Devolution: Local Communities

12. What steps she is taking to further devolve powers to local communities.

The English devolution White Paper, due by the end of the year, sets out how we will transfer power from Westminster to people who know their areas best. The White Paper will also announce measures that will give local places and communities greater control over shaping their area.

Libraries, pubs, football, community centres—these are the things that make up a community, but in so many places they have vanished over the last 14 years. I am delighted to hear plans of a community right to buy. What work are the Government doing to ensure that local authorities and community groups have the guidance and expertise needed to utilise this powerful new right once it is realised?

In there is the point about devolution and localism: structures matter and the framework matters, but in the end it is about getting the power out to the communities who have skin in the game. That is why we want to ensure that the community right to buy provides an effective means for communities across the country to take ownership of assets that are important to them. We are considering what further support and guidance we will provide to communities and local authorities to support them in this measure, and I know that the Minister for local growth, my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North and Kimberley (Alex Norris), is fully engaged in this endeavour.

Many of my constituents would welcome further powers being devolved to their local communities. They are as keen as mustard to see the right homes in the right places, particularly social housing, but one of the things stopping social housing being delivered is the viability calculations that are undertaken by developers, who use them to say that only expensive houses can be built. Are the Government looking at reviewing the use of viability calculations?

That is some way from community ownership, but the devolution White Paper is one of a number of measures that we are taking and it will have a clear community strand. This does not sit in isolation, however; it is part of the wider reforms that are taking place to ensure that communities, local authorities and Government work in partnership.