LABOUR’S INNOVATION IN DERBY LEADS THE WAY

WE have heard much talk over the last two-and-a-half years of the unprecedented level of cuts in funding for public services.

For anyone who believes in public services, as I passionately do, that has been hard to take.

But an unprecedented situation forces a choice: shall I do something innovative to put myself in a better situation, or do I sit back and see how this unfolds?

That has been a choice facing local authorities up and down the country.

Faced with funding settlements from the Government far lower than anybody could have anticipated, the chain reaction is that passing on the cuts means that services fall and support is reduced.

So what are councils to do? Do they simply shrug their shoulders and accept that is their lot, or do they try to do something different to support their residents?

Since the local elections in May, we’ve seen much less of the former and much more of the latter in Derby.

It is a depressing inevitability in Derby as much as anywhere else that the cuts must be passed on and, increasingly, the public understand that.

But I’ve been thrilled to see that Labour-led Derby City Council is countering that with some innovative steps that will help to build the city’s economy from the bottom up.

To begin with, there is the plan to introduce supported council mortgages to help first time buyers onto the property ladder. As well as helping the individuals and couples who will benefit from the scheme, this will crucially get Derby’s housing market moving again.

In fact, this very scheme was dismissed when Labour was in opposition three years ago when I included it as part of Labour’s alternative budget strategy for the city. It is par for the course that the current council leadership has the courage of their convictions that their Lib Dem and Tory predecessors clearly lacked then and still lack now.

Then there is the recent announcement that the council is to become a Living Wage employer, guaranteeing its lowest paid workers a salary in line with the cost of living.

Again, this decision is about helping far more than the people who directly benefit. It is about boosting the city’s economy by creating the disposable income that will be reinvested in local businesses.

In making these choices, the council is proving that when Labour says “there is another way”, it actually means it.

It is this kind of investment which we have been talking about for months. It grows the economy by giving it the opportunity to flourish, as opposed to strangling it by making it insular and stagnant through cut after cut after cut.

Not just that, but it shows the central role that public services play in that recovery. That is why public services are so crucial. It is not just about the front-facing role they play, but also about how public bodies can be the catalysts to spark recovery.

The reality is that Labour needed to win back the trust of the British people - the 2010 General Election results showed that.

But I believe the tide of public opinion is turning. I believe more and more people are recognising that any decent society relies on solid public services to glue it together.

And it is by taking these sorts of steps that Labour can prove that its approach is the right way.