Jodie Gosling MP: speeches

Speeches

• 17 Jun 2026 · High Street Shops: Illicit Activity · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Dowd. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Halesowen (Alex Ballinger) for securing this very important debate. This weekend, Nuneaton celebrated the 800th anniversary of its royal market charter, first awarded by King Henry III. It was an absolutely fantastic day, with live local music and our teenage, independent and normal Saturday markets all coming together to celebrate our rich history and culture and the talent of my town. I was immensely proud to be part of that, and I was delighted to see such an increase in footfall for our traders. But my town, like so many others, has been battered by years of austerity and under-investment. Transformation plans were delayed again and again, while £1.25 million was cut from our trading standards between 2011 and 2015, creating a culture of looking the other way while dodgy shop after dodgy shop moved in. In the past two years, our Labour council has begun to turn things around. Our long-promised transformation plans are finally coming to fruition with the opening of Saints, the demolition approvals for and landscaping of long-empty sites, and now new investment in Grayson Place, welcoming the UK’s first championship padel courts and the brilliant North Warwickshire and South Leicestershire college to our town. Our council and its officers have worked tirelessly to diversify our town, bringing in homes, services, hospitality and leisure. An empty Debenhams has become luxury apartments, and an old nightclub has become Saints—thriving community assets. Footfall is rising again, up more than 24,000 in the final quarter, with 2 million visits to my town centre this year. Businesses are returning and confidence is growing. We are on track to restore our once-vibrant town centre. However, that progress is at risk if we cannot turn the tide on crime and dodgy shops, which threaten the very survival of historical towns such as mine. Dodgy shops undercut honest tax-paying traders by selling counterfeit and illegal goods. Worse still, they undermine public confidence in our country’s ability to enforce the law. People see illegal vape shops, drugs and counterfeit products being openly sold, and suspected money laundering and organised crime, and ask how that is allowed to happen. For far too long, that question has gone unanswered. I welcome the Government’s new funding for trading standards, and the National Crime Agency’s new powers to strengthen enforcement between the Home Office, HMRC, trading standards and the police, but that funding and those powers must reach into towns such as mine. We cannot simply force problems out of larger cities and into smaller towns without providing the resources to tackle them. We need to prevent them from arising in the first place. While out door-knocking recently, I was told by residents about cars driving at all hours of the day, including 4 am visits, with whole streets being disturbed. I raised that with our local teams, and raids took place this week. Illegal goods were seized, and we now await closure orders. However, that is all too often not the outcome. As we have heard, the endless whack-a-mole situation prevents people from closing such places down permanently. If our towns are to make progress and we are to protect what we have, we must be able to close them down permanently and never allow them to open again.

• 23 Apr 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Happy Warwickshire day, and happy St George’s day, Madam Deputy Speaker. This week also marks an event that is incredibly important to me: Allergy Awareness Week. On Monday I was proud to launch the national allergy strategy with more than 150 clinicians, researchers, patients, families and charities. With more than 21 million people in the UK suffering from allergic diseases, does my right hon. Friend agree that time should be given in this House to debate allergy care, the strategy and how we can improve outcomes for those who suffer?

• 20 Apr 2026 · Supported Internships · Hansard source

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  I thank the Secretary of State for her commitment to supporting supported interns and for the announcement of £9 million for non-EHCP—education, health and care plan—pilots. Almost 80% of our brilliant supported interns in Nuneaton go on into paid employment, well above the national average of 5% of young people with learning difficulties. Will the Secretary of State please give us more information about what support will be available to enable our colleges to deliver in line with the SEND White Paper? Also, will she join me at either our brilliant Queen Elizabeth award-winning North Warwickshire and South Leicestershire college, or at George Eliot hospital to see the real impact of supported interns and celebrate their achievements?

• 26 Mar 2026 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Residents in Vernons Mews in Nuneaton, managed by Marston management company, are facing homelessness for the third time following a prohibition order that was first issued in August 2025 by Warwickshire Fire and Rescue Service. For months, I have been working cross-agency to tackle myriad issues, yet a temporary fire system installed back in August 2025, which the fire safety crew deemed inappropriate for the residential building that it is in, is still in place and there are no permanent solutions. May I join the call for Government time to be given to the issues of tenancy management companies, and will my right hon. Friend please update me on what further steps can be taken to address these failures?

• 23 Mar 2026 · Rail Connections to London: Rural Towns · Hansard source

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  Nuneaton serves as a valuable interchange for services to the economic centres of Coventry, Birmingham and Leicester, as well as for connections to Peterborough, Cambridge and Stansted airport. Strengthening those regional links is estimated to be worth about £500 million across the region. Does my hon. Friend agree that routes such as the WSMR will deliver greater growth across our region, because by making more connections—not just to London, but to those centres—we will enhance the travel and services that we can offer?

• 7 Jan 2026 · Rural Communities · Hansard source

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  First, I welcome the changes to inheritance tax, to agricultural property relief and to business property relief. Farming is essential to our rural economies, and with new investment I will continue to work with colleagues to champion food security, sustainability and the key challenges around the sector, which are a result of serious decline over the past decade. I thank Ministers for their time to discuss these important issues and for listening to my views and of those of my constituents. As an MP of a semi-rural area, I am aware of the challenges faced by living in a rural community, which include connectivity, access to work, services and education. I am aware of the impact that the cuts to bus services and outreach services such as Sure Start had on my community and our ability to thrive. Further cuts are now proposed by Warwickshire’s Reform county council to our school transport, potentially making children walk down unlit, unrestricted roads on their way home from school for a proposed 5 miles, which is simply dangerous. I want to focus in particular on crime. I am proud to see a cross-departmental approach to addressing rural crime, ensuring that the Government’s safer streets mission benefits every member of our community. Local farmers have repeatedly raised concerns about the level of rural crime with me, so I was pleased to see that over £12.7 million-worth of stolen machinery was recovered last year, including £800,000 from abroad. Theft of machinery is not the only criminality that our farmers face. One of my local farmers reported on the day a number of dogs from the local hunt broke away from the pack and ended up on his land, filled with sheep. Although none of the ewes was killed, two later aborted, losing two rare-breed lambs and thousands of pounds in stock and vet’s fees, before even considering the emotional damage. That farmer’s story is not isolated. Residents across Nuneaton regularly contact me concerned about the activities of our local hunts and matters such as missing pets and damage to gardens. There are still many serious questions over Warwickshire police’s handling of those offences; indeed, they were forced to release details of a secret protocol signed in 2022. In spite of a subsequent review, residents tell me that the deal seems to have only emboldened Warwickshire hunt. Of the 5,000 reports of criminal activity, only 75 prosecutions against 58 individuals were successful between 2004 and 2024.

• 6 Jan 2026 · Property (Registration and Valuation) · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision about requirements relating to the registration and valuation of domestic and non-domestic property; to make provision about exemptions from such requirements; and for connected purposes. Happy new year to you and all your team, Mr Speaker. For thriving communities, we need warm homes, and safe places where people can live, thrive and survive, bring up their children and start their businesses. We want to see our high streets thriving, with every shop filled, and restored to the proud places they once were as the beating hearts of our communities. My residents in Nuneaton have grown all too used to high streets and residential areas littered with empty properties. Shuttered-up shops and empty storefronts on our local high street deter shoppers and much-needed investment. Vacant homes in disrepair are wasteful and leave hundreds of residents on waiting lists for housing and young families struggling to get on to the property ladder. The figures for my local area show that Nuneaton and Bedworth borough council has over 1,800 empty properties—that is equivalent to one in every 24. Local leaders in Nuneaton, including council leader Councillor Chris Watkins and Councillor Steve Hey, have fought to address the issue, recognising the deep impact it has on our communities—it is literally a waste of space, instead of providing hope and security. I know that they are supportive of the second-home surcharge, as well as additional charges on long-term empty properties. Those are important levers for local authorities that have been strengthened by this Labour Government. However, those measures alone do not account for the full picture or scale of the problem that local authorities such as Nuneaton and Bedworth face. When a property is derelict, it is often removed from the valuation list. That is because it is no longer considered habitable or usable; it is no longer an asset. That measure was originally intended to enable renovations to take place on properties without additional costs being incurred. We support some of that and do not wish to remove the legislation as a whole; we merely wish to time-limit the exclusion, because a deregistered property does not appear on the valuation list unless it is brought back into use. That has led to the situation where properties can lie unoccupied for years. Potential is wasted and properties become an eyesore, attracting antisocial behaviour and restricting local authorities’ capacity to transform our neighbourhoods and high streets. Nuneaton has seen properties left dormant for decades. The former Kingsholme pub has stood empty since 2008 and two houses on Stoney Road were removed from the valuation list in 2000. Those homes have stood empty for a quarter of a century, while we face a national housing crisis and children sleep in temporary accommodation. Nuneaton is growing and the houses we need are being built, but we also have to use the houses and properties that we already have effectively. Nationally, an estimated 260,000 residences are long-term empty. That is a quarter of a million, many of which have been zero-rated and do not pay back to their local councils. I know that many honourable colleagues have the pleasure of getting the train through my constituency each week as they travel down the west coast main line to Westminster. Those who venture further into Nuneaton will see at first hand the impacts that the regulations are having. Nuneaton’s transformed town centre, Grayson Place, is due to open later this year, which is a real opportunity to redefine our town. Yet at the town end of Coton Road, as people enter the brilliant redeveloped site, there is a row of empty properties with buddleia sprouting out of the roofs. Three of those properties are nil-rated—they hold no value—preventing the council from charging an empty property levy and from holding the owners to account for the neglect of buildings that blight my community. At the other end of Coton Road, next to the Coton arches, honourable colleagues will find the Cube, which was formerly a church and has been left to fall into disrepair. Despite the property no longer being owned by a church, it still receives its place of worship exemption, again meaning that it pays nothing. There is no incentive to bring it back from the brink or to make such properties the assets that my town needs them to be, and no responsibility for the impact on the area. Further, once a property has left the register, it becomes increasingly difficult to trace those responsible for it. Nuneaton and Bedworth borough council welcomes the increased powers, but those powers can only do so much. Like many councils, after a decade of harsh austerity, it lacks the financial capacity to compulsorily purchase or restore the sheer number of properties. Nuneaton and Bedworth council leaders view the reorganisation of the Valuation Office Agency as a welcome step forward, but it is clear that the registration and exemption regimes need to be updated to ensure that councils have the power to hold the owners of empty properties accountable for the state of their buildings and turn those eyesores back into assets. That is why my Bill proposes that all properties should remain on the register unless they are demolished, that all properties are given a value, and that all exemptions become time-limited, ensuring that all exempt properties are being used for their exempt purpose. As has been noted by my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Luke Akehurst), this is an issue that impacts almost all our constituencies. Updating our registration and exemption rules will provide us with the tools to embrace regeneration and remove the barriers that hold us back. I hope that my hon. Friends and colleagues will support this Bill and the measures within it today. We all want to see the effective use of our assets and to ensure that all our buildings are put to use to house our residents who need homes and that our local high streets are open for business. Question put and agreed to . Ordered, That Jodie Gosling, Rachel Taylor and Cat Eccles present the Bill. Jodie Gosling accordingly presented the Bill. Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 16 January, and to be printed (Bill 354).

• 20 Nov 2025 · Reopening Railway Stations · Hansard source

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  My Nuneaton constituents are delighted that Nuneaton and Bedworth borough council has approved a lease in principle on a site in Vale View in Stockingford, so that Nuneaton Town football club can return to home ground. Reviving the disused Stockingford railway station on the Birmingham to Leicester line could be transformational for teams, fans and residents of Stockingford and Camp Hill, and could give a huge boost to local growth. What support can be offered, so that we can reopen the station and build on the business case from 2022?

• 22 Jul 2025 · Sir David Amess Summer Adjournment · Hansard source

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  I join colleagues in paying tribute to Sir David Amess, a true champion of his constituency. With that inspiration in mind, and with the summer recess ahead, I want to celebrate just a few of the incredible people and the progress made in Nuneaton. Nuneaton has the proud legacy of hosting the first legal Lionesses game, so I will start with football. Just over a year ago, our football team, Nuneaton Town FC, had no home, no team and no committee, yet this year they have managed to top the league, achieving promotion with 121 goals. I thank the board, the fans, Ministers and the Football Foundation for their support. I look forward to bringing our club back home. This past year has shown me the enormous heart and talent of my town. I commend those who supported the George Eliot hospital through the mayor’s appeal. It raised £46,000, which was presented by Mayor Bill Hancox and Alderwoman Sheila Hancox earlier this year. The breast cancer unit will now hopefully move into a new diagnostics centre to continue supporting health in our communities. I thank the dedicated staff at George Eliot hospital, especially Annette Tracey, who retired after 51 years in the NHS, including 45 years in the breast cancer unit. Their work has reduced waiting lists and improved care not only across Nuneaton but across our country. Mary Ann Evans hospice remains a pillar of our community. It is the proud legacy and final resting place of one of my predecessors, the honourable Bill Olner. I join my hon. Friend the Member for North Warwickshire and Bedworth (Rachel Taylor) in celebrating “Cheers to 60” with CEO Liz Hancock, who has selflessly turned over her 60th year to raising even more funds for those vital services. I am proud that Nuneaton and Bedworth elected its first Nepalese-Gurkha mayor, Councillor Bhim Saru, who is a strong advocate for St Mary’s ward and the Gurkha community as a whole. Around Nuneaton, we are making good progress on improving job prospects. This year I have visited many businesses, schools and training institutes. Hercules Construction Academy trained more than 1,000 apprentices last month. North Warwickshire and South Leicestershire college’s supported internships are breaking down barriers for disabled people to access good work, and it was a privilege to revisit four of those interns who are now in good work and thriving, their confidence booming. It was an honour to hold the first SEND Parliament earlier this year and to see how the Government can support the expansion of these schemes. This year, we held our first Nuneaton sports and activities festival, which was a great success, showcasing the role of sports in community cohesion and improving health and wellbeing. Clubs like Nuneaton rugby football club and Nuneaton Taekwon-Do are thriving, with Nuneaton’s George Wright winning bronze at the 2024 European championships. Like most post-industrial towns, Nuneaton has seen its challenges, but our town centre is now transforming. New college buildings, a food hall, retail units and a leisure hub are nearing completion. The business improvement district is thriving and jumping into action with new wardens and a packed schedule of summer events. We still have issues with crime and antisocial behaviour, which are being tackled by the brilliant officers at Nuneaton and Bedworth borough council, in conjunction with Councillor Nicky King and Warwickshire police. We are seeing the return of designated town centre officers and a summer crime blitz to make Nuneaton the proud place we all need to see. It has been an honour to serve Nuneaton this year. In the key areas of jobs, health, education and crime, we are making real progress. I look forward to continuing this work and rebuilding our thriving, proud town. I thank my team and the House staff who support Members for all their work, which makes it possible to make the change we were put here to make. I wish them a restful, peaceful and safe break.