Examination of Witnesses (Questions 157-159)
PHIL HOPE
MP, TOM LEVITT
MP AND JONATHAN
LINDLEY
29 JUNE 2009
Q157 Chairman: Good evening. Thank
you for being here. May I apologise on behalf of the Chairman
of the East Midlands Select Committee, Paddy Tipping, who is not
very well at the moment? Hopefully he will make a speedy recovery.
We will keep him up to date with proceedings. It might be helpful—not
for our benefit because we know everybody apart from Jonathan—if
you could briefly introduce yourselves for the benefit of the
public.
Phil Hope: First, may I associate
myself with your remarks and wish Paddy a speedy recovery? I hope
that he will continue, from his hospital bed or wherever, to take
an interest in these proceedings. I am Phil Hope, Member of Parliament
for Corby and East Northamptonshire and Minister for the East
Midlands. I will make a few opening remarks after my colleagues
have introduced themselves.
Tom Levitt: I am Tom Levitt, Member
of Parliament for High Peak and Parliamentary Assistant to Phil
in his capacity as Regional Minister, which basically means I
deputise for him every now and again when necessary. I also attend
the Regional Economic Cabinet.
Jonathan Lindley: I am Jonathan
Lindley. I am the Government Office regional director for the
East Midlands.
Q158 Chairman: Good to meet you.
Minister, would you like to do a bit of preamble and general position
setting?
Phil Hope: First, let me talk
about my role. As Regional Minister I see myself as being a voice
for the region in Whitehall, listening to the concerns of people
and organisations and making sure that the Whitehall machinery
responds positively and directly to the concerns that are specific
to the East Midlands. Secondly, I provide leadership within the
East Midlands, hence the creation of the Regional Economic Cabinet,
which is a specific vehicle for us to take through partnership
working through the economic downturn and in other ways I provide
leadership to organisations right across the region. Thirdly,
I represent Government interests in the region to talk about and
to convey the key issues and policies that the Government are
putting forward. So there are three major roles that I play and
I do so with the support of Tom, who is my assistant and deputises
for me. I particularly want to mention the Regional Economic Cabinet
because this was an important development that I put into place
knowing that in these exceptional economic circumstances we needed
to pull together all the partners to up their game and to challenge
those partners, both as individual organisations in their own
right to perform better in terms of the challenges ahead, but
also to work better together and to challenge each other about
the partnership working. On the Regional Economic Cabinet we have
private sector organisations and the business community represented,
public sector organisations represented, such as the learning
and skills council, for example, and the trade union movement
represented through the regional TUC. The cabinet has developed
over time, so we have now invited the Homes and Communities Agency
to join because the issues around jobs, homes, the construction
industry and all that seemed to be key. In future meetings we
are inviting the East Midlands university organisations to come
and present to us the contribution that they make to this partnership
to ensure that we have a strong and vibrant economy with jobs
and growth in the region, both getting through the downturn, but
more importantly perhaps, being ready to manage the upturn when
it comes. When I first began, I identified five major priorities
for action, which included not only jobs and skills, but social
exclusion for those people furthest away from the labour market
in particular. We wanted to make sure that we were reaching out,
ensuring that organisations were responding to the needs of people—those
with disabilities, for instance, those with mental health problems,
and offenders—who would normally find it difficult to get
a job at the best of times and finding out what more could we
do to ensure that those people were engaged with. We set up two
sounding boards, one around PSA 16, which is those particular
groups, and giving them a job and a home, but also a housing sounding
board. I have been delighted; with all the busy things that we
have to do, it has been great having Tom available. He deputised
for me in chairing those two sounding boards recently. Lastly,
by way of my opening remarks, it is about partnership working.
It can be an overused word, Chair, as you will know, but it involves
people getting together, looking at what they can do and how they
can work better together to make their service more seamless—whether
it is to the business community in terms of financial practical
support, or whether it is to individuals and the work that they
do. That is crucial. We want to ensure that we punch our weight
as a region in the East Midlands. I do not like to be too competitive
with the other regions, but the more we can beat the West Midlands
the better—but I shouldn't say that, should I? I think that
we have moved a long way. We have local authorities in the Regional
Economic Cabinet. There has been a lot of change going on, both
political but also structural, to ensure that we have the right
structure in place in the region to ensure real leadership among
local authorities in this shared agenda on improving public services
and ensuring that we have sustainable jobs and growth for the
future. I shall leave it there by way of introduction.
Q159 Chairman: Thank you. That
was useful and helpful. I have a couple of questions. You are
a very busy Minister at the Department of Health. What is the
mix of time that you spend in terms of your ministerial responsibilities
vis-a"-vis the time that you are able to spend purely on
undertaking the activities associated with your role as Regional
Minister?
Phil Hope: It will vary from time
to time, depending on the pressures that emerge at any one time,
but I roughly spend about a fifth of my time as a Regional Minister—I
am sorry, it is about one quarter to three-quarters; it is in
that range. That is physical time, if I can call it that. In fact,
today I was in Derbyshire. I was in your constituency at Derby
University; and Judy, I was in your constituency earlier with
the company that makes composite manufacturing. I hope you knew
about that.
Judy Mallaber: No, I didn't know. I am
shocked.
Phil Hope: You should have known.
I did wonder. That is why I mention it now, because you should
have known. I shall check with my officials whether you had been
told. I shall come back to you later on that. I was in Derby today
looking at examples of organisations working together to provide
jobs and mobility for the future. I tend to spend about that proportion
of time in the region—all around the region, and visiting
all parts of the region—and we hold the Regional Economic
Cabinet in different parts of the region to ensure that they have
a chance to be heard and to see what is happening. It is roughly
that sort of ratio.
|
