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Mr. Harry Barnes (North-East Derbyshire): Does the hon. Gentleman accept the enhanced population figures with which my hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) dealt?
The other side of the coin of Westminster's population being swollen by 81 per cent. and being added to the calculation due to people entering the area to work is that areas such as north-east Derbyshire lose 18 per cent. of their population under the calculation because people work outside them. North-east Derbyshire therefore loses grants for that 18 per cent.
A sensible and reasonably weighted enhanced population figure would mean that Westminster would receive much less grant and areas such as north-east Derbyshire much more. Such a methodology for the standard spending assessment would be much more reasonable.
Mr. Hughes:
There are, of course, two sides to each element. In a sense, it is swings and roundabouts--sometimes one loses, sometimes one wins. Such arguments have to be put by individual local authorities. Indeed, local authorities have to try to persuade their political friends that such changes should be made.
I turn to one element that affects the borough of Harrow in my constituency: the area cost adjustment, of which much has been made in this debate. What happened with the Association of London Government? It was a Labour party stitch-up. The Labour party in central London did not, of course, want to lose the money that it would inevitably lose if there were a change in the area cost adjustment, as has been suggested.
What happened? Outer London Labour boroughs--not all, but some--voted with the Labour party in inner London to say that they did not want any change in the area cost adjustment and that further studies should be carried out. They did that because they wanted to maintain Labour party solidarity--not solidarity with the people in the boroughs. Their decision had nothing to do with fairness. Local government should not be run in that way.
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I wish to refer to the Liberal Democrats, for whom the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Rendel) made a characteristic speech. It is also characteristic that, although the Liberal Democrats bang on about these matters throughout the country, there has been one Liberal Democrat Member in the Chamber--perhaps on a shift system--to listen to or take part in the debate. The Liberal Democrats tell us that they would pay for extra services, and speak as if they were the only honest people in politics. They always refer to the extra penny on income tax that would pay for these extra services.
Even in the limited speech that we heard from the hon. Member for Newbury, we heard about the tax increase. However, that increase would not be a penny--a penny does not sound like very much. It is interesting that, when detailed opinion polls are done, people think that the Liberals are talking about just a penny more. They do not understand that the Liberals are really talking about £12 a month in extra taxation for an average wage earner. When that is explained, people are much less ready to back the Liberals' suggestion for an increase in income tax.
The hon. Member for Newbury was not talking about £12 a month, and his shopping list would amount to more like £24 or £26 a month. Add that figure to all the extra money that the Liberals want to spend in other areas--which were not mentioned tonight--and we are speaking about £30 or £40 a month in extra taxation. We can dismiss the Liberals' tricks from this debate, and I now wish to refer to my borough of Harrow.
First, I thank the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, Central (Sir P. Beresford), for his patience in dealing with a delegation from some parties in Harrow. I am afraid to say that the matter has become so politicised by the Liberal and Labour parties in Harrow that it was impossible to have a joint delegation. As is typical of the Liberals in Harrow, so political did they want to make the matter that they did not want to consult the Members of Parliament who represent Harrow. We had to fight to find out when the delegation was visiting my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary.
Even to this day, the Liberal council has refused to give me the paper that it gave my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary in support of its argument. The council tried to fob me off with a paper that I was told was the paper presented, but I know different. All the council gave me was the crib sheet from which it was working when it spoke to my hon. Friend. I am grateful to him for seeing that delegation, and I know from the people who attended that he listened patiently to what was said.
I am also grateful to my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary for the patient way in which he has listened to the arguments from me and my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow, East (Mr. Dykes). We have sought to put to him the important point about the area cost adjustment, and--even if it is not this year--I hope that he realises that outer London needs a change in the adjustment. We have made our points to him with some force, and he has listened patiently.
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Harrow has made some points about its education standard spending assessment, but even the council officers say that their argument is weak and that they are obliged to accept that the methodology of the Department is right. For example, Harrow has argued that it has lost money in education SSA because of a change in the way in which the number of income support claimants is measured. The council wants to return to the old method. I can understand that--Harrow did better under the old method.
The old method of collecting data was based on a 5 per cent. survey which showed that, in 1997-98, there would be 10,626 children of income support claimants in Harrow schools. When a 100 per cent. survey was done, it showed that the figure would be 9,726--a 3.5 per cent. reduction. That does not sound like much, but it is a significant amount of money out of Harrow's education SSA. It can hardly be argued that it would be right to return to the previous way of assessing these matters--a 5 per cent. survey--rather than using the current 100 per cent. survey. Much as I would like to see the money going back to Harrow, no one could argue logically for the use of the old methodology. There must be boroughs and councils up and down the country that gain from the new methodology and that would therefore object strongly if we were to return to a less accurate way of doing things.
This is a tight settlement for Harrow, and I do not object to that. In running the economy, the Government must take account of the fact that local authority expenditure is 25 per cent. of the whole of Government expenditure. Therefore, not controlling local authority spending would be foolish indeed. That is certainly not the way in which I or my voters would expect a Conservative Government to behave. What do we get from Harrow? We get an absolute torrent of invective from the Liberals, who do not control the council but form the largest group. They say that they have been handbagged by the Government, and they have used the word "mugged" in their newsletters. They said that they expected £22 million extra from the Government, but that was not true and it never has been true. That figure was the difference between their wish list and the money that was to be made available to them.
I pay tribute to the Liberal party, as it is a fantastic campaigning organisation. In terms of propaganda, it is second only to Goebbels. The Liberals are wonderful at getting their message across. If they would use only 1 per cent. of the energy they use in putting across their propaganda in running the finances of Harrow council properly, Harrow would be a better place today. For three years, we have suffered under a Liberal-run administration whose profligacy has been amazing.
There is a hole in the council's budget--it has had to threaten large cuts in delegated school budgets--because it has spent money on pet projects, notable among which has been the establishment of a driving centre. That is a centre where trainee drivers can go and where the highway code can be taught. It is commendable, but is it a priority? A driving centre in Harrow--which was opened when my party controlled the council--ran reasonably successfully for a number of years, but it was a huge drain on resources. When the time came to make a choice between social services and education on the one hand and keeping open the driving centre on the other, a Conservative administration in Harrow had no choice and closed the driving centre. I think that was the right decision.
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When they took power, the Liberals made it a priority to reopen the driving centre. How can that possibly take priority over education? They have spent money on pet projects and ordered council officers to stop looking for savings. Everyone who has been on a council knows that, throughout the year and outside the normal budgeting process, the council has to look for sensible savings. It has to look for money that is wasted or that can be clawed back to be spent on priority areas, and that is true whether the council is run by the Labour party or the Conservatives. The Liberals have stopped council officers doing so, have spent money on pet projects and have upped their councillors' allowances to the tune of £190,000, which is a lot of money for a council. The Liberals have spent that money on other things and have a hole in their budget which is difficult to fill.
The Conservatives have not been in power in Harrow, so we have not been able to make those savings. All that we can do is to try to patch up the budget as it stands. It is clear from the Conservative alternative budget, however--the Labour and Liberal parties even tried to block debate on that, but failed because we called a special council meeting--that it is possible to maintain school budgets without any cuts, retain the vital social services threatened with cuts and make cuts in other areas. That is what a responsible council would do in Harrow. That is what anyone running the council who meant business would do.
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