[Relevant Documents: Seventh Report of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, Resetting the relationship with fishing communities, Session 2024-26, HC 680; Sixth Report of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, Erosion of trust: the impact of coastal erosion on communities, Session 2024-26, HC 1317.]

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—(Jade Botterill.)

It is good to know that I have not lost the ability to lose the room, Madam Deputy Speaker. Like all hon. Members who represent a coastal constituency, I have a huge pride and privilege in representing Poole. When I get off the train at our local station after spending time in Westminster, the smell of the sea reminds me how lucky I am to live in such a beautiful place; it has the world’s second largest harbour, some of the best blue flag beaches in the country and a surrounding coastline that is simply stunning. We cannot eat scenery, however; like other coastal communities, Poole faces a number of key issues that need Government attention. Since becoming MP for the area, I have been running a project called Positive About Poole, asking local residents for their ideas on how we can make our town an even better place to live. They have highlighted ongoing problems of traffic congestion, a lack of youth services and, of course, the lack of affordable housing. Average gross median weekly full-time earnings in Poole are £764, but monthly rent is around £1,400, meaning that half of someone’s wages immediately goes on housing costs, not to mention council tax, energy bills and food. Nearly one in four children in Poole are living in relative poverty after housing costs, further suggesting the impact that high rents are having on the cost of living crisis.

The issues in Poole sound very similar to those in Cornwall, where we have a chronic housing crisis. For several months now we have been asking the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government for a strategic place partnership with Homes England to give us the money to build the social and truly affordable housing we desperately need. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to expand the availability of strategic place partnerships with Homes England well beyond mayoral combined authorities?

Yes; I agree with my hon. Friend’s point and I will develop it further. Like my hon. Friend’s constituency, towns such as Poole are desperate for good quality, affordable and secure housing—I would argue council housing—for local families, rather than the developer-led luxury waterside apartments that have sprung up.

Again, that sounds similar to Cornwall. Does my hon. Friend agree that speeding up a registration scheme for holiday lets would help to deal with all the second homes and holiday lets proliferating around our towns? Maybe if we had that, we could move towards more affordable housing.

My hon. Friend is right. There are some areas of Poole where no one lives; they are all holiday lets, second homes and so on.

First, I commend the hon. Gentleman for bringing this issue forward. He is a very assiduous MP on behalf of his constituents and he should be congratulated on his contribution. I am also an MP for a rural coastal area, and there are other issues as well as social housing, including isolation, which many suffer from. Isolation means more expensive shops and more expensive petrol, less frequent transport, social housing scarcity and a lack of digital connectivity. Does he agree that there is a clear need for the Government to understand that greater support is required, not in terms of per head accountancy, but taking into account rural isolation difficulties, and that more investment is the first step to achieve that?

I always welcome contributions from the hon. Member, and I often find myself agreeing with him, as I do on this occasion. The expensive apartments that have sprung up in my constituency and others are unsuitable for young families in the area or are out of the reach of many local people. While I support the Renters’ Rights Act 2026, we must also go further and look at rent controls to ensure fair play. That brings me to the health challenges that coastal communities face, and the excellent report from the chief medical officer published in 2021, in which he recognised that coastal communities have some of the worst health outcomes in England, with low life expectancy and high rates of many major diseases. While coastal communities are not all the same, many share similar characteristics, which should help in developing some common policy responses. Fishing or port communities such as mine have particular challenges, and a national strategy informed by those common experiences will help reduce health inequalities in those areas. For example, many coastal communities were created around a single industry that has since moved on, meaning that work can often be scarce or seasonal.

Similar to my hon. Friend’s constituency, Blackpool has some of the worst health outcomes in the country. A boy born in my constituency will live 10 years less than a boy born in Hampshire. That is my son, and many others across Blackpool, with a decade lost before they have even started their life. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is about not just additional funding for the NHS, but reducing inequality in the housing and jobs markets, as well as strategic support for coastal communities, where support for the big cities has been for the last few decades?

I absolutely support my hon. Friend’s contribution. Let us be clear that we are not going to get the kind of society that we want until we eradicate inequality. I believe that with a much more equal society, we will see more compassion, care and community.

I am sure that my hon. Friend is aware that the Labour Rural Research Group recently did a report on rural poverty, which identified that on average someone living in a rural area is spending £39 more per week on transport costs. That was described as a rural penalty. Would he agree that there is also a coastal penalty, and that ultimately the Government need to abandon their one-size-fits-all approach to running this country and identify the differences between rural, coastal and urban areas?

My hon. Friend makes a positive point on something that has been overlooked in Government debates until today. We need to recognise the differences between the various parts of our country, celebrate those differences, but also recognise the unique problems that they all face.

My hon. Friend and constituency neighbour is right to point out Poole’s history as a fishing and port town; like my constituency, however, it is also a tourism town. Bournemouth has millions of visitors every year; most of them come to spend a nice time, but some come to drink excessively, start fights and disrespect residents and our local area, putting excessive pressure on our police forces. Would my hon. Friend agree that, where those seasonal pressures are predictable, forces such as Dorset police should have a fair funding formula to reflect that?

I agree with my hon. Friend and neighbour, and I will make that point later in my speech, if colleagues will let me make some progress. Life expectancy, healthy life expectancy and disability-free life expectancy are all lower in coastal areas, and the gap between more affluent and poorer areas continues to widen. Professor Whitty makes it clear that high levels of deprivation, driven in part by major and long-standing challenges with local economies and employment, are important reasons for the poor health outcomes in coastal communities. That means we need a new approach to dealing with the gap in life expectancy between those with limited incomes and those with large amounts of wealth. Tackling the social determinants of ill health such as housing, employment opportunities, access to healthcare and education is key to bringing about a healthier society. One of the key features linking all our coastal communities is the water that surrounds us. Poole harbour is both scientifically and environmentally important and it needs to be protected. The beauty of the harbour lies in the stark contrast between ecosystems, ranging from intertidal salt marshes and mudflats to freshwater marshes, reed beds and wet grasslands. Visitors will also discover a wide range of wintering, migrating and breeding birds. However, most of Dorset’s rivers suffer from high levels of both nitrate and phosphate pollution.

I represent a coastal city that has high levels of deprivation and inequality. Unlike your beaches, none of ours are blue flag—

Order. Ms Martin, I do not think my beaches were being discussed.

My apologies—I meant my hon. Friend’s beaches.

My hon. Friend is absolutely right that the beaches are first-class in Poole; if your constituency had beaches, Madam Deputy Speaker, I am sure that they too would be first-class. The nutrients that go into the water system come from a number of sources, including both treated and untreated sewage, as well as agricultural sources including poorly managed soils, animal waste and fertiliser. Sewage discharge has grabbed the headlines in recent months; as well as the nutrients from treated discharges, outdated infrastructure and regular system overflows in stormy weather can result in untreated or partially treated sewage entering our rivers. In Poole harbour, that can lead to shellfish contamination, as well as direct health risks that put restrictions on the local fishing industry. The Environment Agency monitors water quality at designated bathing sites from 15 May to 30 September, but not all year round, and only in the areas that have been officially recognised as suitable for bathing. In Poole there are many different types of water users, from paddleboarders to windsurfers, who are excluded from those forms of oversight. That is why we need to expand the definition of bathers, monitor water quality all year round and have a serious conversation about bringing water back into public ownership. Finally, I want to consider the issue of tourism and its impact on the local economy and public services. Like most coastal communities, Poole relies on tourism as a key part of our local economy, but with that comes a number of challenges. The local council no longer has a dedicated tourist office promoting the area or funds the kind of events on the quayside that would attract visitors, and the idea of a tourist tax or levy is contentious in my town. Government funding also fails to take account of the seasonality that my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth West (Jessica Toale) mentioned earlier. With the influx of additional people and the extra demands the area faces in terms of car parking, public order and even litter collection, both our police and fire services regularly witness a seasonal surge in demand.

I thank my hon. Friend for securing this important debate. During half-term last week, Looe in my constituency saw some really difficult antisocial behaviour, with our public services under pressure to deliver. I welcome the dispersal order that was granted and thank our frontline services for their work, but we need a fair funding formula in our communities to ensure that services are provided during peak tourist season, and I look forward to hearing more about that in my hon. Friend’s speech.

I absolutely welcome and support my hon. Friend’s point. A fair funding formula that properly reflects the diverse demands, unique demographic complexities and specific geographical challenges faced by the police and fire services is long overdue.

On the point of geographic inequalities, as my constituency is in west Cornwall and on the Isles of Scilly, it is impossible to call on emergency services from the north, the west or the south. The consequence of that geographical reality is that it is much more expensive and challenging to provide those services in such circumstances, a problem that many coastal areas face. Does the hon. Gentleman not agree that these things need to be factored into the funding formula, rather than being ignored, as they are at present?

I absolutely agree with the hon. Member’s point. As I mentioned earlier, the current funding formula is inadequate for communities such as ours. I should also just say that if anybody else wants to intervene, I have two more paragraphs to go. Finally, I want to turn to hospitality, which is a key driver of many coastal towns’ economies. Hospitality is suffering. In Poole, 486 hospitality businesses generate £239 million in annual revenue and employ 5,738 local people, but the lowering of the national insurance threshold and the removal of business rates relief, alongside new revaluations on premises, are forcing many of them to consider whether they can carry on at all. My town needs places where tourists can buy an ice cream, have a meal or enjoy a drink. What we do not want are hollowed-out high streets that offer vape shops and little else. We need a vibrant campaign for people to holiday in Britain and the necessary support for hospitality that brings the high street to life. There are suggestions that the Government are looking at a “nice pub tax”, which would hit landlords whose premises are on the waterfront and would kill off towns like Poole. I urge the Treasury to think again about such a proposal. Coastal communities may not grab headlines the way that cities with a proud industrial heritage do, but there are over 5 million residents living in 169 coastal towns across England and Wales, and they all deserve a voice and a future. They deserve a Labour Government who recognise the challenges that they face and whose policies will ensure a rising tide that lifts all the boats, not just the super-yachts.

It is very important that coastal communities are recognised for our role in the overall identity of the country, but we are also a vital way of developing economic growth in this country. As co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group for coastal communities, what I am asking for, along with many Back-Bench colleagues who are present, is a coastal economic strategy that identifies the key industrial sectors that can help us to grow. It is not only about hospitality, although that is vital; it is also about ensuring that we have a year-round economy.

Coastal communities, because of our geographical location, work very closely together, so within the Pride in Place definition of “community cohesion” we are marked down in our ability to access Pride in Place funding. Therefore, across six constituencies in Cornwall—even though Cornwall is one of the most deprived regions in northern Europe—we have had zero pounds from Pride in Place because of our community cohesion. Does the Minister agree that needs to be looked at?

I am grateful to the Minister for issuing invitations to meet to colleagues. My constituency did not get Pride in Place funding, and I would be grateful if she could find some time to have a cup of tea with me so that I can make the case for it to her before too long.

Does my hon. Friend agree that, as well as housing, education is vital, and that is really missing in coastal communities, so our constituencies are often seen at the bottom of league tables?

Will the Minister give way?

We cannot talk about coastal communities and health without talking about safety, and particularly water safety. Over the past couple of weeks, when we have had hot weather, at least 17 people are known to have died by drowning, many of them children and young adults. Will the Minister talk to other relevant Ministers about holding a national campaign before the summer, when it gets hot once again and children are on school holidays, to ensure that we prevent unnecessary deaths on our waterways?