PARLIAMENTARY DEBATE
Engagements - 24 April 2024 (Commons/Commons Chamber)

I, too, wish to pass on my thoughts and prayers to Lord Field’s family, friends and colleagues and particularly to students and teachers at the Birches Head Academy in Stoke-on-Trent who are part of the Frank Field Education Trust.

Since being elected in 2019, I have: helped to reopen Tunstall Town Hall with a new library and family hub; secured funding for additional CCTV, new alley gates and better lighting in Tunstall to ensure that our streets are safe; and helped to breathe new life into Tunstall’s old library and baths, thanks to this Government’s levelling-up fund of £56 million to Stoke-on-Trent.

Sadly, Labour-led Stoke-on-Trent City Council seeks to undermine that progress by: introducing a brand new tax on residents to have their garden waste collected; refusing to take planning enforcement against rogue and absent landlords who plague Tunstall High Street; and increasing crime and antisocial behaviour by dumping undesirable people in the centre of Tunstall. Does the Deputy Prime Minister agree that Stoke-on-Trent Labour—[Interruption.]

Order. It is normally Mr Gullis who is loud. Please, let me hear him.

This just goes to show the disdain that the Labour party has for Stoke-on-Trent.

Does the Deputy Prime Minister agree that it is time for Stoke-on-Trent Labour to axe the garden tax, to take the fight to lousy landlords—

Order. There is a question to be asked and a time in which we ask it. I suggest that the hon. Member puts in for an Adjournment debate. I am sure that he has the answers.

I call the deputy Leader of the Opposition.

First, may I share the Deputy Prime Minister’s comments regarding our Jewish community and wish them a happy Passover? I wish to acknowledge the loss of David Marquand and Baroness Massey, both of whom made historic contributions in Parliament, politics and wider life. I also send my condolences, following today’s news, to the family of Lord Frank Field, who was a good friend of mine and a colleague. He was a tireless campaigner against poverty and a champion for his constituents.

Mr Speaker, I know that the Conservative party is desperate to talk about my living arrangements, but the public wants to know what this Government will do about theirs. Natalie from Brighton has been served with two no-fault eviction notices in 18 months. She joins nearly a million families at risk of homelessness due to the Deputy Prime Minister’s failure to ban this cruel practice. Instead of obsessing over my house, when will he get a grip and show the same obsession with ending no-fault evictions?

The Deputy Prime Minister clearly thought that he could spend all week obsessing over my living arrangements and did not even bother to read up on his own Government’s Bill this afternoon. The reality is that he caved in to vested interest on his Back Benches and delayed justice for people like Natalie. This week, the Housing Minister said that there is no solid date for banning no-fault evictions. The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities now says that it will not happen before an election. If the Deputy Prime Minister can give us a date, will he name it now?

The Deputy Prime Minister clearly has not been looking up his own Government Bills. Let me turn to another Tory housing failure. Leaseholds are a rip off and a con, but the Government’s proposed ban on new leaseholds applies only to houses. The majority of leaseholds are in flats. What is the point of a ban on new leaseholds if it will not apply to flats?

I was expecting a little bit better from the Deputy Prime Minister. He seems to be a bit worn out. Maybe it is the 3 am calls from the “bad men” that have been keeping him up at night. He talks about strikes and the unions. We have had more strikes under this Government’s watch than at any time before. Once again, he has not read his own Bill. Their ban on leasehold will not apply to the majority of people. It is like banning non-doms but exempting Tory Prime Ministers. He speaks about affordable homes. Families are trapped in temporary accommodation and stuck on waiting lists, and in the west midlands the Conservative Mayor has used his multi-million pound housing budget to build just 46 social homes in eight years. That is almost as many as in the Chancellor’s property portfolio. The British people know that the Conservative party will not build the homes that this country needs, so when will they get a chance to vote for a Government who will?

It is pretty revealing that the Deputy Prime Minister thinks that housing is not an issue for the British people; I think it really is. People in glass houses should not throw stones, because in Birmingham and across the whole country, councils are facing black holes because of his Government’s austerity programme. I warn the Deputy Prime Minister that Tory councils have also faced section 114 notices, and Birmingham City Council has had over £1 billion taken from its budget—from some of the poorest people. More than 16,000 families face losing their home after the Tory party’s mini-Budget, and mortgage bills continue to soar. Meanwhile, the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss), parades around the world in a twisted victory lap promoting her new book, saying that the mini-Budget was her proudest moment. Since she will not apologise to those families losing their home, will he?

The right hon. Gentleman talks about defence. We all want to see 2.5%; the difference is that we have not cut the Army to its smallest size since Napoleon. Never mind some secretive deep state, it is the state of the Tory party that is the problem. The Tories are in a deep state of sewage. After 14 years they have failed renters, they have failed leaseholders and they have failed mortgage holders. I read with interest that the right hon. Gentleman has been urging his neighbour in No. 10 to call an election, because he is worried they might get wiped out. Has he finally realised that when he stabbed Boris Johnson in the back to get his mate into No. 10, he was ditching their biggest election winner for a pint-sized loser?

I call the deputy leader of the Scottish National party.

I join in wishing the Jewish community a happy Passover and sending my condolences to the family and loved ones of Frank Field.

Two years ago, when mass graves were discovered in Ukraine, this House united in condemnation and rightly treated those graves as evidence of war crimes, which Russia must be made to answer for. Yesterday, Palestinian officials uncovered two mass graves outside the bombed hospitals in Gaza. Those graves also constitute a war crime, do they not?

Three hundred bodies, including of the elderly and the injured, some of which had been stripped naked and mutilated, with their hands tied behind their backs. The UK’s own arms policy states that if there is even a risk that war crimes may be taking place, that is reason enough to halt the sale of arms. Given all that we know, why is the Prime Minister yet to do so?

On behalf of the Liberal Democrats, I offer our condolences to the friends and family of the late Lord Frank Field, and wish a happy Passover to all those in the Jewish community.

Unpaid carers have shared heartbreaking stories of how they have been hounded by the Department for Work and Pensions and told to pay huge fines for minor infringements of carer’s allowance earning rules, all because the Government have failed to do anything about a problem that they have known about for years. Yesterday, one of the Prime Minister’s own dementia advisers resigned, saying that the Government’s treatment of those unpaid carers was “beyond the pale.” Will the Deputy Prime Minister apologise to all unpaid carers who have been failed by his Government, and will he commit to a full review of the system?

Has my right hon. Friend seen the video that is doing the rounds of the theft in a shop in my constituency, Boots the chemist on Station Road? In the space of eight minutes, two threatening individuals robbed thousands of pounds out of that shop, and they are not alone: it is happening again and again. In fact, one of my team went out and photographed them leaving brazenly, not caring, and even spitting at the police. Will my right hon. Friend please now say to the Home Secretary, and through him to the police, that this is not a petty crime? This is a threat of violence and massive robbery, and it should be a priority for the police. We always talk about more police; surely what we should be asking for is more effective policing that gets those criminals off the streets.

Labour’s mayoral candidate in the West Midlands talks about housing, but makes no commitment to protect our precious green belt. He talks about transport, but he fails to commit to reopening Aldridge train station. He committed to saving police stations such as Aldridge; then, when the Labour police and crime commissioner said he would close them, he changed his mind and agreed to that. So we are left wondering in my constituency what he stands for. Does my right hon. Friend agree with me that only Mayor Andy Street has a plan and a track record to be trusted to deliver for the West Midlands?

The Labour leader of the almost bankrupt Hastings Borough Council and several other Labour councillors resigned from the Labour party citing that the national Labour party has become overly authoritarian, in a “dereliction of local democracy”, and has “lost its moral compass” and is suffocating local voices because its only objective is power for power’s sake. Would the Deputy Prime Minister agree that voting for Conservative candidates in upcoming elections will ensure local voters are heard, local democracy is upheld and better services are delivered?

I very much associate myself with the remarks of my right hon. Friend regarding Lord Frank Field, who was a good man.

I very much welcome the Government’s firm commitment to increase defence spending to 2.5% by 2030. It is something that will send the right message to our allies and potential adversaries alike, and it is something on which the 1922 defence committee has been campaigning for a little while. However, would my right hon. Friend do what he can to ensure that some of that increased money is spent on additional recruitment—including, if necessary, increasing wages sufficiently—to ensure that the Navy can manage ships, the Air Force can maintain its aircraft and the Army can dominate ground?

May I associate myself with the tributes and condolences paid to the late great Frank Field? One of his lasting achievements in the world of education is the holiday activities and food fund, which this Government can take great pride in having funded. May I urge my right hon. Friend to use his good offices across Government to ensure that we secure a multi-year settlement for the continuance of that vital work?

Last week we had the Finance Bill, and in it I noticed a reduction in capital gains tax from 28% to 24% on residential properties to try to turbo-boost the residential market. Will that apply retrospectively, so that hypothetically, if a Labour Front Bencher owed capital gains tax, they would benefit from this Conservative tax cut?