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23 Jan 2003 : Column 506—continued
Mr. Graham Stringer (Manchester, Blackley): I should like to make one thing clear in response to the speech made by the Conservative spokesman. I voted for the Bill on Second Reading because of the Labour party manifesto commitment to give people a choice about whether or not they wanted elected regional assemblies. I have become persuaded that the detail of the Bill will not deliver what it is supposed to deliver, so it would be wrong to deny people the right to vote against having an assembly.
If the Deputy Prime Minister reaches the judgment that people in the north-west have sufficient interest and they are given the right to participate in a referendum, I hope to persuade them to vote against having an assembly. The reason for that is that this paving Bill has been wrapped up by those who support it with the view that it will somehow solve the West Lothian problem, that it will tackle regional disparities and that it will deal with the democratic deficit that those of us who live in the regions believe exists. We do not have enough say in many of the public bodies that deliver our services.
I came to believe, as we considered the Bill clause by clause in Committee, that it will not do what was outlined in the White Paper. I also do not believe the argument that there is a great deal of desire for it in my part of the world, the north-west. I share the view that the north-west is a recent fiction of the television companies. We can solve the conundrum that was posed by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs. Ellman), who rightly commented that MORI polls and surveys conducted by the BBC give different results from those conducted by Granada. If people are asked whether they want more democracy and more say in things, by and large they say yes. That is especially so if one puts it in the context of the years of Conservative Government during which people in the north-east, the north-west and Yorkshire—indeed, most of the regions—were deeply resentful. People will then say, "Yes, we want less of that and more control over our own lives." To put it in a different context—this would be true in the case of Manchester or Liverpool—if people are asked whether they want more bureaucracy, more politicians, elected regional assemblies whose members represent constituencies of a quarter of a million people, or a loss of power from local authorities, they give a completely different answer.
Mrs. Ellman: Does my hon. Friend accept that the proposals in the Bill are not about removing powers from local authorities, but about democratising the powers that exist in an unelected manner in the regions? In particular, they deal with accountability for regional development agencies, housing investment, heritage, sports and cultural funding, and many other areas in which regional decisions are taken on a north-west basis without elected accountability.
Mr. Stringer: The answer to that depends on one's historical understanding of where the money that funds the regional development agencies comes from. Much of the money that used to be in the urban programme was given to the Housing Corporation and to English
Partnerships and has now appeared in the regional development agencies. We are dealing with a historical process that has taken resources from the local level and put them much further up. I do not accept the basis of my hon. Friend's position.My right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister, like my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside, has a long history of supporting regional government. There is a debate to be had, and we are having it. It is certainly necessary to take some control away from the centre and to democratise many public services. However, I am deeply suspicious, given our debates in Committee and on Second Reading, because the Bill proposes unique mechanisms that, as far as I am aware, do not exist anywhere else. When the Government rightly proposed that city and district councils should have the right to decide whether they wanted an elected mayor, the electorate were given the right to campaign and petition for a referendum on that. In other instances of changes in the democratic structures, the Government have stipulated the right way to do it and imposed it. I may be wrong—one's knowledge is not always complete in such matters—but I cannot think of a precedent whereby the decision on whether to have a referendum about a regional assembly is dependent on the subjective judgment of my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister. When challenged in Committee, my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Front Bench were unable to give any indication of what the subjective opinion of the Deputy Prime Minister would be when he came to consider whether there was indeed sufficient interest.
When we looked at the document that was being sent out to various bodies to get information from them, we noticed that question 7 asked respondents to give not only their own subjective impression but their subjective impression of whether other people were interested. As a basis for changing the structure and seeing whether there is an interest, that is entering the land of fantasy. As I said in Committee, given my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister's commitment to this matter, the only real test that the Government will use is whether, in a particular circumstance, that referendum will be winnable.
4.30 pm
Mr. Kevan Jones: I understand my hon. Friend's position, and I understand that some people in all regions, including the north-east, are vehemently against elected regional assemblies. But is it not a fact that the Bill will give local people the say in whether they want a regional assembly? It will not be down to the Deputy Prime Minister, or any Minister. It will be down to the people. What is he afraid of in relation to people being given a choice about whether they want an elected regional assembly?
Mr. Stringer: My hon. Friend has misunderstood what I was saying and what is in the Bill. People in the north-east and the north-west will not be given the right to say whether they want a regional assembly if my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister does not think they are interested enough. The Deputy Prime Minister will have the right to say whether they have that right. My point was simply that the people of the north-east or
the north-west should be able to petition to have that right to vote. I hope that my hon. Friend will agree with me on that point.The hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) said that it was a debate in Committee that led him to present new clause 4. That is what has led to my suspicion that my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister wants elected regional assemblies. We have a regional assembly: should that body funded by the Government and by local authorities be allowed to spend that public money to campaign and work for what is clearly a political end and a matter of political dispute between the parties and within the parties?
My right hon. Friend the Minister for Local Government and the Regions has sent a letter to me and other members of the Committee saying that he has reiterated the legal position to those bodies: unless they are spending private sector money, they cannot campaign on those issues. I shall read just two sentences from the letter printed in the Manchester Evening News on 6 December 2002 from the chief executive of the north-west regional assembly. He said that
- "it is essential for the future prosperity of Manchester and the whole of the north west that the region has the chance to elect its own regional assembly."
- "The north west needs to be one of the first regions to hold a referendum and gain our regional voice."
Ministers are convinced that the north-east and the north-west should have elected regional assemblies. I think that there are other political priorities. It was a mistake for Ministers, in their Labour party capacity, to say that resources from the Labour party office should be devoted to winning this campaign. I would not want to overestimate the problem, but there is a threat from the British National party in parts of Lancashire. Our campaigning efforts would be better directed at that.
I shall conclude my remarks, as I know that many other Members wish to speak. The need for devolution exists but, unfortunately, the mechanisms in the Bill will not lead to its achievement.
Mr. Edward Davey: It is right that the House should focus on the two key issues: the definitions and boundaries of the regions and the fact that the local government reviews, which the Government seek to link with the referendums on the regions, should be decoupled from them. People outside the House recognise that the Bill requires amendment in both regards.Liberal Democrats have led the opposition on the two issues from the start, and I am pleased that the Conservatives have realised, after the proceedings in Committee, that they are the two key issues and have
woken up to that fact. Although the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) took 30 minutes to make his points, I am delighted that he has recognised that the Liberal Democrats' agenda for opposition to the Bill is the right one.Decoupling the local government review from the referendums is one of the key issues, and the hon. Gentleman said that Liberal Democrat amendment No. 26, which would achieve that aim, is wrong and would not allow democracy to prevail. However, it has been our policy for a long time—we have a policy; the Conservatives do not—that the regional assemblies should decide the review of local government in their region. That is the democratic way. We have tabled amendments and, although some of them have not been selected, the hon. Gentleman can read the amendment paper and see them for himself. The fact that he dealt with the Liberal Democrat case by ignoring those amendments does him no credit.
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