Contribution
My constituents may recall that I once started a speech in this place with the words “Potholes, potholes, potholes”—I thank the hon. Member for North Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller) for that glance of recognition. No one will be more delighted than the people of Congleton with the Chancellor’s announcement in the Budget that we will double the road maintenance budget over the course of this Parliament. The road safety Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood), is in her place, so I will take this opportunity to ask that she makes sure my constituents get their fair share of that money. As she has heard me say before, my roads are dark, fast, dangerous and poorly maintained, so I look forward to us bringing that money through progressively over time.
The cost of living crisis is another major issue for my constituents. The £150 off energy bills will be extremely welcome for families in my constituency, as will the freeze on prescription charges and the freeze on rail fares—something that has not happened for 30 years. I am proud that we have put up the minimum wage, because work should pay, and families working very hard every day should be able to afford the things they need.
With regard to pensioners, we have maintained the triple lock, and the average pensioner on the full state pension will get another £575 next year. Nationally, three quarters of pensioners will remain eligible for the warm home discount, which is very important.
I understand that removing the two-child benefit cap will be contentious for some people, but it will instantly take 1,310 children out of poverty in our local area. The widening of free school meal eligibility has also given 2,000 extra children a warm meal every day. Of course, we all want to see children thriving in our community. The reality is that we are exceptionally affluent in our constituency. I know that for many people it does not feel like it, but we are one of the top 20 most affluent places in the country.
Nationally, we are spending £2.2 billion on temporary accommodation. There are 174,000 children in temporary accommodation, 80 of whom died in that temporary accommodation last year. We have to spend money on relieving poverty for our poorest children and households, because that is the only way that these shameful figures will change. Our children are becoming shorter compared to their European counterparts, because of malnourishment in our communities. There is a moral case to do this, and in all likelihood there will be savings from this investment as well.
I know that local infrastructure concerns many of my constituents. Some of the figures I will give have been provided before, but they bear repeating. We are spending over £1 billion on rebuilding Leighton hospital. We are spending £60 million on rebuilding Sandbach school. We are spending £740,000 on improvement’s to the Ashfield Medical Centre. We are spending the best part of £1.5 million across three local hospices that serve my community, following lobbying from me and other Labour MPs in the Cheshire East area. I am extremely proud of the things that this Budget and the previous one are delivering for my constituents.
On local high streets, we all value our independent businesses, so I was proud to see the permanent reduction in business rates for small independents, whether they are pubs, restaurants or shops. I was also pleased to see that small and medium-sized enterprises, of which there are many in my constituency, will get the training costs fully reimbursed for their apprenticeships. That is good for local young people and for businesses.
I am also extremely proud of the British industry competitiveness scheme, which will allow businesses in energy intensive industries, such as Diamond Electronics, which I visited in Smallwood, and CLD Systems in Sandbach, to be able to reduce their energy costs and improve their competitiveness in the long term. There is a consultation now open on how we do that, and I encourage local businesses to engage with it.
Lastly, I alongside other colleagues called for a gambling tax, and I was very pleased to see it included in the Budget. I have spoken to constituents who are really struggling with online gambling problems. That industry needs to pay for the problems it is creating. I also very much support the mansion tax—this is the way to a fairer society. The Budget has brought economic stability, fair taxes and high-quality public services, and I truly believe in it.