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10.14 pm
Mr. David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op): I am delighted to follow the excellent speech of the hon. Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Hurd). I intend to be very brief because I know that other Members wish to speak. I am pleased to be here today to deal with such revolutionary legislation; indeed, it warms the cockles of one’s heart to be doing so. I shall put on my T-shirt when I get home, as it were, and feel that we have done a little bit to move democracy in the right direction.
I want to make just two points, but I want first to say in passing that although it would be nice to feel that it is the hon. Gentleman’s Bill, the Bill of the hon. Member for Falmouth and Camborne (Julia Goldsworthy), or my Bill, it is not: it has emerged from genuine community action. Although the New Economics Foundation crystallised it, it is not its Bill, either. Indeed, it is not even the Bill of Ron Bailey and Stephen Shaw, who have gone round the country participating in some interesting public meetings, two of which I held in my own constituency.
I have to say that they were very uncomfortable meetings. They were not nice, easy-going and touchy-feely, even though that is the motivation of many of us who want to re-engage with our communities. In fact, they were quite angry meetings, whose anger was
surpassed only by that which we all feel when a particular, well-loved facility in our constituency is about to close. When that happens, we MPs get it in the neck. The usual response is, “Why haven’t you done more about this? Why haven’t you prevented this from happening? If this facility is to close, what are you going to do about it?” There was a lot of disillusionment at those difficult and angry meetings, and the hon. Member for Ruislip-Northwood is absolutely right to talk about the democratic deficit—a wonderful term that means all things to everyone. However, on dealing with such meetings, one knows what the democratic deficit is. The people at them do not trust us. They do not feel that we have done enough, and they certainly do not feel that we are going to do enough. I hope that, in a small way, this Bill will try to change some of that.
The first of my two points is that I hope that we can use the Bill to re-engage with our communities, and that the Government understand that it is as much a question of putting pressure on individual communities as it is of putting pressure on central Government.
Anne Main (St. Albans) (Con): I completely sympathise and empathise with the views that the hon. Gentleman expressed about heated meetings; indeed, last night, I went to the draft east of England plan meeting. Does he agree that people resent things being done to them? They want to work with Government, rather than having something imposed on them. In essence, the Bill is about getting rid of that sense of divorce and regaining that feeling of partnership.
Mr. Drew: I accept that. We can talk about different parts of the United Kingdom facing slightly different problems, but the interesting thing about the Bill is that it encompasses every type of community—urban, suburban, semi-rural and rural. They all face the common problems of the loss of what they regarded as vital services, the difficulty of retaining existing ones, and the even greater difficulty of trying to put new services in place.
Mr. Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con): Does the hon. Gentleman agree that this is a quite unusual private Member’s Bill, in that it has support in all parts of the House? That being so, does he agree that, although there is no procedural need to do so, it would help the House if the Minister sought to catch your eye early in the debate, Mr. Deputy Speaker, so that the whole House can reflect on, and perhaps have time to rebut, his comments if, as suspected, he does not support the measure?
Mr. Drew:
I hope that that will not be necessary. This is a listening Government and I hope that the Minister, rather than intervening early, will listen and make a jolly good response by saying that, although he disagrees with some of the detail—that is for the Government to decide—he wants to give the Bill a fair Second Reading and will not oppose its being discussed in Committee and on Report and Third Reading. That is what private Member’s legislation, at its best, can achieve, and I hope that that will happen today. Unless I have got it wrong, the Government have, I hope,
thought hard about this issue and have no intention of trying to block the Bill, which moves in a direction in which they want to go.
I want to make one other point in passing before talking about what I see as the kernel of the Bill. I want to pay particular tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, West (Jim Dowd). One of the most important things that happened recently was the publication of the all-party group on small shops’ report on the decline of small shops. It is easy to say that that was driven by the Association of Convenience Stores, which is a very good organisation, but the report explains more than anything else what is wrong. It does not necessarily provide a map for the future, but it is important to understand the causes of the problem. That is why so many organisations have signed up to the Bill. It is because we now understand the nature of the problem and the debate now is how to move forward from here.
Jim Dowd (Lewisham, West) (Lab): I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s comments. The hon. Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Hurd) was kind enough to mention the all-party small shops group, and the work that we did on the issue was supported—like the Bill—by Members on both sides of the House. I would mention in particular the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr. Hollobone), who is in his place, and the hon. Member for Colchester (Bob Russell), who is not in his. We await Government action and the results of the Competition Commission’s review of the retail sector. The group’s work reflected the widespread concern in all kinds of communities about the way in which trends in retail development are undermining social cohesion across the piece.
Mr. Drew: I thank my hon. Friend for expressing much more adequately than I can why the Bill is important and the way in which several factors have come together to make the Bill happen at this time.
There has been a view—and I know that the Government agree—that the Bill is overly bureaucratic and top-down, with the Secretary of State having to sign off all sorts of plans and action points for individual communities. That would appear to go against the idea of devolving responsibility. I do not see the Bill in that way at all. It is very much a bottom-up Bill. Yes, the Government are asked to take note and consider carefully how they disburse their resources, but in reality they cannot save services for individual communities. The Government set the framework and the market decides—sometimes very roughly—which service will survive and which will go, but it is up to individual communities to engineer not just the saving of services but their retention and their growth.
Too often we leave matters until a postmaster or mistress is about to move and cannot sell their business, so it has to close. That is far too late. I retain my membership of the town council in Stonehouse, the area in Stroud in which I live, and we managed to save our post office, but we did so by investing in the building and putting the town council next to it. I should say that I was not responsible, because of course I am a lapsed member in the sense that I do not
attend nearly enough, but the town council looked ahead to the potential closure and that is why it was able to intervene. That is why I am such a fan of parish and town councils—I have been a member of one for the best part of 20 years.
Mr. Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab): I did a little bit to help preserve small shops in my private Member’s Bill on Christmas day trading in 2004. I agree with my hon. Friend’s sentiments about town and parish councils and I am a huge supporter of those communities, but does he agree that the public are sometimes a little schizophrenic in their approach? They are willing to sign petitions against the closure of post offices, but when one actually asks whether they use the services they tend not to do so.
Mr. Drew: I agree. It is a case of use it or lose it. It is no good if the parish or town council decides to put money into a service—they do have means—or talk to service providers about how to support businesses through genuine partnerships, if local people do not use the service. Baroness Corston has just moved into North Nibley in my constituency, although I am just about to lose her ward to another constituency—these things happen to us all—where the village has taken over the shop and post office. On the first day that she was in her new house, she received a share certificate and a request for her to buy her share in the village shop. It was explained to her that it was important that people in the community bought their share, because they kept the shop going. If they did not use the shop, it would close. It is that sort of community action that I hope the Bill will support.
The issue is how we can make best use of community assets. We all have community assets in our different communities, but the challenge is maximising them. That is why I think that the Bill is a bottom-up Bill. The Government can have various ideas and initiatives, such as local area agreements, sustainable communities plans and local development frameworks, and they can encourage local strategic partnerships—all good initiatives—but communities need to do more. The Government can help, but the communities themselves must drive it forward. The Bill will force communities to face up to their responsibilities. The representatives of communities—not necessarily the elected representatives, but those who take it on themselves to save a particular community resource—are very important in that and they must work in partnership with democratically elected representatives.
I hope that the Government have listened and do not see the Bill as a challenge to them. I hope that they realise that the Bill is genuinely non-party and community driven. I also hope that it will be improved in Committee. However, today is not about detailed consideration. I hope that the Bill will receive its Second Reading unanimously, because anyone who chooses to oppose it will have an interesting time of it from the various organisations who have written to us all about it. I leave it to other hon. Members to decide, because I would never try to lean on my colleagues in that way.
I hope that the Bill receives a fair wind. I congratulate the hon. Member for Ruislip-Northwood, who chose his words carefully and maintained the
consensus. It is difficult to resist the temptation to make party-political points, but I hope that the Bill receives support from both sides and from Front Benchers. I also hope that the Government will listen and learn, and understand that the Bill is not a challenge to their work—such as the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill, which we will consider on Monday—but complementary to it.
10.27 am
Julia Goldsworthy (Falmouth and Camborne) (LD): I, too, wish to congratulate the hon. Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Hurd) on making the most of his opportunity. He laid out very well how the Bill will work and the benefits that it will bring. It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stroud (Mr. Drew) as we have worked together closely on the issue over the past few months. He mentioned how tough the public meetings on the issue have been. I had meetings in my constituency and I was surprised by how many people turned up, because it is not immediately clear what the Sustainable Communities Bill might do, and it sounds a little technocratic. I did not think that it would set my constituency on fire, but the public meeting was attended by 150 people. I know that other hon. Members had even more people turn up, to the point where they had to change venue. It is interesting that the subject brings up a range of issues, and we have seen as much from the various interventions this morning.
Mr. John Leech (Manchester, Withington) (LD): Does my hon. Friend agree that difficult meetings are often about closures? The whole point of the Bill is to reduce the number of businesses, shops and post offices that close in our towns, cities and villages as part of trying to maintain sustainable communities.
Julia Goldsworthy: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The key problem is not necessarily opposing closures or proposing renewed services, but that people feel powerless about the decisions that are being taken. There is a law of unintended consequences—the Government may not have malicious intent, but they do not appreciate that decisions have entirely different ramifications for different communities. People find themselves coming up against a system where there is no accountability and no recourse; they cannot voice their concerns and feel confident that they will be taken on board. My hon. Friend made that point extremely well.
The Liberal Democrats are pleased about the Bill. In the previous Session, early-day motion 641 was supported by every Liberal Democrat Member, and although I am pleased that the Bill takes forward the Bill that I presented on sustainable communities, I pay tribute to Sue Doughty, the former Member for Guildford, who did so much before I arrived in Parliament to promote the issue. Had it not been for her work, Ron Bailey would have had a much more difficult job persuading me to take on the case. I pay tribute to the Local Works campaign and to Sue Doughty for her work.
We support the Bill because it puts people first and gives them a bigger say. I want to touch on three main
issues: first, the Bill helps to identify and tackle community decline, and promotes greater social, economic and environmental sustainability in communities; secondly, it does so by encouraging participation by communities in decisions that affect them; and, finally, it provides accountability in areas where there is no democratic accountability. I shall give some personal examples of that point.
Mr. Kevan Jones: Does the hon. Lady agree that if we are to consult local communities it is important that we have the widest possible spectrum of opinion? For example, in many constituencies there is controversy about traffic calming in communities and there are hugely fierce debates between people who are for or against it. Does she agree that it is important to ensure that the loudest minority does not get its way over the majority in the community?
Julia Goldsworthy: The hon. Gentleman is right. The Bill particularly encourages the participation of groups who do not have the strongest voice, not necessarily those in deprived areas, but groups such as young people whose views may not have been heard in the past. At the public meetings in which I participated, it was striking that not just the usual suspects attended. There are people with loud voices in every community who want to raise such issues, and we probably meet them regularly, but at those meetings I also met people I had never seen before. They raised some issues of which I was unaware and others on common themes, so I am confident that communities will feel that the Bill offers them a vehicle that enables their voice to be heard. As has already been said, it will create a climate in which they feel that their views will be taken on board—something which may have been more difficult for them in the past.
Mr. Dismore: The hon. Lady has just made an important point. My constituency is diverse, with people from many ethnic minorities, and although there is provision in the Bill for particular consultation with people under 25, there is no reference whatever to reaching out to groups in minority communities with whom it is often hard to communicate and get feedback. As she is a sponsor of the Bill, will she explain why it contains no reference to the great importance of engaging with minority communities that are, by and large, considerably excluded from the political process? In the provisions for consultation arrangements, why is there no requirement to consult in minority languages?
Julia Goldsworthy: The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. If the Government allow the Bill to go into Committee, I hope that we can rectify that omission. The Bill has been drawn in broad terms, but as it progresses we hope to ensure that there are no important omissions.
As we have already heard, it is easy to identify the problems of community decline. We heard on the radio this morning that towns feel threatened by out-of-town shopping centres, with many high streets indistinguishable from one another. Such problems also affect rural areas. I represent a geographically isolated constituency, where the loss of a rural post office means not just the loss of that specific service,
but that the £6 in every £10 taken out at the post office which would have been spent in the local community is spent elsewhere. People have to travel further for those services and might have no access to a car. In a rural area, there will probably be no adequate public transport either.
Mark Williams (Ceredigion) (LD): My hon. Friend makes a strong case. Is not the merit of the measure its holistic approach to community involvement? The loss of schools, post offices and family farms is an interrelated package; it is not necessarily a case of picking off individual things—they can be looked at holistically at local level.
Julia Goldsworthy: My hon. Friend makes a good point, which demonstrates that people who campaign against the closure of a service may not always be its direct beneficiaries. For example, people could support a local primary school even if they do not have children who attend it. The point is that closures have knock-on effects. If young families cannot live and work in a community, there is an impact on the school, on the economy and on public transport. There is concern about the law of unintended consequences; many Government decisions may be well intentioned but the Government do not appreciate that the ramifications will be different in every community.
Vulnerable people can be left incredibly isolated, especially older people living in villages—in my constituency, second home ownership reaches 80 per cent. in some villages. Older people probably cannot drive and in an area with no access to public transport they have no access to shops. Vulnerable groups become even more isolated. One does not have to be a member of such a group to feel the need to champion it, which relates to the point made by the hon. Member for Hendon (Mr. Dismore).
People feel powerless. People in my constituency in villages with 80 per cent. second home ownership have no power to do anything about that. There are no planning controls on the number of second homes in an area—an issue that was raised time and again in the public meetings and in other representations I have received. People feel that the Bill offers an opportunity for the Government to enable local communities to take such power. The Bill is an enabling measure for Government action.
Mr. David: I agree with many of the points that the hon. Lady has made, but given the consensual nature of the debate, does she agree that many of her points have already been accepted by the Government? For example, some of her ideas and principles were included in the White Paper, “Strong and prosperous communities”.
Julia Goldsworthy: I agree that there is consensus on many of the ideas in the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill, which we shall debate on Monday. However, in a series of important respects, this Bill goes further while drawing on the same principles. That is why I hope the Government will see fit to support it.
Mr. Kevan Jones: The issue of second homes is contentious in many small villages, especially in rural areas. Some people support second homes because they bring people and income to villages, but other people oppose them because they reduce affordable housing. Can the hon. Lady point out where in the Bill planning regulations would be affected as she describes? I am struggling to find such provisions.
Julia Goldsworthy: Many and varied issues were raised by people at public meetings, as they have been on the Floor of the House today. The key point is that the Bill is about enabling people; it will create a climate where they can raise their concerns and where the Government feel that they may be able to help communities identify and resolve their problems. At present, there are blocks and they are difficult to overcome.
Julia Goldsworthy: I want to make some progress, as other Members want to speak.
It is easy to identify the problems to which I have alluded; the key thing is how to tackle them. The Bill offers an opportunity to do that by promoting participation from the whole community and giving communities responsibility for identifying the problems. As Members have already pointed out, the Bill places on communities the burden of responsibility to take action. Fundamentally, it provides greater accountability in a way that extends beyond the remit of the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill, as I said earlier.
The Bill encourages greater participation across the whole spectrum of the community, including those from the most deprived wards, which is my experience from such involvement in my constituency. The Bill is bottom-up. We have only to see the number of people turning up at the public meetings to realise that it is not a top-down Bill. If it was, it would not have provoked so much interest across the country and received the support of so many organisations.
The public meetings have been well attended not just across a range of different areas, including deprived areas, but by community groups. For example, there is an active member of a local residents association in one of the most isolated and deprived parts of my constituency who would refuse to consider becoming a councillor, but who is a loud voice for the community that she lives in and the people whose views she feels that she is able to represent.
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