Draft West Midlands Combined Authority Order 2016

Julian Knight Excerpts

Monday 6th June 2016 General Committees

[Mr John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

Although I am not a member of this Committee, as a west midlands Member of Parliament I welcome the opportunity to address this order, about which there are considerable reservations, as my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton outlined. I suspect that those reservations are shared by many on the Government Benches; apart from those on the Front Benches, who are here ex officio, I notice that the Government seem to have had great difficulty in getting west midlands Members to come along to defend this proposition. We do have my colleague the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills, whom I welcome, and my co-commentator—

[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Spellar]

Yes.

[Julian Knight]

I inform the right hon. Gentleman that I am the Member for Solihull, which is a key part of the west midlands.

[Mr Spellar]

I was going to come to the hon. Gentleman after I had acknowledged the presence of my co-presenter on the midlands “Sunday Politics”, the hon. Member who comes from the east midlands. Where do the other Members come from? Gloucester is just down the M5, I suppose. The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham is clearly deeply interested in the fate of the west midlands.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Spellar]

The interests of the hon. Gentleman’s constituents may not coincide much with the interests of the constituents of those of us who represent the great conurbation of the west midlands. That is one of the problems: we have had people meddling in local government—this applies on both sides of Parliament, by the way—who in many cases have had no experience in local government. That is why they so cavalierly ride over the wishes of local councillors. In the referendums that were imposed on our great cities, we saw all but one of the cities that were asked turn down the proposition of elected mayors. I shall come back to this in a minute, but interestingly, two of those cities, Coventry and Birmingham, which rejected elected mayors by an overwhelming majority, are now being forced to have one. I understand that that will come later, but it is part and parcel of this scheme, which has many merits in itself. As my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton said, if these things are properly applied, there is great merit in the ideas of having a combined authority and of authorities working together, but not in the context of the enormous cuts that have taken place and that have been directed principally at the metropolitan authorities. I am talking not just about the disproportionate cuts to council spending but about cuts to the West Midlands police authority, which, along with one or two other of the metropolitan authorities, has borne the biggest percentage cuts of any of the authorities, as has the fire service in the west midlands. That may be why there are so few west midlands Members on the Government side prepared to defend this scheme.

[Julian Knight]

As a west midlands Member on the Government side, I thank the right hon. Gentleman for giving way. Will he reflect on the facts that the Government came to a special arrangement with West Midlands police that will enable them to levy an extra precept to cover any potential shortfall, and that the current Labour police and crime commissioner is sitting on £100 million of reserves and not spending them?

[Mr Spellar]

I am interested to hear the hon. Gentleman concede that the Government have exercised disproportionate cuts on the west midlands. I am surprised that he is not prepared to stand up against the Chancellor of the Exchequer for the interests of the public and the council tax payers of the west midlands.

We must beware some of the traps that lie here. In various of these authorities, the transfer of further health functions from the NHS is being examined. We have had experience of that. Councils have had a number of responsibilities transferred to them, but unfortunately the money—or the sums that were previously being spent—did not follow. Yes, the responsibilities were transferred, but so were increasing liabilities, meaning that other council services have had to be cut.

Although there is great merit in devolving responsibilities as long as there is funding, some problems do not go away. I recollect that when I was a Transport Minister, there were concerns that for peripheral areas of larger authorities or regions—in particular where there was a transport interface with another region, for example in the north-west and Wales—there was always a difficulty in getting funding, even though there could have been considerable benefit. That might have been more easily dealt with at a national level.

I am concerned that there are a number of unresolved questions. The order outlines the authorities that are involved. The core authorities are the councils of the old West Midlands County Council. However, discussions are taking place about whether Warwickshire will be involved, although it is unclear what stage they are at. Equally, discussions are taking place as to the involvement of Telford and the rest of Shropshire. That would be quite a different type of authority and people in the region—not just parliamentarians—want to know what the shape of the authority will be.

There is also concern that if the Chancellor, who—I stand ready to be corrected—has never served on a local authority, is going to force through not only the creation of an elected mayor, but an election next year in May, we could see a repeat of the stand-alone elections we had for police commissioners, where we saw incredibly low turnouts right across the country. That should be a concern on all sides. Therefore, we need clear answers on that issue.

I notice that funding for the authority will be based on the total resident population. Therefore, it will not be based on the council tax value or on a proportion of income, but will just be a per capita charge—in other words, back to the poll tax. There are some serious questions that make this a very unsatisfactory proposal, and it is being rushed through before these important issues have been resolved locally or between Government and the relevant local authorities.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Wharton]

I remind the Committee:

“A Combined Authority would help maximise growth in output and jobs. A region-wide focus on productivity, competiveness and raising skill levels would put the region in the best position to achieve its economic vision and economic goals.”

Glancing at the letter, I do not see reference to a hypothetical argument about local government funding, which is entirely separate from the process by which either devolution or combined authorities are agreed.

[Julian Knight]

I am struck by this Opposition tale of woe from parties that are part of the combined authority. At the bottom of the letter is the name of Councillor Robert Sleigh, who is the leader of the shadow authority and of a Conservative authority in Solihull, and a driving force behind the initiative. We are not so poverty stricken that Solihull council has not been able to freeze its council tax for five years, while still having leading services nationally.

[James Wharton]

That is another comparison to draw. As we know, council tax more or less doubled under the previous Labour Administration. It has reduced in real terms by 9% over the past six years. That reduction has helped many of the people we represent, and many of the people represented by what we are discussing today. I commend Councillor Bob Sleigh not only for his leadership on this issue, but for ensuring that this is a cross-party proposal. The deal has been agreed across the parties and it will deliver real benefits to those communities.