New Labour Party leader, Ed Miliband, has told The MJ he views a ‘strong and vibrant local government base’ as an ‘essential’ part of plans to transform his party and take on the coalition government.
Just hours before his first major speech as Labour leader on 28 September, Mr Miliband told The MJ: ‘A strong and vibrant local government base, well-connected to the party and our policy development, is an essential part of this fight to win back people’s trust, and reconnect with the ordinary voices in communities in every corner of Britain.’
He added: ‘With my election as leader, a new generation has stepped forward to change our party. We are united in our mission to transform Labour so that Labour can begin to speak to the country again, and stand up for those who want a less divided and more prosperous Britain.’
During a conference speech laden with references to rebuilding Britain’s ‘communities’, he later told delegates part of his transformation agenda was town hall empowerment. ‘We need more decisions to be made locally, with local democracy free of the constraints we have placed on it in the past, and free of an attitude which has looked down its nose at local government,’ he said.
Senior Labour sources said the party’s youngest post-war leader was ‘enthused’ by the prospect of working with local Labour parties ‘reinvigorated’ following a strong showing in May’s local government elections. During his speech, Mr Miliband promised he would ‘stand, shoulder to shoulder’ with councillors ‘at next May’s local elections’.
Throughout his leadership campaign, the younger Miliband was advised on local government by former communities secretary, John Denham, and – alongside his brother – regularly pledged to empower localities.
Writing in The MJ last month, he claimed that while the former Labour Government had achieved much after its election in 1997, ‘we have to recognise... that in many cases, we were guilty of not listening enough to concerns at a local level.’
‘As a result, certain issues were ignored for too long, and some policies came too late, including the boost to local authorities to build urgently-needed council houses. Citizens felt the state was not responsive enough to their needs. And council staff were discouraged by layers of central bureaucracy,’ he said.
‘I intend to take greater advantage of the unique perspective of our councillors and elected officials at all levels, and make them able to play a more integrated role in shaping our policies. I am a great believer in the power of politics at a national level, but I also want to defend and embrace the power of local politics.’
An adviser to Mr Miliband said he would now seek to develop a ‘coherent, thorough and extensive’ approach to working with local government. He is an advocate of the former Labour Government’s experiment with Total Place-style devolved funding, and pooled and devolved budgets for local public services could now form a key part of Mr Miliband’s policy programme.
In the meantime, Mr Miliband said he was committed to attacking the coalition’s ‘disjointed and fragmentary approach’ to public services.
In his MJ article he attacked coalition reforms that would impact heavily on local residents and town halls – such as housing benefit reductions and a New Homes Bonus incentive scheme which, he claimed, ‘far from properly incentivising the building of new homes that the country so badly needs, will wreck the council tax system’.
Jack Dromey, MP for Birmingham Erdington and a key figure within the Unite local government trade union, said: ‘Labour was wrong in 1997 to downgrade the role of local government. Ed is right to recognise that we can’t build a better Britain without dynamic and democratic local government.’
A Unison spokeswoman said: ‘Local government as a democratic institution will get a boost from Ed Miliband’s speech. He understands the importance of local government and the services it delivers to people.’
