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The Prosser Perspective.... a weekly column from Dover and Deal MP Gwyn Prosser

19 July 2007

I’ve never had much time for the Regional Assemblies and I’ve had no time at all for our own South East of England Assembly, SEERA which is located one hundred miles away in Guilford makes decisions which effect you and me in Dover and Deal and the rest of the South East of England – but not for much longer.

SEERA, (not to be confused with SEEDA) calls itself “the representative voice of the region” - I call it a remote unelected and unaccountable quango in a far away place and I’ve been critical of it long before it started making irrational decisions which impacted negatively on my constituency and the rest of East Kent.

It was SEERA that kept refusing Dover’s submissions to prioritise the dualling of the last nine miles of the A2 into Eastern Docks - a campaign that some of us have been fighting for twenty years or more.

SEERA said that it was just a trunk road and didn’t warrant investment. And more recently, it was SEERA that ignored Dover's strategic gateway location, it's expanding port and it's imminent High Speed train connection and pronounced that we were not worthy of being designated a Regional Hub for economic development –and they designated little Hastings instead. I've got nothing against Hastings but I’ve always seen it more as the end of a spoke than a central hub of regeneration. Regional Hub status brings with it all sorts of additional funding which Dover would make good use of as its many regeneration programs start to kick in.

I’ve not been alone in complaining to Ministers about the deficiencies of the Assemblies and our opposition has not been wholly based on party political lines. It’s true that SEERA has enjoyed a massive Tory majority since its inauguration but it’s also true that lots of Conservative controlled Councils like Dover have aired their concerns about the governance of the Assembly over a long period.

The good news is that Labour’s new Minister of State for Communities and Local Government, John Healey has just set a new course of local and regional economic reform in England by announcing the effective abolition of Regional Assemblies and I was pleased to be able to be in the House of Commons Chamber to warmly welcome the news.

The reforms will give local authorities and communities greater responsibility and opportunity to boost economic growth in their area; bring consultation and planning for jobs, homes, investment and the environment closer together at both local and regional levels whilst strengthening the public scrutiny and accountability of the Regional Development Agencies in the regions and in Parliament.

One of the advantages of these reforms for our patch is that they will allow our local authorities to pay more attention to the special housing needs of the District and the regeneration needs of localities with high levels of deprivation thus enabling a more focused approach to much needed development and job creation programs across the constituency.