Local Government (Review of Decisions) Bill

Debate between David Heath and Penny Mordaunt

Friday 23rd January 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Penny Mordaunt)]

I, too, put on record my congratulations and thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood (Mr Spencer) for the sterling work he has done on introducing this important Bill. I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for North East Hampshire (Mr Arbuthnot) for his interest in the Bill and for giving me the opportunity to explain the Government’s position.

Local authorities should act in a reasonable, accountable and transparent manner. The Government have already taken action to make local authorities more accountable by improving town hall transparency in decision making—for instance, by allowing the public to report on town hall meetings by tweeting, blogging, and even, in some cases, filming those proceedings. This Bill adds to that transparency. It requires local authorities to put their health and safety related decisions about events in writing. We would already expect them to do that anyway. It is reasonable to expect that if an authority is advising someone of something, it does so in an e-mail or a letter.

This Bill adds to the accountability of local authorities. It gives the person who received the decision or the event organiser, if that is a different person, the right to request a review that the local authority must complete in no more than 15 days.

[Mr David Heath (Somerton and Frome) (LD)]

One potential omission is that, I believe, the Bill applies to local authorities but not to the police. Local authorities will often take the advice of the police. Surely it cannot be sufficient, for a local authority merely to give the reason that it was following police advice without giving the substance of that advice.

[Penny Mordaunt]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. The Bill strengthens accountability. All the considerations that needed to be taken into account when making these decisions should be put in writing as opposed to not being so; that is where concerns have arisen. It is right that the event organiser should be able to challenge decisions. As we have heard, many local authorities and individuals working within them operate in a very pragmatic and common-sense way and have good transparency. However, we want these assurances to be provided because, fundamentally, we all want our communities to be able to put on these events without being worried about the bureaucracy or any other concerns.

We consider that this is a proportionate approach. It puts in place a sensible structure—