could be made to future planning law. As I hinted at in my interventions on my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme, I want to move on to cover what we consider heritage to be. As the hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire rightly points out, he has tried to provide a definition in this Bill, and I am not knocking his attempt to do so. However, if we are talking about pubs, heritage is more than just the building, because pubs are not just a building.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If the Bill were not to go through today, I would certainly be very happy to work with the hon. Gentleman on such issues. I suspect there may be wider support for that. The other area around planning is about listed buildings. Pubs that are formally designated as listed buildings are afforded additional protection in the planning system, with listed building consent needed to demolish or undertake any works of alteration or extension that affect the listed building’s character or appearance as a building of special architectural or historic interest. Of course, failure to obtain listed building consent is an offence.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Indeed. I have seen that, too. There is a property on Pentonville Road that was demolished and then rebuilt, and is now the headquarters of the Royal National Institute of Blind People. Looking at it, one can see the shape of the old building, but sadly it does not have all the character. There is nothing that quite protects a building. Is an unlimited fine enough when it comes to buildings that are of such important heritage? Perhaps the Minister could respond to that. Even if the Bill does not pass today, perhaps there is scope for the Government to consider some of the thrust of the proposals and desires of the hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire, over which there is clearly some agreement across the House, in a future planning Bill.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“They will have 12 months to raise funding and there will be an independent valuation process to ensure a fair price, so that negotiation is successful. That is close to a lot of the provisions in today’s Bill, so he is welcome to intervene and tell me why he thinks his Bill is different.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That includes making decisions on whether a nominated asset meets the definition of an asset of community value, as set out in the Act. Although I have no scepticism about the hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire’s intent, which a lot of us share, I remain sceptical about the Bill. The Government are already strengthening the assets of community value scheme, which I am sure the Minister will go into in her remarks, through provisions in the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act 2026. That will introduce a new community right to buy that covers some of the provisions in the Bill, including, from memory, clause 9 about how people can put in a bid to own a property. Communities will have the first opportunity to purchase an asset if it is put up for sale by its owner.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When I read the Bill for the first time, I was trying to find what was specifically different about the provisions relating to assets of community value. The hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire outlined some of that in his speech, so I am now a little wiser to his thinking. Assets of community value were introduced in the Localism Act 2011. It provides communities with a route to nominate and retain any building or land, such as heritage pubs, that they feel “furthers the social wellbeing or social interests of the local community”. Local authorities are responsible for ensuring that those schemes are run in accordance with the legislation, as set out in part 5, chapter 3 of the Localism Act 2011 and the Assets of Community Value (England) Regulations 2012.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The name 40ft refers to that fact that it is based in two 20-foot shipping containers, so not arches this time. That would not reach the heritage standards set out by the hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire, but there is interesting new heritage coming through in our breweries. Many breweries offer tours, including Signature Brew and Five Points, so if people are thinking about gifts as we approach the festive season, I highly recommend a visit to Hackney and a tour of one of the breweries. This shows the modern culture that is coming through. Some of the breweries are in heritage buildings, and the arches have their own heritage, but the challenge would be whether they qualify under the provisions set out in the hon. Gentleman’s Bill. I want to talk a little about assets of community value.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The arches are part of what might be called “new Hackney”, but they build on the old traditions. Saint Monday is an innovative brewery that combines brewing with heavy metal, so any heavy metal fans here can get a bit of real ale and heavy metal in the same place. Great Beyond taproom and brewery, another archway-based business, was set up by Ollie, Nick and John, three beer-loving friends. They do some amazing work and people can buy great Shoreditch and Hackney-made beer there. I forget which bar serves which beer—perhaps we need to do a crawl of all the ones named after Hoxton and Shoreditch? That alone would keep us busy. The Howling Hops brewery brews on site as well, and I really like the 40ft Brewery in Dalston, which I go to every now and again.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Everybody is always welcome to Hackney South and Shoreditch—it is the centre of the universe, although others may disagree with me. It is only half an hour by bike or public transport from this place, so I highly recommend it—a good night out will be had by all! The new breweries and pubs are bucking the trend in hospitality, and the archway areas are becoming hubs for other businesses. High streets can be challenging, but in Hackney our high streets still do reasonably well, partly because although Hackney is often described as being very hip, cool and expensive—and that is true—it is still achingly poor. One in two children live in poverty, although thanks to the Government’s changes on child poverty hopefully that will reduce, and nearly 60% of people live in social housing, many in overcrowded conditions.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We do not necessarily need to legislate for everything; the legislation is already in place, and I think we are very capable of using the legislation we have to protect the assets that hon. Members have spoken eloquently about and defended. I am happy to continue to work with the hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire on the intent of his Bill, but I do not feel that this is the Bill to support. I think we can deliver on his agenda without passing the Bill today.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am not going to go through all the pubs in my constituency—we would be here for a very long time, and I am aware that other people want to speak. Needless to say, I would be very happy to arrange a tour at any point, and I am sure that the various bodies I have worked with over the years on beer and breweries would be keen to help enable that. In fact, when the current Chancellor was working in the Treasury, he was instrumental in changing the taxation of small breweries to make it possible for these craft breweries to exist—breweries that create many jobs in brewing and, of course, hospitality. They still struggle at times, but they are bucking the trend compared with a lot of our other assets, so as Members, we need to be more ambitious.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Whether it is a tramshed that is a heritage building and has become a pub, a pub that has been there for a very long time or a coffee house that has become a pub—whatever the cultural issues are—we can push for those buildings to be assets of community value in a wider way than the hon. Gentleman’s Bill allows for. I suggest to the Minister and all colleagues that we take today as a call to arms for us to implement the essence of the hon. Gentleman’s Bill, without having to go through a quite complicated process that I think narrows the scope too much. There is an opportunity for us to broaden our understanding of what a culturally rich heritage site is, and push for assets of community value to be more widespread ahead of a threat arising, as the hon. Gentleman rightly says.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“At the time, the council was under Labour control—we also have an elected mayor in Hackney, although of course planning matters are not matters for the elected mayor—and it defended the Chesham Arms from redevelopment. It reopened in 2015; it is a real success story. The hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire is right, though, because the challenge was that that pub closed and then became an asset of community value. Learning from that example and from the comments that the hon. Gentleman has made, we all need to be ahead of the curve on this.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the hon. Gentleman for that clarification. We have already talked with some passion today about the pubs, heritage buildings and heritage in our constituencies that we value, so that means that we need to push for them to become assets of community value. I will give an example from my constituency: the Chesham Arms on Mehetabel Road, which was Hackney’s first ever asset of community value. That pub is 162 years old; it closed in 2012, and the owner at the time just assumed that it would be possible to turn it into flats. It is on a residential street—it is a traditional east London pub in a terrace. It is not very big; it is just a little neighbourhood pub, and when it closed there was an assumption that it would be easy for it to be redeveloped, but the council stepped in.”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is making a really important point. Newer venues are often based in community spaces and deliver the services that the clientele want. There is nothing wrong with preserving buildings, but sometimes older pubs cannot always be preserved as pubs for all sorts of other reasons —development around the area or changing demographics, for instance. This is an invidious question to ask an MP, but does my hon. Friend want to name her favourite modern pub that she thinks should be an asset of community value in her constituency?”
House of Commons16 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“T6. The Government entered office with a target to decarbonise the grid by 2030. The Public Accounts Committee looked at the previous Government’s plans to do so by 2035, which were over-optimistic. I welcome the new Secretary of State to her position. Will she reassure us that she will get into the detail of that project, and when will she announce to the House what the real date will be?”
House of Commons13 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will she work with mortgage lenders not just to get them to sign up to a list saying that they support lending but to be really clear about the criteria that will allow them to lend? Will she look again at insurance and skills, and will she please tackle the issue of tolerability?”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Department’s permanent secretary at the time spoke to several of her predecessors to find out who could have seen it coming. Changes happened here, there and everywhere, and no one saw what the cumulative impact would be on Grenfell—obviously, there were also other shocking aspects of the Grenfell situation. This is an opportunity for the Minister, who is a very capable woman—we are all delighted to see her in her post—to tackle this issue once and for all. It may not help our residents immediately, but it has to work for the future. I have several simple asks. Will the Minister get working on the mortgage lender issue and make sure that we are sending out accurate information?”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is why, after the Adam Kiziak affair, in which a number of EWS1—external wall system fire review—forms were forged, other people qualified to do the EWS1 certificates came to different conclusions. Two buildings in Hackney that were tolerable were then said to have issues that require remediation. My constituent said that insurance has become so expensive because the insurers are not certain about the standards, which will no doubt have an impact on mortgage lenders, too. The issue needs to be resolved. I say with respect to the Minister that the solution must be much more fundamental than the Government getting people in, banging heads together and saying, “Sort it out.” This is fundamental to why Grenfell happened in the first place. It was the biggest public safety failure in several generations.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The lack of skilled contractors was first raised back in 2020 in a Public Accounts Committee report, when I was Chair of that Committee. We asked for work to be done, but nothing has happened. The hon. Member for Surrey Heath spoke about tolerability. I have a very expert constituent who came to my advice surgery this summer. I am very happy to introduce the Minister to him. He has written to me and the Department a number of times, and we have had a number of exchanges about the changes in British standards since Grenfell, and specifically about building materials. Instead of having set standards, fire safety is now done on measures of tolerability. He says that there is now a scale of standards, depending on the individual who does the fire safety assessment.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For two developments in my constituency, only one insurer took part in the insurance tender process—insurers are just pulling out. The Treasury Committee is keen to look at that issue, but there is a real role for the Government to play. I spoke to the Minister’s predecessors in the previous Government, but this nut has not yet been cracked. I think I speak for every Member in this Chamber when I say that we would be happy to put our weight and effort behind it to help the Minister tackle the issues with insurance companies. We cannot have properties that are effectively uninsurable and bankrupting our residents. As the right hon. Member for Islington North said, people are going into debt to pay their insurance premiums, and that is before they have a claim to make.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It takes three years to train them, and if anyone had done that then, we would be in a much better place now. I also wish to mention mortgageability. As recently as 3 September, I had a letter from Baroness Blake of Leeds, repeating what I have had from Ministers of different parties over time: that there are 10 mortgage companies that will lend on property with dangerous cladding. I point that out to constituents and keep referring them to the 10 companies, but there is always a reason why it cannot happen. Those companies obviously have criteria that are often not met. If the Government are routinely sending out that sort of information, it needs to be absolutely accurate. Insurance is a huge and ongoing problem.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I will not name any of the developments that I am talking about, because my residents are very concerned about being blighted. There have been some improvements. The Building Safety Regulator is getting better and the delays have reduced, but as well as dealing with historical issues, it has to work with new developments. Hackney council has a good track record of building council housing, but some of it has been delayed by the Building Safety Regulator. I understand that the delays have now reduced substantially, but I hope the Minister will look closely at that issue in her new role to make sure the Building Safety Regulator is working as efficiently as possible. Skills remain a big issue, and there has been a woeful lack of activity. Some of us were here in 2018 talking about training fire safety engineers.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. I warmly welcome the Minister to her post. I had meetings with most of her predecessors. I do not need to keep having meetings; I just hope that she takes up the points we have raised. I congratulate the hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Dr Pinkerton) on laying out the issues so clearly—as a result, I have cut my speech in half. Sadly, it is a bit like “Groundhog Day”: we have all raised these issues before. The peroration of the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) summarised the complexity that the Minister and the Government have to grapple with. It is not just the Government who are part of this challenge, but they have to be part of the solution.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I welcome that step, but what the Minister says suggests it is some way off. Can she give some indication of the timescale for getting mandatory licensing in place?”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We all want to see stronger and better building control, but local authorities have been hollowed out. We have lost a lot of experienced planners and there is not always a pipeline coming through with the necessary experience. Can we lobby the Treasury for support for local government in that respect?”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We want to honour the promises that the Government made to student loan holders. One of the easiest ways to do that is to not bring in a threshold freeze next April. That is in the hands of the Chancellor of the Exchequer at the Budget. I hope that he and his colleagues are listening to this debate and to the 52,000 people who responded to our inquiry, including the many young people in their 20s and 30s who are suffering the additional burden of the punitive plan 2 loan system, and that they will reconsider freezing the threshold at the Budget in October.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a breach of trust to change that threshold and make students stick at a frozen level. This has been done by previous Governments, but there is an opportunity here. The Government have not absolutely said that they will not review the threshold, so there is a glimmer of hope. As they talk to Treasury colleagues ahead of the Budget, I urge Ministers to take the opportunity of a change of Prime Minister and a change of Government to show that we want to invest in his generation. It is a matter of intergenerational fairness. This cohort is squeezed. The Government need to consider the fairness of the student finance system for borrowers, taxpayers and the public finances, but it is important to note that the rules have been changed repeatedly for this cohort, particularly those on the punitive plan 2 system.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“One of the key things that we looked at was the change announced in last year’s Budget to freeze the threshold at which payments have to be made by students for two years from April next year. This seems to be changing the rules again when students are already experiencing pain. This is a cohort of students who already face huge pressures on housing costs and paying into pensions. They are the generation who are helping to grow Britain’s economy and working to deliver essential jobs in that economy. They are the generation who will pay for the NHS and the ageing population, and they will have the children who will be our future workers. Let us not forget that the birth rate has fallen every year in the past three years, down to 1.41%, so not investing in this generation is a real issue.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We are disappointed on another point. In 2018, the predecessor Committee concluded that the use of the retail prices index should end and we should move to the consumer prices index, which is a lower level of inflation. Back in 2018, the Government responded that the flaws in the RPI measure of inflation are well understood, but they did not make a change. Over that time, Governments of different colours have sat passively by, and today the Government say that they will not make that change because it is coming in 2030 anyway. However, that means that students will have been charged at a higher interest rate for a longer period and we are disappointed by that response.”
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“The Committee also recommended that student loans promotional materials should be brought in line with the requirements of the Financial Conduct Authority’s consumer duty. The Government have declined that in their response to our report, based on the fact that these are not commercial loans. However, the Government are the monopoly provider of student loans—students cannot go elsewhere for a loan of this sort. It is therefore beholden on the Government to treat student loans fairly, as the competitive forces that might maintain a higher standard of customer service in banking and other areas do not apply to student loans. We would like the Government to explain which elements of the Financial Conduct Authority’s consumer duty they feel that they cannot comply with, given they do not want to commit to doing so at this stage.”
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“We said that “more can be done to support borrowers to understand the student finance system and that all information provided to borrowers should be fair, clear, unambiguous and as easy to understand as possible”. The Government have committed to a “transformation programme” that will “review the pre-application process to produce clear, relatable and trusted guidance that supports better decision making and financial planning. This will include making it more prominent that student finance is governed by legislation and that regulations may be amended by Government and Parliament.” These changes are well overdue. It is shameful that multiple Governments have not done that when it is very young people, mostly under the age of 18, who have been taking out loans.”
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“Members of the Committee understand that a national conversation needs to be had about how much society should contribute towards higher education, but our cross-party Committee, made up of representatives from the three main parties of the House, concluded that in the longer term, a 50:50 split should be the ambition, so that we can invest in the young people of today and our country. One of the most shocking elements of our inquiry was the evidence provided by the Department for Education about the advice given to students when they took out loans. As a result of seeing that, we recommended that much better information be provided to make it clear to students applying for a loan that the terms and conditions of the loan can change, even after it has been taken out. I am pleased about the Government’s response on this point.”
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“I can tell the Government that it does not feel like that to many of my constituents, and the constituents of my fellow Committee members. They can read the Government’s own forecasts of repayments, which that show that starting in 2024-25, the average undergraduate will be paying back their loan for 31 years, and the average amount that they will pay back will be well over £30,000. It is even worse for graduates in the top 30% of earnings: the Government forecast that they will pay back more than they borrowed.”
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“The Government’s own submission to the inquiry described the student loan system as “broken and unfair”. The Committee have made a number of recommendations. We heard in evidence from Sir Philip Augar that when he reviewed the system, he recommended that the split between student and taxpayer should be around 50%. Universities UK reminded us of the benefits of graduates to our wider society. For example, if we have an accident, we rely on people who have trained in medicine—paramedics, doctors and so on—to help. The Committee concluded that the split between the individual and the state should be 50%, but in their response, the Government said that their contribution is already in the region of 35% to 40% and that is enough.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗