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Colin Burgon (Elmet): I pay tribute to my hon. Friend's standing in Leeds. He is an outstanding Member of Parliament who is well rooted in the locality. I am lucky enough to know his constituency fairly well as I was born on the Gipton estate and taught for about 16 years on the Seacroft estate. Did not both those estates represent radical solutions to the problems that Leeds faced at the time? What gave them cohesion was common employment in engineering and, especially, tailoring. But given that times have changed, does my hon. Friend not agree that we need radical solutions to give people the type of homes that they want to live in and to make those places attractive? Does he agree that local government should be the agency to deliver that, but that unfortunately, far too often, the Government—our Government—have been too critical of local government? Does he agree that they should adopt a far more positive role to enable local government to pursue radical solutions, as it did in the 1930s and 1940s?
Mr. Mudie: That was an excellent contribution; my hon. Friend did not even take a breath. My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, West (Mr. Battle) is a great admirer of Rev. Jenkinson, who designed and steered through the building of a number of such estates. They were seen as a great thing in the 1930s, because they got people out of the slums of inner-city Leeds. The difficulty is that 70 years have passed, and time and people have moved on. We have to move on, too, with solutions that are relevant to people. I cannot understand the Department wanting to put money into rented housing when for half the sum it could put people into owner occupation, bringing money to constituents of mine who would never have thought that they would receive such an amount of capital. Such a sum would not only offer them support but would give them something to hand on to their families.
The Yorkshire Evening Post, thanks to the social awareness and concern of its excellent editor, Neil Hodgkinson, has been running a serious campaign, entitled "Life in Leeds". I have a copy of the paper and when I have held it up for the camera, I shall pass it to the Minister so that she can see how it approached and understood the issue. The paper stated that its campaign was
- "A major YEP investigation into the thousands of lives blighted by fear, crime, violence and poverty."
Mr. John Battle (Leeds, West): I am grateful to my hon. Friend for leading this debate and, to some extent, leading our city in the debate, as he led it when he was leader of the council.
The economic question in Leeds is massive. Leeds was not just divided in the past; it is still dividing. Unemployment rates in some pockets are increasing, despite the fact that the overall rate is going down. We still give common assent to a trickle-down theory; if the city as a whole does well, we think that that will infiltrate all the nooks and crannies of unemployment. But unless we radically tackle unemployment and the life chances of the people in those corners, nothing will ever happen: the economy will turn down again and they will be completely left out. To echo the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet (Mr. Burgon), as well as looking at housing, is it not time to look at radical community economic developments, including local provision of neighbourhood services, and radically to decentralise the provision of goods and services? I do not believe that 25,000 people will be working in call centres in 10 years' time. Voice chips will have replaced those jobs and people currently in low-paid work in our inner cities will be looking for alternative employment.
Mr. Mudie: I totally agree with what my hon. Friend says, and I am glad that he put it in those terms because I am trying to make the point to the Minister that we must deal with inner-city problems urgently. Those problems fall into two categories: first, housing and, secondly, employment and skills—in other words, buildings and people—and unless we deal with them urgently, we will fail and we shall pass the existing inner city on to the next Government, who will have no interest in such things.
If we had the political will, there is no reason why anyone should be unemployed in Leeds. Only 12,000 people in the whole city are registered as looking for work, but the city is supposed to gain 30,000 additional jobs in the next eight years. If we set our minds to it, we could improve training and skills. In fact, discussions are going on with the jobcentre, the Regional Development Agency and the hospital, which has a new cancer block, to find out whether we can start such a training scheme.
It is we who are taking the initiative—not the Government—and we are so hopeful, optimistic and ambitious that we are looking to my hon. Friends' constituencies and to Batley and Bradford because we feel that, if we have the political will, we can not only wipe out unemployment in Leeds, but become an economic engine for the surrounding areas.
Mr. Harold Best (Leeds, North-West): I am grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing this subject before the House. I should like to say something about the elements of poverty that exist in the city of Leeds. It is often not understood that poverty exists in the greener areas. I represent a constituency with some of the greenest and most wonderful, spectacular views, but with some of the most horrendous poverty, especially in housing. People tend to forget that Leeds is a two-river city. My constituency includes the River Wharf—a magnificent river—and some of the houses in that area were built earlier than those that my good friend referred to in his part of Leeds, and those houses are in desperate need of repair and rebuilding. We as a Government ought to be tackling such problems as a major priority, and putting people's needs at the centre of our agenda.
Mr. Mudie: I totally agree with my hon. Friend.
I want to return to the Yorkshire Evening Post campaign, which was praised by the Prime Minister, to whom Neil Hodgkinson presented a collection of the articles and analysis concerning the blighted lives faced by ordinary, decent people in Leeds. I have a copy, which I shall give with pleasure to my hon. Friend the Minister at the end of the debate. The Prime Minister is on record as thanking the YEP for its initiative, and he also conceded that
- "there is a mountain to climb."
The Prime Minister went on to say:
- "There are too many people in the city missing out on the new opportunities and prosperity . . . and there are too many communities—some within a stone's throw of the thriving city centre—still crippled by multiple and inter-linked problems which remain among the deprived in the country."
Those are the reasons why I asked for the debate. We have been in government for six years. I acknowledge that various excellent initiatives have been taken—I guarantee that we will hear about them—but, as someone who lives in their constituency and spends all the recess and every weekend there, I have to say that they have only marginally improved the lot of my constituents, and my colleagues can speak for their own patches. Indeed, in preparing for the debate and trying to get the balance right and to be absolutely accurate, I spoke to everyone I met in my surgeries and as I went around the community, and they overwhelmingly think that things are getter worse, not better. After six years, I find that very worrying.
The worrying thing is this. In the same papers, the Prime Minister acknowledges the problem, says that there is a mountain to climb, sees the problem first hand in Lincoln Green, but what does he do? As the booklet shows, the Prime Minister lists all the initiatives and the huge sums that are being spent—I fear that the Minister will do the same thing—but the worst thing that people can do is believe their own publicity. We in politics are always told that, and it is true. We cannot feed the hungry with statistics on national prosperity. We cannot tell a kid that he is well off because we have invested £1 million, or even £100 million. If the kid is hungry, he is hungry regardless of what the Government say they are spending.
I should like the Government to listen. I do not exaggerate. I am talking about my constituency, and my constituents are hurting and their lot is not improving after six years. I thought we had a common objective of getting rid of inner-city poverty, but if we are still so far behind after six years, I wonder whether we should not be considering a change in direction.
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