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Mr. Evennett: As the hon. Gentleman has been listening to my speech, he will know the answer to his question. The propaganda, the fear factor and the activities of the local Labour party have frightened parents. The LEA tries to claim that opting out will be the end of civilisation as parents know it. I mentioned Hawksmoor school earlier. The activities of Greenwich were phenomenal in trying to urge parents and teachers to vote against opting out. The politically motivated Labour party and LEA, using the fear factor, encouraged parents not to vote for opting out. I believe that that will change when a Conservative Government are re-elected at the general election. There will be a groundswell of support for opting out, despite the opposition of the Labour party.
The other new education Bill relates to nursery provision. I have always been a keen supporter of nursery education and some years ago I served on the Select Committee carrying out a detailed study on pre-school provision. For many children, it is a vital building block for their future. Under the previous Conservative administration in Bexley, there was a phased programme for increasing nursery provision. That is continuing under the Labour-Liberal Democrat regime.
I welcome the proposals in the Gracious Speech to increase the provision of nursery education for four-year-olds and the pilot scheme to introduce vouchers. At a recent meeting with the Labour chairman of Bexley education committee, I deplored the council's decision not to participate in the pilot scheme. Of course, that decision was taken for party political reasons and not in the interests of Bexley children. Labour deplores parental power and choice because it reduces Labour's control and its ability to dictate local education policy and provision.
I have never believed that local authority nursery provision is the only worthwhile pre-five provision. I believe, as do all Conservative Members, in choice and variety. I accept that, nationally, playgroups have done a marvellous job and I would not want them to be destroyed or diminished in the job that they do and the reputation that they hold. Many independent nursery schools and independent primary schools with nursery classes also provide a good service. Parents must be allowed freedom of choice. Competition between providers of nursery education will undoubtedly improve standards and enhance that sadly underrated sector of education. We should all pay tribute to the nursery teachers and nursery nurses who have a rewarding but demanding working week, and whose career development and progression are often considerably less structured than those in other sections of the teaching profession.
It is essential that nursery education is relevant to the needs of the pre-school child, and is of high calibre. Mere child minding, or constant structured play, is not the answer. The proposed legislation will allow best practice to develop, give parents more real choice and provide the foundation for effective provision for nursery education.
The Labour party always cries out for more nursery education, yet manages to oppose any constructive proposals. Despite what it says, the general public, especially parents, will welcome the Bill as a constructive step that will increase nursery provision for all four-year-olds. The expansion of nursery education to cover all four-year-olds has been an aim for more than 25 years. Now, under the Conservative Government, it looks as if that aim will start to become a reality.
I have concentrated on the nursery proposals in the Queen's Speech, but I am also convinced that the overall legislative package will command widespread support throughout the country. I welcome the fact that this year's programme is not overburdened with Bills. Over the past few years, many of us have been concerned that there has been too much legislation. Conservatives believe in less legislation, but effective legislation.
Mr. Peter L. Pike (Burnley):
I do not intend to follow
However, I shall briefly mention two previous speeches. In the first of those my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Grocott) talked about unemployment, which we all know is still unacceptably high. He also referred to the problem of the large number of people who, although employed, are in low-paid, temporary and part-time jobs.
When I look in my constituency, in the local press or at the job centre, I see that too high a proportion of the jobs on offer are temporary, even in the public sector, which traditionally has permanent jobs. There are also far too many part-time jobs on offer to people who seek full-time jobs--although I accept that things are different if people actually want part-time jobs. An appalling number of jobs are low paid--an issue that I have raised many times in the Chamber and elsewhere in the House. I mean not simply low pay but poverty pay, which is unacceptable. It is a scandal that such low levels of pay should exist in Britain today. I find nothing in the Queen's Speech to address any of those problems. Indeed, it is regrettable that, after 16 and a half years in office, the Government are allowing them to get worse and worse, and they have still failed to do anything to change direction.
I shall also refer to the speech by the hon. Member for Staffordshire, Moorlands (Sir D. Knox), who spoke about the business of the House--I was going to call the hon. Gentleman's constituency Leek and Moorland, but I believe that that is a building society. I serve on the Procedure Committee, which recently considered the Jopling reforms so as to produce a report for the House to read before deciding what it wanted to do in the new Session. The matter was dealt with towards the end of the previous Session. In evidence both from the Leader of the House and the shadow Leader of the House, it became clear how much the introduction of a November Budget has changed the procedures of the House and how great an effect that has had on the Government's legislative programme. Whichever party is in government, we shall have to address that problem.
As the hon. Member for Moorlands rightly said, if the Queen's Speech is on 15 November and the Budget and the debate on it only a couple of weeks later, there is almost no time for either the present Government or an incoming Labour Government to arrange for the Second Readings of Bills and to get them into Committee before the turn of the year. We need to tackle that problem because it will cause a major headache for any Government, and delay legislation.
I shall pick out three main statements from the Queen's Speech. The first is:
The Government will probably not make a 12 per cent. reduction but will suggest a smaller figure, in the hope and belief that people will say that as it is not as bad as they expected, it is acceptable. If that is the Government's intention, they have got it sadly wrong.
Overseas aid is in the interests of this country, because if we do not assist other nations, we must accept that they may be forced to take decisions that are not in the world's best environmental interests. We all know that environmental issues are no respecters of national boundaries, and decisions taken in other parts of the world can have severe environmental consequences for us, however many thousands of miles away we may be. I emphasise my hope that what is in the Gracious Speech about aid will prove to be true.
Oxfam says:
I accept that the loan scheme has a neutral interest rate and that repayment is index-linked to allow for inflation, but most students--certainly my two daughters, and others of whom I am aware in my constituency--have debts to banks and other people when they finish their education. The student loans scheme is adding to the burden of debt that those students face. Students finishing
education may also be entering into relationships, getting married or wanting to buy a house. They will find that they must repay student loans, as well as bearing those other financial burdens. While looking at how loans can be provided in the future, the Government must reconsider whether the loan system is the best way of financing those who go on to university education.
My main comments today concern the housing Bill. In principle, I welcome the fact that we are to have a housing Bill, but I do not believe that that Bill will in any way address the real housing problems in Britain in 1995. The Government will fail to deal with the problem once again. I accept and agree that people should have the right to buy from housing associations, but we must look at that issue carefully. I am worried about the population figure of 3,000 that has been set for a village, as it is an arbitrary figure, but that issue can be properly debated and all of its implications can be considered.
When I heard that the Government were extending the right-to-buy scheme, I thought that one of the things that they might do was to give councils the right to buy back houses from people who are unable to sell them, although I do not mean that in the way that the Government might think. I know many people who would love it if the council were able to buy back their house, but the council has neither the finance nor the powers to be able to do that. The Government might receive more votes in many parts of the country if they gave councils the right--as well as the finance and the powers--to buy houses back.
A few weeks ago, I received a letter from the Manchester and District housing group. The letter stated:
A survey done by the Lancashire housing inquiry was presented to the right hon. Gentleman. The committee involved in the inquiry was chaired by the then Bishop of Burnley, the Right Rev. Ronald Milner. The report stated that there were 34,000 households in Lancashire on council waiting lists, and added that 9.9 per cent. of the private housing stock in Lancashire was unfit, while a further 21.7 per cent. was in need of renovation. The report added that more than 50 per cent. of the private housing stock in Burnley, Pendle, Hyndburn, Blackburn and Rossendale was built pre-1919, and that is why so many houses need improvement.
Shelter says that it believes that
People are worried about what the Government are going to do to housing benefit in the Budget. Will they make it more difficult for people to be able to afford the portion of the rent that they must meet if they do not get full housing benefit? Will they make local authorities pick up a bigger share of the cost of housing benefit? That is a danger.
I received a letter this week from the Bradford and Northern housing association which referred to the opening up of social housing and difficulties with rent. The letter stated:
Of course councils will be able to deal with the worst areas, but in a constituency such as mine, which has many long terraces of pre-1919 housing stock, a single empty house which is not maintained can gradually destroy a complete terrace. What are local councils supposed to do if they do not have sufficient resources? That major difficulty remains.
The Government have failed to recognise that the only way to deal with housing problems--the shortage of property to rent and the need to improve housing stock-- is to make more cash resources available. The Government cannot abolish homelessness by virtue of an Act of Parliament. The shortage cannot be dealt with unless there are houses for the people. That is the difficulty.
My final point concerns houses in multiple occupation. Recently, the Campaign for Bedsit Rights said:
"A substantial aid programme will be maintained, focused on the poorest countries". The second is:
15 Nov 1995 : Column 85
"Legislation will be introduced to enable students to choose between private and public suppliers of subsidised loans." My final extract is:
"My Government will bring forward legislation to make better provision for housing and to promote the smooth running of construction contracts."
The Government have floated the idea, and allowed it to become general knowledge, that they may consider a 12 per cent. reduction in the overseas aid budget. I do not believe for a moment that they intend to do that. The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, who is now on the Government Front Bench, was closely involved with overseas aid in his previous position, and I know that Baroness Chalker is also committed to that cause, but my theory is that it will not be she who determines how much is spent on aid. I believe that if it were her decision, there would be no reduction.
"Instead of cutting aid, we believe that the UK should be increasing aid in line with its international promises and obligations. In this year's budget, aid agencies are calling for . . . No further cuts in the aid Budget . . . Bilateral assistance to be maintained at its current level. In 1996-97, this would require an increase in the ODA's total budget of £100 million". The Government must not allow aid to be cut either in cash or in real terms. We want to see an increase. I give the Minister the benefit of the doubt, as I know that he is sympathetic to overseas aid. I hope that he will give to the Government the message that there is an overwhelming feeling throughout the country, and that people want us to move towards the United Nations target of 0.7 per cent. of GDP. We are way below that target, and the figure has fallen in percentage terms. I am realistic and I know that the target will not be achieved overnight, but we must not make further direct reductions; we should move in the right direction.
The second issue to which I want to refer is student loans. I was surprised to hear people questioning whether students should be able to get a loan from the private or the public sector, because that is not addressing the real problems being faced by so many of our students. The student loan system has been discredited. It is wrong, and the Government should reconsider their approach to student finance. I accept that it is not an easy issue, and there is a lot of money involved, but it is totally unrealistic to expect students to take out loans which they must pay back when they enter work and reach a certain percentage of average national earnings. Not all students get work speedily nowadays when they finish their course.
"An independent study carried out for the 30 housing associations who are part of the Regional Equity Group has revealed an astonishing difference between the Government agencies spending on Regeneration in the North. Most agencies spend over 45 per cent. of their allocation in the North but the Housing Corporation allocates for housing associations less than half of this at 22 per cent." While we recognise that there is a demand for more resources in the north because of deprivation and aging properties, insufficient funding is provided to meet the problems that occur. Housing Minister after Housing Minister has visited my constituency in the 12 years that I have been a Member of Parliament. I should warn any Housing Minister not to come to Burnley, as nearly all of them have lost their jobs and ended up on the Back Benches after visiting Burnley.
A previous Housing Minister--the right hon. Member for Ealing, Acton (Sir G. Young), who has moved on to higher things in the Treasury--once said that Burnley had a peculiar cocktail of problems. My constituency had a traditionally high percentage of home ownership, a high percentage of older properties and a high percentage of people on low wages. The combination of those factors meant that Burnley faced a particularly difficult situation.
"there is an annual shortfall of at least 100,000 affordable homes to rent". That and similar figures are quoted by many independent bodies which believe that there is a shortage of housing to rent in this country. There is nothing within the Gracious Speech--I am sure that the housing Bill will not deal with it--that will solve the problem by meeting the housing demand. The Government fail to recognise that many people choose to rent, or have to rent because they have no alternative.
Another aspect to which I want to refer is homeless households. Shelter has said:
"Local authorities' duties to provide emergency help for homeless people, including families with children and vulnerable single people, are to be seriously weakened. Local authorities will have a duty to provide a minimum of 12 months temporary accommodation to homeless people who are in priority need and who are not intentionally homeless. Some groups will be excluded altogether from even emergency housing."
During the Government's consultation on homelessness, almost everyone said that they had got it totally wrong and that their proposed solutions would not solve the problem. I have said on previous occasions that the Government have made homelessness a national problem. Some 12 or 15 years ago, homelessness was a problem for the big cities. It is now a problem throughout the country, and it exists in almost every constituency. A combination of the Government's social security and housing policies has created that problem, but their current proposals will not make the situation better, and could make it worse.
"In particular, if social housing is opened up to the private sector, under the principle of increasing choice, we are concerned that there should be a level playing field in terms of both regulation and standards . . . there is no doubt that, even amongst the best private landlords, standards of properties and service are different and affected by commercial motivation."
That is a great worry to many people. The private sector is not meeting public demand for rented accommodation. I have often said that without housing benefit and state intervention there would be no private rented sector.
On the condition of stock in the private housing sector, the Bradford and Northern housing association went on to say that if the Government move away from the mandatory grant system
"it will leave those in unfit housing which is outside of a particular strategy in a very precarious position." I have met and written to various Ministers on that issue. We all know that in many parts of the country, councils are unable to meet their obligations for mandatory
15 Nov 1995 : Column 88housing grants. Mandatory housing grants are, in theory, public led, because they depend on whether the public ask for grants.
In theory, if, following the means test introduced by the Government for grants, a house meets certain conditions, the Government have to give a grant. Because the Government know that that policy is failing in many boroughs, they intend to leave it to local authorities to target particular areas. But if additional resources are not provided, the problems will not be solved.
"Two in five houses in multiple occupation were unfit in 1991 and the risk of death from fire was 28 times higher than in self-contained housing". Burnley borough council has highlighted its belief that there should be a licensing system. It has responded to the issues of multiple occupation and homelessness in detail. One problem is that although the Government consult, we all know that they will not take any notice of the results. They make their decision before the consultation takes place. People increasingly believe that it is pointless to respond. However, I hope that on these issues the Government will listen carefully.
Burnley borough council says that a licensing system is necessary because
"it is important to protect the health and safety of tenants".
That underlines the point made by the Campaign for Bedsit Rights to which I referred earlier. The council continues:
"it ensures that houses in multiple occupation known to authorities in England and Wales are inspected; that HMOs are inspected to the same standards throughout the local authorities". The council says that such a licensing system would be
Those are all objectives that we should seek to achieve. The council says:
"a useful tool in reducing the number of deaths."
"the licensing system gives a more pro-active approach, generally, so preventing as many problems occurring." Many hon. Members know from their own constituencies the problems caused by such properties, often occupied by poor or unemployed people. Some are appalling. Just going through the door makes one ask oneself why people should have to live in such conditions in 1995.
The housing Bill should do more than just touch on the problems; it should ensure that there is an adequate licensing system so that units of multiple occupation are of the best possible standard throughout Britain and, most
importantly of all, so that those who live in them do so safely without running the risk of being burnt because of the failure to meet many of the safety requirements.
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