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5 Mar 2003 : Column 881—continued
4.15 pm
This shortened debate is important. The Minister will understand that, on this side of the House, we are not great enthusiasts for regional government. We are concerned that the Government have a stealth policy towards local government: they keep pushing powers to the regions and employing more people there, but without there being any great demand for that, from my constituents anyway. The Government ought to be more explicit about the sort of deal that people will get. Financing will be critical in whether or not people will support regional bodies.
Mr. Leslie: I am glad that the hon. Member for Poole (Mr. Syms) found my earlier intervention interesting. Let me elaborate on it, because I am concerned about new clause 8 and amendment No. 3. Let us be clear about what the new clause will do. It would make it impossible for anything in part 6 of the Bill to allow the raising of revenue for any regional body. However, part 6 does not contain foundation revenue-generating instruments; it simply contains a number of measures that amend existing council tax provisions. The effects of new clause 8 would not be straightforward. For example, the new clause would mean that any revenues that were generated or changed because of alterations to the revaluation cycle would not be able to go towards regional bodies. However, other parts of council tax revenue would be able to go towards regional bodies, which is rather curious. Highlighting technical flaws in a new clause is sometimes a Minister's last refuge, but there are more substantive issues that I would like to raise.
Matthew Green: I am sure that the Minister is just about to raise those substantive issues, but this may be a good time for him to let us know what the Government's thinking is on the possible future need to raise money regionally. Without making any commitments, can he tell us what the likely mechanism will be, so that people can have some preparation time?
Mr. Leslie: The hon. Gentleman will recall from his late-night reading of the White Paper, "Your Region, Your Choice: Revitalising the English Regions", that funding and decision-making powers will not be taken away from local government but from Whitehall. I commend the White Paper to all hon. Members; it will make that point clear, even to the hon. Member for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown). Funding and decision-making powers will be devolved to elected regional assemblies, should they be set up. Funding for
programme expenditure would come from revenues that had already been determined and decided by central Government, rather than being raised wholly from local council tax payers. In that respect, hon. Members on the Conservative Benches have set a hare running in the wrong direction. I hope that what I have said usefully corrects their view.
Mr. Clifton-Brown: My hon. Friend the Member for Poole (Mr. Syms) raised an important point. If the Government are setting up a mechanism to discover whether people want referendums on elected regional assemblies—with all that that would involve in sorting out the different tiers of local government—people are entitled to know what those regional assemblies are likely to cost, and whether council tax, or something else, is to be the mechanism for that. I hope that the Minister will be able to answer those points in the best possible spirit.
Mr. Leslie: We have not yet passed legislation to create regional assemblies. A Bill is going through the House that will enable referendums to be held on the establishment of elected regional assemblies. However, legislation on how those assemblies would operate and the programmes that they would undertake has yet to come.
The White Paper suggests that a precept on council tax could be levied for the administrative running costs of elected regional assemblies, but not for the programmed expenditure. We anticipate that about 5p a week would be the typical levy on a band D council tax payer. That small amount would go towards the administrative running costs of an elected regional assembly. However, we should not rule out other possible precepting capabilities for a regional assembly. If local people choose in a referendum to have a regional assembly, and if they wish to see revenue generated for regional expenditure, who are we to stop them?
Mr. Clifton-Brown: The Minister has just said something very significant. On top of the new council tax band D bills of more than £1,000 that will be imposed, he has just said that he expects a regional council tax precept to be around 5p a week. Is he saying that £25 a year will be added to those huge increases—[Interruption.] If my maths is right, 5p a week is £25 a year—
Mr. Clifton-Brown: I got the decimal point in the wrong place. Even so, the principle would be established that a precept could be put on the council tax to pay for the running costs of regional bodies. Could the Minister confirm that?
Mr. Leslie: Of course I can confirm that. It is in the White Paper and has therefore been in the public domain for some time. If the Conservative party has only just noticed that, I congratulate it. It would be only £2.50 a year, and I cannot see that as too onerous. We should also remember that there are already many precepting authorities for the council tax, many of which are regional bodies. That brings me to the point that the new clause could stop longstanding regional
bodies operating. For example, regional flood defence committees levy a precept on local councils. Under the new clause, they would be bereft of funding, because they would no longer be able to precept local authorities to raise revenue. Other regional environmental, planning, arts and tourism bodies would be affected, even those on which Conservatives serve. I challenge the hon. Member for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown) to confirm that he intends that the new clause should deprive regional flood defence committees and coastal defence committees of the revenue that they need to stave off potential natural disasters that could affect many people. That expenditure is extremely important and those constituents who have been afflicted by floods and disasters would be most surprised at the import of the new clause.In any case, regional chambers already exist, many of them with Conservative members. For example, 41 Conservatives sit in regional chambers in the south-east and 30 in the south-west. Those chambers derive some of their revenue from local authorities, but the new clause would prevent that. It would mean that it was Conservative policy to put an end to those voluntary regional chambers, and would be a significant constraint on the freedom of local government to contribute to them.
Mr. Clifton-Brown indicated assent.
Mr. Leslie: The hon. Gentleman is nodding and it seems to be his deliberate intention to restrict the ability of local authorities to contribute to voluntary regional chambers, even though they perform useful functions. We also hope that they will embark on the scrutiny process for regional development agencies, before elected regional assemblies are set up. That will be important work.
Andrew Selous (South-West Bedfordshire): The Minister is being disingenuous if he thinks that just because Conservatives serve on regional bodies, we think that they are the most appropriate way to serve our constituents. Conservative representatives will serve on whatever bodies currently exist, but that is not to say that we think that they are the most appropriate.
Mr. Leslie: That may well be the case. Conservative members do serve in regional chambers, but I was seeking to establish whether that was official Conservative party policy. We know that the Conservatives are opposed to elected regional assemblies and that they would not give people the choice in a referendum to establish them. However, are Conservatives opposed even to the establishment by local authorities of voluntary regional chambers? The hon. Member for Cotswold was nodding about something before. Will he confirm that the Conservatives oppose regional chambers?
Mr. Clifton-Brown: I shall deal with that later.
Mr. Leslie: I look forward to that.
I believe that new clause 8 would place a significant constraint on local government, but it is not untypical of the general policies pursued by the Conservative party when in government. In any case, part 6 of the Bill
contains no specific provisions relating to precepting, apart from discounts on council tax banding. It is clear that the new clause would have a detrimental effect.
Mr. Clifton-Brown: The Minister challenges me to say whether the Opposition are in favour of funding the voluntary regional chambers, but it would be helpful if he estimated the costs being incurred by those bodies—in the north-east, for example—and said where the funding comes from. Is any council tax precept being levied to fund those bodies at present?
Mr. Leslie: There is no precept as such, but local authorities are free to contribute whatever they like towards regional chambers. New clause 8 would prevent, constrain, inhibit and stop authorities from being able to contribute freely to the perfectly reasonable activities of regional chambers. Local authorities would not be able to use council tax to raise resources for regional bodies. I challenged the hon. Member for Cotswold to say whether or not Opposition policy is to scrap regional chambers, but his refusal to answer speaks for itself.
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