North Thanet Liberal Democrats

Local government - leadership candidates set out stall

All three leadership candidates have responded to a questionnaire from the Assn of Liberal Democrat Councillors:

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Simon Hughes

1. What is your track record on promoting decentralisation?

Throughout my time as an MP - and before - I have championed real devolution of power. For local government to be revitalised it must be given real power, financial independence and sufficient resources.

2. How would you balance the need for local decision making with the need for a basic level of public service provision?

By ensuring that local authorities had sufficient resources to do more than the basics! Statutory duties should be at an absolute minimum to allow local communities to set their own priorities.

3. What is your attitude towards reform of local government finance?

I support a reform of local government finance that provides security of income for local authorities and which enables councils to plan long term. Councils must have autonomy over the raising and spending of their own finances.

4. Would you support an extra tax on second homes?

I would support a higher overall tax burden on second homes in order to better reflect the costs to communities of large numbers of second homes. Funds raised could be spent on affordable housing or other local priorities. I would change planning law to make the purchase of a property for use as a second home a formal 'change of use'. Applications could then be refused by local authorities where it was deemed that there is an excessive number of second homes.

5. How will you campaign to ensure proper funding of public services - in particular with regard to integrated transport in both rural and urban areas?

Local authorities should have the power and resources to take the lead in providing quality public services - with central government playing an enabling role for nation-wide or regional infrastructure. Our commitment to radical environmental action and sustainable communities means that a fully integrated and expanded public transport system should be a major aspect of the Party's programme for government.

6. Do you support the government's plan for unitary local government in England? If you do not what is your vision?

My vision is for real devolution of power to identifiable local communities. The structure that works in one part of the country may not be right in another. That is why I oppose a "one-size-fits-all" approach. The key for me would be that local authorities and their boundaries should have the consent of the local communities that they serve.

7. Do you support the current executive/scrutiny split in English local government?

No. I think this split is a false one and can leave too many councillors feeling marginalised and excluded. The split adds nothing with regard to scrutiny that was not present in the old committee system.

8. What experience do you have of visiting Liberal Democrat Councils and helping with local election campaigning?

I think I can claim vast experience of this - dare I say, probably more than any other candidate. Every year I tour the country supporting local council groups from the largest groups to the smallest.

9. How have these experiences influenced your work as a Liberal Democrat MP?

Massively. I work closely with my own local council group in Southwark and with councillors across the country. Liberal Democrats must be grounded in our commitment to community politics because we care about individuals and the communities to which they belong - and because this is the best way for us to stay fresh and relevant as a party and to be electorally successful.

10. How will you strengthen links between the party's local government wing and the Westminster "village"?

By ensuring that my team of advisers includes councillors and other grass roots activists and by seeking to pursue integrated policy making and campaigning so that what we say in Parliament and in the media is fully backed up by our record in local government and where good practice by Lib Dems in local government is used to develop national policy.

11. What are your plans to increase the number of Liberal Democrat Councillors and Liberal Democrat run Councils?

I want to encourage a re-birth of community politics. In 1970, our official adoption of the 'doctrine' marked the start of our party's revival at local government level. Our immersion in our communities stems from a unique commitment to the people we seek to represent - a passionate commitment that the other parties cannot match. We must add further professionalism to the way we campaign at local level and provide central resources (telephone banks and other campaign support) to enable that to happen.

12. What public services should be run and delivered by local government?

I won't give you a long, tedious list, but power should be exercised at the lowest level possible and the highest level necessary. My priority would be a ruthless campaign of 'Quango-cide' - and hand to local authorities powers currently exercised by non-elected government bodies such as health trusts, regional government offices and passenger transport authorities.

13. What public services should not be run by local government? Please state who should then run them and why?

Decisions should be taken at a national or regional level only for wider strategic aspects which go beyond the remit of individual local authority areas. For example, some transport infrastructure may require co-ordination between large numbers of local authorities and in some cases - for example, the trunk road network, - a national oversight. But this oversight must be democratically accountable.

14. What is your vision for local government in the 21st Century ? Please use this question to expand on any aspect of local government you have any views and opinions on that you have not been allowed to express elsewhere in the questionnaire.

We need to restate our commitment to devolution by supporting powerful local government whose structure reflects local needs and priorities, with the active support and consent of their communities. We need proportional representation in local government in England and Wales following the real achievements of our colleagues in Scotland.

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Chris Huhne

1. What is your track record on promoting decentralisation?

Decentralisation was the central theme of the public services policy commission I chaired at Charles Kennedy's request. This argued decentralisation was crucial to achieve world-class public services. It is ridiculous that the first elected politician with responsibility for the NHS is Patricia Hewitt: local voters must be able to sack or reward local decision-makers in all the key public services.

Decentralisation is the key to reviving faith in our democratic institutions. As the Norwegian royal commission on their democracy showed, the destruction of powerful local government removed a key link between the voter and the wider democratic system. Local authorities must be elected by fair votes to make Labour and Tory rotten boroughs contestable and contested. Competition works in politics as in economics.

2. How would you balance the need for local decision making with the need for a basic level of public service provision?

National minimum standards can be achieved in a decentralised system as long as they are agreed with the local units responsible for the service. If they are imposed, the centre will take responsibility for them and local autonomy will be eroded. Standards must be set at a low enough level to allow for local variation, innovation and creativity.

3. What is your attitude towards reform of local government finance?

Council Tax is a regressive and must be scrapped. It is essential the proportion of expenditure funded locally rises from a quarter to three quarters. There should be flexibility for local authorities to borrow on the capital markets directly to fund investment.

4. Would you support an extra tax on second homes?

I support allowing councils a general competence for action in the interests of their area. This could include an extra tax on second homes. Some rural areas welcome weekenders as making an important contribution to the local economy; it should be for local people to decide!

5. How will you campaign to ensure proper funding of public services - in particular with regard to integrated transport in both rural and urban areas?

Councils' capacity to raise their own finance is crucial to transport. Investment would be made easy by borrowing powers, and by returning the business rate to local authorities. By ensuring business rate is based on site values, councils will capture extra rental revenue from public improvements such as bus services, allowing greater levels of investment.

6. Do you support the government's plan for unitary local government in England? If you do not what is your vision?

In Hampshire where we have two-tiers, I am instinctively in favour of unitaries - my voters are confused about who does what, which reduces accountability. However, the mantra that Whitehall knows best must be challenged. There is no need for a uniform structure to local government.

7. Do you support the current executive/scrutiny split in English local government?

It should be up to local councils to decide. Fair votes and decentralising can allow all local councillors to be genuinely involved in decision making for their communities.

8. What experience do you have of visiting Liberal Democrat Councils and helping with local election campaigning?

As a South East MEP, I supported local campaigns every year both with my presence and with logistical support. It is part of the Leader's job.

9. How have these experiences influenced your work as a Liberal Democrat MP?

I am a campaigner by instinct, helping build up local campaigns across the region and in my own constituency of Eastleigh. We have an incredibly effective team led by Keith House that has managed to go on winning territory from Labour and Conservatives despite years of taking tough decisions in control. We keep in touch regularly, ensuring we sing from the same hymn sheet and support each others' messages.

10. How will you strengthen links between the party's local government wing and the Westminster "village"?

I am an assiduous attender at the meetings between the Liberal Democrat LGA Group and the parliamentary team. One of our great tasks is to convert our reputation for competence in delivery of local services into a national reputation.

11. What are your plans to increase the number of Liberal Democrat Councillors and Liberal Democrat run Councils?

Local government success almost always comes before more general success. The party should laud that fact, and put resources behind areas that are beginning to be effective in campaigning. We must be more ambitious, including going for councils and parliamentary seats that look less likely prospects but with work can be won. As Leader I would continue to support our Liberal Democrat councillors, visiting and helping in key elections and with local campaigns.

12. What public services should be run and delivered by local government?

We need a massive decentralisation of the state so all key services are run and democratically controlled locally by local people. That includes health, schools and policing.

13. What public services should not be run by local government? Please state who should then run them and why?

Defence, foreign policy, national taxation and equalisation payments are likely to remain at national level due to economies of scale or scope. Other areas might have shared competence, such as higher education, research and development, and business regulation for the EU single market.

14. What is your vision for local government in the 21st Century? Please use this question to expand on any aspect of local government you have any views and opinions on that you have not been allowed to express elsewhere in the questionnaire.

Local government once again needs to be the innovative, creative and experimental generator of new ideas for running services. Labour's love affair with the centralised state has left us with too little capacity to innovate and be experimental. Decentralisation is a vast opportunity to allow a thousand flowers to bloom, and for better solutions. It can reintroduce dynamism and creativity into governance.

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Sir Menzies Campbell

1. What is your track record on promoting decentralisation

I have long campaigned for devolution of power at every level, from Europe, Westminster, the Scottish Parliament and locally. I want to see power given back to people, and held at the most local level possible.

That's why I was a strong campaigner for Scottish devolution for many years. As foreign affairs spokesperson, I have fought for reform, founded on the principles of decentralisation, for the European Union. And in Fife, like every Lib Dem campaigner, I have led the calls for more power for local people.

2. How would you balance the need for local decision making with the need for a basic level of public service prevision

There doesn't need to be a trade-off between local decision-making and standards. Delivered properly, localism can be the engine of improvement, not a barrier to equality - because if people see their area falling behind they have the power to change things. We need basic minimum standards, but we must accept that for localism to work, central government needs to take a back seat and let local politicians focus on local priorities,

3. What is your attitude towards reform of local government finance?

It's vital. Until councils have financial freedom, they will be merely the subjects of central government. Our current policy is broadly the right one: scrapping council tax, a local income tax, and locally-set site value rating in place of national business rates. Much more money needs to be raised locally, by the councils who spend it, in order to reconnect citizens with local government.

4. Would you support an extra tax on second homes?

Second homes can be a serious burden on small communities. Taxes will play an important role in tackling this problem, and we already propose levying business rates on second homes. But we also need to consider how to use the planning system to both build and protect homes for local people.

5. How will you campaign to ensure proper funding of public services - in particular with regard to integrated transport in both rural and urban areas?

We need a more sophisticated system for distributing central government funds throughout the UK, with local areas responsible for much more spending that is currently delivered through unelected and bureaucratic quangos.

6. Do you support the government's plan for unitary local government in England? If you do not what is your vision?

There is a real danger that imposing a single system of local government throughout England will take little account of local circumstances. We need to balance the need for efficiency and transparency against the costs of reorganisation and the danger of distancing people from their council. Where mergers make sense they should go ahead, but not by Whitehall diktat against the will of the people.

7. Do you support the current executive/scrutiny split in English local government?

Central government shouldn't be dictating local structures. Many councillors I speak to find the executive/scrutiny system works well in their area; others disagree. But councils should be allowed to vary their democratic structures to suit their local needs.

8. What experience do you have of visiting Liberal Democrat Councils and helping with local election campaigning?

Much, ever since I began to be an active member of the party. I'm always proud to tell local parties that I'm one of the many Liberal Democrat MPs who built up their Parliamentary majority on the back of local government success.

9. How have these experiences influenced your work as a Liberal Democrat MP?

Thanks to my links with local government, and my local council, I have always paid very close attention to local issues and worked with councillors to bring about change.

10. How will you strengthen links between the party's local government wing and the Westminster "village"?

There needs to be regular dialogue between MPs and local councillors on issues that concern us both, including through the new Central Local Partnership. But policy working groups, and spokespeople in their day-to-day work, need to draw more on the expertise of local councillors when developing new proposals: we're in power in councils across Britain, and we need to make the most of that.

11. What are your plans to increase the number of Liberal Democrat Councillors and Liberal Democrat run Councils?

I plan to take our message to the country with vigour and enthusiasm, giving people positive reasons to vote Liberal Democrat and highlighting our record in local government. On a more practical level, I would like to see real campaigns department support for local council campaigning.

12. What public services should be run and delivered by local government?

13. What public services should not be run by local government? Please state who should then run them and why?

Instead of asking which government functions should be localised, we should be asking which should not be localised. Any function of government, delivered by a central department, an executive agency, a quango, a board or a committee should be delivered by a tier of local government unless there is a coherent and legitimate need for it to be national.

14. What is your vision for local government in the 21st Century? Please use this question to expand on any aspect of local government you have any views and opinions on that you have not been allowed to express elsewhere in the questionnaire.

I want to see local government responsible for delivering public services according to local priorities, away from the dead hand of Whitehall. Councils should be set free from the limitations of a centralised funding mechanism and empowered to raise and spend money from and on behalf of their local communities.

Localism and Liberalism go hand in hand: both are founded on a belief in the importance of diversity, of empowerment, and of the dispersal of power. That's why our case for strong local democracy should be at heart not just of our vision for local government, but of our vision for Britain.