English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (First sitting)

Maya Ellis Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th September 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Lewis Cocking (Broxbourne) (Con)]

I am a former councillor and I know lots of the witnesses from my previous role leader of Broxbourne council.

[Maya Ellis (Ribble Valley) (Lab)]

I declare, as per my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, that I am a parish councillor.

[Mrs Elsie Blundell (Heywood and Middleton North) (Lab)]

My husband is a sitting councillor on Rochdale borough council.

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[Manuela Perteghella]

Q I have a quick follow-up. I see that many parish and town councils are capable and eager to take on more responsibilities and deliver services, but I also see that some struggle to recruit enough councillors, especially in rural areas. How should the Bill recognise the different challenges that parish and town councils face with recruitment and building up resources?

Sam Chapman-Allen: There should be more powers in the Bill for councils. They should have more tools, and it should be much more attractive to get involved in local democracy. We should not underestimate or overlook the people who already put themselves forward. The general power of competence, for example, that the Bill provides for strategic authorities is not extended to all councils. Parish and town councils are out of step with the rest of local government. That would be one measure.

There are ways in which the allowances system could encourage more people to come forward and stand for election. It is ludicrous that people with caring responsibilities at parish level are unable to reclaim an allowance to cover caring costs. A number of things, such as remote meetings and strengthening the standards regime, are missing from the Bill. If they were added, they would support local communities and local democracy.

[Maya Ellis]

Q You mentioned how important town and parish councils are, and suggested that you would ideally like to see more parish councils. My question is on the neighbourhood governance proposals in the Bill. What do you make of them? What should they learn from the current structures of the town and parish councils? Based on your earlier comment, do you think that we should not have them, but should be looking at extending parish and town councils?

Justin Griggs: One of the ambitions that the Government set out in the White Paper and the Bill is to simplify local government structures and make them much more consistent. In 92% of England, if you leave your house, the first place where decisions are taken for you is in the stewardship of your park and open spaces, and in the supporting local organisations. You would not have that in many parts of England under local government reorganisation.

Those structures should be set up, and it is very much in keeping with other phases of reorganisation. Cornwall, Shropshire and Northumberland are fully parished. It would very much go with the grain and good practice of what has happened previously. It is really helpful—credit to Sam and many of his members—that many district councils are conducting community governance reviews to take a look at neighbourhood and community governance in their areas, where there is interest and appetite to set up new councils, so that they have a structure and a voice for taking action.

On the ingredients of how neighbourhoods can work, it is really helpful that the Government have set out that they see neighbourhood governance and models such as neighbourhood area committees as not undermining parish and town councils, but recognising their role and how they should be hardwired into representation on those committees. That goes to the heart of how we need to get all tiers of local government—strategic authorities, unitary authorities and parish councils—working collectively to benefit their residents.

Sam Chapman-Allen: It is important that the Secretary of State and Whitehall do not dictate what those local government and neighbourhood arrangements look like. It is for local places, local residents and local councillors—whether town, parish, district, unitary or county councillors—to decide what those types of neighbourhood models look like, bringing everyone together from the voluntary sector to the public sector, and the private sector if required, to deal with the challenges in that place-based locality.

[Vikki Slade]

Q In more urban areas, particularly those that have districts and do not have town or parish councils—I represent an area that did not have a neighbourhood review and does not have them—there is real potential for losing the civic and cultural identity of a place. Can you talk to what you think needs to change in who is the local face for a town or community?

Sam Chapman-Allen: I come back to my previous response: it is for local places to decide. Everywhere will look different. Casting ourselves back to where we are in Norfolk, we have the fantastic cathedral city of Norwich and the two massive coastal ports of Great Yarmouth and King’s Lynn. They are working out whether they need to establish a town or parish council, or whether the new unitary council can pick up that type of role—what is appropriate for them.

That civic place base is really important, with all the history and regalia that goes with it, but the most important bit is how those residents identify and interact with their local councillors and their local town hall. It is not for me, as chair of the District Councils Network, to tell them; I do not believe it is for Whitehall Departments either. It is for those local places to work out. That is what makes this Bill so special. It is for everybody in local communities to derive that. That is why it is important that local communities get to decide the structures, the size and scale, and the neighbourhood arrangements.

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[The Chair]

We will definitely finish on time, subject to any more technical difficulties.

[Maya Ellis]

Q My question is about the difference between the current number of strategic authorities, which are very urban, and the big swathe of coming strategic authorities, which are fairly rural. I am interested in how you see leadership evolving in those different areas. Are there ways in which this Bill needs to be strengthened to account for the different ways that those county and shire areas will be affected by becoming strategic authorities, compared with the urban developments we have had so far?

Bev Craig: With the pattern of devolution over the last few years, you are right that a number of combined authorities have cities as the driving economic force at their heart. That would probably do discredit to some of my colleagues who see themselves as already operating in more of a rural space.

The expansion of the competencies of strategic authorities within the Bill is quite important, as that is how you get the balance that matters for a place. We should also be mindful that size is not a barrier to democracy, and it does not create a deficit—that holds just as much for strategic authority size as local authority size. I run a city of 630,000 people, but my ward has 18,000 residents and I can still do a very good job on their behalf. A change of boundaries does not necessarily change someone’s association with a place.

An adjustment of some competencies still allows a new mayoral model to give a focus to place. The priorities will be different in rural and urban areas, but that is where having strong local authorities wedded into that helps some of that strategic planning.

Kevin Bentley: I absolutely agree because it already exists: Essex and Suffolk are both examples. The population of the Essex local authority area is 1.5 million; it is 80% rural and the rest is urban, so it already exists. In these matters, size must be appropriate to deliver services, but this is not 1974; it is 2025 and we operate differently and deliver our services differently. That needs to improve.

The previous Government delivered a lot of devolution very successfully, and the current Government are carrying that on with alacrity and speed. The bottom line is that it is important that people have excellent services delivered at best value. Modern-day local government does that in the best way it can, but the two-tier system does not allow it to be better. We are running on a 1974 model. It is time to change that.

In terms of local democracy, the neighbourhood delivery committees that we and the Government have proposed in the business case going forward will do something that has never happened before, with decision making going to local people in very local areas. That does not happen now and has never happened before, but it is going to happen with the Bill.

Matthew Hicks: From the CCN’s perspective, devolution is clearly a good thing, which we have pushed for and wanted for a long time. It is now moving forward at pace. The bottom line is that it ensures that decisions are made closer to local people, closer to communities and closer to the businesses they affect. The end result is a much more effective and better targeted authority, better public services, stronger growth and stronger partnerships in the private and public sectors, so it is positive across the board.

Kevin made a point about the partnership boards, which will also play a really strong part. In rural areas such as Suffolk where the population is 760,000, the large geography of the county allows us to deliver that more locally, even though we are a large rural area.

[Paul Holmes]

Q Good morning, everybody. I want to go back to something that was touched on by the previous panel. We are going through simultaneous restructuring of local government and setting up the strategic authorities, and in her questions the Minister has outlined that the 500,000-people target for LGR was never a hard target; it was a soft target. That is not my recollection of when local authorities were approached in quite a speedy way to make sure we went through the LGR.

My question is for all three of you: has there been a change of emphasis on that target from the early conversations that you had with a Minister, albeit a previous one? Do you think there has been a change in Government emphasis on the size, and how has that added to the confusion and the challenges of setting up these strategic authorities as the Bill goes forward?

Kevin Bentley: Yes, I certainly thought that was a hard target. Most colleagues thought it was a target to hit. It changed. It is important that we listen to people; lobbying was done around that and the Government listened to people. Those who do not change their mind never change anything, as Churchill would say, so it is important that the change took place, but it did cause confusion about what they meant.

For me, evidence leads the way. When we went into this in Essex, I was very clear that the evidence would tell us the shape and size of unitary authorities, and we would not set the number of unitary authorities and then make the evidence fit. That is what we have done. We are certainly doing that in the business case, and I believe other colleagues have done the same thing. It did cause confusion, and there was a lot of head scratching in the system to see whether we could test whether it was below, on, or above 500,000. To me, rules are there for the guidance of wise people, and the evidence leads the way.

Bev Craig: In my recollection, the Minister was always clear. Some of the questions arose with the conveying of that from colleagues in the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. At times, the sector felt desperate for a literal prescription, because until that point that was the kind of relationship we had had with Government. It had been quite some time since the Government had come to us and said, “Hey, come and be creative in terms of how these needs reflect your place.”

The 500,000 figure has helped people to understand that the programme of reform does not work if what is created is even more local authorities, each with 180,000 people. So we have taken on the guidance but it has become more clear as we move through the programme that this is indicative rather than prescriptive. I think the reality is about having sensible footprints, where services can be delivered at an economy of scale that helps services to perform well, can work with the strategic authority, and still speak to a sensible place that people can identify with. That is complicated; if it were easy, we would have done this before 1974.

Matthew Hicks: The size of the new unitary models really does matter; it is critical. Half of the members of the CCN are unitary authorities, and we see the benefits that this has brought, including large recurring savings, which is a big consideration. It also puts in place more sustainable structures. Back in February, the CCN supported the guidance in the invitation letters; we saw this as a means of reorganisation, with the numbers and the scale being about right for a sustainable long-term future.

I do think that some elements have been undermined by inconsistent messaging over recent months. The stated ambition for new unitary councils was that they would cover a population of about half a million or more. We saw similar issues coming up around social care and using existing council boundaries. There have been mixed messages around the building blocks of the new unitaries.

That inconsistent and slightly unhelpful messaging has led to a situation that will probably make life harder for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, because we are now seeing a significant increase in the number of business cases coming forward, and that will make it more difficult for MHCLG to scrutinise. If we look at Suffolk now, we are going to have one application for three unitaries of 250,000 each, which is really very small, with new boundaries. So I think the mixed messaging will create more work for MHCLG, because it is important that it looks at the detail and the data, and that its decision is based on evidence, not just politically driven.

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[Manuela Perteghella]

Q My question is for Mr Whittaker. I have many grassroots sports clubs in my constituency, which provide youth teams, women’s teams and walking football sessions, so they are fundamental to community wellbeing and inspiring the next generation of sports people. That is especially true in rural areas. The new provisions for sporting assets of community value apply to sports grounds with spectator facilities. Should those provisions be extended to include grassroots sports clubs?

Robbie Whittaker: That is a difficult question to answer, because as you go down the size scale of sports clubs, the extent to which they are able to mobilise to take advantage of opportunities is different. However, where people in the local area can do that, there is no reason why the legislation should not be flexible in allowing it to happen. I do think that it is a horses-for-courses thing. One of the things that I have learned through my involvement with the FSA is that no two areas or clubs are alike, and no two sets of local circumstances are necessarily alike. It is an area where the legislation should probably give flexibility without mandating any particular approach.

[Maya Ellis]

Q Building on what you talked about before, in terms of neighbourhood governance, I am interested in what you feel should or could happen if things go wrong. Interestingly, we heard earlier an opinion that parish councils, for example, should be rolled out, whereas the Bill essentially proposes neighbourhood area committees or such like to be in places where they do not currently have town or parish councils. One of the challenges is that there is not a baked-in democracy and accountability in that. I appreciate that you want allowance of local variation and differences, but if things go wrong or sour in the community, as they sometimes do, how do you propose that we bake in some assurances into the Bill?

Nick Plumb: That is a really good question, thank you. I have a couple of points on this. To make clear our starting point, I think we are at a point where there is real distrust in democratic institutions, and a democratic deficit, which I heard other witnesses speak about this morning. We need a dynamic view of accountability—one that, yes, works with existing democratic structures, whether that is at the local authority or parish council level, but also recognises that there are lots of different ways in which people exercise their agency at a neighbourhood level. Often, that might be participation in local groups, charities or community organisations. We did some polling recently that looked at neighbourhood governance options, which found that roughly 57% of people are supportive of councils working with existing community organisations. That drops to 19% when we are talking about new democratic institutions such as parish councils. There is something to think about when it comes to the current state of people’s trust in institutions and how we build on what is already there.

The other side of the accountability question is recognising that there needs to be some oversight of what this neighbourhood governance looks like. One of the things that Power to Change, the We’re Right Here campaign and the Independent Commission on Neighbourhoods have been calling for is an independent commissioner for community power. That would exist to recognise challenges from the community around neighbourhood governance and whether it was working well, responding to people’s queries about whether neighbourhood governance models such as community covenants were being introduced. It would also recognise that if those things were not working well, an independent commissioner could step in and say, “This is not working,” and find a different way. For us, it is about that diversity and recognising that parish councils are great in lots of places, but there is only 40% coverage at the moment across the population of England. In some places, the roll-out of new parishes might be the right thing to do; in others, it will not, so it is about how we work with the messiness of neighbourhood institutions.

[The Chair]

If there are no further questions from Members, I thank the witnesses for their evidence. That brings us to the end of the morning session. The Committee will meet again at 2 pm in Committee Room 8, where we are now, to continue taking oral evidence.

Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned.—(Deirdre Costigan.)

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (Second sitting)

Maya Ellis Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th September 2025 Public Bill Committees

[David Simmonds]

Q At what level, or by what mechanism, do you think the views of local businesses, particularly smaller businesses, should be captured and used to influence the decision making of the new authorities that will come into being? I was very conscious listening to your descriptions that you very ably depicted some issues that those businesses might face. How do you make sure that the mayors, and the decision makers feeding into those mayors understand what the impact of those decisions will be, and take those views into account?

Andrew Goodacre: That is a good question. What works well at the moment is the business improvement district model. Where it falls down slightly again depends on the people involved. A good BID represents the voice of local businesses, which are paying through business rates, because the levy is on the business rate, as we know. What I saw in Enniskillen at that time was a BID that really listened to its stakeholders, shared ideas with them and took back the feedback. One of the things introduced there was an Enniskillen gift card that could be used in any shop in that area—ideal for the tourist market that it is trying to appeal to.

We should establish BIDs; the problem with them is that they can be very indifferent, in terms of their make-up and the quality of them. Again, the funding often becomes a point of contention because you are adding to business rates, which is already a massive point of contention for most business owners. In a way, I would like to see BIDs funded in different ways, through the devolution White Paper. Their performance would therefore be a bit more targeted. Part of their performance metrics should be the ability for them to show that they have engaged, understood and taken forward what local business people want, in my case, within their high street.

Allen Simpson: An observation: if you are looking to drive growth, by definition you are looking to bring in businesses that are not there or do not exist, so to some extent your problem is how you consult businesses that do not currently exist. To some degree, it is less about having consultation with specific businesses and more about having an approach that is pro the foundation of businesses in a given area. Clearly, there will be examples where licensing rules could be better consulted on so that existing businesses can expand, but I wonder whether it is less about consultation and more about taking a proactive approach to growth.

[Maya Ellis (Ribble Valley) (Lab)]

Q Both the industries that you represent rely on tourism. One of the things that has come up in discussions that I have had about local government reorganisation is the branding of an area. I just wondered about your thoughts—you have touched on bids and hospitality zones. By way of an example, my area of Ribble Valley is known for food and drink and for weddings. Ribble Valley borough council will disappear in local government reorganisation. One of the biggest fears about that seems to be about the branding of it. We have looked at things such as the English riviera in Torquay, and how they have created a bid to brand that. What are your thoughts on that? Do we have enough mechanisms to protect those brands within the UK, which may disappear as borough council areas, but your industries will still need?

Andrew Goodacre: I think it would be a shame if we lost some of those brands that people have worked hard to create. I think the visitor economy is so important. The most successful independent retailers are in those visitor economies, because people often visit looking for something different that you do not see in a chain store of a large retailer. Creating that identity is something that I hear all the time from successful places. They feel as if they are part of an identity—they have something around them that says, “Yes, we can buy into this.” The riviera example is a good one. It would be a shame if that local effort—that local sense—was lost. I think Falmouth is another good example. Falmouth has created its own essence of Cornwall within that place. You should not lose that. They are so important. It seems counterintuitive that a push for devolution to create more power at a local level means that you would lose local identities. That would be counterintuitive, so we need to make sure that does not happen. Actually, those should be reinforced with better funding.

Allen Simpson: I ran Visit London for five years, so I worked on this a lot. My observation is that the money is not there. Unless you are London, Edinburgh or, to a certain degree, Manchester, which has a very high-quality marketing agency of its own, the money just is not there to do it. Visit Kent has just gone bust. The ability to market a region—sometimes, we devolve the responsibility but not the money with it, and I think that is an example. Equally, not everywhere can be branded. I am not going to pick on anywhere in particular or have one of my regular digs at Essex, but where there is a solid local brand, at the moment, we do not have sensible ways of doing that—just mechanisms to do it. Visit Britain works quite hard internationally to disperse people’s awareness of the UK outside of Edinburgh, York, Lincoln and London, but towards a domestic market, which I think is largely what you are talking about, the exam question is, “What is the pot of money handed down to local communities to do it?” because it is incredibly expensive doing marketing.

[The Chair]

If there are no further questions from Members, on behalf of the Committee, I thank both our witnesses for their evidence. We will now move on to the next panel.

Examination of Witnesses

Gareth Davies and Bill Butler gave evidence.

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[The Chair]

We can squeeze in one more quick question and answer.

[Maya Ellis]

Q I am interested in community empowerment plans and accountability within them. I will read up on them more, but to Zoë’s point, to what extent do you feel that you need to require different communities, so that it is not just the people who shout loudest, and the standard people you go to in a community, who are heard? How do you make sure that the whole breadth of the community is heard?

Professor Denham: My view is that it would be reasonable for the legislation to enable Ministers to set out the broad parameters of the plans, but not to do that in a way that specifies exactly how it should be done in particular areas. It will vary: if you have strong town councils, you would sensibly build them in, but if you have communities that do not engage at all, you would use deliberative participation. People should be required to set out which tools they are going to use, why they are going to use them, how they would monitor the effect of that, how they will keep an eye on who is taking part in those processes, and so on. It is not just a slogan; it is a proper structured framework for doing it.

Zoë Billingham: I absolutely agree with that, and with allowing local tailoring. You are right; sometimes even community conversations can be captured by usual suspects. That is why using participatory methods on an ongoing basis is really important. We have seen some innovation in this space already through the mayors; they do mayoral question times, or invite young people to come in and ask them questions in a public forum. There are lots of ways it can be done.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Maya Ellis Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 2nd September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Maya Ellis (Ribble Valley) (Lab)]

I draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I have always been, and I remain, a vocal advocate for devolution and reorganisation. I got to witness the type of joy and hope I want every community to feel when I worked in Greater Manchester during the establishment of the first devolved mayoralty. I have had robust debates with councils and residents of all political persuasions on how local government reorganisation should best work in Lancashire, particularly when a sense of place and home is so important to most of us. The prospect of what we know to be our place changing somehow can be unsettling, but if we are brought along and engaged throughout, we can usually start to see the opportunities too.

I will focus my comments on the most local level of our democratic structure: the role of town and parish councils, which I believe should be used to even greater effect if we let it. My constituency of Ribble Valley is significantly parished in its rural areas, with parishes such as Broughton and Balderstone, while more suburban areas such as Lostock Hall are not but have active community groups such as the Lostock Hall Village Team. I therefore see the strength of both formal and informal community leadership.

In clause 58, the Bill rightly creates a clearer requirement for local authorities to create neighbourhood governance structures. In a statement to this House in June, it was suggested that those could be called neighbourhood area committees, led by ward councillors. However, I am concerned that the Bill does not fully appreciate the role that town and parish councils currently play and that the accountability of such neighbourhood area committees does not seem to be enshrined.

I will cover a couple of my concerns. First, if the committees are led by ward councillors, such councillors are political in their nature whereas parish councillors are usually apolitical. We therefore need to consider the ramifications of changing the focus of those local committees. Secondly, how do we ensure that every area is advocated for by a committed representative? How do we tangibly protect areas whose ward councillors are not active or who do not create a neighbourhood governance structure? Does that remove the ability for involved residents to form groups outside that? We all know of councillors—rare as they are, I hope—who stand for political reasons or otherwise and then do not drive things locally.

Even though parish and town councils only cover 36% of the population in England, they cover some 90% of its geographical area. Some may feel that such a distinction means that parish councils are not so influential and significant in our country’s governance, but that view does a disservice to the land that we live in and on and are sustained by. As politicians, and as residents in a democracy, we are responsible for the land around us and its resources. Indeed, some of the biggest roles for parish and town councils are around planning, the environment, flooding and ensuring that local areas—the buildings, the fields, the roads and not just the people—are managed well.

Although to some this section of the Bill may feel small and fairly niche, if we do not pay attention to the conversations happening in the pub or the community centre and to the people there who understand their local area better than anyone, we will struggle to understand what people want and need. Let me be clear: this Bill is monumental. But let us build on our fantastic existing structures, especially those town and parish councils that cover 90% of our great country, as has always been—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

Order. I call Siân Berry.

Oral Answers to Questions

Maya Ellis Excerpts

Monday 3rd March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alex Norris]

We have been clear that for local growth funding we want to move away from the old model of competitive funding pots and beauty parades, which was short-term and based on central criteria. I can assure the hon. Lady that the model that people get from this Government will be longer term, will be allocative, will have more flexibility and will have more local leadership, and it will of course be targeted at those communities that need it the most.

[Maya Ellis (Ribble Valley) (Lab)]

May I first thank the Secretary of State for visiting Preston last week to attend this year’s convention of the north? It was a fantastic event and reinvigorated the case for northern investment to be a key determinant in Government decisions. In that vein, can the Minister outline what conversations are being held with departmental colleagues to ensure that the opportunity of investing in the north is fully realised and understood?

[Alex Norris]

I know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State enjoyed her visit. Our Ministry is clear that although we have a crucial role to play in devolution, it is a whole-Government venture. We are having frequent conversations with colleagues about how to crowd-in the important policy interventions they are making, to ensure that our communities across the country have the tools and resources they need to shape their place.