‘Whole of England should be covered by metro mayors’ – Ben Houchen

Mr Houchen also suggested metro mayors could be given some tax powers, along with responsibilities for health and elements of policing.

The Tory mayor, who was re-elected in May for another four year-term heading up the Tees Valley Combined Authority (TVCA), was giving evidence into an inquiry being held by MPs into the future of English devolution, along with newly-elected West Yorkshire metro mayor Tracy Brabin.

Mr Houchen claimed TVCA, which came into being courtesy of a devolution deal signed by local council leaders with the Government in October 2015, had been a “complete success”.

He said: “It’s fair to say that in the Tees Valley the combined authority has been a complete success so far, but we can always do more and go further.

“We have an annual payment that is agreed from Government over the next 30 years, which is extremely powerful and a current revenue stream which allows us to get on with what we need to do.

“Had it not been for the combined authority the Tees Valley couldn’t and wouldn’t be in the place it currently is which is on the national radar both from an economic and political perspective.

“Is it perfect though? Absolutely not.”

He warned that future further potential devolution which could be signed off by the Government risked being a “patchwork affair”.

Mr Houchen told the public administration and constitutional affairs committee that if “he was in charge and could wave a magic wand, he would like to see the whole of the country covered by a combined authority and mayors”.

And he went further saying this model should be adopted also in Scotland and Wales, which have their own devolved administrations away from Westminster.

He said: “I would argue that people from Glasgow would rather have a metro mayor with more autonomy than be governed by the Scottish Parliament from Edinburgh, the same goes in Wales, whether it is Swansea or Cardiff.”

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Mr Houchen said metro mayors provided a single point of accountability, but the power and perception of what a metro mayor could do needed to be given more credence.

He also said there were questions about where they fitted into governmental structures and “everybody likes things to fit into a nice box”.

He said: “It is actually quite good that there is a decentralised process where there isn’t a direct mechanism with central Government because it allows for freedoms and for areas like the Tees Valley, to make decisions, to make progress, to make mistakes, and then look across the country to compare what everyone else is doing.”

Mr Houchen said “tramlining” mayors would “clip their wings” and not allow them to do the things they would like to do for their local area.

He was asked about the region’s representation in Parliament and the impact of now having a number of Conservative MPs in the area.

Mr Houchen said he believed the area saw him as a “mayor first and a Conservative politician second” and also referenced the fact that when he started in the post in 2017 all the membership local councils were Labour-run.

He said: “There wasn’t a single decision we took that wasn’t unanimous because irrespective of the politics at play we knew that it was the right decision for the Tees Valley.

“I was pleasantly surprised that the local area does see me as a mayor first and a Conservative politician second.

“This means you don’t get the push and pull of Westminster politics where there is that party allegiance by definition, that becomes a secondary issue.

“The important thing about devolution is what the regions deliver for the country.”

Mr Houchen said organisations like his were still “relatively immature” and if given a whole host of new powers may not be able to cope, but there were some areas he thought had potential for the mayor and TVCA to expand into.

He said: “If the Government was just to dump every single power on the Tees Valley tomorrow the system would just fall over.

“We are not mature enough to handle it, we haven’t been going long enough, we don’t have the structures or infrastructure in place.”

He was asked by former Labour shadow chancellor John McDonnell what powers could therefore be devolved and said he had early discussions over health following his re-election with former Health Secretary Matt Hancock.

He said: “It depends on what control you want the combined authority area to have over the local NHS.

“The public might be very upset if I as a metro mayor all of a sudden was deciding on operational outcomes and decision making ability within a [hospital] trust.

“I do however think there is no reason why a combined authority could not be a building block in the integrated care system, being the holder of funding at a certain level, with direct responsibility up that hierarchy chain into the NHS, delivering more local accountability and feeding into local health priorities.”

Mr Houchen said while metro mayors did “lots of good stuff”, there was a level of responsibility required which was missing and said an “obvious solution would be the devolution of tax powers”, although he conceded this was ambitious.

He also cited Police and Crime Commissioner powers as another area which could come under the mayoral remit, in answering another question from MPs.

Mr Houchen added a caveat and said one of the benefits of his organisation was that it was not responsible for everything, instead currently focusing on investment, jobs and transport.

He said: “The organisation doesn’t want to become so big and bureaucratic that it does not do anything effectively well because it is doing too many things.

“There does need to be clarity on what is the actual role [of a combined authority].

“My personal view is it needs to be focused, not exclusively, on what they are at the moment – effectively democratically elected regional development agencies.

“Having said that I think there are a couple of areas that you could bring into that which adds cohesiveness to this idea that you are helping to drive the economy.”

Mr Houchen, who recently helped to secure a new Treasury ‘hub’ in Darlington, said he did not think the Government was against further devolution, but described some Government departments as “much more pro-devolution than others”.

He said: “In most instances if you can prove what you have got, spend the money wisely and in the timescales you say you are going to spend it in then you will get more [money].”

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