Local Government Finance (England) — House of Commons, 2020-02-24
Topic: Macroeconomics
Clive James Charles Betts (Labour, Centre-left): The Secretary of State is right that the spending review is better for local government and that it gives a spending power increase of just over 2% in real terms—I think that was the figure given—but that has to be put in context: it is actually a 5% reduction from 2015-16 and a 20% reduction per head of population in real-terms spending power since 2010. Those are the figures the IFS has produced. Local government has received bigger spending cuts than any other part of the public sector, and we have all experienced that in our constituencies up and down the country, whether they be urban, rural, large city or small town; they have all been hit disproportionately by those cuts At least we have some stability this year, as the financial officers in Sheffield have said. For the first time, they are not facing a package of cuts. They have welcomed the £10 million extra for social care, and the city has tried to maintain spending on social care for the elderly, looked-after children and people with disabilities, as have most councils up and down the country, but we know that this is really a one-year settlement, for obvious reasons, and that next time we will probably be looking at a multi-year settlement. The hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) talked about the fair funding review, but that is not about an increased budget in total; it is just about redistribution. Somebody will lose out, unless the Government put more money in so that everybody gains. That will be the challenge that comes out of the review There is also supposedly the retention of up to 75% of business rates, and maybe some impact from the business rates review itself—who knows? These all major changes. The question is: is this year the lull before storm for many authorities or the beginning of better things to come? That is the test for the Government. Another test is: is austerity really over? That was the question the IFS asked in its comments about the spending review and the figures I quoted from its report. Is austerity really over? What do we even mean by "an end to austerity"? That is an even bigger question. Does it simply mean that local authorities will not have to make any more cuts in overall terms, or does it mean they will have resources to undo some of the cuts they have had to make? To my mind, the answer has to be the second one. An end to austerity has to mean going back and putting more money into the services that have been so badly cut over the years. As councils have tried to protect social care, other services—my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) very properly went through them—be they buses, leisure, libraries, street repairs or refuse collection, have been cut consistently by up to 50%. We cannot continue to see more cuts in those important services, and, moreover, we cannot continue without some restitution of the services that have already been cut I heard what the Secretary of State said about the review of social care and the need for cross-party debate and, hopefully, agreement. I am more than happy to join in with that, and I am sure that the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee will be as well. We dealt with the issue in the last Parliament, and I think that our joint report provided a good basis for progress. Realistically, however, any significant change in social care funding will probably not happen during the current Parliament. What we need is more money put into the current system, at least for the foreseeable future Let me identify two areas of concern—apart from social care—that are having a real impact on my constituency and nationally. Like many MPs, I regularly raise road safety issues on behalf of constituents. One concerns the need for yellow lines at the end of Moor Farm Avenue, a road that leads from a private estate to the very busy Mosborough Moor. Those yellow lines would ensure that the corners—the junctions—were kept free of obstruction, so that motorists leaving the estate would have a better sightline to vehicles coming in the opposite direction. What has happened? The council’s response is that after years of funding cuts, it cannot satisfy all requests. That scheme is one of 1,600 on a waiting list in the city of Sheffield Another issue is the lack of a crossing outside Halfway Nursery Infant School. I have been campaigning for that crossing for 10 years. At present, it is dangerous for children and their parents to cross the road, but the council can fund only a couple of schemes a year in the whole city I wonder where the Liberal Democrats are tonight. I do not know whether my eyesight is failing, but I cannot see anyone on the Liberal Democrat Benches. However, they campaign locally, and every scheme is a priority, although when they were in government we experienced the biggest ever year-on-year cuts in local authority spending. But never mind: the point is that these schemes are important, and council funding for them has been cut by more than 50% The other day I read an important article in the Daily Mail—I am sure that the Secretary of State reads nothing else at his breakfast table. According to that article, the Food Standards Agency has doubled its estimate of the number of intestinal illnesses caused by takeaway and restaurant food each year, and 2.4 million cases of such illnesses are linked to food contamination. That, it says, is connected with the reduced number of local authority environmental health officers who carry out food safety checks. Another important service provided by local authorities has been diminished and run down, and, again, not making cuts is not enough: we need money for authorities to be able to reinstate those services I welcomed the Secretary of State’s comments about devolution. I think he has a genuine commitment to and enthusiasm for it. The Select Committee began an inquiry into the issue before the election, and I hope that we will continue that inquiry, because I think that, along with social care, this is an issue on which we can work to secure cross-party agreement.