More joy in heaven over one sinner who repents ...

I welcome the belated conversion of Cumbria's leading Labour figures to calling for exactly the sort of devolution agenda that I and other Conservatives have been calling for for a decade, and which the county could have had years ago, had not local Labour politicians repeatedly opposed it.

We now read in the Whitehaven News and other local papers that "Labour leaders call for Cumbria to embrace the 'devolution revolution'."

What a shame they were so vehemently opposed to it in 2017 and 2022 when a very generous scheme of devolution was on offer, but the Labour led Cumbria County Council and other Labour local authorities opposed it.

Other areas like North Yorkshire which were made similar offers at the same time jumped at it, and North Yorkshire got £700 million pounds and a Mayoral strategic authority which is now up and running with significant powers. Cumbria could have had this too.

A few years ago I was a guest on the weekly local political panel programme which BBC Radio Cumbria used to broadcast, and another guest was one of the converts to devolution who signed the the Labour letter this week calling for a "devolution revolution," Markus Campbell Savours, now MP for Penrith & Solway.

And guess what. This subject came up, and I was calling for a Mayoral authority not that different to the kind of body Angela Rayner is now setting up, and I made arguments for devolution fairly similar to those Mr Campbell-Savours is making now, while he was making skeptical noises.(though I seem to recall they were very carefully vague skeptical noises such as to make it very hard to pin anything on him.

If there is more joy in heaven over one sinner that repents, there must be unconfined ecstasy at so many road-to-Damascus conversions.

But I'm not going to reverse my previous position and oppose devolution just because Labour has now come round to it.

What are the chances that in the present climate they will be able to get as good a deal out of Rachel Reeves as the Conservatives offered a few years ago? I will be very pleasantly surprised if they do.

Nevertheless, a strategic elected Mayor for Cumbria with powers and money devolved to the county from central government could be a very good thing. What a pity that the very same people who are now calling for it stopped it from being in place already.

 

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