Miatta Fahnbulleh

28 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

I thank hon. Members for their continued engagement and their insightful debate on these issues. In the remaining time, I will respond to some of the particular points that have been made. I want to put on record my thanks to Opposition…

28 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

I am pleased to speak once again on the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill. I thank Members from across the House for their constructive engagement in getting the Bill to this point. This Bill matters because, if we are to t…

28 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

I beg to move, That this House insists on its disagreement with the Lords in their Amendments 89B and 89C but proposes amendment (a) in lieu of those amendments.

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

I was just coming to the hon. Member’s earlier contributions. We absolutely want to move at the pace at which our most ambitious and fastest-moving places want to move. We recognise the unique circumstances in Cornwall. I have spent a lot …

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

The role that we will play is to work with our local authorities. Ultimately, the common thread is that we are working in service of and on behalf of communities, and it is for both national Government and local leaders to make decisions o…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. That is exactly what happened under the approach adopted by the Conservative party in government. It created random boundaries and involved ad hoc devolution that did not treat our local leader…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker; I got far too excited about the music industry. Suffice it to say that the Government recognise its importance. That is why the debate about the agent of change is so important, and why we are committed to …

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

I am always very happy to commit my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing to any meeting that my hon. Friends would like. We are very keen to meet in advance of the NPPF biting. May I also say a word about support for the music industry?…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Local plans can include community facilities, and we are committed to looking at ways, through the local plan, that we can strengthen the policy intent that we all agree that we are trying to achieve. First, we intend to work closely with …

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

My hon. Friend is absolutely right; I could not have put it better myself. If we believe in “brownfield first”, which we do, then it has to be enabled. That requires funding, which requires political will, which we Labour Members have, but…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

We are as impatient as my hon. Friend is to get building on brownfield land, so we are working closely with all our authorities and strategic authorities to ensure that they have the power and tools to do that. We recognise that a big barr…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

My hon. Friend is completely right: we need to build more homes. We are absolutely committed to doing that, but they have to be the right homes for communities. That is why this Government are investing £39 billion to ensure that we have t…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

I have had this debate many times with the hon. Member. His Government were in power for over a decade and oversaw the decimation and denuding of local authorities through a sustained period of austerity. His Government saw that local auth…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

My hon. Friend makes a good point. We as a Government are committed to putting in place a neighbourhood governance framework, and that framework will set in place the key principles. It will be a guide for what effective, strong neighbourh…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

The hon. Member is completely right. There is a gap, and we are putting in this provision for a neighbourhood governance structure across the country to address that gap. Many areas that do not have town and parish councils will have other…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

I absolutely agree that communities are a fundamental level. Part of the reason we are putting in place a neighbourhood governance structure is to address the point that my hon. Friend the Member for East Thanet made, which is that at the …

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

My hon. Friend is completely right. Indeed, the reason that the Government originally resisted this amendment was on that very point. Ultimately, we believed that the framework and the set of competences that we had set out were broad enou…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

This relates to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for East Thanet (Polly Billington) made about commissioners and the governance arrangements. We are clear that strategic authorities absolutely must think about how they drive the pr…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

I thank my hon. Friend for raising that question and for being a clear, consistent and passionate advocate of town and parish councils. I will pick up her point, but I want to start with her forceful and effective contribution about coasta…

27 Apr 2026   English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

I thank hon. Members for their continued engagement on the Bill and their insightful contributions to the debate. I am glad that our concessions have secured support. I thank both my hon. Friends on the Labour Benches and hon. Members acro…

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