:01:22. > :01:32.to Thursday's elections. And MPs grill the bosses of Cornwall's
:01:32. > :01:32.
:01:32. > :39:56.Apology for the loss of subtitles for 2303 seconds
:39:56. > :39:59.Politics. Two years ago, the age of 's territory hit Cornwall and as the
:40:00. > :40:05.Council prepares to go to the polls, the arguments are as fierce as
:40:05. > :40:10.ever, will more be needed and who will pay for Cornwall's vital
:40:10. > :40:15.services? I am joined by Sherryl Murray the Conservative MP for South
:40:15. > :40:21.East Cornwall, Dan Rogerson, that the pro-Democrat MP for North
:40:21. > :40:24.Cornwall and by Labour MP Ben Bradshaw. Just two months remain for
:40:24. > :40:27.the government to negotiate a new deal with the insurance industry to
:40:27. > :40:33.protect flood victims, if the present agreement is not replaced by
:40:33. > :40:38.the end of June, people could be left with no insurance cover at all.
:40:38. > :40:42.One specialist company in Cornwall has suggested a private sector
:40:42. > :40:47.solution to protect insurers against the financial loss as they face.
:40:47. > :40:51.think this can be done by setting up a centralised fund that all UK
:40:51. > :40:56.property insurance Company 's pay into. Those companies who are
:40:56. > :41:00.covering high flood risk would be able to draw from this pool when
:41:00. > :41:04.claims happen. The important bit is that we feel this should be a mutual
:41:04. > :41:14.fund and managed and invested for the benefit of the policyholders who
:41:14. > :41:25.
:41:25. > :41:28.are paying in. Over time, the fund could become self-sufficient and we
:41:28. > :41:31.may not even require the levy at all. You have had huge flooding
:41:31. > :41:33.problems in your constituency, this is a big problem. It is a bit of a
:41:33. > :41:36.shambles. We do have to get something together before the
:41:36. > :41:41.current agreement runs out. Is that viable? We have to look at all
:41:41. > :41:45.options. I know the Minister is working hard on this. We have got to
:41:45. > :41:51.do something for those people. I have got people in my constituency
:41:51. > :41:55.who were told they could not be insured unless they had been flood
:41:55. > :42:00.free for ten years. They were in their attempt year and home was
:42:00. > :42:04.flooded again. We have to do something, because I have been round
:42:05. > :42:10.to various houses and I have seen the devastation that floodwater
:42:10. > :42:14.wreaks on a home and it is not just the standard possessions like
:42:14. > :42:20.carpets and things, it is the very personal irreplaceable possessions
:42:20. > :42:25.like photographs and that sort of thing that cannot be replaced. I am
:42:25. > :42:29.talking to the minister constantly about it. You know about this in
:42:29. > :42:38.North Cornwall as well. The government is saying progress is
:42:38. > :42:44.being made. It is positive that we have a contribution from industry
:42:44. > :42:48.saying that they believe... You would expect us to say, from the
:42:48. > :42:51.government side, will be talk about the pressures on public spending, if
:42:51. > :42:59.we could have a solution that draws on funding from industry, that is
:42:59. > :43:02.the solution. One of the other key questions is insurers taking note of
:43:02. > :43:05.things that people have done in their own homes to improve the
:43:05. > :43:09.situation. Isolated properties cannot expect their own flood
:43:09. > :43:13.defence scheme, but they can do things like raise the plug socket
:43:13. > :43:19.and make their homes less vulnerable, yet insurers will not
:43:19. > :43:22.recognise that. There is a lot more the industry could do. Ben knows all
:43:22. > :43:30.about flooding. When this agreement was brought in under the Labour
:43:30. > :43:34.government, it was temporarily. government has had three years to
:43:34. > :43:40.sort this out. I have warned about this. Almost every opportunity I
:43:40. > :43:43.have had, I have urged them to get a move on. I am sure the department
:43:43. > :43:48.ministers are doing their best, but unless the Treasury unlock some
:43:48. > :43:54.money, there is no country on the world which relies solely on the
:43:54. > :43:58.market for house insurance. Even the United States does not. Without some
:43:58. > :44:02.government underwriting of the risk, the costs will all fall, even
:44:02. > :44:09.under the scheme at you have outlined, because in the end it is
:44:09. > :44:18.the consumer who will have to pay for that mutual funding. It is the
:44:18. > :44:28.Chancellor who needs to sort this out. We were left with a massive
:44:28. > :44:31.
:44:31. > :44:36.deficit. That is a general point. There was huge controversy in the
:44:36. > :44:39.run-up to the first elections to Cornwall's Unitarian authorities in
:44:39. > :44:44.2009. Four years on and with elections due next Thursday, in a
:44:44. > :44:48.sense nothing much has changed, though now the rows are about
:44:48. > :44:57.different things. The biggest is over how much money is needed to
:44:57. > :45:01.provide the county's essential services. Posterity hit Cornwall in
:45:01. > :45:08.December 2010. Councillors ignored this protest and voted to cut the
:45:08. > :45:12.budget by 10% over four years. Some have lost their jobs, bus routes and
:45:12. > :45:16.library services have been slimmed down, but many say the most painful
:45:16. > :45:21.cuts are yet to come. Yellow macro we are reaching the point where the
:45:21. > :45:24.great debate will have to take place. The general public are more
:45:24. > :45:30.understanding that we cannot do everything and that some services
:45:30. > :45:33.will have to be seriously looked at. In January, the Conservative leader
:45:33. > :45:43.of the council told this programme Cornwall had reached a point were it
:45:43. > :46:01.
:46:01. > :46:03.could not cope with any more cuts, so he had no choice but to put up
:46:03. > :46:05.council tax. The risks that we have with our budget are quite off the
:46:05. > :46:08.scale at the moment. Not all Conservatives agreed. Council tax
:46:08. > :46:11.was frozen this year. No party won overall control of Cornwall last
:46:11. > :46:13.time, it has been run by Tories and independence. With the Tory split on
:46:13. > :46:15.council tax, Liberal Democrat support for a freeze was crucial.
:46:15. > :46:19.Two years ago, they spent �750,000 per month and we said go back to
:46:19. > :46:24.that level of two years ago which can easily be achieved and then you
:46:24. > :46:29.can spend the money on things like making parking charges cheaper and
:46:29. > :46:33.fixing potholes. That budget bitterly divided the Conservatives
:46:33. > :46:39.and three of their Cabinet members left the party, one of them saying
:46:39. > :46:43.the drive to save ratepayers approximately 45p per week had put
:46:43. > :46:51.services at serious risk. Jim Currie is not standing for election in May
:46:51. > :46:53.and the woman leading the Conservatives does not share the
:46:53. > :46:56.concern of her former colleagues. think we did the right thing. You
:46:56. > :46:59.cannot put yourself in a position where you turn down �5 million for
:47:00. > :47:04.Cornwall and say they should pay instead. It is the right thing. We
:47:04. > :47:08.may need to make adjustments later, but we have achieved the freeze and
:47:08. > :47:12.we will sort the rest out. The 5 million was from government, our
:47:12. > :47:16.reward for not increasing tax, but it is not worth as much and the man
:47:16. > :47:22.who leads the smallest group on the council says those who voted for the
:47:22. > :47:27.freeze were thinking only of their election leaflets. The coalition
:47:27. > :47:31.government has actually cut our funding over four years by �546
:47:31. > :47:35.million. We are struggling to fund public services and I think it was
:47:35. > :47:38.disgusting that the main political groups on the council voted to make
:47:39. > :47:45.further cuts rather than to put through a modest council tax
:47:45. > :47:49.increase to try and stop some of the damage being done. This Labour
:47:49. > :47:52.councillor agrees. Both the Conservatives and the Liberal
:47:52. > :48:02.Democrats are vying with each other to blame each other for cuts but it
:48:02. > :48:08.
:48:08. > :48:11.is their government doing it. They are almost trying to pretend that it
:48:11. > :48:13.is not necessary to cut anything, but it is, it is going to have to
:48:13. > :48:16.be. The decisions are going to have to be made. The UK Independence
:48:16. > :48:18.Party favours low taxes and thinks there is probably more fat to be
:48:18. > :48:28.cut, but even they are not sure whether councillors were right to
:48:28. > :48:29.
:48:29. > :48:31.freeze tax this year. I cannot say they were right or wrong, because I
:48:31. > :48:33.do not have as much information as they do. Conservative and
:48:33. > :48:38.Independent councillors who have seen the figures plan to ask the
:48:38. > :48:41.people of Cornwall to pay an extra 5% next year, but the Conservative
:48:41. > :48:50.and Liberal Democrat leaders fighting Thursday's election remain
:48:50. > :48:56.adamant they could and would avoid that. It is rather confusing, which
:48:56. > :49:00.of these Tory factions do you agree with? There is only one Conservative
:49:01. > :49:05.group that people can vote for, because those people who wanted to
:49:05. > :49:12.put the council tax up or not standing as Conservatives. I have to
:49:12. > :49:16.make it very clear that when you have overspent on a budget, by �4
:49:16. > :49:23.million per year, and I have had people come to me saying why is one
:49:23. > :49:27.van delivering my crutches and another van with another man comes
:49:27. > :49:35.along and collect my used wheelchair? You can see where there
:49:35. > :49:39.is money to be saved. You believe more can be cut? You will know that
:49:39. > :49:42.a lot of people have said that the Liberal Democrats had their eyes on
:49:43. > :49:47.next week, a good headline that would play well to the electorate
:49:48. > :49:53.and did not think it through and now it is going to land the council with
:49:53. > :50:03.a lot of financial problems? That is not true at all. There will be a lot
:50:03. > :50:03.
:50:03. > :50:06.of people on low incomes being asked to pay more. She has outlined some
:50:06. > :50:10.savings which she things could be made and that is after her party
:50:10. > :50:13.have been controlling it for a number of years, they have not made
:50:13. > :50:19.the savings. I think the Liberal Democrats would be looking at some
:50:19. > :50:24.of those issues. It is not easy, but I think it is possible to do more.
:50:24. > :50:32.want to come back to that, but I will bring in Ben Bradshaw. Your
:50:32. > :50:36.constituency is a bit further away. But you take an interest. I defer to
:50:36. > :50:41.Jude Robinson, the only Labour councillor there and I hope she is
:50:41. > :50:46.joined by a lot more after the election. This is more of the same
:50:46. > :50:49.shambles we have seen from successive Conservative and Liberal
:50:49. > :50:51.Democrat and Independent led councils in Cornwall. Cornish people
:50:51. > :50:55.deserve better, they need a competent counsel, they need
:50:55. > :51:04.councillors who know what they are doing, who can make the cuts but who
:51:05. > :51:08.are honest with people. You cannot keep council tax down and not make
:51:08. > :51:14.any cuts. Is there more fat to be cut? The macro I do not know enough
:51:14. > :51:19.about the details. I have enough on my hands dealing with my own
:51:19. > :51:24.constituency. It is not honest to say to people that you can freeze
:51:24. > :51:29.council tax, absorb the huge cuts in government funding and not cut any
:51:29. > :51:37.service, that is dishonest. I think it is very simple and the message
:51:37. > :51:42.should go back to them, yes it is, because if you stopped the Labour
:51:42. > :51:47.implemented things that are unnecessary, that they heaped onto
:51:47. > :51:54.local authorities, there is a lot of waste to be cut. Liberal Democrat
:51:54. > :51:57.and Conservative MPs in areas like this are lining up to say that the
:51:57. > :52:02.local government finance settlement was unfair and if I were Eric
:52:02. > :52:07.Pickles, the next time you came to me saying you could not cope, I
:52:07. > :52:17.would say you could afford to freed council tax and cannot be that bad.
:52:17. > :52:18.
:52:18. > :52:25.We have looked at ways in which we can cut at the waist. So have we.
:52:25. > :52:31.There is a wider issue. It is about funding for a role issues
:52:31. > :52:37.generally. How bad is it?What more could we do if we had a fair share
:52:37. > :52:42.of money. We are doing the best that we can. Another point is that you
:52:42. > :52:45.have had an Independent candidate and is a question in Cornwall
:52:45. > :52:49.because there is so many Independents, you have a group
:52:49. > :52:59.leader, are they really Independent? You know what my position is, if you
:52:59. > :53:00.
:53:00. > :53:04.vote for an Independent, what are you getting? I find it horrendous
:53:04. > :53:10.that in this time of austerity, the simple answer is to allow a budget
:53:10. > :53:15.to overspent. The portfolio holder is Independent. He did not manage
:53:15. > :53:19.and keep control of the budget. I do not believe it is right when people
:53:19. > :53:26.are finding it hard to have money to go and buy the same shopping every
:53:26. > :53:34.way, it is not right to expect them to go and ask them to foot the bill
:53:34. > :53:38.of that thing. I will come back to them. They made some representation
:53:38. > :53:42.saying Cornwall should have more money from central government. They
:53:42. > :53:45.voted for that. Labour MPs were saying they should be more money for
:53:45. > :53:55.cities in the North of England! Yellow marker there is less money
:53:55. > :53:56.
:53:56. > :53:58.for everyone. . Your point is correct, how can you complain to the
:53:58. > :54:03.government and then not accepted that there needs to be cut if you
:54:03. > :54:07.freeze the council tax. All I can say is here in Exeter, we have a
:54:07. > :54:11.good Labour Council, one of the lowest council tax is in the
:54:11. > :54:15.country, and the city council are managing to protect services in the
:54:15. > :54:21.city and I think the people of Cornwall would like to see a council
:54:21. > :54:30.doing that. The education budget is very clear under Labour, because of
:54:30. > :54:33.the way they dealt with it, Cornwall is at the bottom of the league. At
:54:33. > :54:36.the end of the day, the government now have to reverse that. They are
:54:36. > :54:39.trying to do that, but unfortunately when you see the cities in the North
:54:39. > :54:44.getting more per pupil than they are in Cornwall, when it is costing
:54:44. > :54:52.more... You say all of this, but it is getting close to the next General
:54:52. > :54:56.Election and none of this has been fixed. You will have to wait and
:54:56. > :54:59.see. We are staying in Cornwall where the trouble provider of out of
:54:59. > :55:03.hours GP services was summoned to Westminster to give an account of
:55:03. > :55:06.its failings. Senior managers at Serco were unable to explain why two
:55:06. > :55:08.of its former employees had fiddled figures and it became clear the
:55:08. > :55:16.company is still not meeting at least some of that service
:55:17. > :55:21.commitments. Serco gets �32 million for running the out of hours GP
:55:21. > :55:25.service in Cornwall. It has had the contract for around seven years. But
:55:25. > :55:29.recently there have been concerns raised about its performance and
:55:29. > :55:36.some of these problems appear to be ongoing, according to these patients
:55:36. > :55:41.in North Cornwall. You ring them up and they say they will get back to
:55:41. > :55:46.you in two hours. They should have sent a doctor out straightaway. They
:55:47. > :55:51.always send a doctor first. This week Serco and the commissioners who
:55:51. > :55:59.hired them to provide the service came under fire from the Public
:55:59. > :56:04.Accounts Committee. Everything is someone else's fault. It is never
:56:04. > :56:07.the three of you. The group of MPs were looking into three key issues
:56:07. > :56:14.highlighted by whistleblowers about two years ago and investigated by
:56:14. > :56:19.the National Audit Office. The first was that Serco regularly had trouble
:56:19. > :56:23.filling shifts with appropriately qualified staff. The second was that
:56:23. > :56:26.some staff were altering performance data to give a better impression of
:56:27. > :56:31.the company's services. And finally, there was concern that
:56:31. > :56:36.whistleblowers were not given enough protection. The company said the
:56:36. > :56:41.findings were out of date and it has gone far to implement changes. One
:56:41. > :56:44.example is that it has increased the number of doctors fourfold since the
:56:44. > :56:49.first critical report by the Care Quality Commission. But it emerged
:56:49. > :56:53.during this week's hearing that the service is still facing challenges
:56:53. > :57:03.and managers admitted it was only meeting ten out of 13 quality
:57:03. > :57:03.
:57:04. > :57:10.standards. How many unfilled shifts in January? Unfilled shifts? In
:57:10. > :57:17.terms of that, I can tell you the stats from last Saturday. I want to
:57:17. > :57:23.know January, February and March. is important to recognise... Answer
:57:23. > :57:33.the question! In terms of clinical, nonclinical, we have a range of
:57:33. > :57:37.staff. Answer the question!Unfilled shifts, which was recently
:57:37. > :57:42.highlighted in the media, is not an accurate way to measure care
:57:42. > :57:45.delivery in and out of hours service. And MPs were baffled as to
:57:45. > :57:53.why Serco had not faced any financial penalty for breaching its
:57:53. > :58:01.contract. Does that not give a signal that the moment a company
:58:02. > :58:09.wins a contract they do not deliver? They sorted out the issues. It was
:58:09. > :58:14.not last year. There was repeated failure to comply, and ultimately
:58:14. > :58:23.the contract could be terminated. On what basis did you take the decision
:58:23. > :58:27.not to? It is about taking a proportionate approach. It is a
:58:27. > :58:34.judgement call, not just for me, but for the board of the primary care
:58:34. > :58:38.trust. This retired GP used to run Kernow Doc, the service that
:58:38. > :58:43.preceded Serco before they lost the contract to them. He shares the
:58:43. > :58:49.Select Committee's concerned that the only mechanism to Pina lies
:58:49. > :58:52.Serco appears to be to terminate the contract. You have got to have
:58:52. > :58:57.graduated response, depending on the severity of the bridge. If the
:58:57. > :59:00.breach is very serious, then the contract should be terminated. If it
:59:00. > :59:05.is a minor breach, perhaps a financial penalty, but it depends on
:59:05. > :59:09.the level of the bridge. He think the problem lies with the regular
:59:09. > :59:15.monitoring of the contract and he says the process needs to be more
:59:15. > :59:20.transparent. I personally believe that the nature of the contract and
:59:20. > :59:23.the terms of the contract should be in the public domain. People have a
:59:24. > :59:28.right to know, patients have a right though, they pay for the service,
:59:28. > :59:33.they want to be safe, they have a right to know what has been
:59:33. > :59:37.negotiated on their behalf. Serco's problems in Cornwall first came to
:59:38. > :59:41.light because members of staff decided to speak out. Serco says it
:59:41. > :59:51.has good and robust whistleblowing processes in place, but a National
:59:51. > :59:52.
:59:52. > :59:56.Audit report published last month found that staff were still fearful
:59:56. > :59:58.raise concerns. There seems to be a fair amount of agreement in the
:59:58. > :00:01.studio, there is a problem with accountability, this is a system the
:00:01. > :00:04.coalition is running with but it was introduced by the Labour government.
:00:04. > :00:08.The prime responsibility for making sure that the service provided to
:00:08. > :00:18.the Cornish people is meeting the requirements is the primary care
:00:18. > :00:22.trust and what worries me is that they do not appear to have picked
:00:22. > :00:27.this problem up in the first place, it had to go to the Independent
:00:27. > :00:32.regulator, and they still appear to be having a softly, softly
:00:32. > :00:36.approach. I agree with Margaret Hodge and the other members of the
:00:36. > :00:39.committee. They are asking why they have not been fined or had the
:00:39. > :00:45.contract terminated if they are not delivering. They have the power to
:00:45. > :00:54.do it, they hold the contract, it is their responsibility. What about the
:00:54. > :00:57.point, you can terminate the contract, but there are no other
:00:57. > :01:05.sanctions? There are financial penalties. If a company that is
:01:05. > :01:14.contracted by the National Health Service, if they are not delivering,
:01:14. > :01:17.then the Commissioner can issue a penalty or terminate the contract.
:01:17. > :01:23.It is not doing nothing or termination, there are other things
:01:23. > :01:30.that can be done. They can make sure that they are delivering. I think
:01:30. > :01:33.that this goes back to the new GP contract, because GPs were given the
:01:34. > :01:39.opportunity to opt out of providing art -- Michael out of our services
:01:39. > :01:44.and when you had some of the older GPs, they still carried on to do it
:01:44. > :01:49.but now they have retired, a lot of the newer GPs... What about the
:01:49. > :01:53.management of the system? One of the main things was they could not
:01:54. > :02:01.provide enough qualified staff and that is why, because of the new GP
:02:01. > :02:05.contract is. Say we have more doctors, how does that add up?
:02:05. > :02:12.are a big company, they do not want this, so they would add to the
:02:12. > :02:17.resources. The government comes under criticism for looking at
:02:17. > :02:20.making changes, all this happened under the original system,
:02:20. > :02:26.completely unaccountable, these Independent bodies that were looking
:02:26. > :02:30.at things. Now, we have boards who set the strategy and this is the
:02:30. > :02:35.sort of thing they can call into question. You have the GPs as well