Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill

I did not expect such an exciting flourish at the finish from the hon. Member for North-East Bedfordshire (Alistair Burt), who is normally such a consensus politician. Let me, in all seriousness, draw the House’s attention to the reaction to our White Paper and the Bill from the Conservative-led Local Government Association, with which we have spent two years building consensus to ensure that English councils can benefit from the devolution that the rest of the United Kingdom has already experienced. The hon. Gentleman criticised the Government for not being able to let go. We let go in Scotland; the Conservatives opposed it. We let go in Wales; they opposed it. We let go in London; they opposed it, having abolished it in the first place. We let go on transport. We let go in Northern Ireland. We let go through the prudential borrowing regime. We are letting go through the local authority business growth initiative, to the tune of £1.5 billion. We let go through non-ring-fenced grants and £500 million from the neighbourhood renewal fund, opposed by the Conservatives. The local area agreements and the change in the performance regime that the Bill introduces have already let go significant powers, to the tune of £500 million of pooled money, to local government and its partners. That amount will rise to £5 billion by the end of the next period. We are letting go across the country. Let the House be in no doubt about the Conservatives’ response when we do let go, and ask councils to come up with their own proposals for new organisation—not ours—with the clear criterion that they will be allowed to go ahead only when there is value for money and no extra burden is imposed on the council tax payer. What is their response? It is to get out the Central Office staffers and send them to the county councils of England to hold their hands and tell them that they are not allowed to present proposals that their own officers are telling them would reduce the council tax bills of people in those areas. The Government have not prescribed where the unitary proposals should come from. We have not told districts or counties which model we prefer. We have said that value for money for the council tax payer should be the criterion. We have heard a great deal about Shropshire this evening. Shrewsbury is a beautiful place and it does have pockets of poverty, although not as many as Telford. Members have spoken as if the Secretary of State were proposing to abolish the council in the constituency of the hon. Member for Shrewsbury and Atcham (Daniel Kawczynski). It is not the Secretary of State who is proposing that; it is Shropshire county council. I am happy to give way to the hon. Gentleman, who may wish to ask me who is the leader of Shropshire county council. In fact the leader of Shropshire county council is a very eminent Conservative, Malcolm Pate. It is a Conservative proposal that the hon. Gentleman is trying to pretend is an example of the Government’s taking central powers. It is not possible to square that with the proposals of the 1980s and 1990s, which changed the boundaries of local government in England in Berkshire, Middlesex, Lancashire and other areas across the country. The former Secretary of State Mr. Heseltine admitted—