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3 Oral Answers 20 JUNE 2011 Oral Answers 4 Since the election, eight Tory councils, including in the Prime Minister’s own constituency, have abandoned weekly bin collections, and the Secretary of State has been forced into a humiliating U-turn. Why can he not deliver on his promises? Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD): Rubbish! Mr Pickles: My hon. Friend suggests, from a sedentary position, that that was rubbish, and I cannot disagree with him. We are looking at delivering weekly collections and a financial incentive for providing them, but we had to start from the basis of dealing with the legacy—we had first to remove the Audit Commission and the instructions in the Waste and Resources Action Programme suggesting that it was best to close these things down after local elections, and we had to ensure that the fortnightly collections, which the right hon. Lady advocated so strongly when she was Minister for Housing, were also stopped. Caroline Flint: Of course, under Labour, recycling went up, and last week we heard that across our islands, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales have higher targets for recycling than England. I think that the record will show that most of the local authorities with fortnightly bin collections are Conservative-controlled. Is not the truth that this chaotic climbdown is a personal humiliation for the Secretary of State? He is making promises he cannot deliver, his own councils are not listening to him and he has been dumped on by his Cabinet colleagues. Mr Pickles: I understand now why Polly Toynbee is so disappointed with the right hon. Lady’s opposition across the Dispatch Box. I apologise, Mr Speaker, for not directing my earlier remarks to you. She is concerned about the number of Conservative authorities, but their number is due to the fact that the majority of councils in this country are Conservative—she had a big chance in May to rectify that and failed singularly. However, we are removing the incentives for fortnightly collections, and looking at incentives for weekly collections. Housing (Armed Forces Personnel) 2. Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con): What plans he has to provide support through his Department’s housing policy to serving and former members of the armed forces. [60274] 10. Christopher Pincher (Tamworth) (Con): What plans he has to provide support through his Department’s housing policy to serving and former members of the armed forces. [60282] The Minister for Housing and Local Government (Grant Shapps): I am absolutely determined to ensure that serving and former serving personnel from the armed forces are treated properly when it comes to housing on their return. Mr Gray: Serving men and women form a disproportionately large part of those who are homeless or rough sleepers. I therefore very much welcome the Government’s notification that they are a priority group under the Firstbuy scheme. However, many of them cannot afford to buy a house at all. Will the Minister now consider whether he can bring pressure to bear on local authorities, so that serving men and women are also designated as a priority for local authority housing? Grant Shapps: I do not just want to remove the housing disadvantage for those who have served in the military; I want to put them at a positive advantage. That is why we have announced today that they will receive that priority in the Firstbuy scheme. I can also tell my hon. Friend that they will be a priority in the social housing allocation list. Also, if I may correct one point, the new figures for rough sleepers out today from CHAIN—the Combined Homeless and Information Network—show that just 2% of those who have served previously in the military are on the streets. Christopher Pincher: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his answer. Will he join me in congratulating Tamworth borough council on the steps that it proposes to take in prioritising service people on its housing list? Professional organisations such as the Residential Landlords Association have also been encouraging their members to support service people with housing needs. Does that not demonstrate that the private sector can work with the public sector to deliver the housing element of our armed forces covenant? Grant Shapps: I have no hesitation in congratulating Tamworth on its approach to the armed forces, or the Residential Landlords Association, which has done much to push this issue. I congratulate them, and I will go further when we draw up the social housing regulations after the Localism Bill has passed. Service Provision 4. Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab): What recent assessment he has made of the effects of reductions in central Government funding for local authorities on levels of local authority service provision. [60276] 13. Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab): What recent assessment he has made of the effects of reductions in central Government funding for local authorities on levels of charges for local authority services. [60286] The Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Greg Clark): I can tell the House that I have made a new assessment of the consequences for local authorities of paying down the deficit. Currently, the average reduction in spending power for councils this year is 4.4%. However, if VAT were reduced, as per a recent suggestion, the £13 billion a year needed to pay for it would require the average cut in council spending to be 29.1%. In my view, that would be to go too far and too fast. Mr Slaughter: That is all very interesting, but from next month, nine Sure Start centres in Hammersmith and Fulham will lose more than 90% of their funding, and therefore will close. Parents at one of them—Cathnor Park—have got a judicial review going, but they are having to expedite it, because the council is going ahead with 50 redundancies and closing services, despite the fact that the courts have not yet considered these matters.
5 Oral Answers 20 JUNE 2011 Oral Answers 6 Will the Minister at least go as far as advising that rogue council not to proceed with those closures until the courts and the parents have had their fair say? Greg Clark: That is a superb council, and it certainly does not need any advice from me. In fact, I am astonished that the hon. Gentleman has not taken the opportunity to congratulate his council on saving every library in the borough, by merging the service with neighbouring boroughs, and on saving £1 million. When he was leader of the council, he doubled the council tax and his Labour administration was booted out at the election. The current, Conservative administration was returned with a healthy majority at the last council election. Mrs Glindon: As a result of the Government’s decision to impose huge, front-loaded cuts on local authorities, many councils are increasing charges for social care, hitting the elderly and the vulnerable. Will the Minister join me in condemning Tory councils such as North Tyneside council, which has increased its home care charges by more than 50%, from £99 to a maximum of £150 a week? Greg Clark: We still have not had an answer—perhaps we will shortly—to the question of how the extra black hole that has opened up will be funded, and whether that will come from local government, but I will answer the hon. Lady’s question. Three years ago, one of the predecessors of the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) as Minister for local government, the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey), complained that only one in five councils was using charging to its full potential. Indeed, the last Government issued statutory guidance to force councils to charge more for parking, for example. Council charging doubled under Labour. Unlike the last Government, we will not force councils to increase their charging. Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con): Does my right hon. Friend agree that there is great cost variation in like-for-like authority provision? Therefore, it is inappropriate to judge the quality of services by the amount of other people’s money—that is, taxpayers’ money—spent on them. Greg Clark: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. His record in leading Wandsworth, which was transformed under his leadership—I am pleased to say that that transformation has continued under the leadership of Sir Edward Lister, whom I am sure the House will congratulate on his knighthood—shows what can be done when there is a Conservative council that takes the economies seriously. Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con): Does my right hon. Friend agree that, now that the Government have introduced greater transparency in relation to any amounts over £500 that local authorities spend, our constituents will be far better informed about the politics involved in the reduced budgets for local authorities? Greg Clark: My hon. Friend is another distinguished former leader of a local authority, and he is absolutely right. We still have not heard whether those on the Opposition Front Bench think that it is a good idea for councils to have full transparency. I think that Nottingham city council is still holding out, but perhaps we shall be enlightened on that matter soon. Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab): Today’s report from the Equality and Human Rights Commission demonstrates that Britain’s pensioners are not receiving the care that they deserve. In Birmingham, the coalition council’s cutting of care to 4,100 of the most vulnerable has been branded unlawful by the High Court. Having imposed the biggest cuts in local government history, does the Secretary of State take any responsibility? Will he intervene in this matter, or does he share the view of the Prime Minister that the actions of Birmingham city council were “excellent”? Greg Clark: The problem with Birmingham is that it has a legacy of mismanagement and waste from the days of Labour control, which lasted quite a long time. If the hon. Gentleman is interested in the economies, as I am, will he tell us his position and that of the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint)? He is the Rasputin of the Labour party, the power behind the throne of Edward Miliband. I have to warn the Leader of the Opposition, however, that the hon. Member for Derby North (Chris Williamson) is an acolyte of the shadow Chancellor. In Wimbledon fortnight, it would perhaps be appropriate to say that he is one of Balls’ boys. Is it the shadow Secretary of State’s policy to add an extra £13 billion of cuts? Yes or no? And would that come from borrowing, or would it yet again come from local government? Will she tell us what her policy is? In the week that— Mr Speaker: Order. I am grateful to the Minister, but he must now resume his seat. In the name of utilising our time properly—I use the word “properly”advisedly—we must focus questions and answers on the policies of the Government. New Homes Bonus 5. Eric Ollerenshaw (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Con): How much funding his Department has allocated from the New Homes Bonus scheme (a) to Lancaster and Fleetwood constituency and (b) in total since the scheme’s inception. [60277] The Minister for Housing and Local Government (Grant Shapps): The first New Homes Bonus allocations were made in April. Over six years, Lancaster will receive some £1.4 million and Wyre some £1.6 million. Across England, the allocations will total almost £1 billion during the spending review period. The next allocations will take place next April. Eric Ollerenshaw: I thank my right hon. Friend for that reply on behalf of the two district councils. How long will it be before this policy and others of the new Government begin to address the failure over the past 13 years to get the right number of new houses that we need? Grant Shapps: The policies are already having some impact. In the first year of this new Government, house building starts were up 22%. That compares rather favourably with the period during which the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint), who is now the shadow Secretary of State, was housing Minister, when house building starts were a third lower than they are today.
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