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Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I hope that the hon. Gentleman's general comments will be within the scope of the debate.
Mr. Cook: I am trying to explain how staff will be affected by the proposals, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I hope that that will be within the scope of the debate.
We are not talking about fat cats; we are not even talking about top officers in local authorities.
Mr. Cook:
If the hon. Gentleman would listen, rather than trying to get his name on to the record--as he has tried to do throughout the debate--he might learn something, and Bromsgrove might be a better place.
We should not even be talking about top officers, many of whom have done rather nicely out of reorganisation, either through generous pay-offs--for those taking early retirement--or through enhanced salaries for those taking promotion or moving on. Conservative Members have mentioned that. We should be talking about the thousands of hard-working and frequently low-paid staff in local authorities--the many people referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras--whose lives and careers have been thrown into disarray through no fault of their own.
They are the victims of a cynical and, in my view, dishonest political and bilious vendetta against authorities such as the effective and efficient Labour authority in Cleveland, whose only crime was to have the nerve to defend local services and defy the Government's unremitting drive to destroy a truly democratic local government structure, transferring its responsibilities lock, stock and barrel to a quango state. The county of Cleveland is rapidly becoming known as "quangoland".
I know, from the experience of my constituents who work in the local authority, the heartache and disruption that is being inflicted on so many local authority employees. Junior staff have had to apply for 30, 40--sometimes 50--different jobs, in the desperate hope of finding further employment. I know of highly qualified senior staff whose careers have been destroyed and who are now told that they are simply the casualties of the reorganisation. I know of examples where staff have reached such desperation about their future that they have been unable to eat or sleep. There have been reports in the local media that at least one employee was driven to the point where he took his own life. His fears over reorganisation were considered a significant factor.
Yet what happened to Cleveland county council--the current employer and which will be dismantled at the end of next month--when it offered modest counselling and
support? Abuse was piled on it, not least by some hon. Members, because it had the temerity to offer a counselling service to the very people whom we are discussing, who not only were in danger of a miserly level of compensation but were thrust into the maelstrom of emotional turmoil. I wonder what those hon. Members would say if they came face to face with those workers or their families tonight.
What do the Government, who so hate public services, offer to victims of the vendetta? The regulations offer the worst compensation ever offered in any reorganisation. The offer is far worse than the terms that the Government provide for civil servants or, indeed, Ministers. Is it any wonder that morale among so many workers is at rock bottom? They are seeing the services that they have worked so hard to build up ripped apart and their future thrown into chaos and confusion. They are not only losing their employment, but seeing the structures that they have helped to build over the years dismantled as they leave.
As a former construction worker, I can tell the House that when I took redundancy at the end of a contract, I was happy to walk away and see that what had been a green-field site when I walked on to it had become an operating entity contributing to the community. The individuals we are discussing will not have that benefit.
Against such a background, what hope is there for the consumers of local services, who are being treated with precisely the same cynical disregard as the staff? Day in, day out, they are discovering that the promises made to them by Ministers and their stooges in local government were total illusions. Let us remember some of the promises. Let us remember that Sir John Banham and his commission colleagues told the people of Cleveland that, with regard to costs, they estimated that the annual savings under their proposals would be, on average, £46 a household, or the equivalent of 10 per cent. of the average council tax bill. The people of Cleveland are paying more, the services are fewer and the people who provide those services are threatened with meagre compensation.
Only last night, my local evening paper carried on its front page what it described as "the full horror" that my constituents, my council's employees and the rest of the Teesside community face. It is a horror that is likely to include drastic cuts in services to some of the most vulnerable groups--the elderly, disabled people and the mentally ill. Yet local council tax payers will face bigger bills, and local employees the prospect of unemployment.
Mr. Michael Alison (Selby):
The hon. Member for Stockton, North (Mr. Cook) represents a neighbouring county to my own in North Yorkshire, and nobody who lives in and represents the north of England can dispute the fact that Cleveland has been at the eye of the storm in terms of local government change and reform in recent years. I understand the points that he made. As a
The hon. Gentleman has, however, cast a pall of gloom over the regulations before us, which do not merit the negative criticism that he levelled at them. This is, after all, a compensation measure.
I am obliged to my hon. Friend the Minister for Local Government, Housing and Urban Regeneration, who pinpointed and spelled out clearly the improvements that have been made to the measure compared with what was on offer in 1986. As I understand it, local government officers who are confronted with the dilemma of having to choose between transferring to new local authorities as a result of the reorganisation and thereby having to accept lower salaried posts, and ceasing employment in local government altogether and henceforth going into retirement with a pension, or accepting redundancy, will have a real incentive as a result of my hon. Friend's measure. They will have an incentive at least to try to find a new lease of life in local government.
That is particularly relevant to the parliamentary division of Selby, which is coterminous with our local government district. The hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) was good enough to refer to Selby in his speech. Indeed, I hardly ever see him on his feet without Selby district getting a notice, and I am obliged to him tonight. He is quite right to say that Selby has been rather hard hit by the local government reorganisation--the double whammy, as he referred to it.
I remind my hon. Friend the Minister that, out of a staff provision of about 250 local government officers in the Selby district, no fewer than 65, which is a high proportion, will depart from Selby district employment. Forty-three of them will go to York. That is a relief, because they will continue in local government service. No fewer than 23 are not in local government employment, because there does not seem to be the opportunity for them at present, and early retirement or redundancy looks like the only option for them.
For the 43 or so Selby local government officers who are going to York, the compensation offered this evening, which will extend for three years and represent the difference between old and new pay, frozen at the point of reorganisation, will be a welcome incentive for the younger men in particular to continue to try to make a career in local government, even if it means an initial drop in salary.
I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Minister for giving in the regulations--it may be a standard, but it is refreshing to have it reiterated--the welcome definition of remuneration, which is set out on page 2 in the interpretation clause. There are incidental expenses in changing one's local government employer, particularly in a rural area such as Selby district, where distances are quite extensive. There are the repercussions of the increased cost of travel from one's home to the new employer, of the uprooting of home and household and so on. Those are real and measurable disincentives to moving to a new local government employing authority, but I am glad to say that they are covered in the remuneration definition. I am grateful to the Minister for that.
Unquestionably, the taxpayer and the Government will pay for the scheme. I trust that local government will not have to foot the bill for the remuneration and
compensation schemes. My hon. Friend will be vividly aware that part of the purpose of the scheme is to encourage people not to take the redundancy route or to opt for early retirement but to continue to try to find work in local government.
A recurring problem that is acutely felt in the Selby district is that the cost of redundancy falls on the ratepayer, not on the taxpayer. That is why it is valuable to have a proposed scheme that will be funded by the Government, one of whose purposes is to avoid redundancy costs, which, as I say, fall directly on the shoulders of ratepayers.
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