Josh Fenton-Glynn MP: speeches

Speeches

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I am somewhat confused by the hon. Gentleman’s speech. He started off by accusing Labour Members of talking Scotland down, but then told us that Scotland was in crisis—one wonders who was in government at the time—and continued his peroration by saying that there is an aging society. I wonder if he will take some sort of responsibility, or reflect on the fact that he seems to be talking down the independent Scotland of which he dreams.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  Care is an issue that matters deeply to me, but the problem with care is not that we are not getting cheap labour from elsewhere; it is that we are not paying care workers enough. That is one of the things that a national care service would seek to solve. Why did the SNP waste so much money—£28 million—on its failed national care service, rather than working across the House in good faith to deliver the care that people need?

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I am particularly concerned about the idea of tying everything to a certain tax code. Anyone who has dealt with modern slavery knows that the more a visa is tied to a place or employer, the fewer rights the person with the visa has, and the more likely they are to be exploited. The tax code example has a whole load of unintended consequences, none of which are considered in the 17-word Bill.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  Of course, there has previously been a border between England and Scotland: Hadrian’s wall was built between 122 and 138 in the Christian era, and the Antonine wall was built between 140 and 150. There is a history of borders—and I do not think any of us were there at the time—but none of us in this House wants to see a return to that, do we?

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  Listening to the Conservatives after 14 years in government and the Scottish National party after 18 years in government argue about who is responsible for the problems in universities is a bit like watching two bald men argue over a comb. However, the point is well made that this is a national problem. National problems are not solved by having a different policy for different parts of the country; they have national solutions across the British Isles.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  Like the shadow Secretary of State, I will be running the London marathon on Sunday. I mention that because people do not run marathons by making excuses, yet when we hear from SNP Members about skills, growth, health and universities, the excuse is always either immigration policy or a lack of devolution. If there is always an excuse for their failure, they will not achieve anything. That is why we need a serious debate about how we will get more people into Scotland.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  As a fan of the England cricket team, I am used to having a belief that something that is slightly rubbish will be able to achieve a lot more, but that is dwarfed by the belief of the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry (Stephen Gethins) that 17 words will solve all the problems with the Scottish Government that have been listed. Perhaps my hon. Friend could say a bit more about some of the work that needs to go into solving those knotty problems.

• 23 Apr 2025 · Hospitals · Hansard source

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  I think if the hon. Member for Henley and Thame (Freddie van Mierlo) were to reflect on what he said, he would know that these things always go a lot deeper. What have we inherited? We inherited 14,000 unnecessary deaths in A&E alone each year. NHS waiting lists peaked at 7.7 million. That is people waiting anxiously, needing treatment, tumours growing, their bodies getting further from being well, and every day 2,000 people were being sent to hospital who did not need to be there, because social care had been failed and forgotten by the previous Government and by the coalition Government. In my constituency, that means 20% of beds in our hospitals are taken up by people who do not need to be there. We have work to do, and I am concerned that in this debate we will get caught up in a discussion about hospitals and will not fix the systems within them that we need to fix. That is why we have talked about three shifts. The first is from hospital to community. We have to stop people needing hospital care because they have been failed by care closer to home. That is why our revolution in GPs will make a real difference. The second is the shift from fitness to prevention. We can have the best buildings, but with less prevention they will still be full. Finally, there is the shift from analogue to digital; every week, the Health and Social Care Committee hears about people caught between systems and between computer systems. Although I welcome this debate, we must not fetishise buildings over people. We need to think holistically about our system and deliver the decade of national renewal that the public voted for. We need to look at all of our health service, across parties and in good faith.

• 3 Apr 2025 · Waste Incinerators · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Lewell. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Derby South (Baggy Shanker) on securing this debate. Much like him, I am going to tell a story about companies using the courts to ride roughshod over local people’s opinions. I rise to speak about a proposal for an incinerator in Calderdale; my hon. Friend the Member for Halifax (Kate Dearden) and I feel like we have spent months banging our head against a brick wall about it. The incinerator is to be built on the border between our constituencies, and while it will be located in Halifax, I speak with her permission, as Members will be well aware that fumes from such incinerators do not respect constituency boundaries. The story of this incinerator is also a cautionary tale about the way that wealthy companies can ride roughshod over the wishes of the local community. The Calder Valley Skip Hire company was given an environmental licence by Calderdale council in 2022—a decision made on the basis of the legal advice that the council got about the rules that left it powerless to intervene or refuse. I know this because I was a council member at the time. The local community, however, appealed that decision and reviewed the finding. The planning inspector reversed the decision to grant the application on the basis of the risk to health and the lack of good information about the impact of the valley and vegetation on smoke dispersal. That meant that the company could not go ahead with it. So far, so good—the system is working as it should and the courts are upholding standards. However, rather than making changes and appealing the decision, the site owners just withdrew the application and resubmitted it as a fresh application, showing no respect for the community or the decisions that had been made. The council, with similar legal advice to the advice that was received last time, then went ahead and granted the application again, and the decision is being reviewed again. The incinerator in Calderdale has been opposed many times by our local communities and local councillors, particularly Councillor Adam Wilkinson. It has received more than 900 objections and has been objected to by both the local MPs. Unfortunately, when unscrupulous developers wish to seek legal options, they attempt to water down communities’ voices and force them into submission. Frankly, there comes a point when our job in this Chamber is to stand up for our local communities, and to say that enough is enough. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Derby South for securing today’s debate, and I will continue to speak for my residents in Calder Valley and Halifax on this issue, because, frankly, some things are more important than the profit of a company.

• 14 Mar 2025 · Arm’s-Length Bodies (Review) Bill · Hansard source

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  The case of the hon. Member’s constituent is a really interesting one, although I do not know the full details. However, sometimes when we get rid of a quango, it is a case of, “Be careful what you wish for.” One of the jobs I had before coming to this place was parliamentary officer for the Public and Commercial Services Union. One much lamented former body from the bonfire of the quangos was the Independent Living Fund, which provided support for some of the most complex cases—potentially like the hon. Gentleman’s constituent—and was able to work much more easily. In a cost-saving measure, that support was transferred into local government, and local government is much less efficient at administering it, so I would say, “Be careful what you wish for when you close quangos just because they are quangos.”

• 10 Mar 2025 · Crime and Policing Bill · Hansard source

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  I absolutely agree that the last Government failed people on tackling crime, particularly due to its hollowing out of the police. Indeed, in West Yorkshire alone, within just six years of the Conservatives taking office, over 1,200 police officers had been let go, and 1,000 of those were in frontline roles, leaving their numbers even more depleted than the Opposition Benches. When the numbers rose back again, it was just not the same because the previous Government failed to recognise that police are more than just a number on a spreadsheet. They got rid of 1,200 officers who knew their communities, who added local intelligence and understanding of the local nuances, and who had experience supporting those neighbourhoods. We lost the heart of neighbourhood-based policing—the best tool to combat antisocial behaviour—and one of the best reassurances that evidence can have. The lack of local knowledge is why we have seen over 3,000 reports of antisocial behaviour in Calder Valley in three years, ruining lives. The lack of trust in police is why I know that so many more incidents simply go unreported. After 14 years of the last Conservative Government allowing antisocial behaviour and other crime to grow unchecked, I am proud that this Labour Government are restoring respect for law and order, standing with and bringing communities and police closer together, with named officers in every community, backed by £2 million of funding to kickstart recruitment for the new neighbourhood police officers. The Government will end the impunity that criminals feel they can operate under by giving officers stronger powers to tackle antisocial behaviour, violent crime and persistent offenders who make people’s lives a misery. Against a backdrop of the lack of trust in our police service that was allowed to fester over 14 years, this Bill is an important step in the process of rebuilding trust and confidence and why, on behalf of my constituents from Calder Valley, who have suffered because of antisocial behaviour, I am backing the Bill to take action today.

• 10 Mar 2025 · Crime and Policing Bill · Hansard source

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  Antisocial behaviour ruins lives. On Friday, I held an event at the Field Lane estate in Calder Valley, the first in a series of events across my constituency to listen to members of the community about antisocial behaviour, and their stories were heartbreaking. Families are being terrorised by problem residents, children are scared to go to school and residents fear for their property and personal safety. All the while, people have no trust that making reports to the police will bring an end to the fear their families are facing. Sadly, this lack of trust became all too common a feature in communities under the last Government. They know that, no matter how many reports they make or how much evidence they have, the police will either not turn up or turn up late and then not take people seriously, after the last Government hollowed out our policing services.

• 5 Mar 2025 · Department of Health and Social Care · Hansard source

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  I am pleased to be called to speak in this important debate, Madam Deputy Speaker. When we talk about the NHS, we can argue either about specific investments or about general principles, and like many colleagues, I have received a great amount of correspondence highlighting no end of specific areas where investment is needed. I could also speak about the need to invest in urgent treatment centres in Todmorden, or to celebrate the work of Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS foundation trust—two things that I continue to raise with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care. However, as I have the privilege, along with others, of sitting on the Health and Social Care Committee, I want to talk in more broad terms about some of the problems facing our health and social care system, and about how the proposed shifts in the NHS need a reprioritisation of resources. I will focus on what I argue is the most important of those shifts—the so-called left shift of care from hospitals to the community. The hon. Member for North Cotswolds (Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) outlined the need for that well—even if to hear him speak one might think that it had come from on high, and not as the result of 15 years of the previous Government. One in 10 people are stuck on waiting lists in a healthcare system that is becoming increasingly hospital-centric, and those lists will only grow if we continue on the same course. There is no solution to our crisis in emergency medicine without the left shift of solving problems earlier and closer to home. Of course we need hospitals and to invest in them, but they should be where people go with acute and complex cases, not where they go for want of working services elsewhere. Despite the need to shift to community care being obvious to just about everyone, one of the most glaring revelations of the Darzi report was how poorly successive Governments have gone about achieving that. Meanwhile, we are not training or retaining enough GPs—that is where the renegotiation of the contracts is important. In Calder Valley, the retention crisis has meant that Bankfield and Church Lane surgeries, Northolme practice, and Rastrick health centre all have a ratio of patients to fully qualified GPs that is far higher than the local, regional and national averages—averages that simply do not meet what is needed from our health service. More than a decade after the Dilnot report, social care remains the forgotten service—the Cinderella service, as my hon. Friend the Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) artfully called it. With 1.4 million social care staff, our care system is the same size as the NHS workforce, but it receives nothing like the support or understanding of other areas of our health system. The consequence is that our Committee, week after week, hears about delayed discharge, with 20% of beds in my local hospital taken up by people who should be treated at home or closer to home. Meanwhile, carers are missing their appointments because they are delivering care to loved ones, and they end up with worse illnesses, adding to the strain on the NHS. In less than a year, this Government have ended the industrial action in our NHS and delivered 2 million additional appointments, and they are now setting up a new deal with GPs. However, that cannot be the extent of our actions. The 10-year plan cannot continue down the same road that the last Government took us on, of trying to fix a crisis in the NHS by putting more money into hospitals and nothing else, because that tackles the symptoms but not the causes of the problem. Therefore, when setting out the estimates, I urge the Minister to be mindful of the shifts we need to ensure that funding not only increases, but increases with a focus on community and social care. That is what we need for a sustainable system that will protect the rest of our health service in future, because a sustainable system is the only way to deliver better healthcare and better social care for people across the country.

• 5 Mar 2025 · Department of Health and Social Care · Hansard source

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  Another issue my hon. Friend may wish to reflect on is that the council tax base differs from place to place, so councils are even more disadvantaged than the NHS on funding.

• 26 Feb 2025 · High Street Businesses · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Desmond. I thank the hon. Member for Stockton West (Matt Vickers) for securing this debate, which has been a wonderful tour of Members’ high streets, although, as a member of the Health and Social Care Committee, I cannot recommend a deep-fried Mars bar. I pay tribute to those who, on top of running their own businesses, put time into a broader business community, such as Calder Valley’s town deal boards, including in Todmorden, Elland and Brighouse, and those who have helped their towns to thrive by having a bigger vision for what their towns can be. Even though I did not always see eye to eye with local businesses on parking charges when I was a councillor, those businesses show how the spark of an idea can end up as a dream that becomes part of a community of successful businesses, because success breeds success. Calder Valley is a series of towns, all of which have their own personalities. A great proponent of this theory is the Totally Locally campaign, a national campaign that was founded in Calder Valley and remains active in the towns of Brighouse, Elland, Todmorden and Hebden Bridge. It extols the virtues of local businesses’ working together and the power of spending money locally. Their annual “Magic Tenner” campaign uses analysis from the New Economics Foundation that found that £10 spent in a local shop could be worth as much as £50 to the local economy, as those local shops use local suppliers, so the money is recycled again and again. The campaign highlights that by having participating businesses offer deals for a tenner, and we are going to see that operating throughout Calder Valley and across the country starting next week and running until 16 March. I urge people to take part in those Totally Locally campaigns. I pay tribute to the small-business owners of Calder Valley who started with a dream and ended up building a proud business community.

• 8 Jan 2025 · Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill · Hansard source

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  Calderdale council took the innovative step of giving foster carers a council tax break, which has been incredibly effective in recruiting foster carers. Would this and other such ideas be a good way to get more people into the system?

• 6 Jan 2025 · NHS Backlog · Hansard source

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  I welcome this debate. Another winter and there are more severe backlogs—the causes are structural and predictable. The shadow of what Lord Darzi found weighs heavy on this debate, with 14,000 unnecessary deaths in A&E each year, waiting times for over-65s in emergency care having more than doubled to seven hours, and over 100,000 under-threes waiting more than six hours to be seen in 2023. Each one of those numbers is a devastated family, a patient at greater risk, or a patient enduring that long, nervous wait. This winter, my local hospital trust has seen average bed occupancy rates hit 98.5%. At one point in mid-December, only three out of 715 beds were free to use. The crisis in our NHS that my constituents in Calder Valley face is not the result of a lack of work by our NHS staff—I hope everyone in this House can join me in paying tribute to those hard-working staff. Instead, this crisis has come about because of bad policy choices and warnings repeatedly ignored. In his report and when he came to the Health and Social Care Committee, Lord Darzi made it absolutely clear that the root cause of the problem is the Health and Social Care Act 2012, which was pushed through without precedent or preparation by the coalition Government amid repeated warnings from healthcare professionals. This disaster proves that to move forward, we have to learn from why bad health policy gets made: because of a focus on ideology over practicality, on efficiency savings over real improvements, and on treatment over prevention and later-life care. We must also learn that to rebuild our NHS we cannot be top-down, but must build on a foundation of decent social and community care that is close to home and respects the skills of those who work throughout the system. That brings me to my next point, which is about social care. The scale of the crisis in the NHS means that it will not be fixed overnight—indeed, the Secretary of State talks about a 10-year plan—but we know that problems are solved easier and earlier if patients are treated closer to home. Yet the failure to plan health and social care together over the past 14 years means that more than one in 10 NHS hospital beds are filled by people who simply do not have the right care.

• 6 Jan 2025 · Health and Adult Social Care Reform · Hansard source

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  I welcome the commission, which hopefully will lead to some certainty on the future of social care. However, a 2023 National Audit Office report found that 17% of local authority directors of social services were concerned about their ability to meet statutory obligations last year, and a further 18% are concerned about their ability this year. I have concerns about what will be done to fix the immediate crisis in social care. Will my right hon. Friend outline what he will do to guarantee the sustainability of our care system now, while we await the further structural reforms that we dearly need?

• 18 Dec 2024 · Winter Preparedness · Hansard source

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  Last week, Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS foundation trust’s bed occupancy was at 99.6%. Some 20.1% of those beds, because of the failure of social healthcare and community care, were taken up by people who could be treated elsewhere. All I want for Christmas is a reassurance that, next Christmas and next winter, social care will be on a more secure footing.

• 18 Dec 2024 · Provisional Local Government Finance Settlement · Hansard source

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  I welcome the money for homelessness in today’s statement. Evidence increasingly suggests that prevention works in homelessness. Calderdale is one of three local authorities working with Crisis to pilot a system of early prevention. In six months, that has already led to a 20% reduction in people using temporary accommodation. Will the Minister look at that work and commit to championing what works?

• 11 Dec 2024 · Finance Bill · Hansard source

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  Norfolk county council, which covers the area that the shadow Minister represents, has a housing waiting list of 1,341 homes sought. That is up 400 since he was elected in 2019. If the new clauses are about reviewing the impact of actions, perhaps he could take a moment to review the impact of the last Government’s actions, which saw the housing waiting list increase in his constituency?

• 25 Nov 2024 · Storm Bert · Hansard source

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  This weekend, much of my constituency was under a severe flood warning. Businesses, roads and homes were flooded. We were luckier than in previous years in terms of severity, but in places it was agonisingly close, with rivers centimetres away from breaking their banks. Calder Valley has had two major floods in the past decade, and the fact that we avoided the same level of destruction this time was in no small part because of the work of local flood wardens, natural flood management organisations such as Slow The Flow and Calderdale council. I pay tribute to them. It is almost a decade since the serious floods in Calder Valley on Boxing day 2015. We had further floods in 2020. While the Environment Agency has carried out flood prevention works in Mytholmroyd and Brighouse, it has not even made a start on planned schemes in Hebden Bridge and Elland. Will the Minister meet me to discuss the plans we have upcoming and get some action from the Environment Agency? My constituents are understandably really anxious.

• 18 Nov 2024 · Children’s Social Care · Hansard source

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  In my time as a councillor and corporate parent, nothing was more distressing than the complex safeguarding issues that we had to deal with, and nothing more enraging that seeing people profit from them. That is why Calderdale council did good work to bring children’s homes in house. I hope that the statement means an end to that profiteering.

• 6 Nov 2024 · Budget Resolutions · Hansard source

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  I am proud to stand up on behalf of my constituents in Calder Valley and thank this Government for the Budget delivered by our Chancellor—a Budget that rebuilds the country and protects the NHS. As someone who spent eight years in local government before coming to this place, I recognise some of the huge steps that this Budget takes to cement local government, guaranteeing funding for high street projects like those in Calder Valley, and ending the beauty contests that see communities pitted against one another for meagre funding. There was £600 million guaranteed for social care and a commitment to longer-term, proper funding for our highways and the scourge of potholes. Most importantly, we get three-year funding settlements—no more annual scrabble in December to work out how to make a budget fit. Local authorities and businesses can plan long-term, which is what they want, and it is the stability that we need. It has been quite something to sit through this Budget debate for the past few days, because it seems like there have been two Budgets. One was delivered by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, which fixed our foundations, supported hospitality and the high street, provided billions for the NHS, found funding for SEND and opened breakfast clubs. Then, there has been the Budget that exists in the imagination of Opposition Members. Today, the Leader of the Opposition claimed that it did not mention the word “defence”. The speech mentions it six times, and the Budget has a whole section in the funding settlement for defence. Today, we heard from the hon. Members for Solihull West and Shirley (Dr Shastri-Hurst) and for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Dr Johnson) about the problems of social care. That should not be a new concern for Conservative Members. Andrew Dilnot released his report in 2011. We were then promised that we would get some kind of proposal in 2014. In 2017, the Conservative Government released their proposal, but then withdrew it because they had an election. They then delayed it in 2018. It came back in 2021 and was delayed again in 2022. Then they said that they would deliver it in 2024, but did not find the funding. Throughout all that, there has not been a shred of contrition or acknowledgment from the Conservatives that they left the country on its knees. They have no idea yet why the public rejected them so resoundingly at the last election. I hope that as they sum up, they will perhaps show some contrition and answer the Budget as it is, not the one that exists only in their imagination.

• 16 Oct 2024 · Access to Primary Healthcare · Hansard source

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  I am glad that this debate has been called. Across the House, stories of failings in primary care are too familiar and, frankly, too distressing. The Darzi report makes it clear that since the announcement in the late 2000s of the so-called left shift—the shift from hospital care to care in the community—we have seen the number of people treated in hospitals rising. Indeed, 58% of the NHS budget is now spent on hospitals compared with 47% in the late 2000s. As Darzi said, there is no left shift, just a “right drift”. Let us be clear: GPs work hard and do a fantastic job. Just a few weeks ago, I visited the fantastic Hebden Bridge group practice in my constituency. The 13 doctors conduct about 2,000 appointments a week, and while they are fantastically efficient, that is taking its toll. The General Medical Council’s national training survey—I used to be proud to work on that report every year—found that 68% of GP trainers said they always felt worn out at the end of the day. This is simply unsustainable. We see the impact of the unsustainable model and the underfunding in our constituencies every week. In my constituency, the Calder community practice in Todmorden closed with over 2,800 patients on its books because there simply was not anyone able to take it on. The Darzi report makes it clear that we need to prioritise primary care and care in the community. The left shift must not be a slogan, but create real action. It cannot be right that, last year, 2,000 patients each day were admitted to hospital for something that could have been treated elsewhere and closer to home. I look forward to supporting the Government amendment, and to working across the House week in and week out to make sure that we rebuild the NHS and get it the support it needs.