Peace is the path to peace.

As I set out in an article for the Bucks Free Press in February, I am determined to create the right environment for a flourishing local democracy and a radical decentralisation of power.  Today, via The Bucks Free Press, we see local democracy in action:

HUNDREDS of protesters marched through High Wycombe today with a clear message for council bosses – “say no to the stadium”.

Campaigners turned out in their droves to make their voices heard ahead of Monday’s key decision on the scheme by Wycombe District Council chiefs.

As I have said to councillors, protesters and advocates of the proposals, I believe entrepreneurial projects should be brought forward by entrepreneurs, not government at any level, and judged democratically under the planning system. With the Coalition’s plans for a decentralisation of power and the intended public service reforms in progress, it is absolutely vital that we have high levels of participation in local democracy: there will be greater freedom, greater transparency and greater local power.

Local communities will be able to use that power in a variety of ways. Some may wish to stop development; others may wish to deliver particular projects. In any event, MPs will have no authority to overturn local, democratic decisions. I was therefore delighted that, as Conservative activist Dr Marcus Wood put it on Twitter, “it was certainly the Big Society out in force!”

Good – now could not be a better time for Wycombe people to take a close interest in the deployment of local power. Wycombe District Council will hold a full Cabinet debate in public on Monday night, leading to a decision on the proposed sports village.

Via Hansard, my unlikely alliance with Labour’s John McDonnell over the need for shareholders to be able to control directors’ remuneration:

Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con): As I listened to the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) speak to amendment 15, I thought that my ears were deceiving me because I felt so much sympathy for what he was saying. Indeed, he put me in mind of a book by a reformed Trotskyite, James Burnham, who predicted in “The Managerial Revolution” the system of capitalism—the set of structures—that we now recognise in publicly listed companies. My discomfort evaporated, however, when I realised that the hon. Gentleman was defending the interests of the owners of capital.

John McDonnell: Some of us are not completely reformed.

Steve Baker: In that case, I am delighted that we are on opposite sides of the Chamber.

It is strange that capitalism has come to this: that, nowadays, the owners of capital need to be defended by the House from their own directors. If I have understood the amendment correctly, it would mean that the change in the main rate for 2011 would not come into force until legislation had provided arrangements for shareholders to approve their directors’ remuneration. It is almost incredible that such an arrangement does not already exist.

We must reunite ownership control and the risk taken with capital, and I believe that the amendment goes to the heart of one of the problems of our capitalist system. I am not sure that it would achieve the aim that the hon. Gentleman has set out because it might not affect the rate for 2011, and I therefore cannot support it. Nevertheless, I think it is an extremely good idea, and I urge the Government to consider it.

As you can see on today’s order paper, Mark Reckless MP has courageously brought forward the following motion, which I have signed (emphasis mine):

EUROZONE FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE

That this House notes with concern that UK taxpayers are potentially being made liable for bail-outs of Eurozone countries when the UK opted to remain outside the Euro and, despite agreement in May 2010 that the EU-wide European Financial Stability Mechanism (EFSM) of €60 billion would represent only 12 per cent. of the non-IMF contribution with the remaining €440 billion being borne by the Eurozone through the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), that the EFSM for which the UK may be held liable is in fact being drawn upon to the same or a greater extent than the EFSF; further notes that the European Scrutiny Committee has stated its view that the EFSM is legally unsound; and requires the Government to place the EFSM on the agenda of the next meeting of the Council of Ministers or the European Council and to vote against continued use of the EFSM unless a Eurozone-only arrangement which relieves the UK of liability under the EFSM has by then been agreed.

In my view, this is quite right. Parliament exists to restrain the tendency of the Crown to expropriate the wealth of the British people.  The people long since asserted their sovereignty in this country: it is by consent that we have a monarch and a Parliament. We are here to require the Crown to act in certain ways.

Nevertheless, the following amendment has been brought forward to give the Government masses of wriggle room:

Line 9, leave out from ‘unsound’ to end and add ‘urges the Government to raise the issue of the EFSM at the next meeting of the Council of Ministers or the European Council; and supports any measures which would lead to an agreement for a Eurozone-only arrangement.’.

A larger number of colleagues have signed the amendment than the original motion which it spoils. So much for Parliament asserting itself.

This morning, I had one of my regular informal meetings with local senior NHS management. As you would expect, the present top-level political manoeuvring leaves senior NHS staff in a difficult position: how can they plan when policy is again up in the air?

Right now, the NHS is scarcely under democratic control. Whether it should be is another subject but the fact is that health is primarily state provided in the UK. You would expect the state to have a grip.

However, not only is the NHS out of democratic control, it is scarcely under Departmental control either. Before my election, I had cause to meet a number of the most senior Department of Health officials and the overwhelming majority began the conversation with, “This is not NHS HQ.” In then discussing how the NHS is organised, I quickly found that the structures are astonishingly complex and that senior staff get things done through informal channels.

So, here we have the world’s second largest employer, funded by taxation, and not in any meaningful sense answerable to the people who pay for it. Even Tesco answers to the people: we could choose not to shop there.

If that seems far-fetched, so is the notion that the NHS is under meaningful public control. That is what the Government’s reforms were about: getting healthcare under control by pulling the one available lever – structural reform.

And yet here we are: the Lib Dems seem to be threatening to veto changes which are, as John Redwood explained on the Today programme this morning, very much in line with the Lib Dem manifesto. We know why the conversation has taken this turn: their party and their leader just took a pounding. But Clegg signed the health whitepaper. He was fully behind these reforms but now there’s turmoil.

Why should the public or NHS staff tolerate these shenanigans? Health care is too important to be subject to politics like this. Whatever emerges from the present pantomime, reform should shift the balance of power from politicians and unaccountable officials to the public.

Only the public have the capacity and the will to ensure health services meet their needs and expectations. We should take the politics out of health.