The City Law School’s Senior Law Lecturer speaks to members of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee.

By Mr John Stevenson (Senior Communications Officer), Published (Updated )

Senior Lecturer in The City Law School, Dr John Stanton, gave oral evidence to members of the House of Commons’ Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee on March 16th 2020.

Dr Stanton spoke about the progress of devolution in England and specifically addressed the role of combined authorities and mayors.
He told members of the Committee that "measures need to be taken and maintained which limit Government’s prescription of devolution and which preserves bespoke deals that depart from a one-size-fits-all approach”.

He added:

“Directly-elected mayors are a good thing and have the potential to work in a range of localities, including non-metropolitan areas.”

Giving oral evidence alongside Dr Stanton, was Professor Francesca Gains (Professor of Public Policy at University of Manchester) and Professor Colin Copus (Emeritus Professor in Local Politics at De Montfort University).

The Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee monitors the policy, administration and spending of the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and its associated arm's-length bodies, including Homes England.

It consists of eleven backbench Members of Parliament, and is an investigative Committee rather than a legislative Committee: it sets its own programme and chooses subjects for inquiries.

Dr Stanton’s research primarily focuses on localism in the UK, including local decision-making and democracy. He is interested in the nature and role of local government, central-local relations and the broader constitutional position it fulfils.

He is currently engaged in a large-scale empirical project exploring the relationship between local government and centralised government across the UK and Ireland.

His first book, Democratic Sustainability in a New Era of Localism, was published by Routledge-Earthscan in 2014. He has also been published in a range of UK law journals, including Public Law and Legal Studies.

To watch the proceedings of the session involving Dr Stanton, please visit this weblink.