Examination of Witnesses (Questions 160-179)
MR ROBBIE
JONES, MS
RIMA BERRY,
MR PAUL
BIRNIE, MR
ROBERT TUNSTALL,
CLLR JOHN
BLACKIE, MRS
RUTH ANNISON
AND DR
PETER ANNISON
2 JULY 2008
Q160 Mr Drew: Is there a problem
that you could see yourself being too much the victim? Representing
a semi-rural area, I believe that sometimes we talk up all the
problems—you have already provided a great deal of balance
in terms of what good things are going on—but there is a
perception in urban Britain that rural Britain moans a lot about
things that are not being given to it such as lower grants and
the fact that it is more difficult to provide services. Obviously,
the Post Office saga has been experienced by all of us. Is this
something of which we must be aware so we give the message from
rural Britain that we are working on it but could do a lot more
with greater resources?
Mrs Annison: I believe that today
we have shown you some fairly positive enterprises which are not
small scale. We do not always need money but encouragement. This
is meant to be a bottom up society with individual businesses
and communities offering advice. We have experienced a long spell
when this has not been taken on board. I am sorry if you think
we moan. We are taking the opportunity to explain to you what
the barriers are, which was the question. We are also pretty optimistic
as well, and you can help.
Cllr Blackie: I thought I prefaced
my remarks by saying that I did not want to be negative but positive.
I started my political life locally on the wall outside shouting
and moaning that this factory should reopen when Dairy Crest closed
it down summarily in 1992. Together with my colleague Peter Annison
at the back, we said there was a role to play for Wensleydale
cheese as a niche product. Has it not done fantastically? It employs
two hundred people. You can walk into a shop in Mallaig in the
far north of Scotland or New York and pick up a lump of Wensleydale
cheese made in Hawes. That is a success story and there are others.
Occasionally, you have to look at the other side of the coin.
I do not believe it is moaning so much as fear of what might happen
because it can be swept away over night as Dairy Crest did when
it sent up a chauffeur from Thames Ditton who stood on the stage
in the market hall and said it was to be closed down but we were
not to worry; a relocation team would be sent up and all the people
would get jobs. Somebody asked, "Where?" and he replied,
"Give me a map."
Q161 Dan Rogerson: Defra, the department
that it is our job to scrutinise, has set us the objective of
creating strong rural communities but it has not told us what
a strong rural community is. Can any of you define what you believe
is a strong rural community? Are we sitting in one? Do you think
it is useful that a government department is focusing on that
as an objective?
Ms Berry: I am not surprised that
they have trouble defining it or feeding back to anybody what
the definition is. I think "strong" is the wrong word;
it should be "sustainable". When I talk about "sustainable"
I mean not just development or environment but income and business
life, community capacity and inclusion issues. I think that it
has got it wrong, and its indicators are totally wrong.
Q162 Chairman: Would you like to
develop that? Why are the indicators wrong?
Ms Berry: When I saw its indicators
I looked at them with disbelief. To me, the whole perception of
wages, local authority indicators and unemployment is homogenised
under Richmondshire. In Richmondshire there is a huge garrison
town which means that if you lump our statistics in with them
suddenly we have hardly any old people at all. We have a high
level of employment here but it is characterised by low wages,
so under the Defra indicators we will appear as a really strong
community but we are not. Cllr Blackie mentioned access to services.
One of the wards here is 23rd out of the 22,000 wards in the whole
of England. Referring to the Index of Multiple Deprivation in
terms of access to services it is 23rd. That is absolutely huge.
Again, that relates to access to housing and everything else.
Only 30% of our workforce is in full-time employment; the rest
are in part-time or self-employment. We would not even hit the
radar for the Defra indicator. I do not believe that the needs
of our communities are being addressed through public service
delivery and policy when that policy takes no account of the grass
roots needs of the communities themselves. The communities are
very good at identifying their own needs. The local White Paper
goes on about the bottom up approach and yet the strong policy
that is coming through is a top down approach and does not even
notice us.
Mrs Annison: One of the features
of a strong community is its ability to respond to change. I think
you have seen that demonstrated here. As Cllr Blackie said, you
can sweep it all away over night by a decision imposed elsewhere.
The day the dairy closure announcement was made Peter and I were
the only business people at a three-day residential government
inquiry which discussed how to help small businesses. We were
surrounded by under-secretaries of state, chief executives of
the RDC and so on. We were in a position to say this was a really
important issue for Hawes. We were incredibly lucky at the amount
of support round the table which was part of the armoury that
supported the local initiative to save the dairy, but I believe
that one of the factors that assisted in the saving of this dairy
was absolute luck.
Cllr Blackie: I like the word
"strong"; "sustainable" is an overused and
hackneyed word in my view. "Strong" sounds right. I
believe that a strong rural community is one that has the confidence
to see itself today, tomorrow, next year and 25 years down the
line. That means that the three prongs of sustainability, if I
may bring it back in again—social, economic and environmental
matters—are all in balance one with the other so that there
is a social care network and health facilities. One of the big
issues here in the dales is its distance from healthcare provision.
It is likely to be further away if Lord Darzi has his way. We
want prosperity. Prosperity may be self-generated and kept within
its own local network, but that spins off to the social side as
well. I guess we can always rely on the national park to give
us an environmental offer which is as good as anything outside.
Q163 Lynne Jones: Unlike my colleagues,
I come from Birmingham which is very much a non-rural area. What
is coming across to me is that we need policies that relate to
the characteristics of the individual area. The policy of Defra
is to concentrate its efforts on rural areas that are the poorest
performing. What Ms Berry said begs the question: what is the
definition of "poorly performing"? Do you think that
is the right approach or should we look to the whole rural economy?
I do not know what Defra's definition of "poor performance"
is but from the comments made it appears that it is not looking
at the right indicators in assessing poorly performing areas anyway.
Ms Berry: If we had received the
last tranche of European funding in 2000 under the indicators
now proposed by Defra we would not have had that money. Since
2000 close to £½ million in funding has come into this
area which has helped enormously. It has created fantastic child
care facilities and helped a good number of community-led projects;
it has built social capacity hugely, but according to these indicators
we would not have had that money.
Q164 Lynne Jones: Does anyone else
want to comment?
Cllr Blackie: Some of my best
customers come from Birmingham, so you are very welcome here.
For a time a whole carload of people came here on a weekly basis
from Birmingham to work at the dairy when it was short of staff.
I believe that Defra ought to look at individual communities as
you suggest. Simply to take a tranche of poor-performing rural
communities without having a handle on how to describe a poorly-performing
rural community does not seem to be the best way to spend money.
I return to the issue we talked about earlier. It does not have
to be a huge investment. In any of these rural communities small
can have huge impacts. By anybody's standard you can make a small
investment but locally it will have a great and beneficial impact
on the local economy and undoubtedly there will be a spin off
to the social side because social, environmental and economic
matters are always inextricably linked in these deeply rural areas.
Mrs Annison: I would invest my
money in the likely winners, not the poor performers because the
poor performers are likely then to imitate when they see success.
I should like to make a small point about four-by-fours and the
Chelsea tractors. The new tax on those which is intended to deal
with urban Chelsea tractors hits the people in this area who need
these vehicles because we still have some snow. If one looks at
the map, European Objective 5b funding areas exactly reflect where
the snow falls first in the north of England. There are families
living down a farm track which have the responsibility to get
their children to the lane end to be picked up by the school bus;
there are farmers who have to go out at any hour of the day or
night. They need these vehicles but the tax discriminates against
them. I do not often plead the case of farmers but I think this
is one that needs specific consideration.
Q165 Lynne Jones: You said earlier
that the policies needed to be adapted to rural needs, for example
in relation to education. You have now given another example where
policies that are designed mainly for urban areas or the country
as a whole impact negatively on a rural community. How can you
mainstream the needs of rural communities when you have to make
nationwide policies? If you have to deal with the Chelsea tractor
how would you modify the policy to ensure that the needs are catered
for within policies that are designed for the whole country?
Mrs Annison: It may be that you
can use postcodes. For example, insurance premiums are based on
postcodes. It may be that some existing statistical analysis will
help you to make the right decision in that regard. I think that
the press is our greatest friend. The press listens to these stories,
although it may highlight anecdotes rather than general patterns.
I believe that in an economic sense without the press we would
not be here at all, but it may be that the information is there
if we can only uncover it to advise you in your policymaking.
Mr Birnie: As to the issue of
four-wheel drive vehicles that is linked to the cost of fuel.
For example, I do not live in the dales but 30 miles outside it.
Here petrol is 10p to 20p a litre dearer than 30 miles away just
because it is a small area with a small garage and it does not
have the same volume of throughput. If you weigh up the cost of
a four-by-four, which I understand is needed here, having to pay
extra for petrol means that the costs are multiplied one on top
of the other. Surely, something can be done on a postcode basis;
it is done for everything else.
Q166 Lynne Jones: In effect you are
advocating subsidies for petrol retailers.
Mr Birnie: Yes, in rural areas.
Why not? Perhaps it would not be a subsidy but lower tax.
Q167 Lynne Jones: We are talking
about government policies, but if we really have decentralisation
of power and decision-making Mrs Annison spoke earlier about the
need for small amounts of money. Surely, if the funding formula
for local authorities is made right, where money is allocated
for local schemes should be a matter for local decision-making?
Mrs Annison: Whether this will
work or not depends on how "small" is "local".
Perhaps Cllr Blackie needs to address that.
Cllr Blackie: Earlier you asked
how we could mainstream a policy that applied to the nation as
a whole and did not miss out the smaller, rural communities such
as the one in which we are present today. I am chairman of the
health scrutiny committee of North Yorkshire County Council. The
government brought forward a new policy on pharmacists and completely
overlooked the fact that in an area like North Yorkshire most
GP surgeries were dispensing practices. Unfortunately, the impact
of the new pharmacy contract was very much negative when it came
to GP dispensing surgeries. I just offer that as an example. What
we do not want is one size fits all. By all means mainstream it
and have a policy that applies across the nation but you have
to build in exceptions; otherwise, the more remote rural communities
fall through the net.
Q168 Lynne Jones: Specific funds
are made available for example for post offices or pharmacies
but generally they are administered nationally. Should particular
regard be had in formula funding to the need for local authorities
to intervene where necessary? To take one example, Essex has been
supporting post offices. Surely, in terms of these developments
could not more be done at a local level so it is more bottom up
rather than top down?
Cllr Blackie: Unfortunately, the
problem is that resources are always in short supply. My experience
of formula funding—I certainly do not pretend to be an expert—is
that it is a completely dense, complex area and you cannot make
any headway at all. I have been a member of the LGA for some years.
Rita Hale comes along and tries to explain it but at the end I
am none the wiser. That is no disrespect to Rita Hale who is absolutely
brilliant, but you just cannot get your head around it. I believe
there is a need to build into any sort of funding stream or government
policy that relies on the distribution of resources the ring-fencing
of funds for rural areas and communities. I do not see a way round
that. We are underneath the radar screen here when it comes to
numbers.
Mrs Annison: If you look at the
telephone directories that serve our area, we deal with Darlington,
Harrogate and Leeds—different areas—for our normal
lives. One phone book does not cover dealings with HM Revenue
& Customs, tax and all the things that employers deal with,
let alone customers and suppliers. We have local strategic partnerships
and Peter Annison was chairman of this one. That is one layer
of discussion but they are not active decision-makers. The national
park is a decision-maker but it does not have to take account
of the effects of its decisions, so if, for example, it turns
down an application for a house, unlike Richmondshire District
Council, it does not have to deal with the homeless. The district
council does not have authority over building and planning permissions
in the national park. Some years ago a government minister in
this very room thumped the desk and said there would be joined-up
government but there is a lack of joined-up thinking. Sometimes
decisions are taken out of sequence. To give a practical example,
a subsidy was given to a bus service from Hawes to Ribblehead
which is about 15 miles away but it failed because they did not
put in the link that was needed first to make a success of the
longer transport route being subsidised. The scheme ended a year
early because it failed, but the local view that you have to do
A before you do B was ignored.
Q169 Mr Drew: We have heard a lot
about Yorkshire Forward, but if the figures are to be believed
the amount of real resource that comes in via the RDAs is relatively
low compared with the learning and skills councils, particularly
local authorities. The figures we have been given show that RDAs
account for about 4%, LSCs 18% and local authorities 78%. Therefore,
this is really a question initially for Cllr Blackie. I have served
all three authorities at the same time; I bear the scars. I also
served on a parochial tourist council, so I was very greedy. How
would you redesign local government to be more effective in remote
areas? One of the problems with local government at the moment
is that in my experience it has abdicated a lot of responsibility
in terms of what I call the drive for initiative and there is
a lot of overlap. For example, in the case of flooding it was
not very clear until we looked into it who should be doing what.
We may be getting better at it. There is now the involvement of
other bodies like the Environment Agency. I give you a blank sheet
of paper. You are concerned with all three. If somebody said,
"Cllr Blackie, I want you to sort out local government in
this area", what would you do?
Cllr Blackie: I have to say that
as leader of the district council at the time I was a supporter
of the unitary bid made by North Yorkshire County Council. It
did not quite make the grade; it was an early favourite, but somehow
or other in the race to the finishing post it was pipped by Northumbria
and Durham. Here we have several layers of local government but
the local people out there do not care a jot who does what; they
just want it done. A lot of people think that the national park
does everything because sometimes it is the most dominant authority
and you read about it most in the paper. Perhaps a degree of streamlining
would not go amiss. There is no need for duplication and overlap
that you rightly point out. Obviously, I would wish to see the
devolvement of local government and funding to a more localised
community than the one we have now which is many miles away. I
should like to see area committees which have substantial funds
to spend on their local areas. That is how I would start to tackle
the issues you raise.
Q170 Mr Drew: Having heard Cllr Blackie,
what would the other witnesses want from local authorities in
terms of business development that is not happening at the moment
but might happen if a reorganisation or, dare I say, more sensitive
feel for local authorities could be delivered?
Mr Birnie: The first one is Yorkshire
Forward. Yorkshire is a very large and varied county. West Yorkshire
is different from South Yorkshire and that is entirely different
from North Yorkshire. North Yorkshire is as big as many other
counties. If you could split up Yorkshire Forward into three or
four at least it would give us somewhere fairly local to go and
it could focus on a particular area. I think that would help immensely
in this area.
Q171 Mr Drew: Would you make that
the responsibility of local authorities?
Mr Birnie: No.
Q172 Mr Drew: Perhaps you would explain
that.
Mr Birnie: For most of my working
life I have had more success when dealing with the old Department
of Industry in terms of business help than the myriad of authorities
we now have.
Q173 Chairman: The RDA has had the
responsibility for a couple of years of disbursing funds to the
rural economy. What kind of contact do you have with it?
Mr Birnie: A couple of years ago
I spent many hours writing a paper in support of an increase in
the visitor centre. I took it along to Northallerton and various
questions were raised upon it. Basically, we were looking to spend
quite a bit of money to create jobs. At the end of the day I was
told that the budget had run out and it was being transferred
to Yorkshire Forward anyway next year. The whole thing was a complete
waste of time.
Chairman: Perhaps I may put a question
to Rima Berry. Bearing in mind that you represent a business association,
do you have any kind of continuing dialogue with Yorkshire Forward?
Does it come along and bounce ideas off you or ask for information,
or has it been unable to get through on the party line?
Q174 Mr Drew: To make a quick rejoinder,
do you know who your rural director is? Each RDA has one person
who notionally has a rural responsibility. Have you met that person?
Ms Berry: I do not have a clue.
It is hardly knocking on the door. In my other role I work for
a rural community council which has a bit more contact with Yorkshire
Forward, but at this level I am afraid we do not exist, to be
honest.
Cllr Blackie: It was Richard Caborn
who some years ago as minister sat where you are, Mr Drew, and
introduced the idea of Regional Development Agencies. I was sitting
approximately here listening to this hope for joined-up thinking.
It was then a brave new world but, unfortunately, Rima Berry is
quite right; there is no engagement in the more rural areas by
the local Regional Development Agency. I make these remarks with
caution because the agency is now the only game in town but the
fact of the matter is that the rural funding that has been swept
up into its coffers has not come back in the way it did in the
past. We are back to having small hypothecated funding streams
that are ring-fenced for rural areas if we are to make a difference.
Q175 Lynne Jones: Mr Birnie, you
said earlier that you believed the RDA needed to be regionalised
further, but you then said that the old business department was
more helpful. Is not the locality less important than having a
sectoral interest?
Mr Birnie: I think a lot of it
comes down to the people. If you have someone in the organisation
who is driven you can usually get somewhere. At that time I was
working more in the North East and dealing with Newcastle. I had
some very good support in the area. That was not a rural area.
But if you have people who are switched on and who focus on a
rural area you may get some action.
Q176 Lynne Jones: Might not the problem
be that rural areas are the responsibility of Defra which may
not have very much clout in terms of the RDAs?
Mr Birnie: Quite possibly.
Q177 Chairman: Perhaps we may draw
matters to a conclusion by looking at one of the areas that sometimes
can be very contentious, that is, the operation of the planning
system in terms of enabling business to develop. Mr Birnie, I
start with you. You have expanded your business and done a great
deal in terms of the physical structures. What is your experience
of dealing with the planning authority in terms of the type of
project in which you have been involved?
Mr Birnie: I have not been here
long enough, given from when they were originally developing this
site, but I gather that the national park is rather slow and cumbersome
in terms of planning applications. It is particular in terms of
the finish that is needed and so on, but I have been benefiting
from the tourist trade and I go along with that by all means.
Generally, I believe it must be a bit more expansive in allowing
businesses to develop further and faster. We have a site here.
We cannot move Wensleydale cheese-making away from Hawes; this
is its natural home, but there are other things that we could
take away if we were not allowed to develop them. We have another
site 40 miles away that could be developed as easily as this one,
but it is our wish to keep the heart of the company in this community
because that is where it belongs; it is its home. We need the
planners to help us do that. We cannot stand still because other
dairies will overtake us with technology, so we have to develop
the site. These buildings have been standing for 50 years. They
are patched up a bit and we need to keep making improvements.
We need the park authority to understand our need to develop the
business which we believe also meets the need of the local authority.
Q178 Chairman: How often do you ask
a representative to come down so you can provide an update on
what your business is doing outwith any other need?
Mr Birnie: It happens once a year
or two years.
Q179 Chairman: Do you think it ought
to be a bit more proactive in learning what your business does
and its needs?
Mr Birnie: Yes.
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