Local Government Pensions Scheme (Transitional Provisions, Savings and Amendment) Regulations 2014
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham
Baroness Hanham (Con)
My Lords, I will be slightly out of line with other speakers, all of whom have local government experience as well. I have been listening carefully to the debate. As a former leader of a council and a former Minister who did not take a pension—I declare that interest—I am very conscious of the work that is done by local councillors and the extra amount that they do as a result of the changes to their responsibilities that have been made over the years.
However, I part from a number of the speeches, for which I am sorry because I am very fond of my noble friend Lord True and everyone who has spoken. I want to draw back because the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, and others have talked about the difficulty of recruiting people as councillors. I remember extremely well when allowances of any sort were first considered. The argument was that if we did not provide them, only the rich, the old and people who had time on their hands would be able to be councillors. We introduced allowances and some of them are very substantial indeed. I know that my noble friend Lord True says that they were reduced, but he is not necessarily in the majority. Over the years, council allowances have exponentially increased. I am not concerned about that but about the fact that we are beginning to use the same arguments that supported allowances for supporting the pension scheme. I have never understood why councillors were included in it, and I shall tell noble Lords why.
It is because local councillors are responsible for their position to their local electorate. They can be there, at elections, or they cannot—they can be taken away. They voluntarily stand for election. They do not know whether they are going to be councillors. They are totally reliant on the electorate to make sure that they are there and for how long. That underlines the voluntary nature of standing for a local council. The work that they do is, of course, immensely important. However, this work can be done alongside other jobs—and many people do that—and therefore I do not understand where the pension comes into it.
I understand why there are allowances. If I may say so, they were quite hard fought for at the time but the allowances are there. I do not think that my noble friend has a policy on which she is going to win very strongly but it is something where the Government have to grasp the nettle. If not, the argument will go on and on as people justify more and more expenditure for local councils.
Finally, I want to make a distinction between councillors and council officers. If councillors ever come to be seen as in any way doing officers’ work and running councils on the basis of officials, then we will have lost the plot. Councillors are there to represent people in the local community which they serve; they are not there to implement policy. There is a difference between employed people on the council and councillors, and I think that that is what drives the distinction between those who do and do not have a pension.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill (LD)
My Lords, I, too, must declare an interest, having been a councillor for 28 years and being in receipt of a very modest council pension, to which I contributed. The point is that people like me have contributed to their pension and that seems to be forgotten when we talk about the largesse that is provided.
A councillor said to me that he runs a council with a budget of more than £500 million a year and he is paid £28,000 per annum. The noble Lord, Lord True, is probably a good example of someone in that position. It is a full-time job, and the councillor and the noble Lord are not alone in that. Many people have no income other than that provided with this job, and running a council is a job. Many councillors are not full time but they devote a large amount of time to their council. My noble friend Lady Hanham said that they may be here today and gone tomorrow, but what better reason for them to have some form of pension, however small? These people are giving their time when they are not able to contribute to a pension, and the fact that in many cases they are transitory adds to the argument for them having something of substance to fall on when they get older.
I make no apology for also referring to the insult and lack of understanding from the right honourable Grant Shapps when he said that the work that councillors do is the same as volunteering to run the local Scout troop. I do not want to undervalue the leaders of Scout troops but that comment shows complete ignorance. It is demeaning and insulting, and, quite honestly, it is idiotic to make that comparison. What do councillors of all parties and no parties do? They do a valuable job which takes a great deal of time, and the idea that one can take away or reduce pension rights seems quite unfair.
Various figures have been quoted for how much this is costing. I am not sure now what the correct figures are but one that I was given was that countrywide 18,000 councillors cost £3 million. Whether it is £3 million, £5 million or £8 million is irrelevant; it is fairly modest in terms of national expenditure. I should like to compare it to the cost of the 651 Members of Parliament of up to £10 million a year. It seems quite wrong that the other place can take away pension rights when they themselves will enjoy pension rights of much greater substance.
I said that I started work at Barnet Council 28 years ago. As the noble Lord, Lord Bourne, said, that was a time when one received a tiny attendance allowance of £20 if one turned up at a meeting. Life has moved on in terms of how people are attracted to the scheme. The point was made that a percentage of people are not in the scheme. That is their choice because it is a contributory scheme. People can make the choice that they do not wish to contribute to a scheme albeit that the local authority will also contribute to the scheme. That is their choice. They make their choice because, in most cases, they have a pension from another source, they are affluent from another source or have inherited money from another source. However, that does not apply to all the people that we want to be councillors and running our local authorities, with expenditure of something like £500 million per annum.
Reference was also made to the concessions my Government have made. I look with amazement at how we regard such small droppings as concessions. We are told that rather than access to the scheme being withdrawn immediately—that was horrific on 1 April—we have a big concession that eligibility will be phased out as councillors are re-elected on 22 or 23 May. What a concession. It really is insulting. It has been agreed that local authority remuneration panels can agree to replace the pension provision with a cash allowance for councillors. My local Conservative council administration—I am chairman of its audit committee and am very involved—a little while ago decided to up the allowances by 54%. There was a public outcry and the allowances were very much reduced as a result. The public will not take cognisance of the fact that pensions have disappeared and that remuneration and allowances of councillors will be substantially reduced to take account of the fact that they are not contributing to a pension scheme. That will be regarded by the public in a very poor light and councillors should not be put into that position. The Government made a commitment that they would not criticise councils which decided to allow such payments. The Government may not criticise them but I am sure that many other people will.
This is devaluing the people who are running local government. As central government devolves so much more to local government, what message is going out to local councillors who do not have an outside income? Their efforts are being devalued by the Government, of which I am part, and I regret these regulations.
Local Audit and Accountability Bill [HL]
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham(11 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, in Committee, my noble friend said that the Government would commit to amend the legislation to create a framework to support a voluntary national procurement exercise. When she replies, I would appreciate it if she could put some meat on that earlier commitment.
Dealing with the point made by the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, if one was always looking in terms of cost savings, which seemed to be the main thrust of his speech, we would have almost the demise of all local authorities. It would be a case of, “Let us have it all done nationally and then we would save some money”. We as a Government are committed to localisation. The idea that local authorities should be to a degree able to choose their auditor is part of that localisation. There was a feeling of despair in the noble Lord’s comment about how local authorities would be less hard negotiators than the Audit Commission. I doubt whether that will be the case. Many local authorities would be very hard negotiators on their own behalf in fixing the audit fees, the level of audit taking place and how it will dovetail with the internal audit systems of the local authority. A local authority that has a good local internal audit system can probably negotiate much harder with the external auditors, because of its knowledge of its internal audit system, than the Audit Commission has in the past.
I believe that the amendments are unnecessary, and I would welcome and wait for my noble friend’s comments on how the Government will keep the commitment that she made at an earlier stage of the Bill.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Baroness Hanham)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, for introducing the amendments so succinctly and clearly and my noble friend Lord Palmer for reminding me—although I am not sure that I made a total commitment—that I said that we would return to the matter.
Both noble Lords have laid out the situation very clearly. The proposal in the Bill is that local authorities should be able to purchase or contract for their own auditor. They can do that individually, in conjunction with another authority or in a group. That is about as wide as the Bill takes it. The noble Lord and the Local Government Association have made strong recommendations that we should consider further the current situation, which is that the Audit Commission has purchased the contract for all local authorities. We have made it clear that there must be optional arrangements about this. Local authorities must be able to get their local auditors in the way that they wish. However we accept—and did accept—that there was potential for wider procurement, with a procurement body such as the Audit Commission, which did not require local authorities to purchase from it, but could be used by local authorities if they wished. So we accept that there is potential for such arrangements.
I have asked departmental officials to work with the Local Government Association to clarify what arrangements it envisages might need to be made and to get the detail right for any amendments that we would propose elsewhere. The Government intend to make an amendment to the Bill in the Commons, which will allow arrangements for optional centralised procurement to be made in regulations. I am happy to keep noble Lords who are interested in this informed.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, the purpose of Amendments 2 and 6 is clearly to try to improve the transitional arrangements. It seems to be felt that we need a certain overprotection for transitional arrangements, but when private corporate bodies change their auditors and way of management, some transitional arrangement always has to take place. It works in a natural way, without the Secretary of State being involved in every item.
Amendment 2 inserts three paragraphs. The first deals with,
“the management of existing audit contracts entered into with the Audit Commission”.
One of the main purposes of the Bill is to make the audits of the various local authorities much more the responsibility of the local authority. Its appointment of the auditor and dealings with the auditor, and the auditor’s dealings with the authority, will become a more localised matter. However, because there are a limited number of audit firms, there will be a consistency in the types of audit operated.
The main point that the noble Lord spoke about was,
“the maintenance and updating of Value for Money profiles”.
Value for money in the external audits of local authorities has been a very important and costly factor in terms of the time that the Audit Commission and private firms of auditors have spent on those activities and how much they have charged for them. Two or three years ago, the value-for-money audits carried out by external auditors were more limited. There was no large-scale review of the use of reserves, assets and finance. Under the current arrangements, external auditors do not have to carry out a prescribed list of value-for-money exercises.
Currently, before the Bill, that situation is very much localised. There is a virtue in that localisation. Different firms of auditors will possibly take a different view on what is needed within that particular local authority, and that view will have an effect on the fees charged to that authority and on how much work needs to be done. As the years progress, it will be interesting to see how different local authorities have their value-for-money details published. We hope that all local authorities will publish these, and there may need to be some national gathering of that information for comparison purposes. However, that does not necessarily need to be in the Bill. Although I understand where the noble Lord is coming from on this, I think that it amounts to a little too much control which is not needed.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Palmer for bringing some rationality into this particular aspect. I support him very much in reminding the House that this is an intention to bring to a local level the management of an extremely important part of local government’s responsibilities, which is to have proper audited accounts, but to do it in a slightly different way from what has been done in the past, without the overall management of the Audit Commission but having to take into account the fact that these have to be properly done, whether they are done on the optional basis that we are talking about—having the wider procurement—or because they have taken account of having these on their own requirements.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, from these Benches we also look forward to the Minister giving that information. Although there is worth in the amendment, I wonder whether it needs to be in the Bill rather than being done by regulation at some stage in the future.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, as the noble Lord said, I was sympathetic about his amendment in Committee. It would ensure that if the Government were to bring forward what might amount to a hybrid instrument under the powers in Clause 2, the bodies affected would be consulted before regulations were laid. This, indeed, would need to be through regulations. We do not expect that the need to bring forward regulations would be anything less than rare.
As I said in Committee, we recognise that in these cases there would be especially compelling reasons for the Government to consult. In our previous discussion I referred the noble Lord to our forthcoming response to the DPRRC’s report. We have accepted the committee’s point and informed it that we would announce our commitment, which I am doing, and consult affected bodies at Report. We confirmed that this will not entail the need for any amendment to the Bill. I am happy to give that commitment today, and to consult relevant persons on a draft of any statutory instrument containing regulations or an order falling under Clause 40(7) of the Bill. Any such regulation would be subject to the affirmative process, so Parliament would have the opportunity to scrutinise it. In the light of that commitment, I hope that the noble Lord will feel that we have satisfied his requirements.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, I would also welcome the Minister clarifying some issues, particularly if there is, indeed, a problem of a practical nature. At present, most local authorities are audited by a professional firm. A fairly small proportion is audited by the commission. Those audited by professional firms will be audited under the continuing contracts until 2017. The local authority will then have the ability to appoint a new auditor. This is what happens in the commercial world. One has an auditor, the auditor audits for a period—generally for the year, in this case for slightly longer—and then there is a new appointment. This is quite the natural way of things. I am not sure—and I hope that the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, will clarify this—why we need to have this because, in a practical sense of the word, auditors are there for a period, they finish their term of office and then they, or another auditor, are appointed. That is the natural way of things whatever we decide or do not decide in your Lordships’ House.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, first, I confirm that it is possible to introduce different parts of the Bill at different stages, and the order in the Bill can be switched around. I think the noble Lord asked whether Clause 4(2) could be introduced before Clause 4(1) and the answer is that it could—it is a case of whatever is convenient. The Bill introduces powers to commence different parts of the Bill at different times and to make savings on provisions relating to the Audit Commission Act 1998. Therefore, we would expect to commence this reference in line with the introduction of the local appointment, which I think we were discussing when the noble Lord, Lord Christopher, was here.
If the noble Lord wants to know our wider intention of how to manage the overall transition to the new audit framework, it may be helpful if I say a bit more about that. Our intent remains, as I said, to close the commission in spring 2015. The existing audit contracts will continue to run until 2017, but management of those will transfer to an interim body. We have discussed these over the three previous amendments. As the contracts will run until 2017, authorities will not need to make their own appointments until that stage, but they will have to have made those appointments so that there is a smooth transition between the contracts currently managed by the Audit Commission and whoever manages them subsequently, into the local authority’s own regime. We therefore expect that much of Part 3 of the Bill, which deals with local appointment, will not be commenced until closer to 2016, which then gives them a year to do that. It will be 2016 when procurement of auditors for 2017 is likely to begin.
The current intention is that the new eligibility and regulatory framework and provisions on the conduct of audit will come into effect immediately following the closure of the commission in 2015. It is our intention to make arrangements to enable us to do this under the powers in the Bill, subject to analysis of the transitional arrangements—again as we have discussed, there have to be transitional arrangements—that may arise.
Local Audit and Accountability Bill [HL]
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham(11 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, I will speak to these amendments, although sitting next to me is my noble friend Lord Tope, in whose name Amendment 14ZA stands. I hope the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, will confirm that we have already dealt with the collaborative basis and the fact of buying centrally. Even I was a late adherent to this, but I think we agree that in one form or another that is the way to go forward, however it can be arranged, although there were numerous alternatives. As the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, has said, there are going to be significant savings, which is something that we cannot ignore.
I have one question about a sentence in Amendment 14ZA on the appointment of a new auditor, or the re-appointment of an existing auditor, to,
“audit its accounts for a financial year not later than 31 December in the preceding financial year”.
Both the Bill and the amendment say that that appointment should be made not later than 31 December in the preceding year. I cannot work this out in practical terms. Let us say that KPMG is the auditor of a local authority or group of local authorities; it has not finished its accounts and the accounts will not be signed off until, at the earliest, the end of January the following year. That company could be under notice, according to the amendments, that it may not be, or could not be, the auditor for the ensuing year. While KMPG is finishing off its audit—the accounts will not have been finished and signed off by the relevant person in the local authority, who in my local authority is me, so I am told; I have done it three years in a row—a new auditor, PricewaterhouseCoopers, perhaps, will have been appointed.
I worry about how that will affect the mindset of the auditor who is being replaced. Enshrining within the Bill that the auditor has to be appointed by 31 December within that year will cause moral, and sometimes practical, difficulties. Perhaps the Minister will take this issue back and consider whether the wording should be “could be appointed by 31 December” or “as soon as possible by that date”. I worry how the changeover, if there be a changeover, will affect the performance of the outgoing auditor.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Baroness Hanham)
My Lords, I thank both noble Lords for these amendments, which take up the points that we made on Monday about the possibility of a centralised audit process for both larger and smaller authorities. As I understand it, the larger authorities will be run, more or less, by the LGA and the smaller authorities by the NALC. I made it quite clear that we were content to have discussions with the LGA and the NALC, to whom we are talking already, on the strict understanding that there could not be, in either case, mandatory schemes. The amendments brought forward today by the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, and the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, are flexible enough to take account of that. As I said on Monday, we are willing to continue the discussions that are already taking place. I am sure that we can come back to this issue at a later stage if anyone feels that they are not going in the right direction.
Amendment 14BZA would specifically exclude bodies that opted into such an arrangement from the need to have an auditor panel. We agree with that. If there is a centralised system it is plainly not sensible for those who are being helped by it to have their own audit panel. However, it is essential that if they are appointing their own auditor, independently or in conjunction perhaps, with another authority, they have to have an audit panel. We have discussed the make-up of an audit panel and its independent membership, and they would be required to do that.
The noble Lord, Lord Palmer, raised the question of the date of appointment of auditors. The reason behind the auditor needing to be appointed by 31 December is to ensure that if for some reason the local authority fails to make an appointment, there is time for the Secretary of State in particular to take action under Clause 12, which allows him either to direct a body to appoint or make an appointment on behalf of the authority. We will discuss this later, but it will certainly apply to health authorities, and I understand that the situation is similar in local authorities. I hear very clearly what the noble Lord says about the auditors possibly lacking the enthusiasm to carry on if they are about to be replaced, but I think the audit bodies are pretty professional, and they would need to continue.
We will discuss the appointment of auditors when we reach the amendments that are a couple of groups further on, but I think those are the main points that have been raised. As I said, I hope that we shall be able to return to this matter at the next stage with some further ideas on how the centralised but not mandatory system might work.
I hope that with those explanations, and if I have covered the points that were made, the noble Lord will withdraw his amendment.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, this goes back to what we were discussing when we were talking about local authorities. If the clinical commissioning group has not appointed an auditor by December and has no reasonable expectation of employing one by the end of March, the Commissioning Board will have to notify the Secretary of State and he, NHS England or the commissioning group will have to ensure that an auditor is appointed. There is no question that the clinical commissioning group should not have an auditor in place at the beginning of the financial year.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
Perhaps I may ask the Minister for clarification. The Bill states:
“by the end of 25 March in the financial year preceding the financial year to which the accounts to be audited relate”.
So, if the relevant year is to 31 December 2012, as I understand it, the auditor will have to be in place by 25 March 2011 because that is the financial year preceding the financial year to which the accounts to be audited relate. Is that right? I would have thought it should be in the financial year to which the accounts to be audited relate, not the preceding year. This is bringing the date incredibly far forward and I wonder whether I have misunderstood it. Perhaps my noble friend the Minister can elucidate.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, I have misled the Committee, for which I apologise. As the noble Lord said, it is the preceding year. If the clinical commissioning group fails to appoint an auditor in the preceding year at the end of March, the Commissioning Board will have to notify the Secretary of State. This gives time for an auditor to put in place the provisions for the following year. The Secretary of State has to be notified by the commissioning board by 25 March that the clinical commissioning group has failed to appoint an auditor. The provisions are intended to ensure that a clinical commissioning group has a local auditor in place in a way that is consistent with their respective roles. I agree with the noble Lord that nine months seems a long time to get someone in place.
Local Audit and Accountability Bill [HL]
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, my only point is that the latter clauses deal with the general duties of auditors but the first deals with the accounts themselves. Whereas auditors must ensure that it is a “true and fair view”, in Clauses 19 and 20, it has always been an accepted belief that with accounts prepared and signed off by external auditors—it is the chairman of the audit committee in my authority who signs off the accounts, with the chief executive—it is always a “true and fair view”. I have no real problems with it being added, but I just wonder if it is necessary.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Palmer of Childs Hill, raises a question that I hope to answer—that it should not be, and is not, necessary. We can see whether the noble Lord agrees with that at the end of what I have to say.
We intend to require larger relevant authorities to present statements of accounts that are true and fair and for local auditors to give an opinion on whether this is achieved. This requirement is not included in the Bill, but the same outcome is achieved and mirrors the approach currently taken.
Amendments 11 and 16 would put these requirements in the Bill for all relevant authorities, but we are of the view that this is not necessary. Larger relevant authorities are currently required to present accounts that are true and fair, and their auditors are required to give an opinion on whether this is achieved. I assure the noble Lord that it is the Government’s intention to continue these requirements. These requirements are currently achieved through the interaction of primary and secondary legislation, the Audit Commission Act 1998 and the Account and Audit (England) Regulations 2011. All relevant authorities must observe proper practices in the preparation of their accounts. The regulations require chief finance officers of larger relevant bodies to certify that the statement of accounts presents a true and fair view of the authority’s financial position before these are audited. We intend to mirror this requirement in the regulations to be made under Clause 31, and Parliament retains oversight of these regulations.
This approach is less complex than specifying “true and fair” requirements in the Bill, because further amendments would be required to disapply these provisions and include modified provisions for smaller authorities, which, as the Bill makes clear, are not required to ensure that their statement of accounts are true and fair. Instead, they are required to ensure that their accounts “present fairly” or “properly present”, which are briefer and more proportionate forms of accounting. It is our view that that the current split between primary and secondary legislation works, and we intend that the interaction of the Bill and regulations under Clause 31 will continue to require larger relevant authorities to ensure that the statement of accounts present as true and fair.
The noble Lord raised the question of health authorities. The Bill does not change the scope of health authorities’ audit, or that of principal local government bodies. Auditors of clinical commissioning groups will give additional opinions on whether their expenditure has been spent in accordance with Parliament’s intentions. This is necessary because the resources available to health bodies are provided by Parliament. Expenditure by clinical commissioning groups is consolidated into the Department of Health’s accounts, and the department must be able to demonstrate to Parliament that all resources have been used in the way that Parliament intended. I hope that, with that explanation, the noble Lord may feel able to withdraw his amendment.
Housing Act 1996 (Additional Preference for Armed Forces) (England) Regulations 2012
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, first, I apologise to my noble friend the Minister for missing the beginning of what she said. I was contributing to the debate on the Statement in the Chamber, so I hope that I will be forgiven for being a few minutes late. I declare an interest because I am still a councillor for the London Borough of Barnet, and my comments will take that into account. Of course, I echo the comments about the debt that we owe our veterans. Speaking on defence, as I do, I make these comments about our Armed Forces very often from another angle.
The point that I want to explore is whether local authorities and housing associations are really going to be aware of these provisions. Yes, they will be told, but my experience of local authorities is that there are all sorts of provisions and my guess is that these will not figure very highly unless they are very much promoted with all those local authorities.
How will these provisions affect those local authorities that have little housing stock? Only this week I have been dealing with someone who has a brain tumour, three children and a husband partially in work, and they have been graded only at grade 2 rather than grade 1; they were evicted on Monday and I have been concerned with finding them some accommodation. I use that as an example of how in the London boroughs, certainly in north-west London, there is a great lack of housing, and to put this additional strain on them is going to make it even more difficult for people such as this woman. I think that I have got her into a house, but they are still dealing with the void and getting it into a state for her to go there. It has taken me since March, knowing that she was going to be evicted, to do this. How do we house the veterans and people whom we need to?
Another point is how the claimants decide in which geographical area to seek to exercise their claim. If you have been in Germany or Afghanistan or wherever and you do not really have a base other than a military base at, say, Colchester, where do you go to exercise your claim on a local authority? There are some places in the UK where there is spare housing but, in the places that I know, this does not apply.
Have the Government consulted veterans’ associations? Our veterans’ associations in the UK are nothing like the veterans’ associations in the United States. There is a good argument for consulting them and perhaps trying to tie in with these regulations previous debates that we have had on the Armed Forces covenant over how we deal with housing for members of the Armed Forces. With the return of service personnel from Germany and Afghanistan, and the fact that they are going to be based more permanently in garrison towns, there was talk during consideration of the Armed Forces Bill of encouraging members of the Armed Forces to purchase property in the area in which they would now live more permanently—previously they were not living permanently anywhere—so that when they retired or were invalided out there would be a house or a flat nearby that they owned. We are trying to encompass within social housing a large group of people for whom there is not enough social housing. I hope that when the Government consider this they will think outside the box about how, looking in the longer term, we can encourage people in the forces to acquire properties in their own right that they can then live in in their retirement or disablement, rather than trying to squash people into an area of social housing that does not exist in many parts, particularly in London.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, I thank the two noble Lords for their contributions. To start with the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, the veterans’ associations have been consulted. It was largely because of their response that the changes were made following that consultation to ensure that the Reserve Forces were included in this, and also serving members. When the regulations started, they were for those who had left the Army and were not serving at the time. These changes have been made as a result of that.
I appreciate that the noble Lords, Lord Beecham and Lord Palmer, said that there is not a huge excess—if I can put it that way—of social housing. These regulations are very specific and put to the top of the pile those who have been injured and have to leave their place in their barracks, or wherever they are, and who have nowhere else to go and need adapted or new property. It is not clear at the moment how many this will amount to. However, it is perfectly clear that the able-bodied who are leaving the service will either have made their own provision, which I suggested they would have done before they leave, or will have to make it subsequently—they will not be at that top priority level. We are looking particularly at those who are most vulnerable. Members of the Armed Forces are of course already within the top priority for housing as far as regulations are concerned. This just takes them out of that top priority and puts them one higher. Local authorities have always had to have some form of priority and, although the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, is right about localism, I think that they will accept this as an edict that they will not complain too much about.
As for guidance and whether anybody will know anything about it, we have produced new guidance that has made it clear that these regulations are being put forward. We will also be writing to local authorities when the regulations finally come into force to draw their attention to that. I am sure that the noble Lord’s authority will be well aware of them; if not, I am sure that he will draw them to its attention.
It will be up to anybody claiming a local connection to decide where they want to go. If somebody comes back wounded from Afghanistan in need of housing accommodation and decides that they want to go and live in Sheffield, to Sheffield they will go and they will go to the top of the list. If they want to come to the noble Lord’s borough, they will do the same. The local connection, which applies to practically every housing matter other than this, including homelessness, does not apply.
Those are the main points. I am not going to open up the debate on affordable housing, as I think the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, was tempting me to do. I will say only that he and I know that great efforts are being made to ensure that there is more affordable housing. If we can get the Ministry of Defence to release quite a lot of its property and land, we may be able to move that on. I hope that, with those explanations, noble Lords are happy for these regulations to be agreed.
Local Government Finance Bill
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham(12 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, has covered most of this but I wish to add a few words on Amendment 47. This ensures that the Secretary of State must consult on whether the remaining balance on the levy account is redistributed to local government or rolled over to the following year. I really feel that this amendment is trying to prevent this legislation from resembling the National Lottery, where if someone does not win a prize it is rolled over to the next round. Here, instead of there being a balance that is distributed to the people whence it came, we are suggesting that it is rolled over to the next lot of recipients in some lottery-type arrangement. All this amendment is trying to do is to limit the levy to the period to which it relates and to those who have contributed to the levy within that period.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, we are in danger of amending the amended. These clauses were amended in the other place as a result of some of the concerns there. These amendments would reverse changes to the way that the Government distributes surplus levy income that were made in the other place. I recognise the noble Lord’s intentions in tabling these amendments—indeed they reflect much of the Government’s proposed process for distributing the levy surplus when we first introduced the Bill in the other place. However, as the Bill was amended to meet concerns raised there, I cannot accept these amendments. We have said that any surplus levy income that is not needed to fund the safety net will be distributed back to local authorities. We will not simply hold larger and larger surpluses.
Amendments 47 and 48 propose that the Secretary of State should consult with relevant authorities in advance of determining how much levy surplus should be distributed back to local authorities and set out the basis of distribution of levy surplus in the annual local government finance report. Although I sympathise with the intentions behind these amendments, setting out the distribution of any levy surplus through the local government finance report rather than through regulations is not the best approach. In fact, there are unintended consequences of this approach, in particular for the timings of payments to distribute the levy surplus.
When the Bill was discussed in Committee in the other place, concern was raised that the proposed process for distributing surplus levy was a bit long-winded. Setting out the basis of distribution through the local government finance report would mean that even when the Government had taken a decision to distribute some or all of any surplus back to local government, authorities would have to wait six months to a year before they saw the money. As a result of that, the Government agreed to look into speeding up the distribution and therefore amended the Bill—which is how it stands now—so that the process for distributing levy surplus, and the basis of that distribution, could be set out in regulations, ensuring that the payments can be made immediately after the decision to make them is taken.
Furthermore, to provide appropriate parliamentary oversight, the Government ensured the regulations would be subject to the affirmative procedure and hence subject to the approval of both Houses of Parliament. Regulations will need to be in place well in advance of any levy surplus being distributed, so authorities will have the certainty that the noble Lord is seeking. Once the regulations are in place, they will have this certainty each and every year until and unless they are revoked.
Amendment 49 requires the Secretary of State to report to Parliament the reasons why any remaining balance of the levy account has not been redistributed within three years. Again, although I recognise the intention behind this amendment, I do not believe it to be necessary. I reiterate that it has always been the Government’s default position not to hold back excessive amounts of surplus levy. The levy account will also operate with a high degree of transparency—the payments made both to and from this account will be easy to identify, as will the overall balance. Furthermore, the Comptroller and Auditor-General will report on the account and lay this report before Parliament in the same way as he currently does in the report entitled Pooling of Non-Domestic Rates and Redistribution to Local Authorities in England. This will provide Parliament with adequate opportunity to raise the issue of the levy balance, if required, through the normal processes.
On the basis of these arguments and the fact that this has already been amended, I hope that noble Lords will not press their amendments.
Local Government Finance Bill
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham(12 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
No, I am not a vice-president of anything. In addition to the comments that I and the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, made about reserves—specific and non-specific—one also needs to take into account the restrictions imposed on local authorities by external auditors. External auditors used to come under the Audit Commission but now they are a stand-alone operation. They require a certain level of reserves on the balance sheet, and it would be difficult if central government were to impose requirements on those reserves. External auditors say that you have to have £5 million, £10 million or £15 million in reserves to make everyone feel comfortable, but I have always said when making speeches that I think they make people feel too comfortable. However, that is what the auditors say and they will qualify your accounts if you do not do that.
Baroness Hanham
I return to the fact that unfortunately I did not hear, and do not know, what the Secretary of State was referring to. Of course, reserves are part of local government finance and part of control systems in local government. I should like to make some further inquiries about how that interlinks, if it does, with what we are talking about—the business rate retention scheme—so that I do not mislead the Committee. I know that the provision and use of reserves—and sometimes councils have large reserves—could potentially be used to help to ease the current financial situation. I shall not say anything more about that because I do not know what was said but I shall come back to it.
I was also asked about the police authority, and again I apologise for not picking that up. As I understand it, and I shall write if I am incorrect, the police authority will make the precept because it will be in place until November. It would be pretty unreasonable to ask a new police commissioner to come in to sort that out in the short time available. Therefore, what he or she inherits from the police authority will be what goes forward for the first year. After that, the police commissioner will set his or her own precept. I am not being prodded from behind and being told that that is incorrect but I will let noble Lords know if it is not correct.
Baroness Hanham
I think I have said all I can say. The list is not complete and others can be substituted or interposed if necessary. Those will arise at other times but I do not know what they are. If we have information on or a sort of idea of which others we might be talking about, I will let the noble Lord know, but at the moment it is simply left that other bodies may be included.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Best because there is a need to take into account revalued and increasing rateable values of properties. The analogy used by the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, reminded me of development land tax where when agricultural land got development planning permission its owner had to pay substantial extra taxation. We are in danger of looking at how much individuals, companies and corporations make as a result of Crossrail or whatever. If the land has increased in value as the property has increased in value, it ought to be a factor in the calculation of what the local authority receives. The point made earlier was that local councils such as Westminster would gain by the redistribution. Projects such as Crossrail spread that gain through rural areas and the like. I do not think that the fact that some local authorities may gain because of a national or regional development is a reason not to give that local authority the benefit of having an increased rateable base. If you look at new floor space, there are many places where that will not happen. Some noble Lords showed a degree of pessimism when they spoke about how things will devalue rather than increase in value. We have to look positively at how we should encourage local authorities to do infrastructure and to encourage infrastructure, even if it is Crossrail or whatever, so that the valuations of those properties increase and local authorities can see the benefit. That would incentivise local authorities to co-operate on those matters.
Baroness Hanham
That was an interesting, if unexpected, debate. When it started, I was very touched by the fact that I had a little note that said, “The purpose of Amendment 15 is not entirely clear”. My reply may not be totally applicable either, but somewhere along the line we have clearly raised really important points. We are going to have to look again at the amendment, but in the mean time, I will tell the Committee what we thought it was about, and if it does not quite tie up, we will sort it out, I am sure, between now and the next stage.
I am advised that the amendment in its current form could not stand as it would insert an amendment into Schedule 8 which, as a result of this Bill, will cease to apply for any purpose in England. That is the first problem. Even without this technical deficiency, we have a bit of a problem. We fully respect the noble Lord’s views that under the rates retention scheme authorities should be able to benefit from rental growth as well as physical growth. Westminster has been touched on by several speakers, but for authorities such as Westminster or, potentially, for my ex-authority Kensington and Chelsea, the potential for physical growth is much more limited than for others as there are very constrained sites with developments all through.
The efforts of local authorities to make their areas more attractive to business are not quite as limited as some would like to pretend. Efforts that have resulted in a steady increase in rental values and hence rateable values will arguably go unrewarded under the rates retention scheme. The duty of government is to legislate for a rates retention scheme that is workable for the whole of local government, not just for some authorities. For that reason, we could not devise a scheme that allowed local authorities to keep any part of the growth in rateable values. To explain why, I need to explain to the Committee how the revaluation works, although I hesitate to do that because the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, will understand this far more than I do. Perhaps for the benefit of the Committee we should go through it.
Every five years, the Valuation Office Agency undertakes the revaluation of non-domestic properties and, as a result, the aggregate rateable value of all English non-domestic properties either—amazingly—increases or decreases. In setting the multiplier for the first year following the revaluation, the Government take account of the overall increase or decrease in order to ensure that overall the same amount of tax is raised from business after revaluation as from before. For example, if the aggregate rateable value were to double, the multiplier would have to halve. In that way, it simply redistributes the tax burden between businesses on the basis of their up-to-date property values.
In the new world of rates retention, the system is set up at the outset so that through the means of tariffs and top-ups there is an initial redistribution of resources. That protects the position of those authorities that are relatively resource poor. But if, as I explained, we collect no more money from businesses following the revaluation than we did before, it follows that there is no additional money in the rates retention system. If therefore some authorities are to be allowed to keep additional resources, by the same token, some will have to receive less. Therefore, because of the uneven distribution of the rates base, this would not just mean a cut in funding for those authorities that have seen their rateable value fall. So an authority could see a funding fall, even if its rateable value had risen, if that price was by less than the national average. That could not be fair. In fact the only way to ensure that all authorities see their rateable value rise and see some income benefit is to break the multiplier link and raise the overall burden on business, and the Government are not prepared to do that.
For those reasons, I cannot accept the amendments that seek to allow any part of an increase in rateable values to be retained by local authorities. I hope that that explanation, somewhere along the line, meets the basis of the amendment. If it does not, perhaps we could discuss it between now and the next stage. I am not sure at all that it covers any of the matters raised by the noble Earl, Lord Lytton. Having looked at Hansard, we may need to come back to that. While it was a very relevant aspect to commercial improvements, I am not sure that it necessarily fits in with the amendment, but it may do. I will happily say that if the amendment is to be pursued and if the noble Earl feels that the reply is not adequate or there is something more that needs to be done, we should discuss it between now and the next Sitting and then we might be able to get us both together to decide what we are trying to achieve.
Local Authorities: Standards
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Hanham
My Lords, that was a legal decision which was interpreted, I think, as part of European Union law. It is clear that councillors can voluntarily attend prayers if they wish. There is no compulsion on them to attend, but council authorities can have prayers out of the chamber if people wish to have them before a meeting.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, is the Minister aware that under the new legislation the sanctions being considered and imposed by local authorities are only as draconian as asking the leader of the group to have words with the offending member? Has my noble friend any observations as to how the sanctions can be more biting than those being imposed by a cross-section of councils that I have been observing?
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, I think the noble Lord slightly underplays what the sanctions can be. There can be censure. If it is a trivial matter, it can be dealt with by the leader of the group. It can be much more seriously dealt with. It can be taken to the council for formal censure. Someone who is found to have transgressed can also be removed from a committee for a certain length of time. We have not allowed local authorities to suspend councillors as a result of such decisions, but I think we have put forward a perfectly reasonable set of sanctions.
Housing: Landlord and Tenant Legislation
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, I hear what the noble and learned Baroness says and I will see what the response to that is from other sources.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, one of the most common complaints from private tenants is the failure of landlords to do major repairs such as a broken boiler or leaking roof. Could my noble friend the Minister clarify what steps can be taken to allow a tenant to carry out such major repairs and legally deduct the moneys from their rents? Would she also comment on the desirability of those rights being contained in legislation and not just relying on the varied proposals in common law?
Localism Bill
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham(13 years, 2 months ago)
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Baroness Hanham
My Lords, this is important. We do not believe that it is necessary to prescribe in statute the requirement on the Greater London Authority to establish a London housing and regeneration board. The letter of July 2010, to which others have referred, assumed a decision-making board. However, there were concerns over accountability. I will come further on to that.
The noble Lord, Lord Palmer, put the case very well. For the benefit of noble Lords who might not have picked up the letter that I wrote following the withdrawal of the amendments last time, I should say that we believe that setting a board in statute would give London minimal flexibility in determining its own arrangements for governing housing and regeneration activities. We want to keep prescription by central government to a minimum and ensure that the Greater London Authority is free to respond to changing times and circumstances without having to resort to changing primary legislation to do so.
The Mayor of London, the Assembly and London Councils are already deciding how they want to run things. They are already in the process of change, without any input from the Government. They are able to set up a board structure such as the amendment suggests—should they want to. They do not have to wait for us to tell them how to do it, they can do it themselves. I think that is one of the main reasons why we do not particularly want to put this on to the statute book. They can do it, they are able to do it, so there is no reason to tell them to do it, and they do do it.
A decision-making board will ultimately determine the GLA’s housing and regeneration activities, but the GLA was created on a model of a democratically elected executive mayor to provide strong leadership and do things on behalf of London. Therefore it is important that the mayor has the final decision on housing and regeneration matters, but he has to take into account the views of the boroughs as well. Of course, the checks and balances on the mayor should remain with the London Assembly, which is there to hold the mayor to account.
We do not think that it is a good thing to put the mayor in the position of having to have a board. We are absolutely clear that he is working very co-operatively with London Councils and the local government group. Therefore I think that we would resist very much putting that on to the face of the Bill. In light of what I said in my letter and what I have said today, I ask the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, to withdraw his Amendment.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, my noble friend Lady Hanham makes my points for me. She points out that the GLA and the mayor will evolve; things will happen. That is exactly what frightens me. Under whichever mayor, of whichever colour, whether it is next year, four years hence or eight years hence, as the Minister says, the GLA can evolve and change, and that is its virtue. In fact, it is the opposite. What we are trying to do is to enshrine in primary legislation a protection for the 32 London boroughs and for the GLA, a partnership of which we all approve, rather than rely on the good will and resolve of the mayor of the time, whenever that may be. The idea that it should evolve, put forward by the Minister, makes the case for it being in primary legislation. However, at this stage, with the mass of people in this place having tested the water, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Localism Bill
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham(13 years, 2 months ago)
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Baroness Hanham
My Lords, I have all sorts of answers that were given in the letter, which I was absolutely satisfied covered everything that could possibly be raised. I am stuck on this position about the courts and will have to come back to noble Lords, because the response I have already given is that landlords must have the right to go for possession, particularly where there are rent arrears and particularly where those are long term. On the other hand, landlords are expected to use every possible means of supporting tenants to sustain their tenancies and to prevent unnecessary evictions. That should be a requirement on all social landlords within a revised tenancy standard. The expectation is that evictions should happen only as a very last resort.
There is a well established pre-action protocol on rent arrears and the data show a steady decline in evictions of housing association tenants in recent years. However, we believe that good practice in managing rent arrears should not exclude using mandatory grounds in limited circumstances—right at the end of the road when the landlord really had not been able to come to any satisfactory conclusion. Recent independent research suggests that mandatory grounds are used sparingly, in less than 5 per cent of total housing association evictions for rent arrears. That is not a very high percentage, and indicates that it is not being used as a blunt instrument and takes proper account of the particular circumstances of the case.
There are protocols and we expect landlords to abide by them. I do not think we want to remove the mandatory aspect of ground 8 from the legislation. Under the previous Government, a working group was convened to look at the issue in detail and it commissioned independent research through the Tenant Services Authority. However, there was absolutely no unanimity among external partners that abolishing ground 8 was necessary or desirable.
Having talked long enough, I have been able to get at least a partial reply to my ignorance about what happens in the courts. The grant of possession does not necessarily mean eviction. Landlords may need to apply to the court again for an eviction order and arrears could be resolved before that point, which should have been the situation in the case mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Palmer. If it is an arrear, time should be given for housing benefit to come through to prevent that eviction.
I think I understood the noble Lord to say that the courts felt that they had no alternative but to grant possession and to ensure eviction. I may have misunderstood him but I hope I have not. If that is the situation, I simply say again that no action should necessarily need to be taken immediately as a result of that court decision, particularly if it relates to money and it is felt that eviction is likely to come about. I am bound to say that in that scenario I would expect the landlords to have got to that situation before they apply for eviction, but there may be reasons why they have not.
We would resist removing ground 8, which leaves room for negotiation and should not have the effect of ensuring that tenants are automatically evicted as part of the court decision. If I have misunderstood anything that the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, has said, he is bound to let me know when he replies to the amendment. If necessary I will look at that position again, but I hope I have picked up the main points of his concerns. I very much hope that he will feel able to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, I thank the Minister for her detailed reply both in writing and verbally. She has not misunderstood anything but she lives, as perhaps we all do, in this utopia where all landlords are good. I am afraid that in the world in which I live not all landlords are good, and I believe that there are a modest number who will use ground 8. I hope that only a modest number will do that, but there will be some who will. There should be nothing in legislation that removes the discretion of the court to do what is right. The matter of when the bailiffs move in was raised. Those who have had experience of the courts know that that is a varied situation because it often depends on whether the landlord has set the thing in motion to get early occupation of the property.
That is particularly important at this moment. The noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, talked about when benefits—universal benefits and the like—are paid. Those of us who have been local councillors—I have been a councillor for 25 years and still am—know that local authorities and social landlords use IT systems to deal with housing benefits. For years, my local authority used Pericles, which went dreadfully wrong. It is not an indictment of any landlord that they should use a system that goes wrong, because IT systems often do, but the fact is that, with the changeover to universal benefits, which has already been mentioned in this debate, there is a great probability that housing benefits arrears will be built up unintentionally because of a changeover in computer systems. In that case, there would be the danger of ground 8 evicting people without the courts having a chance even to postpone eviction. I would ask that my noble friend the Minister looks again at how many such cases there have been and whether there is a need to tweak this in the legislation.
Housing: Market Stability
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, this goes back a little to my answer to the previous question. The economy, which is the first priority of this Government, needs to be effectively stabilised. After that, we hope that the banks will feel able to bring themselves more into the market to help particularly first-time buyers with mortgages. However, the first line of defence will have to be making sure that the economy is right.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, as the Joseph Rowntree report says, the main reason for the problem is the shortage of land. Would my noble friend comment on whether the Government will look at how to encourage the release of unused land, such as in land auctions or the taxation of unused land, to encourage the owners and developers of land to bring it into use even when its value might be lower than they expect?
Big Society: Britain in Bloom
Debate between Lord Palmer of Childs Hill and Baroness Hanham
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, that is a bit off the Question, which is about flowers and gardens. I thought that such matters might come up under the next Question, so I do not know whether the noble Lord will want to ask it again. The straight answer is that Birmingham City Council, like other councils, has to make its own decisions on its expenditure. There has been and will continue to be considerable pressure on councils to ensure that the voluntary sector is protected from such reductions. If I may bring the noble Lord back to the Question, there is no doubt that people will make a plea to ensure that they can plant their gardens and have them competitively looked at.
Lord Palmer of Childs Hill
My Lords, may I bring the Minister back to the original Question by asking whether she believes that colourful flower displays have a good-feel factor for people and they should be encouraged? Will she deprecate the fact that in so many areas of public life flower-beds are being replaced by shrubs? I am not against shrubs, but colourful flowers do produce a good-feel factor. Would the Minister like to comment?
Baroness Hanham
Well, my Lords, we all like flowers and we like to see them in public places. It gives life to areas if there are planted flowers rather than bushes, which can be rather drab. I agree very much with that and with any other schemes that are taking place. Indeed, as I am sure noble Lords know, local authorities run their own schemes. The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, which is my borough, runs Kensington and Chelsea in bloom and has its own competitions, there is the wider London in Bloom competition, and there is the green flag award, which is run for public open spaces and provides an incentive for people to beautify the areas.