John Healey
MP for Rawmarsh and Conisbrough · Labour · United Kingdom
“Mr Spock, I think some would say, Mr Speaker! My hon. Friend is right. Despite global conflicts, trade tensions and rising threats in the world, which are pushing up inflation, bearing down on growth and pushing up borrowing costs, the UK economy is demonstrating huge resilience.”
“The Prime Minister and I have been clear that we must cut the costs of welfare. On levels of taxation, we had a period of Conservative Government, with low growth and high debt. They crashed the economy with the mini-Budget, and we had levels of taxation that were putting pressure on business, adding to the cost of living.”
“The hon. Lady is talking to the person who led the work to establish a defence and security partnership with the European Union and bilateral agreements with other countries, on which we now build both our economic strength and our national security strength. On the question of the Budget, I ask the hon.”
“Since day one in the job, the Prime Minister and I have been in lockstep in our determination to meet Britain’s fiscal rules. This is the bedrock on which we build good growth and help give a bit of breathing space to families and businesses.”
“May I start by paying tribute to my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West and Pudsey (Rachel Reeves)? I am proud to have been a member of a Government with the first female Chancellor in 700 years.”
“My hon. Friend speaks up very strongly for his local area. He is right about the importance of pubs, social clubs and live venues, and about the importance of the 20% cut that we announced in July. These are the things that make the places where we live the places that we also love.”
The complete record
Every one of 6,340 lines we hold for John Healey, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 64 of 127.
“I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman) for moving this debate, to my hon. Friend the Member for York Central (Hugh Bayley) for ably supporting him and leading our campaign to support our Yorkshire air ambulance service, and to all Members, on both sides, who have spoken in support of their local air ambulance services. I pay particular tribute to Ken Sharpe, my hon. Friend’s constituent, who must hold the record for getting 100,000 names on an e-petition in the shortest possible time and who has helped provide the basis for this debate. I say to the Minister that we are asking for a small contribution that will be a big boost to the efforts of those who support and keep our air ambulances flying across the country. The motion covers the interests of our 18 air ambulance services across England.”
“The Minister mentions the review under the 2012 Act, but it is a review of charities that carry out NHS services. The whole point about the air ambulance services is that they are not NHS services, although they play a great role in emergency health support. Therefore, they are unlikely to be covered by the second review. The Minister says that the review proposed in the motion is useful, but will he accept the motion and conduct the review it urges on him? I am still not clear about that.”
“NHS staff and patients simply do not have the same rosy view of the NHS as the Secretary of State. When a Government-commissioned survey asked people last summer what they thought of the NHS, why had satisfaction with the NHS plummeted from 70% to 55% in just a year under the Secretary of State?”
“Does the Minister agree that the best efforts to reduce reoffending are often based on local courts with good local knowledge, working closely with local agencies? We have a very good magistrates court in Rotherham for Rotherham, and a very good one in Barnsley for Barnsley. Will he rule out any further magistrates court closures, which might put local justice in jeopardy?”
“The Leader of the House’s statement makes it clear that the Government are going to ever greater lengths to avoid a full judge-led inquiry. By the time this House votes at 5.15 pm on Thursday, the Treasury Committee will have held three sessions on the LIBOR scandal, and it is also halfway through an inquiry into governance in the banking industry. If the Leader of the House wants Parliament to do the job, why not let the Select Committee do it, instead of involving the Lords?”
“Which of the flood-hit areas has the Secretary of State visited? There was nothing in her statement about the actions she will take, and little that showed that the Government understand that, when the waters recede, so does public and media interest, but the problems that families and firms face simply do not. It can take months to get those problems, including insurance claims, sorted out, so will she call in the insurance companies and ensure that claims are speeded up, as the Labour Government did after the 2007 floods?”
“I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his leadership of this debate. He is looking for evidence and examples, but has he come across Guardian Care Homes, a firm with two care homes in my constituency? Its problem was that the term of the swaps that it was sold far exceeded the term of the loans to which they were linked.”
“Like my hon. Friend, I have written to the head of Barclays, which was responsible for selling the two swaps that have cost Guardian Care Homes at least an extra £12 million so far. Does my hon. Friend agree with the point being made on both sides of the House that such small companies are often afraid to complain, for fear that their loans will be pulled? Does she also agree that a moratorium is needed following complaints, and that firms should be able to make collective challenges for redress?”
“The Minister said that there was nothing dramatic in his plans. Is it not time for a bigger reform than one that simply involves the appointment of permanent secretaries? Should not a change of Government mean a change at the top of those agencies delivering the most important parts of the new Government’s programme? Perhaps we should consider a system closer to that of the United States, in which Ministers would propose appointments which would then be confirmed or rejected at hearings in this House. Those who were appointed would then, like Ministers, be publicly accountable as well as directly accountable to Parliament.”
“Will the Business Secretary confirm that the green investment bank will be able to raise funds from the capital markets? In other words, will it be a bank that is able to borrow? If not, it cannot be described as a bank, and it is really just a fund.”
“If the referendum on Scottish separation is successful, will the Secretary of State relocate this green investment bank from Edinburgh back to England? May I recommend that he considers Leeds and re-examines the case for locating the bank in Yorkshire?”
“May I say how welcome the Secretary of State’s balanced view is, in contrast to those of some Members behind and beside him? On the question of changing the tribunal system, what increase in resources will he make available to the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service if everyone who wants to put a claim to a tribunal must first put it to ACAS?”
“If we look back over the past several years, we see that building societies and mutuals have not run the reckless risks that banks and other financial services have. They have not lost their core business purpose and their sense of what they are there to do and who they are there to serve, as many banks and other financial service companies have. Mutuals did not need a public bail-out and did not cost the UK taxpayer billions of pounds to make up for their mistakes like others in the banking and financial services sector did.”
“Crucially, it would also require an action plan from the Government within six months. We have not had one after two years. It would also require regular public reports and stock-takes of progress. I say to the hon. Member for Wycombe (Steve Baker) that those reports would be about not the Minister’s progress but the growth of mutuals, the diversity of the industry and the growth of competition in the sector—all the aims that the Government set for reform. Mutuals bring something quite special—a concern about values, not just valuation. That is the root of the consistently greater levels of confidence and trust demonstrated by those who deal with and borrow from building societies and mutuals compared with those who deal with their corporate competitors. Mutuals display a prudence born of concern for and knowledge of their members.”
“I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie) on tabling the amendment. He is doing the job that the coalition parties promised to do in the coalition agreement but are failing to do. I shall remind the House of a quotation from the coalition agreement. That is the benchmark for the action that the Government have pledged to take, so the House and others can judge them on it. It states: “We will bring forward detailed proposals to foster diversity in financial services, promote mutuals and create a more competitive banking industry.” I applaud the aim of greater diversity and competition, but missing from that statement is the aim of greater confidence and trust in financial services. My hon. Friend’s amendment captures the aims of diversity, the promotion of mutuals and greater growth in mutuals.”
“My hon. Friend, who knows far more about this matter than me and many in the House, is absolutely right. At a time when a loss of trust and confidence in financial services is evident across the board, that local presence and face-to-face relationship counts for a great deal.”
“I am disappointed in the hon. Gentleman, because he, too, has a strong track record on this matter, and that sort of nit-picking misses the point of the amendment. The point of the amendment is to hold the coalition parties in the Government to their coalition pledge, which he is unable to do. It is a way of making public two years of failure and saying, “Within six months, you must do better.””
“I have not seen the hon. Gentleman’s amendments to make the measure not permissive, but a requirement of the Government—Mr Speaker must not have selected it. Clearly, anything in statute would be a significant step forward, as the shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham East, has argued. Those on both sides of the House who have an interest could use a permissive measure in future.”
“No, but by measuring height, one makes a statement that height matters. The amendment makes a statement that the coalition pledge on mutuals, and on greater diversity and competition in financial services, matters. That is the purpose of the amendment and the debate. I hope that my hon. Friend presses it to a Division because it will expose the Government’s complacency in making promises and failing to live up to them.”
“I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who has an eye for detail that I cannot match—it almost matches the eye of the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming).”
“Mutuals look at the coalition agreement and point to the words on the paper, but they cannot point to the action that followed. The amendment is designed to force the hand of the Minister, the Treasury and the Government. I am surprised that it finds any objection on the Government Benches, because it simply seeks to hold the Government to the promise they made”
“There is a saying that what is measured matters, and if it matters, measure it. In many ways, that is the core of the argument being made by Opposition Members. Sixteen per cent. of those who aspire to own their own home and who borrow to buy do so from building societies. Roughly one in six of us borrows our mortgage from a building society. That significant market share is gradually growing. That is why I have argued that building societies are the unsung success of British financial services. They are certainly unsung by a Government who promised to be their champion. In my view, building societies are the quiet strength of British financial services, but it is time that that strength was properly supported by Government policy and action.”
“I have a petition here, “Stop the Caravan Tax”, signed by Scott Staniforth of 45 Vicar road, Wath, and others from my constituency. They see that the tax on static caravans could add £8,000 to the price of a caravan, price families out of their regular holiday and thwart many people’s ambition to own an affordable second home. They have therefore signed a petition in similar terms to that presented by the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart). The Petition of residents of Wentworth and Dearne constituency. [P001050]”
“The Minister mentions the seven technical notes. Dozens and dozens of pages about how the Government are going to approach this were released on the working day before Report and Third Reading in this House, and three and a half months after this House finished its Committee stage. Does the Minister accept that to anyone outside this House it looks as though, at every stage, this Government are going out of their way to avoid people being able to take a proper look at this and to avoid this House being able to do its job of scrutinising this Bill properly? We will be leaving too much to the other House to do.”
“The Minister has just said that the Government want councils to be able to draw up schemes to take account of local circumstances. Why then is he putting this funding noose around their necks by cutting the available money by 10% from the start?”
“How can the Minister say that? He talks about protecting pensioners. In Rotherham, there are 2,600 people who are in work but on incomes so low that they need the support of council tax benefit to get by, week to week and month to month. They will lose out as a result of this measure, and they will do so by significantly more than 10% of the overall cut, so how can the Minister piously say that work incentives matter to this Government?”
“Does my right hon. Friend agree that one other consequence of taking the Committee stage on the Floor of the House, rather than in a Public Bill Committee, was that those organisations responsible for implementing the system with concerns about its consequences did not have the opportunity formally to give evidence to the House, and thereby inform the debate and scrutiny, and ensure that the legislation was better than it is now?”
“My hon. Friend mentions Wigan in the north-west and authorities in the north-east, but the case he makes is equally true for many authorities in Yorkshire and the Humber, such as Barnsley and Rotherham. As he has access to the figures, he might care to look at them in this regard. Wokingham may be facing an increase in its grant, which is astonishing given that local government is taking such a hit across the board, but Barnsley and Rotherham are facing double-digit reductions in their grant, despite increasing need and increasing pressure on services in their communities.”
“Does my hon. Friend agree that not only is the current settlement unfair, but it is the baseline for the future system, and the Bill will lock in that unfairness for at least a decade?”
“The problem faced by many of the poorest non-pensioners is that they will lose the most, as the Government tell councils to protect pensioners and make everybody else worse off—in other words, penalise everybody else and protect pensioners. That cannot be done without causing significant pain for many non-pensioners because the overall sum available, irrespective of need or entitlement under the current system, will be cut by £500 million next April.”
“If the Minister was telling the House and telling me, as one of the MPs representing Rotherham, that there will be no cut in the pot available for council tax benefit payments next year compared with this year, I will willingly give way to him, but I think he was using those figures to make a completely different case, entirely separate from the challenge that Rotherham and every other council will face next year because of the decision taken, as he admitted tonight, for the purposes of crude deficit reduction, not as a bold local and localising reform. The Minister has not accepted my offer to give way, so I take it that he accepts the case I made and is not able to sustain the impression that he gave the House earlier.”
“In future there will be a smaller cash-limited pot and a severe means test, with that £112 million cut from the outset by 10%. Earlier, from the Dispatch Box, the Minister gave some figures—£1.8 million and £1.9 million—which he said were the figures for the value of the reliefs and discounts compared with what he argues is the shortfall in Rotherham. Of course, reliefs and discounts are part of the council tax scheme. They bear no relation to the level of council tax subsidy, which under the current system is paid by councils and reclaimed from central Government.”
“That limit next year will be 10% less than the spend on and cost of council tax benefit this year. I have the figures released recently by the Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill), showing the total subsidy properly paid by councils to those entitled and then properly reclaimed from Government in 2010-11. In Rotherham, the figure was £22.5 million; in the other local authority that my constituency partly covers, Barnsley, it was nearly £20 million; and the total for South Yorkshire was £112 million. That money went to many of the poorest, who need help with their council tax costs and who currently have an entitlement to that help.”
“It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones), who has more than a decade’s experience in local government and knows what it is like for local authorities trying to deal with central Government cuts and central Government diktats. He knows that local government across the board, irrespective of party, is willing to change but wants that change to be implemented properly and fairly. Much in the Bill will make that more difficult for local government in the months ahead. The Bill signals that council tax benefit is no longer a benefit or an entitlement for those whose incomes are such that they need help with council tax costs. In future, there will be a means-tested, cash-limited discount on council tax bills.”
“The hon. Gentleman must not have been listening carefully, because that is not the case my hon. Friend was making. His point was that providing special protection for pensioners when £500 million is being cut overnight from the available fund means that those people who are not pensioners but who are currently entitled to council tax benefit or council tax support will inevitably be hit harder. Local authorities and charities are making the same case, as did Barnsley Advice Network to me last week when we discussed the potential challenges and problems that people will be forced to face.”
“I am glad to see my hon. Friend in his place. He has been an active participant in all debates on the Bill, including on Second Reading and in Committee. I have seen that work by the House of Commons Scrutiny Unit, which I think is useful and supports the point I am making to the hon. Member for Manchester, Withington (Mr Leech). If anything, the 16% figure is probably on the conservative side. My local authority in Rotherham calculates that non-protected, non-pensioner claimants of council tax benefit are likely to lose, on average, 19% of their support.”
“I hope that we do not lose sight of the sort of pressure that the Bill and the changes the Government are making will put on many households, including many that are working hard and have an entitlement that they simply will not have under the new system.”
“My hon. Friend makes clearly and succinctly the points he made earlier. I am concerned about the percentages, whether 16% or 19%, and the averages, such as the LGA’s calculation that non-pensioners are likely to lose, on average, £6 a week from the support they currently receive to help pay council tax. Percentages and averages are one thing, but the family, household or individual—the one in eight people currently entitled to council tax benefit who are in work but do not earn enough to cover their council tax bills without help—will face a reduction of perhaps £10, £12 or £15 a week, at a time when other costs are being loaded on them and they are struggling to make ends meet. They will find such a difference really hard to deal with.”
“In Rotherham, just over 2,600 people are in that position, in Barnsley, just over 2,200, and across South Yorkshire there are more than 13,500 people in work who earn so little that they are entitled to support from us and others to help cover their council tax bills.”
“I wonder—are they unintended consequences? If they are, the degree of negligence in the legislation is unforgivable. If they were foreseen and have been calculated as part of the legislation, that speaks volumes about the “doublethink” and “doublespeak” that my right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr Raynsford), quoting Orwell, talked about earlier. The Government are making a pious claim to be on the side of those who are struggling but who are trying to do the right thing by staying in work in order to support themselves and their families, but those people will find it much harder from next year as a result of the changes that are going ahead.”
“I hesitate to disagree with my right hon. Friend, but I am not sure that they have forgotten it, because earlier the Minister said from the Dispatch Box that the scheme will somehow preserve work incentives. The whole design of the proposal, the framing of the legislation and everything the Government have published do not match the claims he has made from the Dispatch Box. They are hollow words that will hurt many people who are working at the moment and others who are not pensioners but who rely on the council tax benefit to help make ends meet, week to week and month to month.”
“The Minister wants to intervene. Perhaps he will give the House the straight account of the figures for Rotherham, on which I challenged him five minutes ago.”
“They should localise the decisions and let the local authorities that will run the scheme devise them, in the Minister’s words, to suit local circumstances.”
“With new clause 2 and amendment 2, I seek to challenge the Secretary of State’s powers over, and prescription of, the new council tax support schemes. My purpose is this: I believe that the House and local government require a justification for the inclusion in this Bill of such powers of prescription from the centre over the local, otherwise their removal from the Bill is justified. None of the arguments that I have heard from Ministers, on Second Reading, in Committee or today, justifies the extent of the centralised powers vested in the Secretary of State to design and to enforce a particular manner of council tax support scheme. The Government claim that the reform is a localising one. If it is, they should localise the decisions on the design of, and procedure for preparing, the scheme.”
“In practice, that is what we are building in for non-pensioners: a requirement to cover for themselves, whatever their income, about 20% of the council tax costs in their local area. Given the way in which the measure will work for many, it is a return of the poll tax: rushed into law and rushed into practice, with a deaf ear to local government, to charities, to experts and to Members, who warn the Government, “You’re pushing too far, too fast with these changes.” I will return in a moment to the amendments on the legislation’s commencement tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich, but first let me do my job and introduce new clause 2 and the amendments that stand in my name.”
“Those on low incomes who are not pensioners, but who would get the full council tax benefit under the current system, will, as the Barnsley advice network has told me, have to find 20% of their council tax bill from their basic income, whatever they earn, as councils try to make less go further. The Minister is old enough, experienced enough and has been involved in local government long enough for this measure to sound a warning to him and his colleagues. This is the return of the poll tax— [ Interruption. ] There are a few groans from Tory Members, but let us remember that a 20% minimum payment expected of all people, whatever their means, was part of the flaw in, and at the heart of the unfairness of, the community charge a couple of decades ago.”
“If that is not the case, exhortations on the importance of local government schemes reflecting needs and not damaging work incentives will not be worth the paper of the circular on which they are sent out, because there will be no protections guaranteeing the preservation of work incentives until and unless the Secretary of State chooses to use his powers as he has pledged to use them for pensioners. Until that point, it is reasonable for Opposition Members, who are concerned about the future of this support for council tax payments, to continue to press the Minister and to be concerned that non-pensioners are likely to bear a heavy cut in their current support.”
“The Minister has just told the House and me that, to run the new scheme from April next year, Rotherham will have available no less funding than it has during this financial year. I will look very carefully at the facts, and, if they match the Minister’s words, I will welcome them; if they do not, I shall demand that he puts the House straight and offers an apology. On work incentives, will not the Secretary of State therefore use his powers under schedule 4 to specify that people in work must, and work incentives will, be protected as he proposes, and has pledged, to use them for pensioners? If that is the case, the Minister’s actions will match his words.”
“That completely undermines not only the constant mantra of Ministers across the range of their departmental responsibilities but the specific pledge that they made in their response to the consultation, where, on page 2, they said that this is “a policy of decentralisation that will give local authorities increased financial freedoms”.”
“Amendment 1, which is also in my name, is in the same vein although more moderate, because it seeks simply to require the Secretary of State to consult before making any changes to the requirements that he chooses to impose nationally on local schemes. As the Bill stands, there is not even any obligation to consult local government on the requirements that central Government impose. Paragraphs (8) and (9) of schedule 4 make it clear that the Secretary of State may make regulations to require any matter to be included in the design of a local scheme; may prescribe any class of person to be included in the scheme; may prescribe the reductions that cover any class in any area; and, to reinforce my earlier point, may prescribe the way in which the provisions are made.”