English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (First sitting)

Debate between Perran Moon and Miatta Fahnbulleh

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th September 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Miatta Fahnbulleh]

Q Councillor Craig, obviously Greater Manchester has been at the forefront of devolution and the development of mayoral strategic authorities; I had the pleasure of being there at the outset a decade and a half ago. I am interested in your take on the impact the difference and it has made on your communities and, critically, on the collaboration between constituent authorities and the mayor and the strategic authority. During the last panel, the concern was about the power, onus and importance of constituent authorities. I am interested in how it has worked in practice and what we can learn from that.

Bev Craig: That is an important question. The difference for Greater Manchester was that we asked for devolution. That started the journey across the north of England initially, but it went out across the whole country. It has come off the back of a generation of co-operation in Greater Manchester, so it was built into a system. When the Greater Manchester authority was disestablished in the 1980s, my predecessors carried on with the meetings and kept that model alive.

I will come on to accountability, but what helps is that people do not identify with local authority boundaries. We represent people who, in their normal lives, say that they are from a place. A colleague might say that they are from Middleton and they are proud to be from Middleton, but when they are on holiday and people ask where they are from, they say “Near Manchester.” There is something about creating a place that people can identify with; that has been really strong. When you look at models where mayors have been successful, it is because they have tapped into a place identity. That links to my point that rural areas can still have place identity.

On accountability, in the Greater Manchester model of combined authorities, which moved to strategic authorities, we all have a role to play. Think about the role of the city. It is a major economic driver for not just Greater Manchester but the north of England as a whole. The whole region needs Manchester city centre to do well, in the same way that Manchester city centre needs the rest of Greater Manchester to do well if it is to have people with skills, good education, homes to live in and places to celebrate that they enjoy spending time in. That is why, through our model, we all hold portfolios. I am just as interested in getting Atom Valley in the north of the conurbation to be a success as I am in growing my life sciences sector in the city centre. There is something about getting people to take responsibility.

When we look at the competencies, that is why the LGA argues for clarity in the Bill that local authorities will still have a stake in some of the areas that we might think mayoral strategic authorities lead on. I say this with kindness, and I often say it to my Mayor’s face: he can give the parameters of the homes that we build and he can help fund them, and I will put on his logo and picture if we need to, but fundamentally it is Manchester city council that is out there building council homes. That is why we built more council and social homes last year than at any point over the last decade and a half. It works when we work together.

To clarify the role of commissioners in the context of the Bill, where they have been useful in Greater Manchester has been in an advisory capacity. We have been able to draw in people like Dame Sarah Storey as an active travel commissioner. She does not need to be a deputy mayor or take away my authority as a leader of a place, but she brings something that is additional. We must not lose sight of the fact that devolution models work with systems and Bills in place to deliver them, but actually it is about collaboration. There will need to be investment in the time that leaders of a place spend together if you are to get that relationship with the mayor to work.

Kevin Bentley: The identity question was raised before and it is important that we say political boundaries might change but communities do not. Identity of communities will always remain strong, whether you are in a district or county council. I represent 1.5 million people. That could be a disparate place. If you want to say, “Which is the most important to your leader?” they are all important, because they all have their own identities.

[Perran Moon (Camborne and Redruth) (Lab)]

Q A quick question to Councillor Hicks. In your role as chair of the County Council Network, have you had any discussions with or representations from Konsel Kernow, Cornwall Council? If you have, what is the nature of those discussions in relation to mayoral combined authorities?

Matthew Hicks: I have only been in post a week, so I cannot give you an answer as to whether those discussions have taken place in the past. Certainly I know we have looked at the Cornwall business case and Cornwall has always been well represented and a strong voice at the CCN, putting its case very strongly, and I am sure that will continue in the future. However, I cannot answer that question today.

Warm Home Discount

Debate between Perran Moon and Miatta Fahnbulleh

Tuesday 25th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Miatta Fahnbulleh]

There will be a role for gas in our energy mix, but we are very clear that the route and the quickest way to getting ourselves off that dependence is through clean power. We have made a decision that we will put our energy into driving clean power by 2030. In the end, that is the quickest and best route to delivering for consumers and businesses and ensuring that we can deliver energy security, which we all, across the House, agree will deliver financial security for families across the country.

[Perran Moon (Camborne and Redruth) (Lab)]

I thoroughly welcome the statement, particularly on the reform of Ofgem and back billing. It is a key plank in the just transition as we move away from a rigged energy market that is totally reliant on imports of gas from dictators such as Putin. It is not, however, just about the transition to renewables. Does the Minister agree that in that transition we will also create hundreds of thousands of new green jobs right across the UK, including in Camborne, Redruth and Hayle, covering onshore wind, offshore wind, geothermal, tidal and solar?

[Miatta Fahnbulleh]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. At the heart of this is the opportunity to create jobs and boost local economies across the country. That is good not just for our energy independence and family finances, but for every single part of our economy. That is why, rather than slowing down, we are committed to accelerating to deliver clean power by 2030.