Council Tax

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Monday 3rd February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The social care precept was introduced by the previous Government. There is an increase in demand for social care in our demographic, and that has to be funded. The Government continue to keep under review how adult social care is paid for. At the moment, it is paid for by an additional precept on council tax for those who need social care. It is very important that we continue to support people in our communities who need it, and I am sure the noble Baroness would want us to continue to do that.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, under the Liberal Democrat administration, Windsor and Maidenhead Council’s financial discipline has collapsed. The council is now seeking to impose a 25% council tax hike on residents. Does the Minister agree that local residents are paying the price of Liberal Democrat councillors failing to maintain financial discipline?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

When I hear the party opposite criticising Labour and Liberal Democrat local councils, whose main financial problem was the economic mismanagement of the previous Government, they ought to have another think about who they are attacking.

Non-Domestic Rating (Multipliers and Private Schools) Bill

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 29th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I also pass on my condolences to the noble Lord, Lord Khan of Burnley, and his family.

While I understand the strategy of switching the burden from bricks and mortar retailers to internet retailers to support our high streets, I think this is far too blunt an instrument. I agree with my noble friend Lady Scott of Bybrook that increasing NNDR on large businesses risks damaging some of our key high street retailers, particularly anchor stores, high street cinemas and leisure, that help drive footfall. However, I would like to speak about the wider impact on growth of these measures.

This morning, the Chancellor talked about the Oxford- Cambridge arc as Europe’s Silicon Valley. I declare my interest as a councillor and former leader in central Bedfordshire, which is at the centre of that arc. I agree with the Chancellor about the potential of the arc to support economic growth and improve jobs, but this needs to be nurtured and not taxed. In central Bedfordshire, we have many world-class businesses, such as Lockheed Martin, Millbrook Proving Ground, MBDA, Nissan and Cranfield University—not to mention the potential of Universal Studios coming to our area. All of them will see significant increases in their NNDR.

As a councillor, I worked hard to support the growth of these and other businesses, yet in the past few weeks, talking to local businesses, they have made clear to me the headwinds that they are facing from national insurance increases, employment rights and changes to minimum wages, which have led them to review some of their growth plans. A potential 20% increase in NNDR risks being yet another nail in the coffin of growth, not only in central Bedfordshire—I use that as an example—but across the country.

One of the many attractions of Bedfordshire for international companies and their international staff is the excellent Bedford Harpur Trust schools, notably as they provide the international baccalaureate. Yet, here again, we see the impact of government policies of charging VAT and increases in national insurance and, now, NNDR—to that I will add the pension issues raised by my noble friends—making this option much less attractive for those businesses and their employees.

We have also previously raised the important role private schools provide for those with SEND. Just this morning, I had a council leader raise with me the issue of a parent who had sent their child to a private school and now, with the additional cost of VAT, they are seeking an EHCP so that that burden will now fall on the local council to pay the fees. Again, adding NNDR will only exacerbate this trend.

Finally, I want to touch on the hospitality and leisure sector, which will lose its discounts this year. While many small businesses will benefit from the proposed NNDR changes, larger local businesses such as Center Parcs and Woburn tell me that they will face the double whammy on NNDR, in addition to the impact of national insurance, extension of worker rights and minimum wage increases—yet more headwinds to growth. This is a Government who are focused on growth yet they seem to think more about taxing growth.

As I said earlier, this is too blunt an instrument. There is no clarity on the business rate multipliers and two little information on the impact. I ask the Minister whether the Government will commit that there will be no net negative impact on council finances from these measures and what the impact of the measures will be on high street businesses, businesses in general, jobs and economic growth.

Local Government: Funding

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Monday 27th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

As the noble Earl said, arts and leisure services took an absolute bashing as local government funding was successively cut over recent years. The purpose of devolution is to put control for that back into local hands and to make sure that more of the money spent in Westminster gets spent in the local areas to protect the services that people really care about and feel are important to them. I hope that will include those key leisure, arts and cultural services that make life around this country so rich and wonderful.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I associate these Benches with the noble Baroness’s comments earlier.

I refer to my interests as a central Bedfordshire councillor. A recent survey published by Southwark Council revealed that 61% of councils have already cancelled, paused or delayed housebuilding projects and more than one-third have cut back on repairs and maintenance of council homes due to pressures on their housing budgets. In light of this and given the Government’s ambitions for housebuilding, will the Minister tell the House how this Government will support councils to build?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I have to say that it is very difficult to take lessons from the Benches opposite about local government funding, particularly in relation to council house building. The noble Lord will be well aware of the steps we have already taken to increase overall funding for local government but also that we have taken big steps to alter right to buy so that local authorities can keep 100% of the receipts they get from right-to-buy properties. We are changing the position on new properties built by local councils so they do not have to sell them at less than they built them for. We are fixing the foundations of a very broken system that we inherited from 14 years of the noble Lord’s Government.

Devon and Torbay Combined County Authority Regulations 2024

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Monday 27th January 2025 Grand Committee

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach (Con)]

My Lords, I have spoken on many subjects in Grand Committee in this Room, and this is the first time that I have spoken on local government. In fact, there is a much better qualified inhabitant of Lincolnshire to speak on this subject—the noble Lord, Lord Porter of Spalding—but he must be away because I phoned him up at the weekend to check whether he was able to do this. However, I feel I should speak on this order because local government is, to my mind, perhaps the most important institution that affects people’s day-to-day lives. Governments talk about the big issues, but delivery of much of the Government’s policy is through local authorities, and it is very important that we get the balance of this right.

I speak as somebody who lives in an area of the countryside that is part of a small market town. I was born in Holbeach and I live in Holbeach—I live in the house that I was brought up in—so I have not moved very far, and the world has sort of moved around me, if noble Lords see what I mean. But I can see the change in local government from even when I was a boy in Holland County Council. Lincolnshire was divided into three parts, with the city, and it seemed to work because there was local interaction between citizens and the local authority. I am not talking about the councillors, but the staff of those councils were responsive to people making contact with them and telling them that there was a pothole in the road. Sure enough, somebody would come along and fix it. It was much more immediate.

There is an interesting thing in Peterborough station. An electrical board has been out of action since Christmas. The central heating in the waiting room has been out of action since that time, and there is a door that was working well before Christmas but is now closed. Fortunately, the door that was not working well before Christmas is now open. When I mention this to people, they all say, “Oh, well, it’s been reported”. How often that happens in life. If we can make local authorities really responsive to people’s convenience, we will do so much better.

I am speaking on this because Lincolnshire is a big county, and I am looking ahead at what will happen when we devolve government powers to the mayor and the mayoral authority, which is very good indeed—at least there is a bit of local knowledge there to help local government to apportion resources. But I represent a particular part that is quite removed from the Humberside end of the county. We are still very much one county. I was president of the Lincolnshire Agricultural Society and am proud to belong to it. I am proud to be a Lincolnshire horticulturalist and farmer, along with so many people in that most productive corner of the country.

I am also pleased to hear that the Humberside authorities are thinking of uniting together as a district of their own. If we are going to have three units in Lincolnshire, we will have to look at the numbers because, at the moment, I am told that 500,000 is the sort of population figure that the Government are thinking of. I hope the Government will be elastic in this area, if only to make sure that there is some sort of general practical application of boundaries to the new district authorities.

I mentioned the noble Lord, Lord Porter of Spalding. He was instrumental in setting up the confederation of East Lindsey, Boston and South Holland, where he and I come from. They have shared senior staff members of councils, co-ordinated activity and shared specialisms. We all know that a lot of the service in local government is quite specialised; if you are going to get good people, you have to pay reasonable salaries, and they are best shared if that can be done.

I hope that any new arrangement for Lincolnshire will have the north, including the Humberside, the west, including the city of Lincoln, the east and the North Sea coast, which will carry the electricity. We were talking briefly about energy beforehand, though I came in halfway through; we know that the power links to the North Sea come ashore in Lincolnshire, to be distributed through the eastern part of the county. It is also the home of the food valley, which stretches from Grimsby right down to Peterborough, the A1 and the road system that is the artery of the eastern part of the county. There is seafood transported from Grimsby and there is the production and distribution of the country’s vegetables and flowers—bulbs, to mention my own interest. We also have centres in the eastern part of the county, so getting communications right and enabling them through a combined vision of what the area represents economically is most important.

The Government are avowedly keen on growth. I support them in that venture. I hope that they set up a local government structure that encourages growth, where soil types and economic potential recommend themselves. In my view, that is how the authorities might develop in future. Surprising to say, I support this measure, as it is a good development. Local government can be reformed, but I hope that it will be in a way that brings it closer rather than further away, as much of the trend was before the last Government introduced the Act.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I am a Central Bedfordshire councillor and therefore have some interest in this, although not in these particular SIs. I echo the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, about the importance of local government. Most residents see local government services on a daily basis, not central government services. I also echo his comments and those of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, about the unique nature of all our local areas and, therefore, how much better it is for them to be run locally, in so far as is possible, rather than centrally. In that spirit, these regulations build on the work of the previous Conservative Government; we support this important devolutionary shift, but it is also important to go further.

However, before that, I want to assess some of the proposed changes. First, on the Devon and Torbay Combined County Authority Regulations—I shall say “combined authority” for brevity—that deal was signed in January 2024 by the previous Conservative Government, Devon County Council and Torbay Council to provide powers and funding to the new combined authority to

“improve the economic, social and environmental well-being”

of people in the community, as well as to devolve further powers locally and provide wider flexibility for local action.

The Greater Lincolnshire Combined County Authority, formed by Lincolnshire County Council, North Lincolnshire Council and North East Lincolnshire Council, will have authority over transport, housing and regeneration functions in the region. It will be tasked with transport planning, local transport services and highways maintenance, with a mayor due to be elected in May 2025.

I turn to the Hull and East Yorkshire Combined Authority, which comprises Hull City Council and the East Riding of Yorkshire Council and, again, will be overseen by a directly elected mayor. The mayor will govern and drive strategic development across the region, including in areas such as transport, housing and regeneration. Additionally, the mayor will have the authority to levy taxes, such as a precept or business rate supplement, to fund those projects.

Community Engagement Principles and Extremism Definition

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, does the Minister agree that, in addition to reviewing the definition of extremist organisations and the community engagement strategy, we should also review the wider communication policy regarding acts of extreme violence and terror to maintain an open dialogue with the general public and prevent the spread of misinformation?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Lord Khan of Burnley) (Lab)]

My Lords, let me first of all say that national security will always come first for this Government, and we will always treat the threat of extremism with the seriousness that it requires. The noble Lord makes an interesting point. I confirm to the House that the Government take the threat of extremism very seriously and will continue to work with partners to tackle extremism in all parts and forms. That is why the Home Secretary commissioned a rapid review of extremism in 2024. The Government will set out their approach to countering extremism in due course and will update Parliament accordingly. I am sure that many of the issues that the noble Lord raised will be part of that review.

Homelessness

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Tuesday 21st January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The noble Lord is quite right in what he says. He will know that we have set a target of building 1.5 million homes over the course of the Parliament, which in the long term is the answer to tackling this issue. In the short term, we need to tackle the issue of many children spending years in temporary accommodation, when they need space to play and develop, at the same time increasing the funding to tackle the long-term causes of homelessness and poverty, which, as he rightly says, sit at the heart of this. The Renters’ Rights Bill, which is coming before this House very shortly, will tackle some of the causes of homelessness.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as a councillor in Central Bedfordshire. As the Minister has identified, the primary cause of homelessness is a lack of homes. London has nearly 70,000 families living in temporary accommodation—over half the total in England. Of those, almost half—33,000—live out-of-borough compared with one in seven for the rest of the country. Does the Minister agree that this is largely down to London having failed to build the homes that its residents need? What will this Government do to get London building?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The noble Lord will be aware that new targets have been set for building homes across the country, and in London no less. Local authorities use out-of-area placements to provide temporary accommodation, as he rightly mentioned. We are enabling more funding to go into London so that we can reduce the level of temporary homelessness accommodation. However, the long-term solution is to get more houses built, which is why we have increased the housebuilding target for London.

Local Government Reorganisation

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Thursday 16th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The intention is that this will help with the delivery of both growth and new homes. The intention, as set out quite clearly in the White Paper, is for mayors to have powers over strategic planning—not the local planning that local authorities currently do—so that they can work with the constituent councils in their areas to set out plans for housing. The noble Lord referred to issues of planning. We have put in a significant sum of money to improve the capacity for planning authorities as we take forward the programme of delivering 1.5 million homes.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as a councillor in Central Bedfordshire Council. On Monday, in Grand Committee, the Minister stated that

“we move into a picture where we have all unitary authorities”.—[Official Report, 13/1/25; col. GC 200.]

Can she confirm that it is the Government’s intention to oblige all county and district areas to unitise?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The process of local government reorganisation will do that. We want to move at a pace that is right for the local authorities concerned. That is why we have set out a four-track approach, depending on where people are with their readiness to go forward. We believe that unitary councils can lead to better outcomes for residents, save significant money which can be reinvested in public services, and improve accountability, enabling politicians to focus on delivering for their residents. Generally speaking, as I said earlier, residents do not care about structures; they just want good public services, delivered at value for money.

English Devolution

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Thursday 19th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend and she is quite right. I remember very well the regional development agencies, back in the day. Some of the departments in government already have a regional presence. My own department has offices in each of the regions, and we intend to extend that and offer a widespread programme of secondments to regions. I think it will be of real benefit to the Civil Service to be working in our regions and then bringing that back to central government, or the other way round: working in central government and going out to the regions. I look forward to seeing how that programme develops. My noble friend is right to say that it will be very important to see that the offices in our regions are fit and well equipped to serve the mayors and combined authorities.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, we are the most centralised country in the OECD. Can the Minister enlighten the House on the real powers and fiscal devolution that this will lead to? In particular, what is the Government’s target for the proportion of taxation that is devolved? Secondly, I appreciate the Minister’s comment on the letter. However, it is causing confusion to a number of councils, which have been told that they need to submit a letter by 10 January. Many believe that, if they do not, they will miss out on devolution and it will be imposed on them. What is the deadline, what is expected of those who do submit and what does it mean for those who do not meet the deadline? Can this be clarified to councils?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for his questions. This is about real devolution of powers and funding, and there are real benefits there to those who take up the offer. The earlier they start to get established, the more powers they will be able to take on. That is a really important step for councils to take.

In terms of the letter, I have looked closely at it and it is asking for expressions of interest only by 10 January. For those who want to move quickly, we will ask them to submit their proposals by May—that is, full proposals for reorganisation and devolution. For those who want to move more slowly, they can do that at their own pace. We would hope to get proposals across the board by autumn this year.

Provisional Local Government Finance Settlement

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Thursday 19th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as a councillor on Central Bedfordshire Council. I thank the Minister for bringing this Statement to the House of Lords. While I welcome the additional funding announced in the spending review, it is unfortunately not keeping pace with the increases in costs and demands seen by councils, and it is dependent on an above-inflation 5% increase in council tax. Is this not yet another tax on hard-working people?

The Government are also imposing additional costs on local government, and while they are funding the £550 million of national insurance increases for directly employed staff, they are not funding the LGA’s estimated £1.25 billion impact due to costs imposed on our suppliers. I might add that this ignores the impact on many of those local charities that do so much for our communities. This will lead to cuts in local government services and a reduction in the support that those local charities provide. Will the Minister commit the Government to look again at this matter?

I remind the House that, in the Autumn Budget, the Chancellor pledged to raise the national living wage. It is set to increase by a further 6.7% in April 2025, with minimum wage rates for younger employees and apprentices set to increase by between 16% and 18%. This is welcome for those on some of the lowest wages. However, it will have a cost impact for local councils, where many social care services are provided by suppliers that pay close to the living wage. This is another cost that local authorities will have to absorb, unless the Government agree to fully fund the increase. Will the Government fully fund the impact of increases in the living wage?

As the Minister is well aware, the rapidly increasing costs of SEND services is crippling councils, and this desperately needs to be reformed, as we have often debated in this House. Continuing the statutory override for dedicated schools grant deficits will delay a number of councils going bust, but with the deficit set to increase by a further £3.2 billion in the coming year, this is just kicking the can down the road—again, this needs to be fixed.

The Government propose to look at the funding formula and, if I have interpreted them correctly, to focus on deprivation. While this may superficially seem appropriate, in practice the major cost driver of local government is social care, including SEND services, which represents around 70% of cost. This means that the focus should be on population demographics and where there will be the greatest need. Analysis by the County Councils Network and PwC demonstrates that rural areas will see the greatest increase in demand compared to metropolitan areas. We have just finished a debate in this House on rural areas. Can the Minister commit that the Government will look at and consult on the underlying cost drivers before any changes to funding formulae are made?

Furthermore, the Government are imposing a number of additional burdens on councils, including through their children’s Bill, renters’ reform Bill and planning measures Bill. Can the Minister confirm that these additional costs will be fully funded through the new burdens doctrine?

I turn now to the Government’s changes to the funding formula, with the repurposing of the rural services delivery grant and the new recovery grant. The latter is heavily focused on metropolitan authorities, with only three county and rural unitary authorities receiving the grant. I reiterate that 70% of the cost of upper-tier authorities is for social care, which is largely driven by demography. Along with the pernicious impact of national insurance increases on social care providers and charities, this will inevitably lead to further cuts to services.

Finally, I turn to growth and fiscal incentives. There have been few fiscal incentives for growth, but the new homes bonus and the business rates retention scheme were genuine incentives for growth and gave some compensation to communities for the impact of this growth. I add that growth imposes significant additional capital costs on councils, and these incentives were helpful there. The proposals to stop the new homes bonus and to reset business rates are deeply concerning, as they will have significant deleterious impacts on the councils that have done the right thing and supported growth, while benefiting those that have not taken the tough decisions to support growth. Given that the Prime Minister has said that growth is his number one mission, milestone, step and so forth, can the Minister assure the House that the councils and communities that have supported growth will not lose out?

I thank the Minister for sharing this Statement from the other place. I wish her, and the rest of the House, a very merry Christmas and a peaceful new year.

[Baroness Pidgeon (LD)]

I thank the Minister for the opportunity to discuss the provisional local government finance settlement. It is always an early Christmas present for finance departments in councils up and down the country.

Local government was brought to its knees under the last Government, with funding cuts happening at the same time as further responsibilities were given to our hard-working local government workforce. From the Liberal Democrat Benches, we welcome the move set out in the Statement for multiyear settlements—something my party has long called for.

The Statement suggests that funding previously allocated to rural local authorities under the rural services delivery grant will be repurposed under a need and demand basis. This is despite the grant providing rural local authorities with £100 million for the rollout of essential public services, including emergency services and the provision of social care in the last year.

From these Benches, we are concerned that this new system of allocation will not recognise—as has just been discussed—that the sparse and isolated nature of rural areas drives higher costs for the delivery of essential services, creates challenges in the recruitment of staff for key services, and of course requires local authorities to provide a greater public subsidy for the provision of services such as public transport.

Deprivation in rural areas would also likely be hidden through the use of this measure because it occurs over a wider geographical area. Using deprivation as an indicator of demand for services also does not consider local authorities with a higher number of elderly or vulnerable residents and the additional demands these residents place on services, as the noble Lord just outlined in his response.

I urge the Government to provide rural councils with a funding settlement which reflects the impact of the rurality and sparsity of the areas they serve, through the application of the fair funding formula. With additional pressure on councils to deliver further scrutiny in planning decisions, deliver further housebuilding and accept additional NICs changes, it is essential that they are funded robustly to achieve these aims. Can the Minister say what plans the Government have to ensure that local authorities in rural areas have the support that they need? These authorities face unique challenges and their funding settlement needs to reflect this.

We are also concerned about the funding of certain services such as special educational needs and indeed special educational needs transport. What assurances can the Minister give that the new funding settlement will allow local authorities to deliver special educational needs services at the level needed, as well as child and adult social care?

From these Benches we welcome the consultation on wider local authority funding reform, but we urge the Government to move as fast as possible with this, as 2026-27 feels a long time away and, the more time passes, the more the contents of this Statement will feel rather like a sticking plaster. Can the Minister say anything more today about the timescale of the consultation and whether genuine fiscal devolution will be considered, so we are not looking just at how the government funding is divided up but at powers to enable local authorities to raise funding to invest in services and infrastructure for their local communities, rather than always being reliant on the Government of the day?

Finally, given that we are on the final sitting day before the Christmas break, I take this opportunity to wish the entire local government workforce a very happy Christmas, and of course I extend that to all noble Lords as well.

Housing: Permitted Development Rights

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Wednesday 18th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord, and for his time in meeting with me to discuss embodied carbon. We have been talking to the construction industry and to developers across the board, and there are some complex issues involved. I know the noble Lord is doing work with stakeholders as well, and I look forward to working with him further in the new year. I believe we have a meeting scheduled for early in 2025 to discuss this further.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as a councillor in central Bedfordshire. To deliver the housing this country needs, we need to ensure that planning permissions and allocations are being built out in a timely manner. Yesterday, I asked the Minister whether the Government will provide local councils with adequate powers to ensure that allocated and permissioned sites actually get built, and she responded that there is a whole section on sanctions in the report. Can the Minister tell me which section that is in the NPPF, as I could find in it no meaningful additional tools being provided to councils to ensure build-out?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord and apologise for misleading him yesterday: it is not in the NPPF but in the accompanying notes. There are powers that local government can use, including completion orders and so on, to encourage developers to build out when necessary. I will provide him with a detailed written response about all the powers that are available to local government to do that.