English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Baroness Willis of Summertown Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 27th January 2026 Grand Committee

Secondly, there is the emerging land use framework for England. The Minister referred to the work being done for that. It was due to be published last year. Then we were told that it was due to be published early this year. I am hoping—touch wood—that it is imminent. It gives us an opportunity today to say that it is not only much anticipated but potentially very useful. To understand how it might be useful, I looked at the three Scottish land use strategies, which relate directly to the regional spatial strategies in Scotland. In their scale, they would be very similar to the spatial development strategies that would emerge from the large strategic authorities intended to be created by this Act. The land use framework for England should, like the Environmental Improvement Plan, necessarily be a document that spatial development strategies must look to. We have this opportunity to insert that requirement back into the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act. I beg to move.

[Baroness Willis of Summertown (CB)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 46, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. We must ensure that any spatial development strategy underlines and works with the principles of the Environmental Improvement Plan and the upcoming land use framework, as the noble Lord rightly pointed out. Particularly regarding the latter, it makes no sense to have two systems dealing with how we use our land pulling in different directions—which is the risk here. We have these central government legally binding environmental targets, so we need to use the Bill to ensure that this new devolved governance structure means that each tool is deployed in an effective but consistent manner. Consistency is key here.

Bluntly, I do not see how we can halt biodiversity loss, let alone restore it, without giving authorities the duty to work towards meeting these targets. A recently published global biodiversity assessment highlighted the threats to the UK’s national security and prosperity from biodiversity loss and really stressed the importance of delivering the 30by30. This is a very tall target at the best of times, but if we have the devolved Governments pulling in different directions on this, there is no chance that we will reach anywhere near it. We are a long way off right now—at 7%—so have an awfully long way to go in the next seven years.

This amendment would mean that authorities think about nature recovery, soil, water and land use from the outset, rather than as something to be dealt with at a later stage. We had a long-standing debate on this in the planning Bill. This is often where the delays are, caused by nature and environmental considerations. If we consider the environment strategically before we get into this whole planning process, I hope many of those delays and debates will go away, so we do not have them. This will reduce conflicts and create more consistency in how we achieve our environmental targets. It is a very good amendment and it has my strong support. I see it as essential but also proportionate.

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

My Lords, I speak in support of Amendment 46, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. Spatial development strategies are a really big opportunity and much to be welcomed. We have long needed a spatial view at that sort of level, so we have to get this right because there is a lot that they can deliver.

However, to be frank, if spatial development strategies do not play a key role in delivering things such as the Environmental Improvement Plan statutory targets, I am not entirely sure how government will get those statutory targets delivered, because the land is fundamental to delivering those targets. The question really is: if there is not some strong guidance that the spatial development strategies must play a role in delivering the Environmental Improvement Plan statutory targets, how will government ensure that these targets are met? Is it envisaged that there will be guidance rather than something in the Bill?

We should not underestimate the importance of the environment for growth. I remember years ago, when some of the big drug companies were thinking about where they were going to put production facilities, they came to the conclusion that England’s green and pleasant land was a pretty good place to come. Not only was there a reasonably stable economy in those days, but there were also excellent places for the people they would have to attract—potentially from other countries but also from other parts of the UK—to come and work for them. They were also potentially attractive places for those businesses to come and pursue sustainability and growth as part of their global strategies. Therefore, a pleasant, productive environment not only provides security against climate shocks, flooding, heat and all those things if done on a big enough scale; it is also an attractive place for businesses to come because they can get good staff who want to come and live in pleasant places. That is a crucial element that the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, has rightly pointed out.

I have stood up and talked about the land use framework many times; I do go on about its importance. For me, it has two major importances. First, it brings a degree of rationality to considerations and discussions about competing land uses, which is absolutely what regional—spatial—development strategies ought to be doing as well, so they are very complementary. As the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, pointed out, the land use framework is also a means of reducing conflict.

We all too often see development being delayed because there is local or county-level antipathy by the public to what is being proposed. A land use framework approach is a way of getting that dialogue going across multiple land uses—including land for climate, biodiversity and other environmental management, and land for development—that can introduce a note of calmness, conciliation, balance and rationality to the debate. The land use framework is important and the big problem right now of course is its timing. We have been a very long time waiting for it. My understanding, and the Minister can perhaps confirm this, is that it is in a good enough shape for write-round, but we hear that it may well be delayed.

The reality is that we are up against a hard deadline. The hard deadline for me—and this is a purely personal view, not the view of my party, I am sure—is that we are going to have a rough time in the elections in May and there could well be all sorts of reshuffles emanating from that. The last thing that any of us wants is for a brand-new set of Ministers to be appointed as a result of a reshuffle, or even a few Ministers to be appointed as a result of a reshuffle, who quite rightly, in the case of something as important as the land use framework, will want to delay and have a look at it themselves to make sure that they understand it and that they are behind it. That could cause even more delay, so if we do not get it agreed and published by late April, we could be stuffed—I think that is the technical term. Perhaps we could persuade the Minister to tell us what it would take to get this announced by April.

There is one further requirement that the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, does not cover, which is the whole issue of local nature recovery strategies. Those noble Lords who have played a role in local nature recovery strategy development and approval will realise just how much sweat and blood has been magnificently used at a county level to produce these agreed strategies. They are very much another brick in the wall of the rational approach to land use. There has been a huge amount of engagement of local authorities, communities and NGOs at the county level to get these strategies going. They are incredibly valuable, because they have been a meeting ground for all these competing land use bodies. One has to ask: what is the point of a local nature recovery strategy if it does not play a role and does not figure in the spatial development strategy? Can the Minister assure us that local nature recovery strategies will be material in local development strategies? If so, why not put it the Bill? Depending on her answer, I may have to egg on the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, to add that into consideration on Report.

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[Baroness Willis of Summertown (CB)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendments 51A and 52A in my name. I respect and agree with the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, about having some flexibility in the appointment of these different commissioners.

My amendment looks specifically at the commissioners for climate and nature. In particular, it seeks that these two topics do not just become a political football at the mercy of the political leanings of the mayor that is put in place. It is not enough to say that a mayor merely can appoint a person to oversee the delivery of one of the authority’s competencies; the mayor needs to appoint someone to oversee the delivery of the competencies outlined in Clause 2. That is especially important when we consider nature and climate, since both the 2008 Climate Change Act and the 2021 Environment Act have clear, unambiguous delivery targets, many of which are spatially constrained and require strategic oversight and consideration of competing land uses. We need someone in place who is able to oversee the delivery of these competencies strategically. The problem is that, currently, the duties in these Acts apply only to the Secretary of State, so there is an incredibly high risk that one of our most important delivery arms is under-deployed or at least deployed very unevenly, depending on the political swing or leanings of that mayoral authority.

Why is this so important? I calculated—on the back of an envelope, I admit—the amount of land the six new mayoral districts and the combined areas will be responsible for. It is 75% of the English landscape. This is not a small amount: we are talking about the biggest part of our landscape. Therefore, this should really make us stop and think whether we have the right safeguards in place to ensure the delivery of climate and nature targets if the political leanings of the mayor are not that way inclined.

Of course, it should be for the mayors to appoint whom they wish as commissioners, but it is also important to note that we need them to appoint commissioners in certain areas where they have relevant experience or expertise. Although I accept that it would be the responsibility of the mayor of an area to decide how to develop an action policy, we need to put in place some safeguards to ensure that central government’s policy priorities and legal responsibilities are delivered.

I am going to give a few examples of the importance of a commissioner for nature and climate. The first, as we heard about before in the previous discussion, is local nature recovery strategies. These are full of potential, but now, as they reach implementation stage, there is a risk they will sit on the shelf, for two reasons: first, because of the challenge of integrating decision-making in local government; and secondly, because of the need to organise co-ordinated action at scale.

Environmental skills is another issue. They are commonly and widely recognised as a bottleneck; we do not have the people who are able to help our planning officers to make the decisions needed in the planning system. Lack of skills in planning control and enforcement is a really big risk to delivering on things such as biodiversity net gain right now; only 5% of local authorities say that they have adequate resources properly to manage biodiversity net gain. To deliver and fill those gaps, we need skills and education programmes that are co-ordinated and have oversight at the strategic levels. It is highly unlikely that any of these areas of competence for strategic authorities would see the skills gap as part of their portfolio. I cannot see any of those competences thinking that they should focus on employing people or on education programmes; I would see this sitting under a commissioner for climate and nature.

Finally comes the issue of green infrastructure planning, which many of us discussed in the passage of the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, and the delivery of nature-based solutions and protecting and restoring the UK’s natural capital assets. This requires some large-scale spatial co-ordination actions—for example, the Environment Act targets to reduce nitrogen and phosphorous pollution, and ambitions for nature-based solutions for flood defence. All of that will require strategic interventions and top-down leadership, and to be under a dedicated, named person. Who is going to do it if, within a mayoral system, there is no one with that title who can oversee and manage nature and climate?

At the same time, these large-scale conventional infrastructure projects—I know that one of our noble friends works in the Oxford–Cambridge Arc—require large-scale nature plans to ensure that they do not destroy large swathes of nature and critical natural capital assets. That is something we often forget about when we think about nature recovery.

I would like to zoom out a bit on this one. It is worth remembering that in a report last year about the role of natural capital in the UK’s green economy, the Environmental Audit Committee found that while natural capital assets are an essential foundation of the UK and global economy, there is little evidence of that being considered in decision-making. So, while the amendment does not specifically deal with natural capital, it would ensure that somebody at the top was considering and responsible for oversight of this in the new authority.

I make one more point about natural capital. It is not just a “nice to have”. In November, the ONS released its reports, valuing natural capital assets in the UK at £1.6 trillion. This is not just about the pretty flowers somewhere—this is serious infrastructure. Natural infrastructure underpins so many things we rely on. The annual value of £41 billion in natural capital assets was largely driven by health benefits gained from recreation. So, it comes back to us needing a commissioner at the top who looks at these figures and at what we need to do to deliver on the ground. Devolved government is a fantastic idea, and I am a huge supporter of it, but we need the right people in the right place to deliver what I believe they can deliver.

I would be grateful if the Minister could say what the Government’s intention is here. Do they think there should be a commissioner for each of the competences? Given that there are seven competences and seven commissioners, I would think that the answer is yes, although I am not sure any more—maybe it should be more. If they do not think they should state that in statute, why? What situation are they allowing for if we get in a political situation whereby the mayor does not support nature and climate as part of our infrastructure? That is a very big risk that we should look at in this Bill now.

[Lord Bach (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall speak to six amendments, 54, 55, 57, 58, 59 and 171. As this is my first and may even be my last contribution, I want to express straightaway that I welcome the Bill very warmly. It gives mayors new powers to appoint commissioners, to increase capacity and to maximise the benefits of devolution. Obviously, mayors will have to consider carefully how best to use these directly appointed roles, drawing on the right expertise and ensuring value for money.

I also welcome the Government’s approach to entrusting directly elected mayors to make decisions on commissioner appointments tailored to local needs. However, these amendments seek to make some pragmatic changes that would improve the Bill by giving—vitally—greater flexibility on shaping commissioner roles. All my amendments go to that greater flexibility on shaping commissioner roles and appointments so that they are suitable for the specific circumstances of their region.

I will briefly outline three such issues, to which I will ask the Government to consider making changes. First, in relation to my Amendment 171, the Bill could enable greater flexibility for the appointment of deputy mayors for policing and crime under mayors that will be responsible for more than one police force area. As the Committee may know, I speak as a former Leicestershire police and crime commissioner. Although I may have mixed feelings about the Government’s decision to abolish police and crime commissioners, I am enough of a realist to realise that it is a done deal—it will happen—so we have to talk about the future, and I am happy to do so. Speaking as a former PCC, I recognise the importance of effective democratic oversight and accountability for our police forces in this new world that we are undoubtedly moving into.

The integration of police and fire services under mayors will improve democratic accountability and enable better integration of these services with wider mayoral functions. The Bill will enable the transfer of police and crime commissioner functions to mayors whose boundaries are coterminous with one or more PCC areas, and for most PCC functions to be delegated to a deputy mayor for policing and crime. In the east Midlands, this means that Derbyshire PCC and Nottinghamshire PCC functions transferring to the Mayor of the East Midlands, because the boundaries of the two PCC areas are coterminous with the East Midlands Combined County Authority.

Importantly, the Government also intend to transfer fire and rescue authority functions to mayors too. For the east Midlands, the Government have committed to explore merging the Derbyshire FRA and Nottinghamshire FRA, so that the East Midlands Combined County Authority becomes the fire and rescue authority for the area. I will return to that point in a moment.

As drafted, however, the Bill risks limiting the full potential of this integration, where a mayor takes on PCC functions for more than one police force. This means that a deputy mayor for policing and crime must be appointed for each police force area, so there will be two deputy mayors where there are two police forces. There are good reasons why a mayor may want to appoint a deputy mayor for each police force, including to ensure effective oversight and scrutiny of complex organisations. However, in some cases, a single deputy mayor for policing and crime—or a single deputy mayor for public safety, including fire—may enable better integration and join-up across services.

That is particularly the case—this is the main argument for this in this area—where a mayor may be responsible for two police forces and one fire and rescue authority. For example, it would be impracticable to have a deputy mayor responsible for fire across the whole region but for only one of the two police forces. Therefore, my Amendment 171 to Schedule 22 seeks to ensure that, where a mayor may be responsible for more than one police force area, they would have the flexibility to appoint a single deputy mayor or separate deputy mayors for each police force. I invite the Minister to think carefully about whether this is a sensible proposal to make this part of the Bill marginally more flexible.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Baroness Willis of Summertown Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 9th February 2026 Grand Committee

Scotland is now taking this agenda forward through its own community wealth building legislation. If we are serious about meaningful devolution in England, this Bill should provide similar support for local economic empowerment. I hope that the Minister will receive this amendment in the constructive spirit in which it is intended and will consider how community wealth building can strengthen the Bill’s ambitions. I beg to move.

[Baroness Willis of Summertown (CB)]

My Lords, Amendment 241B is in my name, and I strongly support Amendment 192 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett.

The devolution Bill creates these large, powerful strategic authorities whose decisions on planning, housing, transport and infrastructure will shape England’s carbon emissions, climate resilience and natural environment for decades to come. Once they are in place, these six new mayoral districts and combined authorities will be responsible for the strategic oversight of 75% of England’s landscape, so huge swathes of the landscape will be under these authorities. Despite this, as it currently stands, the Bill contains no clear mechanism to ensure that these authorities will contribute to the UK’s legally binding climate and nature targets under the Climate Change Act 2008 and the Environment Act 2021. Both have clear, unambiguous delivery targets to which we have agreed—they are in our law.

These targets are spatially constrained and require both strategic oversight and the consideration of competing land uses. Currently, however, they sit under the Secretary of State only. Without even a mention of a duty to deliver on these targets in the devolution Bill, I believe that there is a high degree of risk that they will be undeployed, or at least deployed unevenly. This is a real risk; it is particularly important given the shifting political priorities and how they can deprioritise action. As the system stands, the Secretary of State-level duty for our Climate Change Act and Environment Act targets does not automatically filter down, be it to a local government, a regulator or a non-departmental public body.

I am sure that the Minister will say that local authorities have a “duty to conserve biodiversity”, under Section 40 of the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act 2006, which was strengthened by the Environment Act 2021 and requires an authority to consider what it can do to conserve and enhance biodiversity. This is of course correct, but it is rooted in guidance—that lovely word to which I keep coming back—that can, and I am sure will, be changed. That then leaves it up to the individual authority as to whether it will or will not further the objective. What happens if we have an elected mayor who does not agree with net-zero policies or is someone who sees nature as a luxury that we can no longer afford? What will be their guidance on these strategic decisions to their commissioners, if we even have commissioners appointed for climate and nature, since this is far from guaranteed under the Bill as it is currently constructed?

My Amendment 241B would require strategic, mayoral or local authorities to take all reasonable steps to contribute to our net-zero target and the targets under Sections 1 to 3 of the Environment Act, and to adapt to the risks set out in the climate change risk assessment report. It is hardly as if we are starting from a good place. We have only to look at the papers or the reports coming through from the Office for Environmental Protection and the Climate Change Committee, which are loudly ringing the alarm bells to say that we are nowhere near delivering on our targets in the Climate Change Act or the Environment Act. Without any firm duty on mayoral authorities to deliver, I fear that we will move further and further away from these targets.

I put it to the Committee and the Minister that we cannot rely on whatever provisions we currently have or the fact that we have national targets. We need to embed the targets in everyday decision-making—in local decision-making on the ground by council officials and elected members, as much as anyone. We can say that councils already do this. That may be the case, but it is too little and not quickly enough. If we look at the climate scorecards produced by Climate Emergency UK, which has assessed councils’ progress on a variety of climate and nature issues, they demonstrate this clearly: we are not moving quickly enough and we are seeing the consequences of this day in, day out. Species numbers are going down, landscapes are being lost and we are seeing flooding as a result of a lack of joined-up thinking on nature-based solutions.

At worst, without a duty such as this one, we could have authorities pulling in a completely direction from what Ministers or the Secretary of State expect or desire. I would hope that, from a legal standpoint, Ministers would want to be seen to be doing everything within their power to meet those targets by empowering the new strategic authorities with a responsibility to contribute. Just because an individual council decides that it does not want to progress further towards these targets—or, worse, that it actively wants to make them harder, if particular mayors come in with that role—it does not mean that we should just roll over and accept it. These issues absolutely transcend borders and affect us all. They are not within these mayoral authorities; they are much broader than that.

We have been happy to give local authorities other statutory duties; social care is the obvious big one but there are many others. It is welcome to see the new health improvement and health inequalities duties coming through. My amendment asks that the same statutory duties be given on the environment and climate change. On this critical matter, we must align local government with national government. This point was made succinctly in Dan Corry’s review for the Government last year, which covered Defra’s regulatory landscape for driving both economic growth and nature recovery. In it he said:

“A stronger and clearer link is needed between targets and plans set nationally and the activity being carried out to protect the environment and support development locally”.


That is exactly what this amendment tries to do.

With the biggest shake-up of local government in generations, if we fail to give a duty to do what we can to address two of our most critical threats—nature loss and climate change—what are we doing, really? I see this as very important.

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

My Lords, I too support Amendment 241B in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, to which I have added my name. I also support Amendment 192 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, which was moved so ably by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. In fact, I think she probably has the slightly better amendment, if truth be told; I may go into that later.

I am sure that the Minister is detecting a pattern here. A number of public authorities have already had similar duties for the achievement of various legally binding environmental targets laid on them either in legislation or by agreement with Ministers in subsequent guidance. Recent examples include Great British Energy, Skills England, the Crown Estate, Ofwat and the GLA. This is particularly important for these strategic authorities because they have key functions in housing, strategic spatial planning, economic development, regeneration and health improvement. If you think about it, the achievement of these environmental targets is part of the fundamental underpinning of the delivery of growth, economic development, regeneration and health improvement. Conversely, the achievement of the national environmental targets will be possible only if there is effective local and regional action. Without explicit provisions in the Bill, there will be a structural gap between national environmental commitments and these important, new, local decision-making bodies.

Having this duty would ensure clarity, consistency and legal certainty, which would certainly benefit not only authorities themselves but business and investors. So it is not surprising that the proposed duty is supported by businesses across relevant sectors, the LGA, the District Councils’ Network, London Councils, ADEPT, the majority of UK100’s members and a number of council leaders and Cabinet members. There is widespread support for this duty being applied.

Another point is that, as has been said already, the national environment and climate change targets are pretty stretching; the Office for Environmental Protection and the Climate Change Committee are already expressing concern that the Government are not on track to meet them. If the Government are to have any chance at all of achieving the statutory targets, all relevant public bodies need to do their bit—especially strategic authorities. Simply listing the areas of competence for the strategic authorities is not enough. These bodies need a duty; it has to be something that they must do, not a competence that they may carry out in a variety of ways.

Amendment 192, moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, is particularly elegant. It would apply a sort of triple lock, if I can use that expression. Apart from the duty, it would introduce a requirement that the authority must not only exercise the duty in carrying out its functions but think about how all the decisions it makes fit in with the duty; that is the genuine spirit of the integration of environment and climate change requirements into all decision-making, which has long been talked about as a principle but, alas, is not really happening as yet.

The most cunning thing about Amendment 192 is that it goes on to say that each authority will have guidance from the Secretary of State, and that the guidance will be “clear” and “measurable”. That is a pretty neat combination; it is better than our amendment, I think, and therefore I would endorse it beyond ours.

In both amendments, the duties would apply not only to strategic authorities but to mayors and local authorities. It is important that all these local decision-making bodies are singing from the same hymn sheet. Since the GLA was set up with climate and biodiversity duties from the very beginning, I ask the Minister whether the Government will agree to do the same for strategic authorities, mayors and the reformed local authorities.

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[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

I beg to disagree. Once you place a duty on an authority, all its decision-making needs to have that in mind. The authority can be challenged for not doing X, and X could involve significant expenditure, or it could be something that it has very little power over. To take a local example, my local council has a statutory duty on pollution in certain areas, such as Ampthill, which is just down the road from me, but it does not have the ability to stop cars going into Ampthill, and they are the cause of the pollution. So you end up with these dilemmas, and that needs thinking through. That is why I am wary. I do not disagree with the thrust of what the noble Baroness is trying to do, but we need to do it in a practical and deliverable way. All good councils will try to seek to do the right thing wherever they can.

As certain Peers have alluded to, in the future there may be somebody who might not be as keen as some of us are on the environment, well-being or anything else. That brings me to my second point: I am a huge believer in democracy. We have a very serious question to ask ourselves: do we believe in democracy? That means local decision-making and devolution, and, at times, it may mean that people do not do what we would choose to be our priority. That is a dilemma that we face and have to accept. If you believe in democracy and devolution, you cannot always seek to bind the hand of people to do what you want, because that is not devolution and democracy but centralisation and state control, which may be the right thing—

[Baroness Willis of Summertown (CB)]

Can I ask a question of clarification? I agree on democracy and the point that the noble Lord is making, but these are legally binding targets that we have agreed in the law through these Acts, so do we ignore the law through devolution?

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

As the noble Baroness rightly says, they are legally binding targets that people need to take into account. We do not necessarily need to do it again. But I come back to my central point: do not place a duty on somebody if you do not provide the capacity for them to deliver it.

My second point is on devolution. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, made some interesting points about local wealth building and it probably is a very good model, but it may not be the only model. There may be other models and there may be other models that work locally, so why are we doing a one size fits all? We should trust people to deliver for their residents; that is why they get elected and re-elected. Sometimes we will make mistakes, and we do it differently the next time because we made a mistake the first time.

Those are my two key concerns that we need to focus on. First, if you provide a duty to somebody, you need to provide the means and capacity to do it. Secondly, on the issue of democracy, if we are genuine about devolution, we should be very careful about providing a centralised diktat about what we should do. That has nothing to do with the proposed areas of concern, which I have a huge amount of sympathy with.