Summary of the English Devolution White Paper

Rachel Murray-Smith, Beth Edwards and Freddie Farrell provide an overview of the white paper on devolution intended to increase powers of local authorities.

Overview

On 16 December 2024, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (“MHCLG”) released the English Devolution White Paper (the “White Paper”), setting out plans to develop devolution in England with the intention of “unleashing power from Whitehall back into local communities that know their areas best”.

The Government announced plans to merge local authorities in certain areas as well as new powers for Mayors across a wide range of services and sectors including planning, transport, employment and the environment.

The Government’s stated goal is to extend and expand devolution across England by developing new “Strategic Authorities”, whilst also supporting local government reorganisation, to lead to a more efficient state.

Below, we summarise the key reforms and consider the extent to which local authorities will be obliged to act on them.

Strategic Authorities

The White Paper proposes the introduction of “Strategic Authorities”; regional bodies created to streamline decision-making across local councils within a region.

Strategic Authorities, which will be either “Foundation” (not led by a Mayor) or “Mayoral”, will comprise of a number of councils working together with the intention of avoiding the duplication of efforts and to give regions a unified voice.

The Government’s preference is for combining multiple authorities over a large geography, taking into account factors such as scale, economies, and identities.

The Government also intends to grant itself a ministerial directive to create Strategic Authorities in any places where local leaders have not agreed on how devolved powers should be accessed.

Increased powers and budgets for Mayors

The White Paper proposes putting Mayors “front and centre”, introducing more directly-elected Mayors to increase accountability.

In addition, the Government proposes providing Mayors with significant increases in powers in what the government calls “the devolution offer”.

The proposed increases to mayoral powers can be categorised in four ways: the power to make important decisions, the power to control budgets and funding, the power to set long-term plans and strategies, and the power to implement policies directly – rather than relying on central government.

The proposed list of areas of competence

The intention is to receive views from Mayors, the public, and local government on the areas of competence – in essence which areas are being devolved more where mayors and Strategic Authorities will gain powers transferred from central government.

The proposed list, which may be expanded, is:

• Transport and local infrastructure;
• Skills and employment support;
• Housing and strategic planning;
• Economic development and regeneration;
• Environment and climate change;
• Health, wellbeing and public service reform; and
• Public safety.

Reorganisation of local authorities

The White Paper proposes a “programme of local government reorganisation”, inviting proposals from all two-tier areas and “failing” unitary councils to introduce sustainable unitary structures.

The Government indicates its ambition to reorganise as quickly as possible into “new unitary councils” of the correct size to achieve efficiencies.

The White Paper suggests that legislation will be introduced “where it becomes necessary” to ensure effective reorganisation can take place.

Conclusion

The full impact of the proposals contained within the White Paper will not be understood until their implementation.

However, the Government’s ambition to create effective devolution and increase mayoral powers, as well as the planned impact on existing two-tier structures is clear.

Further updates on the full detail of today’s announcement and how we can help you will follow.

Rachel Murray-Smith is a Partner, Beth Edwards is a Junior Associate and Freddie Farrell is a Trainee Solicitor at Sharpe Pritchard LLP.

This video is for general awareness only and does not constitute legal or professional advice. The law may have changed since this page was first published. If you would like further advice and assistance in relation to any issue raised in this article, please contact us by telephone or email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..