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18 Dec 2002 : Column 882—continued
Mr. Kevan Jones (North Durham) rose—
Mr. Hammond: I am mindful of the time, so I will make a little progress if the hon. Gentleman will allow me.
I say to the Minister that this is not a solution for all England, and in their heart of hearts the Government know that. It is a response to the specific concerns of one or perhaps two areas masquerading as a final solution to the English question. We would prefer it if the Government went back to the drawing board and tried to build from established units of local government, rather than seeking to sweep them away. However, we recognise that the Government are committed to the process, and our purpose today is to address some of our specific concerns about the Bill.
5.30 pm
Clause 1 sets out the process for initiating a pre-legislative referendum and the conditions that must be met before one can be held, as well as preparations for the establishment of regional assemblies. On closer inspection, this rather large group of amendments can be whittled down. Amendments Nos. 15, 17 and 18, together with the paving amendments Nos. 43 and 44, effectively duplicate amendments Nos. 45 and 46, but were tabled because it was possible that the Standing Committee would have reached clause 26 before today, in which case amendment No. 46 could not be selected. I am glad that it has been selected, and I shall address it rather than amendments Nos. 15, 17 and 18, as it embodies our preferred solution.
Amendments Nos. 34, 35 and 36 tabled by the Liberal Democrats seek to reduce the conditions of precedent and eliminate the link in the Bill to local government reorganisation. We are sympathetic to the objection to the compulsory unitarisation of England, which the Liberals are targeting. They have correctly identified the problem, but have drawn the wrong conclusion. The correct conclusion is that the Government's proposals for regional government in Britain simply do not work—they either involve the compulsory reorganisation of local government or, in the Liberals' preferred option, the imposition of a third tier of government.
Mr. David Clelland (Tyne Bridge): Amendment No. 46 calls for a review of the boundaries of the English regions, but as they were basically drawn up by the last Conservative Government, would the hon. Gentleman tell us which ones they got wrong?
Mr. Hammond: Yes, in just a moment if the hon. Gentleman would bear with me.
Amendment Nos. 46, 24, 23, 9 and 10 address substantive issues. Amendment No. 46 deals with conditions of precedent that must be met before the Secretary of State can call a referendum in a region. Proposed subsection (3)(a) imposes a requirement for a review of regional boundaries. Members on both sides of the House will know that one of the principal
objections to the Government's proposal concerns the unwieldy and incoherent nature of the regions and their disparity in size. The smallest region, the north-east, has a population of about 2.5 million; the largest region, the south-east, has a population of 8 million. The electorate per directly elected assembly member will range from 150,000 in the smallest region to nearly 350,000 in the largest region. People in Cornwall do not identify with Bristol; people in Dover have little in common with Banbury. Arguably, only the north-east has a coherent or readily recognisable regional identity. If the regions are to work, they must be natural entities with a sense of identity.The hon. Member for Tyne Bridge (Mr. Clelland) asked why I am dissatisfied with the current regional boundaries, when they were indeed established by the previous Government. However, those regions were established for convenience as a tier of administrative government and, as vastly disparate areas, are simply not suitable for the introduction of democratically elected institutions.
Mr. Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton): For the second time in debates on the Bill the hon. Gentleman has said that the Conservatives now recognise that people in the north-east have regional aspirations. Will he tell the Committee how the Conservatives would allow the people of the north-east to realise their legitimate regional aspirations?
Mr. Hammond: We recognise—the hon. Gentleman has heard this before—that people in some parts of the United Kingdom feel that decision making in London is remote from them. We believe that it is essential to strengthen local government to ensure genuine devolution of power, rooted in natural communities in cities and counties where people have a true sense of identity. That is the way to strengthen the system of government in this country.
Joyce Quin (Gateshead, East and Washington, West): How would strengthening local government respond to regional identity, which the hon. Gentleman has conceded exists in the case of the north-east?
Mr. Hammond: I said that regional identity may exist in the north-east. Of the Government's proposed regions, that is the one where, by general consensus, there is most likely to be interest in a regional identity. If the proposal is to work, it must be an all-England solution. That is the point that I was about to make. If the Government want to engage the population, they must start from the bottom and work up.
Mr. Hammond: If the hon. Gentleman will allow me, I must make progress. We have a very constrained timetable for debate today.
Mr. Hammond: Very well. I shall give way one more time to the hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Davey: I want to explore the hon. Gentleman's logic a little further. He said that there were regional aspirations in the north-east, but that those could be realised only through regional government throughout England. Does he not realise the logical inconsistency of his argument?
Mr. Hammond: No, that is not what I said. I said that if the solution is to be workable, it must be applicable throughout England. It is no good the Government proposing a solution that purports to be a resolution to the question of governance across England, if it applies in only one or, at most, two regions.
Mr. George Howarth (Knowsley, North and Sefton, East) rose—
Mr. Hammond: I shall make some progress. Hon. Gentlemen will have plenty of opportunity to speak later.
Paragraph (a) of the amendment refers to new clause 3, which will be considered in due course in Standing Committee. New clause 3 establishes a review of the regions based on submissions from local authorities. It requires the Secretary of State to invite all local authorities to submit proposals to him for the creation of regions for the purposes of the Bill. It also requires the Secretary of State to invite other persons and bodies that appear to him to represent relevant interests to submit proposals, and to ask the Electoral Commission to comment on those submissions and make proposals to the Secretary of State for the creation of regions, having regard to the desirability of all regions being approximately equal in size—one of the great flaws in the Government's proposal—and having regard also to the need to reflect the identities and interests of local communities.
Mr. George Howarth: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, and I shall certainly support the Opposition in one of their amendments on clause 2. I am considering supporting them on this group. First, however, I should like to hear the hon. Gentleman's thinking. My argument, as someone representing a Merseyside constituency, is that Merseyside does not fit neatly into the fictional north-west. If I supported the hon. Gentleman on amendment No. 46, and in the unlikely event that it was carried, would that, in his opinion, enable Merseyside to come up with a totally different solution?
Mr. Hammond: That is the purpose of paragraph (a) of amendment No. 46 and new clause 3, which I am sure the hon. Gentleman has studied. Essentially, the local authorities in the proposed regions would be invited to make their own proposals. The Electoral Commission—not the Secretary of State—an independent body that already controls the boundary committee and has expertise in these matters, would consider those proposals and present to the Secretary of State a proposal for a sensible structure of regions that would allow identities such as the one about which the hon. Gentleman is concerned to be effectively recognised.
Andrew George (St. Ives): The hon. Gentleman pointed out that the original boundaries were set purely
for administrative convenience. He says that the proposal in new clause 3 is to establish regions of approximately the same size, but are not regions that reflect regional identities bound to vary in size? He is simply creating regions that reflect administrative convenience, not identity.
Mr. Hammond: I accept entirely that there will always be a tension, but it is no good the Minister nodding. What he is proposing are regions that do not reflect any sense of identity. What does Banbury have in common with Dover? We have already heard that the people of Lincolnshire do not want to be included in the east midlands. We have all heard in Committee that the people of Shropshire do not regard themselves as being in the west midlands. The problem already exists, and it is compounded by the huge disparity in size between the different regions that the existing structure proposes.
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