| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
DELEGATED LEGISLATION
Madam Deputy Speaker (Sylvia Heal): I propose to put together the Questions on the two motions.
Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 118(6) (Standing Committees on Delegated Legislation),
Contracting Out
- That the draft Contracting Out (Local Education Authority Functions) (England) (Amendment) Order 2003, which was laid before this House on 11th July, be approved.
International Immunities and Privileges
- That the draft Vienna Document 1999 (Privileges and Immunities) Order 2003, which was laid before this House on 3rd July, be approved.—[Ms. Bridget Prentice.]
Inner-City Poverty (Leeds)
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.— [Ms Bridget Prentice.]
7.11 pm
Mr. George Mudie (Leeds, East): I very much welcome this opportunity to debate the real challenges stemming from inner-city poverty in Leeds. The problem is especially severe in my constituency of Leeds, East, although I am sure that those of my colleagues who are present will present their own experiences to the House if time allows.
I thank Mr. Speaker for allowing me to initiate this debate. I also thank my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister for telling the recent party conference that No. 10 is now in listening mode. Many people hope that that is true, although many are cynical about it. I raise this topic in the belief that my right hon. Friend is prepared to open up debate, especially on domestic policy—as long as sensitive matters such as tuition fees are avoided. I hope that the time is right to raise pertinent questions about inner-city poverty, and about how we are dealing with it.
There is no argument about the problems caused by poverty in the inner city. Leeds is one of the most prosperous English cities, but great poverty and deprivation exist there side by side with wealth and material success. The scale of the deprivation is debatable, but a few statistics will give the House an idea of the size of the disparities that exist between communities.
In Leeds, 25 per cent. of households claim some sort of means-tested council benefits. That figure of one in four rises to 40 per cent. of households in some inner-city wards, and reaches 60 per cent. in smaller neighbourhoods. Although recorded crime is decreasing in Leeds as a whole, the rates vary. The lowest level of domestic burglary is 11 per 1,000 households—I am tempted to think that that is in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet (Colin Burgon)—but that figure rises to more than 126 per 1,000 households. Where someone lives therefore has a very clear effect on the burglary and crime rates they experience.
Death rates from heart disease also vary, rising from a low of 180 deaths per 100,000 people to a high of 320 per 100,000. That gives some idea of the effect of diet and poverty. Similarly, the rate of teenage conception—among girls aged between 15 and 17—is zero in some wards, but rises to 102 per 1,000 in other wards.
Figures show that in some schools, 40 per cent. of school leavers achieve the magic five GCSEs at grades A to C. Some schools achieve an average of 70 per cent., but in some inner-city schools the level is as low as 4 per cent. Unemployment averages 3 per cent. for the city. In some wards, the level is 1 per cent., but in some inner-city wards the rate is as high as 12 per cent. The ethnic groups do even worse, with those in the Afro-Caribbean community suffering an unemployment rate of 24 per cent.
Housing is also very important. I am delighted that the Under-Secretary of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) is to respond to the debate. Although I would prefer her constituency
to be called Castleford and Pontefract, I have the greatest respect for her and I hope that she will communicate to her colleagues the seriousness of some of the housing problems in Leeds. My predecessor was Denis Healey, who noted in one of his books that the Harehills area had the second highest population density in western Europe. I think only Milan has a higher density.In Harehills, the accommodation consists of back-to-back houses or through-terraced houses, with sloping streets and no gardens. Even so, families have raised generations of children there, despite the lack of open space—there is no full-sized football pitch in the area, for example. The housing is disgraceful and a blot on the city, built the century before last for working men. It has been refurbished time and time again, but kids are still being raised and families are trying to lead normal lives there.
I remember Chris Patten when he was Minister with responsibility for the environment coming to a meeting in my constituency—although he did not come to meet me, I hasten to add. He was so intrigued and shocked by what he saw that he had his driver take him round the area twice. He simply could not believe what it was like, but I suppose that the experience was good training for what he eventually encountered in Hong Kong.
North of my area lie two large council estates that were built on either side of the second world war. They have their good pockets, but they are largely unattractive. They need either to be modernised and refurbished, or demolished and replaced. The scale of the problem is tremendous.
I shall refer to this again, but so far nothing has happened to improve the housing deprivation in Leeds. That deprivation exists alongside the quality housing to be found in areas such as Elmet, where there are houses to die for. The disparity shows how different are the communities that exist in the one city.
I want to mention too the bizarre behaviour of the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in respect of arm's-length management organisations. The Minister is thoughtful and sensitive, and therefore unlike many of her colleagues. The Department forced ALMOs on Leeds city council. I fought the imposition, and lost, but I was a lone voice, and such things happen. The Department said that ALMOs would bring in money to refurbish housing and resolve all the city's housing problems. The council did as it was told, and broke up its housing department into six ALMOs.
Within six months of being set up, the ALMOs were inspected. Some of the officials in the ALMOs did not know the location of the areas that their bodies covered. They were inspected days or weeks after being appointed, and they were found wanting. In its wisdom, the Department has said that the ALMOs will not be given the money needed for capital spending. As a result, no refurbishment will take place. Is that not wonderful?
None of the local government officers I know will have sleepless nights as a result of that. Some will even say, "So be it, it will save us a lot of work." It is not the ALMOs that are being punished, but the poor tenants who live and raise their families in substandard housing. What is the sense in penalising tenants because of the ALMO? In some circumstances, that might make sense,
but to inspect the ALMOs within six months of their establishment and penalise them after some doubtful reports is extremely strange and I should love the Minister to raise the matter with her less sensitive colleagues.
Mr. Colin Challen (Morley and Rothwell): As my hon. Friend knows, I disagreed with his view about the creation of the ALMOs, but I agree 100 per cent. on his latter point. As a supporter of the concept, I perhaps wrongly did not anticipate that ALMOs would be inspected so soon after their creation. It was an unrealistic target to expect the ALMOs immediately to perform and gain stars so that they could obtain money. No one voted for them on the basis that they would be cheated—if that is the right word—out of their money owing to a bureaucratic inspection regime that they never understood.
Mr. Mudie: My hon. Friend makes a good point and I am glad that he has now seen wisdom. He gives me an opportunity to discuss something about which there are many stories in Leeds—choice-based letting, which is badly harming ordinary people. So far, despite heavy pressure, my area is the only one to refuse to accept that lunatic system for allocating houses, which is causing real distress in Leeds.
In Leeds—except on my patch—people are not offered a house, they have to bid for one. How can a blind lady on the housing list understand such a system? How can she see houses to make a bid? Last week, I visited the house of a poor lass who suffers so badly from Parkinson's that she cannot get out of her house because the stairs are so difficult. The last time she tried to go downstairs she fell. Yet presumably to get another house she has to get out to see the list. As she was in such a bad physical state, she was simply going to pen a letter.
A woman who visited my surgery had raised her kids in a five-bedroomed house but she now lives there alone and wanted a one-bedroomed flat: impossible under choice-based letting because she did not have priority. In another case, a boy and girl at the sensitive ages of 13 and 11 were sharing a bedroom in a two-bedroomed house, yet there was no priority for overcrowding. The system has been forced on people on the ground: if they do not accept it, they will not get the money. We have set up ALMOs and changed our letting system, adversely affecting already disadvantaged people, yet we still do not get the money.
As the time arrangements are propitious, I shall take this opportunity to raise another housing matter: equity release. I have dreamt of, sponsored, fought, argued and cajoled for an equity release scheme in my constituency. We have vacant land and a builder who specialises in building good houses cheaply. We have engineered a system whereby building societies will give mortgages that relate to rents. It is an honest attempt to move people from rented accommodation to homes of their own at very good rates. They can walk into a three-bedroomed semi that costs just above £50,000. Where could anyone get a new, three-bedroomed semi-detached house for about £50,000? Houses like that are worth £70,000 the minute people walk through the door, yet the Department would rather spend £15,000 doing up a council house that nobody much wants than give half that sum as a subsidy to persuade people to move from rented housing.
On a series of points—welfare benefits, recorded crime, death rates, health, education, employment and housing—we can see disparities and problems.
| Next Section
| Index | Home Page |