Debate on the Address

My Lords, to follow my noble friend Lord Bradshaw, I wondered what, if this debate were ““Gardeners’ Question Time””, the questions might be. Perhaps there would be something along the lines of, ““I planted some seeds a couple of years ago. There are signs of growth and I gather from the local garden centre that other places report growth but say it is a bit early to tell. Should I dig up my new little plants to check on them? Should I replace them? I have a lot of extra seeds. Are there dangers in overworking the ground and having too many plants close together?””. Perhaps it would be stretching the analogy a little far to ask about fertiliser as well. Legislation is not a cure for everything. Indeed, it is a problem when its provisions are not allowed to take root, to grow and to be assessed. In planning, it seems no time at all since we finished the last planning Bill. I will be one among many who will be happy to see local councillors able to act as local champions and play their full part in difficult applications in their own community. We are promised this—I hope it is this—in the local government White Paper. I would be even happier were I to think that this might come as a separate piece of legislation, even sooner than the Local Government Bill. But what about further reform, and how many new acronyms will there be? The previous round of legislation was originally to have included very dramatic changes in major infrastructure projects. The Green Paper proposed having decisions made by Parliament. Public inquiries were to be held through a parliamentary committee but after a short time it was pointed out, I think by a Select Committee, that parliamentarians were not keen on having to undertake this duty. Then we heard that the votes on the committee were to be Whipped and that, I hope, was the end of that. We talk of planning as quasi-judicial, but let us not forget that it is founded on the democratic process. We heard a good deal at the time about the strain of long inquiries. They are a strain, including on the dedicated objectors who, with very few resources, contribute enormously to discussions. It is essential, whatever we end up with and however major infrastructure projects are dealt with, that there is public debate and a rigorous process, giving the opportunity for all views to be put in public. I am not suggesting that infrastructure is, of itself, an evil. Indeed it is not. Transport infrastructure for public transport is necessary, and the planning system needs to deliver regeneration and growth without being a barrier to them. It is not the planning system but the need for investment which is the greatest problem. In opening the debate, the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, mentioned Crossrail. I was interested that his estimates for job creation mentioned 2016, which suggests that the funding, as well as the legislation, is on its way to being sorted out. Perhaps the noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, will be able to confirm that. Given the focus, rightly, on climate change, are we to see its effect become a material consideration in planning applications? Will the Minister comment on whether there will be joining up in this area? One could spend longer on planning, and we will. However, it appears that we will not spend very long on housing—the supply of affordable housing, the encouragement of the private rented sector or other housing issues. I am sad to say that I feel no sense that the Government are on top of these. With the Greater London Authority Bill, I shall have to declare an interest as a member of the London Assembly. These Benches have always supported the capital having its own strategic government and it will be very welcome when the Bill transfers powers from central government. To describe London as a city region may be controversial—but I am intrigued that city regions, which were much vaunted by No. 10 not so long ago, now seem to be a matter for study by No. 11 or the Treasury. I wonder what criteria there are for this study. At any rate, the issue of London will be debated in this House soon. The continued expansion of the Government Office for London makes no sense now that we have a GLA. The Government Office’s staffing levels are higher than in 1998, its budget has more than doubled, and it is no answer to say that it passes money on to the boroughs, since should that not be the job of the democratically elected Government? When the strengthening of the Mayor’s powers is at the expense of the boroughs, it is generally another matter—but we welcome much of what is proposed, with the heavy caveat that checks and balances need to be in place. Six years on from the establishment of the GLA, I still find myself explaining that the Assembly’s powers do not include any sort of veto on the Mayor. People find it counter-intuitive that those who are elected on the same electoral mandate have such a narrow role. It is little understood that the Assembly’s power to block the Mayor’s budget by a two-thirds majority means that the Mayor needs the support of only a minority of one-third of the Assembly to get his budget. I know that that is not to change, but it is an important piece of context. It is also important to understand that when the budget is set, changes to allow the head of the paid service to take responsibility for the appointments of GLA staff, including the size of the establishment, will mean very little flexibility for the individual. The current Assembly control of staffing is some sort of political check as well as administrative. It has often been asserted that the Assembly—and very often that means me—has stopped reasonable mayoral proposals going through. I have asked many times and never been given an example of that happening. The reality is that things get worked out. The Assembly will have an interesting new role in confirmatory hearings of mayoral appointments. I understand that nine appointments are to be the subject of this initially—involving the chairs and deputy chairs of the fire and police services. I suspect that it is not at the most senior level that mayoral appointments should be scrutinised; board members apart from the chair can, individually or cumulatively, have a great deal of influence. I do not think that any mayor would be so crass as to appoint a chair whose main qualification is being a crony. The Assembly’s main role is scrutiny. There is scope—indeed, I would say a need—for considerable development of this at local government level. I would say to my noble friend that scrutiny can be forward-looking, and effectively so. In the case of the GLA that means scrutiny of the Mayor of London, which office is the strong leader model. Strong leadership is the main ““bang”” in the White Paper, which is more of a whimper. The Secretary of State’s preface to the White Paper talks about ““letting go”” and about showing confidence in local government and local communities. It seems inconsistent that a presidential single person model will be rammed down the throat of local government. I do know whether the Government regard the fact that there have been few referendums for the mayoral model, few of which have led to that outcome—and some are now under threat because of local discontent—as meaning that there has been a failure of the referendum process. To put it another way, is this not an expression of local will? We hear much from this Government about choice, but it is not a term that seems to be included here—or not in a wide sense, anyway. I would like to express my gratitude to the noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, who, following the short debate when the White Paper was launched, sent me research reports in response to my question about evidence underpinning her department’s policy. I agree with the passages that were kindly highlighted by her officials, which included matters such as citizens feeling that it was very difficult to influence local policy. But to take that one example, I do not believe that it is answered by putting all executive powers in a single person who cannot be removed for four years. The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, used the term ““partnership”” this morning. It is a term that we hear a great deal. Similarly, the imposition of partnership working is a contradiction in terms, as the essence of partnership is surely that the partners choose to go into partnership—which, in most cases, as people are sensible in the local government area, they do and will continue to do. My noble friend Lady Scott of Needham Market has made many of the arguments about local government reform, which we shall come back to. I suspect that she felt as frustrated as I do that we could not spend half a day each on each topic. We might compare reform of that area with reform of this Chamber. In your Lordships' House we are focusing far too much on composition and not on the role of the Chamber. In local government we are focusing on part of the constitutional arrangements—the obvious exception is the electoral system—but not at this point, or in conjunction with the forthcoming Local Government Bill, on how local government resources itself or is resourced by others. I have enough faith in my colleagues in local government to say that it is assistance not control that they would welcome. Many have worked out how to do it for themselves. To finish, I shall quote a short passage from a book of essays on local government published by a number of Liberal Democrat colleagues. A comment is made about a Member of this House who was, until recently, the leader of a London borough, that in his, "““typically understated way no London borough has delivered more local involvement than many councils dare dream about. And clearly it works well enough for them””." The author goes on to say that he knows, "““better than anyone when to keep his head down and just get on with it. By the time anyone in Whitehall notices what is going on, it’s working too well for any civil servant or rational mind to say ‘Stop! We want you to do it this way!’ This is a lesson many council leaders would do well to learn. All governments will be prescriptive about what they want us to do, but they usually hesitate before telling us how to do it. Some of the best practice in the individual contributions comes from councils and councillors who have just got on with it””."