Localism Bill

My hon. Friend is absolutely right; it is a demonstration of localism. Indeed, I was lobbied about that very topic at the weekend. I will certainly give it my support. I am sure that hon. Members will refer this evening to many different aspects of the Bill, but I will touch on just one or two. First, we have governance and the general power of competence, which has already been alluded to, and which is an opportunity for authorities to be radical and innovative. I believe also that the referendums on council tax will have a restraining influence on the excesses of some councils, although they will not prevent councils with a popular mandate from taking on a project and proceeding, even if they need a referendum to support it. Also important in my view is the potential introduction of 12 new elected mayors. I have been a long-time supporter of elected mayors, believing that they bring to local government visible leadership, accountability and transparency—people know who is in charge and, in many respects, it is the modern way of doing things. I fully support the Bill. However, I will be interested to see what the Government do when it settles. Will they introduce and transfer more power to local authorities? I hope so. I am also encouraged that the Government are looking at how we fund local government, because that is critical to the future independence of local government. I would encourage, where possible, the transfer back to local authorities of responsibility for business rates. One good reason for that is that if businesses are paying rates to a local authority, they will have a stake in that local community and the decisions made by that local authority, and they will engage more. Currently, many businesses take an ambivalent view of what goes on in local government, which is not good for communities. My final point is probably almost as important as the Bill itself: there has to be a culture change. There has to be a culture change in central Government whereby they accept that different parts of the country will make different decisions about different topics. They have to accept that even though they might not like it. However, there also has to be a culture change in local government: it has to take on responsibility to embrace these powers and build its own communities in the way that it wants. However, I fully support the Bill. It is a great work in progress, and I look forward to supporting it through its later stages.