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Regional Accountability House of Commons Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons Regional Accountability Third Report of Session 2007–08 Report, together with formal minutes, oral and written evidence Ordered by The House of Commons to be printed 2 July 2008 HC 282 Published on 10 July 2008 by authority of the House of Commons London: The Stationery Office Limited £0.00 The Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons The Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons is appointed by the House of Commons to consider how the House operates and to make recommendations for modernisation. Current membership Ms Harriet Harman (Labour, Camberwell & Peckham) (Chairman) Chris Bryant (Labour, Rhondda) Ms Dawn Butler (Labour, Brent South) Ann Coffey (Labour, Stockport) Philip Davies (Conservative, Shipley) John Hemming (Liberal Democrat, Birmingham Yardley) Mr George Howarth (Labour, Knowsley North & Sefton East) Mr Simon Hughes (Liberal Democrat, North Southwark & Bermondsey) Mr Greg Knight (Conservative, Yorkshire East) Mark Lazarowicz (Labour/Co-operative, Edinburgh North and Leith) Mrs Theresa May (Conservative, Maidenhead) Mr Richard Shepherd (Conservative, Aldridge-Brownhills) Sir Peter Soulsby (Lab, Leicester South) Dr Howard Stoate (Labour, Dartford) Sir Nicholas Winterton (Conservative, Macclesfield) The following Members were also members of the Committee during the Parliament: Liz Blackman (Labour, Erewash) Mr Paul Burstow, (Liberal Democrat, Sutton & Cheam) Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell) Mr David Heath (Liberal Democrat, Somerton and Frome) Mr Geoffrey Hoon (Labour, Ashfield) (Chairman) Jessica Morden (Labour, Newport East) Mr Adrian Sanders, (Liberal Democrat, Torbay) Mr Jack Straw (Labour, Blackburn) (Chairman) Graham Stringer (Labour, Manchester Blackley) Andrew Stunell (Liberal Democrat, Hazel Grove) Paddy Tipping (Labour, Sherwood) Mr Edward Vaizey (Conservative, Wantage) Lynda Waltho (Labour, Stourbridge) Mr Iain Wright (Labour, Hartlepool) Powers The powers of the Committee are set out in an Appendix to the House of Commons Standing Orders. These are available on the Internet via www.parliament.uk. Publications The Reports and evidence of the Committee are published by The Stationery Office by Order of the House. All publications of the Committee (including press notices) are on the Internet at http://www.parliament.uk/modcom. Committee staff The current staff of the Committee are Helen Irwin and Dr Susan Griffiths (Clerks), Rob Bartram (Committee Assistant) and Jane Cooper (Secretary). Contacts All correspondence should be addressed to the Clerk, Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons, Journal Office, House of Commons, London, SW1A 0AA. The telephone number for general enquiries is 020 7219 3318; the Committee’s email address is [email protected] Regional Accountability 1 Contents Report Page Summary 3 1 Introduction 5 Background 5 New arrangements for regional accountability 6 2 The accountability gap 7 Is there an accountability gap? 7 Remit for Parliamentary scrutiny 10 3 Regional committees 12 Select committees 13 Grand committees 15 Other models 17 London 18 Effective regional accountability 18 Effective regional select committees 19 Membership and quorum 20 Meetings and travel 23 Avoiding duplication 25 Regional identities 28 Accountability of Regional Ministers 29 Resource implications 29 Experimental period 30 4 Conclusion 32 Conclusions and recommendations 33 Annex: Estimated costs 38 Regional select committee costs: an estimate 38 Regional grand committee costs : an estimate 39 Other possible costs 41 Formal Minutes 42 List of witnesses 54 List of written evidence 55 List of Reports from the Committee during the current Parliament 57 2 Optional header Regional Accountability 3 Summary In July 2007, the Prime Minister put forward proposals for improved democratic accountability and scrutiny of the delivery of public services in the English regions, as part of The Governance of Britain Green Paper. The paper followed the appointment of ministers for the English regions for the first time. This Committee’s inquiry into Regional Accountability has invited evidence on possible models of accountability; the role of the House in regional accountability; and the level of resources that would be needed to make regional accountability work in the House of Commons. We have concluded that there is clear evidence of an accountability gap at regional level. Although Regional Development Agencies (RDAs) and other bodies have a central line of accountability to ministers, who are in turn accountable to Parliament, many of their activities in the regions are not subject to regular, robust scrutiny. More should be done to monitor the delivery of services in the regions, to complement national lines of accountability. We recommend that the most effective way to strengthen regional accountability to Parliament would be to establish a system of regional select committees. The membership of these committees should be constituted in the same way as that of existing select committees and should therefore reflect the political composition of the House. There should be one select committee for each of the administrative regions in England, with the exception of London. As London already has a measure of devolved government and accountability to elected representatives, it is likely to require somewhat different arrangements, which should be considered in the light of experience with the other committees. However, as select committees can offer only a minority of members in a given region the opportunity to exercise regular and detailed scrutiny, we also recommend that up to two regional grand committee meetings should take place in each session for each of the eight regions, taking place either in Westminster or in the relevant region. This will allow more members to engage in scrutiny. Regional grand committee meetings should take the form of a general debate (or a series of short debates) and questions to the relevant Regional Minister, to ensure his or her accountability to Parliament. Regional Ministers should also take questions on a regular rota basis in Westminster Hall. We expect that both regional grand and regional select committees will hold a large proportion of their meetings outside Westminster, within their regions. We believe that regional select committees have the potential to bring about a significant improvement in regional accountability. Nevertheless, there are practical challenges in their creation, including the risk of disrupting existing departmental select committee business or distracting agencies working in the regions from their core activities and central lines of accountability. They will also place increased demands on House resources in terms of Members’ time and workload, staffing, printing and publication costs, availability of rooms for meetings and office accommodation. We consider that these risks can be mitigated by a number of sensible precautions. 4 Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons Regional select committees must meet far less frequently than departmental select committees. We recommend a relatively small membership of up to 10 members, to ensure that regional select committees are functional and do not have an adverse impact on Members’ other commitments. Regional select committees should develop positive working relationships and regular liaison with existing departmental select committees as well as local authorities in their region in order to take advantage of local knowledge, to co- ordinate scrutiny activities and to reduce the prospect of clashing inquiries or duplication of effort. Finally, we do not consider it appropriate for all eight Chairmen of the new regional select committees to sit on the Liaison Committee, which is already a large committee. Instead, we consider that one of their number should be chosen by the House to attend meetings. We make these recommendations in the interests of establishing proportionate scrutiny and facilitating Members’ attendance and involvement. In order for regional committees to operate effectively, the House must take account of these challenges and accept the need for an initial transitional period. We therefore recommend that the arrangements recommended in this Report should be implemented at first on a temporary basis until the end of the present Parliament. After that time, there should be a review of the operation of regional committees to decide their future. Regional committees require adequate resources to operate properly and to represent a real improvement to regional accountability. We have included an estimate of the required resources with our report. Given the significant budget allocated to RDAs and other agencies working at regional level, for which they are not currently adequately accountable, we do not consider the cost of regional committees to be excessive. This estimate assumes that regional select committees will meet far less frequently than departmental select committees, as we have recommended. If levels of activity were to increase beyond this, a steep rise in costs would be likely. Our Report has focused on the desirability of establishing new structures within the House of Commons to improve regional accountability and scrutiny in Parliament. It is not our remit to comment on local scrutiny arrangements. Clearly, any new Parliamentary structures would need to complement local scrutiny arrangements and we have borne this in
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