Mr Mark Francois

I have two responses to the hon. Gentleman, whom I have a great deal of time for, as he knows. First, the Chairman of the Petitions Committee laid out clearly the responsibilities of local government, so I shall not try your patience, Mr Mundell, or that of the rest of the Chamber by repeating them, but it is everything from planning to housing, adult social care and education. These things affect people’s everyday lives, and they are really important. People should have a democratic right to decide which councillors run those services, which they pay for as customers via their council tax. So of course there should be elections. Secondly, and on a personal note, and I hope that the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and other colleagues here will understand this: nobody delayed the general election. I went into battle 20 points behind in the polls. No one gave me a bye; I had to fight to be here. I had to convince my employers, in my constituency, to renew my contract of employment to represent them, and so did everyone else in this House this evening, so why should it be different for local councillors? Why do they not have to get their contract of employment, in effect, renewed by their employers at the ballot box? I thank the Minister for the fact that the local elections will now go ahead. She may recall that we had some sparky exchanges in the Commons Chamber about this, but we have ended up with the right decision, albeit after far too long. So if the people of Essex wish to support the Government’s bonkers housing targets—mandatory and top-down, imposed by some Whitehall civil servant who could not find Essex with a TomTom, and supported by a mad computer algorithm—they can go and vote for that. If, conversely, they want to vote for Conservative councillors, who care about the area they live in and want to defend the green belt and carry on providing good services to people at a cost that they can afford, they have the chance to vote Conservative—although, for the record, other products are available. People can actually have elections in Essex and pass a verdict, and I very much hope that in my corner of the world—for Essex county council, for Rochford district council and for Basildon borough council—they will vote Conservative. But however they vote, whomever they choose, whomever they give the very important mandate to run those really important services to, the fundamental point is that they will be allowed to exercise their right to choose. It was this Government who very nearly took that away and we should never let them forget it. Other than that, I have no firm view on the matter.