B

Baroness Thornhill (LD)

Speaking in the House of Lords on 5 March 2026

Debate

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Contribution

I am going to be very honest and say that the Minister packed one heck of a lot into that response. I struggled to keep up with her and really understand the ramifications, because this matter is technical and detailed. I will revisit Hansard. I know that my noble friend Lord Shipley and I will have some detailed questions, which it did not seem appropriate to ask here but which we would like the Minister to go through with us. For us, this is about early, robust and public challenge. I am not sure that, with the Bill as it stands at the moment, we can be assured of that in the face of catastrophic failures that are shameful to local government, as well as this imbalance of power. The Minister knows that I want this to work, but I believe that it will work only if the scrutiny is as balanced as the powers of the new mayoral authorities. With that caveat, in the hope that we will be able to have some specific discussions—and with the aim of reading the Minister’s detailed response in Hansard, perhaps tomorrow—I beg leave to withdraw the amendment, which was tabled by my noble friend Lord Shipley.

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