Localism Bill

My Lords, as it is the beginning of Committee, I should declare my interests yet again. I am an elected member of Pendle Borough Council, vice-president of the Open Spaces Society and a member of the British Mountaineering Council and its access, conservation and environment group. There may be others, which I shall declare if they arise as the Bill progresses. Topically and coincidentally, an article by Julian Glover in the Guardian this morning, headed ““The coalition still hasn't worked out the principles that bind it together”” states: "““Last year's coalition agreement was brilliant at forcing a quick start, but useless as a guide to the government's founding values now the pace is slowing. It provided a to-do list of reform ""but avoided deep questions that must now be confronted: what is the coalition's attitude to democratic accountability, the role of markets and competition in public service? What does it mean by localism? To what extent should empowerment be accompanied by a harsher willingness to allow people to fail if they do not act? Above all, is the reconstruction and fragmentation of the state ideological rather than a consequence of deficit reduction?””." Those questions are fundamental to the Bill in front of us. Localism is not new, although the word ““localism”” used in this context is fairly new. The first person whom I could find using it was David Blunkett in 2004, and what he said then is not much different from what the Government are saying now. The amendment seeks to state at the very beginning of the Bill that its purpose is to promote a political and administrative system and culture which is based on localism—localism as defined in the amendment. Proposed new subsection (1)(a) states that it should be based on the principle which in Eurojargon is known as subsidiarity and that, "““there is a presumption that the local level will prevail unless there are clear and over-riding reasons why it should not””." It is not clear that that presumption is uniformly and consistently applied throughout the Bill. We have some very localist provisions; we then have some very detailed national prescriptions; and they rest side by side as one reads avidly through the 430 pages of the legislation. I do not want to be too critical; I am trying in the amendment to provide the Government with a friendly challenge to look at some of the inconsistencies that may exist and to tell us clearly what their view of localism is. Proposed new subsection (1)(b) states that localism is, "““underpinned by basic rights for all persons and safeguards against arbitrary discrimination against any person””." It must not be local majoritarianism; it should be based on the principles of democracy in which basic individual rights are fundamental. Proposed new subsection (1)(c) states that localism, "““focuses public decision-making on bodies which are elected, representative and accountable””." All Governments in the past few years have said that they want to decentralise and get away from the controlling hand of Whitehall and Westminster in the detailed way in which it has developed in this country. It is not clear in all cases, either with the previous Government or with this one, that the predominant role of democratically elected authorities is high in their mind; in fact, it is not clear that local government is always held in high regard by the people at the centre. Yet true localism must be based on democracy. Proposed new subsection (1)(d) deals with the knotty problem of minimum standards. There was considerable and interesting discussion in Committee in the House of Commons as to how localism interacts with a belief that in many areas—certainly, for example, in social care—national government has not only the right but the obligation to lay down minimum standards before local diversity can apply. The question of what those minimum standards should be and in which areas they should apply is fundamental and it is not clear that the Government have given this issue the clear thought required. Proposed new paragraph (e) seeks to include a restriction against regulations and orders from central government to the minimum absolutely necessary. If the figure in the Bill is 142, as the Local Government Association has calculated—or whatever it is—no one will persuade me that that complies with the requirement for them to be the minimum absolutely necessary. You have only to look at some of them to see that removing them would not cause the whole edifice to collapse. Proposed new paragraphs (f), (g) and (h) concern local democracy, local involvement and the growing interest and realisation in local government, particularly in the past 10 or 15 years, that the framework for local government in which councils are elected—whether by thirds, every four years or whatever, and then simply get on and do their will without further involvement, often at many stages, by the local population—is no longer the way forward. Local democracy has to involve local citizens, individually and as communities and neighbourhoods, and the system should welcome and encourage that local involvement. Very often when Governments think it is a good idea for communities to be involved, they do so on the basis that that involvement is different and separate from the system of democratic local government. That will not work. It is absolutely crucial that the system of democratic local government is fundamentally based on involvement and participation by local people. This has to be a genuine involvement, not only the organising of surveys and so on which are written so that they are effectively rigged to get the outcome required. Proposed new paragraph (h) involves encouraging the formation of bodies by local citizens in which they may organise to influence public decision-making. This reflects the argument of the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, at Second Reading when she gave a graphic account of how people had been actively involved in campaigning in her borough in London. However, this cannot always be organised by authorities, local government or national government; it will happen when people want to do it. The important thing for Government is to ensure that the structures make it easy to do and not restrict or block it. Proposed new subsection (2) is the most important of all. It requires that public bodies and public officials should be under a duty to act in the light of the principles of localism and the points set out in proposed new subsection (1). At the moment that is not the case. People, officials and bodies cannot be challenged because they are behaving in a traditional bureaucratic way—or, at least, not legally challenged because there is no underlying requirement for them to change their culture and the way they do things and to help create a more democratic and better society. I hope that the Government look favourably at this amendment. I can understand that they might want to change a few of the words. They might think that some of it is rather revolutionary. If they look underneath the surface, they will see that it is highly revolutionary, but it is what this Bill ought to be about and ought to be based on. There are parts of this Bill that are based on this; but there are other very substantial parts, as we will find out as we go through the Bill, which are not. They are still centralised and, even when the proposal has been put forward and can be described as localist, it is top-down localism. It is saying, ““You must behave in this way, which we define as localist, because it’s good for you—but we will determine the rules and regulations and the way in which it’s going to work””. That is not localism; it is a new form of top-down government. It may be better than doing everything at central level and not paying attention to local level, but it is not true localism. As I say, I hope that this friendly challenge to the Government will be well received and that we end up with a Bill that is indeed true localism. I beg to move.