England is governed by an over-centralised and incoherent tangle of institutional structures.
It is administered in Whitehall by departments that are simultaneously attending to the UK, while local accountability faces upwards to ministers rather than downwards to local people.
Our new report – ‘Devolving English government’ – lays bare some of the main weaknesses of England’s political structures and the challenges this creates for devolution.
Part of a wider review of the UK constitution by the Bennett Institute for Public Policy and the Institute for Government, the report assesses the current state of English governance and identifies three fundamental problems that are holding back devolution and undermining the effectiveness of local and devolved government.
First, England’s administration is over-centralised.
Drawing on three different indices of decentralisation across OECD and European countries, we show that England is an outlier compared with most others with a similar population size and levels of economic output.
This characteristic is linked to a cluster of other problems: the geographic concentration of economic and cultural power in the capital; a London-centric civil service; top-down control over public spending; a half-developed layer of city-regional government; and a notable lack of autonomy for local councils.
Second, the complicated map of local government does not align with the vast array of policy geographies used by Whitehall, making it almost impossible to know who is accountable for many outcomes in a given territory.
The failure to conceive of an English territory is linked to the confusing way in which England and the UK are repeatedly conflated within the culture and structures of British government.
These features contribute to a widespread feeling among the public that England’s administration is opaque and unaccountable.
Third, there are major problems with how democratic accountability works in England.
There is a strong ‘upward’ line of accountability from local and devolved government to Whitehall, with ministers considering themselves responsible for issues that are often local or regional in character.
People in England are less likely to turn out to vote in local elections than in other comparable countries, weakening local accountability.
Polling suggests that the public trust councillors more than MPs, but they struggle to understand local government and feel very disengaged with local democracy. Additionally, England faces a reform paradox: there is a palpable need to address long-standing institutional weakness but there has been a seemingly unending stream of reforming initiatives since the late 1960s.
The problems we identify are interlinked and complex; they require an integrated and considered response. But in the past few decades there have been repeated, unfinished attempts to reform local government.
If the emerging model of English devolution is to be given the chance to bed in and progress, new structures in Whitehall are needed to oversee and protect the devolution process.
We therefore propose a new institutional framework, comprising:
- a new independent commission
- on English governance
- a cross-party commitment to
- devolution by 2030
- the codification of existing legislation
- on local and regional government
- an English Devolution Council to represent local government at the centre
- the creation of an England Office and an England-focused cabinet committee.
It is not sufficient to offer a new blueprint for local government reform. A key part of the problem of English governance is rooted in the organisation and culture of central government.
To unlock the potential benefits of devolved government, change is also needed at the centre.