Budget Resolutions
I welcome the opportunity to speak in today’s debate on fresh hope for the future, including for the businesses on our high streets and my constituents who rely on them. Last week’s Budget, delivered by a Labour Chancellor, was the Budget that people in my constituency need. They know that our high streets cannot become hubs for criminal activity while legitimate businesses are priced out and run down. They also know that our high streets cannot remain clusters of vape shops and gambling premises, and cannot continue to withstand these hits without serious ramifications for the future of our communities up and down this country. I am proud that this Labour Government are making the right choices by putting place over profiteering. Too many of the constituents and businesses that I represent feel that day in, day out, their finances are being stretched beyond what is palatable or fair. I understand that, the Prime Minister understands it, and it is clear from this Budget that the Chancellor understands it. My constituency of Heywood and Middleton North has so much potential, and its people are determined to see a sense of pride, vibrancy and purpose return to their neighbourhoods. I want to focus my remarks today on the high streets that have been eroded because of a sustained lack of investment, but that can prosper again and provide much-needed respite for responsible businesses, with power directed to leaders with the means to turn things around. That is what I heard from the Budget last week. The £1 billion package announced by this Chancellor will mean that businesses in Heywood and Middleton North will see their business rates frozen, reduced or cut to zero. The measure will apply to around 600 properties in my borough, and we are also taking more businesses out of paying business rates by increasing small business rate relief thresholds for retail, hospitality and leisure premises. Businesses that enrich our communities are getting the focus they deserve. The choice at the heart of this is how we differentiate between those businesses that strengthen our high streets and those that weaken them. For years now, my constituents have seen vape shops and similar premises pop up en masse and corrode the ties between local people and the high streets they once knew. That is why I fully support this Labour Chancellor in not extending business rate relief to those businesses, but instead throwing our full backing behind those who are building back our towns piece by piece. That measure sits alongside the steps announced by the Government earlier in the year. We are determined to revoke the outdated “aim to permit” rule in the Gambling Act 2005, which restricts councils’ ability to refuse new betting shops, even where there are strong local concerns. Additional planning permission will be required for vape shops to finally give local people and councils a say over where they open and to stop them from opening near schools. That is alongside a doubling of the maximum duration of closure orders for dodgy shops to give investigators more time to gather evidence and secure prosecutions. I have been calling for this for some time, because I have seen the scars that these illicit operations have left on high streets in Heywood and Middleton. It cannot be right that residents are forced to watch authorities scramble as these businesses skirt accountability and reopen weeks later. It is time that we sided with good businesses and made it clear that good practice is the only practice that will be tolerated. There is a moral argument that we must engage with and win. Residents, shoppers and businesses in Heywood and Middleton North are all completely justified in not wanting the continued proliferation of these shops. They want to see civic ties, family ties and social ties restored on our high streets, rather than ample profits for endless vendors that exploit working-class communities, run down public health and chip away at the communities they once knew. That has been made clear not only in the Budget, but in the publication of last week’s cross-Government strategy, “Hope on the High Street”, which includes £210 million to transform derelict buildings into the new anchors of our high streets. In closing, I want to put on record my thanks to the businesses, business leaders and workers who are the pillars holding up the high streets of Heywood and Middleton North. Each week, I visit businesses from Heywood market through to Middleton shopping centre, and they are making an immense difference to the towns I represent. Whether it is Tilly’s Tea Room or Pecado in Heywood, Waffle Co in Middleton, or Honey Café on Boarshaw, these are the businesses that we need to be supporting, and we should demonstrate to them that their contribution to our communities is recognised and valued. I am proud to stand here today and speak on their behalf, and I am proud to stand here as part of a Labour Government who are well and truly on their side.