9.24 pm
Regeneration (Southend)
James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend, East) (Con): May I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, West (Mr. Amess) on securing this debate so soon after our return from the recess? Having spent two months thinking of lots of things to say, and given the hours that one could spend talking about Southend, I thought I had to pare my contribution down to five minutes, only to find that I have the luxury of a little more time. It is a great position for someone who is so passionate about Southend to be in, but I will limit my comments and not take up all the available time and detain the Minister too long on his first full day in office. Ministers come, and Ministers go. In the case of some Ministers, they come and go, come and go, and come again. However, being made a Privy Councillor is something that people cannot take away from someone. The Minister will always be a right honourable Gentleman, and it is good to have him here to reply to the debate.
I hesitate to disagree at the outset with my colleague, but the title of the debate gives me some discomfort. I represent Rochford and Southend, East, but as soon as I talk about Southend, everyone in Rochford writes to me and says, “What’s wrong with Rochford?” I will not stray, however, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and test your patience. The other problem that I have with the debate concerns the other word in the title-there are only two words, so it seems rather churlish-which is “regeneration”, as it suggests something that is done to an area, rather than by an area. It has connotations of the public sector, a master plan, a right way forward, and a process that is planned and ultimately reached. However, if one looks at Southend’s history, some of the best changes have been organic and have been achieved bit by bit. Some of the worst things in Southend have been planned: the ’70s tower blocks that were built, with old Victorian housing smashed through. Parts of the town centre were ripped out and destroyed to provide new, progressive, modern buildings, so I am a little concerned when we talk of regeneration that we may repeat past mistakes. Personally, I prefer the term, “investment”, not only by the private sector but by the community, which should invest not just its money in the town but its time, community spirit and so on.
Under the term “regeneration”, Southend council quite rightly wants to make Southend a better place to live, work, visit and indeed to invest in. If we achieve all four things we will achieve regeneration-a term I dislike somewhat. Another term mentioned by my hon. Friend that has been bandied about is “partnerships”. Everyone seems to be working in partnership, and it has almost become incestuous. We cannot be sure who are the different parties in the regeneration debate. I will illustrate that point for the Minister by citing an excellent development that I fully support. The university of Essex came to Southend, and, I walked through the site with the opening party, which was quite large-not only were there dignitaries and a member of the royal family but everyone who had participated in the project. Representatives of some 15 organisations were wandering through, and when we unveiled the plaque, there were about 15 different logos representing people who had put money in. One lady who was wandering round said, “You know, James, actually, it was us who pump-primed all of this.” Their logo was not even on the board.
When one drills down into the question of what those organisations were, quite often they were the Department for Communities and Local Government in one guise or format or another. Everyone was saying that they pump-primed the university: they put in a little bit of money and achieved a great deal of change. I asked them a question, “How much did the whole thing cost?”, but very few people knew. In fact, no one was able to tell me. I am sure that I could have probed the issue further. Interestingly, however, when I spoke to a third of those 15 or so donors, no one appreciated the overall cost or how much Government money had been put in. No one appreciated how much DCLG money had been put in. They were just proud that they had pump-primed the investment.
I worry that as part of the regeneration process, it is conceivable that we end up spending more money than we need to. It is also conceivable that we spend it on the wrong thing. One of the problems with all these partnerships is that there is a democratic deficit. There is a lack of linkage between what the people of Southend want and what all the organisations want. To a degree, Southend council got into an unholy alliance of necessity with a number of partnerships, because that is the only way to get money out of the Government. They played the game, but is it right? Are the rules of the game right? Is the structure of funding right? I assert to the Minister that it is not right, it is confusing and there is a democratic deficit. One of the things that he can do, not just for Southend, but for other areas in the country, is to give the process a good shake-up.
In our area there is Thames gateway. No one I know describes themselves as living in Thames gateway. Thames gateway does not even exist. Southend exists. People say they come from Southend, from Prittlewell, from Essex or from the east end. Nobody has ever told me they come from Thames gateway. It is not a defined area of community spirit.
I am extremely concerned about central Government taking assets into national hands, even with the acquiescence of a local council, to pump-prime some type of investment. That seems to be completely the wrong direction of travel. For example, English Partnerships took a large share in the car parks in Southend, in the hope that it would get private sector development money to develop those car parks, provide car parking space and develop the town centre. The Government should be helping to push money down, not pull money out.
I want to be brief, but I want to touch on some of the points that my hon. Friend made. The errors in the census, which predates my election, are crucial. Those errors cost Southend £7 million every year. If the Minister takes away one thing from my contribution, will he please look at the figures again? The Government will probably not want to look all the way back to the last census, but we must make sure that we get the census right for areas such as Southend, Slough, Manchester and the City of Westminster, which do not easily fit into an existing box. It is difficult to measure those populations.
Southend airport is an excellent airport. I have mixed feelings about its rebranding. It is now called London Southend, as seems to be the fashion with airports across the whole of the United Kingdom. Southend airport is a decent airport that is looking for extra money to expand. I ask the Minister to look at the 2012 Olympics and speak to his colleagues about London City airport, which may well have to close for security reasons. If it does-it would be a sensible decision to close London City-Southend airport needs the investment now rather than in three or four years so that it can be leveraged for the Olympics.
I agree with my hon. Friend on transport infrastructure. We need a decision on Priory crescent as soon as possible. Almost any decision is better than the present prevarication, waiting and uncertainty. We need consistent, joined-up government. HMRC was mentioned. Not only are those 400 jobs moving away, but new public sector jobs cannot be created in Southend because the south-east is deemed an affluent area and under the Lyons review, new jobs cannot come into largely affluent areas such as the south-east and the east of England. That ignores the clear pockets of poverty in Southend, which are largely clustered around the very same buildings that provided a great deal of part-time work and temporary work-exactly the type of work that was getting people off benefits, into the working marketplace, then off benefits entirely and into full-time jobs.
Lastly, I shall mention two issues. The first is the driving test centre in Southend. This might seem a trivial point but it is symptomatic of the Government moving services away. Southend has an expanding population and an expanding youth population, given the university, yet the Government have taken the decision to close Southend driving test centre. They held a consultation and ignored it. The consultation seemed pretty pointless, because the Government had made the decision already, and I must admit that I wondered aloud in my office, asking rhetorically, “What on earth is a consultation?”
My research assistant, taking that more as an instruction than a rhetorical question, did some research on what a consultation is. Evidently a consultation is a consultation only if the decision is not predetermined. I have documents that have been leaked to me that say not only that the decision was taken, but that planning permission was granted and that the site was being built before the consultation took place, moving Southend driving test centre out of Southend and into a bigger centre near Basildon, which is a problem experienced elsewhere.
Finally, let me reiterate the point about business rates on empty properties. There has been a boom in the demolition business in Southend. Some of the buildings were ugly and needed to be demolished; indeed, it is good that they have been demolished. However, there were many buildings that were important to Southend’s history. There were lots of buildings that were largely unoccupied, but partially occupied by small businesses, which have had to move out and suffer all that disruption. I am not entirely sure whether what has happened in Southend is the same as elsewhere in the country or whether the Government’s intentions have matched the consequences. I urge the Minister, in his dealings with other areas, to see whether the consequences of raising business rates on empty property have been adverse, particularly in regeneration areas.