[Relevant documents:Second Report from the Communities and Local Government Committee, Session 2006-07 HC 351 and the Governments response thereto, Cm 7126.]
Motion made, and Question proposed, That the sitting be now adjourned.[Jonathan Shaw.]
Dr. Phyllis Starkey (Milton Keynes, South-West) (Lab): I rise to introduce the Select Committee on Communities and Local Governments report on coastal towns. Given that a large number of hon. Members who represent coastal towns are present, I shall try to keep my remarks short. I do not intend to cover everything that is in the report, since it largely speaks for itself.
Let me explain why the Committee decided to undertake the inquiry. We have a strong interest in regeneration and we perceived a lack of national policy focus on coastal regeneration. The report reproduces a map of deprivation in the UK. Unfortunately, because it is printed in shades of green, it is not quite as striking as the original, but it shows a clear ring of deprivation around the coast of England, as well as large areas of deprivation in inner-city and former industrial areas. Twenty-one of the 88 most deprived authorities in the UK are in coastal areas. We felt that there was a lack of policy focus on coastal regeneration, in contrast to the Governments well established policies on urban and inner-city regeneration.
There has been a considerable amount of interest in the report both inside the House, where it was most recently mentioned during Prime Ministers questions, and outside, where it was one of the subjects of a You and Yours programme that occasioned a great deal of public input and interest. There has been considerable interest from local authorities, local authority organisations and various organisations that are involved in coastal towns. It has also been the subject of discussion at a number of national conferences on coastal towns and regeneration. I am confident that the issues raised in the report will be carried forward outside the House and within it.
The evidence given to the Committee demonstrated clearly that although coastal towns are extremely diverse, which we recognise, they have a number of shared characteristics. The most obvious is their physical isolation and peripheral location, which often means that they have poor transport connections.
The demography of coastal towns is often skewed by the outward migration of young people. One of the more distressing experiences that the Committee had was when we met young people in Margate, who all said that they would leave as soon as they could because they did not see their future in their home town. One will always be able to find young people who want to
leave their home town, but for them all to want to leave is depressing. Not only do such towns see outward migration of young people and inward migration of older peopleoften those who have chosen to retire by the seaside and so have a reasonable incomebut they see inward migration of people on benefits or low incomes who can live more cheaply at the seaside than elsewhere, and the number of transients, including vulnerable adults and children, is high. There is often a two-level housing market, in which the incomers drive up house prices so that they are out of the reach of many local people. Coastal towns have a low-wage, unskilled economy, often with seasonal unemployment. I shall return to that point in a minute because it is the subject of one of the Committees recommendations.
The Committee also remarked that no one Department has responsibility for coastal towns, which are affected by a range of policies administered by many Departments, and that there is no national strategy or policy framework for coastal towns. In fact, the Committee did not recommend that there should be a national strategy, although many organisations outside the House wanted one, but we stated our belief that some changes in the way in which Government works were necessary to ensure that there was more effective cross-departmental working and to ensure that issues that affected coastal towns were given proper consideration in all Departments.
We called for the establishment of a cross-departmental group led by the Department for Communities and Local Government to examine the impact of national policy on coastal communities and to monitor and maintain an overview of the situation in coastal towns. Unfortunately, that recommendation was one of those that were rejected by the Government. I hope that they will reconsider that. I am sure that some of the MPs who are in the Chamber to represent coastal towns will make their own arguments about why the Government should accede to the Committees recommendation.
I welcome the fact that there has been greater activity on the part of some Departments, notably the Department of Trade and Industry, since the inquiry began. It was interesting that a couple of Ministers who gave evidence to the Committee readily admitted that they had not thought about coastal towns as a group until our inquiry started and they were required to give evidence. We have at least achieved something by focusing individual Ministers attentions on coastal towns. The DTI organised a coastal towns conference on 8 May. The Committee can claim some credit for having stimulated greater DTI activity on that front.
The Government have agreed to our recommendation that one of the regional development agencies should act as a lead in co-ordinating RDA activity in respect of coastal towns. That RDA is the South East England Development Agency, because it was generally felt that SEEDA already has a reasonably well developed strategy for the coastal towns in the south-east and would be the most suitable agency to lead and exhort the other RDAs to take greater note of their own coastal towns.
We also concluded that there was a lack of Government understanding of and of substantive research on coastal towns and the problems that they face. We were particularly unimpressed by the evidence that we were given by the Department for Work and Pensions. It seemed stunningly
unaware of the situation on the ground in some of our coastal towns. The DWP did not challenge the findings that we reproduced in our report, which demonstrate that since 1997 the levels of those who claim incapacity benefit, special disability allowance or income support for disability had increased six times as much in coastal towns as the national average. We sought to ask the DWP what evidence it had to show whether those figures meant that individuals in coastal towns were more likely to claim those benefits, or that people who claimed those benefits were more likely to migrate to coastal towns, since the Departments response would need to be different depending on which explanation was correct. We are not impressed that the DWP does not seem to have challenged those findings or responded to them in its response to the recommendations. It has simply written off the problem as historical.
It will also come as a surprise to many of those who represent coastal towns that the DWP believes that seasonal unemployment in coastal towns is
not substantially higher than the national average.
I recognise that, given that coastal towns are very disparate as a group, there might be some support for the DWP in the numbers if one takes into account all coastal towns, including those that are successful. However, that avoids the issue of those coastal towns that have substantial problems with large numbers of people on disability benefits and with seasonal unemployment. We wish to follow that issue up and will refer it to the relevant Select Committee.
I want to draw attention to some other issues, but I shall not expand on them. The first problem is the lack of affordable housing in coastal towns and the fact that young people are often completely priced out by the more affluent incomers. The second issue is houses in multiple occupation, which are a particular problem in those coastal towns that were once seaside resorts and where a large amount of housing that used to be hotels is now HMOs, and the effect that that has on districts in those towns.
Further issues are the growing importance of coastal management in the light of global warming, and the need to integrate shoreline management plans with economic planning, rather than treat them in isolation. Funding for coastal towns and the formulae used by Government are also issues of importance, and I am pleased that the Government are reviewing the day visitor indicator, which is obviously significant to many coastal towns.
Mr. Michael Jack (Fylde) (Con): I see the hon. Member for Blackpool, South (Mr. Marsden) in his place. I am sure that he will provide a remarkably good exposition of what is needed by a big coastal town. However, many of the characteristics that the hon. Lady has just enunciated are typical of the problems faced by a small, resource-pressured district council in trying to maintain the character of coastal towns and areas such as Fylde, and particularly Lytham St. Annes. Does she believe that the Government have shown, through the changes to which she referred, that they truly understand the need to make additional resources available to such places, in recognition of the costs of taking action in the four areas that she mentioned?
Dr. Starkey: I certainly hope that the Government now have a greater understanding, but it is up to individual councils to make the arguments for their particular area very strongly, both directly and through the Local Government Association. The Government need hard evidence on such matters, especially because the more money that is given to one authority, the less is given to others. Additional More funding has to be justified to the residents not only of the right hon. Gentlemans constituency, but to those of all Members, because if one constituency gains more funding, others are the losers.
I want to draw attention to one final aspect of our inquiry, which shocked those Committee members who took part in the Committees visit to the Kent coastal towns, particularly Margate. It is the problem of using former guest houses as care homes for vulnerable childrena problem that is most marked in those coastal towns that are relatively close to London, although I suspect that it occurs also in other coastal towns near large urban conurbations.
The problem is one of boroughsin Margates case, London boroughsplacing vulnerable children in care homes in a coastal town, rather than in facilities in their home borough. The Committee understands that there are circumstances in which the required facilities are so specialist that an individual borough does not have them within its boundaries. However, we are concerned by the apparent practice of placing children outside a boroughin particular in towns such as Margatebecause it is the cheaper option.
We made it clear that children should never be placed outside their home authority simply on the ground of cost. The effect on such children and, indeed, on the authority in the area where they are placed was graphically described to us by representatives of Thanet district council. The council cited individual cases in which vulnerable children, although adequately supported financially, were not given the necessary additional support and care by the home social services authority. The social services in the town where they had been placed were completely unaware of their existence until the point of crisis.
In one case, a teenage girl came to the notice of the Margate authorities only when she waded into the sea to try to commit suicidethankfully unsuccessfully. So I am pleased that the Government have accepted the principle of the Committees recommendation in this area, and are considering how to take matters forward in their Green Paper, Care Matters: Transforming the Lives of Children and Young People in Care.
Mr. Adrian Sanders (Torbay) (LD): That is an important issue to emerge from the report, and one that we do not necessarily think of in relation to wider coastal towns matters. Social services are not the only bodies affected; education bodies are tooI know that from experience in my own constituency. There is a school there that deals with a dozen different social services departments because those departments stick with the child even though the child has changed area. That is a real problem.
Dr. Starkey: I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman.
Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con): I apologise to the Chairman of the Select Committee for not having been present for the start of her speech. I am particularly pleased that she has mentioned looked-after children, because Worthing shares Margates experience. The real problem is the clustering of independent childrens homes, not only in former retirement homes but in domestic residential properties which, if they have six or fewer residents, do not need planning permission.
The point is not a new one, however. Lord Utting made a recommendation back in the 1990s that such placements should not happenthat children should be placed within 20 miles of their own home unless that would result in serious harm to them. How much confidence does the hon. Lady have that the Government will show more urgency in the matter than previously?
Dr. Starkey: I accept the Governments word when they say that they will take an issue more seriously. However, it is incumbent on hon. Members who represent areas in which the problem exists and who have evidence of the points that have been made to make the Government directly aware of the practical consequences in their constituencies of the policys continuance. The point is not that people are unaware of the problem; it is that until now the efforts that have been made have been inadequate in ensuring that the placing authorities do not continue their practices.
I understand the pressures on London boroughs in particular. They might not have sufficient accommodation in their area, but in my view they should be more proactive in dealing with the problem, instead of shunting children off to care homes. Those homes might try their best, but they can never provide the proper care that is needed, because the children concerned have been completely removed from the support mechanisms that they would normally expect in their own borough.
I said that I would be brief, and I do not have any further substantive points to make. I shall listen with interest to the remarks of other hon. Members. If they do not manage to address all the points that they wish to, I urge them to continue to use other parliamentary avenues to get their message through to the Government.
Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con): I appear not as a resident of a coastal town but as one of the Committee members. It has been pointed out by some hon. Members who represent coastal constituenciesin particular, those who are within earshotthat the tide is in, that I should be short and succinct and that I should then shut up and get out of the way so that they can get to the meat of the report.
The report is very goodit is among the better reports that the Committee has submitted. The Committee Chairman has given a very able summary, although she was a little more benevolent to the Government than I feel inclined to be. In the preparation of the report, evidence was received from many witnesses from coastal towns and from groups and individuals. There was also a considerable response to the report itself from many and varied sources. The reaction of witnesses varied considerably, as indeed did the problems that were
described. Some witnessesboth in person and in writingwere very positive and took a positive approach to the benefits that they have.
Brighton and Hove city council is a good example of that. Brighton has lots of benefits: it is close to London, it has a university and it has been well known as a seaside town for decades, if not centuries. The interesting thing is that it was determined to overcome its problems and that it had a very positive attitude. Some of the other townsI shall not mention themalso showed that spirit. One that I must mention is Blackpool. In my opinion, it should succeed on the grounds of effort alone. It is a town that even when clobberedand it has been clobbered recentlyseems to get up on its feet and fight back. It was quite a contrast with some others.
A few of the authorities that presented themselves before the Committee were crying in the pool of their own deprivation and lying there with their hats out waiting for central Government grants, instead of getting down to it and doing something. Yes, some of them have huge problems, but a positive attitude might be more helpful.
Our essentially radial transport system means that coastal towns are at the end of the line or the end of the roadBrighton, for example, is at the end of both. Brighton has quite a good transport system, but other towns such as Hastings do not, and I hope that the Government will consider such issues.
On a more positive note, there were increasing signs that the coastal towns are working together on coastal town issues, which is more than I can say for the Government. The British Resorts and Destinations Association, whose name is a heck of a mouthful, is a relatively new grouping. It and the British Urban Regeneration Associations seaside networkan even bigger mouthfulare two positive groups that are providing guidance and pulling together ideas. They are starting to get some positive things back into the thinking of coastal towns.
As I have said, and as the Chairman of the Select Committee has faintly and delicately hinted, there is much that the Government could do. In many cases, expenditure is not needed. Unfortunately, the Governments response to the recommendations in the report is, in essence, negative. Some of the recommendations are fairly basic. A joined-up approach is a fairly basic thought, but there was no action on that. It is clear that there is little Government understanding, research or assessment of coastal towns, particularly as a group. The fact that coastal towns have similar problems should be recognised.
The effect of seasonal low-wage employmentthe other way of putting it is off-season unemploymentthe outside placement of vulnerable children and adults, which has already been mentioned, and the outward migration of the young and inward migration of the retired are key factors that should be but have not been recognised. The effects of poorly checked coastal flooding and erosion, and even the acceptance of such things, need not only compensation but concerted thought and action. Action is needed.
The report speaks for itself. It is a good report, and it has attracted good attention. This debate is an opportunity for hon. Members on both sides of the
House who represent coastal towns to push the Government and then sit back while the beleaguered Minister comes up with some positive responses on behalf of joined-up government. I hope that she feels beleagueredshe ought to, if she does not.
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