Helen Morgan MP: speeches

Speeches

• 19 Jun 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Oswestry livestock market in my constituency serves not only North Shropshire, but Mid Wales, and its operations are under threat because of the hard border introduced as a result of the bluetongue protection zone. I echo the call of my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Marie Goldman) for a statement on how we can effectively manage this concerning situation. May I also ask the Leader of the House to consider whether 40 minutes for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs questions is sufficient, given that a fifth of the country live in rural areas, and there is very little time under the current allocation for those of us who represent those areas to question Ministers?

• 9 Jun 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill · Hansard source

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  I chair the all-party parliamentary group on flooding and flooded communities, which is concerned that there are 6.3 million properties currently at risk of flooding—a figure that is forecast to rise to 8 million by 2050 because of climate change. However, the Bill does not really address climate change or any kind of flood resilience. Will the hon. Gentleman join me in urging the Minister to consider the amendments tabled by me and others that deal with building properties in areas that are at risk of flooding and lack flood resilience?

• 14 May 2025 · Glass Packaging: Extended Producer Responsibility · Hansard source

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  I totally agree with my hon. Friend: the continuation of the PRN scheme alongside the EPR scheme is one consideration. We need to protect local and high street businesses. The lack of clear information about what the levy will be is really problematic. Since September 2024, the price has been estimated at between £110 and £330 per tonne—a huge variation. Businesses cannot plan their cash flow and how much they need to accrue without at least some certainty about the levy that will be introduced on a scheme that is already in place. I urge the Minister to nail down that final amount as quickly as possible, so that there is certainty for managing this difficult situation. There is an enormous amount of bureaucracy involved in calculating the amount of packaging. For example, an importer of wine bottles sells bottles to the on-trade and the off-trade. Although the importer can make good assumptions about the off-trade, where people buy bottles for personal consumption, they have no idea what happens when bottles go to the on-trade—they have lost control, so how do they realistically accrue? Some of DEFRA’s assumptions are not helpful, such as that a bottle of wine or beer bought from a pub will end up being recycled by the council just because it cannot be proven that the person who bought it did not take it home with them. That seems insane. Most pubs are paying huge amounts of money to get their waste recycled privately and they are not costing the council anything, but the producer—the importer of the product—is now having to charge them. They will be paying twice, which is not sustainable for most local pubs. Small pubs will have to pay about £350 or more a year, a medium-sized pub will have to pay around £750 and larger ones will have to pay £2,000, on top of their excessive business rates. It is important to remember that pubs cannot absorb that, because of their tiny margins, so 85% of those costs are likely to be passed on to consumers anyway. The idea that the producer pays is not going to work in this instance because pubs cannot change the packaging they use, so the consumer will end up paying, which is extremely problematic. The cost will be about 5p to 7p on every bottle of beer and around 15p on a bottle of wine; that might not seem like a great increase for a one-off purchase, but it will cost consumers an extra £154 million a year to buy bottled beer, which is quite considerable. It is crucial that businesses are supported in transitioning to this scheme, because they are already struggling with the employer’s national insurance hike, the business rate increase and, for wine merchants, the changes to the way that duty is paid. I call on the Minister to take a sensible, common-sense approach to this issue and to consider an exemption from EPR for pubs. We should also reconsider the scope and timeline of its implementation, because we are at risk of delivering a crippling blow to hospitality and the drinks industry, which are already struggling with huge headwinds. In the time that I have left, I will mention the example of a wine merchant—Members may wonder how I know this information. The wine merchant in question has a turnover of £25 million and makes profits of only £500,000 a year. That is a 5% profit margin, and this wine merchant is unusual in that it is quite profitable. EPR is estimated to cost it £272,000, more than 50% of its current profit margin, so there is no way that it will be able to avoid passing that on to the pubs and the consumers that buy from it. The increase in national insurance will cost the wine merchant £92,000, and the ABV changes a further £262,000. It is a highly profitable and successful business of enormous longevity, but there may be no alternative for it other than putting up prices and laying people off. I urge the Minister to take into account these really serious concerns about the viability of businesses and to reconsider the implementation of this tax.

• 13 May 2025 · Flooding: Planning and Developer Responsibilities · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mrs Hobhouse. I commend the hon. Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman) for his excellent speech. I have several points to make in the short time that I have, so here goes. I agree with the hon. Member that when people are flooded either by surface or river water, the response is often chaotic. In Gobowen in my constituency, it is not clear who is responsible for closing the road. When vehicles drive through, there is a big bow wave, and the flooding in shops and homes becomes much worse. I fully endorse his point about better co-ordinating the response for people who have been flooded. Insurance is hard to get. Homes built since 2009 are not covered by Flood Re’s remit. The remit ends in 2030, leaving people stuck in potentially unsaleable and unmortgageable homes. I know that the Minister is looking at Flood Re and its remit, so I would be grateful if she gave us a bit of an update. I should have declared at the start that I am the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on flooding and flooded communities, so I have an interest. After people have been flooded, it is often hard to get help. The “frequently flooded” criteria do not catch all homes in rural communities, because the density is not there. I know that the Minister is looking at that; I would be grateful for an update. Farms are hit very badly, and they are storing an enormous amount of water upstream. Will the Minister be working with her colleagues in the Department to consider how the sustainable farming incentive and similar plans might be used to help people to store water upstream and prevent flooding downstream? Finally, in the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, the Government are not taking the once-in-a-generation opportunity to deal with the increased likelihood of flooding. We have talked about having water companies as statutory consultees in planning; about implementing schedule 3 to the Flood and Water Management Act 2010 so that SuDS have statutory guidance and are properly maintained; and about ensuring that houses are not being built in inappropriate places. The current guidelines do not achieve those objectives. I hope that the Minister will work with her colleagues to make those requirements statutory.

• 23 Apr 2025 · Sewage · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is making a typically good speech. Does he agree that water from areas where one cannot swim still ends up in areas where one can? The Roden and Perry rivers in my constituency suffered over 2,000 hours of sewage spills in the past year—the Perry is affected by a spill into the Common brook near Oswestry. Not only does that water go past farmers’ fields, but it ends up in Shrewsbury, where there is a designated swimming area. I want to swim in it. Does he agree that the blue flag status would clear up the whole catchment, not just the places where people go swimming?

• 23 Apr 2025 · Hospitals · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House regrets the appalling state of repair of NHS hospitals across the country; notes that the NHS maintenance backlog rose to £13.8 billion in 2023-24; further notes the sustained pattern of cannibalising NHS capital budgets to keep day-to-day services running; condemns the previous Government’s record of starved repair budgets and exploding maintenance backlogs, which made sewage leaks, cracked walls, crumbling ceilings and sinking floors commonplace; further condemns the previous Government for launching the New Hospital Programme with no realistic plan to fund or deliver it; further regrets that almost half of the selected hospitals are now not set to begin construction until after 2030; calls on the Government to reverse the delay to the New Hospital Programme and create a crumbling hospitals taskforce to bring construction dates forward; and further calls on the Government to end the vicious cycle of false economies and rising repair backlogs by putting hospitals across the country on a path towards sustainable funding. The appalling state of our hospital buildings is a national scandal. Everybody in this country should be in control of their own lives and health, which means everybody getting the care they need when and where they need it, but that can never be realised while so many patients are treating in grossly inadequate settings. From Shropshire to Cornwall, Cambridgeshire, Watford and Devon, patients are losing their dignity because of decisions taken by the Conservatives, and the Labour Government’s failure to rectify them. The Conservatives’ record is one of starved repair budgets, serious leaks, crumbling ceilings and bucket-strewn wards. It is an outrage that millions of people are waiting for treatment, yet overcrowded hospitals have had to close operating theatres because they are no longer fit for use. Patients and hospital staff deserve the dignity of safe, modern and clean environments, but instead the previous Government shamefully chose to raid the repair budget to plug the gap in day-to-day costs, as our hospitals fell apart, and the new Government, who were elected on what increasingly looks like false hope, are pursuing a false economy in delaying the desperately needed new hospital programme. As with so much of their agenda, the Government promised so much but are delivering so little and betraying those who put their faith in the Labour party. Farmers who were fed up with the Tories taking them for granted have been hit with a tax grab on their families’ futures. Employers, who were promised growth and no new taxes, have been whacked with a national insurance increase. Patients, who were promised new hospitals, have had them taken away.

• 23 Apr 2025 · Hospitals · Hansard source

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  No. I have been very generous with my time and I am going to make some progress. We are also campaigning for a review of outdated Government finance rules that prevent NHS trusts from investing the funds that they have raised into their own buildings. Even NHS managers struggle to access common-sense investment in their facilities due to overly complex rules and glacial processes. Trusts are prevented from using unspent funds on improving their buildings. We need root-and-branch reform, combined with our 10-year programme of investment, to bring our local health facilities up to scratch. In conclusion, the recent history of the NHS is one of short-term decision making and of the failure of successive Governments to grasp the nettle of long-term sustained investment in the things that matter: hospital buildings, GP services, dentistry, pharmacy and, crucially, the unspoken crisis of social care. The outcome is an organisation that is spending millions of pounds to go backwards. It truly is a false economy. This Government have spoken warmly of the need to reform the NHS and improve productivity, and we support them in that, but we cannot expect to retain staff and provide high-quality care when so many doctors and nurses are negotiating leaking roofs and sewage backing up on the wards. Dealing with the new hospital programme is a matter of urgency, and I urge the Secretary of State to, at long last, grasp the nettle.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Housing Development Planning: Water Companies · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman makes a good point, particularly about holding funds in escrow, which is a sensible suggestion. I am reluctant to let water companies off the hook, because they have made enormous profits, and they have been able to predict the growth in housing and changes in the weather, but they have done nothing to invest in the existing infrastructure. Let us not feel too sorry for them, but there clearly needs to be a long-term plan in place for overall infrastructure in an area. I agree that that needs to be taken into consideration in the planning process. Local planning authorities have discretionary powers to try to prevent the situations I have described. They could stop occupation of the final properties on the development until the defective sewerage has been remediated. There are various conditions they could put in place up front to prevent these situations, but in practice that is not happening.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Housing Development Planning: Water Companies · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. Shropshire is quite wet, so we do not often find ourselves talking about a lack of water; it would have to be an extreme summer before we found ourselves in that situation. He makes a good point that the country increasingly sees very dry periods and then extreme rainfall in winter. We need a water system fit for the future to deal with that and with localised capacity issues in the freshwater network. Finally, I call on the Government to implement the recommendations of the report published by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in 2023 on schedule 3 to the Flood and Water Management Act 2010. The schedule would provide a framework for the approval and adoption of drainage systems; a sustainable urban drainage systems approving body, or a SAB; and national standards on the design, construction, operation and maintenance of sustainable urban drainage systems, which also have a lovely acronym—SUDS. Critically, it makes the right to connect surface water run-off to public sewers conditional on the drainage system being approved before any construction work can start. Currently, that is not a statutory requirement, but those things are often built as part of the planning process. That means that when a development happens in an area that has previously been, say, fields, the water must drain off at the same rate as it would have done had the area still been a field. That is a clever way of managing surface water, and it seems odd that the previous Government, and indeed the current Government, have not yet adopted schedule 3. That would be an important start in protecting new and existing residents from the nightmare of both surface water and foul water flooding. In conclusion, the current planning-led approach is clearly not fit for purpose. Numerous colleagues have turned up today to tell similar stories of residents dealing with raw sewage in their homes, which is just not acceptable. The planning process is failing to protect residents of both new and existing homes, opening the risk of surface water and foul water flooding. Most of us cannot imagine how awful untreated sewage in the home must be, but a failed planning system is making it a reality for far too many people. I urge the Minister to make water companies a statutory consultee in planning, to implement schedule 3 to the Flood and Water Management Act and to tighten the rules around section 104 so that rogue developers cannot get away with building illegal connections to the sewers.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Housing Development Planning: Water Companies · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is exactly right. Water companies have certain powers to object to developments that exacerbate existing capacity problems, but they are very much constrained by duties under the Water Industry Act 1991, which obliges them to accept domestic flows from new developments. Moreover, developers have an automatic right to connect to the existing network for domestic flows, which limits the ability of the water companies to object solely on the basis of network capacity. They can apply for Grampian conditions—planning conditions attached to a decision notice that prevent the start of the development until off-site works have been completed on land not controlled by the applicant. Developers can do that through the planning authority, but only if there is already a scheme promoted and a date for the improvements to be delivered has been set, so Grampian conditions are rarely used. My hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) tabled an amendment in Committee to the Water (Special Measures) Bill, which would have provided some of those safeguards by making water companies statutory consultees and ensuring that water infrastructure requirements were considered.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Housing Development Planning: Water Companies · Hansard source

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  The problem of historical sewers is particularly difficult, because there is no immediate developer to put on the hook. We certainly need a mechanism for dealing with historical sewers. It is a complicated problem, because we certainly do not want sewage from inadequate systems to start going into the main system, and it is difficult to say the taxpayer should to have to pay for something that happened a long time ago. Nevertheless, we need a mechanism to deal with historical sewers; there is no doubt about that. The homeowners in The Pines in Higher Heath are in a situation where the developer has refused to rectify the issues and Severn Trent has washed its hands of the matter by returning the bond. They have nowhere else to go. One resident told me: “The whole system has failed us, from start to finish…we have layers upon layers of Water, Building, Planning, Council Regulations, Controlling Authorities and processes and procedures, all designed to protect the public and the environment. Yet, a pre-existing local drainage problem, a planning process and building supervision and approval all failed to pick up and address it, and then allowed ‘defective’ drains to be built, then a Developer and a Utility company agree among themselves to terminate the S104 and totally wash their hands of us/the people who pay the taxes that fund the system that is supposed to protect us/the people.” We see there the root of the problem. People who rely on the regulatory system to protect them in their homes are being hopelessly let down by a system that provides no protection when the worst happens and push comes to shove. Clearly, the section 104 process is not fit for purpose. The conveyancing process, when solicitors are involved, never seems to detect this type of situation either. I have sympathy for the people affected. When the section 104 agreement and bond have been put in place, and people have found that through their search, they should be able to have reasonable confidence that the sewerage network will be completed as planned. I have raised many times the situation of people living in The Brambles in Whitchurch, so I will not go into all the details again. People bought houses in that development, but the developer was a rogue developer, who collapsed the company as soon as the final house was occupied. The sewage pumping system was inadequate, and another property was illegally connected to it. Fourteen households had to spend £1 million between them to fix that situation. Those householders were the people left holding the management company when everything crashed down around them, and they were liable to fix that situation. That was totally unacceptable, as well.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Housing Development Planning: Water Companies · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House has considered the role of water companies in new housing development planning. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mrs Lewell-Buck. It is something of a cliché for a Liberal Democrat to be talking about sewage, but today I am breaking the mould and talking not about sewage in seas, lakes and rivers but about sewage in people’s homes and gardens. Buying a home in the UK is not easy. People spend years and years saving penny after penny, and when they finally sign on the dotted line and complete the purchase, they are relieved and delighted. They are not expecting to be forced to become an expert in complex regulations relating to drainage and the planning process. Most of all, they are not expecting raw sewage to start backing up through the manhole covers in their garden, the drains or, in the worst-case scenario, their downstairs loo, but unfortunately, that is what some of my constituents have had to deal with when buying or living near newly built houses in North Shropshire. I think the whole House should be asking itself how any water company, developer, conveyancer or local authority could think that this situation is acceptable. During my time as MP for North Shropshire, there have been multiple incidents in which constituents have been put in this troubling position by the sewerage network failing, and I am quite angry about the lack of progress in dealing with the issue. Just two weeks ago, I attended a meeting with residents of a village in my constituency that has seen a relatively large amount of development in recent years; their village is low-lying and on a gentle slope. Severn Trent, the water company, has adopted the drainage system from the new developments, so this is not a case of a dodgy developer failing to build suitable infrastructure, but it is an old, medieval village and unfortunately the existing combined sewer infrastructure is inadequate to deal with prolonged rainfall and the additional homes connected to it.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Housing Development Planning: Water Companies · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. He has campaigned endlessly and consistently on that point and I entirely agree with him. I was concerned when both the Government and the Conservatives voted against his amendment in Committee. Perhaps in their winding-up speeches, they will explain the rationale to my constituents, who are faced with the reality of putting cling film over their toilet every time there is a big storm. The current requirements, all of which allow consultation, have been inadequate in the example I have given, and indeed in many others. The local plan process requires local authorities to consult the water companies on infrastructure requirements. That should be a positive step; it is how future infrastructure should be determined, with plans made by both the local authority and the water company. However, many councils fail to develop local plans. Shropshire’s Conservative council has just had to withdraw an inadequate plan, having failed to satisfy the requirements of the planning inspectors, leaving the county open to a planning free-for-all in which it is unnecessary to consult water companies. I therefore urge the Minister to ensure that in the review announced at the beginning of this week, water companies are added to the list of statutory consultees. I urge him also to tighten up the rules to prevent such a fiasco from emerging again, when after years of work and of taxpayers’ money being spent on a local plan, it is not fit for purpose and the whole process has to be started again. That is unacceptable for my residents, who are paying their council tax. Another development 10 miles to the north has had similar issues, but in that case, in addition to concerns about the capacity of the pumping station and existing surface water flooding problems, Severn Trent has refused to adopt the drainage network, citing as its reason that the sewers were not built to the standard agreed under the section 104 arrangement in place. The developer, which I should say disputed that there were defects in the system, requested that Severn Trent return its section 104 bond, and it did. All of that was done without the residents’ knowledge. They only found out nearly three years later, following repeated complaints to the water company, which is tanking sewage away from the village on a weekly basis.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Housing Development Planning: Water Companies · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend describes a situation that I think we are all familiar with. I agree with her about the role of water companies and will go on to talk about that point at some length in my speech, so I thank her for that intervention. When there is heavy rain, the residents I met struggle with surface water flooding and, unfortunately, with sewage backing up into homes and gardens, which we all agree is pretty horrible. Further homes in the area are in the planning process, so the residents are extremely concerned. Each year, their situation gets worse. An elderly resident told me that sometimes, when it has been raining heavily, she has to ask her neighbours not to use their bathroom, because sewage will flood into her garden if they do. That is not a position that any homeowner should be put in, so we need to ask ourselves how we have allowed this to happen in the first place. We are acutely aware of the need to build more homes, and we support the Government in their mission to build more homes, but it is essential that the infrastructure for both new and existing residents keeps pace with development. Astonishingly, water companies are not statutory consultees when a housing development goes through the planning process. That means that there is no statutory safeguard for home buyers that the company responsible for dealing with their foul waste has ensured or confirmed that its existing sewers will cope; nor is there any statutory safeguard for existing residents against a new development bringing some unpleasant surprises.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Housing Development Planning: Water Companies · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. Residents are genuinely concerned about the impact on their village or town when the rules clearly are not allowing for additional infrastructure to be built. It is reasonable for them to expect that infrastructure to be built. We would see far less nimbyism if people had confidence that the infrastructure will be there when new houses are built. The point I am trying to make is that the section 104 process is not fit for purpose. It is ridiculous to require a financial bond. The point of that bond is to deal with exactly the situation where the sewerage network has been inadequately built and needs to be adopted. The bond is there to ensure that the water company brings that sewerage system up to standard, so that it can be adopted.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Housing Development Planning: Water Companies · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend makes a good point. That is where we are going with having them as statutory consultees in the process. It is no good the water companies saying, “You cannot build those houses.” They need to be able to say, “We have this plan to improve the infrastructure. You can build those houses when we have done it.” It is probably also quite critical that they are able to say, “We are doing it fairly quickly.” I will come back to section 104 for a second. One problem is that council planning departments are hollowed out. They have neither the human nor financial resources to get involved in expensive planning enforcement action, or to ensure that every person has been thought about and invited to consult on a planning application. They need to be required to do that, because the idea that cash-strapped councils will go above and beyond is currently unlikely; many are desperately just trying to stave off a section 104 situation. We have planning legislation coming, which is welcome. I implore the Government to address section 104 agreements and the bonds that secure them, because at the moment they are not the iron-clad guarantees they should be. We need to ensure that drainage systems are built to an appropriate standard and adopted, so that people can have confidence that, when they buy a home, they will not have to deal with a raw sewage problem for years and be unable to sell their house in many instances.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Housing Development Planning: Water Companies · Hansard source

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  I thank everyone who contributed to the debate. It was good to see cross-party agreement on some of the issues that our residents face, such as the lack of capacity in local drainage systems when houses are built and the lack of appropriate planning conditions in some of these localised incidents. I also thank the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hamble Valley (Paul Holmes), the Minister and the Lib Dem spokesperson, my hon. Friend the Member for Taunton and Wellington (Gideon Amos), for their thoughtful contributions. They were all excellent. I particularly thank the Minister for not ruling out the adoption of schedule 3 to the Flood and Water Management Act. I understand the Minister’s point that water companies being statutory consultees would pose a risk to getting planning applications through the process, but I ask him to consider the fact that the local planning system does not work either. Many councils do not have a local plan. They do not have the planning officers, and cannot afford them, to develop good local plans. We have to find a way to address that problem. Finally, I will write to the Minister on the specific issues that I have had in relation to section 104 agreements. I would be grateful for a meeting with him to go through them in detail. Question put and agreed to. Resolved , That this House has considered the role of water companies in new housing development planning.

• 12 Mar 2025 · Sustainable Farming Incentive · Hansard source

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  Farmers in North Shropshire are really keen to improve the environment and farm in a friendly way, but they are also running businesses and they need to plan. There are farmers in my constituency who were hoping to apply for grants to raise the water table in peat soil areas, but had not yet applied because those grants were not yet open. Now, the opportunity is gone. What will the Minister do to enable farmers to plan, and what will the replacement scheme look like?

• 10 Feb 2025 · Inheritance Tax Relief: Farms · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Dr Murrison. I thank the hon. Member for South Norfolk (Ben Goldsborough) for opening the debate. It is the first time that North Shropshire has been in the top 10 constituencies in a petition—713 people have signed, which is not surprising when we consider that there are over 1,000 farms in the constituency, covering 62,000 hectares. It is one of the 20 most rural constituencies in the country. Producing food for the country is our main activity, not just through farming and the thousands of people who support those farms. Food production, storage and distribution are all major industries as well. Farmers have had a tough time: incomes are historically low and farmers can ill-afford to pay inheritance tax when an estate sadly passes on. The Government estimate that 288 farms will be affected in North Shropshire. Even if that is not an underestimate, which we strongly suspect it is, that is a whopping 27% of the farms in my constituency—more than a quarter—that will have to sell off land rather than further invest in the rural economy. That is shocking.

• 10 Feb 2025 · Inheritance Tax Relief: Farms · Hansard source

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  I agree with my hon. Friend, and will come on to that point in a moment. I want to mention Robert, whose family has farmed a traditional mixed dairy and arable farm near Oswestry for 120 years. Their farm is valued at £6 million, which sounds like a lot, but their income is only £60,000 a year. Even if the £3 million dual relief that we have been told about by the Treasury applied, paying it off would wipe out their income for 10 years. In fact, they estimate their liability would be higher than that. It is not just traditional farms that are affected: rental businesses, nurseries, and horticultural businesses all fear that they cannot pass on their business at the time of death as a result of this ill-thought-through policy. The Chancellor wanted to put wealthy non-farmers off buying land to avoid inheritance tax, but I reckon being charged 20% with 10 years to pay it off is a pretty attractive alternative to paying 40% now. With such a low threshold of £1 million, many small farmers will be left with a liability they simply cannot afford to pay because land does not translate to cash unless they sell it. This tax does not achieve its mission at all. The idea that farms can survive it is not true. Years of being taken for granted by the Conservatives have left farms in a desperate state. Some 8,000 farms shut their doors last year—one in 25—and farm incomes have been dropping year on year. That is down to a number of factors, including soaring inflation, which is beyond the Government’s control, and the botched implementation of the sustainable farming incentive, which was not. The disastrous trade deals with Australia and New Zealand, and the comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-Pacific partnership have set an alarming precedent, especially while the President of the United States is holding anyone who does not give him what he wants to ransom with trade tariffs. The Government must protect the farming budget. We need our family farms to thrive: for economic growth, which is so crucial in rural areas; to produce our food; and to protect our environment. There is still time to reverse this disastrous decision. I urge the Government to listen to the valid concerns and to demonstrate their commitment to rural Britain. Let us axe this family farm tax.

• 10 Feb 2025 · Inheritance Tax Relief: Farms · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is doing an excellent job of summing up the debate. Lots of residential houses in rural areas such as mine have a couple of acres at the back, which people might use for hobby farming. They are not commercially viable farms. Does she agree that if the Treasury have taken those into account, it will have grossly underestimated the impact of this change?

• 20 Jan 2025 · Obesity: Food and Diet · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to close the debate for the Liberal Democrats. I congratulate the hon. Member for Stroud (Dr Opher) on securing the debate. All the contributions, including his opening speech, have been excellent and well informed. I was particularly interested to hear about the existence of good food deserts in Blackpool South and Liverpool West Derby. Even in Shropshire, where we grow some of the most wonderful and nutritious food that can be imagined, we have a higher-than-average obesity rate: 67% of adults are overweight and 32% are medically obese. That is an interesting reflection on the availability of good food and on people’s ability to choose healthy options because of the cost of food at the supermarket. In rural areas, housing is more expensive but average wages are lower. If people cannot access public transport, as the hon. Member for Bathgate and Linlithgow (Kirsteen Sullivan) pointed out, they are often forced to shop at expensive local shops and are thereby forced into buying packets of less nutritious food. We need to deal with obesity. Two thirds of the adult population are overweight. The NHS is spending almost a tenth of its annual budget on diabetes. Obesity has a significant impact on the health and wellbeing of people who deserve better: they are three times more likely to develop colon cancer, two and half times more likely to have high blood pressure, and five times more likely to have type 2 diabetes. The history of tackling those problems is a litany of failure for all three major parties in 30 years of government because, as other hon. Members have mentioned, we have had 700 different policies on the issue over the years, with no impact. It is time for a coherent strategy to tackle the obesity crisis. It is good to tentatively welcome the Government’s new national food strategy and their steps on junk food advertising, which are a positive move. The Liberal Democrats would like to see the Government go further, particularly on the use outdoor advertising in areas where people are particularly vulnerable to seeing it. For example, we want local authorities to be allowed to restrict outdoor advertising near schools. I am interested in some of the suggestions that have been made about planning and fast food outlets, especially as 35.2% of children aged 10 to 11 are now overweight—a staggering 20% rise since 2015. That coincides with a 16% fall in spending on obesity-related measures in the public health grant during the same period. We welcome the Government’s proposed preventive measures. We hope that some of the large sum earmarked for health and the NHS in the recent Budget can be put into public health and prevention measures, because we want to stop people getting unhealthy in the first place rather than dealing with the problem after it occurs. In Shropshire, one in five children aged four to five are overweight and more than one in 10 are obese. Ironically, almost half are not eating enough fruit and veg, despite the fact that they are grown all around us. The same number are not active enough. To encourage activity, we could introduce a different classification for leisure centres. Hon. Members have mentioned the importance of swimming pools and places to become fit and healthy. I know that the hon. Member for Stroud says that the food element is more important than the activity element; none the less, we should be encouraging getting fit as part of a healthy lifestyle. Will the Minister consider making leisure centres part of our critical health infrastructure so people can rely on their leisure centre staying open and can have somewhere to go if they cannot exercise in their home or their local area? Healthy eating helps with other preventable problems, such as tooth decay. My hon. Friend the Member for Honiton and Sidmouth (Richard Foord) mentioned poor oral health, another avoidable issue that we can deal with. The importance of good oral health in care homes has recently been impressed on me by various members of the dentistry profession, because poor oral health can lead to aspirated pneumonia. That is a partially separate issue from obesity, but unhealthy and sugary snacks are being offered to people in care homes, so I wonder whether we can encourage healthier eating in those settings as well as in our schools and hospitals. There is no getting away from the fact that obesity is intrinsically linked to inequality and deprivation. Since 2019, the cost of a weekly food shop has risen by almost a third. As I mentioned, rural areas are not excluded. In Shropshire, 14% of households are struggling with food poverty, or as I prefer to call it, poverty. There is a high risk of cost of living vulnerability for children who are in poverty. Lots of Members spoke about the great work of their local food bank. In Shropshire, an organisation called OsNosh takes food that is due to be thrown away by the supermarkets at the end of the day but is still perfectly good to eat. The next day, it produces fantastic chef-cooked lunches that people can enjoy. If people are able to pay for those lunches, they can do so; if they are not, they do not have to. It is a wonderful way of bringing the community together to eat good food without the stigma of not being able to afford it. However, I think we all agree that reliance on the third sector to solve this problem is not really acceptable in the modern age, so lifting families out of poverty must be a priority for the Government. Our policy is for free school meals for all children in poverty, and a roll-out of free school meals to all primary schools is our ambition when funds allow. I hope that the Government also have the ambition, when funds allow, of lifting the two-child benefit cap, which would lift a quarter of a million children out of poverty. Holiday activities and food programmes happen across the country, not just locally. In the summer, I visited a HAF programme in Oswestry at which children were offered a healthy meal, a day out of the home—often in a much safer environment than their home—and a good day of activities. The organisation that delivers that in Oswestry, the New Saints Foundation, offers it not just to children whose families cannot afford a nutritious meal at home but to all children, to remove the stigma, and give all the kids a fun day at the HAF programme. Future funding for HAF programmes is not certain, so will the Minister clarify what will happen to them? They are a really good way to ensure that children eat healthily through the holidays, as well as when they are at school and in receipt of free school meals. The hon. Member for Stroud also mentioned labelling. I am conscious of time, so I will be fairly brief with this little anecdote. Labelling can be really misleading, even to parents who are comfortably off—I would not describe myself as the most well off—and well meaning. It was a long time ago, so I will not mention the brand, but I resorted to buying an organic brand of food for my child when we were at the puree stage of weaning. He became so addicted to it that it became really difficult to wean him off on to something much more nutritious, filling and healthy, such that I had a sleepless night every night because he was still hungry. One evening, I had a very embarrassing moment in the supermarket, almost having a breakdown because I had bumped into an old friend and the supermarket had sold out of these food pouches, and that was a complete disaster. I found out later that although the puree was organic and had no added sugar, it was actually really high in sugar. It was essentially just pears, water and some spelt, so it was really sweet and sugary. I had inadvertently given my child something that I had expected to be healthy but was not. Good labelling would have solved that problem; I am sure that it would help many parents whose child has a single brand addiction. It was 15 years ago, and the brand may well have reformulated since then, which is why I will not mention the name, but it is something that we need to be aware of. The right hon. Member for Wetherby and Easingwold (Sir Alec Shelbrooke) spoke powerfully about his own struggle with his weight, and he mentioned the use of various different types of jab to tackle obesity. I do not think that we should dismiss jabs out of hand. Clearly, they are very helpful for some people, but I really think that the Government’s emphasis needs to be on prevention, and on a public health strategy to stop people getting to the point of needing to use those drugs in the first place. The UK should be one of the healthiest countries in the world. We have a great history of grassroots sports, the highest-quality food production imaginable, and world-leading medical research, but we are becoming sicker, and falling behind similar countries. It is time to act. We welcome the junk food advertising ban and restrictions on high-caffeine energy drinks as a really good first step. We also welcome the commitment to a national food strategy. I put in a plea for our farmers, who work to very low margins. I ask for the strategy to consider the role of the Groceries Code Adjudicator, and ensure that our farmers are kept in business to continue to deliver our food. Finally, please consider our calls for prevention, to give children a healthy start in life.

• 15 Jan 2025 · Foot and Mouth Disease · Hansard source

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  In Shropshire, dairy and other livestock farmers have been having a torrid time recently, and they will have read this news with a sense of dread. I am also an officer of the all-party parliamentary group on food security, and we recently heard some eye-watering evidence from the border authorities at Dover about illegal meat imports and the threat that they pose to UK biosecurity. Can the Minister explain to the House what assessment he has made of the problems with that process, and what he intends to do to ensure that diseases such as foot and mouth do not arrive in the UK?

• 10 Dec 2024 · Storm Darragh · Hansard source

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  This morning, 2,500 people in my constituency were still without power. That is down from 8,000 yesterday morning, and I am grateful to all the engineers who have worked so hard to get those people back online. Water booster pumps also lost power on Sunday, so those in a large area of the constituency experienced low water pressure. In the sizeable town of Wem, there were large areas with no water at all, despite there having been only a yellow weather warning. It seems that that the resilience of the utility companies is not where it needs to be to respond to an event of this nature. Can the Minister reassure me about what she is doing with those companies to ensure that we are more resilient in future, given that these events will be increasingly frequent as the impact of climate change worsens?

• 9 Dec 2024 · Planning Committees: Reform · Hansard source

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  As the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on flooding and flooded communities, and the MP for a constituency that suffers from surface water flooding as well as river flooding, I am concerned that the proposals will divert decision making away from those with the greatest local knowledge. When a flooding area is drained, the water has to go somewhere else, and where it goes is critical to the people living in the surrounding area. Can the Minister reassure me that the proposals will not dilute the importance of local knowledge in making critical decisions about draining and flooding when we build?