Speeches by Green.

“You are trying not to restrict yourselves.”

“Just to be very selfish for a second, I represent a constituency in Buckinghamshire, which is a unitary authority, not a strategic mayoral authority. How will places that are not part of strategic mayoral authorities benefit from the fund we are talking about?”

“Understood. It sounds like money has already been unlocked and has already started flowing. Have I understood that correctly? Amy Rees indicated assent. Dame Sarah Healey indicated assent.”

“How much of the £21 billion will be available for new unlocking land investments?”

“My constituents did not want HS2, and they have been putting up with the disruption of construction for years. Some of them warned that this would be a colossal waste of money, and they were right. This railway is costing nearly a billion pounds a mile. Every pound of cost overrun is a pound not spent on the local infr…”

“Is there a wider comms plan beyond writing to them?”

“Thank you for clarifying that.”

“I may have misheard you. Did you say that you were going to write to all those with unclaimed— John-Paul Marks indicated assent.”

“Back in 2016, HMRC gained legislative powers for your special measures regime. For 10 years, you have had the power to sanction poor behaviour by the worst offenders. Why have you never used those powers?”

“Thank you.”

“Thank you. I will stop there, because my colleague has some follow-ups.”

“I want to ask about the time it takes for these cases to be resolved. The Report says that the large business directorate has been closing compliance interventions more quickly in recent years, and that we should congratulate you on that, but it is still taking 17 months, or at least it was when the Report was written.…”

“Some of it is out of your hands.”

“Do you expect that figure of 17 months to reduce?”

“A few moments ago, you mentioned litigation. I know it is a much smaller cohort of cases, but where businesses decide to litigate, their cases are taking significantly longer. I thought I had misread this figure, but they were taking 97 months in 2024-25. That is a long time. What work are you doing to bring that numbe…”

“I declare an interest as a member of the all-party parliamentary group on the loan charge. My colleague said that you are spending £31 million a year on loan charge compliance. To date you have settled only £52 million of a total £1.7 billion tax liability, so how can you give us assurance that the approach you are tak…”

“I am not clear on how that will help to bring that number down. Are you saying that it is unlikely to come down?”

“To turn to the governance and management of the different interdependencies, paragraph 18 of the NAO Report states: “Inadequate governance of interdependencies is still hindering clusters’ planning for the value for money and delivery of shared services”. I would like to understand how you are managing your five interd…”

“If there is a problem, what is the route to a decision?”

“If you identify an issue, who ultimately has the lever to mandate a decision?”