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Debate on Regional Assemblies - 11 February 2004

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Mr. David Curry (Skipton and Ripon): Mr. David Curry (Skipton and Ripon): I beg to move,

That this House notes that the Government's proposals for elected regional assemblies as set out in their White Paper, Your Region, Your Choice grant the proposed assemblies limited powers, many of which are taken from local government; further notes that the Deputy Prime Minister has made statements suggesting that elected regional assemblies may acquire additional powers not reflected in the White Paper and that he intends that elected regional assemblies should open up the debate about the Barnett formula and public spending in the regions; and urges the Government to publish a draft Bill and to clear up this confusion by the end of June so that Parliament can debate the proposals in good time before the summer adjournment.

The motion sets out a simple proposition—when there is a decision to be made about the way in which we are governed, the debate ought to take place on the basis of a clear indication of what is at stake; the time scale; and the powers of the institution that we are debating. That will enable debate to be clear, above board, transparent and honest. The way to achieve that is to publish legislation as early as possible. In the course of debate in the House, legislation is amended, but those amendments are themselves subject to detailed scrutiny and analysis.
At the moment, there are proposals for regional assemblies, and there is a great deal of activity in pursuit of the case for or against them. However, we still do not have proposals about what the assemblies will actually do. If the powers of the proposed regional assemblies are to be closely based on the contents of the White Paper, "Your Region, Your Choice", it is difficult to see why the legislative propositions cannot be published at an early stage. If the powers are to differ substantially from that outline, the need for legislation is even more urgent, as our debate would be based on a false premise.

We may have the proposals in July, hard against the summer recess. All Governments are desperate to get their business finished before the recess. There is not exactly a panic, but there is an urgency to getting business done. We come back for some slightly token sittings in September, which tend to be taken up with statements and other matters, before going into the party conference season. The referendums are supposed to take place at the end of October or in November, so there is a genuine danger that those legislative proposals will not receive effective debate in the House before people vote.

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David Curry MP | House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA | tel: 020 7219 6202