Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 17th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I come from Cumbria, where I chair the local enterprise partnership. It has been described in general terms as a county where there are both pockets of prosperity and various very real pockets of serious deprivation. Taken in the round, it is a place that, on most national metrics, is probably nearer the bottom of the class than the top. It is very difficult for places such as Cumbria to compete, because much of its economic and social infrastructure is weak—for example, road and rail connections, and connectivity, which has just been mentioned—and its training, skills and education are not as good as they should be. This means that, in the context of decisions taken commercially in relation to such things as inward investment, this part of England, and others like it, have a ball and chain around their leg.

That is why I support the concept of levelling up, which the Bill is intended to promote, although, as has been said, its exact definition is perhaps a bit opaque. It is, however, extraordinary that the Government appear to make little or no effort—as touched on by the noble Lord, Lord Teverson—to see what is being done in places such as mine, where we work for free in respect of things such as natural capital and ecosystem services, from which everyone else seems to benefit. We do not get the market value of the work carried out there.

Given the nature of the world we live in, local government clearly has a big part to play and, to do this effectively, scale is required to help to pay for the capacity to do it properly. Capacity is important when we are thinking about the kind of things we are discussing this evening. Equally, local government needs more profile. Local authority leaders are far less well known than, for example, leading players in local football clubs. It is only with profile that they can become the focus of the public debate and scrutiny which are necessary around the important matters we are talking about. Hence I am a supporter of the idea of mayors. Given that the country divides naturally into discrete areas, it must be right that these units should be the basis of the way we go forward. That is why I support the idea of the variable geometry in the Bill. After all, what is right for Manchester is not necessarily right for Cornwall or Cumbria.

However, I am concerned, as a number of other noble Lords have said, that devolved activities do not simply develop into devolved delivery mechanisms. The local administration should have real discretion in financial and policy matters, even at least if to some extent they end up cutting across central government policy. If voters and political leaders are allowed to make their own bed, they should have to lie on it.

Equally, it is important that elected mayors are not captured by national politics and political parties. I remember when I was selected as the Conservative candidate to fight the European election in Cumbria, Willie Whitelaw, the then Deputy Prime Minister, confided to me, “Richard, you must always remember that the way to be a successful Conservative politician in Cumbria is to be discreetly disloyal to the Government”. I am glad that the present evidence suggests that, right across the political spectrum, this capture has not yet happened. That is encouraging.

As far as the general condition of the country is concerned, it seems unarguable that we are not in a good place and we have to do better. A combination of bad luck, bad judgment and poor decisions means that we are not as a country where we would like to be. To improve matters, we have to keep them simple, focused on what counts and creates value and not vanity projects and meretricious populism.

Physical infrastructure obviously operates within the planning system. We have to have a planning system because, if it is not based on sound intellectual principles, land use in this country will simply become anarchic. The danger will be that our laudable efforts at simplifying things and improving the way in which matters are administered will lead to the whole system imploding, which will be hugely damaging.

Clearly, housing is at the heart of the debate around this topic, but we must not forget the fact that housing is a wasting asset which always requires more money, which has to be found and then paid for. It is common to all types of tenure across all kinds of ownership. This is at least as important to the well-being of the housing stock as to any other consideration and should be treated as a discrete aspect. Furthermore, the legislative tools within our system of planning controls and housing oversight are by themselves incapable of solving the problems we undoubtedly face.

None of this can be achieved without leadership combined with focus and realism. I look forward to seeing in Committee and at Report how the details emerge. Levelling up must not be allowed to become a cover for bureaucratic inertia and inadequate political posturing, and a smokescreen which disguises administrative shortcomings from the public gaze at national or local level.

Queen’s Speech

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Monday 17th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, like others, I congratulate the two noble Lords who made their maiden speeches in this debate. I will start my remarks where the noble Lords, Lord Campbell-Savours and Lord Clark of Windermere, concluded on day one of this debate on the gracious Speech. I refer to the controversy surrounding Newton Rigg College near Penrith, where I studied myself. As chair of the Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership, I considered it inappropriate publicly to man the barricades on this matter; rather, I have been busy behind the scenes, including keeping the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner of Kimble, up to date with my concerns. However, now that the Cumbrian campus has publicly been placed on the market, with a view to unilaterally expatriating the proceeds to Yorkshire, I feel free to express my personal feelings and anger, shared by so many other Cumbrians.

Together with the chief executive of the Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership, I was a witness at a hearing of the other place’s EFRA Committee on 23 March this year. In the same session, there were two witnesses from Askham Bryan College, neither of whom was either the chair or vice-chair of the governors. The committee’s questioning was skilful and forensic, led effectively by the honourable Member for Brent North, Mr Barry Gardiner. My LEP colleague and I spoke relatively little. I left the hearing stunned by the college’s evidence and its inadequacy and shortcomings, and was more or less completely bemused by it all. Since then, I have revisited the evidence, which was recorded, and have given it careful thought. It correlates with what I know has been happening on the ground and with Askham Bryan College’s behaviour, which has been evasive, disingenuous and inconsistent, including gagging its employees.

As noble Lords will know, FE colleges are charities, but they are not required to register with the Charity Commission; rather, their principal regulator is the Department for Education. None the less, their charitable purpose is paramount. However, in the face of what appear to be considerable financial difficulties, Askham Bryan College’s prime purpose seems to have morphed into one of preservation of itself to the exclusion of everything else, in a manner which specialist legal advice—which I have seen—suggests may be unlawful and certainly seems to me to disregard a number of the Nolan principles.

All this is very similar in a number of respects to what happened some years ago in the case of the Kids Company. That was a real scandal, and this is equally so. It is as simple as that.

I conclude with three pleas. First, I say to the Minister and the Government: this FE college is part of the nation’s system for delivering education and training, and the Government are the college’s principal regulator and guardian of the public interest. Their prime concern must be the integrity of the system and proper administration of the provision of FE, skills and training to everybody in this country, not just to those in Yorkshire. They should not emulate Pontius Pilate and weakly stand by wringing their hands. They should take a grip.

I say to your Lordships: one of our roles as parliamentarians is to identify abuse, bring it to public attention, place it under public scrutiny and stamp it out. As I have said, the EFRA Committee’s hearing on 23 March has been recorded and is available. I urge your Lordships to view it and form your own conclusions. I believe that something very wrong is going on.

Thirdly, I would say through the House and via Hansard to the media—I speak as an ex-Minister in the then DNH who had considerable involvement with the media, as an ex-chairman of the Communications Committee of your Lordships’ House when we produced an important report on investigative journalism, as chairman of a local newspaper group for more than a decade and now a director of Full Fact and the Public Interest News Foundation—that you the media, both local and national, because this is not a parochial issue, are part of the wider system of checks and balances in which our system of government and administration is set. I know a scandal when I see it. Go out, investigate, form your own conclusions and then tell truth to power. That is what you are for.

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Earl, Lord Shrewsbury, has withdrawn, so I now call the noble Lord, Lord Thurlow.

Levelling Up

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Thursday 18th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, in order for there to be a reduction in economic disparity, of course that needs to touch on the issues that my noble friend raises. The proof of the pudding will be that we see those left-behind areas with large minority communities level up with those areas that are economically more successful.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, as chairman of the Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership, I welcome these levelling-up initiatives. As the Minister has pointed out, levelling up is not simply a northern or an urban challenge. As has been pointed out, the headings of expenditure described in the Statement are a mere drop in the ocean of what is needed nationally, but they are a start. Can the Minister tell the House how, and in what specific ways, public expenditure and policy will be recalibrated to take this levelling-up agenda forward, at the same time ensuring that this is not done at the expense of global competitiveness?

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, I do not see the levelling-up agenda as being anything other than helping us to be more economically competitive at a global level. I am sure that there will be opportunities to refine the outcomes frameworks and the metrics used to ensure that we are successful in our desire to raise all boats.