Tuesday Volume 646 11 September 2018 No. 182 HOUSE OF COMMONS OFFICIAL REPORT PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES (HANSARD) Tuesday 11 September 2018 © Parliamentary Copyright House of Commons 2018 This publication may be reproduced under the terms of the Open Parliament licence, which is published at www.parliament.uk/site-information/copyright/. 581 11 SEPTEMBER 2018 582 Mr Hammond: My hon. Friend has detailed a remarkable House of Commons turnaround in the fortunes of a pub. I congratulate the Friends of Haden Cross on that success, and on making such good use of the “assets of community value” Tuesday 11 September 2018 scheme to save their local. The Government remain clear about the fact that The House met at half-past Eleven o’clock local pubs are instrumental in facilitating the support networks and social interactions that are such a vital part of local communities. We will continue to protect PRAYERS them, and it is welcome news that pubs such as the Friends of Haden Cross are benefiting from the measures that we have taken. [MR SPEAKER in the Chair] Daniel Kawczynski: Will my right hon. Friend join me on a pub crawl in Shrewsbury? [Laughter.] I am buying. BUSINESS BEFORE QUESTIONS My right hon. Friend has mentioned some very positive figures relating to Government support for pubs, but I UNIVERSITY OF LONDON BILL [LORDS] should like him to come to the Salopian Bar, my local in Second Reading opposed and deferred until Tuesday Shrewsbury,and hear at first hand about the extraordinary 9 October (Standing Order No. 20). rises in business rates with which some pubs have had to deal. I should like him to gain first-hand experience, by talking to landlords, of some of the financial pressures Oral Answers to Questions that they are under. Mr Hammond: Provided that I can have it in writing that my hon. Friend is buying, I am very tempted to consider his offer. I will negotiate with him. TREASURY I understand the pressure that pubs and many other traditional businesses are facing. Pubs in Shrewsbury have benefited from recent cuts in alcohol duties and The Chancellor of the Exchequer was asked— business rates, but of course we recognise the challenge Pubs that many smaller businesses face, and we will keep that challenge very much in mind as we formulate our policies. 1. James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con): What fiscal steps he is taking to support the pubs sector. Jenny Chapman (Darlington) (Lab): The Chancellor [906778] is obviously very welcome to join me in a pub crawl around Darlington as well. I always stand my round. 2. Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con): Many of us who represent towns are fighting very What fiscal steps he is taking to support the pubs sector. hard to support our high streets, and the business rate [906779] pressures that have confronted retail businesses are exactly the same when it comes to pubs and catering The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr Philip Hammond): outlets. In my town, there are so many anomalies in Pubs are a vital part of our local communities and the relation to pubs and business rates that such anomalies Government are committed to supporting them, which have become almost normal. The situation needs to be is why I froze all alcohol duties in the 2017 Budget. That looked at as a matter of urgency. Will the Chancellor freeze, and cuts in alcohol taxes since 2013, mean that a investigate the way in which smaller pubs are particularly typical pint of beer is 12p cheaper than it would otherwise disadvantaged by the business rates system? have been. Pubs are also benefiting from recent wider reforms of Mr Hammond: It is true that pubs are assessed in a business rates that will be worth £10 billion by 2023, different way from other retail premises for business including the doubling of rural rate relief to 100%, the rates purposes. Welooked into that recently and concluded switch from retail prices to consumer prices indexing, that the current system was in fact the best system for reforms in small business rates relief that have taken pubs, but I shall be happy to look into it again. 600 small businesses out of rates altogether, and the We all recognise—every single one of us, whichever introduction and then the extension of the £1,000 business part of the country we represent—that high streets are rates discount for pubs. under pressure, primarily because the behaviour of consumers is changing. I think that our challenge is to James Morris: Will the Chancellor join me in support the high street as it undergoes that process of congratulating the Friends of Haden Cross, a pub in my change. We cannot simply turn our backs on a change constituency? Will he,in particular,join me in congratulating that is driven by consumer behaviour, but we must Tim Haskey and Jim Mumford, who rescued the pub support businesses as they make it. when it was on the point of closure, and who, working with new management, have seen a 500% increase in takings Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab): I am sure the Chancellor since November? Does he agree that the Government will agree that there is a need to encourage entrepreneurs should continue to provide good fiscal support for pubs, and small business start-ups, including the setting up of given their importance to our local communities? new pubs. Will he agree to follow the lead of the Welsh 583 Oral Answers 11 SEPTEMBER 2018 Oral Answers 584 Labour Government, who have set up a micro small businesses, fewer jobs and less tax revenue, there would business fund that provides up to £500,000 a year to be less money going into the NHS and the hon. Lady’s enable small businesses to protect and create jobs? A local services. UK-wide scheme could protect a great many small industries, including the pub industry. Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con): There is strong public appetite for increased spending not only Mr Hammond: The hon. Gentleman will know that on the NHS, but on education, defence and a whole we have the start-up loan scheme, which provides support host of other areas, and, if the polls and all the petitions for entrepreneurs starting small businesses, and the are to be believed, there is a strong public appetite to Government will continue to encourage small businesses pay more tax in order to finance those spending increases. to be established and then to grow. Will the Minister bear that in mind in the upcoming Budget? NHS Funding Elizabeth Truss: I am sure my hon. Friend will recognise that we are not going to announce the contents of the 3. Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab): What recent Budget at today’s Treasury questions, but I point out discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for that we are a Government who believe in low taxes: we Health and Social Care on NHS funding. [906780] have reduced taxes on basic rate taxpayers by £1,000. Of course, as well as putting that extra money into the The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Elizabeth Truss): NHS, my job as Chief Secretary is to make sure we get We have regular meetings with the Health Secretary and value for money from every penny we spend, and that is have recently allocated an additional fund of a 3.4% rise why we are developing a 10-year plan. We are improving per year to the national health service, which will equate the use of technology and we are getting better value for to £20 billion by 2023. money from the drugs budget as well. Mohammad Yasin: In Bedfordshire, children with Peter Dowd (Bootle) (Lab): Is the Chief Secretary mental health issues are travelling up to 100 miles to aware in the discussions the Health Secretary may have access services. Their recovery is hugely compromised had on NHS funding whether he mentioned his unilateral by sending them away from their families and friends. plan to ditch the 2013 pensions deal agreed with Will the Chancellor now commit funds to local specialist representative bodies, which was supposed to last for facilities for young people and reinstate the mental 25 years, and which may affect 1 million NHS staff? health beds in Bedford that his Government took away? Elizabeth Truss: What I am aware of is the deal that Elizabeth Truss: We recognise that there is increasing has been done with NHS workers to give them a demand for the NHS, which is precisely why we have 6.5% pay rise in exchange for reform over the next three allocated the additional funding, and the Health Secretary years. We know that on average public sector workers will shortly publish a 10-year plan with mental health as get approximately 10% more in terms of pensions than one strand of it. their private sector counterparts, but we are also making sure that we have the right wages to recruit and retain Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con): Is it people in the NHS. reasonable for me to expect to pass my assets and property to my heirs unencumbered and intact and at Peter Dowd: Clearly,the Chief Secretary to the Treasury the same time to expect the taxpayer to pay for my does not even know what she has put out in her name. social care? The pension changes snuck out on Thursday evening could negatively affect the pensions of a further 4 million Elizabeth Truss: We recognise that social care is an public sector workers—[Interruption.] No, that is not area where reform is needed, and my right hon.