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Norwich and Norfolk (Structural Changes) Order 2010

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Tope, who made an excellent and compelling speech, in marked contrast to the reasons advanced by the Government in support of this order. I declare that one of my law firm’s offices is in the City of Exeter. I have known the city well for over 40 years, and my firm acts for many people in and round the City of Exeter. I have lived most of my life in Devon and I was Member of Parliament for Torridge and West Devon from 1997 to 2005. I pay tribute to the Merits Committee for its report on this matter and to the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments. These committees are drawn from all parts of the House. Members of both have put on record, as we have heard many times already this evening, that they have many and profound misgivings about these orders. Reports of both committees highlight the fact that there is clear written advice from the Permanent Secretary himself to the Minister that there is a risk of these decisions being successfully challenged in judicial review proceedings. I emphasise that the Permanent Secretary told the Minister that the likelihood of these challenges succeeding was very high. We have also heard this evening that this is a unique event in the history of this department of state. These proceedings have now been taken and are due to be heard towards the end of April. Many of us in this House support the concept of unitary authorities, but I am amazed that Ministers have proceeded with these orders in the light of the deep and fundamental flaw in the reasons propounded to support them. I shall speak to the Exeter order because that is my area of interest, but most of the points I set out are equally applicable to the Norwich order. The Exeter order, as we have heard, should have satisfied all five criteria set out in the 2006 document, Invitation to Councils in England. The first criterion is that, ""the change to future unitary structures must be affordable; (defined as self-financing, with transitional costs being more than offset by savings over no more than 5 years)"." The Department for Communities and Local Government’s own impact assessment of the draft order includes an analysis of costs and savings which shows a net cost of Exeter and Norwich becoming unitary authorities of £1.6 million over six years. Thus, the first test is failed by the department’s own impact assessment. I am told by very reliable sources that £1.6 million over six years is a minimum cost figure, and it is likely to be considerably more than that. The figure contrasts dramatically with a net saving of £42.4 million if Norfolk and Devon became unitary including their capital cities. This figure comes from the department’s impact assessment. The loss to the public purse is at least £44 million if these proposals are implemented. It is not as though the public Exchequer is awash with money. The Government are borrowing nearly £500 million every day just to function, and yet they seek not only to drive a coach and horses through their own value-for-money test, but to add substantially to public sector debt—the debt that we all carry in this country. It is quite preposterous. Ministers, in contradicting the Permanent Secretary’s overwhelmingly compelling advice, have put up two new reasons to support the orders. These are not tried and tested reasons; they have not been consulted on. The Minister has resorted to "back of a cigarette packet" political expediency. The first reason is to give priority to jobs and economic growth, which could not be contemplated in 2006 when the criteria were developed. As the Merits Committee states, this is an unquantified assertion. I would add that it was untested and has never been consulted on, and there is no logic or rationale whatever for the statement. Indeed, the Merits Committee has asked the DCLG to give a much more explicit analysis of how much economic growth each city, as opposed to each county, is expected to generate as a result of becoming a unitary authority. The second so-called reason is the total-place approach, whereby, as unitaries, the two cities could open the way to improvements to the quality of public services. As with the first test, there is no logic, body, work, consultation or study to back up this assertion. As the Merits Committee rightly states, the Minister should provide a clearer explanation of why the Total Place approach is considered a compelling reason for granting each city unitary status. Noble Lords will have heard that the third county, Suffolk, has been treated entirely differently, and there has been inconsistency even in this decision. I draw noble Lords’ attention to the submission made by the leader of East Devon District Council, Councillor Sara Randall Johnson, which is item 7 in the Merits Committee’s report. She states: ""I struggle to understand how a unitary Exeter could open the way for improvements to the quality of public services, which in a Devon context are already performing to a high level (recently confirmed in the Devon wide Comprehensive Area Assessment)"." She goes on to say: ""It is a matter of record that even before 2006 local government in Devon was strongly focused on jobs and economic growth (witness, for example, the relocation of the Met Office and the expansion of Exeter Airport’s industrial base)"." She goes on to make an entirely valid comment: ""Exeter’s boundaries are tightly constrained. Exeter’s economy is a success story but the suggestion that it has been achieved despite two-tier local government is nonsense"." The city’s success has been built on a partnership of the city council, the county council and other local authorities. Most of Exeter’s future economic prospects now depend on development outside the proposed unitary city boundary. The county council has proved a very successful enabler for cross-council development. There is very little public support for the Exeter order. I draw noble Lords’ attention to the MORI poll also referred to in Councillor Randall Johnson’s submission. All Devon local authorities are against these orders except for Exeter city. The orders will cost the average Band D council tax payer in Devon approximately £200 a year extra. I believe also that many, if not most, Exonians are against these orders, but most of all I believe these orders are deeply flawed, unlawful and amount to a gross abuse of power. We are here to deal with matters such as this. We should vote against these orders and throw them out.