Central Government and Local Communities

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 3:33 pm on 5 May 2004.

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Photo of Baroness Maddock Baroness Maddock Shadow Minister, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister Local Government & the Regions 3:33, 5 May 2004

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, on introducing what is a very timely debate because we have local elections coming upon us shortly. On these Benches we believe that central government can best support communities by setting a framework which empowers communities and the individuals that make up those communities; and that such a framework should be underpinned by a coherent philosophy and a set of political beliefs.

The present Government have set out to help many of the most deprived communities in Britain. Although much has been achieved after years of increasing centralisation, and in some cases wholesale destruction of some communities—here I think particularly of coal mining areas—several recent reports have flagged up a series of failings in some central government inspired and funded projects. Indeed, the noble Baroness touched on some of those. I shall talk a little more on that later.

I believe that the failures in some circumstances stem from the fact that a clear philosophy and a set of political beliefs do not underpin this Government's actions. There is some evidence for that. Some years ago the parliamentary question that left the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, uncharacteristically lost for words was not about health statistics, ministerial failures or foreign policy; it was a modest request from one of his own side that he should give the House of Commons a brief characterisation of the political philosophy and beliefs that underpin his policies.

He did not actually take the opportunity; he hastily started talking about health service investment figures. That lack of coherence shows through in the various Acts of Parliament and some of the current Bills which the Government have introduced affecting local and regional government. They are often heralded by claims of giving more power to local councils, but the reality is that they are always hedged around with tight description, particularly in secondary legislation, and with too many new powers for Ministers.

If there is no underlying framework of belief or philosophy, the direction of policy change becomes unpredictable. I believe that has been the unhappy experience of many Labour voters of this new Labour Government. As Liberal Democrats, we believe that we have a distinct advantage, which we probably do too little to advertise or exploit, although our opposition colleagues would say we are probably a bit sanctimonious. Nevertheless, I shall continue to be slightly sanctimonious.

Our party is based on a clear set of beliefs. They can be traced back not only to the 19th century when they were systematically articulated by John Stuart Mill, but even further back to the conflict between Crown and Parliament in the 17th century. Fundamental to Liberalism is the belief in the freedom of the individual. That freedom is threatened from many directions: by over-mighty states; by private concentrations of power; by the actions of other individuals; or by circumstances that leave the individual without access to power or opportunity.

The preoccupation of Liberalism has been the creation of a democratic system of government which can protect individual liberty and whose institutions are themselves restrained from usurping the freedom of the individual.

Relationships between different tiers of government will always be strained. We have already heard about that. But there needs to be a clear spreading of power among the different tiers where powers are handled at the most appropriate level. In that way we can guard against the maxim that,

"all power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely".

The past 50 years have been characterised by what I think I can describe as, the "Whitehall knows best" syndrome of bigger is better. Local government reorganisers have swept away many of our small, community-based councils in the name of efficiency. We have seen more bureaucracy, more central government initiatives, targets, inspections and bidding rounds for various central government programmes. I believe that has led in many areas to greater public alienation from the political process.

Over the same period, services that have traditionally been run by local government were nationalised or run through government-appointed agencies. In Britain, we witnessed the birth of something that has been described as the "quango state". Today, we see too much financial control at the centre and not enough in lower tiers of government. I think—and I am sure that it will come out in the debate—that across the board everyone recognises that we need to empower local communities if we want to have thriving, vibrant and sustainable communities. Too many of our citizens live in communities where they are excluded, either because of unemployment, low incomes, poor streets, poor housing, high crime environments—a matter referred to by the noble Baroness—bad health and, increasingly, family breakdown.

The Government have tried to drive through an agenda to tackle some of these problems. Some initiatives have been more successful than others. I say again that where there is a lack of success, I believe it stems from the setting up of too many schemes, which again the noble Baroness referred to, often led by Whitehall or quangos. I feel that there has been a failure to strengthen and support local government structures, including changing the financial structures, where we could deliver most of what we all want to see in our local communities.

There have been several reports recently about some government schemes, one of them from the National Audit Office on the New Deal for Communities. The press release following its report states:

"A lack of basic financial and performance reporting data hinders NDC partnerships' ability to demonstrate effective delivery and performance, to monitor their own performance, and to draw comparisons and learn from each other".

That was said about the New Deal for Communities. If it had been said about local authorities, Ministers would be sending in hit squads to try to deal with them. The report also states:

"In many cases there are tensions between NDC partnerships and their accountable bodies, usually the local authority".

The schemes often have poor financial management and spend large amounts of money on administration. That is not a cost-effective way to target regeneration.

Indeed, the report of the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in 2003 found that, because the New Deal for Communities is a separate programme to the many other area-based initiatives and local authority regeneration programmes currently running, it overlaps with many other programmes. I probably do not have time to list them all, but some of them are the single regeneration budget, health action zones, education action zones, employment action zones, Excellence in Cities, Sure Start, European Union-funded area-based initiatives, and I could go on.

Yet another report has been produced, this time by the Economic and Social Research Council. It looked specifically at urban regeneration, working in conjunction with the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. It highlighted some of the problems that can be created by the partnership approach. On the whole, people think that the partnership approach is a good way to proceed, but we must be aware of the problems. The report states:

"Bringing together the private and voluntary sectors, local community groups and various central and local government agencies in urban regeneration partnerships . . . can sometimes work well. However, it can also raise a host of issues about trust, leadership, costs, and having too many unproductive meetings".

The study was led by Professor Michael Ball of the University of Reading and explored the difficulties of co-operation between such diverse groups. One conclusion was that if we are to use such a model, which is often neither a market nor state project, there should be much more testing before schemes are implemented.

We do not doubt the Government's good intentions in supporting communities. Indeed, we support many of their aims and welcome their successes. Looking at the number of Labour Members on the speakers list, I suspect that we will hear a lot more about some of the Government's successes. But there is quite a bit of evidence, on which I have merely touched, that shows that more thorough evaluation of schemes and a clearer philosophy is needed to guide policies if we are to be and to create what we would describe—and what I have even heard the Government describe—as a liberal democracy that empowers individuals to create the thriving, vibrant and sustainable communities we all want.