MP calls for tax-raising regional parliaments across England

A Brighton MP has said Sussex and other English regions should be granted tax-raising parliaments.

Lloyd Russell-Moyle, the Labour MP for Brighton Kemptown, said he regions across England ought to be granted their parliaments with powers similar to Wales, where the Senedd has power over education, transport, economic development and other key portfolios.

Plans for elected regional assemblies with limited powers were tabled in 2002, but were scrapped after the North East of England rejected the idea in a 2004 referendum.

He told the BBC: “Rather than Scotland constantly feeling like it’s out-ruled by England, what you would have is Scotland and London and Sussex and the nation of Yorkshire coming to a parliament in London.

“That to me would be a Britain that would be more functional, but also would have a true power at a level people need it, and you can then organise things according to how local people want it.”

He said: “Sussex seems to be a kind of level that would work… It would be over a million people – you can organise good size things there, whole states are able to be organised at that level.”

He also referred to the example of Cornwall, a region with a history of secessionist movement due to its more recent Celtic history than the rest of England, saying that although its population was “about half a million… it’s still bigger than Malta, and that functions as a perfectly stable independent country within the European Union.”

He said such devolution across England would allow issues such as the housing crisis to be better tackled with local priorities in mind.

He used HS2 as an example of how centralised schemes were often plagued with difficulties, saying: “If you’d given that resource to the counties of Yorkshire and Lancashire, they would not have spent it on a faster line down to London.