Greater London Authority Bill

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. I think that she used the word ““gridlock”” in a number of debates, but there has not been gridlock. A highlight of our debates on the Bill was what became chapter VII on public-private partnerships. In debate after debate, we told the Government that PPP would be expensive, cumbersome and that it would not work. Just a couple of weeks ago in The Guardian, the PPP arbiter, Chris Bolt, criticised Metronet, one of the two consortiums, for a ““deficient”” management structure and poor performance. Metronet estimates that the contract faces a cost overrun of £750 million by 2010. So we were right on that score. In 1999, we pressed for the Mayor to be given more powers to control rail. They were denied, and in his speech the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich explained why. It was clearly a rearguard action on the part of the then Transport Secretary to oppose any further shift of those powers. Of course, the Government are now moving in our direction and are seeking to give the Mayor greater powers over rail. My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Mr. Davey), who cannot be here today, will certainly be asking the Mayor to play a more active role in dealing with peak fares in his constituency, which are due to rise by more than a third in January. The Mayor needs to take firmer action on rail. In spite of our reservations about the PPP, Liberal Democrats welcomed the creation of the Greater London authority, which devolved power from central Government to London government. Although we object strongly to some of the Bill’s clauses—particularly those on planning, to which I shall turn shortly—its direction of travel is to be welcomed. It will enable the Mayor to draw up strategies for climate change, health and housing, to take over responsibility from the Government for the Museum of London, to set up a separate budget for the assembly, to hold confirmation hearings for some appointments, and so on. I wonder, however, how fruitful the Mayor’s setting up of a health strategy will be, given that so many of these decisions are being taken in and around London by unelected trusts. They are unlikely to listen to any of his concerns and will proceed with accident and emergency closures without his having much of a say. Three tests for the Bill will determine whether it arrives at its destination in one piece. First, does it devolve greater powers to London; secondly, is there greater devolution within London; thirdly, is there more accountability for the Mayor? As the hon. Member for Beckenham (Mrs. Lait), who spoke for the official Opposition, said, greater devolution to London must spell the end of Whitehall’s Government office for London. As the GLA’s budget and staffing levels have grown in recent years, so have GOL’s. It is an extra tier of bureaucracy that must now be scrapped. In a speech made just a couple of days ago, the Prime Minister talked about a bonfire of red tape, but I listened in vain for the announcement that GOL was for the chop. Members could be forgiven for thinking that spending on GOL would decline as responsibilities and powers were passed to the Mayor and the GLA. That has not happened. A graph has been published that tells the story: since 2000, spending has continued to rise at a dramatic rate, year on year. Admittedly, there was a slight drop in 2000, but since then both spending on GOL and its staffing levels have increased. In addition to having a ballooning budget, it overlaps many of the functional bodies that have been established in legislation, in that it works in the same areas. For instance, according to GOL’s website,"““GOL provides advice on certain roads issues…on the development of the Mayor’s Transport Strategy…extensions to traffic management orders and special event orders…advice on transport finance, major transport projects and buses.””" Why is that not the preserve of the Mayor and Transport for London? In addition to areas of overlap, there are matters for which GOL has sole responsibility that surely would sit more comfortably with the GLA and its functional bodies. Let us consider people and sustainable communities. According to its website, GOL is responsible for a wide range of activities to promote sustainable communities. It oversees the delivery of neighbourhood renewal policy, including local strategic partnerships, neighbourhood management, the new deal for communities, and so on. It also works with a wide range of voluntary sector and community organisations that are at the heart of regeneration and community cohesion in London. Surely such matters should be the responsibility of the Mayor and of the Greater London assembly. On the second test, greater devolution within London must mean the Mayor taking powers from central Government, not grasping powers such as planning controls from local councils. We will oppose a planning controls smash-and-grab by the Mayor, who already has a rather unhealthy interest in planning applications that cannot be considered strategic. His comments about many planning applications are certainly not of a strategic nature. Let us take the example of a planning application in Carshalton, in my constituency, that the hon. Member for Beckenham mentioned earlier. I do not want to go over the top, lest it leads to further delays to that project, but very significant delays arose as a result of the Mayor’s intervention. The impact on the ground was that people living in Durand close—a ‘60s estate—who had expected to move to new properties were unable to do so. As a result of the Mayor’s intervention, the whole project was delayed and there was a knock-on effect on costs. Indeed, he has intervened in 1,200 applications since taking office, and it is clear that not all those interventions were of a strategic nature. In dealing with people’s concerns about the Mayor’s taking responsibility for planning controls, the cure is simple. Deleting clauses 31 to 35 would restore the planning status quo and avoid the problem that would be created by having to define an application of potential strategic importance. That is what we will seek to achieve in Committee. If the Minister, as she mentioned in her opening statement, does manage to secure the agreement of the GLA, the Mayor, and the London councils and boroughs on a way forward—if she finds something that satisfies all their concerns, and that does not impinge on the powers of local authorities—we will of course reconsider. However, we need a fall-back position that assumes that the Minister or the bodies that she is liaising with will not be up to that very substantial challenge. If the Government decide to push through these proposals, the transparency issues that other Members have raised will have to be addressed. The Mayor will have to be much more transparent in his approach to planning; indeed, we would expect from him the same degree of transparency that prevails among local authorities. The right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich said that he does not support third-party representations, but it is my understanding that the Mayor is inclined to allow such representations in respect of planning applications that he decides to approve.