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Mr. Raynsford: I regret giving way to the hon. Gentleman because he added nothing to the debate by repeating the entirely inaccurate allegations that he made in his speech.
 
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It is important for the debate to have a proper and serious tone, so let me explain the three main new policy developments affecting assemblies' powers that have been made since the regions White Paper was published. First, the June 2003 White Paper on fire and rescue services announced that responsibility for fire and rescue services will transfer to a regional level in regions that choose to have an elected assembly. That mirrors the effective arrangements that already exist in London and will help to ensure that fire and rescue services are properly equipped to respond to the many new challenges that exist, not least those posed by international terrorism that require co-ordination beyond the level of existing fire authorities.

Mr. Philip Hammond (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con): The Minister repeated that regional fire authorities will be created where there are elected regional assemblies, but the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister's business plan, which appeared earlier this week, says that regional fire and rescue structures would be imposed only where elected regional assemblies were created and

"elsewhere to promote an effective regional dimension".

Will the Minister confirm whether regional fire and rescue authorities will be imposed under any circumstances where elected regional assemblies have not been created?

Mr. Raynsford: The hon. Gentleman was a member of the Committee that debated that at enormous length, so he knows perfectly well what the arrangements are.

Mr. Hammond: That is different.

Mr. Raynsford: No, it is not. My explanation is exactly the same as the one I gave in Committee, and I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman has forgotten it. The clear commitment that we have given time and again is that where people vote for an elected regional assembly, it is right that there should be a regional fire and rescue service that is democratically accountable to that assembly, as is the case in London. Otherwise, regional management boards will be brought together by the existing fire and rescue authorities to deal with matters that need to be handled at a regional level, including resilience planning, anti-terrorist arrangements, procurement and so on. The hon. Gentleman knows all that—it is exactly what we have always said, and it remains our policy.

Mr. Hammond: Is the ODPM business plan wrong when it sets an objective of delivering

"regional Fire and Rescue Authorities in regions voting for an Elected Regional Assembly, and elsewhere to promote an effective regional dimension"?

Are those words wrong?

Mr. Raynsford: The wording is designed—and I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman is having difficulty with this—to support the creation of regional fire and rescue authorities in areas where there is an elected regional assembly.
 
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Mr. Jenkin: That is not what the business plan says.

Mr. Raynsford: Would the hon. Gentleman contain himself and listen to the reply that I am trying to give the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge?

Elsewhere, the aim is to have appropriate structures to ensure that things that need to be discharged at a regional level are so discharged. That has been explained time and time again. I know that the hon. Member for North Essex does not want to believe it because he has a conspiracy theory about regionalisation. He is wrong and, as on so many issues, the Opposition are showing that they do not understand the policy of devolution.

Richard Younger-Ross (Teignbridge) (LD): I was not here for the beginning of the right hon. Gentleman's speech, but people would be more convinced that the Government were in favour of regional governance if regional authorities were given the same powers in relation to regional fire authorities as the Welsh Assembly. A number of regional assemblies will cover areas bigger than Wales but will have fewer fire protection powers than the Assembly.

Mr. Raynsford: The hon. Gentleman made that point in Committee. The model that we have broadly followed is the model used by the London assembly, with the distinctions that I highlighted in response to the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Mr. Davey). We envisage a strategic authority in the English regions. London is to all intents and purposes an English region, and it is appropriate that other English regions should have broadly comparable arrangements.

I was speaking about changes to the fire service. We announced in February 2004 that we would strengthen the powers of elected assemblies in respect of regional planning. The third new development concerns the involvement of stakeholders—business, trade unions, the voluntary sector, faith communities, representatives of rural areas, young people and ethnic minorities, and other interest groups—in the work of elected regional assemblies. Following consultation, we concluded that elected regional assemblies should be subject to a duty to introduce proposals for involving stakeholders in their work. How they do so will be for them to decide—that is the nature of devolution—but they cannot ignore the concerns of stakeholder groups. That is all part of the new, more inclusive approach towards arrangements for governance that we are putting in place.

Mr. Mark Francois (Rayleigh) (Con): Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Raynsford: No, I should like to make progress as I have given way many times.

From the outset, we made it clear that our proposals are designed to add value and minimise bureaucracy, which is why we have proposed small, streamlined bodies consisting of 25 to 35 members. At the same time, we made it clear that three tiers of Government below the national level—regional, county and district—are too many. We therefore insisted that if people voted in a referendum for an elected regional assembly in their region, that must be accompanied by unitary local government throughout the region, which follows the
 
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pattern in Scotland, in Wales and in London. The boundary committee has now completed its review and set out options for unitary local government in Cumbria, Lancashire, Cheshire, Northumberland, Durham and North Yorkshire. The residents of those two-tier counties will have a say on their preferred option in the referendum, which is another advance in letting people express their preferences—something that the Opposition never did when they imposed wholesale reorganisation on local government in the 1990s.

Mr. Gordon Prentice: We know that there will be fewer local authority councillors in the new local government configuration proposed by the boundary committee, but can my right hon. Friend estimate the number of councillors that we will lose?

Mr. Raynsford: As my hon. Friend knows, that will depend on the proposed configuration, but as I said in response to our hon. Friend the Member for West Lancashire (Mr. Pickthall), we are not in a position to give figures until there has been a proper consultation on the committee's proposals. However, we will do so, and my hon. Friend the Member for Pendle (Mr. Prentice) will know that the boundary committee's proposals involve a significant reduction of the existing 50 local authorities in the six northern counties to a total of between seven and 19.

Mr. Francois: I thank the Minister for his courtesy in giving way. A few minutes ago, he mentioned regional planning, which is intimately connected to the issue of housing and regional housing boards. He knows that that is extremely controversial in Essex, where the Government's attempts to increase the amount of housing is a principal reason for the effective slaughter of the Labour party on 10 June. It even lost Thurrock, which it has held for decades. Why does the Minister think that the Labour party was slaughtered in Essex on that day?

Mr. Raynsford: I regret giving way to the hon. Gentleman, because this is a debate about devolution and elected regional assemblies. To the best of my knowledge, he has not shown any interest in having such an assembly in Essex, so I should like to get back to the agenda and talk about elected regional assemblies in those parts of the country where referendums will take place.

I should like to say a few words about the way in which the referendum is conducted. During the parliamentary passage of the Bill that enables the referendums to be held, many concerns were voiced about turnout, and we agreed that it was vital to do everything possible to encourage participation. We have, as hon. Members know, conducted an extensive programme of electoral pilots at local government elections that demonstrated very clearly the scope of all-postal ballots in achieving dramatic increases in participation, in many cases doubling the number of voters in traditional ballots. In its evaluation of the 2003 pilots, the Electoral Commission concluded that, subject to certain safeguards, all-postal elections should be adopted as the norm for future local government elections. Against that background, we concluded that it would be sensible to use all-postal balloting in the
 
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three northern referendums. We announced our decision last autumn and it was welcomed by the Electoral Commission. That is the basis on which we have been proceeding, with the agreement of the Electoral Commission.

Following the June 2004 elections, we held further discussions with the Electoral Commission, which once again will conduct an evaluation of the electoral pilots that must be completed by 13 September. In those discussions, the commission suggested that we delay laying the orders necessary to allow the referendums to be held until after its evaluation of the June pilots was published. We in turn pointed out that because of the specific commitments already given to Parliament about the referendum period and the provision of information to all electors, it would not be possible to hold the referendums this autumn if the orders were not agreed before the summer recess. In seeking a sensible way forward to try to meet both concerns, we gave an undertaking to the House last week, which I am happy to repeat today. To enable the autumn timetable to be met we need parliamentary approval of the orders in July, but we undertake not to proceed with the all-postal referendums as planned if the Electoral Commission's evaluation of the 2004 pilots produces convincing evidence leading to the conclusion that it would be unsafe to do so.

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