Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill

I am happy to respond to the spoken to moved by the noble Baroness. I appreciate what she is trying to do and I will give as much background as I can about why we have arrived at this position. Essentially, we wish to extend the empowerment of parish councils, giving local people as much freedom as possible to enhance their own well-being. That is the purpose of Clause 79. Among the long list of parish councils’ current powers is that given by Section 137 of the Local Government Act 1972 to undertake actions which will bring ““direct benefit”” to the parish or its inhabitants. As the noble Baroness knows, I am sure, power is limited in effect, not least because there is a ceiling on the extra amount per head that parishes can spend. It is currently £5.64, although few councils spend that much. Clause 79, taken with Schedule 6, will release eligible parish councils from these constraints, including the financial ones, giving them broad powers to promote the social, economic and environmental well-being of their areas, and to commit their council tax payers to such expenditure as they see fit. That means that they will have powers broadly equivalent with regard to well-being as the principal authorities. Obviously, it is an extremely valuable power and it has been welcomed. It signifies the importance and trust we place in parish councils and the expectations that we have of them for all the reasons that we discussed earlier. But the breadth of the power will also mean that they will need to spend less time investigating whether some proposed action falls within the ““direct benefit”” test. To take one example, they may decide to support more extensive youth activities. They may wish to take part in joint ventures with community groups. They may want to spend money on publicity or to underpin the efforts of others by providing financial guarantees. Of course, they can use it wherever they currently rely on Section 137—a typical example being where a parish wishes to contribute to the expenditure of another local authority. The power of well-being is potentially very broad, but we have not sought to constrain it by placing statutory limits on eligible parishes’ expenditure, nor by taking capping powers. In the light of that, we are convinced that it would be prudent to have some safeguards in place. As Committee Members have already said, parish councils vary enormously in size, ambition and competence. So we have to have some test to ensure that those who exercise this new power, which is potentially very considerable, have the capacity and competencies that they need to do so knowledgably and effectively. That is why we include the notion of eligibility. What do we mean by ““eligibility””? The local government White Paper said that eligibility would be based on that for the non-statutory quality parish scheme, which is a good starting point. We are in the process of doing that, with the help of the Local Government Association, the National Association of Local Councils, the Society of Local Council Clerks and others. We have made available to the House a statement of intent about this—and if the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, has not seen it, I shall make sure that she has it. In brief, the quality parish scheme provides for tests of criteria for electoral mandate; qualifications of the clerk; the numbers of council meetings; the nature of communication that is used in relation to the constituency; the production of an annual report; proper accountability; and an ethical framework. We are not using those tests en bloc, because that would not be appropriate for what this money and new competence could be used for. We intend to draw from those tests a set of conditions against which a parish council will be able to assess itself and decide whether it is eligible to use the well-being power at the time when it contemplates using it—because it will be ad hoc in the sense that a council will want to engage in a particular project, activity or initiative. It is a sort of non-statutory kite mark, awarded for a period of years by an independent peer group, but it will enable everyone to have some notion of competence. However, it is definitely not about arbitrarily limiting the number of parish councils that can use the well-being power. It is simply about ensuring that these powers are exercised sensibly. I hope that after that description the noble Baroness will agree that we have to have safeguards, not least because we must ensure that the local inhabitants are not necessarily made vulnerable to potentially—and perhaps sometimes accidentally—unwise decisions.