Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Hywel Williams Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 8th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

I am glad to speak as a Welsh MP after that. This Bill should be read in the light of the Public Accounts Committee report on “Local economic growth”, published today. On the levelling up fund, it states:

“principles for awarding funding were only finalised by Ministers after they knew who…would win and who would not as a result of those principles.”

That is, the decisions were taken and then the principles were established as to who would win. It also states:

“The Department also needs to demonstrate how the priorities of the devolved administrations will be addressed in the context of administering these local growth funds on a UK-wide basis.”

That is, the Government in Wales decide their own priorities, but somehow the administration of local growth funds is decided on a UK-wide basis. Many people in Wales feel that this Government have been steadily undermining devolution, and that is another example.

The Bill intrudes on devolved areas such as health, education and housing, bypassing our Senedd, which raises concerns regarding Wales. For instance, what discussions has the Secretary of State had with the Welsh Government regarding the levelling-up metrics? How will they be monitored to account for distinct Welsh economic and development structures? What methodology will the Government use to measure the success or failure of the metrics in Wales?

Wales has the highest levels of child poverty in the UK and high levels of disability, and we should not be disadvantaged by ill-thought-out evaluation procedures. The Westminster Government should take immediate action to address the structural causes of poverty in Wales, and I shall list just three. Research and development funding should be devolved. Per head, research and development expenditure in the east of England was £1,106 in 2019; in Wales, it was £252, which is a great difficulty for our local economy. We should be getting the £5 billion Barnett consequential owed from HS2 spending, which is provided for Scotland and Northern Ireland. The Welsh Government require greater borrowing powers to pursue proper economic development.

This Bill is just one part of the levelling-up agenda, and it cannot be divorced from the replacement of EU funding. Wales has done very poorly out of that. Not only is the funding far below what was promised, but there is no coherent strategy as to how it will be spent. We know that the funding formula for other funds, such as the shared prosperity fund, does not reflect the needs of Welsh communities. Indeed, Wales Fiscal Analysis has shown that funding for the SPF will shift money away from the west of Wales, which is poor, to the east of Wales, and will fail to address rural poverty. There is also a huge democratic deficit involved in the levelling-up approach.

The UK Government’s application of the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 to devolved areas has excluded the Welsh Government from decision making, which again is a very severe blow to the Government of Wales. Indeed, we all hold, as I have said, that the UK Government are busily undermining Welsh democracy, and I am afraid this Bill will continue that process.