English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Debate between Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town and Lord Fuller

Committee stage
Thursday 29th January 2026 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)]

My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Tope, and my noble friend Lord Pitkeathley, I have added my name to Amendment 72 and the others already spoken to by my noble friend Lord Harris.

I have to say only two things. These amendments would provide the appropriate vehicle, as some of the tasks that fall within London are cross-borough. A lot of tasks and responsibilities fall to the GLA, and some fall quite clearly to the boroughs, but some are cross-borough. It is important that we have the correct vehicle for that to happen, both for statutory consultations and, as has already been mentioned, to make it possible to spend money in that way, rather than it having to be funnelled through a particular lead borough. It is therefore useful and probably necessary.

I do not agree with what the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill of Bexley, said about it being another level of government. That is absolutely not the intention. There is a non-statutory vehicle there, which is immensely useful, but there are a couple of things that it cannot do. It seems to me that defining it in statute would fill a gap and would be better for the people and boroughs of London.

[Lord Fuller (Con)]

My Lords, I am not a London councillor, nor am I a vice-president of the Local Government Association, so I suppose I have a bit of an independent view here. I am just a provincial councillor from Norfolk. However, I associate myself with the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Harris. It is time to have a look at governance in London, because 32 plus one is quite a lot. There is also an assembly and a mayor—arguably, London is over-governed.

It is time to have a look at this, because it is out of kilter with elsewhere. Outside the M25, the Government are proceeding on the basis that all local authorities must be half a million people or more, covering huge territories. Norfolk, where I come from, has over 900 parishes. It is 85 miles wide and 40 miles long. If you were to start here in Westminster and then travel down to the south coast, the width of Norfolk would take you 30 miles past Brighton and out into the English Channel before it ran out. That is the size and scale of the territories we have in the shires. In Norfolk, over 9,000 electors are needed to elect a councillor. In Essex and Kent, it is between 12,000 and 15,000. In London, just 3,108 electors are required to elect a borough councillor—and of course there are other representatives too. These London boroughs are much smaller territories and much more tightly defined—they do not have 900 parishes. As a result, not only is democratic representation diluted to an unacceptable extent outside the M25, but we end up with the nonsense of the borough bike wars. If you ride a Lime or a Forest, there is an inexplicable invisible line in the middle of the road that applies the brakes as you ride up the King’s Road.

London is overrepresented; there are more councils and more councillors. In fact, there are more councillors within the M25 than in all the county councils of England. This review should happen. I associate myself with the remarks of the London councillors who have spoken. You cannot reorganise local government everywhere else and leave London to sit it out. That is not good for democracy, councils, governance or the country, and it certainly is not good for the principle of equality of democratic representation.

In the other place, all the constituencies have been equalised, plus or minus 5,000, so that there is an equality of representation. The value of everybody’s vote is the same, wherever you are in the United Kingdom. In London, because of the excess number of councils and councillors, the vote representation is up to five times greater than it is outside the M25. That alone should be an example and a reason to go into a governance review. London cannot just sit it out any more while, elsewhere, there is wholesale reorganisation.