Rewiring the State

Debate between Noah Law and Louise Haigh

Wednesday 2nd September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Louise Haigh]

The right hon. Gentleman is right that traditionally the model of moving people or roles out of London has meant duplication in the centre. That is exactly what we are attempting to fix. We want new senior roles across the country. I pay tribute to the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Richmond and Northallerton (Rishi Sunak), who created the Darlington campus. That campus is a proper model of delivery, with senior policy making and civil servants in Darlington, based around the Treasury there. It has helped to deliver and change decision making, and that is exactly what No. 10 North is attempting to do.

[Noah Law (St Austell and Newquay) (Lab)]

I welcome the steps taken by the First Secretary to ensure that strategic authorities such as Cornwall have the capacity to deliver on our growth agenda, but I want to ask specifically what steps she has taken to ensure that both national and local government have the financial analytical capability to identify those most promising investment cases and help shepherd them towards success.

[Louise Haigh]

It is an excellent question and something that my hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Dan Tomlinson), who sits in the Treasury as well as the Cabinet Office, has been working on through No. 10 North. We are planning a brand of civil service reform that will move civil servants from the centre to regional and local government in order to share expertise, and we will provide them with the AI and data expertise that we have at the centre in order to do exactly that.