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5.58 pm
Sir Peter Fry (Wellingborough): There used to be a saying among Conservative Members: "Vote Labour for higher taxation." We still say that, but we have just had a wonderful illustration of the fact that, if we vote Liberal Democrat, we shall be taxed even more than we would be taxed by a Labour Government. All that we have heard is a catalogue of complaints about more and more money being required. Does the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Rendel) not realise that there always will be a greater demand for public expenditure? He seems to forget that, because his party will never be in government--unless the Labour party lets the Liberal Democrats into government--he will never have responsibility for raising taxation to meet his demands.
I would prefer, however, to spend a few minutes commenting on what we have heard from the official Opposition. I am coming to the conclusion that, if Westminster council did not exist, it would have to be invented. Virtually all the attacks on the policies of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and his colleagues relate to the anomalies that Opposition Members claim exist in that council. I find it much more interesting that--apart from a peculiar phrase about root-and-branch reform--we have heard very little about what the party that expects to take office intends to do about local government. Its policy on capping, for instance, is rather unclear. Does it want to abandon capping completely, and allow councils to let rip and spend as much as they like--obviously, the hon. Member for Newbury would like one council to be able to do that--or will the right hon. Member for Dunfermline, East (Mr. Brown) make that impossible?
We cannot assume that a large amount of extra money will be available for local government purposes. We should ask ourselves, therefore, which party is the more hypocritical. Is it the Conservative party, which says, "That is the amount that you will receive; you must make the best of your budget within it," or is it the party that says, "Nowhere near enough is being spent in this or that part of the country, but there will be no extra money to fund what needs to be done"? I suggest that the official Opposition's stand is totally hypocritical and totally inconsistent.
There are those who complain that insufficient grant leads to a considerable reduction in services. As I have said before, we have been given no idea of how any increase in services--or even leaving them at their present level--can be maintained if we stick to the present guidelines for two years. Let me remind the House, and the Opposition in particular, that when a new system is adopted, the present system is generally supported by most people in local government. They may not like this or that aspect, but the overall feeling is an unwillingness to undergo another major change. As my hon. Friend the hon. Member for Bury, South (Mr. Sumberg) pointed out, there is increasing concern about the way in which the area cost adjustment has been reached in recent years. It is often forgotten that that is a comparatively recent problem, because the formula was revised only three or four years ago.
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I have made it abundantly clear on previous occasions in the House that, in my view, the way in which the ACA is currently calculated is grossly unfair to the county of Northamptonshire. Despite what my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Bedfordshire (Sir D. Madel) has said, I find it difficult to understand why Bedfordshire receives £100 per pupil per year more than we do in the adjoining county. I accept, however, that if the proposals in the Elliot report had been introduced for 1997-98, the system would have been fairer. Northamptonshire would have gained up to £13 million, but--and it is a big but--many local authorities would have received less, and presumably the squeals that would have come from those authorities would have carried more weight than the arguments advanced by those who felt that they were being unjustly treated under the current arrangement.
I agree that all the local authority organisations are resisting change, and I understand that it will take time to negotiate the changes that I would like. I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement this afternoon, and for his answer to my intervention, but what I would like to hear--as, I am sure, would my constituents, no matter which party they vote for--is a similar commitment from Opposition Front Benchers. It is no good talking in vague terms about a fairer system without giving some indication of how the present system is to be made fairer.
Mr. Robert Ainsworth:
Am I right in interpreting what the hon. Gentleman is now saying as meaning that he intends to vote for what he has exposed as a totally unfair settlement for his county?
Sir Peter Fry:
Over the past three years, I have expressed extreme concern about the way in which the area cost adjustment has been defined and operated. Two years ago, I refused to support the Government in the Lobby because I felt that--
Mr. Ainsworth:
The hon. Gentleman is fishing now.
Sir Peter Fry:
The hon. Gentleman asked me a question. If he is kind enough to allow me, I will now answer it.
Two years ago, I refused to support the Government because I believed that no progress was being made in ironing out the difficulties of the area cost adjustment. Last year, largely owing to the intervention of all the Northamptonshire Members of Parliament, the Government decided to set up a review of the ACA under Professor Elliot. We made a start in the right direction, and that, along with the amount of grant that we received last year, enabled me to feel that I could support the Government in the Lobby.
This year, I made it clear to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, the Chief Whip and my constituents that, unless there was a meaningful move towards a change in the ACA, I would consider my position in regard to supporting the Government tonight. I have received an assurance from my right hon. Friend, and I have heard not a word in support of that from the Opposition. I--dare I say it?--would rather believe the assurance that I have been given, in very clear terms, because I think that it is generally agreed that some change should take place. That is what the Government have promised, and I would like to think that the Opposition have the courage to make the same kind of commitment.
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As I have said, we have experienced problems in Northamptonshire. It has been claimed that the county council is underfunded by some £28 million. That, of course, is the difference between what the Labour county council would like to spend and what the Government feel that it should spend. When we start to investigate the source of that £28 million, we find that, interestingly, there have been enormous overspends for years in both the education and the social services budgets. It is fairly simple to put a finger on where things went wrong in the education budget. The county council decided to educate all the rising fives without obtaining any Government grant to support it; the cost has continued to increase, and now accounts for some £9 million or £10 million of expenditure--money that comes directly from the council tax payer, without Government grant.
We have not looked closely enough at the question of social services. One of the biggest grey areas in recent years has been policy on residential care. Labour's policy in Northamptonshire, where it has been the controlling party for the past few years, has undoubtedly been politically biased: it has attempted to dissuade people from choosing private home care rather than care in county council homes. The committee of the council met on 13 June 1996. The report from the director states:
For example, a constituent of mine who is 91 years of age was moved into a home outside his home town. As a result, he could not be visited, he was grossly unhappy and he asked to be moved back. I am still waiting to hear from the county social services department whether he can be moved back into the town in which he has lived for many years. There are two private homes, the costs of which are certainly not as high as those of the county homes, yet he is refused the choice that he wants: to stay in the town in which he, his friends and family have lived. That is the choice that the Labour county council has given him. It ill behoves anyone to defend such a policy when it leads to a certain amount of personal unhappiness for elderly people.
The refusal to give people choice is unfair, but the practical matter of cost must also be considered. It has been estimated that about 14,000 people are in residential care in my county. Private home owners claim that they could save up to £100 a week on the true costs of running the county homes. The total saving would amount to £7 million. If it were only half true, the saving would still be more than £3 million and the county council could have avoided some of the cuts that it has had to make this year and in previous years.
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I understand that a council cannot suddenly change from putting most people into county homes to putting no one into county homes. A gradual alteration in policy and a rundown in the present structure would be necessary. My criticism is that the county council has known for at least three years of the difficulties that it was going to have. It made no attempt to make major changes to its policy, so it is guilty of mismanaging the social service needs of the people of Northamptonshire. It has restricted choice and undertaken unnecessary over-spending. It has therefore failed to change its policies and to live within its budget.
The effect is that the county council has had to make cuts elsewhere--in other social services--which, if it had followed a sensible policy, would not have been necessary. Other people in Northamptonshire have suffered unnecessarily because of the service reductions that the county council has had to make and because of its failures. I am therefore entitled to accuse its leadership not just of being hypocritical and of pursuing party dogma but of not getting down to managing the council's resources properly.
The county council has decided that, for 1997-98, there will be no increase in the amount paid per pupil to school governors and managers--a real cut in funding. It has already refused in the current year to pass on to school managers and governors about £2 million that the Government had allowed it in last year's settlement. To reduce the amount in real terms and to make no allowance whatever for a teachers' pay increase next year clearly passes the buck from the county council to school governing bodies. Despite that, the local education authority still keeps about 25 per cent. of total education income.
This year, the county council has decided to cut hard in many regions because, according to the blurb from county hall, the position is so serious, but the truth is that the county council, or the LEA, are acting too late. They are just making matters worse than they might have been if they had tackled the problems earlier.
I understand that my friends on the county council who represent the Conservative cause will present an alternative budget that would increase the moneys given per pupil to schools. That will be an excellent proposal because it will help schools to fund the teachers' pay increase. I commend that alternative budget to the Labour party and to the Liberal Democrats and hope only that they will vote for it.
"Action . . . will continue to ensure maximum use of services that are already funded. This means that directly provided services . . . must be used to the maximum."
The report goes on to refer to
"Making sure that residential beds provided by the county council do not remain empty."
For years, the policy of those who obey the orders of their political masters has been to steer to a county council home anyone who applies for or needs to go into residential care, despite the fact that it is cheaper and often more convenient to go into a private home. People are deliberately not informed of their rights of choice. It is interesting to see how the Labour party in power operates against individual constituent's interests.
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