Debate on the Address

I want to make a few comments about the Gracious Speech. I note the Government's intention to increase the availability of affordable housing, which is one of their priorities. I want to express encouragement in that laudable objective, but also some concern. As MP for Thurrock, I was persuaded that the Government were charged and seized with the idea of building up the Thames gateway, regenerating brown, fallow and derelict land in that area and producing new affordable homes to rent and to buy, which they saw as a great prize. The emphasis was on planned growth of essential public services commensurate with the increase in housing units. At the last general election, I was prepared for and, indeed, enthusiastic about the ideas behind the Thames Gateway regeneration and I was proud that the Government had created a Thurrock urban development corporation. However, after some years, I have to tell the Government that there is very little to show for the legislation and policy that they put forward. I am justifiably very irritated. I am irritated because a plethora of Ministers have had some responsibility for this. We have seen numerous quangos with ““Thames Gateway”” or similar terms in their title. Every week I am invited to what I can refer to only as ““junkets””—though they are also called receptions and dinners—by people who claim to be involved in part of the regeneration. I spurn them—there are far too many junkets and receptions in this place anyway—but I am also concerned that such people seem to see receptions, dinners, exhibitions and conferences as a substitute for bricks and mortar. It is not good enough. The Minister in charge is now on test. The Thames Gateway needs housing units, and it also needs appropriate demonstrable growth in essential public services to meet the increase in housing units. There has been no indication of that happening. If we look at the age profile of my general practitioners, we see that many are old and in single practices. A lot of people were put on quangos—some of whom I did not commend to the Government, but my advice was ignored—who have not been able to produce much. I am getting frustrated, and I will not put up with it. The Government need to show some dispatch. Ministers have all these buzz words—gateways, stepping-stones, blue-skies policies and so on—and one of them is joined-up government. Their performance in this area is the opposite of joined-up government. The Department has within it—I forget what it is called now—what I used to call the ministry of housing and local government; I am a bit conservative about such things. Whatever the Department is called now—communities or whatever—part of it wants to build up the Thames Gateway with regeneration and so on, while a junior Minister in another part of it is holding things up. Apparently, he or she is in charge of approving something called the spatial strategy, the approval of which keeps being pushed back. I have never coveted being at the Dispatch Box, but I have to say that I could do a better job than some of those who have been doing it for some time. It is now time for a bit of candid speaking. I have never asked to see a Prime Minister before, but I shall ask to see the new Prime Minister if there is not appreciable movement, a reduction in junkets, receptions and dinners and, instead, a manifest regeneration in the Thames Gateway. I have now got that off my chest.