Teignbridge’s council tax support scheme, in which those in greatest hardship pay nothing, is set to continue next year.
The district council is one of only 20 per cent of local authorities in the country to offer eligible residents a full discount on their bill, and the only one in Devon.
Councillor Richard Keeling (Lib Dem, Chudleigh), member for corporate resources, this week told a meeting of the council’s ruling executive that it was “not the time to consider cutting support or making other changes to the scheme.”
“Our residents need some stability, and certainly as we emerge from the covid crisis we need the time and a more sustainable baseline to carry out a review of our scheme’s performance, before determining whether we need to make any changes for the future.”
In approving the policy, which will need to be ratified by full council, the executive also agreed to adjust the thresholds to ensure those on the lowest levels of benefits don’t lose out because of an upcoming rise in welfare payments.
A council report explaining the policy stated there were 5,716 working age council tax reduction claimants in December, a slight drop from a peak of almost 6,000 last April.
The cost of the scheme – around £10 million per year – is shared between Teignbridge and the three other major recipients of the council tax: Devon County Council, police and the fire service. Teignbridge contributes just under nine per cent.
It was changed in 2020, introducing an income-based scheme, with overall household income and size used to determine how much discount they are eligible for.
Cllr Keeling said it is “easier for our customers to understand, quicker for our council tax team to administer and better able to cope with minor fluctuations in universal credit entitlement.”
Council leader Alan Connett (Lib Dem, Starcross & Kenton) said he hadn’t realised Teignbridge were “unique in Devon” in still offering the full discount to some households.
He added: “Looking ahead, with the bills that are going to come into people with power, utilities and all rest of it, [the scheme] is going to be a real help.”
When asked how it is promoted to people, an officer said there was more information online and those who phone up the council struggling to pay their bill are also made aware of the help on offer.
In total, directors were paid £1,869,000 during the 18 months to the end of October 2020, with £53,000 paid in pension contributions. Steve Hindley, Midas Chairman, is also Chairman of The Great South West, the “powerhouse” brand which promotes the local enterprise partnership (LEP) areas of Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly, Heart of the South West and Dorset. In 2019, he stepped down as chair of the Heart of the South West LEP, after holding the position since November 2013.
A boss at collapsed South West construction giant Midas Group Plc was paid more than half a million pounds while the company was making huge losses, it has emerged.
Accounts for the stricken firm, which is now in administration with the loss of 303 jobs, show the highest-paid director trousered £504,000 in the 18 months to the end of October 2020.
This sum does not include pension contributions so it is likely the director benefited further.
The payment was made in the same 18 months when the company made an after-tax loss of more than £2m.
The highest paid director also pocketed £443,000 in 2019, the group’s annual report and financial statements reveal.
In total, directors were paid £1,869,000 during the 18 months to the end of October 2020, with £53,000 paid in pension contributions.
At the time the directors were chairman Steve Hindley, chief executive Alan Hope, Mike Hocking, and chief commercial officer Scott Poulter, plus finance director Duncan Rogerson, who resigned in July 2019 and was replaced by Michael Ready.
Mr Ready left the company in March 2021 to move to Australia and was replaced by Peter Skoulding.)
Mr Poulter left the company on December 21, 2021, the same day another former finance director, Mr Hocking, also left.
Mr Hocking had been a key figure at Midas since 1998 when he and Mr Hindley, now aged 72, purchased the company in a management buy-in.
Mr Hindley, who led that buy-in, was chairman of the Midas Group up until its administration and is among the most high-profile business figures in the South West.
He is a chartered civil engineer, a fellow of both the Institution of Civil Engineers and the Chartered Institute of Building and a member of RICS.
He was awarded the CBE in the 2006 New Years Honours List for services to the construction industry and appointed Deputy Lieutenant of Devon in 2009.
Mr Hindley graduated from Salford University in 1971, but also received an honorary doctorate of engineering from the University of Exeter in 2011 and an honorary doctorate in business from the University of Plymouth in 2015.
He is the chairman of The Great South West, the “powerhouse” brand which promotes the local enterprise partnership (LEP) areas of Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly, Heart of the South West and Dorset.
The organisation, led by an alliance of business leaders, LEPs, universities, colleges and local government, aims to deliver £45bn of economic benefit and become the leading region for the green and blue economy.
Mr Hindley, who has blamed the Covid pandemic for Midas’ collapse, is also a member of and former chairman of the CBI Construction Council and the SW Regional Council.
In 2019, he stepped down as chair of the Heart of the South West LEP, after holding the position since November 2013.
Mr Hindley, an aficionado of classic cars, has served as a trustee and chairman for the Devon Community Foundation, a trustee of Children’s Hospice South West and was formally on the board of governors at the City of Bristol College.
Midas Group’s chief executive Alan Hope was credited on the firm’s website, before it was shut down by administrators, as having “led Midas’ growth to a £250m-plus pa revenue business” since joining in 2004.
The company said he had driven the group’s restructuring into five “customer facing companies” – Midas Construction Ltd, Midas Retail Ltd, Mi-Space (UK) Ltd, Mi-Space Property Services Ltd, Midas Commercial Developments Ltd, all now in administration – overseen a brand refresh, and launched the new company vision “Leaders in Customer Service and Performance.”
Peter Skoulding, chief finance officer at the time of the firm’s administration, is chartered accountant and was described on the Midas website as having “a track record of sustained strategic, commercial and technical success across diverse sectors”.
Mr Skoulding spent 15 years at Mitie from 2003, holding a variety of finance positions. He left as director of finance planning in early 2018 and held a range of senior finance roles at the publicly listed Smiths News before joining Midas.
No. Dorries has stood by Johnson through all of that.
What’s more, Dorries said she would support Johnson even if police found he had been “criminally negligent”.
But what she would not stand for is kicking a dog. That would be a step too far. That would be enough to see even Dorries hang up her ministerial boots.
At least that’s what the Culture Secretary told CNN.
Should that actually come to pass, it seems more likely Dorries would deny there ever was a dog.
Look at her track record. In that same CNN interview Dorries was confronted with the Sue Gray update (the full report is still due).
The host highlighted how Gray had “condemned a failure of leadership in Boris Johnson’s government”.
Dorries replied: “No, she didn’t. She didn’t express a failure of leadership in Boris Johnson’s government at all.”
Mmmmm.
To quote the Sue Gray report: “There were failures of leadership and judgment by different parts of No 10 and the Cabinet Office.”
Which way is up? Dorries will have to check with the Prime Minister before answering that.
“Midas was Teignbridge District Council’s main contractor and also had contracts to build nine affordable homes in Paignton and improve a school in Torquay.”
Business leaders in Devon have been reacting to the news that one of the UK’s biggest privately owned construction companies has gone out of business – affecting a number of public sector projects in the county.
Midas Group Limited has offices across south west England and Wales including in Exeter in Newton Abbot.
A contract with Torbay Council to build an £11 million Premier Inn is now threatened but the council said it will work with stakeholders to make sure it is delivered.
Over 300 people are expected to lose their jobs with the closure of Midas Construction, although its housing division Mi-Space has been acquired by commercial decorating firm Bell Group, saving 46 jobs.
Midas had a turnover of almost £300 million last year, with many smaller firms around Devon being subcontractors and suppliers for the group.
CEO of Devon and Plymouth Chamber of Commerce Stuart Elford said it is very sad news.
“The Midas group, Midas construction and Mi-Space, are large companies that have been around in this region for a long time and been a staple part of the economy,” he said.
“It’s very sad also that over 300 redundancies have been announced, although the positive news for those poor people who’ve been made redundant is that the jobs market is incredibly buoyant and there are massive shortages in the construction industry.
“So I’m confident that with the support of the local authorities and chambers of commerce, they will find other employment.”
But Mr Elford explained that many small companies in Devon would also be hit by the closure.
He said: “One of the major concerns will be about the supply chain because this will have a knock on effect, especially to small businesses that were supplying products or contracts into Midas.
“And so the knock on effects of this could go on for some time.”
The company recently posted a loss of over £2 million for its last financial year, blaming its troubles on the pandemic, ongoing shortages of materials and labour, and a significant rise in costs because of inflation.
Mr Elford said there were many factors which led to the company’s collapse.
“It’s not really a shock in some ways that Midas is going under in that we’ve seen huge price rises.
“The effect of Brexit and the pandemic have caused the price of raw materials, of construction materials, to go through the roof. And so where large contracts may have been taken on on a fixed price basis, they just couldn’t be delivered for the sort of price that may have been quoted.
“I’m not saying that’s definitely what’s happened here, but you can see how supply chain difficulties, costs of materials for buildings and labour shortages – increased prices across the range – will, of course, have a dramatic effect, and sadly, I suspect it won’t be the last we’ll see.
Mr Elford explained that large sections of the construction industry have reported significant increases in costs.
“And this is a sector, a business, that has been struggling with the effects of the pandemic; unable to operate fully, staff shortages, shortage of raw materials and so forth, exacerbated by the Brexit situation where again, more staff who were perhaps EU citizens have returned home and raw materials have been difficult to get hold of,” he said.
“So sadly, this has been a bit of a perfect storm.
“Businesses that have borrowed to survive the pandemic are now having to pay that borrowing back. And if there are cash flow shortages, that will mean they don’t have the reserves to survive.
“So I unfortunately think we will see further firms going under.”
However, Mr Elford said that workers who had lost their jobs because of the closure of Midas should not lose hope.
“You know, I really feel for those people who’ve been made redundant and they must be concerned, of course.
“But my message to them is there are loads and loads of companies recruiting, who’re doing well, who are desperate for good talent.
“So don’t lose heart. You will be employed because business is desperate for good people.”
Earlier this month the Liberal Democrat leaders of Torbay, Teignbridge and North Devon Councils wrote to Michael Gove, asking for help.
Midas was Teignbridge District Council’s main contractor and also had contracts to build nine affordable homes in Paignton and improve a school in Torquay.
Whether Boris Johnson, Rishi Sunak, Keir Starmer or someone else is at the helm, the government is going to face some unenviable and unpalatable choices. Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, has told The Independent the country must choose between higher taxes for the next 20 years or cutting back the welfare state because it faces a spending black hole of £60bn each year.
He said an ageing population would force politicians to choose between the approach of other western European countries – increasing taxes by another 2-3 per cent of national income – or paring back basic education, health and social care services.
A rise in national insurance contributions, together with increasing energy and council tax bills, will provide a “triple whammy” for many already hard-pressed households in April. The word “crisis” is overused by politicians and the media, but on this occasion it is no exaggeration: the cost-of-living crisis looks set to become the dominant political issue of this year.
Almost two in three workers expect their pay to rise by less than the cost of living this year, according to a Britain Thinks poll for the TUC published today. Three in 10 do not believe their wages will increase at all and only one in 10 expects a rise that will exceed living costs.
As if the government did not have enough on its plate, the British Chambers of Commerce is warning the Treasury of a “cost of doing business crisis”. Its survey of more than 1,000 businesses found that 73 per cent say they are raising prices in response to increasing costs, which the organisation warned would fuel the cost-of-living crisis for households.
These short-term pressures will require a more proactive and generous response than the government has managed to date; spreading the rise in gas and electricity prices over five years will bring only small comfort, and bills could rise again in the autumn.
In the medium term, the pressures on households and business from higher taxes are likely to grow. The IFS’ warning is underlined by a study today by the Resolution Foundation think tank which suggests demographic pressures will add £24bn to state pension spending, and rising health costs a further £52bn to the health budget by 2030. The transition to net zero could cost another £12bn. Overall, the size of the state could rise from 42 per cent to 44 per cent by the end of this decade.
Such gloomy but realistic predictions should act as a reality check when Mr Johnson dangles the prospect of tax cuts before the next general election in front of Tory MPs as part of his struggle to hang on to his job. And when Mr Sunak plays along, knowing he might soon be contesting a Tory leadership election in which he would parade his credentials as a fiscal conservative and instinctive tax-cutter despite his recent actions. Whatever the state of the public finances, the Tories seem to have foolishly locked themselves into pre-election income tax cuts in an attempt to wrong-foot Labour.
The political debate on tax is dishonest. National insurance has shouldered the burden of tax rises since 2000 and has more than doubled as a share of GDP since the Second World War. At the same time, Tory and Labour governments have announced headline-grabbing cuts in income tax, knowing that voters are more willing to support higher national insurance for health and social care because of its original contributory principle.
Given the inevitable demands on vital public services in future, it would be fairer to raise income tax for higher earners than to increase the burden of national insurance, which starts to bite when workers earn £9,568 a year.
Alternatively, politicians should be ready to raise more from taxes on wealth, which has grown from three to almost eight times the value of national income in the past 40 years. Labour has dipped a toe in this water but is wary of Tory attacks on a single “wealth tax”. However, if the UK is to have the public services it needs and to avoid deeply damaging, regressive cuts to the welfare state, it is a route down which politicians of all hues will probably need to go sooner or later.
The new photograph shows the prime minister with three members of staff around a table with what appears to be an open bottle of champagne and crisps. One staff member has a garland of tinsel round his neck, while another is sporting a red and white Santa hat. Source www.independent.co.uk .
Downing Street previously said the quiz, held on 15 December 2020, took place virtually but with some members of staff taking part in the office.
It took place during a period when indoor social mixing was banned in London, which was under tier two Covid restrictions.
Official guidance also stated: “You must not have a work Christmas lunch or party, where that is a primarily social activity and is not otherwise permitted by the rules in your tier.”
“He’s on a virtual call, no alcohol, thanking his staff for 10 minutes before he goes back to work, is that really a terrible crime?” the minister asked in a TV interview last December.
And the prime minister himself said at the time: “I can tell you once again that I certainly broke no rules.” [Owl’s emphasis]
“Back to Blighty where Boris Johnson, money launderer to the Tsars, clings to his position as Rishi Sunak’s house-sitter.”
How the other side of the world sees Boris Johnson, his government and ultimately us. – Owl
See Tweet here. [Full text reproduced below for clarity.]
Text reads:
Letter from London
from Our Own Correspondent
Back to Blighty where Boris Johnson, money launderer to the Tsars, clings to his position as Rishi Sunak’s house-sitter.
The natives are as oblivious to the never-ending decline of this erstwhile superpower as they were when they first watched Zulu. But since Partygate, it has begun to dawn that electing a rococo gigolo to guide them through a pandemic, imminent world war, economic crisis and environmental systems collapse, was not the smart move the metric-averse once thought it to be.
Some of Johnson’s henchmen are buckling too. When 8-bit shaman Dominic Cummings invoked the sacrament of moral conscience, several MPs who hitherto had been labouring to disenfranchise refugees, disability claimants and the working poor, suddenly felt unable to follow a nonce-bantering PM and began the brutal defenestration rite of licking Basildon Bond envelopes and giving them to Graham Brady.
Only the hardcore remain: those for whom employment in another Cabinet would be inconceivable, the likes of Nadine, Grant/Michael, and Jacob, counsellors to a man who has never known friendship, a gang of acolytes so sycophantic as to make Mugabe blush. These bunker girls and boys speak only in platitudes, severing words from meanings and reciting cliched phrases in the hope that nobody will notice how stupid they are. In such a climate ‘vaccine rollout’ becomes ‘your living costs are going through the roof’, ‘levelling up’ means ‘we partied while you watched your mum die on Zoom’ and ‘sorry’ translates as ‘fuck you’. The great classicist needs them. But they may prove to be his Achilles elbow.
Downing Street, where near-hourly resignations are spun as decisive leadership, is giving off strong Downfall energy. It seems increasingly likely that unless they can lure him out with a crate of Estrella, Boris Munchhausen will be supergluing himself to the Lulu Lytle wallpaper before anyone is found with the special skills needed to convince him to go quietly. That’s OK though. Rishi can afford to redecorate.
Downing Street bought a fridge for a meeting room with taxpayers’ money around the time No 10 was hosting “wine time Fridays” and other parties, The Independent can reveal.
Boris Johnson was urged to “come clean” about how much public money had been spent on the lockdown bashes – a fact which is yet to have been established about the rule-breaking gatherings.
No 10 insisted that the publicly-funded fridge was not involved in the festivities but shadow attorney general Emily Thornberry told The Independent that the government had questions to answer about any potential “misuse of public funds”.
The Daily Mirror reported last month that a wine fridge had been “smuggled” into No 10 through the backdoor to hold bottles for the regular gatherings – prompting anger at a time when indoor socialising was supposed to be banned.
The regular “wine times” sit alongside the 16 events investigated by top civil servant by Sue Gray, which all took place during May 2020 and April 2021.
The government confirmed that the taxpayer-funded fridge had been purchased at some point between April 2020 and April 2021, though did not specify on which date. The fridge apparently expanded the chilled drinks holding capacity in a meeting room in No 10.
Labour’s Ms Thornberry said: “We all know that Covid rules were repeatedly broken in Downing Street during lockdown, but we don’t yet know what taxpayers’ money was spent in the process.
“Rather than have the answer to that question dragged out of them one pizza delivery or wine fridge at a time, I would urge Cabinet Office ministers simply to disclose any misuse of public funds they have discovered related to the Downing Street parties, and tell us what action has been taken as a result.”
The government was last month asked by Ms Thornberry to disclose how much public money was spent on refrigerators for No 10 – but dragged its feet on responding.
In its eventual response, Paymaster General Michael Ellis said in a written answer that two fridges had been purchased during the period, one to replace and existing fridge and one apparently to expand the capacity to store drinks in a meeting room.
“Downing Street is a working building, including catering facilities and offices for staff; as is common in workplaces including the House of Commons, refrigerators are provided for general staff use,” he said.
“One refrigerator was purchased in the financial year for a Downing Street meeting room, and one to replace an existing refrigerator that had reached the end of its working operation.
“Notwithstanding, I can confirm that no such public expenditure was accrued in relation to the matters considered in the investigations by the Second Permanent Secretary or connected with associated media reports on this matter.”
Sue Gray’s report found that “failures of leadership and judgement” and excessive drinking at work against the backdrop of the pandemic led to events that “should not have been allowed to take place”. She said that other events “should not have been allowed to develop as they did”.
The prime minister faced calls to resign following the report, including from within his own party. No 10 is now subject to an investigation by the Metropolitan Police, which could levy fines under Covid-19 regulations.
Police reportedly have a photograph of Boris Johnson holding a can of beer at one event, a lockdown birthday party allegedly instigate by his wife Carrie in June 2020. The picture is thought to be one of 300 submitted the Met by Ms Gray’s inquiry – which was asked not to publish details of the events so that it did not prejudice the ongoing police investigation.
But full details of the parties may never be released because the prime minister will ultimately control whether evidence submitted by the second permanent secretary ever sees the light of day.
The acquisition grows Bell’s already strong presence in the South West and Wales and protects an estimated 110 direct and indirect jobs.
Bell is a market leader in the sector and already has offices across the South West in Plymouth, Taunton, Bristol, and South Wales, with plans to open up a new office in Exeter in 2022.
The deal to purchase the Mi-space business and certain of its assets out of administration secures economic activity valued at up to £20m annually to the local economy, significant supply chain links and indirect employment.
Mi-space has worked for many years in communities across the South West and Wales on a wide range of property improvement, energy efficiency upgrades and retrofitting to homes, benefiting thousands of families and supporting clients which currently include: Vale of Glamorgan Council, Cornwall Housing Association, Curo Places Ltd, Bristol City Council, Exeter City Council, Ovo Energy and Sanctuary.
But this afternoon, February 8, the Exeter-based construction giant fell into administration with 303 staff being made redundant as a result, according to Construction Enquirer.
It is understood Midas chief executive Alan Hope and chairman Steve Hindley notified staff via teams calls and email on Tuesday afternoon.
Administrators from Teneon are now in charge of the construction group.
In Torquay work has stopped completely on Torbay Council’s £11m Premier Inn at The Terrace and the Fragrance Group, which is investing in excess of £30 million in the two hotel builds on Paignton Esplanade also confirmed it is “increasingly concerned” about the lack of progress over the last three months and now says it is “reviewing its options”.
A spokesperson for Midas told DevonLive: “As is well known in the industry there are issues relating to Brexit, Covid, ongoing shortages of materials and labour, and significant cost inflation, which are providing challenges to project delivery and timescales.
“We are working closely with all our stakeholders to resolve the situation.”
Midas won the contract from Torbay Council to build the £11m 120-bedroom Premier Inn on part of The Terrace car park in Torquay.
It was scheduled to open in late 2022 and bring 30 new permanent jobs to the town – with over 150 jobs during the construction and hopes of attracting an annual extra £3.3m tourism spend to the resort.
Torbay Council said it worked hard to ensure that the construction contract with Midas included requirements to employ local companies and apprentices.
A Torbay Council spokesperson said: “We are working with Midas to identify any issues which may be affecting the site and any required solutions. The council remains committed to the scheme which will not only generate new employment opportunities but will complement existing hotel accommodation in Torquay that will attract thousands of guests each year, boosting our local tourism economy by more than £3 million.”
Last year Midas, one of the UK’s largest privately-owned construction and property services companies, posted a trading loss for the first time in it’s 40 year history.
Midas is one of the region’s largest employers, supporting more than 10,000 jobs in supply chains.
The impact of Covid-19 was blamed for the post-tax loss of £2m.
NHS and social care workers in England will pay an estimated £390m extra to subsidise their own services when the National Insurance rise comes into effect in April, exclusive analysis by openDemocracy has revealed.
Nurses will take a £275-a-year pay cut on average as a result of the rise – despite Boris Johnson saying the money was needed to “pay good wages for the 50,000 nurses” that he pledged to recruit by 2025 when the plans were announced in September.
Social care workers will take an average cut of £129 a year.
The National Insurance rise will fund ‘the NHS and equivalent bodies’ and will be replaced by a formal ‘health and social care levy’ of the same value from 2023.
“Our crumbling social care system desperately needs more cash – we all know that. But a regressive tax which takes money from the pockets of the lowest-paid workers is not the way to do it,” said Rachel Harrison, national officer for the GMB trade union, which represents NHS and care workers.
“The Conservatives’ National Insurance hike will snatch hundreds of millions from the pockets of carers and NHS workers. It’s a completely backwards way of raising the money and it will ultimately be self-defeating.”
The lowest-paid NHS and social care staff – those earning £24,000 or less – will lose £66m in total from their pay cheques, calling into question the prime minister’s promise that the money “will go straight to the front line” of the health service.
Of that figure, £47m will come from the lowest-paid NHS staff and £19m from the lowest-paid social care staff.
The government has said that the manifesto-breaking tax rise, which is expected to raise £12.4bn a year, will be spent on tackling the backlog of patients waiting for treatments caused by the pandemic and fixing long-term problems with social care.
NHS workers will lose £327m while workers in the social care sector will lose £61m in total.
Care workers will lose £4.4m a year from their pay, despite 71% already being paid below the real living wage of £9.50 in the UK and £10.85 in London, according to Skills for Care.
NHS staff in England have suffered real-term salary falls of up to £2,949 over the past decade, according to analysis by the Health Foundation published last year.
Last year, English NHS staff received a 3% pay rise following an independent pay review. However, junior doctors will lose on average £193 from their annual pay after the tax rise.
“Over the last decade we’ve seen doctors hit by repeated real-terms pay cuts, while they have been asked to work harder and go above and beyond during the pandemic,” a British Medical Association spokesperson said.
“Upcoming tax changes will further erode doctors’ take-home pay, which is why we are calling for a pay increase that reflects cost of living increases.”
The 1.25 percentage points rise in National Insurance comes as households are already struggling with a worsening cost of living crisis.
Inflation is already at its highest level for three decades and the Bank of England expects it will peak at 7% when the increase comes into effect in April.
Last month, 14 unions, representing 1.2 million health staff in England, called on the government to raise NHS pay and raised fears of a “growing exodus of exhausted staff”.
The NHS said that staff shortages were “the single biggest and most urgent we need to address” in its 2019 recruitment plan. One in eight nursing posts and around one in 11 care worker roles are currently unfilled, with demand for the positions set to rise in line with the UK’s ageing population.
Social care statistics were estimated using data from Skills For Care’s workforce estimates by cross-referencing the number of public, private and independent FTE jobs in the social care sector against Skills For Care’s estimates for mean FTE annual pay.
A Treasury spokesperson said: “We’ve taken decisive and historic action, with our Health and Social Care Levy due to raise around £13bn a year for the NHS and social care. It is a progressive tax with those earning more paying more. We rightly funded a 3% pay-rise for NHS staff this year, increasing nurses pay by £1,000 a year on average, and have committed to pay rises next year.
The Health and Social Care Levy will benefit people up and down the country, including by tackling the backlog that the pandemic has created on NHS operations and procedures strengthening the adult social care system so that people do not have to bear the financial risks of catastrophic care costs themselves.”
More than 11 million potholes will go unfilled from April when funding for rural councils is cut by £480 million.
Councils outside England’s major urban areas say they will be forced to cancel or drastically scale back road maintenance work as a result. They are to receive £727 million for road maintenance funding in the next financial year, compared with £1.2 billion two years ago.
Critics accused the Conservatives of breaking a manifesto pledge to earmark an extra £500 million a year for potholes. The budgets of England’s largest county and rural councils are being cut.
The County Councils Network (CCN), which represents the councils and carried out the analysis, said the cuts would leave local authorities with little choice but to cancel planned works, despite the worsening condition of England’s roads.
County leaders said they had welcomed the 2019 pledge of “the biggest-ever pothole filling programme”, which included £2.5 billion in additional funding to councils over the course of the parliament, but they were now receiving 40 per cent less than they did two years ago.
“A £479 million drop in funding between 2021 and 2023 is hugely significant,” Martin Hill, the CCN devolution spokesman, said. “With the government making such a clear announcement that it was increasing pothole funding in 2019, we are left grappling with the public’s expectation that we are able to continue to invest in our road network.
“Unless this reduction is reversed, and the government provides an urgent injection of resources to match the level it distributed in 2020-21, then we will have little choice but to cancel planned works. This would represent a major scaling back of our ambitions.”
In contrast England’s major cities and urban areas will benefit from significant investment in road and transport infrastructure through a new dedicated £5.7 billion fund over the next three years.
Last year the RAC dealt with more than 10,000 pothole-related breakdowns, which worked out as 27 every day and was the highest total since 2018.
The CCN said that 13,000 miles of rural roads in the 36 affected county areas were identified as requiring maintenance last year, equating to 9 per cent of the total road network.
In 2020-21, when councils were allocated the first tranche of the pothole fund, budgets rose to £1.2 billion for those councils, although there were immediate reductions in the 2021-22 budget. For the next financial year the amount will be £727 million.
Local authorities in southwest England will have the biggest reduction in funding over the two years. Their budgets will fall by £100.7 million, which would pay for 2.4 million potholes to be filled.
Counties in the southeast lose out on £87.1 million of funding, the equivalent to two million potholes, while those in east of the country lose out on £71.4 million, which could have filled 1.7 million potholes.
The latest research by the Asphalt Industry Alliance found that average pothole repair cost an average of £41.61. This means that the funding shortfall will result in 11.5 million potholes not being dealt with.
Residents in blocks of flats up and down the country are being hit with energy bill increases of as much as 700 per cent because they are not protected by Ofgem’s price cap.
The cap will rise by a record 54 per cent in April, but an estimated 800,000 homeowners and tenants are on communal networks that heat large buildings. The contracts are negotiated for all residents collectively by freeholders and managing agents. Because the contracts are classed as commercial, not domestic, residents have no protection from rising prices.
Many more flat owners and tenants will also be hit with increases to electricity bills to cover communal lighting and the energy used to pump water to higher levels of buildings, campaigners have warned.
The government has confirmed that while the “vast majority” of leaseholders will qualify for a £200 discount on bills – a measure announced by Rishi Sunak last week – some will not.
Residents of the Pan Peninsula development near Canary Wharf in London received a letter in December quoting a 1,000 per cent increase in the unit price for gas used in their communal heating system. The quote was reduced after wholesale prices decreased in January, but tenants and leaseholders are still facing a 450 per cent increase in their gas bills.
“People are seeing some shocking increases to their bills,” said Andy, a member of the residents’ management committee for the development. He counts himself as “fortunate” because his flat is on the 33rd floor and benefits from heat rising from lower floors. The heating contract is negotiated by the owner of the building, which means residents have little say.
Adding to consumers’ woes, many heat networks are inefficient, unreliable, and use much more energy than they would if they were well designed.
“There are no technical standards for heat networks. A lot of contractors that install them don’t have the right expertise,” said Stephen Knight, director of the Heat Trust, a voluntary body that oversees the sector.
“If your system is using 10 kW of power to generate 5 kW of heat – as many networks do – you end up paying for twice as much energy as you need to.”
Mr Knight said that without government intervention, almost all of the estimated 800,000 customers on communal heat networks will see increases of around 400 per cent in the coming weeks and months as contracts come up for renewal.
“This is a sector that is crying out for regulation,” he said. “There really is not good news here.”
For years, the government has promised statutory regulation of the sector, but it has failed to deliver.
A government spokesperson said: “We recognise that leaseholders and heat network customers are currently only protected by the energy price cap for the gas and electricity they buy directly from an energy supplier, which is why we are giving Ofgem new powers to regulate prices in this sector in the future.
They said that the “vast majority” of leaseholders would receive a £200 loan to reduce their energy bills in October, and a further £150 council tax rebate in April.
It is not just communal heating networks that are being hit with price-cap-busting bill increases.
In Birmingham, Ray Illingworth has just received notification that his communal electricity bill will more than quadruple, from 15p per unit to 65p. That’s more than double the Ofgem price cap amount of 27p.
Mr Illingworth estimates that it will cost him and other residents between £600 and £1,000 extra per year. The cost comes on top of thousands of pounds that they have been forced to pay to fix dangerous cladding and other fire safety defects.
To make matters worse, he has recorded temperatures below 12C inside his flat, because cladding and insulation has been removed and is yet to be replaced.
“Anyone in a building over four storeys tall is going to be hammered by these bill increases. It’s pretty awful,” he said.
“Why should these residential blocks be charged commercial rates? It doesn’t make sense other than to allow people to make more money out of us again.”
Martin Boyd, chair of campaigning charity Leasehold Knowledge Partnership, said consumers have no control over what their freeholder landlord decides.
He added: “There is also no Ofgem price cap to protect them from soaring costs, and so many are currently facing gigantic price hikes due to providers passing on runaway wholesale gas costs in full against the backdrop of the Russia-Ukraine standoff and a Europe-wide gas crisis.
“At LKP, we’re seeing flat leaseholders come to us concerned that their freeholder or freeholder-appointed managing agent has dumped commercial-rate VAT and the climate levy onto their utility bills, which should not be happening. As with everything leasehold, the flat owners pay but have no say.”
Devon MP Anthony Mangnall, who submitted a letter of no confidence in Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Wednesday, has admitted he is “terrified” for his political future as a result.
But, he said: “I did not come into politics to lie to people, and I did not come into politics to be lied to by colleagues.”
The Conservative MP for Totnes and South Devon, whose constituency covers Brixham and parts of Torbay, was speaking on the Telegraph’s “Chopper’s Politics” podcast.
He became the 12th Conservative MP to submit a letter of no confidence in the Prime Minister to the influential 1922 Committee.
It takes 54 letters to trigger a vote of no confidence in the Prime Minister, whose position is becoming increasingly fragile in the midst of claims of parties being held in Downing Street while the rest of the country was in lockdown.
“His actions and mistruths are overshadowing the extraordinary work of so many excellent ministers and colleagues.”
A report into the so-called “Partygate” by senior civil servant Sue Grey pinpointed “serious failures of leadership and judgement” from the Prime Minister.
Mr Mangnall told the podcast: “I think we have to have a real conversation about standards in public life, about making sure our elected representatives are not just adhering to the rules but actually leading by example.
“Unfortunately I don’t see that to be the case at the moment.”
He said Mr Johnson’s handling of the Sue Grey report had been “below par”, and had been the latest in a series of problems to come out of 10 Downing Street.
He said he supported the Government and was a “Conservative through and through”, but the catalogue of problems around the leadership could not continue.
“It’s a question of the Prime Minister’s judgement, and whether he is the right man to be leading this, and I’m not sure that he is,” he said.
“I’m not questioning my place within the Conservative Party. I’m questioning how we are led.”
The Totnes MP admitted he was “terrified” and “incredibly emotional” about what his action might mean for his own political future, but added: “It is not about me. It’s about how we govern in this country.
“I’m sorry to him personally, but I’m not sorry for the course of action I have decided to take, because my party and my country matter.”
Mr Mangnall is one of the so-called “Class of 2019” who won their seats in the last General Election. He took over the reins at Totnes from another controversial MP, Dr Sarah Wollaston, whose strong opinions on Brexit led her to leave the Conservatives, stand briefly as an independent and then join the Liberal Democrats.
Mr Mangnall took the seat from her with a majority of almost 13,000 votes.
Cllr Bell follows Cllr Owen Martin who resigned from the Allerdale Conservative Group last week
Another councillor has defected from the Conservative Party over the Downing Street parties scandal and the Prime Minister’s controversial comments about the leader of the opposition.
Councillor Carmell Bell, who represents Crummock and Derwent Valley, has left the Conservative Party but will remain on Allerdale Borough Council as an Independent.
Cllr Bell feels she can not remain in the Conservative Party due to the recent actions of Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
Evidence has emerged recently that Downing Street hosted a number of parties, seemingly breaching the Government’s own lockdown rules.
Cllr Bell follows Cllr Owen Martin who resigned from the Allerdale Conservative Group last week.
Councillor Bell said “For some time now I have been unhappy in the Conservative Party. The recent behaviour of the Prime Minister and the unapologetic defence of his position by many within the party has convinced me it is time to leave.”
Mr Johnson has been under further scrutiny recently after making controversial comments at the despatch box, suggesting that Labour leader Kier Starmer failed to prosecute Jimmy Savile.
Cllr Bell said: “During the pandemic I was employed as a housing support officer for a housing charity. It was my job to work with vulnerable people at risk of homelessness. This was a difficult time for many and I saw first hand the impact that lack of resources and cuts has had, not least on our stretched police and mental health services within Cumbria.
“I don’t believe the government has a handle on this situation and hearing the stories coming from Downing Street, I’m not sure they care.
“I wish my colleagues in the Allerdale Conservative group well and look forward to representing my ward as an independent over the coming months”.
Alan Williams, 78, previously financed First’s X53 service between Bridport and Weymouth in 2019 and has chosen to do so again.
This year, he has arranged for the service to be extended to Lyme Regis because he believes the route is ‘important’ to people who use it.
The amount he has paid First has not been disclosed.
Mr Williams said: “I just want to give the community their bus service and to encourage people to use it more.
“I hope it also encourages bus companies to keep such services.”
He added: “People still need to travel on Sundays. Some people have got places to be or they have to work and don’t have cars so this service is a lifeline.”
Operator First had been running four services on Sundays but these were stopped for the winter on January 16 with the service resuming in March when the summer timetable launches.
Mr Williams opted to step up and fund the service to fill the gap out his own pocket. Two services are now running each Sunday until March.
Mr Williams said: “I have seen the regulars still using the service now as well as new people.
“Public transport in general needs to be improved to get around especially now with the train timetable changes and the issues it causes with buses.
“The company have indicated they would start running the services from the March when their summer timetable starts.”
Transport lobby group West Dorset Western Area Transport Action Group (WATAG) welcomed the move.
WATAG chairman Bob Driscoll said: “The Sunday service X53 will continue, but reduced from four to two round trip journeys between Weymouth and Lyme Regis, as a result of Mr Alan Williams agreeing to support this service financially.
“First Wessex intended to withdraw the Sunday service last September with the introduction of the winter timetable.
“Mr Williams suggested that if they did he would support a service between Bridport and Weymouth as he did in 2019.
“Subsequently, First Wessex decided to run the four services until 16 January, when the service would cease.”
Mr Driscoll added: “I hope as many people as possible will use the service for a day out, thereby helping us prove the need for a bus service seven days a week all year round.”
A spokesperson for First said: “We can confirm a west Dorset resident funds a limited Sunday X53 service between January and March.
“We fund the service for the rest of the week and year. On the rare occasions where we are unable to run a service, we are always happy to work with members of local communities to find solutions to meet a community’s needs.’”
“Lesley Horn, who worked in the the Future Inn hotel in Plymouth for two months told the Guardian she feared people were being “warehoused” in temporary care hotels, which health officials have been instructed to use amid an acute shortage of care packages.”
A care worker at a hotel used to relieve pressure on NHS beds has claimed vulnerable people have been “failed”, with problems including stinking clinical waste being stored in a bathtub and a lack of accessible showers.
Lesley Horn, who worked in the the Future Inn hotel in Plymouth for two months told the Guardian she feared people were being “warehoused” in temporary care hotels, which health officials have been instructed to use amid an acute shortage of care packages.
More than 500 care homes are closed to new admissions because of outbreaks of Covid among residents and many more closed because of staff testing positive. There are also shortages of homecare workers so “care hotels” have been set up in places including Bristol, Norwich and Newquay. But there are rising concerns about their suitability.
Horn said a bathroom on the residents’ floor was periodically used as an overflow for clinical waste with bin bags filled with faeces and urine-soiled materials stacked up.
“You can imagine – you open the door and it was oh, my God, you are kidding me?” she said. “The smell. And this was not according to the infection control guidelines. It’s not on.”
Current NHS England guidance states that care hotels are supposed to be used for “days, rather than weeks” but Horn, who worked at the Plymouth hotel from late October to early January, said some residents stayed as long as two months. Care hotels are not regulated as care homes by the Care Quality Commission regulator, but they are recorded as locations where domiciliary care is being provided. CQC is currently undertaking a risk-based inspection of the Plymouth hotel.
Horn said there were only two walk-in showers for more than 30 of the residents and these were located on a different floor to their rooms. She alleged there were not always enough hospital-style beds and there was sometimes a lack of appropriate equipment such as commodes.
Devon NHS clinical commissioning group, Plymouth city council and the private operator, Abicare, defended the arrangements, said they did not agree with some of Horn’s claims and said “safety and quality of care are always our main priorities”.
They conceded there had been issues with a waste contractor, but said these were now solved and patient care was unaffected. They denied equipment shortages and said it was normal for hospital patients to walk a short distance to access a shower. Long stays were only in a very few cases where, because of homelessness or safeguarding concerns, discharge was difficult.
“Feedback from the people who have used the centre has been overwhelmingly positive and staff have been touched by the many cards and messages,” said Darryn Allcorn, Devon’s lead chief nurse, and Craig McArdle, strategic director for people at the council.
“The care hotel is just one of the many measures health and care partners have put in place to support the city’s main hospital during a period of unprecedented pressure when capacity in the care sector is challenged by the effects of the pandemic.”
The need to accelerate the discharge of hospital patients has been acute. Derriford hospital in Plymouth recently declared a level 4 alert, which means patient safety could be compromised.
But domiciliary care operators have warned that “care hotels … may not be equipped to meet [the] needs” of older and disabled people.
“It should never have come to this,” said Jane Townson, the chief executive of the Homecare Association. “We call on the government to invest properly in home-based support and care, so we can enable people to live well at home … take pressure off the NHS and reduce costs for the health and care system.”
Last month the daughter of a resident at a care hotel in Bristol complained her father hadn’t been seen by a nurse for a week. Linda Slade told the BBC: “He has a stoma bag, they didn’t know anything about stoma bags or what to do.”
Kate Terroni, CQC’s chief inspector of adult social care said the regulator would “engage providers to ensure high quality care for people in these settings” and “inspect in response to concerns”.
Horn, who has worked in healthcare for 40 years, said conditions of some residents being discharged were worse than she would usually see in care settings. Health officials countered that all discharges had been deemed medically appropriate.
Horn said it felt as though people were being “warehoused” and said: “They are put in our hands to give them the best care we can and this is where I feel we were put in a corner … It was difficult for us.”
The providers said these were the opinions of one person but that they strongly disagreed with them.
Most rooms had conventional baths, which are not accessible to many people in care settings, but there were two walk-in showers on the fourth floor, one in a room stacked so high with furniture that it was impossible to turn the main light on, Horn said. It required care staff to take residents up in a lift, usher them through the darkened room and give them a shower.
“It’s horrible,” Horn said. “This isn’t the type of environment you take somebody in.”
The Department of Health and Social Care said it had made £3.3bn available to assist timely hospital discharge since the pandemic began, with funding due to continue until March.
On the same day that Michael Gove published his “Levelling Up” paper, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) published its first attempt at developing statistical indicators to help understand the strengths and weaknesses in local communities.
This first iteration covers a core set of indicators grouped in three broad categories (boosting living standards, spreading opportunity and improving public services, and restoring local pride). This aligns with some of the metrics selected to measure the progress of levelling-up, where data is available.
From the interactive tool, East Devon has three significant weaknesses which are interesting in the light of the article below:
Public transport or walk to large employment centre
Cycle to large employment centre
Drive to large employment centre
New greenfield housing forcing people to use cars, report finds
New greenfield housing developments are locking residents into car dependency, making everyday journeys impossible without a vehicle, a new report has found. Meanwhile, pledges for walking, cycling and public transport are often left unfulfilled.
The group Transport for New Homes (TfNH) visited 20 new housing developments in England, finding that while those on urban brownfield sites generally lived up to sustainable transport pledges, greenfield sites were often far from shops and amenities, without public transport, cycling links or even pavements, and the homes themselves were seemingly designed around car parking.
Surface transport is responsible for 22% of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions, and the Climate Change Committee says reducing demand for car travel is key to meeting emission reduction targets. Campaigners say housing pledges in the “levelling up” white paper, launched last week, will do little to achieve this and that planning reform is urgently needed. The government aims to build 300,000 new homes a year to meet growing demand.
The report, Building Car Dependency, which follows research from 2018, says greenfield housing “has become even more car-based” in recent years, adding hundreds of thousands of additional car journeys to our roads.
Steve Chambers, a campaigner at TfNH, told the Guardian: “We have found places where you can’t do anything without getting into a car; you literally cannot do anything. There is nothing within walking distance, there’s nothing within safe cycling distance, and for work, for going to the shop; for everything you can imagine, you need to get in the car.
“The impact of that is that houses are being designed around two and three parking spaces with tiny back gardens, no front gardens whatsoever, and that poor design obviously crowds out walking, cycling, and basically good homes.”
“There isn’t even the most basic public transport in a lot of places. There isn’t even a bus route, which is clearly an issue.”
The report did identify a few cases of greenfield developments with sustainable transport links, such as Hampton Park in Peterborough, Poundbury in Dorset and Derwenthorpe in York, but otherwise found “the internal road layout, the car access on to major roads with bigger junctions to take the traffic, the sheer quantity of residential car parking, all told the story”.
During the pandemic, residents of such estates reported being unable to walk anywhere because the surrounding roads lacked footpaths.
While car access was built first, TfNH say walkable elements such as a high street, a children’s centre or community facilities arrived after driving habits were formed. At Chapelford Urban Village, on a former RAF site north-west of Warrington, a new railway station finally opened in 2019, 15 years after the first homes were sold.
“Quick wins” such as footpaths to nearby shops or park-and-rides failed to link up or led nowhere. In one case, shops adjacent to a retirement home were rendered inaccessible to less mobile residents by an ankle-high fence. Some front doors opened directly on to car parking spaces. In Cranbrook New Town, near Exeter, a road was too narrow for buses to reach a new bus stop.
Exceptions were at brownfield sites like Bath Riverside and Trumpington Meadows in Cambridge, the former where “the public realm is shaped around walking” with car parking “limited and mostly out of sight”.
Steve Gooding, chair of the steering group for Transport for New Homes, told the Guardian: “There’s no evidence coming through in the report that at scale we’re managing to deploy new housing in a way that really promotes the government’s parallel objectives of promoting active travel, public transport and alternatives to the private car. And unless we do that, then it shouldn’t surprise any of us that the car is going to be the default choice for the vast majority of trips that people make.”
Among the report’s recommendations are that new housing is “recast around sustainable travel”, with compact, mixed-use developments such as European-style apartments above business premises. In addition, less parking per home would reduce sprawl and make use for pavements, green space and a network of Dutch-style cycle routes. Authors also want devolved powers for things like local rail and bus rapid transit systems, with funding diverted from road-building to provide walking and cycling links.
Chambers added: “We’ve found everything from developers planning applications, through to the local plans of local authorities, right up to the National Planning Policy Framework have incredibly warm words about walking, cycling, public transport, and ‘creating vibrant walkable places’, and what we have shown through our visits and our documentary evidence, hundreds of photographs, it simply isn’t being delivered.
“There’s no reason to believe that what’s presented in the levelling up white paper – which make no changes to the planning system, and crucially includes no new funding whatsoever – will have different outcomes.”
Rosie Pearson, chair of the Community Planning Alliance, said: “Developers are building in the wrong place, with the wrong design and the wrong layout. This locks in car dependency from the outset, leading to persistent traffic jams, dangerous conditions for pedestrians and cyclists, and air pollution. It’s time for change.”
A spokesperson for the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities said: “We welcome this report and agree that new development should be less dependent on cars. By 2030, we want half of all journeys in towns and cities to be walked or cycled and are investing £3bn into bus services.
“National Planning Policy is clear that significant development should give priority to pedestrians, cyclists and public transport, and we will be updating guidance later this year to promote street design that favours walkways and cycle paths over motor traffic.”
A review is being carried out by East Devon District Council (EDDC) on how the people of Colyford are represented.
And it could see the village gain its own parish council, which would have the power to collect money from the council tax to spend on local schemes.
Now, anyone living in the area covered by Colyton Parish Council is being asked to share their views on the draft proposals before a deadline of 5pm on May 4.
The aim of the ‘Community Governance Review’, which was requested by the Colyford Village Residents Association, is to find the most suitable arrangement to represent the village.
Once EDDC has received responses, it will consider the results of the consultation and publish a proposal in spring 2022, which will then be subject to further consultation.
If a separate parish council is set up for Colyford the aim is that it would be in place in time for elections to take place in May 2023.
Councillor Sarah Jackson, EDDC’s portfolio holder for democracy, transparency and communications, said: “It is important that different communities are able to operate with autonomy to decide how best to make use of their resident’s council tax and ensure that decision making is both democratic and in the interest of their particular community.
“It is important that you feel properly represented by the parish you live within. In this instance, Colyford may well have a different set of requirements and separate identity from Colyton.
“Separating the area into two parishes could well be in the best interest of both communities, but we need to hear from you first to understand if this is indeed the prevailing view.
“If you are a resident living in Colyton Parish I encourage you to engage with the consultation and to take this opportunity to tell EDDC what you think.”
Town and parish councils are the most local tier of government and have two roles; community representation and local administration.
People registered to vote within the Colyton Parish Council area will soon receive a consultation pack in the post, including a short questionnaire inviting residents to have their say.
If you’re not on the electoral register and need a copy of the consultation on paper or in any other format email colyford@eastdevon.gov.uk or call 01395 517569.
East Devon Watch 