Chris Curtis MP: speeches 2026

Speeches

• 7 Sept 2026 · Economic Growth · Hansard source

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  We are now on the fourth round of consultation on East West Rail, the latter rounds of consultation consulting on the outcomes of the earlier rounds of consultation. At the same time, we are in the middle of building the most expensive nuclear power station in the history of the human race because of the four rounds of consultation required for Sizewell C. When we tried to build the lower Thames crossing, the total consultation for the development consent order process was 359,000 pages. That is 250 times the length of “War and Peace”. It is right to go to war on these consultations, but can the Minister tell us how she will stop at nothing to ensure that we get infrastructure projects built more efficiently, so that we can save taxpayers far more money and drive economic growth?

• 2 Sept 2026 · Rewiring the State · Hansard source

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  I want to ask about devolution and transport. Since we introduced Transport and Works Act orders in the 1990s, we have dramatically decreased the number of new tramlines, which we know are a big driver of local growth, being built in the UK. France has a mass rapid transit system in every town and city with a population of over 150,000 people, yet Leeds is the biggest place in western Europe without any mass rapid transit system at all. Will the First Secretary please tell us what powers she will push downwards to combined authorities to allow them to build new tramlines, and how she will make that a success?

• 2 Sept 2026 · Representation of the People Bill · Hansard source

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  Before I turn to the substance of the Bill, may I take a moment to put on record how much I enjoyed serving on the Select Committee under the chairship of my hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi)? I am proud of the work we did together, including on tackling rough sleeping and confronting Britain’s housing crisis. I know she will take that into government as she takes on her new role. New clause 56, standing in my name, concerns the implementation of automatic voter registration. It is hopefully slightly less controversial than some of the other topics we have covered today, and I hope the Minister will support it, given that the new clause stood in her name until just a few weeks ago. Fundamentally, if we want high participation in our elections, we should make it as frictionless and easy as possible for eligible citizens to take part. We know that participation is too low. Turnout at the 2024 general election was a little under 60%, which was the lowest figure since 2001. However, that does not tell us the whole story, because the published turnout figure is the percentage of registered voters who go out to vote in the election. It excludes the estimated 8 million people, according to the Electoral Commission, who are eligible to vote but do not do so, because they are not on the electoral register. That could be because they are registered incorrectly, they have moved home or they did not get around to registering. Meanwhile, research from the University of Manchester showed us that we make it harder to register to vote here in the UK than almost any other democracy. This problem is not evenly distributed across our constituencies or across demographics. Young people, private renters, disabled people and those who are more transient are all less likely to be registered to vote. For too long, we have operated a slightly absurd system whereby the British state can know where you live, your age, your demographics and whether you are eligible to vote, and yet you still have to fill out a separate form to be registered to vote. The Bill creates a new process through which electoral registration officers can register eligible voters without requiring them to make that separate application once the necessary commitments are met. It allows existing registrations to be updated without requiring somebody to submit a fresh application, and it creates a data sharing and piloting framework needed to move towards a genuinely modern system of electoral registration. These are all brilliant things that really move automatic voter registration in the right direction. The purpose of new clause 56 is simply to ensure that we now turn that legislative framework into a reality. At the moment, the Bill gives us the architecture for automatic registration. What it does not yet give us is a clear public timetable for when the different parts of that architecture will actually be implemented. It would be good to hear from the Minister something on that timetable in her closing remarks today. We should have a clear pathway to delivering substantial change during this Parliament, which the Electoral Commission says is possible. New clause 56 asks for just that. Within two months of the new clause coming into force, the Government would have to publish a plan setting out the steps needed to implement registration without an application, the dates by which those steps would be completed, when they expect regulations for the registration pilots to be laid before Parliament, and how many additional people they expect to be registered by 15 August 2029 as a result of implementing part 2. I will just make one very quick point on the pilots. I mentioned it on Second Reading and I still think we need a response. The fear about piloting automatic voter registration projects is that if they are done on local authority boundaries, as they would be, because local authorities are responsible for voter registration, there might be constituencies—Vauxhall and Camberwell Green is a perfect example, given that it is in both Lambeth and Southwark—where one part stands under the new scheme being piloted and another part of it does not. That can create a problem if part of one party’s votes come from a system where the registration has gone up and another part does not. So, may we please get a commitment from the Government or the Electoral Commission that when they are running pilots they will consider that point and preferably not run them in places where constituency boundaries do not line up? Finally, I completely understand the Government’s arguments that reform cannot happen overnight and that we need to do it securely, accurately and carefully, especially when it comes to ensuring that only those who are eligible to vote, go out and vote. The Government have made the right decision to put a legislative framework in place for automatic and direct voter registration. We just need to know when it will be implemented.

• 2 Sept 2026 · Representation of the People Bill · Hansard source

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  In line with that, is the right hon. Lady calling for the age at which one can get a job to be raised from 14 to 18, ruling out 16 to 18-year-olds from being able to work? Is she calling for the age at which one can learn to drive to be raised from 17 to 18? To follow her argument, it would be inconsistent not to support those things.

• 1 Sept 2026 · Direction of Government · Hansard source

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  When the Prime Minister travels up the west coast main line through Milton Keynes and Bedfordshire, he will be travelling through a bit of the country where there is a lot going on. We are building many new homes, we are building a new hospital, a new railway line and a new theme park, and we are expanding Luton airport. Without a devolution deal, however, we cannot make those projects a success for the area, and there is a fear that we will be left behind. Will the Prime Minister work with local councils and Members of Parliament to deliver a devolution deal as quickly as possible? Unlike many of the local MPs, including me, some local councillors are still not convinced of the benefits of devolution. What would the Prime Minister say to them about the benefits that it would bring to Milton Keynes and Bedfordshire?

• 30 Jun 2026 · Draft Town and Country Planning (Discharge of Local Planning Authority Functions) (England) Regulations 2026 · Hansard source

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  I thank the shadow Minister for making that point because it was the last point I was going to briefly make before wrapping up. This is the key point: it adds not only uncertainty, but delays. If uncertainty has costs in the housing system, the developers might go to the Planning Inspectorate, but that adds extra delay and costs. Most of the developments in schedule 1 are very small—often up to just 10 properties. The margins that a developer would make on that project are much smaller than the costs of that delay and of having to go to the Planning Inspectorate in the first place. That means that most developments across the country have effectively stopped construction altogether. The big consequence of that is that SME builders, particularly those in local communities who have generally been building smaller sized developments, are going under. One of the only ways to fix that is by bringing certainty back into the system, given that uncertainty is one of the reasons why they have been facing challenges.

• 30 Jun 2026 · Draft Town and Country Planning (Discharge of Local Planning Authority Functions) (England) Regulations 2026 · Hansard source

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  I have taken up too much time; people really want to get off. We all accept that we should be focusing on smaller sites because, as the Minister set out, the bigger sites should be decided and focused on by the planning committees. This measure will free up more of their time to focus on those bigger sites and issues. However, schedule 1 sets the size of small sites at nine properties or fewer, which I think is at the lower end of people’s expectations. I appreciate that the Minister has done lots of consultation work on the draft regulations, but given that just 69% of the properties built each year would fall into that category, can he please give us some information on how he has settled on that number? Will he consider raising that number in future, if he is convinced that it would lead to more benefit and more good-quality homes being constructed?

• 30 Jun 2026 · Draft Town and Country Planning (Discharge of Local Planning Authority Functions) (England) Regulations 2026 · Hansard source

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  I do not believe that democracy is changing it. It is fundamentally the incentives of certain local politicians to do this when they can have a veto power over a development that has a wider gain, often outside their local constituencies. That is a wider consequence. I am democratically elected, as is the shadow Minister, so in this sovereign Parliament we have the ability and right to set the rules under which that democracy operates.

• 30 Jun 2026 · Draft Town and Country Planning (Discharge of Local Planning Authority Functions) (England) Regulations 2026 · Hansard source

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  To prove that point, the hon. Gentleman would need to prove that the types of applications currently going to either officers or planning committees are effectively random, but they are not. We know that different types of applications go to each one, so we cannot make that comparison between the two numbers.

• 30 Jun 2026 · Draft Town and Country Planning (Discharge of Local Planning Authority Functions) (England) Regulations 2026 · Hansard source

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  It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Desmond. I would like to make a couple of additional points, adding to the really important comments made by the Minister about why these changes are important. It is worth dwelling on the fact that housing in this country is prohibitively expensive for too many people. That is the reason why people are increasingly having to wait so long to get on the housing ladder. Fundamentally, housing is too expensive because, first, there is not enough of it and, secondly, increasingly it is too expensive to build new housing units. If we want to bring the cost of housing down, we have to address those two problems. We have to increase the number of new homes that are built, but also decrease the cost of building them. On the latter, increasing global pressures, from supply chain disruptions to the impact of geopolitical events, are pushing up construction and labour costs. Most of those headwinds are outside our control, but when we have difficult headwinds it is even more important that we do everything we can with the levers that are within our control to bring down the cost of construction. I mention that because one of the most damaging, self-inflicted and unnecessary costs in our current house building system is uncertainty. Right now, there could be companies out there—including developers, housing associations or, as the shadow Minister said, local councils—that are looking to build new homes. They could be doing everything right; they could be putting the land together and coming up with a plan that builds the right amount of affordable housing, gives local planning gains and supports local infrastructure. After putting all that investment and support in, coming up with a plan and designing a project, they could still face the daunting prospect of having that development blocked at the eleventh hour by the whims of a small number of local councillors, who are often responding completely rationally to local political incentives. Obviously, those trade-offs exists. That uncertainty comes at a cost: we either add to the price of a house that constituents are paying for, or we decrease the amount of planning gain that we can make from the developers. By definition, it either means higher housing costs or it means fewer GP surgeries, less road infrastructure or fewer affordable homes being built. That is the cost of having more uncertainty in the system. It is right that we reduce that uncertainty; one way to do that is by having decisions made by officers who are following planning laws, rather than by people who are responding to political incentives.

• 22 Jun 2026 · East Midlands Railway Collision · Hansard source

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  I join the Secretary of State in offering my deepest condolences to the family and friends of the driver, Shaun Burton. I thank her, the Rail Minister and staff at East Midlands Railway for keeping us updated in what I am sure were very difficult circumstances on Friday evening. As someone who represents the railway town of Wolverton, I know how such incidents have an impact on people right across the rail community. Will the Secretary of State join me in paying tribute to the emergency services, including brave firefighters from Milton Keynes, who acted quickly and professionally in the aftermath of this tragic incident?

• 3 Mar 2026 · Spring Forecast · Hansard source

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  Economic policies introduced by the previous Government piled more and more pressure on my generation, adding to intergenerational unfairness, and nowhere is that more clear than with plan 2 student loans; to declare my interest, I still owe more than £40,000. The policy proposed by the Conservative party will not do anything to alleviate the cost of living pressures on young people. Given the better economic outlook that we have seen today, will the Chancellor meet me and other MPs who are concerned about the plan 2 student loan system to talk about how we can make the system fairer and more sustainable?

• 2 Mar 2026 · Representation of the People Bill · Hansard source

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  I do not think I will get the time to say this at the end, so I want to put on the record that the Government should set up a national commission to look at our voting system. Whatever our views on it, we no longer live in a two-party electoral system, and if our electoral system does not acknowledge that fact, we will have even more chaotic and unpredictable election results, as Professor Rob Ford says. I welcome many of the changes introduced by the Bill. Members from across the Chamber have talked about the principles behind democracy. My view is pretty simple: we should make it as easy as possible for as many people as possible in our democracy to vote. Unfortunately, some political actors have moved us away from that basic principle in recent years with some of the measures that they have introduced. There are always trade-offs in supporting the security and integrity of our electoral system, but the introduction of photo ID in our elections was done in a way that placed an unfair burden on people going to vote, while not doing anything to support the integrity of our electoral system. In the 2023 election—the first time voter ID was introduced—a nurse in my constituency was not able to vote because she did not have a valid form of ID. I am sure it is possible for people in this Chamber to argue that at some point between her 12-hour shifts, saving the lives of my constituents, she should have found the time to fill in the proper paperwork. That right to vote was taken away from her to stop a problem that the Electoral Commission consistently said basically did not really exist. There is almost no evidence to show that it ever existed, if only because it would be incredibly inefficient to provide that on a large scale. I acknowledge that there are problems with electoral fraud in our democracy, but there is almost no in-person fraud at the ballot box. The introduction of that law therefore had almost no benefit, and it is right that the Government are increasing the range of supported IDs. In the same vein of making it as easy as possible for people to vote, I would like to support the changes to automatic voter registration, but I acknowledge some of the problems raised by Opposition Members. While I accept that it will not be possible to say that there will be full-coverage automatic voter registration by the time of the next election—that does not, in and of itself, create a problem—it would be good to have reassurance from the Government on two points. First, where there are constituencies that cross multiple local authorities, we must not have a problem whereby half the constituency has automatic voter registration and the other half does not. Secondly, by the time we come to the next boundary review, when it comes to automatic voter registration, there must not be incomplete coverage. Can we please have a commitment to a way of addressing that problem—

• 11 Feb 2026 · Woodland Creation · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House has considered the matter of woodland creation. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Lewell. I am grateful for the opportunity to open this debate on woodland creation, which my hon. Friend the Minister just described as the most wholesome debate we are going to have this week. I secured it because I really benefited from the beautiful blue and green spaces that I grew up alongside, and it is important to provide opportunities to benefit from accessible, beautiful blue and green spaces to everyone across the country. Green and blue spaces are not just a luxury but essential infrastructure for our climate, nature and people’s everyday lives. Trees and woodlands cool our towns and cities, reduce flood risk and revive biodiversity. They support both medical and physical wellbeing, strengthen social connections and give people access to nature close to home. We have many missions as a Government, but I think providing good blue and green spaces, including through the creation of new woodlands, is one way we can help to support them all. When green and blue spaces are planned well, they demonstrate that growth and environmental responsibility are not opposing forces but natural partners. I believe my home city is living proof of that. It is a new town created by the Harold Wilson Government of the 1960s, and from its very beginning the city was designed around green and blue corridors, with parks, woodlands and waterways woven into the fabric of daily life. That founding principle continues to shape the city today. Modern development sits alongside ancient landscapes, historic waterways and diverse habitats for wildlife. As a result, Milton Keynes now benefits from over 6,000 acres of parklands, rivers, lakes and woodlands, supported by more than 22 million trees—my fantastic city has 80 times more trees than the number of residents. Over time, the city has protected and enhanced its natural assets. Ancient woodlands remain accessible and cherished, while parks and waterways connect neighbourhoods. Nature is not pushed to the margins but placed at the heart of the city. Many places are now trying to retrofit that approach, but Milton Keynes understood it from the start. I have previously spoken to the Minister about the wetland arc project, led by the Parks Trust in Milton Keynes, with support from a National Lottery Heritage Fund grant. Once completed, this uninterrupted blue and green corridor will significantly enhance one of our city’s greatest assets. It supports wildlife, provides vital flood mitigation and carbon capture, and gives residents access to nature on their doorsteps. As the impacts of climate change become far more visible in our communities, the importance of wetlands and woodland creation cannot be overstated. According to the 2025 global wetland outlook, around 22% of the world’s wetlands have been lost since the 1970s, placing immense pressure on biodiversity and increasing flood risk. The wetland arc will stretch across the north of Milton Keynes, covering 355 hectares, which is around 500 football pitches of parkland. What excites me most about the project is the understanding of wetlands as multifunctional spaces: they are not only habitats for wildlife but places that protect communities from flooding, support active travel and connect local people. Under the stewardship of the Parks Trust, another great invention of the Milton Keynes Development Corporation, the wetland arc has the potential to become a distinctive and accessible landscape for the whole city, strengthening biodiversity while remaining open to everybody. We must not only create new woodlands for today, but think about stewardship into the future. I was reminded of the power of the Parks Trust’s local stewardship just last month, when I joined the trust to plant trees in Stanton Low Park. Among them was a “tree of hope”, a sapling grown from the Sycamore Gap tree. Only 49 of them were gifted across the UK, and I am proud that one now stands in my constituency. Elsewhere in my constituency, Linford wood offers another powerful example of how woodland can be protected and enjoyed within a city. This 97-acre ancient woodland, with its network of footpaths and carved timber sculptures inspired by woodland wildlife, is deeply loved by local residents across the city. It shows that ancient woods are not just a relic of the past, but living spaces that continue to enrich modern communities. What makes places like Linford wood so valuable is not only their ecological importance, but their role in people’s day-to-day lives. Families walk in the wood at weekends and runners use it for shaded paths. It is part of the route I am using to train for this year’s London marathon —the Minister is welcome to sponsor me, to support my local hospice. Woodlands are not just abstract environmental assets but part of the rhythm of community life. I hope that, throughout the debate, we talk just not just about the woodlands in rural parts of the country, important as they are, but the ones that exist in and support urban contexts. We might feel instinctively that spending time among trees lifts our mood and clears our mind, but the evidence increasingly backs that up. Aviva’s latest “Picture of Health” research, published in September 2025, highlights a growing shift across Britain towards embracing nature as an essential part of maintaining wellbeing. In a survey of 2,000 UK adults, 65% said they actively seek out nature to support their mental health or manage stress, 80% said nature boosts their happiness, and 74% reported a reduction in stress and anxiety after spending time outdoors. The research also found that regularly spending time in nature is linked to higher energy levels, improved concentration and better sleep. After the week some of us have had, I think we would appreciate all those things. The findings underline an important truth: access to nature is not just a luxury or a lifestyle choice, but a fundamental part of supporting the nation’s health and wellbeing. If more people are turning to green spaces to support their wellbeing, it becomes all the more vital that we protect, create and sustain the natural environments they rely on. Woodlands in particular offer accessible, restorative spaces close to where people live. Investing in their creation and long-term stewardship is therefore not only an environmental priority, but a social one, ensuring that the physical and mental health benefits of nature are accessible to everyone and not just a fortunate few. Woodland creation must sit at the heart of our national approach to environmental recovery. After 14 years of Conservative drift, England was left with a serious deficit in woodland creation and forest resilience, with tree planting falling to a 20-year low before Labour took office. The Government are turning that around, and planting rates are now at their highest level in more than two decades. More than 7,000 hectares were planted last year, with 10.4 million trees planted in 2024—a 46% increase on the previous year. We are back on track to reach 16.5% of woodland cover by 2050, meeting the Environment Act 2021 target. Backed by £1 billion of investment over this Parliament, it is the largest tree-planting and forestry programme that England has ever seen. The investment supports not only planting but long-term stewardship, skills and apprenticeships, nursery capacity and access to nature. The announcement of a new national forest across the Oxford-Cambridge arc, where my constituency sits, is fantastic news. I hope the Minister will consider that with reference to the forest of Marston Vale, in the constituency of the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Blake Stephenson). That would be a fantastic position and is obviously close to Milton Keynes. Milton Keynes shows what is possible and what has worked. I think I owe such a good start in life to the fact that my city provided so many things for me, up to and including fantastic access to green spaces and nature. I want to ensure that everybody right across the country has that same access. If we are serious about leaving a better environment for future generations, we must continue to invest in woodland creation, tree planting and new forests so that the benefits seen in Milton Keynes today can be enjoyed across the country for decades to come.

• 11 Feb 2026 · Woodland Creation · Hansard source

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  I thank everyone who has contributed, including my hon. Friends the Members for Dunstable and Leighton Buzzard (Alex Mayer), for Cannock Chase (Josh Newbury), for Thurrock (Jen Craft), for North East Hertfordshire (Chris Hinchliff), for Camborne and Redruth (Perran Moon) and for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Alison Taylor), as well as the hon. Members for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and Mid Bedfordshire (Blake Stephenson). People like me often talk about the importance of building new homes and infrastructure in this country, and no one in Government should apologise for housing targets in places anywhere across the country—but I do not think, nor will I ever believe, that that is in conflict with improving nature. My city is proof of that. Derek Walker, the chief architect of Milton Keynes, said that for the city to be a success, it needed to be “a forest city that would be greener than the surrounding countryside”. He achieved that. The reason I am so supportive of the Government’s nature strategy is that it would allow that sort of thing to happen again as it supports outcome over process. I would like to see the Department go further in ensuring that, when we enhance nature in this country, we focus on outcome and not on process, so that, for example, when we are building a railway line across this country and there is a £120 million to spend, it is spent on ensuring that we can enhance and protect forests, and not on a pointless bat tunnel that does absolutely nothing to enhance nature. When we think about an energy strategy for the future, as was recommended by the nuclear regulatory taskforce, we acknowledge that building nuclear power stations is one of the best ways of enhancing nature in this country because it means that, within a very small geography, we can produce a great deal of energy. Anybody who cares about protecting nature should support the Department in implementing those measures in full. I conclude by returning to the topic of trees and woodlands. They say that planting a tree is the greatest act of altruism. The time spent digging and planting is a small act, but it will shape the Earth for future generations. Consider the people who planted the 22 million trees in Milton Keynes; Fred Roach, the guy who led the development corporation, died a few years before I was born, but the city he built, the trees he planted and the green spaces he created were enjoyed by my family, especially me and my brother as we were growing up. This Government need to show that same altruistic attitude, planting trees and forests so that this country can remain a green and pleasant land for centuries to come. Question put and agreed to. Resolved , That this House has considered the matter of woodland creation.

• 27 Jan 2026 · Business Rates · Hansard source

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  I welcome the engagement from the Minister and today’s fantastic announcement, and invite him to come and have a pint at the Dolphin in my constituency, where I used to pull pints. Just down the road is William Cowley, a business that has been in my constituency since 1870. It produces the vellum on which much of the history of this nation has been written, including royal weddings, births and deaths; royal patents; freedoms of the city; and many Acts of Parliament. It is worried about its viability going forward, particularly after the revaluation of business rates. Will the Minister agree to meet me to have a discussion about how we can better support heritage businesses going forward?

• 22 Jan 2026 · Local Government Reorganisation · Hansard source

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  I should make it clear that local elections will be going forward in full in Milton Keynes and that I look forward to continuing to work with my brilliant, hard-working Labour councillors locally. One of the reasons for delaying the elections is the time it is taking to go through the local government reorganisation process. That affects elections, but it also affects the creation of the new combined authorities, which is happening in parallel. Given the delays, will the Department look at the fast-track programme for the combined authorities, and at whether it is worth adding areas that do not face the reorganisation challenges, such as Bedfordshire and Milton Keynes?

• 19 Jan 2026 · Local Elections: Cancellation · Hansard source

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  Local elections will be going forward in full in Milton Keynes this year, and I look forward to continuing to work with my brilliant hard-working Labour councillors. The ongoing process of reorganisation is delaying elections, but it is also delaying the creation of new combined authorities across many parts of the country. Given that, will the Department look again at the fast-track process, and whether places that have already gone through reorganisation and are fully unitarised, such as Bedfordshire and Milton Keynes, should be added to that programme, and that the creation of new combined authorities should be sped up in those places, given that it has taken some time in others?

• 15 Jan 2026 · New Towns · Hansard source

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  I thank the Minister for being generous with his time and for reinforcing the Government’s strategic direction, which I think most of us agree with. As we move on to the next stage, many of the local council leaders who he has spoken about feel like there is friction and frustration in the communication between them and the Department, with the Department making it feel like they are bidding for the money. Will he meet local council leaders to reset that relationship so that it can be more constructive in the next stage of the process?

• 15 Jan 2026 · New Towns · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch (Katrina Murray) not just for securing this debate, but for her passionate and moving speech. I will start by building on some of the comments made by the hon. Member for North Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller) about his constituents’ experiences of what is potentially the beginning of a new town process. It reminded me of a conversation I had after returning from the Labour party conference two and a half years ago, when we were in opposition. We had announced that if we won the election, we would move forward with the new towns programme. I got back to Milton Keynes—maybe slightly worse for wear—and popped into the family home to see my then 92-year-old grandmother with her friend Georgie in the living room. My grandmother had grown up in a small farmhouse in Wollaston, a village of about 300 people. It has since been consumed into what is now Milton Keynes. They were talking, as they often did, about how things used to be: the roads they knew by name, the rivalry between the cricket teams, and the local pubs in that small village. They also spoke of their fears at the time—I am sure that similar conversations are happening now in Tempsford—about how the new towns programme would change the tight-knit community they had grown up in and were used to, and their many concerns about what it would mean for local culture and infrastructure. It is easy for us, as politicians, just to stop there in our conversations with local constituents, but this conversation went further. My grandmother talked about how she lived long enough to see what a difference the community built in Milton Keynes—my home town—made to the lives of her daughter and her grandchildren. I am the first MP to have been born and to have grown up in the new town of Milton Keynes, and I owe almost everything to the fantastic start in life that Milton Keynes gave me. It meant that my parents could afford decent and affordable housing. It meant that there were good and decent jobs available because of what the development corporation did. It meant that public services were there when we needed them. Just like Tempsford, Milton Keynes was built on a floodplain—the River Ouzel floodplain—which I know is often a concern for people. The development corporation solution for that was to build balancing lakes. My grandmother and Georgie were pretty opposed to the balancing lake at the time. It was fields next to the farm she grew up on. There were massive diggers and slurry everywhere coming in. She used to call it “that daft puddle”. Today, because of what the development corporation was able to achieve—it was a pretty significant infrastructure project—not only does the balancing lake provide flood protection and alleviation to tens of thousands of homes, which allowed the city I call home to be built; it also means that my city has 5,000 acres of beautiful blue and green spaces that are enjoyed by thousands of people. The lake is also where my parents met, when my dad was teaching my mum—not particularly well—to sail. The city was determined to ensure that recreational activities were available to people whatever their background. I lost my grandmother just before Labour party conference last year, and the hospice that looked after her in the last weeks of her life looked out over that very same lake. I mention that because I owe so much to the vision, confidence and level of ambition that was shown to build somewhere truly special—Milton Keynes—in the 1960s and 1970s. It is the story of my life; it is the reason I am here. It is only with that same level of confidence and ambition that we can hope that people talk as positively about the work we are doing now as I can talk about the work that was done by the Milton Keynes development corporation in the 1960s and 1970s. I will mention a few points with the potential to make me nervous about whether we will fulfil that ambition, some of which were mentioned by the Chair of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee. These projects will not come cheap to the Government. We obviously need to maximise the financing options that we can use. We also need to look at maximising the amount of land value capture. Milton Keynes was given 700 million quid in the 1960s—about £14 billion in today’s money—which came back to the Government multiple times over because of the economic value generated by building the city. I do not think anybody has that level of ambition for a new town project, but we are going to have to see money—not just capital money and direction to the pots of money available for capital, but revenue spending in order to set up the development corporation. We have not seen enough from the Department about that approach yet. I also have a fear about death by consultation. The process to come up with a list of new towns was a very good piece of work by Sir Michael Lyons, and we should all pay tribute to him for it. However, the Government response is taking further months, and there will be a consultation on that. If development corporations are set up, there will be further consultation on that. We need to look at how we can streamline the process and get these projects going as quickly as possible. I will raise one final concern now. Following conversations with local councils, it seems to me that the approach from the team working on this is to go back to that kind of begging-bowl culture: to go back to the sites that have been selected, of which Milton Keynes is one, and to convince them—even though Sir Michael Lyons did the work on why these 12 sites were the correct ones—that they should get the resources required to deliver what the Government are saying needs to be delivered. That will not lead to success. A big part of the report talked about the importance of building communities that are not dependent on the car and that have good public transport options. My area is very car dependent, but if we are going to continue to grow, we cannot be; we will need support from the Department for Transport in order to do so. DFT’s approach has been, “Why do you need this money? Your roads aren’t congested yet.” That is completely out of line with the Government’s ambition and the new towns approach. We need to change the culture of how the Government is approaching the new town programme so that, in decades to come, somebody can stand in this Chamber talking about being the first MP for the new town of Tempsford and about how much of a success this programme has been.