Robert Jenrick
MP for Newark · Reform UK · United Kingdom
“Robert Steele was a beautiful four-year-old boy who died three weeks ago in Newark when he was thrown from an off-road bike that was being driven by a 24-year-old man. This is the culmination of a number of incidents in my town, and many others across the country, involving off-road bikes, e-bikes and e-scooters.”
“The Minister said that Governments are elected to lead. Most people would assume that means that Ministers are elected to lead, because they are accountable to Parliament and to the people.”
“There is an air of total unreality hanging over this debate. Successive Governments have run down our Royal Navy to its present enfeebled state, they have conspired to surrender other British sovereign territory and we have a Government who procrastinate about signing off a new oil field in the North sea—let alone about one in the south A…”
“I welcome the right hon. Gentleman to his position. I have known him for a long time—I wish him well. He has a huge task ahead of him. Earlier in the summer, the Prime Minister said that walking the streets of Makerfield lodged in his mind that so many working people want to see the personal allowance raised.”
“Imagine that you are a worker at JLR worried about your future, and you have the misfortune of watching the Chancellor’s speech, which contains searing economic insights like, “I want to see businesses make a profit.” There was nothing about scrapping electric vehicle mandates, bringing down energy costs by getting rid of net zero targets…”
“The sight of the Government escorting illegal migrants into Portsmouth harbour, the home of the Royal Navy, was a national humiliation. Sometimes I wonder whether Members of this House have no appreciation of the level of anger there is in the country at the rapes, the murders and the billions being wasted that should be being spent on th…”
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“I do think this is a fair intervention. It is the largest of its type I think any Government in this country have ever made. It is a balance between the interests of the leaseholders and those of the broader taxpayer, as I have already said. In terms of wider building safety defects, as I said in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Caroline Ansell), we will do everything we can to support leaseholders to pursue action against those who made those errors and omissions in the past. I share the anger of leaseholders at the mistakes that have been made—both by industry and by regulators who came before us. What we must do now as a Government is move forward, make sure this never happens again and support leaseholders as much as we practically can, and that is exactly what we intend to do.”
“That is the balance that we have tried to strike today, and I hope that fair-minded people on both sides of the House and in the country will appreciate that and understand the choices that we have made.”
“On the important second point that my right hon. Friend raises, we have worked with the Department for Education and the Department of Health on buildings in the wider public sector—universities, student halls of residence and, in a small number of cases, buildings in the NHS—to ensure that the works there proceed at pace. I will happily update him with respect to Lincoln University. The first point that my right hon. Friend made is actually extremely important. We have had to strike a careful balance because millions of our fellow citizens are not homeowners, and we have to protect their interests, just as we want to provide safety and fairness for the leaseholder.”
“In other buildings where the risk is significantly lower, the new financing arrangement will give people real comfort that they never need to pay more than £50 a month. My expectation is that many of them will pay significantly less. I think most reasonable people would see that sum of money as truly affordable and manageable within the budget of most homeowners.”
“The hon. Lady is wrong. Thousands of her constituents will directly benefit from today’s announcement. We have chosen rightly, on the basis of expert advice, to prioritise buildings of over 18 metres. That is where the greatest risk is. It would be quite wrong for us to direct public money—taxpayers’ money—to buildings where the risk is low or extremely remote, so we are targeting that money on the buildings that need it most. In those buildings, leaseholders can have certainty that they will not be paying for the remediation of unsafe cladding. It will be paid for either by the building owner—the developer—which is quite right, or by the taxpayer. We will use the levy and the new tax to recoup as much of that as we possibly can.”
“I honestly do not know. The Scottish Government have, as far as I am aware, done nothing with the very significant sum of money that the Chancellor has given them through the Barnett consequentials process. I am not aware of what the Welsh Government are doing. I think those questions are better directed to the Scottish Government and the Welsh Labour Administration.”
“The hon. Gentleman, for whom I have great respect, misunderstands the scheme that we have just announced. For buildings of between four and six storeys, where the risk is much lower, leaseholders will have the opportunity, if they wish—there will be no compulsion—to take advantage of the financing scheme. That loan scheme financing arrangement will sit with the building, not with the individual. It will not affect the individual’s personal credit rating, and it should not have a material impact on the value of their property. It will be akin to paying somewhat more on their service charge every month. As I say, it will be capped at £50 a month, which is similar to the average service charge. Of course, in many buildings the service charge is already far in excess of that.”
“We have chosen to focus both the grant scheme and the financing arrangements on cladding. That is for good reason, because the expert advice that we have received from the independent panel has consistently been that cladding is the greatest danger that needs to be combated. There may be other defects in buildings, and they will vary widely from building to building. They will have to be a matter for the building owner and for the homeowner. We, as a Government, are going to tackle the big issue here, which is cladding. We are going to end the cladding scandal that began with the Grenfell Tower tragedy.”
“This is a comprehensive plan to provide comfort, reassurance, certainty and confidence to as many leaseholders as possible.”
“We do not want any leaseholders to be paying for fire safety defects; we want that to be paid for by the building owners, the developers and the builders—the people who did this in the first place. As I said, there are circumstances where that is not possible, because there are building owners who no longer exist, who have gone bankrupt or who are shell companies overseas. That is the world we are dealing with. This is complex and multifaceted; it is not simple. In those situations where that is not possible, buildings above 18 metres, where the greatest risk lies, will take advantage of the new scheme and no leaseholder in that situation will have to pay for the remediation of unsafe cladding. Below 18 metres, where the risk is significantly lower, guided by our expert opinion, the financing arrangements will be in place.”
“I, too have been shocked by the allegations I have heard at the inquiry, which is why, as an interim step, before we hear the judge’s recommendations, I have announced that we are going to create a new national regulator of construction products and that I am going to review the testing procedures for construction products, which seem to be woefully inadequate.”
“The hon. Lady is wrong; as a matter of fact, we moved swiftly. We set up the Grenfell inquiry, which has heard those shocking allegations. We brought forward the Judith Hackitt review of building safety, which concluded that the regulatory regime needed to change. We have drafted and are now bringing forward the legislation to do that. I hope that the hon. Lady and Opposition Members will vote for the Fire Safety Bill and the Building Safety Bill when they come before this House soon, because that is the best way of creating the new regime, holding developers to account and making sure that local fire and rescue services and councils have the powers they need to take action against unsafe buildings.”
“That work has started and the numbers are already increasing. We are also working with the Treasury so that those individuals are not merely trained but can get the professional indemnity insurance that they need to do the job. If we can bring those two things together—that is happening quickly—we will be able to have a very significant increase in the number of individuals going out, doing the assessments, helping to give certainty to individuals and getting the works started.”
“I thank my hon. Friend for his support and advice in recent months, and that of all members of the Select Committee. We have received a large number of applications to the fund that, as he says, are incomplete. That reflects the fact that many building owners do not know as much as they should about the materials on their buildings, so a great deal of work needs to be done to assess them so that they can be funded, the work can be contracted and we can get workers on site to do the important building safety work as quickly as possible. There is a particular problem, which my hon. Friend alights on, with respect to the number of fully trained, competent assessors who can go out and do that important first step. We are working with the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors to dramatically increase the number of fully trained assessors.”
“I beg to move, That the Local Government Finance Report (England) 2021-22 (HC 1200), which was laid before this House on 4 February, be approved.”
“It recognises the role that councils have played every day at the forefront of our response to covid-19, and we thank and salute them for the hard work that they have done on our behalf. This settlement places them at the heart of our national recovery. I commend this motion to the House.”
“Councils have rightly embraced meeting and working remotely, and we will build on reforms to digitise our planning system, utilise our local digital fund and ensure that local authorities fully embrace moving more meetings, services and processes online, transforming how they deliver for residents, for their staff and for the country. We will work with councils to build back better from the pandemic, becoming a more prosperous, greener, safer and more neighbourly country. Local councillors will be a golden thread woven through the fabric of that better country. The settlement that we are debating today provides local councils with the resources that they need to plan for the future.”
“We will be setting out more details on that shortly through my right hon Friend the Chancellor. In each and every one of these endeavours, we see a very strong role for local councils, knowing their communities best and being at the heart of their future economic recovery. We do this while helping councils to seize new opportunities, particularly in technology. We do not intend to return to the way things were done before by default. As we leave the pandemic, we want to ensure that councils build back better, build better public services and embrace some of the good things that have come out of this unusual period.”
“Our £3.6 billion towns fund and the urban centre recovery taskforce will ensure that our towns and city centres are renewed and become once again the vibrant places that we love and want to see people living, working and shopping in again, attracting tourists from home and abroad. Our £900 million getting building fund is integral to this work, kickstarting local recoveries and delivering the next generation of roads, bridges, 5G networks and full-fibre broadband, with more than 50% of the shovel-ready projects already started, creating thousands of jobs all over the country. Our £4 billion new levelling-up fund will invest in high-value local projects, regenerating eyesores, upgrading town centres, breathing new life into local arts and culture and, above all, creating and sustaining jobs.”
“We will empower them to reboot and restart vital public services on which communities depend, from health to justice: making sure that vulnerable children get the care that they need; helping schools to see children returned safely and address lost learning, particularly in our most deprived communities; and increasing funding for social care to help tackle the backlog in assessments while laying the foundations for future reforms and a sustainable future for the sector for decades to come. As we tackle those issues, we will help councils to grapple with the sharp drops in footfall that we have seen on our high streets, and the knock-on effects for local businesses.”
“My Department and the Cabinet Office will do all we can to support local council officers and the brilliant staff and volunteers of polling stations the length and breadth of England with the hard work and challenges that lie ahead. We want to ensure that the process is as smooth as possible and, in particular, that as many schools as possible can remain open. We know that there are challenges posed by the pandemic, of course there are, and we also know that the scars are likely to take time to heal, but we are not cowed by them. We want to work together to learn from our experiences and to solve long-term problems in local government, because councils will be the thread running through our response to each and every one of these issues.”
“While the final decision on the increases rests with the Mayor, and with the Mayor alone, I would urge him to abandon this ill-judged pursuit of tax hikes and to behave responsibly at a time of great difficulty for Londoners. We want to unite and level up our councils, as we do the whole of the country, and to build back better from this pandemic and stronger than before. That starts with holding local polls in May this year. We said that further delaying elections would require a high bar, and the huge success of our vaccine programme gives us confidence that we can and should now move forward. More than ever, people deserve their say on issues ranging from safer streets to the level of council tax, and we are providing £15 million to ensure that our polls are made covid-secure.”
“Taxpayer support of this kind is never provided lightly, and in return for the increased flexibility afforded to councils next year, we expect sound financial management, with residents shielded from unaffordable increases. I wish I could say that here, in our nation’s great capital, the Greater London Authority is blazing a trail that others might wish to follow, but, sadly, the opposite is true. I have reluctantly placed before the House today a principle to allow for the Mayor of London’s request to increase council tax by £15 on band D properties without holding a referendum in order to fund transport concessions above the level available elsewhere. This brings the total increase in precept he is seeking from Londoners to nearly 10%.”
“We made promises and we have kept them, and we are making sure that local councils can continue to deliver for their citizens. We know that a handful of councils face serious financial challenges—some, it has to be said, due to very poor management, but others due to the exceptional events of the past year. There is quite a broad range, and today we are publishing details of the targeted support that we are providing to four councils unable to balance their budgets without some additional recourse to Government. This aid is provided on an exceptional basis, with these councils being subject to rigorous reviews of their financial positions, their governance and their ability to meet some or all of their budget gaps for the next year without Government funding.”
“We have also provided our published final position on the extension of the sales, fees and charges scheme from April to June 2021, a vital safety net for councils facing lost income as a result of covid-19, ensuring that everything—from the local car parks to our theatres, heritage attractions and all the things that local councils provide and which demand income to keep going—will have that guarantee of certainty and confidence to move forward until at least the mid-point of this calendar year. They will soon receive grant funding reflecting 75% of irrecoverable losses in their council tax and business rates income from 2020-21, with an up-front payment early in the financial year to aid cash flow. In both respects, we have listened to the sector, acted and provided them with the certainty and the resources they need.”
“We were able to provide certainty to local councils in December on allocations for £1.55 billion of un-ringfenced funding, and I am now very pleased to confirm, on top of the funding already provided in the settlement, the final allocations for £670 million of grant funding for local council tax support. This helps local authorities to continue reducing council tax bills for those who are finding it hardest to pay.”
“We will reform it over the course of next year to ensure that this significant amount of money is focused on the councils that are keenest to build, build, build and get the homes this country needs under way. While these measures are providing confidence and stability, we know that councils will continue to face very unusual challenges as a result of covid-19 for quite some time, despite all the success of the vaccine roll-out, so today I am setting out further details of nearly £3 billion in additional covid-19 support for councils next year.”
“Recognising the vital door-to-door services that councils deliver day in, day out to the most isolated, our settlement provides an extra £4 million to authorities in remote rural areas through the rural services delivery grant, taking the total to £85 million—the highest contribution to the delivery of public services in our rural areas to date. Lower-tier local councils will also receive a new £111 million lower-tier services grant, with main funding allocations for the full range of council services rising in line with inflation. Finally, we know that the new homes bonus accounts for a considerable part of funding for many councils. We are therefore implementing a further round of the bonus allocations, with the same 0.4% funding baseline as last year and no new legacy payments on the new round.”
“Balancing the contributions of national and local taxpayers, this settlement gives councils increased flexibility, with a 2% council tax referendum limit for most authorities and an extra 3% for social care authorities, which councils may choose to defer until 2022-23. I can inform the House that many councils, particularly Conservative ones, are indeed doing so. The council tax referendum principles are not a cap, nor do they force councils to set taxes at the threshold level. Councils should and must consider the financial concerns of local residents at this most challenging time, alongside the public’s support for action on keeping our streets safe and providing essential services.”
“That stands alongside an unprecedented package of covid-19 support this year and next year, totalling more than £11 billion directly to councils and £30 billion in additional help for local councils and their businesses and communities. The settlement strengthens social care, with councils able to access an additional £1 billion, comprising £300 million from the social care grant and a 3% adult social care council tax precept. It also supports children’s social care, helping councils to provide better services for the most vulnerable children in society, children in care and children with disabilities. Those vital services have experienced severe disruption over the last few months and will no doubt experience further demand as we ease lockdown and move forward as a country.”
“I am grateful to councils for their support for local businesses, enterprises and entrepreneurs; for keeping essential public services going against the odds; and for the part that they are now playing in the success of our national vaccine programme, ensuring that it reaches all communities and paving the way for our recovery as a nation later this year. From the outset of the pandemic, we promised to do everything within our power to support local authorities during this most unusual and difficult time. Our local government financial settlement shows that we have kept that promise, with a real-terms increase in core spending power and a guarantee that no council anywhere in the land will receive less funding than it did last year.”
“Among the many acts of heroism that we have seen over the past year, the quiet dedication, hard work and compassion shown by all who serve their communities in local government has truly shone through. I am sincerely thankful for their efforts. I am grateful to them for protecting the most vulnerable, including those who are shielding from the pandemic, and providing unprecedented levels of support through Everyone In to reduce rough sleeping, bringing it to the lowest levels that we have seen for many years.”
“Their memory and their example should, like the light in the darkness, kindle a new flame in our hearts to do the same in our time.”
“Memory is the constant obligation of all generations. Today we mourn with those who mourn, and we grieve with those who grieve. We pay tribute to those who survived, who all these years have borne witness to that great evil and have served mankind by their example. We honour and remember the memory of all the allied forces who suffered appalling casualties and freed Europe from the grip of tyranny. Today we acknowledge the resilience and strength of Jewish people here in the UK and around the world. Finally, we pay tribute to the memory of those non-Jewish heroes who saved countless lives; those who the people of Israel call the “righteous among the nations”. In an age of indifference, they acted. In an age of fear, they showed courage.”
“I want their generation never to go through those horrors, and I want this Parliament to be able to look out upon that new memorial as a lasting reminder and as a source of education and nourishment to future generations. I am also proud that the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government supports holocaust education and remembrance. Like other Members, I pay tribute to Karen Pollock and the Holocaust Educational Trust, and to Olivia Marks-Woldman and her team at Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, both of whom are worthy recipients this year of honours from Her Majesty the Queen. They have done a fantastic job of keeping the flame alight, despite covid-19. We gather today to fulfil a solemn obligation—an obligation of remembrance, to never allow the memory of those who died in the holocaust to be forgotten.”
“Friend the Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley), who knows perfectly well that his argument of partiality was tested at a judicial review and found to be wanting, only focuses our attention and increases our resolve to make sure that the memorial is built within the lifetime of this Parliament. I am grateful that it has received the full support of all living Prime Ministers, the Leader of the Opposition and the leaders of the other major political parties and major faiths. I know that some local residents, including my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West, have concerns about the memorial’s setting. However, I too walk there on a weekend when I am in Westminster, and I take my children to play in the playground. I can never forget that my children are the great-grandchildren of holocaust survivors.”
“The work of tackling antisemitism will continue, I hope, through a new holocaust memorial and learning centre, which currently awaits the outcome of a planning inquiry. If built, it will be a world-class memorial in our preferred location next to the Palace of Westminster. I thank Lord Pickles and Ed Balls, the co-chairs of the UK Holocaust Memorial Foundation advisory board, for their fantastic efforts in pushing this project forward. Some of the opposition to the memorial, the inaccurate reporting and, I am afraid to say, the statement we heard earlier from my hon.”
“Member for Croydon North (Steve Reed), in that regard. I was heartened to see the English Premier League adopt the definition, thanks in part to the efforts of the noble Lord Mann, using its fantastic and unique international reach to provide a powerful reminder to those who perpetrate antisemitism in sport around the world. I strongly urge other institutions, councils and universities that have not yet adopted it to do so as quickly as possible. The reluctance of some of our great universities to do so is difficult to explain. It is surely not beyond the wit of our greatest minds and our most liberal institutions to be able to criticise the state of Israel without lapsing into antisemitism. I am pleased that the universities of Oxford and Cambridge agree and have shown the way.”
“We see it on our university campuses, and I pay tribute to the fantastic work and bravery of the Union of Jewish Students, which does so much to ensure that Jewish students can enjoy all that university should have to offer. No realm of public life has escaped the cancer of antisemitism, which is why I am proud that we are the first Government to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism. It is a tool to identify how antisemitism manifests itself in the 21st century, but as the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) said, it is a tool only as useful as our willingness to apply it robustly. I am pleased that nearly three quarters of local councils have responded to our call and adopted it, and I am most grateful for the strong support of the shadow Secretary of State, the hon.”
“Members have spoken of today, endures as a grim memorial—one of the most unforgettable places that anyone can visit. It is distressing, but perhaps not entirely surprising, that covid-19 has itself given the hatemongers another excuse to dredge up and repurpose age-old antisemitic tropes, claiming, just as they did as far back as the black death and later, that the Jews were the cause of the virus. As we have heard in the course of this debate, we see antisemitism everywhere. As my hon. Friends the Members for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) and for Bury South (Christian Wakeford) said, we see it most prominently on social media, where, sadly, antisemitic abuse is rife.”
“We remember, as others have said, the subsequent genocides—the millions of victims of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia; the million-plus victims of the Rwandan genocide; the 8,000 Muslim men and boys who were murdered in Srebrenica. We heard powerful first-hand testimony from my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) of those deeply disturbing events within our own lifetime and within the continent of Europe. It is now more than 75 years since the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau. A year ago this week, I accompanied His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales to Jerusalem to mark that occasion. I was pleased that subsequently, we were able to make a £1 million donation on behalf of the United Kingdom to the Auschwitz-Birkenau Foundation to ensure that the camp, which many hon.”
“In doing so, we must draw on the power of the testimony of holocaust survivors. As many Members have said today, it is one of the greatest privileges to meet them. We need to ensure that their stories endure and are understood by us and by future generations. We have heard today from many Members, including my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell), about the connections that we draw between the memories of atrocities of the past and those of the present. He can be assured that I have already drawn his powerful call for action to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and the Metropolitan police war crimes unit.”
“I start by adding my thanks to my right hon. Friend the Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire (Stephen Crabb) and all those Members who secured this afternoon’s debate, including the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge), whose personal bravery and courage in combating antisemitism I think we all admire in this House. Yesterday, I was honoured to speak at the annual Holocaust Memorial Day ceremony honouring millions of Jewish people and other victims of Nazi persecution. Like thousands of people from across our country, I then lit a candle in their memory, joining them to be the light in the darkness, the theme of this year’s commemorations. As it is for many others, the holocaust is part of my family’s story, but it is a universal human tragedy as much as a personal one—a tragedy from which we can all learn something.”
“The Labour party position on this most important question is so inconsistent and contradictory that it is difficult to know where to start, but let me give a few basic facts to the House. The Leader of the Opposition thinks councils should not be given limited flexibility to decide themselves, locally, to raise their council tax rate. Yet, as we have already heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Felicity Buchan), the Labour Mayor of London has decided to hike his share of council tax by 10%, while still finding the room to up his personal PR budget to £13 million, run by a £130,000-a-year spin doctor based in California. I am all in favour of working from home, but that really is quite a leap.”
“I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “House” to end and add: “notes that council tax doubled under the last Labour Government, but has fallen in real terms in England since 2010; asserts that council budgets are a local decision for elected councillors and mayors, but local taxpayers are now protected from excessive council tax increases, a policy opposed by the LGA Labour Group; disagrees with the Labour Party’s ‘Land for the Many’ proposals to hit hard-working families and pensioners with a new homes tax; notes that the biggest increases in council tax have been under the Labour Government in Wales thanks to their council tax revaluation and lack of referendum protections; welcomes the fact that Conservative councils set the lowest average Band D rates; and further welcomes the additional government funding of over £30 billion provided by the Government to support councils during the Covid-19 pandemic.”.”
“They describe in their responses to the local government settlement that keeping their tax-raising instincts in check is frustrating, “an imposition”—not an imposition on tax payers, I hasten to add; they barely get a look-in. It is all there in black and white in the Labour councils’ responses to the local government settlement.”
“We all know where that leads for Labour councils: while council tax has fallen under the Conservatives in real terms since 2010, the last Labour Government presided over a doubling of council tax, and in Labour-run Wales it is trebling. Perhaps the Leader of the Opposition should pick up the phone, check in with his own local leadership from time to time and get their ducks in a row before opposing the very same flexibility that their councils are the greatest advocates of. From Leeds to Telford to the Wirral to Sefton, the A to Z of Labour local councils have demanded that we allow them to increase council tax “without limit”.”
“I certainly can. My right hon. Friend is fortunate to have a good Conservative council and it will benefit from the largest ever rural services grant in the settlement, which will give more money to help deliver the sorts of services that his constituents will rely on in a very rural part of the country. The shadow Communities Secretary as leader of Lambeth Council hiked council tax by more than £100, including a 5% rise at the height of the unemployment crisis presided over by the last Labour Government. Yet today he believes that councils should not even have limited flexibility to do the same. Labour leaders in local government do not want limited flexibility to increase council taxes; they want to abolish the right of local people to veto excessive tax increases altogether, so that they can increase taxes by as much as they want.”
“His first attempt after nine months has fallen apart at the slightest interrogation. Labour councils themselves want to raise taxes locally at or above the flexibility we are proposing. Labour and Liberal Democrat councils consistently have higher council taxes than Conservative councils. Labour councils consistently perform less well than Conservative councils. Whether it is Croydon or Nottingham, they are consistently letting down their local residents.”
“After Bristol City Council’s socialist energy company went bust, Warrington’s own version, Together Energy, decided it would be a good idea to buy it and then, of course, got into financial difficulties itself. Hackney Council planted thousands of trees, only for them to die of neglect—literally, Labour dead wood. Even the Labour Local Government Front Bench keeps up the tradition, inexplicably taking two shadow Secretaries of State to do the job of one actual one. The shadow Housing Secretary freely admits to reporters that she has no policies. The shadow Local Government Secretary reportedly rebuked a colleague in the shadow Cabinet for trying to develop some. From what we have heard today, perhaps it would have been better if he had taken his own advice.”