Clause 19 - Application to parish and community councils
Local Government Bill
2:45 pm
Mr Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Cotswold, Conservative)
It may be worth having a canter round the powers and duties of parish councils. The Bill seems very much in line with Conservative policy in that the Government envisage a much bigger role for parish and community councils. It would be interesting to probe what the Under-Secretary envisages.
The clause gives parish councils very big powers, but that has been the case with all the clauses that we have debated. Clause 2(3) relates to control of borrowing. Clause 6 deals with protection of lenders. Clause 9 relates to capital receipts. Security for money borrowed is dealt with under clause 13. Guidance, inevitably, is dealt with under clause 15. Clause 17 is about external funds.
Clause 19 gives parish councils pretty significant powers. If we combine that with the powers and duties under clause 36, which relates to best value and parishes, we see that those bodies will perform a significant role. With all the increased borrowing powers, the Under-Secretary must envisage their performing significantly greater functions than they do at present. If they do perform greater functions, someone else, one hopes, is performing lesser functions. It would be interesting to know who is performing those.
One assumes that, all the way down the line, powers are being devolved. If we must have the regional bodies that we disapprove of, one hopes that they will delegate as many functions as possible down the line to subordinate councils—district, unitary and county councils. In turn, the Government are encouraging those councils—we approve of this—to devolve as many functions as possible to parish councils. One hopes that that is what is in the mind of the Under-Secretary, but also that the parish councils will be subject to as light a touch as possible.
We will debate best value and other issues, but the Government have loaded a number of requirements on to parish councils in respect of auditing, disclosure and so on. I do not know whether other members of the Committee have had this experience, but we are finding that parish councillors are standing down because of those onerous requirements. Surely we want to encourage as many people as possible to take up their civic duties and become councillors. The tradition was that parish councils were not a particularly burdensome office and that everyone from the spectrum of the community was encouraged to stand for them. If we make the post too burdensome we will simply turn parish councils into mini district councils, and then what will be the point of having this extra tier of local government? This is a circular argument and I simply probe the Minister on the matter.