On 3 June 2025 Jim McMahon, Minister for local government and devolution made a Written Statement in Parliament. It matters massively and is largely ignored by the media and by most commentators who understand the shenanigans called local government devolution and strategic planning. It is absolutely worth the read. The WS sums up with clarity and brevity what the government wants to achieve with its local authority devolution policy. The objectives are admirable. I would say near perfect. Unfortunately the analysis is incorrect for local political reasons. Simply local opposition. The delivery is impossible because local councils do not have it in their gift to deliver the objectives. Unlike landed estates they do not have a landed inheritance, so they do not control the land. And the leadership confidence the Minister places on local leaders does not exist; (read again the recent National Planning Barometer 2025 survey of local councillor attitudes by SEC Newgate).
To catch the flavour of the government’s hopes read these quotes, The Minister says this local government re-organisation is part of a wider project which includes “resetting the relationship with central Government to give(s) councils the power they need to get things done…….We understand the need for flexibility, especially given our ambition to build out devolution and take account of housing growth alongside local government reorganisation. ……..so that new authorities are set up for success . …Local government has proven its adaptability and resilience…….I am also aware that developing proposals could distract councils …….This is especially true for progressing local plans, to allocate land for new homes that we so desperately need. …..Local government re-organisation should not hinder this essential work; neither should the introduction of the new legal framework for plan -making later this year, or our strategic planning reforms.”
Being negative intentionally is not my wish. But if serious progress is to be made these dreams need to be tested in the real world.
- He says local government has proven its adaptability and resilience. It has not. Over five decades local councils have made housing unaffordable; they have permitted haphazard development; they have destroyed trust and confidence in the planning system.
- Their approach to the Duty to Co-operate has shown their unwillingness to ‘ work collaboratively and proactively by sharing information and data to develop robust and sustainable unitary proposals that benefit the entire area’.
- Councils do not have the ability deliver the housing desperately needed as their power to allocate land for new homes is based on the call for sites system which is results in haphazard locations and lacks any ability to fulfil preferred timeframes. Allocation is reactive, unpopular and ineffective. Land ownership is the form of control that reverses these failures.
- The effective introduction of strategic planning creates host locations and overspill sources. Residents in host locations must be turned into welcoming hosts to overcome the absence of local support. This void must be recognised and filled.
- These objectives need a generation for fulfilment with popular support. The local council’s 3 year electoral cycle will block the policy continuity that policy delivery demands until local politicians becomes civic leaders and dispense with their political labels.
There are very big ambitions here. They have my wholehearted support as they are the grown-up way to make homes and fire economic growth. Their delivery right now is on another planet. The first step is win the support of the other political parties, now and for a decade ahead.
Ian Campbell
11 June 2025
