By Richard Johnstone in Manchester | 22 September 2014
Labour’s shadow local government secretary Hilary Benn has insisted the party’s plans for a constitutional convention following last week’s Scottish independence referendum no vote will lead to increased fiscal powers for local government as well as control over services.
Speaking to the party’s annual conference in Manchester yesterday, Benn also stated Labour would honour the pledge made to increase the powers of the Scottish Parliament in the build up to last Thursday’s vote, which saw 55% of people vote to stay part of the UK.
He said that, following the pledge on further devolution to Scotland, the people of England were also now looking for additional powers. Prime Minister David Cameron has proposed this should include the introduction of new rules to ensure that only English members of the Westminster parliament can vote on legislation relating only to England.
However, Benn said Labour was also listening to the calls from people in England, and would offer ‘a new deal that will pass power down, money down, responsibility down’ to local government.
‘I want cities and counties, towns and districts, parishes and neighbourhoods to make more decisions for themselves and to have more control over the money they raise and contribute,’ he said.
Labour’s plan was to form a national debate in England, leading up to a Constitutional Convention, that would be similar to the process that first lead to devolution in Scotland in 1999, Benn added.
Early indications of the plans included the policy to devolve £30bn of Whitehall funding over five years to local government bodies to allow them to take to control of skills, infrastructure and housing spending.
Such moves would be vital in ‘changing the way decisions are made so that we can free local communities, the people of England, to shape their own destiny,’ Benn concluded.
‘Not something cooked up in corridors of Labour’s shadow Whitehall, but a deeper, more profound change involving people from every part of the country.’
Benn also reiterated Labour figures claiming the coalition government was cutting spending power for every household in the ten most deprived areas in England by as much as sixteen times more than the ten least deprived.
‘It’s not fair and we will change it. We will make sure that the money we have is fairly shared.
‘We will make sure devolution goes hand in hand with redistribution from each according to their ability to contribute, to each according to their need.’
