Memorandum by Dr Peter Kenway, Director,
New Policy Institute, and Mr Andy Howell, public sector consultant
and former Birmingham City councillor (DRA 05)
SUMMARY
1. As strong supporters of the idea of a
democratically elected tier of government positioned between local
authorities and Westminster, we see the postponement of the referenda
in the North West and Yorkshire and the Humber as an opportunity
to think more deeply about the kind of bill that can produce something
that is attractive enough to gain public support.
2. Our assessment of the bill in its current
form is that it gets one fundamental thing right and two fundamental
things wrong. What it gets right is the idea that regional assemblies
should only come into being if they can secure the support of
the public through a referendum. What it gets wrong are first,
the limited powers on offer to any new assembly, and second, the
restriction that the only regional assemblies that can come into
being are ones corresponding to Government Office Regions.
3. Our proposals for what should be contained
in the bill follow directly from this assessment, that is:
— That the referendum "test"
not only is essential and should be retained but that it could
be used more ambitiously, to approve or reject key aspects of
the proposed assembly's powers.
— That the powers potentially on offer
to a regional assembly should range much more widely than at present,
for example, from transport and aspects of education to water.
— That regional assemblies should be
open to what we call "sub-regions", self-defining entities
whose geographical extent follows the boundaries of a group of
counties and/or unitary authorities.
4. Above all the bill must provide a framework
for local and aspirant "regional" politicians to lead
a process of defining the remit of a regional assembly which then
stands a good chance of commanding public support through a referendum.
A REFERENDUM IS
RIGHT—BUT
THE PRIZE
MUST BE
WORTH WINNING
5. The requirement that a referendum must
be held is crucial. Because it has to win popular support, the
emergence of regional government under the Bill cannot just be
the result of a bureaucratic exercise in re-shaping the machinery
of central government. Yet this support will not be given easily.
After all, the referendum forces those proposing regional government
to answer the awkward question: why do we need another tier of
(fairly) anonymous politicians?
6. The Bill's answer is to insist upon the
abolition of one of the two tiers of local government as a pre-requisite
for an assembly. While we agree that the creation of a regional
assembly would certainly necessitate a reorganisation of local
government, we don't believe that it should be a pre-condition
for it. This means that the assembly and the extra tier of politicians
it brings into existence have to be justified in their own right.
7. It is here, though, that the Draft Bill
is at its weakest, for having insisted on the need for popular
engagement with the notion of regional government, the Bill fails
to offer much that the public can be expected engage with. In
offering a collection of powers and competencies of frankly mind-blowing
banality, the Bill follows the White Paper. Yet no experienced
political campaigner could see how this could be sold on the doorstep.
No self-respecting marketing executive could see how to mount
a campaign to develop public affection for what was on offer.
8. We conclude that in order to stand a
chance of winning a referendum, the bill needs to change in two
ways:
— first, regional assemblies must be
allowed to arise in "regions" that have a real identity
in the eyes of their public;
— second, they must possess real powers
to address problems that are seen to have a regional character
to them.
REGIONAL IDENTITY
LIES ELSEWHERE
THAN GOVERNMENT
OFFICE REGIONS
9. The creation of the Government Offices
for the Regions (GORs) ten years ago has done nothing to foster
a popular regional identity. That is not surprising: identity
does not come from bureaucratic bodies. In those regions where
a sense of identity does exist—London, the North East, and
perhaps Yorkshire and the Humber—it long pre-dates the GORs.
Even in the latter two, it is not clear whether regional identity
is going to be strong enough to legitimise regional government
on the present model. In almost all other cases, the GORs are
purely administrative constructs to which their populations feel
no sense of either affection of affiliation.
10. So where are the "regions"
that do possess an identity? Of course, we don't know for sure,
but some certainly do exist. Devon and Cornwall have a much stronger
identity as the "South West" than the GOR of that name
which stretches from Lands End to within 20 miles of the outskirts
of Coventry. We suspect that Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire may
have a much stronger sense of themselves as the "East Midlands"
than the GOR of the same name to which it would appear that many
are deeply opposed. And some of the former Metropolitan Counties,
too, possess a sense of identity: South Yorkshire and Greater
Manchester for example. We believe that the future of regional
government lies with entities of this kind, which we will call
"sub-regions".
11. Now it is certainly not the job of the
Bill to start defining "sub-regions". Instead, what
the bill should do is be as open as possible about "who"
can apply to create regional assemblies. Instead of the current
restriction to GORs, the bill should open up the possibility of
bids to create assemblies from self-defining sub-regions. At present,
that is not possible as the provisions of the bill make no allowance
for a change in the number of regions.
12. Although consideration would need to
be given to exactly what would constitute a legitimate bid for
sub-regional status, we believe that any such bid would have to
be driven by local politicians, whether from unitary authorities
or counties. This seems to us to be crucial: unless the local
politicians with the energy, vision and standing see a regional
assembly as a prize worth securing, nothing worth having with
that name can arise.
A REGIONAL ASSEMBLY
MUST BE
ABLE TO
DO THINGS
THAT MATTER
13. Even where a regional or sub-regional
identity does exist, it won't be enough to give birth to an assembly
unless it is seen as having something worthwhile to do, something
that matters to the people of the area. What this might be, though,
is bound to differ from place to place. The Bill needs to reflect
this by offering a range of powers of which any individual assembly
would have some but not all.
14. How should that selection be made? One
possibility would be that this should form part of the details
of the proposal for a regional assembly that the electorate is
asked to decide upon in the referendum. The referendum could,
for example, contain two alternative sets of powers, a "greater"
one and a "lesser" one with the electorate asked to
choose between the two. True, this complicates the referendum,
but no more so now than the current requirement upon the electorate
to vote for how they want local government reorganised. And unlike
reorganisation, the "powers" question is directly related
to the role of the assembly and whether it is worth having.
15. What powers might these be? We believe
that the bill has to be far bolder in what it would allow, subject—as
we have already said—to approval being granted through the
referendum. Powers could be extended to allow the assembly control
over:
— things that are currently administered
at a sub-region level;
— things that are at present ruled
out within the draft bill on the grounds that they are of "England-wide
importance"; things not mentioned in the draft bill which
at present are not accountable to any democratic body.
16. Transport is an example of the first
of these. The political importance of transport in a region or
sub-region is not in doubt: it has certainly "made"
the London Mayor. In those sub-regions where transport is the
responsibility of a Passenger Transport Executive (PTE), the assembly
could take over the PTE making it accountable to it. The recent
White Paper The Future of Rail foresees PTEs having a greater
financial responsibility for their decisions but also greater
flexibility over how money is spent between rail and other modes
of transport. It is arguable that this anyway requires stronger
political authority of the kind that a regional assembly would
provide. The Future of Rail also foresees an even greater shift
in responsibility for rail to the London Mayor. Why could a regional
assembly with a PTE not have the same?
17. Education is something ruled out from
the draft bill on the grounds of being a matter of "England-wide
importance". Yet there are issues that fall naturally between
the level of the individual local education authority and central
government. The policy governing admissions to secondary school
is one such issue—demonstrated by the new attempt in London
and eight surrounding authorities to produce a co-ordinated approach
to admissions[1]—while
the planning and location of schools is another. In both these
cases, local authority boundaries (especially where the area covered
is small) make little sense on the ground. The sub-region, by
contrast, may be a more sensible unit.
18. Water is not mentioned at all in the
Draft Bill, despite its environmental importance. There are some
parts of the country where water (which as an industry is divided
along regional lines) has long been a sensitive issue and there
are others where it may become so. In such an area, the assembly
could have powers to direct the water company on matters relating
to tariffs and investment. The consequences of some of these decisions,
whether on social justice today or on the state of the environment
in 25 years time, means that there is a very good case for their
being taken not by an unelected industry regulator (Ofwat) but
by a democratically elected authority[2]
19. Underpinning all of this is the question
of taxation. At the moment, the draft bill allows only for a precept
on the council tax. While the Balance of Funding Review concluded
that council tax should not be replaced by a local income tax,
it did suggest that future thinking about a local income tax should
treat it as a supplement to council tax. The idea of allowing
a regional assembly to raise its money via income tax fits that
suggestion. Funding local and regional government from different
taxes would aid transparency and accountability. It would also
help distinguish a regional assembly from a local authority, making
it look more like a "small" version of national government
rather than a "big" version of local government.
20. We therefore conclude that the Draft
Bill should allow for the possibility of the assembly raising
money via income tax, with the decision to allow it to do so being
left to the referendum. That would certainly stimulate interest.
CONCLUSION: LEARNING
FROM EUROPE
21. The task of the Bill is to create framework
within which local and aspirant regional politicians can argue
for and win a referendum for regional government in a particular
part of the country. To do that, the bill, which is both a roadmap
("how to get there") and a menu ("what you could
when you are there"), has to offer public and politicians
something worth going for. It needs to be far more open about
both the areas that can apply to have a regional assembly and
the powers that an assembly could have. Wherever it can, it should
offer options to be decided upon via the referendum.
The result of this would be to produce what
could be called "regionalism a la carte", led not for
the most part by Government Office Regions but by sub-regions.
It is a picture of regional government that is strongly influenced
by our understanding of developments elsewhere in Europe.
— The picture of "patchwork"
regional government, with varying powers and competencies according
to the wishes of the different regions' electorates, is suggested
by Spain. Indeed, the Spanish parallel is with Britain as whole
not just with England: at one extreme, "regions" with
a strong sense of national identity (Scotland and Wales, Catalonia
and the Basque Country) while at the other, non-traditional regions
(East Midlands, La Rioja).
— The view of sub-regions as the driving
force of regional development comes from a number of countries
where dynamic city-regions, emerging "from below", so
to speak, are the driving force. These regions have gone on to
form international associations with other city-regions, for example,
Lyon with Turin.
— The view of Government Office Regions
as the wrong basis for regional development in the 21st century
is suggested by Germany. There, the system of Länder introduced
after the Second World War is now seen as a barrier to the development
of dynamic sub-regions, often centred on cities, for example,
Frankfurt am Main. Administrative boundaries drawn in the 1940s
are of course the basis for our own Government Office Regions.
1 Education and Skills Committee, Fourth Report, July
2004. Back
2
Ofwat could still play a technical/advisory role in these decisions,
similar to that suggested in The Future of Rail, (eg paragraph
5.6.4) for the Office of the Rail Regulator. Back
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