English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (Twelfth sitting)

Debate between Vikki Slade and Paul Holmes

Committee stage
Tuesday 28th October 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Vikki Slade]

New clause 5 is designed to ensure that local authorities are provided with the resources and support they need to deliver the content of the legislation, with specific regard to preventing any further delays in future local elections. New clause 43 is about the duty to provide professional planning support for neighbourhood plans in areas that do not yet have them or where they are due for re-establishment.

We are desperately concerned about local elections being delayed. In fact, one of my colleagues asked about that in Prime Minister’s questions last week and did not get a direct answer. There remains a real concern that the whole process has the potential to create more delays. As we say, an election delayed is democracy denied, so it is hugely important.

[Paul Holmes]

I hope that the hon. Lady will take a reasonable and responsible tone on this new clause. Will she tell her colleagues around the country, including those from Hampshire, to stop standing outside Parliament for mock photographs saying that the Conservatives want local elections delayed? Will she take my word and the shadow Minister’s word that, as I said last week and he will no doubt say this afternoon, the Conservatives are not calling for the delay of local elections? Will she stop putting out misleading leaflets across the country saying that we are?

[Vikki Slade]

I would like to thank the hon. Member for his intervention, but I am not sure I should—I did not expect that coming from the Opposition Benches. I am glad that the Conservatives do not want to see elections delayed either. I hope that the Government will not delay any further elections, particularly in places that experienced a delay this year. The purpose of this new clause is to guarantee that elections are not delayed because councils are overstretched and under-resourced while trying to do neighbourhood plans at the same time. We do not believe that elections should be postponed because the Government have not given councils the means to do their job.

On new clause 43, I am sure that every member of this Committee has heard from their town and parish councils—because they have not yet been mentioned this afternoon—and from communities that do not have town or parish councils yet but may wish to, that the ability to fund a neighbourhood plan relies heavily on grant money. One of the first neighbourhood plans was set up in my constituency—in fact, in my ward of Broadstone—where we set up a neighbourhood forum that allowed us to create a neighbourhood plan. I believe there was £10,000. We would not have been able to secure a neighbourhood plan in any other way because we did not have a town council at the time, although we will have one by next year.

Without a town council, where does the money come from to do that? Even with a town or parish council, £10,000 would be a significant proportion of a precept, particularly for some of the small councils. It does not seem like a very fair thing to do to local authorities.

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[Paul Holmes]

Will the hon. Lady give way briefly?

[Vikki Slade]

Gladly.

[Paul Holmes]

I thank the hon. Lady; we can now resume our laughs together. We entirely agree with her on this issue. Will she comment on our debates during the Planning and Infrastructure Bill where it was clear that the Government were resisting allocating funding for drawing up neighbourhood plans? Does she agree that the protections of many of our rural village communities that are adequately and perfectly served by their parish councils will be reduced just because they want to put forward a sustainable plan about how they build in their area, meaning that fewer houses will be delivered in the long run if this funding is not reinstated?

[Vikki Slade]

There is a village in my constituency called Shapwick, which, for some reason I cannot quite understand, did not take the opportunity to do a neighbourhood plan a couple of years ago, and now has lost that opportunity. It is surrounded by green fields. There are four or five sites within this small National Trust village where there are gaps, cottages either having fallen down or burnt down over the years. We could recreate a beautiful chocolate box village that would really boost our local tourism and enable local services such as the nursery and the pub to maintain themselves in the long term by having a slightly increased population.

As Shapwick does not have a neighbourhood plan, however, it is reliant on Dorset council, which, through the Government’s desire to build 1.5 million new homes, is now expected to find 55,000 homes in the county of Dorset—not the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole element, just the Dorset council element. That will ruin small villages with 50 or 60 homes, as they now run the risk of having 300 or 400 homes that will change their nature forever. A neighbourhood plan would allow those villages to go, “Do you know what? We could probably get to 75 or 80 houses and still maintain everything that we love about our village.” That cannot happen now, because there is no capacity with such a small village to raise the funding required to produce a meaningful neighbourhood plan.

New clause 43 simply says that if neighbourhood plan funding is not directly restored, local authorities should be able to provide professional planning support to councils for the purposes of developing their neighbourhood plans. My preference is for the Minister to commit to restoring the independent funding, so that our town and parish councils and communities do not have to go to the local authority, but failing that, our only option is to push this approach and say, “If we can’t have our money back directly, let’s do it through this method.”

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[Vikki Slade]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for another fabulous contribution. I thought he was going to criticise my love of town and parish councils for a moment, but he did not. I have made it clear that I would rather see the Government bring this funding back, but the new clause would introduce a duty to provide professional planning support, because we recognise the chances of it not coming back.

[Paul Holmes]

Before the Minister uncharacteristically turned her guns on me, after remaining largely silent on the Committee this afternoon, I was about to say this. I believe that the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole has tabled new clause 43 not because of the funding that has been cut—even though I remember being a lead member during the previous Labour Government, when we experienced cuts—but because there are more town and parish councils being created through this reorganisation. Those new parish and town councils, which will have councillors who are unpaid volunteers, will have no infrastructure at all. The Government seek to expand and create town councils, but have taken away training and the ability to conduct their functions. What the Minister has outlined is not accurate, is it?

[Vikki Slade]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend—we have worked so hard together on this. I understand the situation with the finances, which is why new clause 43 is designed to impose a duty on local authorities to provide support to smaller organisations, some of which are brand new and will not exist until everyone is on this rush to provide them. I would like to press new clause 43 to a vote later, but on new clause 5, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 6

Councillors: proportional representation vote system

“(1) The Secretary of State may by regulations introduce a proportional representation vote system in elections of local authority councillors.

(2) The regulations in subsection (1) are subject to the affirmative procedure.”—(Manuela Perteghella.)

This new clause would allow the Secretary of State to introduce a proportional representation voting system for local authority councillors.

Brought up, and read the First time.

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[Paul Holmes]

It is a pleasure to see you in the chair, Dame Siobhain. I was going to resist the temptation to have another say on voting systems in local government, but I saw this new clause and could not resist it. Smoke would otherwise come out of my ears at how ridiculous a suggestion this is. I will outline briefly why, and I will declare an interest—I am against it, and I have made that clear throughout the Bill Committee.

The hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon, speaking for her party as she has done throughout this Committee, very ably suggested, promoted and proposed this new clause. I agree with the hon. Lady that many people in my constituency, the half of my constituency in Eastleigh, do not think they are properly represented in local government. However that is not because of proportional representation. It is because of the dire decisions of the Liberal Democrat administration of Eastleigh borough council. I agree with her about my constituents in the Eastleigh side of the constituency, who just do not feel properly represented.

[Vikki Slade]

Would the hon. Member like to consider why it is that the Eastleigh side of his constituency keeps on voting Liberal Democrats in year after year, to make it almost a one-party state?

[Paul Holmes]

In part, because the Liberal Democrats put out six leaflets a year that do not tell the truth about what is actually going on, and make a mockery between the relationship between truth and non-truth. The residents of Eastleigh get those six times a year. Unfortunately the hon. Lady will know that because the Liberal Democrats are so electorally successful in Eastleigh, the association of my local party, though we do our best, are like ducks with little feet under the water trying to compete. However I guarantee to her that when local government reorganisation comes, the reign of Keith House, who is one of the longest serving local government leaders in the country—he has been in power longer than Kim Jong-Un, although I do not argue he goes to the same extremes—will come to an end, and I say thank God for that.

On proportional representation—

[Paul Holmes]

Dame Siobhan, the answer to that is no and if you Google it you will see the relationship. I have a lot of respect for Councillor House. We just have very big political disagreements on the way in which he runs the council.

When I saw this proposal, I was not surprised when I saw those who had proposed and seconded the new clause. It would be a disastrous action for local government. We can use the arguments about why we should not have proportional representation at a national, general election level in the same way for local government, and particularly for councils. Councils are essentially mini Houses of Commons and mini democratic forums. It is vital that there is a link between a councillor, their ward and their voter. In local government, that is even more important because of the smaller geographical—

[Vikki Slade]

Can the hon. Member—not my hon. Friend anymore—explain to me why there is not a link? Proportional representation does not remove the link. It just allows people to have a proportional way of voting for somebody. We are not removing the link to a ward, division or constituency.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (Eighth sitting)

Debate between Vikki Slade and Paul Holmes

Committee stage
Tuesday 21st October 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Paul Holmes]

I am glad that the hon. Gentleman has accepted the premise of the argument that we can back pragmatic amendments to legislation to improve it. I hope that he might look on that in his career, particularly when it comes to recognising the independence of Cornwall and having the mayoralty just for Cornwall that he is striving for.

[Vikki Slade]

A couple of amendments have been tabled on that issue. I think they were supported as a coalition by the Opposition, but not by the hon. Member for Camborne and Redruth.

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[Paul Holmes]

No, not at the moment. I know that anything about town and parish councils exercises the hon. Members for Mid Cheshire and for Banbury. They may want to speak shortly, but I will first answer the hon. Member for Camborne and Redruth. I do not think he is an analogue politician in a digital age, but consulting downwards could merely mean that an email is sent to a mailing list. I am sure he has a huge mailing list, given the number of constituents who admire his work. That is one click—it does not mean his constituents have to respond to it, and it would not mean that his councils had to.

[Vikki Slade]

I wonder whether the hon. Member has a situation in Hampshire similar to ours in Dorset, where we have the DAPTC—the Dorset Association of Parish and Town Councils. Nothing in the amendment states that the strategic authority would have to engage with each and every town and parish council; it just says,

“with town and parish councils”.

That could be through their associations and through clusters of town and parish councils, such as the DAPTC.

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[Paul Holmes]

We welcome this section of the legislation. I congratulate the Minister, the Government and officials on ensuring in legislation a smooth process for transfer of responsibilities, and on including a target date. The people served by the mayors—that is, our constituents—will want to understand very simply what new powers and responsibilities are being handed to the mayor. This is a sensible solution.

We also welcome the creation of the deputy mayor for police and crime. Given the responsibilities outlined in other sections of the Bill, the mayor will quite rightly have many and multifaceted responsibilities. It is therefore perfectly reasonable to provide in statute for a deputy mayor specifically to cover the police and crime powers of the mayoralty. That will ensure that policing and crime is looked at as a top priority for the residents they serve. We welcome this sensible section of the legislation, and will not seek to oppose it.

[Vikki Slade]

The Lib Dems have long wanted to see the end of police and crime commissioners, and we know that that has also been Labour policy for at least 12 years. [Interruption.] Do I hear a “Hear, hear!” from the Government Benches? I believe we are in violent agreement on that, which is great. Where we differ is in the how. I spent a lot of time as a councillor trying to get through the police and crime commissioners, who really take no accountability for what goes on. If I ask the police and crime commissioner about a particular incident, the answer always comes back, “That’s an operational matter. That is not for me.” It is always the local councillors who end up dealing with issues, and they are always the ones held accountable by the residents.

Where we disagree is that we do not believe that a police and crime commissioner should be an appointment of the mayor. We think that they should be held accountable to boards of councillors within councils, as was formerly the policy of the Labour party. Quite straightforwardly, the amendment would remove the provision allowing the mayor to appoint a person to manage policing and crime. We do not actually believe that this should be a mayoral appointment; it should be down to the elected persons of the area.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 44, as amended, accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 45

PCCs and police areas

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

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[Paul Holmes]

As with the previous clause, we see that clause 45 is a perfectly sensible provision. The Minister has done an admirable job on what I know has been a long day, particularly after the late night yesterday. She is explaining the legislation in an excellent way.

I wish to touch on amendment 26, tabled by the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole. In order to dispel the myth, for the hon. Members for Banbury and for Camborne and Redruth, that there is a coalition going on, this is where unfortunately the coalition comes to an end. Amendment 26 is not pragmatic or sensible. It would essentially remove the mayor’s power to appoint a deputy mayor to a day-to-day role for policing. The amendment would be bad for the legislation because, as I outlined in relation to the previous clause—and as we on the Conservative Benches agree—the mayoralty is a multifaceted role, and a role that is accountable to the public. In many previous sittings of the Committee, we have outlined that there has to be that democratic accountability. That is given in this legislation by a mayor appointing a deputy mayor for policing who is accountable to the public, but also accountable to the mayor who is accountable to the public.

I understand the Liberal Democrats’ longstanding view that PCCs should not exist. We fundamentally disagree with that. We think PCCs are one of the better solutions of the coalition Government. We believe that policing is a public priority and that the public should have a say in the way in which their police forces are run. I am not sure whether opposition to PCCs is a widely held view within the Liberal Democrats. Indeed, the Liberal Democrat candidate for Hamble Valley, who stood against me, also stood for the PCC election for Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, and put himself forward for election as Mayor of Hampshire and the Solent.

[Vikki Slade]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Paul Holmes]

In one moment. It seems that that Liberal Democrat candidate perfectly endorses the solutions that the Government are putting forward, and actually wanted three jobs at once.

[Vikki Slade]

There is a fairly well established position in which those people who wish to see something abolished have to work within the current system. I believe that our dearly beloved Lord Paddy Ashdown desperately wanted to see the abolition of the House of Lords and yet was able to take up a seat. It is quite common for people to go into a role knowing that their job is to try to reform or remove that role.

[Paul Holmes]

I would say, in a respectful tone to the hon. Lady, that the thing that the Liberal Democrats are most known for is saying one thing and in their actions doing another, but we will leave that there. Clause 45 is perfectly sensible. We will oppose amendment 26 if it is pushed to a vote. I am pleased to see that the hon. Lady has reverted to the Liberal Democrats’ traditional position of holding many positions at once. We support the clause, and oppose amendment 26.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (Seventh sitting)

Debate between Vikki Slade and Paul Holmes

Committee stage
Tuesday 21st October 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Vikki Slade (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to have you back in the Chair, Sir John. I welcome the introduction of MCIL. We have spoken before about how these authorities will be funded, and this is another tool in the toolbox. I am slightly concerned about how it will sit alongside strategic CIL and neighbourhood CIL. I would be really concerned if this took away the portion of money that is available for local neighbourhoods through neighbourhood forums or town and county councils to spend on hyper-local infrastructure, which can otherwise never be funded. I am also interested in the pieces of infrastructure that currently are funded through strategic CIL by an upper-tier authority. Will those responsibilities pass in full across to the mayor, so that we do not end up with a situation where the mayor gets the CIL, but the council gets the responsibility?

That is one of the reasons why we have tabled new clause 1, although the Minister may say we do not need part of it. The first part of the new clause states that the Secretary of State must, within six months of the passing of the Act, prepare and publish guidance on the implementation and administration of community infrastructure levy charges—tt may be that that is going to happen anyway. More importantly, there is the issue of error and incorrect charging. I have been speaking to my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Mr Dillon), who has been involved with the CIL Injustice Group, where there have been miscalculated charges, with councils charging up to £100,000 for the community infrastructure levy completely incorrectly. We know that CIL is supposed to be charged on additional dwellings for commercial use, not on self-builds or extensions, but that has happened in a number of councils around the country. There are a couple of councils in Surrey—Waverley in particular has a huge problem. The new Liberal Democrat council in West Berkshire had to pay back £300,000 in total to 18 different constituents who had all been incorrectly charged. In my own county of Dorset, there are cases where people have been incorrectly charged.

In some instances, people have been building their own home and suddenly had a notice put on the path outside. Some have been chased down for huge amounts of money, and some for tiny amounts of money, and have had court charges applied to them. It is a problem that needs solving. Last Monday in the Chamber—I believe you were present, Sir John—two Conservative Members raised cases from their own constituencies. A previous Minister said that a series of households had been badly hit. It is clear that the CIL regulations are not intended to operate in this way. We do not believe our new clause would create a significant new burden on the Secretary of State; it is there to assist, and we would be grateful for a commitment that its provisions will be rolled into the legislation.

[Paul Holmes]

I will speak to amendment 289, in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner, on behalf of the official Opposition. I will also briefly speak to new clause 1. The hon. Lady has just very expertly outlined why the Government should accept it, and the official Opposition agree with her. She is absolutely correct that CIL, although a very good thing, is—not always intentionally, but sometimes negligently—being used in inappropriate ways. Just last week, my right hon. Friend the Member for Godalming and Ash (Sir Jeremy Hunt) mentioned a case in his constituency with his local authority, where somebody was being charged £70,000. That is clearly unacceptable.

Any measure that could improve the regulation and guidance to local authorities, not necessarily to restrict them but to give them clarity—it would also slightly pull on the tail of their coat, so they do not act irresponsibly to people who are responsibly improving their homes—is a good thing. We will therefore be supporting new clause 1 if the hon. Lady chooses to press that to a vote. It clearly does not place an undue burden on the Secretary of State, and it would mean that the system would become more streamlined and transparent. It would give protection to people who are doing the right thing and ensuring that they are following the rules, but the rules are clearly being interpreted in different ways.

Amendment 289, in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner, would ensure that the mayors charging CIL report on the effect that this has on housing development. Similarly to new clause 1, we do not think that that would place an undue burden on the legislation or on the necessary parties because, where the community infrastructure levy is being used at the moment, there clearly is a lack of transparency on what it is delivering for local people. The amendment will improve the transparency that mayors and local authorities would be bringing to the table.

CIL is meant to improve infrastructure and make sure that housing is delivered. We have seen across the country places where existing mayors are not necessarily delivering on their housing commitment, particularly in London. We argue that this amendment would bring transparency because a mayor has to account for how they are using CIL and the effect that that would have on housing development in a city region that they control. We think that is a perfectly reasonable amendment.

For that reason, we will press amendment 289 to a vote, and if the hon. Lady the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole chooses to press new clause 1 to a vote, we will certainly support that today.

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[Paul Holmes]

I apologise for what I hope the Minister does not think is a discourtesy—it is due to my rustiness on Bill Committee procedure; I last served on the Planning and Infrastructure Bill Committee—but I wish to speak briefly to new clause 28, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner.

New clause 28 is designed to do exactly what I argue the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole, wishes to achieve. In her response to new clause 1, the Minister outlined that the Planning Act 2008 gives guidance on the two charging and reporting mechanisms, and if there is a problem with the amount of CIL that has been charged, it gives applicants the right to try to rectify that through an appeal. That is clearly not working; otherwise we would not be talking about the situations that many constituents have faced over the past years, including the cases that the hon. Lady mentioned and the one that I mentioned in which £70,000 is being charged to someone and they are now, I think, a couple of years down the road and cannot get rectification.

New clause 28 is very simply worded and makes it absolutely clear that

“the Secretary of State may not charge CIL on householders’ property extensions that are for their own use.”

I believe that last week in oral questions, the Secretary of State outlined clearly that he thinks there is a problem here, and that the system is currently not working, particularly for people who are doing property extensions for their own use. The new clause clearly aims to mitigate that problem.

[Vikki Slade]

Will the hon. Member comment on the fact that, according to the CIL Injustice Group, £1.65 million has been incorrectly charged. The Minister for Housing and Planning said:

“It is very clear to us that the CIL regulations in question are not intended to operate in this way. We are giving very serious consideration to amending them to ensure that no one else is affected in this manner.”

Will the hon. Member join me in asking why the Minister would not take the opportunity to put that provision in the Bill, when it has a clause specifically about community infrastructure levy?

[Paul Holmes]

I cannot comment on the motivations of the Minister, who I believe is an hon. Lady of utmost integrity, but I suspect that the Government want to amend the Bill on their own terms. The hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole and I both speak for Opposition parties, but we would not make hay if the Minister chose to accept these new clauses. The Government have a position, stated on the Floor of the House of Commons, that CIL is not working for people who tried to follow the rules but are being persecuted and in many cases prosecuted by local authorities, through the wrong charging mechanisms being applied. The Minister outlined the mitigation and the appeal infrastructure that people can currently use, but they are not working either. New clause 1—an admirable new clause—and new clause 28 would make it very clear that people in that situation cannot be charged the CIL.

The Minister is in charge. She has the power to accept the new clauses and improve the legislation to change the lives of people who face injustice every day in the current system. I absolutely accept that the last Government did not do it, but she has a simple choice today: accept these new clauses, change the situation, and make sure that people do not have to go through what these people have been going through. I encourage her to accept these new clauses in the spirit of co-operation and tripartisanship—[Interruption.] Quadripartisanship! We would genuinely support her in doing that.

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[Paul Holmes]

The hon. Lady and I are veterans of the Planning and Infrastructure Bill Committee. She is absolutely right to outline some of the comments made in that Committee, because that Bill has fundamental consequences for this legislation. Does the hon. Lady share my concerns that not only is nature not included within local growth plans, but the consequences of the Planning and Infrastructure Bill will mean that nature will not feature at all in some of the planning decisions made in the development of those local growth plans?

[Vikki Slade]

The shadow Minister is exactly right; that is why so many people are so worried about the Planning and Infrastructure Bill. My inbox has been filled with people asking how they can block it, because of the damage it will do to so much of our nature.

The piece missing from this measure is that economic growth in rural areas is fundamentally entwined with nature recovery. In my area in Dorset, Purbeck Heaths is a new national nature park, and nature tourism is actually one of our growth industries. We have incredible charitable businesses, such as Birds of Poole Harbour, that have brought back species to Dorset—species that have been missing for generations and are now thriving—and we now have a whole industry growing around that. The National Trust is also buying land that is no longer commercially viable and restoring it for rewilding, ensuring that it is there for generations to come. Failing to think about that as part of the local economic strategy is a missed opportunity, and it risks subverting development that is already there.

Economic development is not independent of our lives. People move to places because they have nature around them. Those places may have great shops, town centres and theatres, but people will also move there because of the great quality of life. A lot of people will say that being in nature is a part of making their lives better and happier. If times are tough and people do not have a lot of money in their pocket, being close to nature is something that they can still enjoy and that restores their mental health. We underestimate the power of that at our peril.

We have huge areas of countryside where farming is becoming a marginal activity. Rather than being the driver, it is almost becoming something that people are doing because they love it—but they are losing money hand over fist. If we do not bake in that land use framework, which already pre-exists the local growth plan, it will be much easier for farmers to “get rich quick” by moving land out of its existing use and into what the economic development plan sees as the latest, greatest new thing—losing that land forever—rather than complying with a land use framework that explains why it is so important to keep that land in use, and helps to retain the value of that land for farming, or ancient industry, into the future.

I recognise that the Minister has not yet accepted any of our amendments, so I recognise that getting this one through may be a real struggle, but it is so important, particularly given how, as the shadow Minister has already explained, the Planning and Infrastructure Bill has really squeezed out nature. I say to the Minister, “Please put nature back in and recognise that the land use frameworks and nature recovery strategies matter.” In many places they already exist and already have local buy-in, and we would not want to see mayoral authorities ride roughshod over what is already there.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (Sixth sitting)

Debate between Vikki Slade and Paul Holmes

Committee stage
Thursday 16th October 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Paul Holmes (Hamble Valley) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair as usual, Ms Vaz. I want to make a quick remark, notwithstanding the fact that the shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner, may want to speak to this. Briefly, I welcome that the Minister’s and the Government’s recommendations, contained in schedule 5. The Minister does not know those of us on the Opposition Benches too well at the moment—she will do by the end of this Bill Committee—but, if she can get my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne to agree to extra regulation, that is absolutely good enough for me. He is well known as somebody with strongly held views about the role of the state in local government from when he ran his excellent local authority and administration. The Minister has managed to achieve something that I, as his Whip, have never managed to achieve.

I welcome this sensible piece of regulation. One of the things I welcome in the Bill is the assurance the Minister has given, and which is set out within the House of Commons Library paper, that it would grant strategic authorities and county or unitary authorities where a strategic authority does not exist. That is a sign that the Government are listening to the wants of local authorities—as the previous Government did when they licensed pedicabs, for example, with my former colleague Nickie Aiken getting that Bill through. I wanted to place on the record that I believe this is a welcome piece of regulation—but the Minister should not get too carried away and start making regulations everywhere willy-nilly.

[Vikki Slade (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)]

I have nothing to add, apart from the fact that this is a good addition; but the hon. Member for Hamble Valley mentioned pedicabs, and I cannot let that go by without asking the Minister to look again at that issue, because they are absolutely blighting the part of London where we work, making tourists’ lives utterly miserable, and contravening virtually every traffic law I have seen, with little enforcement. If there is any opportunity to go further on pedicabs, bring it on.

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[Vikki Slade]

This is very much about clarification. We know that a decision will be made, apparently very soon. I believe “very soon” was used in a Westminster Hall debate only a couple of weeks ago—I am new at this, but I think that that might mean sometime in this Session, perhaps—and we will get the outcome of the consultation on general pavement parking. Our amendment 348 is about obstruction, which is an existing offence.

[Paul Holmes]

I agree with the comments made by the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon and I thank the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole, the Lib Dem spokeswoman, for her excellent speech. Will she acknowledge that—as much as she gets emails, every colleague across the country gets such emails—this is about making it easier for the end user, our constituents, to report stuff? Does she agree that Guide Dogs, which has been running an excellent campaign on behalf of the blind for many years, would be pleased to see the Minister accept amendment 348?

[Vikki Slade]

I am so glad that the hon. Gentleman mentioned Guide Dogs. I have Guide Dogs written down on my notes, as well as the RNIB, the Royal National Institute of Blind People, of which I am a champion. They have been campaigning for the full change, but amendment 348 would certainly be a step along the way. I also understand that it would implement the Transport Committee’s 2019 report recommendations. A lot of work has already been done on the issue.

The second element of amendment 348 contradicts something that the shadow Minister talked about in connection with Conservative amendment 291, which relates to parking fines. As a councillor and former leader of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole, I was delighted that over the summer a Minister gave permission for Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole to have a trial of extended fines. That is not about councils trying to make money, but about councils trying to balance the books and local taxpayers not carrying the burden.

Let me give the Committee an example. A parking fine for someone who parks in the middle of a roundabout, on a grass verge or somewhere else dangerous—I am talking not about not paying in a car park, but about a dangerous piece of parking—is £70, reduced to £35 if paid within 14 days. For someone who has travelled down to Bournemouth for a day at the beach, parking will cost between £25 and £30. It will cost a similar amount to park in Brighton, Bath or Oxford—in most of our thriving places.

Someone might as well pay £35 between four adults in a large vehicle that can bump its way up the kerb and park right next to the beach, where it is really convenient. The vehicle will need to be ticketed and, at some later stage, probably towed away if it is causing a danger to ambulances or bus routes. Even if it is towed away, the fine that can be levied is £150, and yet for the council to have that vehicle towed away can cost up to £800. The difference is paid by the local council taxpayer. In a typical summer in somewhere such as Bournemouth, something like 1,500 tickets are given out. Members can imagine how much of a shortfall there is.

Amendment 348 seeks to give the ability that already exists in London to other places, so that they can apply a different parking fine where deemed appropriate, potentially in limited circumstances. The system is not working at the moment. So many people think that it is perfectly okay to turn up to places and do that, although I do not think it happens quite so much in Cornwall. When I visited there, people behaved incredibly well, but people who visit places like Bournemouth behave incredibly badly, and to have that freedom would be useful.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (Fifth sitting)

Debate between Vikki Slade and Paul Holmes

Committee stage
Thursday 16th October 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Paul Holmes]

I will—that is called an election. That is my point. I understand that the hon. Lady comes at this from a genuine position—I hope she accepts that I do, too—but the accountability and trust element is a general election, or an election for the role of mayor, at which they will be held accountable for whether they have committed to and, more importantly, delivered what they said they would do. That is the key process, and key accountability structure, of the Bill.

Although new clause 19 is very well drafted, it would place a huge cost burden on the new authority, or the mayor, to establish a citizens assembly, not to mention the administrative burden of selecting 40 people from the area “by sortition or lottery”. Although I do not believe in prescriptive legislation, I think that the new clause would be open to interpretation in many different ways and would add huge costs to the operation of the authority or the mayor, at a time when it is generally accepted that the public finances are not in the way they should be. The mayor must not be overburdened in delivering their key priorities and strategic aims by the additional expenditure that would be required.

[Vikki Slade]

I think there is absolutely a role for citizens assemblies. What does the hon. Member think about asking the Minister to look at a role for citizens assemblies but without the prescription about 40 people? In an area of 1.2 million people, 40 would not be representative; we might want to make it much bigger or have it convene on an ad hoc basis. We might want to create something in the legislation, but possibly not what is proposed.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (Third sitting)

Debate between Vikki Slade and Paul Holmes

Committee stage
Tuesday 14th October 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Vikki Slade]

We rehearsed the conversation about the level of consultation, but this is really about the role of town and parish councils. We have seen, since the devolution announcements were made, areas around the country rush to form town and parish councils where they do not already exist, and to protect services through town and parish councils where they already do.

However, we have heard that town and parish councillors have been completely ignored throughout the entire process. There has been no formal consultation with them and they have barely been mentioned. In fact, in the whole of the Bill, the title “parish councillor” is mentioned just four times, and in relation only to community assets. They are the true local councils; they are the people who know what is going on in their communities. The suggestion that there is no formal role for them to play in something as important as the creation of a huge council that will move things further away from them is hugely problematic.

We had local reorganisation in the Dorset area back in 2019. I have visited a number of the parish councils, and they have said to me that, since they lost their district council, the unitary council that they now have to work with is distant; things do not get done. In some of the areas being proposed, the new unitary authorities might be 50 or 60 miles away—they are going to be dealing with half a million people. Their main role is going to be in those really statutory, strategic functions. Yet our town and parish councils will be the ones that have to pick up the pieces, so their voices have to be heard. Of course, they will not be the ones making the decision—we know that—but they are simply invisible. We feel strongly that they should be part of that conversation; they should be consultees in this. Things should not be able to happen without their voices being heard.

[Paul Holmes]

I have great sympathy with the point that the hon. Lady is making. Would she agree that town and parish councils are already being asked to take on more services? We are seeing potential districts being abolished, handing down—or essentially getting rid of—assets to town and parish councils. Meanwhile, the town and parish councils are not being consulted on the wider reorganisation going forward. I wholeheartedly endorse the hon. Lady’s view that parish and town councils need to be consulted. Could she elaborate on why she thinks the Government are so reluctant to do so?

[Vikki Slade]

I thank the hon. Member for his intervention. I am not in the mind of the Government; I cannot understand why they would not want to embrace the incredible hard work of these volunteers in our communities who are already doing so much. But we are seeing, in every community, services handed down or at risk of closure, which are then only saved by the incredible work of the parish councils. It just strikes me as odd that we would not embrace the role of those parish councils.

--- Later in debate ---

[Vikki Slade]

I used to live on the Isle of Wight. I got married there and my parents met there, so I have a fond connection to it. Does the hon. Member agree that if “Isle of Wight” is not included within the authority name of “Hampshire and the Isle of Wight”, it might disappear from all the other organisations in which it features, such as fire authorities or health authorities? Suddenly, the Isle of Wight’s unique identity would be completely subsumed into an amorphous Hampshire.

[Paul Holmes]

As the hon. Lady knows from when we were on the BBC’s “Politics South” programme some weeks ago, I rarely agree with Liberal Democrats, but I suspect that she and I agree on this point. I know that she stands for her area and, as a former council leader, for the wider area, and that she knows a lot about the Isle of Wight. I did not know that she got married there, but I am sure it was a lovely wedding, because the Isle of Wight is a beautiful place steeped in history. She is absolutely right that while Hampshire and the Isle of Wight have been together geographically, they have also been together in the way organisations have worked, over hundreds of years. I see the Solent as the water motorway connecting the mainland to the Isle of Wight. We could not interact without having it there. “Hampshire and the Solent” is the wrong name for the proposed mayoralty, because it leaves out the distinct identity of a proud people on the Isle of Wight.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (Second sitting)

Debate between Vikki Slade and Paul Holmes

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th September 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Paul Holmes]

I thought you might say that—thank you.

Donna Jones: I have represented my two counties, with 2.2 million people, for four and a bit years now. It is tough, because I have two large geographical counties; it would take me three and a half hours to travel from north to south of my patch, and I know colleagues have the same issue. If you are doing your job well and you are delivering, the press—the media, radio and TV—is your best friend. The power of being able to work with the press to get out the good news of what you are doing is very impactful. For mayors who have police under them, if the police are delivering and helping, that is another way of getting messaging out there.

On parish and town councils, I think that in my area, the rub will come with local government reorganisation, which thankfully is a year or two behind devolution—or planned to be one year behind it. I am trying to very clearly separate the two: this is about spending and more power to our elbow in Hampshire and the Solent, and that is about how we save money through local government reorganisation.

If I was still a unitary authority leader, facing the prospect of moving from 15 councils in my area to perhaps four or five, I would be consulting on parish and town councils, if we did not have them in the area that I represented. When you have four very large unitary authorities across a county such as Hampshire, which has 1.8 million people, the nucleus of your council becomes much further away from the village or town that you live in. Therefore, from a democratic perspective, getting things at that lower level to give real buy-in will be key.

[Vikki Slade (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)]

Q I am really concerned about the movement of powers from police and crime commissioners to mayors, but more so about the moving of the fire and rescue services, which are given almost a passing mention in the Bill. I am fascinated to hear how you see this, as mayors who are already in place. Strategic authorities will cover multiple counties, multiple fire authorities and multiple police authorities, and all that will be vested in a single person. That feels like a real democratic deficit.

How do you understand those different areas? In my area, Wessex, there will be four counties, with two different police authorities and two different fire authorities, and the authority itself. It will all have to line up eventually. I am really concerned about how you can improve services for your residents, because that is what this is all about. It feels very remote when services such as police and fire might be very different in the New Forest compared with the centre of Portsmouth, the North York Moors or one of the cities.

Tracy Brabin: If I could just make the case for mayors and police and crime commissioners, we have had so many amazing opportunities because of those two responsibilities—the teaming and ladling of responsibilities and moneys, and being able to have a strategic police and crime plan. Crime does not just come from bad people; it comes from poor housing, a lack of skills and opportunity, and a lack of transport to get to jobs and training. The ability to bring together those responsibilities in a Venn diagram gives us really great outcomes.

One example is using money from the apprenticeship levy share scheme that would have gone back to Whitehall. We have kept some of that money in the region, including £1 million from Morrisons, to train up 15 PCSOs to go on my bus network and in bus stations, so that we can target my safety of women and girls plan. That opportunity is a gift. I know that the Mayor of South Yorkshire called an early election in order to get those powers, because he saw the opportunity. I also know that Kim McGuinness, who has been a PCC and is now a mayor, is desperate for PCC responsibilities, because she knows the benefit.

To your point, the challenge is coterminosity. I know that the previous Home Secretary was very focused on trying to identify how to get not just savings, but efficiencies, in coterminosity. Bringing fire into that makes a fair bit of sense. In West Yorkshire, we already have a really decent relationship between fire and police, so I am not sure whether having additional powers would make a substantive difference, but I will say to the Committee that mayors need to be in local resilience forums. Following the horrendous attack in Southport, the public, the Government and the press went to the mayor, but the mayor is not privy to all the information in the first instance. The resilience piece is really important, and I know the Bill is going to address that.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill (First sitting)

Debate between Vikki Slade and Paul Holmes

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th September 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Vikki Slade]

Apologies for having a second go, but my husband is also a sitting councillor and I am a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

[Paul Holmes (Hamble Valley) (Con)]

In case we do not get to it this afternoon, Donna Jones, one of the witnesses, is a personal friend of mine.