Tim Farron MP: speeches

Speeches

• 4 Feb 2025 · Accessibility of Radiotherapy · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. Back at the time of the last Labour Government, the national radiotherapy advisory group recommended that it was bad practice for anybody to live beyond 45 minutes of a radiotherapy centre one-way, or a round trip of an hour and a half, yet so many people—7.5 million people—including his constituents and my constituents, live beyond that.

• 4 Feb 2025 · Accessibility of Radiotherapy · Hansard source

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  Yes. By definition, almost all of the radiotherapy deserts—those places that are beyond sensible and safe travelling times—are rural communities. As a result, they have terrible public transport. It is not just about the cost. The increase in the bus fare cap is hugely damaging, but for many of our communities—my hon. Friend’s and mine alike—it almost does not matter what the bus cap is; if there is no bus to spend the fare on, people are stuffed, really. That has a huge impact on their cancer outcomes, which means whether they survive or not.

• 4 Feb 2025 · Accessibility of Radiotherapy · Hansard source

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  That is a good point. Early diagnosis is vital. We are getting a bit better at it, but it would be a tragedy if we diagnosed people but then did not treat them early enough to cure them. The hon. Gentleman makes a good point on behalf of his communities. If we cannot cope with treating the number of cancer patients we are seeing now, how will we deal with the projected 30% increase in cancer cases by 2040? The good news—the very, very good news—is that it does not need to be this way. The upcoming cancer plan, of which we have heard an outline today, is an opportunity to supercharge cancer services and transform a culture of normalising unacceptable delays into one that drives continuous cancer care improvements. However, without decisive and radical action and leadership, lives will continue to be lost needlessly.

• 4 Feb 2025 · Accessibility of Radiotherapy · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend makes a good point. There is a combination of reasons, which I will come on to in a moment, but distance from treatment is undoubtedly the critical point that decides whether people can access and take advantage of lifesaving and life-prolonging treatment.

• 4 Feb 2025 · Accessibility of Radiotherapy · Hansard source

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  I would not be doing my job at all well if I did not pursue the Minister on this point. Earlier, he very kindly talked about meeting the all-party group to talk about the national picture, and I want to press him on our local bid to tackle the problem he has just spoken about. Will he meet me and local oncologists to talk about how we can deliver a radiotherapy satellite centre in Kendal?

• 4 Feb 2025 · Accessibility of Radiotherapy · Hansard source

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  The hon. Member makes wonderful points, and it is absolutely right that in every corner of the United Kingdom we need to ensure that we have the staffing, the kit and the level of technology to meet need close enough to where people live for people to be kept safe and treated in a convenient way. In Westmorland, we successfully campaigned to bring chemotherapy, greater amounts of surgery and a new diagnostic hub to Kendal. All of that is welcome, and all of that has saved lives. I am unbelievably grateful to all those in our communities who campaigned alongside us, and to the wonderful NHS professionals who deliver and run those services, but the failure of successive Governments, including the one I was a part of, and NHS management to take the people of Westmorland out of the radiotherapy desert is utterly inexcusable given the multiple opportunities to do so over the last 30 or so years. So my first ask of the Minister is that he takes a personal interest in the call for a satellite radiotherapy unit at the Westmorland general hospital in Kendal, and that he meets with me and with oncologists, commissioners and patients, to kickstart that bid.

• 4 Feb 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T7. Will the Minister agree to meet the wonderful Cumbria Action for Sustainability and me to address some of the imperfections in the Government home insulation programme? It does not properly support older rural-community properties that are single-skinned, not so easy to insulate, and therefore not so easy to keep heated cheaply.

• 3 Feb 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Hundreds of farmers and other small business owners in Westmorland who earn less than the minimum wage are not eligible for universal credit because of the failure of that system to take account of variability of income. Will the Minister look to put that right so that we can support the people who support us?

• 28 Jan 2025 · Solar Farms: Agricultural Land · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is being super generous and I am grateful to her. She makes excellent points. We obviously have means by which we can control how those things happen, through the environmental land management payment scheme and planning law. Would she agree that, through both of those streams, we should be able to ensure that food security is at least as important as energy security, and that we should not be using productive agricultural land for solar farms when they can be developed elsewhere? Westmorland and Furness Council, for example, has used disused land to provide a solar farm of its own on non-agricultural land.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Solar Farms: Agricultural Land · Hansard source

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  The Minister is being very generous; I am grateful. The concern is that farmers are often pushed into things that they would not choose initially—such as giving over productive agricultural land for stuff that is not food production. Because of the perversity of Government funding changes, perhaps the most egregious thing in the Budget was the 76% cut in the basic payment for farmers this year, which will make many of them feel that their hand is forced to go down a direction that they do not want to go down. Might the Minister have a word with the Treasury to see whether that cut could be taken away?

• 28 Jan 2025 · Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  Let me say, without going through all the flowery stuff that we did earlier, that I am grateful to Members in all parts of the House for what has been a broadly collegiate debate. However, the shadow Secretary of State said something that is worth reflecting on. I think she was talking about what I am about to mention, namely the fines of £164 million that Ofwat had indeed proposed should be levied against the very three water companies to which she referred. For what it is worth—and I am not here to defend the Treasury—this was not a Treasury decision at all. It was because of Ofwat’s weakness, and a culture of timidity that is evident when it comes to gathering money from the water companies, that the money was not collected. That information is 100% correct, because it was given to me in response to one of my Freedom of Information Act requests. In any event, the key feature is my disappointment in the Bill. I will certainly support it should it come to a vote, and I support it anyway, but its weakness lies in the fact that it is not radical enough. It does not go far enough, and it does not tackle the weakness in regulation to which, in a roundabout, accidental way, the Secretary of State has referred . We will engage with the Cunliffe water review and recognise it as independent. My reflection is simply this. The Labour party has been in opposition for a long time. They were a well-funded Opposition through short money—we could only dream of such things—and surely had the capability to come up with a set of plans that meant they could get on with it straightaway, rather than kicking it to halfway into the Parliament. This is an unambitious Bill, but it is good enough, and it will have our support. Question put and agreed to. Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed , with amendments .

• 28 Jan 2025 · Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  They are not mutually exclusive, are they? Knowing the duration of a spill is important, but knowing what went into it and how much also helps to know the impact so we can regulate it. Is that not true?

• 28 Jan 2025 · Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  Will the right hon. Lady give way?

• 28 Jan 2025 · Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  Somebody representing the water industry will say that the water industry, as structured, is deeply unappealing to investors. There is a case for changing the model of how we structure those companies. When a company goes into special administration, we do not think it is right that innocent customers should have to foot the bill. The management of those companies, and their investors and creditors, are responsible for the mess the company is in. They took the risks and speculated in order to make money, so it is only right that they should have to cover the costs of the risks that they took, not our constituents. One of the positive aspects of the Bill is the Government’s decision to deploy volunteers, citizen scientists and campaigners to ensure scrutiny of the water industry. Only last week, I spent time speaking with the leaders of the Save Windermere campaign and the Clean River Kent Campaign. I also enjoyed getting my hands dirty and my legs very wet alongside the Eden Rivers Trust in the River Eden not long ago. We are lucky across the whole country to have passionate, committed, expert volunteers who are dedicated to cleaning up and protecting our precious waterways, yet we are saddened that the Government have failed to provide those volunteers with the resources they need or the power they deserve.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  Those funds are vital. Bathing water status is important. We hope that DEFRA will come out with new criteria soon so that places such as the River Kent can bid to be included. We have tabled new clauses 4, 10, 13 and 15, which between them would strengthen the hand of those wonderful volunteers, including by ensuring that the Government’s proposed live database, which we support, retains comprehensive historical data. If it does not, the Government are expecting campaigners to be watching that database 24/7. If they have the temerity to go to sleep, look after their kids or go to work, they may miss something. If we are to back campaigners and volunteers, the least we can do is give them the tools to scrutinise water companies’ performance. Knowledge is power, and our amendments would give those campaigners knowledge and power. New clause 11 and amendment 14 address monitoring. Event duration monitors tell us how long a spill took place over. For instance, they tell us that last February, United Utilities spilled into Windermere for 10 hours in one go, but those monitors do not tell us anything about volume. As a result, they do not tell us enough about the impact of sewage spills on the ecology and wildlife of our waterways. It is equally possible to have a long duration trickle or a short duration deluge of sewage into our lakes, rivers and seas. New clause 11 would insist that water companies have to measure and report on the volume of discharges and that regulators hold them to it. New clause 25 would put into law concrete pollution targets and proper penalties when companies fail to meet them. Companies who fail to meet those targets would be put into what we are calling special measures, meaning that they would be subject to financial penalties and/or be made to undertake a specific improvement project. No water company chief executive will quake in their boots if they are not held to targets that are ambitious and enforceable with penalties, and which actually mean something.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  I pay tribute to the Minister and the Bill team from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs who are in the Chamber, as well as to all my colleagues who sat on the Committee for what was a genuinely enjoyable and collegiate experience. I hope they will forgive me for making a few criticisms in the next few minutes. We tabled 44 amendments in Committee, but only 34 today, you will be delighted to know Madam Deputy Speaker— [ Interruption. ] I know—I am failing. I will not speak to all of them for blindingly obvious reasons. We tabled those amendments because we in the Liberal Democrats, humbly yet enthusiastically, have taken on the mantle in this place and beyond of being the voice for many thousands of campaigners, volunteers and citizen scientists who continue to lead the way in exposing the failures and injustices in the water industry, and fighting for meaningful change. We are immensely grateful to those people all across the country. Our water industry has become a money-making vessel for speculators, who appear to care little for the quality of our rivers, lakes and seas—something I can tell the House is a source of great fury in England’s precious Lake district. The water companies have accumulated £70 billion in debt since privatisation, while still managing to pay out £83 billion in dividends. That is more than a third of the total spent on infrastructure during that time. In the last year, water companies paid out £9.3 million in executive bonuses, and Thames Water’s bonuses doubled to £1.3 million that year. Money leaks out of the industry, infrastructure is failing, and it is our constituents who pay the price. Meanwhile the regulatory framework has failed utterly and is not fit for purpose. As I speak, £164 million in fines has been levied against water companies by Ofwat, following an investigation that began four years ago, of which it has so far failed to collect a single penny.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  The Secretary of State talks about Sir Jon Cunliffe’s water commission, and we are obviously interested in engaging with that. Does he think, though, that today’s appointment of a former Thames Water executive to the commission will fill the public with confidence that it will be independent in any way?

• 28 Jan 2025 · Water (Special Measures) Bill [Lords] · Hansard source

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  I strongly agree with my hon. Friend. The water companies simply do not fear Ofwat, or indeed any other part of our fragmented regulatory system. They dwarf Ofwat in terms of resources, they flout the limited regulations that they face, and they run rings around the regulators and obviously get away with it. There was the outrage of the water companies being permitted, just before Christmas, to increase water bills by 36% by 2030, and what makes it even worse is that a third of customers’ bills are being spent just on servicing the debt—a debt that was in part run up to fund excessive dividends. Water companies are already passing on the consequences of their complete financial mismanagement to our constituents—their customers—but this Bill could enable that to go further and to be even worse. According to the Government’s explanatory notes, “following the provision of financial assistance by the Secretary of State to a company in special administration”, clause 12 of the Bill, as drafted, would “require a water company to raise amounts of money determined by the Secretary of State from its consumers, and to pay those amounts to the Secretary of State to make good any shortfall”. In other words, when a water company goes into special administration, there is a cost to the Government of ensuring that supply is maintained, and the Government need to recoup that cost. That sounds reasonable at first glimpse, but it does not seem reasonable that bill payers should have to pick up the tab, despite bearing none of the blame for the financial mess a water company finds itself in. My hon. Friends and I are keen to press amendment 9, which would make it explicit that it should be the creditors of the companies—the big financial investors that have loaded debt on to the water companies—that cover those costs instead. The amendment would strike out the Government’s provision in the Bill that opens up bill payers to carrying the cost of paying off company debt, even in the event of bankruptcy.

• 27 Jan 2025 · Clinical Academics · Hansard source

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  The new Pears medical school at the University of Cumbria and the Lancaster University medical school, among others, are struggling to recruit and retain medical academic staff, in no small part due to the last Government’s somewhat masochistic decision to undermine one of Britain’s best exports: namely, the income we receive from overseas students. Will the Minister undo this nonsense and allow Britain’s brilliant universities, especially the medical schools, to help boost the quest for economic growth?

• 27 Jan 2025 · Storm Éowyn · Hansard source

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  I thank the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster for advance sight of his statement and for his thoughtful presentation of it. As he said, Storm Éowyn may well have been the strongest storm to hit the United Kingdom in 10 years. Sadly, it is a sign of what is likely to come. I am praying for those who are grieving those who have died, and I pay tribute, alongside everyone else in every corner of this House, to all who worked throughout the weekend to support others, often at great cost and even risk to themselves. Back home, communities such as Patterdale, Flookburgh, Cark, Shap, Tebay, Crosby Ravensworth, Witherslack and Bouth saw many homes, businesses and community centres lose power. Like others, I am incredibly grateful to the engineers at Electricity North West and the wider community groups who have worked tirelessly to reconnect residents and support those without power. I want to mention the Commodore Inn at Grange over Sands, the Kings Arms at Stainton, the Watermill at Ings and the Kings Head at Ravenstonedale, which provided shelter, food and drink to residents hit by the power cuts. Storms are becoming more commonplace and severe, and the damage that they leave behind all the more troubling and increasing. Four days on, tens of thousands of homes across the British Isles are still without power, and transport networks remain badly hit. The Government’s failure at the recent Budget to guarantee funding for flood defences beyond this coming financial year is a cause of great anxiety for communities such as mine, who are often the first to be hit by extreme weather events. It also strikes me as extraordinarily short-sighted. Will the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster demand that the Chancellor of the Exchequer puts this right, and quickly? Farmers are our crucial ally in the fight to build more storm-resilient communities. Will the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster get the Treasury to ringfence funding, in addition to the environmental land management budget, to support farmers to protect our villages, towns and cities through natural flood management? Farmers are also major victims of these storms, with crops and livestock tragically lost and equipment destroyed.

• 27 Jan 2025 · Storm Éowyn · Hansard source

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  Will the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster ensure that resilience funding goes to the farmers who need it? Finally, will he meet the electricity companies to consider how they can improve the resilience of power lines?

• 27 Jan 2025 · Storm Éowyn · Hansard source

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  Have I gone over it?

• 21 Jan 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Schools in Westmorland have been told that they will have to meet the costs of teacher pay rises next year, at least in part, from existing funds and by making efficiencies. Does the Chancellor not understand that all that is available to schools in my constituency is sacking teachers and merging classes? Will she instead commit to fully funding the teachers’ pay rise and other cost increases, so that our schools can do the job that they are meant to do?

• 20 Jan 2025 · New Hospital Programme Review · Hansard source

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  The acute hospital that serves most of my constituency is the Royal Lancaster infirmary. It is an overcrowded Victorian hospital; parts of it are falling to bits, it has inadequate parking and it is at the wrong end of a one-way system. With the Secretary of State’s help, the local hospital trust has acquired an almost perfect site for a rebuild. The trust has designed the new hospital and even begun consulting the public on it, so today’s announcement that we face a 10-year wait until a spade is dug into the ground will come as something of a bombshell. Will he reconsider the timescale? The longer we leave it, the more the cost will spiral and, I am afraid, the less likely it is that people will have confidence that it will even happen at all.

• 20 Jan 2025 · Second Homes: Use Class · Hansard source

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  4. If she will make it her policy to introduce a new planning use class for second homes.