Clause 68
Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Bill [Lords]
4:30 pm
Rosie Winterton (Minister of State (Yorkshire and the Humber), Department for Communities and Local Government; Doncaster Central, Labour)
Obviously, the hon. Gentleman will know that I cannot name every individual who responded to the proposals. However, I can say that we had a number of responses to the consultation from local government. Although the Opposition spent most of the morning sneering at both councillors and their input, councillors are able to reflect the views of local people. In particular, the view they have taken with regard to ensuring that the regional development agency works closely, through the leaders’ board, with local councils is exactly what the public want.
The Opposition say that the regional development agencies are unaccountable and that they do not believe there is adequate local government representation. However, as soon as we bring forward proposals for that representation and partnership, they sneer about sashes and grand approaches by councillors. If they took the time to consult their own councillors, they would find that our proposals have been welcomed as a good way forward. I hope that the Committee will support the clause. It is about getting the right partnership between the RDA and local authorities in the area so that they can draw up an effective regional strategy that will help local people, local communities and local businesses.
I shall briefly address the issue about representations from members of the public. As I said, it is not possible for me to name every individual, but in the interests of being helpful I can tell the hon. Member for Falmouth and Camborne that we summarised the feedback from the consultation in our Government response in November 2008. I am more than happy to make available to the hon. Lady or any other Committee member an analysis of the respondents.
I want to address two other things. We do not want to assert from the centre that leaders’ boards will look the same in every region. What we want to do is recognise that local authorities are obviously mature bodies that are able to have discussions about how to constitute the leaders’ boards. That is why we have said that we want them to have their own arrangements. The overall purpose is to give local authorities a stronger collective voice at regional level. We have tried to provide a transparent process for establishing the mechanism that will enable the local authorities to act collectively and with authority. It is encouraging for our approach that approximately five of the regions have put together ideas about their leaders’ board. There have been a number of discussions in those regions with local authorities on exactly what the board should look like.
It is important to reassure the Committee that within that process, we have been anxious to ensure that there is scrutiny so that the voluntary and trade union sectors, for example, can retain in their discussions with local authority leaders some of their input to regional assemblies.