Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mike Martin and Jim McMahon

Monday 20th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Jim McMahon]

It is important to say that any requests for local government reorganisation are proposed to Government by the local areas. It is for the Government to provide the process by which those applications are heard. Over at least the last four years, local authority elections have been postponed countless times to allow reorganisation to take place. To be clear, there is a bottom-up approach for both the postponement of elections and the boundaries that are drawn for the unitaries. Our job is to ensure that the process supports that approach.

[Mike Martin (Tunbridge Wells) (LD)]

I want to ask about the interaction between the planning reforms and devolution, which are two huge bits of legislation. In Tunbridge Wells we have a local plan, but we have been asked when we do our new local plan to have a 66% increase in houses. Except, we will not have a new local plan because Tunbridge Wells borough council will cease to exist—it will become part of the West Kent unitary authority. How will these two huge reforms interact and what will it mean for housing numbers in Tunbridge Wells?

[Jim McMahon]

In a sense, a council is only an organisation at a point in time, but there will always be a local authority responsible for the area. We want to ensure that the authority is strategic but also takes that wider view. Reorganisation is of course part of that, but, importantly, a strategic authority can also take wider responsibility for aligning public service reform with local growth. The hon. Gentleman talks about housing numbers and we can sometimes miss how important that is: housing targets are one thing, but we must not forget that for every one of those numbers there are people and families who currently do not have a safe and affordable place to live. This agenda is about tackling exactly that.

Local Government Reorganisation

Debate between Mike Martin and Jim McMahon

Wednesday 15th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Jim McMahon]

We tackled that head on in the White Paper, which said that, for efficiency, the minimum population will be 500,000, but was clear in the same paragraph that—this is where devolution goes hand in hand with reorganisation—there needs to be some flexibility for the reasons that the hon. Member set out. That is our firm commitment.

[Mike Martin (Tunbridge Wells) (LD)]

Kent county council has opted to go on the priority programme and cancel elections this May; I guess turkeys do not vote for Christmas. The timetable going forward is a little confused. We will have mayorals in 2027, unitaries in 2028, and then it stands up later on. Could the Minister give some more detail on that? If the process is stretched out like that, Conservative Kent county councillors will be in power for seven years. Judging by my inbox, the people of Kent are absolutely appalled by that. I would be grateful for more details.

[Jim McMahon]

From the Government’s point of view, acting in a legal, quasi-judicial way, we have to take such decisions on the value of the evidence and the proposals. It is not our job to get involved in the politics of whether the Liberal Democrats want to see the back of the Tories but the Tories want to avoid an election, or vice versa. It is our job to play with a straight bat, and look at the benefits of the proposals. Kent has applied, but we are going through the process of screening applications to ensure that they are realistic proposals for devolution and LGR that hold together. If they meet those criteria, we will support them. If they do not, we will not.