Baroness O’Neill of Bexley (Con)

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating this quite significant Statement. The Government have suddenly paused the reorganisation plans they started for local government. This is astounding. Proposals to merge councils in Norfolk, Suffolk, Hampshire, and Essex have been withdrawn. The 14 areas which formed the third tranche of the programme have also been put on hold. Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, and West Sussex, which were awaiting the Government’s decision, now face further uncertainty for residents, councillors and council officers. We are told that this new review follows updated legal advice but is also to align the plans for local government with new government priorities. The only area unaffected is Surrey, where the two new unitary authorities have already been established. This has come too late for them. It was only in June that we were told that this Government “remain fully committed to the timetable already set out”,—[Official Report, Commons, 16/7/26; col. 141WS.] and that their local government reorganisation programme was “a once-in-a-generation opportunity to ensure that councils genuinely represent the communities they serve today and stand the test of time”.—[Official Report, Commons, 16/7/26; col. 139WS.] Time has hardly passed, and the programme is paused. Let us not forget that local elections were postponed. Now, elections in May 2027 will go ahead on existing council boundaries. So much time, not to mention money, was spent drawing together proposals, conducting and responding to consultations nationally and locally, with staffing, governance, finance and service delivery about to be restructured—without, by the way, any guarantee that this would end up saving taxpayers any money or improving services for local people. Are we now being told that it may have all been for nothing because the Government did not think through the legal implications or because the new Prime Minister simply does not fancy it? What is the estimated total cost of this review, both to national government and to the authorities affected? Do the people making those decisions have any idea how damaging the uncertainty and inconsistency is to many councils, including to staff recruitment and staff morale? Councils are losing large numbers of staff who want certainty on their future, and, for the same reason, cannot recruit replacements. Your Lordships’ House spent eight days in Committee and two days on Report on the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act 2026. The Minister said at Second Reading that the Bill would “drive the biggest transfer of power out of Whitehall to our regions and communities in a generation”.—[Official Report, 8/12/25; col. 30.] However, we now have the rewiring of state White Paper to look forward to, which will focus on devolution and local government. Can the Minister clarify, if this new Bill is to deliver devolution, was the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act not devolution at all? As we said at the time, it was not community empowerment. It shifted power away from the local to the regional and to Whitehall—from locally elected councillors to mayors, and from democracy routed in local identities to new managerial, technocratic boundaries. Will this new Bill reverse that direction of travel? We are hearing the same platitudes from this Government to disguise their lack of long-term vision. Can the Minister tell us exactly what the priorities of the new Prime Minister are, and how they will differ? What certainty can she give to local councils receiving this news? I look forward to her response.