6.30 pm
Regeneration in Southend-on-Sea
James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend, East) (Con): I want to speak about aeroplanes, tax and flowers-a combination that probably has not been addressed by the House so far.
I shall speak first about planes. There has been much debate recently about Heathrow. I opposed the third runway there and I also oppose the development of the Thames estuary airport that is sometimes known as “Heathrow-on-Sea” or “Boris Island”. Whatever it is called, it is a rehash of the Maplin Sands proposal of the 1970s and it is wholly and totally inappropriate. However, I fully support the expansion of Southend airport.
That may appear contradictory, but the expansion of the current facilities at Southend airport would be very positive for the town and the surrounding area. The main expansion would involve lengthening the runway from 1,605 to 1,799 metres. That would make Southend a successful regional airport with the capacity to serve 1 million to 2 million passengers, and so similar to the very successful airport at Southampton.
Southend’s economy is heavily interwoven with tourism, and a fully functioning passenger airport would provide a major boost to the town. However, Southend cannot rely on tourism alone, as it also needs to rely heavily on the business sector. The airport plays an important part in that respect as well.
Hi-Tec is a big company with its headquarters in Southend, to which it relocated mainly because of the existence of the airport and the capacity that it offered for staff to get around Europe. A larger airport would offer more passenger flights, and both Southend and Rochford councils have made a strong commitment to develop a business park. The airport already employs 1,300 people: its expansion would create at least another 1,000 jobs, but my gut feeling is that there would be a great many more.
There are always different views on airport expansion. I have received many letters and e-mails both supporting and opposing expansion. I conducted my own survey of local business people and 62 per cent. said that they supported expansion of the airport, with only 13 per cent. saying that they opposed it.
Politicians can disagree with each other as well. In our last recess Adjournment debate, my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, West (Mr. Amess) set out some of his legitimate concerns about expansion, but the final decision rests with councillors in Southend and Rochford. I urge them to have some backbone: they should do what is right for the town and not worry about political point scoring. Some politicians in both towns have stepped up to the challenge, but not all. We should set aside party politics and do the right thing for Southend.
The consultation on the joint area action plan closed on 15 May. It was a mistake for the councils in Southend and Rochford to request the airport not to get involved and to stay silent. It was also a mistake by the Stobart Group to acquiesce in that and not to get out and sell the benefits of the airport. Now that the consultation is closed, there should be much more aggressive selling of the benefits that an expansion of Southend airport could bring, especially as we approach 2012. Southend is closer to London than Stansted, with faster journey times to the capital.
I turn now to the question of tax credits. I know that Mr. Speaker is keen to speed up responses to parliamentary questions, and I hope he will consider extending that to parliamentary correspondence as well. I have written to the Financial Secretary to the Treasury about my concerns about queries to the tax credits office and, given that over the next 10 days some of my constituents will fill in their tax credits renewal forms, that is a very appropriate matter to raise today.
Some families in my area have children leaving full-time education. If they do not notify the tax credits office of that, they could end up in receipt of an overpayment of tax credits and thus being fined more than £300. The system is a mess, and the responses from the tax credits office are poor, untimely and sometimes not especially comprehensive. The result is that several clarifications have to be issued, and the extended correspondence can cause confusion. It is a great disincentive to people taking on the extra work and promotions that would be notifiable to the tax credits office.
I turn now to flowers. I have noticed that Members of Parliament sometimes get the bit between their teeth about really small issues. Given the bigger issues such as the recession and the economy, it may seem odd to speak about Southend hospital’s decision to ban flowers, but things are sometimes symbolic. The ban on flowers is symbolic of a public institution that has lost touch with reality-one that has lost the common touch.
Ministers have said that the flower ban is a matter for the local hospital trust, but I am sure that if they seriously thought that flowers were a risk to health they would issue national guidance on the matter. An article entitled “The Evidence Base and Infection Risks from Flowers in a Clinical Setting” was published in the British Journal of Infection Control in 2005, and I am sure that hon. Members of all parties will have read it in great detail. It states that there is no “robust evidence” that flowers cause a problem, and it goes on:
“Occasionally, new practices become part of clinical routines despite the lack of supporting evidence. Banning flowers from general hospital wards falls into this category.”
Another survey that I held found that more than 70 per cent. of people wanted to keep the display of flowers in hospital. The journalist Matthew Stanton spearheaded a campaign in the popular local newspaper the Yellow Advertiser, to which the majority of respondents also said that they wanted the hospital to allow flowers in the wards.
Last week, I went to the hospital at quite short notice to see a friend, and I found it to be dirty, depressing and disorganised. The visit confirmed some of my worst fears, and the hospital’s failure to see common sense on flowers is on the same level as the failures that have caused it to become dirty and have poor patient flows. Despite its multi-million pound budget, the chairs are crumbling and there is not a decent one to sit on. The ragged signs on the walls telling one where to go suggest that the operation there is not run in a professional way.
The symbolism of the ban on flowers represents a much greater problem at Southend hospital, and it is a problem that I hope the hospital addresses.