Examination of Witnesses (Questions 80
- 99)
MONDAY 17 OCTOBER 2005
MR NEIL
KINGHAN, MR
RICHARD MCCARTHY,
MR ROB
SMITH AND
MR PETER
UNWIN
Q80 Anne Main: How can you do that
without doing an assessment?
Mr McCarthy: Environmental impact
assessments are done for a large scheme, so you do individuals
assessments, but we can do an overall calculation using the information
that ENTEC are providing us with and we will be publishing more
information on that, I hope, later this year.
Q81 Anne Main: Will that include
the impact not just on the natural environment but on the built
environment, such as heritage?
Mr McCarthy: It does not deal
with the impact on heritage. I think those are dealt with in different
ways. I must draw your attention to the fact of the extent to
which we are now getting successful development on brownfield
land and through higher levels of density. Now, at the moment,
we will build the one point one million homes planned in the wider
South East on less land than the 900,000 homes that were due to
be built in 1997. So we are already improving the use of our existing
previously developed land and getting more homes on it.
Q82 Anne Main: In consultation with
people like conservation and heritage groups?
Mr McCarthy: They have a voice,
amongst others, as well as the voice of those who need those homes.
They are all taken into account.
Q83 Martin Horwood: First of all,
I would like to say, from the South West, that I share Ms Main's
concern about the infrastructure costs, and that is a widespread
feeling. In terms of the environmental impact, I would refer you
to the work of the Environment Agency, which is based in my constituency,
in Cheltenham, and you had better consult them before it is abolished,
on the importance of the urban fringe and the value placed on
that by people living in urban areas. My question really is about
regional government, and indeed documents like the Regional Spatial
Strategy, all 100 pages of it, going into minute detail, underline,
I think, the perceived shift. It reflects your strategic Priority
5, in the Annual Report, of promoting the development of English
regions and the shift that a lot of us perceive of power and responsibility
towards a regional tier of government, whether that is the RDAs
or the Government Offices or the offices of the regional assemblies.
The original intention in your Department's policy was to have
that going side by side with democratic development, which obviously
hit the buffers somewhat in the North East. I would like to ask
you whether or not the shift in power and responsibility to the
regions is continuing despite any new progress on democratic accountability,
or whether you are now going to reverse that, given the lack of
democratic accountability, or whether you are going to continue
with plans for regional elected assemblies?
Mr Smith: The White Paper "Your
Region, Your Choice" which then published its plans around
its vision for the regions, did always have in it a section on
improving regional arrangements where there were not elected regional
assemblies. The current policy really is about improving the way
the current regional institutions work and work together, and
that includes the indirectly elected assemblies with their co-opted
members, the RDAs, the Government Offices and also the Learning
and Skills Councils. The current policy framework is to see what
can be done to improve, to streamline the way the current regional
arrangements operate and doing that in the context of looking
at policies around other geographies, for example, the cities,
for example, the strategy for local government with Local Area
Agreements, so to try to get a set of structures where sensible
things are done at a geographical level.
Q84 Martin Horwood: On the specific
issue of democratic accountability, forgive me but the regional
assemblies do not look and feel like very powerful democratic
bodies. Certainly, the South West Regional Assembly meets very
infrequently, for one day at a time, a lot of those days are taken
up with workshop sessions rather than the kinds of debates or
inquisition that we are carrying out today and they have none
of the support that, for instance, this Committee would have,
independent of the Offices, to question the policies that are
being put before them. You talked about improving the ways of
working; how is the democratic accountability going to be improved?
Mr Smith: I think, in terms of
the democratic element, ministers do not at present have an intention
of moving ahead with direct elections, which in the terms you
are talking would be the only way to improve the democratic element.
That, of course, is separate from working arrangements and the
way business is dealt with and the possibility of the housing
allocations coming to the regional assemblies to put alongside
their planning responsibilities, and all of that is part of the
current agenda. If you are saying are there plans to increase
the democratic accountability, I am not sure that would be possible
without moving further down the road of elected regional assemblies.
Q85 Martin Horwood: That is a useful
clarification. In that context, is there not going to be a growing
democratic deficit?
Mr Smith: It is not growing from
before you had elected regional assemblies.
Q86 Martin Horwood: For the rest
of England, your strategic priority in the Annual Report is to
promote the development of the English regions and we are still
seeing more and more powers going to the regional level, are we
not?
Mr Smith: The powers that ministers
are suggesting, particularly housing allocation powers, will be
coming down from central government.
Q87 Martin Horwood: Really? Certainly,
the South West Regional Spatial Strategy includes details on exactly
where housing is envisaged around bits of my constituency. That
seems to be a power which previously has been carried out at local
and county planning level and which now, at the very least, has
gone up in framework terms to the region?
Mr Smith: I am sorry, I was talking
about giving advice to central government on housing allocations
in the region, which currently is done by the Government Offices,
and the proposal is that we move under the Barker recommendations
to the regional assemblies. From that view, it would be a central
government function going to the regional assemblies.
Q88 Martin Horwood: The thing I have
just described, the planning framework, is certainly moving up
from county and districts to the region, is it not?
Mr McCarthy: Can I just clarify
that. It did that in the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act.
As you know, we moved from Structure Plans to Regional Spatial
Strategies and the regional planning body, which is part of the
regional assembly, does not set that, it recommends a regional
planning policy, a Regional Spatial Strategy, to the Secretary
of State. It has not been delegated, decision-making powers other
than decisions to recommend actions to Government and, you will
be aware, that went through a democratic process in the House
of changing from Structure Plans to Regional Spatial Strategies.
Q89 Martin Horwood: It seems to me
to suggest that powers have gone all the way from districts and
counties right up to the Deputy Prime Minister?
Mr McCarthy: They are always recommended
to the Secretary of State.
Mr Unwin: Can I just be clear
that the powers Rob Smith was talking about, which again are going
from central government, are the recommendations on financial
allocations to local authorities and housing associations on housing,
They will go from central government.
Q90 Dr Pugh: Can I just pick up on
the financial allocations. I have seen a paper in the North West
which has gone to an executive committee of the Regional Assembly
which prioritises transport projects worth about £1.35 billion
of its £800 billion and that more or less is going to be
spent on trams. That is a very major, major decision for the North
West, for all the communities in the North West, for all the businesses
in the North West. That was made by a body which probably nobody
knows exists, which is a creation that has appeared off the back
of the collapse, to some extent, of the regional government agenda.
Does it not concern you that such major, major decisions are made
by a very limited number of people and does it not concern you
also that, having prioritised huge transport projects like this,
there is not some further process by which that can be either
democratically tested or, at the very least, consulted on? You
can imagine that businesses all over the North West do want to
know where the roads are going to be built and the trains are
going to be developed, or cancelled, or whatever. To have it made
by a very small executive committee of co-opted people, is it
not disturbing and do you not think something should be done in
order to rein that in?
Mr Smith: I think, plans of that
type tend to get reflected across various strategy bodies within
the region, including the RDA, and I think there is significant
consultation around the region on those major issues. Then that
constitutes advice to Government about policy.
Q91 Dr Pugh: That is the crucial
point. The consultation at the first stage is all very pleasant
and very affable and everybody puts their projects in and everybody
gets consulted on them. Then they make a decision and that decision
goes to the Government without any recourse to a further process
of consultation. What I am saying is that people are quite happy
to put in their two-penny-worth but when the priorities are written
down and it is decided what is going to be done and what is not
going to be done that has enormous repercussions for the whole
region. Therefore, there needs to be some further stage of accountability
after prioritisation is done and not simply the list signed off
and sent off to Government. Do you not think so?
Mr Smith: Clearly, there is a
range of options about how you could consult further on these
kinds of prioritisations. I do not think that ministers have any
plans for that just at the moment.
Dr Pugh: Perhaps there ought to be.
Chair: It is clearly something we can
take up when we have the ministers here.
Q92 Mr Betts: The new Firelink radio
system, which we are all eagerly anticipating, as I understand
it, now it is quite likely that some of the Regional Control Centres
will be up and running before the Firelink system is installed.
Is that the best way to go about things, to have a new control
centre and then have to change the technology within a very short
period of time?
Mr Smith: We are currently working
on the plans for the interface between Firelink and Fire Control
to make sure that, as both projects move forward, you get the
best possible fit between the two. It is possible for the fire
control rooms to operate under the existing technologies and for
Firelink to be linked to the existing control rooms, so you have
got some flexibility. The ideal would be to try to line up the
control rooms and the Firelink technology as closely as possible.
Q93 Mr Betts: What I gather from
that answer is that we are committing ourselves to a major investment
in control centres, a major investment in Firelink and only now
is the Department getting down to thinking about how they might
relate to each other?
Mr Smith: There has been work
on these interfaces which has been going on for a number of months
before now. We needed to be clear about the need to keep refining
that work as we were clear about the Fire Control decision, which
was made only fairly recently, about the location and the number
of the Fire Controls.
Q94 Mr Betts: The principal decision
on Fire Controls was made some time ago. Are you saying that we
made the decision on the Fire Controls without thinking how it
related to Firelink?
Mr Kinghan: No. The decision to
go ahead with the Regional Control Centres was made and confirmed
only in August.
Q95 Mr Betts: For the specific centres,
the principal was agreed?
Mr Kinghan: No. The decision was
left until after the general election to confirm. Ministers did
consider, because, as I am sure you know, there has been a degree
of controversy about regional control rooms, and a final decision
was not made until after the general election and then announced
in August.
Q96 Mr Betts: The locations were
announced in August. I thought the decision actually to have Regional
Control Centres was made earlier?
Mr Kinghan: No.
Q97 Mr Betts: Let me pick up the
Firelink issue. In this brave new world of joined-up government,
presumably you have attempted to learn some lessons from your
colleagues in the Home Office about the disastrous implementation
of the new systems in the Police control rooms?
Mr Smith: Certainly our experts
talk to both the Police and to the Fire Service about lessons
to be learned generally, in terms of introducing projects of this
sort.
Q98 Mr Betts: Specifically, that
is a very similar system, introduced for a major emergency service
and unfortunately it did not work for months, and even now members
of the public and police officers on the beat will keep telling
you how bad it is, in terms of actually dealing with its job of
receiving calls and passing them on. It does not work properly
even now, does it, in many places?
Mr Smith: I think really that
is something for Home Office officials to answer.
Q99 Mr Betts: Are you learning lessons?
Mr Smith: We are both in touch
to learn the lessons and we hope the Firelink equipment will work
as specified.
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