John Pugh
Main Page: John Pugh (Liberal Democrat - Southport)
Greg Clark
As I suggested, the Localism Act 2011 abolishes top-down imposition and releases local communities to have their say, and with the new planning framework it will be unambiguously clear that it is local communities that do things their way.
John Pugh (Southport) (LD)
T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.
The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Mr Eric Pickles)
Last week we announced that the abolition of the Audit Commission will save councils £250 million over the next five years in lower audit fees, so cutting quangos does save money; we have finally abolished Labour’s ports tax, which threatened to scupper England’s export trade, so cutting taxes saves jobs; and, finally, we have welcomed more than 3,500 applications so far for diamond jubilee street parties, promoting our guide to organising a street party, so it shows that cutting red tape allows more bunting to be put up.
John Pugh
I thank the Minister for that welcome news, but as part of his duties as Secretary of State will he defend the right of Christian local authority workers discreetly to wear crosses or crucifixes at work, just as he would I hope defend the right of Sikhs to wear the turban, given a pending European judgment?
Mr Pickles
It is certainly my view that, provided any object does not get in the way of someone doing their job, a discreet display of their religion is something that we should welcome.