Category: Articles

Many of the things constituents write about are matters decided b y Wokingham Borough Council. Some people seem to think the MP has power to override the Council or to tell the Councillors what to do. I can assure you we have 54 directly elected independently minded Councillors who make their own minds up, exercising the substantial powers they enjoy. They can settle local planning issues, school appeals, decide how much social care provision to offer, decide on our local roads and car parks, administer housing benefit and much else besides.

As a local MP I am of course interested in what they do, and talk to Councillors and Council officers on a regular basis. I need to know from them if they need decisions,assistance or changes of law from the national government, and they sometimes like to explain to me what they are doing as they know I will often get the feedback on their policies. I am pleased that the Council is intending to press on with Town centre renewal. These are testing times for town centres. More of the retail pound is being spent on the internet. More is being spent in the biggest and best shopping centres. Small town centres like Wokingham have to offer a great mixture of convenience and variety to compete. The Town Centre that does not modernise and develop is in danger of dying, as we see elsewhere in the country.

I read of the questions being asked by Lib Dem Councillors about the cost and the level of borrowing the redevelopment may entail for Wokingham taxpayers. The Council Opposition is right to ask questions about affordability, but would be wrong to want to stand in the way of progress and change. My advice to the Council is to press on with Town Centre improvement, but to do so in phases. It is important to fully let each new phase before moving on to the next. The Council may be best advised to sell a completed development, as with the food store on Elms Field, to cut the borrowing and raise more capital from sale before moving in to the next phase. What better than to pay for the next phase with the money from the last one which has been successfully sold at a profit? If holding a completed phase, it will be important to ensure there is a sustainable rent roll from the extra development which will more than pay the interest on the extra debt incurred.

These are good times to be borrowing for major projects. It is possible to borrow for a longish time period for a relatively modest interest rate. When constructing property, a long term investment, the borrowing should be spread over a decent period of years. One way or another it is possible for the Council to improve our Town Centre without undermining the finances. They are right to want to do so, in these troubled times for shopping centres.

Mansion taxes are much in the news. Both Labour and the Liberal Democrats in Parliament have chosen £2m as the witching level which turns a home into a mansion. Fortunately most homes in my constituency are below that valuation. If the aim is a wider asset tax you will have to be careful if you have a decent home and a reasonable pension, as you could soon be over the ceiling of the Wealth Tax. If it is anything like the Coalition’s approach to pension saving, the level of £2m would soon be cut anyway, were such a tax ever to be introduced.

There is an underlying unfairness about a “Mansion Tax”. If you own a 1000 square foot 2 bedroom flat in Central London it might well be worth £2m. Conversely, if you had £2m to spend in parts of the north and west of our country you could be buying an enormous mansion with many rooms in its own grounds. One person paying the Mansion Tax may have a low income, with the tax taking up all or most of their pension or pay, whilst another in Mansion tax territory might be on a mega salary and so quite able to pay a 1% Wealth tax. You could be tripped into paying the tax by a sudden burst of house price inflation. If you have just the one home and want to stay living there, the house price inflation does not make you any better off. Instead the tax comes along to make you much worse off.

The UK’s problem is not that we tax too little, but that we produce too little. The UK has got poorer since 2007. Higher taxes and the threat of even higher taxes does not help get us out of the hole we are in, but makes it worse. The Coalition is right to take more people out of Income Tax altogether, but is dragging too many people into 40% tax. It is right to cut Corporation Tax to tempt more businesses to set up and stay here, but wrong to favour dear energy which makes it less easy for manufacturers to flourish. It also hits people’s living standards.

I am asking the Chancellor to avoid all suggestion of a Mansion tax in the budget. He needs to do more to lower the cost of living, and to make it more worthwhile for people to work at all levels of income. I will put in my proposals soon to the Treasury.

The Coalition government came together to sort out the poor state of the nation’s finances. On leaving office Labour legislated to halve the extra borrowings in the years ahead, without making clear how they would do this and without saying which budgets would be cut. The incoming government said they would get rid of the structural deficit, the main bulk of the extra borrowing each year, over the lifetime of this Parliament. They intended to do it mainly by curbing public spending.

So how are they doing? The government tells us it has got the deficit down by a quarter so far. That means that instead of borrowing £155 billion more, as Labour did in their last year, this government got that down to borrowing an extra £120 billion last year. This year the government has found it harder to keep the pressure on. The latest figures show the government borrowing more this year than last. In the first nine months the government borrowed £106 billion, £7 billion more than the same period last year.

The government has had to abandon its plans to get rid of the deficit this Parliament. Why has this happened?

There are two main reasons. The first is spending. The Coalition, far from cutting current public spending, decided to put it up. They have delivered this promise. We have seen bigger rises in pensions and benefits, more generous payments to developing countries, a large rise in our EU contributions, further rises in money spent on schools and hospitals. Spending went up by £29 billion in the first year, £18 billion the second year, and a planned £17 billion this year.

The second is tax revenue. The Coalition inherited the planned rise in top rate income tax to 50% from the 40% Labour always thought appropriate when in office. This led to a sharp fall in receipts from rich people, as they left the country or rearranged their tax affairs, or simply earned less. The rise in Capital Gains Tax rates did not help, and company profits tax has also been weak. Only the increase in VAT worked and brought in more money to help pay for the public services.

So what should they do next? We need above all a stronger recovery in our economy. That takes more action to mend banks and to make it more worthwhile working.

It was a wet end to 2012. I was worried to receive a call from the Environment Agency at lunch time on Boxing Day about flood warnings, but relieved to be told that they thought the most threatened locations would get by without flooding of homes or electricity installations. I am following up with various responsible bodies, as we do need to do more to maintain ditches, drains and water courses to get water away from areas of settlement. We also need to build in more resilience in low lying areas as changes are made to the landscape. I am grateful to those who went out to man pumps and improve ditches to keep installations safe.

I was pleased to learn before Christmas that following the meeting the Council and I held in Whitehall, the Minister for Housing has made available the £500,000 extra that Wokingham Borough requested to help them get the detailed plans right for development in the District, and to offer the £2m the Council say they would need to put an additional bridge over the railway line as part of the plans. I am pursuing the new Planning Minister over the issue of appeals, as Wokingham does not wish to lose on appeal over important development sites, now it has done so much to set out where development can take place in the Borough. The government’s side of the bargain should be to help the Council protect our greenfields where they have identified them in the Local Plan.

I have been working on advice and suggestions for the Prime Minister’s important big speech on the EU later this month. The mood of the country is very clearly wanting the UK to have more control over its own decisions and spending patterns. As the Euro area evolves into a much more centralised administration, with something approaching a United States of Euroland government, it is all the more important that the UK has a different relationship with this body. We cannot possible join it, and have no wish to abolish the pound. We want to be able to trade with them, and work together where both sides think it makes sense. We have no wish to be governed by them. Many of us think the EU has far too much power over our benefits system, our criminal justice policy, our energy and environmental policy and much else besides. We have never been happy with the high price food of the CAP, nor with the open access to our fishing grounds with the overfishing that has resulted. We want a different relationship, and want the opportunity for a vote on the whole question of our EU membership.

The government is highlighting the need for welfare reform. I am all in favour of paying decent benefits to those in need. The issue is how many people should be eligible? I am not in favour of the current system where nationals from other EU countries can come to the UK and rapidly qualify for a whole raft of benefits, which nationals from outside the EU do not receive. The government is right to be looking at ways of helping and encouraging more unemployed people resident here into jobs. The best type of welfare reform is to reduce the numbers who need through the success of policies to promote growth and more jobs which they can take.

I wish you all a happy and prosperous 2013.

There was some good news in the Autumn Statement, which turned out to be kind of mini budget. The tax threshold for Income Tax has been raised again, this time to £9440, helping income taxpayers with lower bills. Both Coalition parties are keen on this tax cut.

The planned increase in fuel duty by another 3p has been cancelled. Whilst this does not make us any better off, it does remove a nasty threat to family budgets for the New Year. Petrol and diesel is quite dear enough, with another hike in taxes. Tax already accounts for more than 60% of the pump price, so motorists are making a big contribution to paying for the public sector.

The Chancellor also decided to cut Corporation Tax on company profits to 21% in 2014. I think this will raise more money from companies, not less. As we have seen in the last few days, large companies are able to switch revenue and profits around the world to places where the tax rates are lower, and get away with it under the different legal and accounting rules. Many people are angry that some large companies do not pay enough tax on their activities in the UK. There are limits to what a single medium sized country can do about this, as our tax gain would be another country’s tax loss. Setting lower rates makes it likely companies will invest more here, do more business here, and book more of their revenues and profits here. Taxpayers should benefit from the move. Of course the beefed up Inland Revenue will also check up that all companies are obeying the tax laws.

The independent Office of Budget Responsibility sets out the official forecasts. They think the economy will grow next year, and pick up speed in the following three years. They also think our real incomes will start to rise again, with better increases in wages and salaries as the recovery gets underway. Let’s hope they are right. My worry is they have been far too optimistic before. To make sure we are going to enjoy rising living standards, more jobs and better wages, I think the government needs to take more action.

I am still pressing for tougher action to sort out RBS/Nat West and Lloyds/HBOS, the banks with state shareholdings. We require stronger banks able to lend more to the next generation of homebuyers and small businesses that we need to propel us forward. I also think we need lower tax rates in some cases, to boost growth and boost revenues. I am all too conscious that many of my constituents are in the 40% tax band, where income tax has been tougher than lower down the income scale, and where changes to Child Benefit above £60,000 are not helpful either.

There are still plenty of ways of doing more for less in parts of the public sector. The government needs to press on with controlling inward migration, to keep down the costs of additional public sector services for a rapidly growing population. It also needs to weed out the parts of the Overseas Aid and EU budgets that do not give us value for the larger sums we are spending.

DAILY MAIL (London)

November 28, 2012 Wednesday

THEIR MESSAGE TO DAVID CAMERON

With the publication of the Leveson Report on Thursday it is clear that the central issue will be whether the Press should, for the first time, be subjected to statutory regulation or have the opportunity to put in place a new system of binding self-regulation.

As Parliamentarians, we believe in free speech and are opposed to the imposition of any form of statutory control even if it is dressed up as underpinning. It is redress that is vital not broader regulation. The prospect of drafting legislation may have the dual benefit of exposing the dangers of the statutory regulation and at the same time focus the minds of those seeking to further strengthen the existing tough independent proposals.

No form of statutory regulation of the Press would be possible without the imposition of state licensing – abolished in Britain in 1695. State licensing is inimical to any idea of Press freedom and would radically alter the balance of our unwritten constitution.

There are also serious concerns that statutory regulation of the print media may shift the balance to the digital platforms which, as recent events have shown through the fiasco of the Newsnight broadcast prompted by Twitter, would further undermine the position of properly moderated and edited print journalism.

The Press abuse chronicled at Leveson was almost wholly about actions which were against the law. It demonstrated not a sole failure of regulation but rather of law enforcement.

However the status quo is not an option. We cannot countenance newspapers behaving as some have in the past. The solution is not new laws but a profound restructuring of the self-regulatory system. Lords Hunt and Black have come forward with a detailed proposal for a much improved, genuinely independent regulator with the power to intervene proactively, to levy substantial fines, and to enforce membership for the first time through a system of civil contracts. They need to deliver on this promised reform.

We agree with the report of the Joint Parliamentary Committee which came out against any form of statutory regulation – not least because of the signal it would send to emerging democracies around the world.

Public debate will necessarily follow publication of the Leveson report and will be needed to provide confidence in a rigorous tough new system of self-regulation. Such a debate will lead to a speedy way of establishing a new self-regulatory regime that can restore confidence in the Press.

SIGNED BY: David Blunkett, Conor Burns, Stuart Andrew, Steve Baker, Lord Bell, Bob Blackman, Nick de Bois, Baroness Boothroyd, Peter Bottomley, Peter Bone, Graham Brady, Angie Bray, Julian Brazier, Andrew Bridgen, Alun Cairns, Baroness Chalker, Bill Cash, Douglas Carswell, Lord Cavendish, Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, Lord Coe, Therese Coffey, Damian Collins, Earl of Courtown, Tracey Crouch, David Davis, Glyn Davies, Philip Davies, Lord Dobbs, Brian Donohoe, Stephen Dorrell, Lord Eden, Lord Fellowes, Liam Fox, Frank Field, Lord Flight, Lord Forsyth, Mike Freer, Lord Glentoran, James Gray, Robert Halfon, John Hemming, Gordon Henderson, Kate Hoey, George Hollingbery, Lord Howell of Guildford, Margot James, Eleanor Laing, Pauline Latham, Phillip Lee, Julian Lewis, Peter Lilley, Karen Lumley, Jason McCartney, Karl McCartney, Stephen McPartland, Baroness Morris, David Morris, Stephen Mosley, Baroness Neville-Jones, Brooks Newmark, Lord Norton, Mark Pawsey, Christopher Pincher, Mark Reckless, John Redwood, Lord Renton, Lord Risby, Baroness Shephard, Lord Skelmersdale, Graham Stringer, Julian Smith, Gisela Stuart, Graham Stuart, Lord Swinfen, Lord Tebbit, Justin Tomlinson, Lord Trimble, Lord True, Andrew Turner, Martin Vickers, Lord Wakeham, Heather Wheeler, John Whittingdale, Sarah Wollaston, Tim Yeo.

© Daily Mail

All the talk in Westminster is of “shovel ready” building work. The government is keen to give the economy a push by allowing or initiating new projects. They want better roads, more power stations, faster broadband, improved railways, new free schools and new homes. They are trying everything to see how they can stimulate this activity.

Locally we see people pressing on with the large project at Reading station. It is now taking shape. We have had a new fire station headquarters for Wokingham, a new free school at Ryeish Green and can look forward to the start of the Wokingham Town Centre facelift and expansion. We may even get the often promised new railway station. Faster broadband is edging its way round our homes and district. Ministers are keen to see us do more and build more, and have had conversations with the Council about the next phase of their plans.

The government has announced a massive £80 billion of money to help the banks, so they can lend it on to companies and institutions who need it for these kinds of projects. They are hoping to tap into longer term investment by pension funds. Recently we put through a piece of legislation authorising the government to spend up to £50 billion, another huge sum, on ways of helping finance major new infrastructure schemes.

So why isn’t more happening nationally? The UK still finds it takes a long time to decide what to do and how to do it. Give us a task like building an Olympic Park to a deadline, and we surprised ourselves. The industry did it magnificently. Give us the problem of how much runway capacity to put into London and the South-east, and we spend years arguing over how much we need and where it should be put. Ask us how to keep the lights on, and we find Lib Dems and Conservatives in disagreement about how much power people should be allowed and how cheap it should be, with the Lib Dem Secretary of State favouring dearer energy. We also find the EU telling us to go for dearer power, at exactly the same time as the USA and the developing world pushes for cheaper power. As a result we are losing industrial jobs from the UK, with Tata Steel announcing more job losses and explaining that energy costs are the main reason they are going to put the jobs elsewhere.

The banks are still not financing a stronger recovery. Small and medium sized enterprises are finding it difficult to raise the money they need to grow, or fear there will not be sufficient demand. Larger companies often have plenty of cash and good profits, but they are afraid they need to put much more of their cash into their pension funds, thanks to the ultra low interest rates created by the government. These same interest rates, planned to help us grow, are doing plenty of damage to the pension funds who need better returns and suffer from low rates in the way they work out the pension deficits.

I have set out my views again on how we might move to faster growth, and will lobby the Chancellor ahead of his Autumn statement and next year’s budget. There is much more to do.

It’s been a busy two weeks in Parliament. The Commons sent a clear message to the government that we would like reductions in the EU budget. It would be quite wrong at a time when the government is talking about cuts at home to let the EU budget grow. Domestic spending contains many more important items than the EU budget does. We agree with Ministers that no real increase in the budget is acceptable. I was surprised Ministers did not accept the amendment to cut the EU budget moved by Mr Reckless, a Conservative MP, as they spoke about how much they agreed with its sentiments. The government is naturally apprehensive that it will be difficult to negotiate what we want, as many other EU members like a larger budget because they get more money out of it than they put it. Parliament thought it should make clear to our EU partners how this country feels about it, as we pay in a lot more than we take out.

I am pleased the government has adopted new words on its approach to the EU. Ministers have accepted the advice of those of us who have been saying for sometime that the UK needs a new relationship with the EU. The countries in the Euro want to press on to a full political, fiscal and monetary union which we cannot join and do not wish to join. As they do so we need a new relationship with them. We want to trade with them, be friends with them, have sensible arrangements over matters of common interest. The next few months will see more work by the government and more ideas floated by MPs on what this new relationship might look like and how we might negotiate it with the EU partners. I am trying to firm this up and help the government form its new policy.

At the same time the government needs to develop the work it is doing with business to improve trade and other links with the large emerging market economies of the world. Our future lies with more trade with India, China, Brazil and a host of other Asian, latin American and African countries. The stresses and strains created by the Euro are going to mean recession or slow growth for the foreseeable future on the continent, damaging our prospects if we rely on the EU rather than the rest of the world for our growth.

This week sees the important Police Commissioner elections. I know some of you are sceptical about these new posts and others feel poorly informed. The new Commissioner we elect on Thursday will have the power to set the budgets, establish the priorities for our local police service and handle complaints. It is a very important job. Now is your chance to express your views on what you think our police service should do and how it should spend the money. The Commissioner will not, of course, interfere in day to day policing and will not be intervening in individual cases. Our police service has to maintain fine traditions of independence and impartiality when it comes to enforcing the law Parliament has laid down. The Commissioner replaces the Police Committee of Councillors which currently does this job.

If you want more police on the beat, a faster response to crimes of violence and anti social behaviour, or other priorities as people often tell me, now is your chance. Your new Police Commissioner when elected will be able to do this for us. I think that means it is worth reading the leaflets and websites about the candidates and placing your vote in the box.

It was good news that the UK economy bounced back last quarter. Over the last two years many new jobs have been created. Unemployment here in Wokingham has remained mercifully very low. Conditions remain difficult, however, for families and businesses. I will continue to recommend the government to take more measures to promote growth, and help business. Finding enough orders and getting sufficient bank credit can still be a problem.

This week Parliament has a chance to debate how much money the European Union should spend over the period 2014-2020. This is a sore subject for many of us. We did not like the way the UK’s rebate, the reduction Margaret Thatcher got on our bills, was partially given away by the last government. We liked even less the failure of the EU to reform the high spending on agriculture, which was their promise in return for the surrender of more of our money.

The EU has rightly been lecturing its member states to do a better job controlling their borrowing. It has issued instructions to some of the Euroland states to cut their public spending, as the EU thinks they are spending far too much. It is far from helpful that at the same time the EU comes up with future budget proposals that mean a lot more EU spending. That all has to be paid for by the member states. The more the EU spends, the bigger their deficits will be, and the more they have to borrow to pay for it.

I am urging the UK government to object strongly to increased budgets for the EU at a time of financial strain in most EU countries. The spending the EU undertakes on regional aid, more regulation and agricultural subsidy is not as important as the money we spend at home on benefits for those in need, and on paying for our schools, hospitals and other crucial local services. Surely where we are looking for savings EU programmes would come high up the list for less, whilst these important domestic services would be high up the list for protection?

Several of you have written to me about the proposed badger cull in trial areas, which has now been postponed for a year. I have held meetings with Ministers to stress that many would prefer a solution based on vaccination rather than culling. There remain difficulties with this approach according to Ministers which I have set out on www.johnredwood.com. I am also receiving copies of a campaign email about forests which some of you are sending to Owen Paterson. He is the right man to send it all too. He and his staff will soon have to conclude on how to proceed following a report into the future of our forests, and in the light of your representations.