Localism Bill

Debate between Mark Reckless and Bob Blackman

Monday 7th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mark Reckless]

As I said, I believe that in this respect the Bill is a marginal improvement on what we had before. Let us consider the idea that the federal Governments in the US or Germany would look at each state, determine what the level is—indeed, the same level for all states—and say, “If you want to raise your property tax by more than that, you have to have this referendum, and this is the exact way in which we specify that it has to be run.” By comparison, we seem to have an extraordinarily centralised state, and I am disappointed that the tiny steps in the Bill have only a very little impact on that.

In the policing universe, the Bill is not just a little bit of progress but a step back. The significant difference is that there is not a single body making the decision, as with a local council within the referendum protection; we are setting up a special local body, a police and crime panel, that will have scrutiny, oversight and an overview of the directly elected commissioner. We said in the coalition agreement that the elected police and crime commissioner

“will be subject to strict checks and balances by locally elected representatives.”

We were then told—I questioned the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice about this earlier—that the panel

“will have a power to trigger a referendum on the policing precept recommended by the Commissioner.”

The Minister said that he disagreed with the premise of my question, which was in fact the premise in the White Paper that the Home Office published in July last year, “Policing in the 21st century”, which said that the police and crime panel will have this power. However, the Bill, which provides for these referendums, has no provision to allow the police and crime panel to trigger such a referendum, and the powers appear to have been taken by the Secretary of State, despite the coalition agreement and what was promised in the White Paper last year.

When the Minister spoke about this on 30 March, it seemed that his officials had not properly explained to him his own Bill. He said that

“the police and crime commissioner will set the precept but a referendum will be triggered. The”

police and crime

“panel will not be able to prevent that, but it will be able to propose an alternative precept with accompanying reasons that will have to be published. The public will then have to decide—having both sides of the story.”—[Official Report, 30 March 2011; Vol. 526, c. 433.]

That suggests that the referendum was going to be between the commissioner’s precept and an alternative proposed by the panel. That is what we said would happen, but unfortunately the provisions of the Bill do not allow it to happen. In the case of the police precept, we are bringing in this third body—the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State, not the local panel, has the power to trigger a referendum. That is a highly regressive step that will prevent the elected police and crime commissioner from establishing a responsible relationship with his chief constable—perhaps being able to get him more budget and, in return, getting different priorities for policing. They will always be looking over their shoulder to the Secretary of State, who is giving a standard rise that they cannot go above without the risk of a local referendum that would cost perhaps 2% of the council tax, which they would have to pay even if they won. This will have a chilling effect on our proposals for police accountability.

I am very disappointed, because in 2005 I wrote a book called “Direct Democracy” for which I had four co-authors—my right hon. Friends the Members for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark) and for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert), my hon. Friend the Member for Clacton (Mr Carswell), and Daniel Hannan, who is now an MEP. In that, we called for direct democracy and the devolution of powers, and, in particular, an elected person in charge of overseeing the police who would have local powers. We still believed that in the coalition agreement and we still believed it in last year’s White Paper when we said that the panel would be able to trigger a referendum. It is terribly disappointing that this Bill fails to provide for that and instead hugs the power to the Secretary of State.

[Bob Blackman]

I want to make three points. The first is about the codes of conduct and the abolition of the Standards Board. I, like many local councillors at the time, was the subject of numerous referrals to the Standards Board. The first that anyone heard of it was when they received the letter from the Standards Board saying that it had decided to take no further action on the vexatious complaint. It could take many months and, in certain cases, years before a complaint was determined one way or the other. In cases that were chosen for investigation, the investigations could take the length of a councillor’s term of office before it was decided whether they were guilty.

I have concerns about what is being proposed. I completely agree with having a national standard for the codes of conduct that local authorities should impose. There should be national standards and everybody should abide by them, even though they will be monitored at a local level. There is a key concern about how valid complaints will be investigated. I have a concern about elected councillors overseeing complaints about other elected councillors and about how politicians might seek to gain party political advantage over one another through standards committees. The concept of having independent individuals in charge is of course welcome. However, the risk is whether such people can be found for every local authority and whether they will be of a suitable standard to make the system work. I have concerns but, broadly speaking, the Government’s amendments should be welcomed.

My second point touches on the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith) on referendums. The key concern is about the difference between a local authority consulting the people it serves and it being bound by a referendum, possibly on a single proposition. I do not think that local authorities in this country consult properly. Instead, they notify the public that they will do something to them, regardless of what they think of it.

I will give an example from a local authority on which I used to sit. The London borough of Brent has decided to close half its libraries. The council put it to the public and 82% of people said that they did not like it. The answer from the council was, “We’re still going to do it.” That was the result of a consultation. The idea was overwhelmingly rejected, but the council are progressing with it. That would be a case, like my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park described, in which a referendum would undoubtedly go against what the local authority wishes to do. However, that does not change the fact that local authorities are elected to serve and to make decisions. They should do so even if those decisions are not liked by the people whom they represent.

I will also cite the case of Bristol, which several years ago conducted a referendum on the level of council tax to be charged. The council put four options to the people of Bristol: a reduction in council tax with a drastic reduction in services; a marginal reduction in council tax with a marginal reduction in services; a stand-still option; or the council’s preferred option of an increase in council tax and keeping services at the same level. Lo and behold, the people voted for a substantial reduction in council tax and a substantial reduction in services—not quite what was expected. One has to be careful in taking on a referendum. For the purposes that I have described, a referendum is clearly not the route to follow.

Equally, as I have said in interventions, if we had referendums with a trigger of 20% or 30% of people signing a petition, that would not necessarily work if the turnout for such a referendum would be far too low. That would be ridiculous and would impose on local authorities an unfair basis for making decisions. As we all know, it is easy to get people to sign a petition, but it is another thing to get them to vote. Clearly there is a role for petitions in consultations, but using them to trigger referendums is difficult.

My third point relates to the position on council tax. I have always been an advocate for councils being free to set council tax at the level they choose. If councillors choose to impose a swingeing increase in council tax, the public have the right to vote them out at the next election. We should trust the people to do that. I have always been stringently opposed to the capping of council tax or previous forms of local taxation, because it takes away the decision-making powers of local authorities. Councils should not have referendums held over their heads on council tax, but people should have the power of the ballot box to remove councillors who vote for a swingeing increase. That is the right way to protect people.

Most local authorities in this country have their councillors elected by thirds, so the local electorate has the power every year to remove councils and councillors who choose to vote for large increases in council tax. In unitary authorities, there are all-out elections, which means that councillors, having been safely elected, can take decisions at the beginning of their cycle to get their betrayal out of the way before they face the threat of the ballot box three or four years later. Perhaps we need to re-examine the governance of local authorities and ask whether they should face more frequent local elections, rather than having periodic elections when the decisions made by the local electorate are often more about the national Government of the day than the decisions that are made at a local level.

Having spoken about those three key issues, I will conclude my remarks. I warmly welcome the amendments proposed by the Government.