‘Sometimes the centre has to let go – set standards but free up the frontline and devolve power to speed up new ways of doing business, delivering for citizens better than before.’ This was the sentence that captured my attention in Liam Byrne’s excellent analysis of the electoral challenge facing the Labour party The new centre-ground: how can progressives win a new majority.

As someone who hasworked all his life on the frontline I know Labour did many good things when in government. We enjoyed investment in education, health, police and other public services the like of which we had not seen before. And these services stepped up to the plate, delivering clear improvements in quality in the services people received. Higher education standards, safer streets and neighbourhoods, better health outcomes and improved patient satisfaction.

But people quickly accept the new standard, and then expect more, which is a good thing for driving further improvement. What they won’t accept is inefficiency and waste, and sadly any model of delivery will have – whatever people say – perceived inefficiency and waste. But top down models with prescription and meddling from Westminster and unelected quangos is the worst sort. It contributes to a lack of faith in government action and government spending.

There are two prescriptions for this condition I wish to explore: first, trust the frontline, second, devolve real decision making.

We need to properly trust the frontline. That means trusting the professionals who work on it and those people who receive those services.

I saw a lot of waste in education spending when I was principal of John Leggott College in Scunthorpe. Money wasted on consultants and contractors who inhabit that unreal world between Whitehall and the frontline, trusted by Whitehall to deliver but in reality creaming off time and money that could be better spent on students directly. The seminal example of this is the disastrous Building Colleges for the Future Programme that could have delivered so much more with much less pain – political and real – if it had only properly listened to the frontline.

The reason HMCI say that a 12 per cent cut in policing budgets over four years is doable is because they know how to frame the service in a way to make efficiencies without damaging delivery. The reason why the Tory-Lib Dem proposals to upskittle the health service are in real trouble is because it is seen as an unnecessary top-down reorganisation, divorced from reality. They are imposing a political will on the frontline without the support of either the professionals or patients – the two groups of people who understand the service.

So the number one thing we need to shout out is that we will trust the frontline. That doesn’t mean we don’t challenge them. We must challenge complacency. But there are huge and real challenges without political interference: the challenge of an aging population, the challenge of the changing nature of young people, the challenges driven by exponential technological change. That is enough without the distractions and headaches of unnecessary reorganisation imposed from above. Such endless top-down reorganisations are wasteful and distract from the real challenges, the real issues.

Politicians should, in my opinion, do fewer things but do them well!

Second, we desperately need devolution of powers from Westminster. The needs and solutions for Yorkshire and the Humber are completely different from those needed by the south-west or the south-east. So as anoraky or geeky as it may be in risk of being seen we need to argue for devolution to the English regions. And now is an opportunity to do just that. Because the landscape is changing significantly. In May there will be referenda in 11 English cites for directly elected mayors. And this November will see elections not only for those mayors where communities vote for them but also for police and crime commissioners across England and Wales. Furthermore, Alex Salmond and David Cameron are locked together in a Scottish independence jig. This is producing some interesting, if worrying, reaction from England. As Zahir from Rotherham posted on my twitterfeed recently, ‘On this side of the border (England) Salmond would be granted his wish with huge majority.’ This core English frustration with Scotland is very real and very dangerous to the union. Maybe more dangerous than the Scottish referendum!

Currently we have an unstable settlement with the nations and our capital city, London, having devolved powers whilst the regions of England are largely governed from Westminster. Directly elected city mayors and directly elected police and crime commissioners may go some way towards addressing the democratic deficit.  But in a confused and chaotic way that won’t address our core need.

For our core need is – as always – for jobs. Real jobs for real people. And to realise that we need an effective regional economic and industrial growth policy. In our region, Yorkshire Forward had begun to make a real difference but it was remote and misunderstood by the region’s people. It had no mandate or accountability back to the people – that was a huge weakness. It left it vulnerable to being caricatured as a wasteful, bureaucratic quango. Hence it was swept away by the incoming coalition government and its strategic functions atomised into the several Local Enterprise Partnerships. Already there are noises bemoaning the dismantling of RDAs as potential engines of growth – and these noises are not coming from the usual suspects but from the hard-headed.

Germany, by anyone’s measurements, has got more things right on industrial policy than the UK. Much of this is down to the power of the Lander. There regional government drives regional growth with effective regional banks investing in and developing regional manufacturing and regional businesses.

So it’s not so much the West Lothian Question as the English Question!  Now is the time for the regions to come of age and drive their own growth. This will not be achieved by English MPs only voting on English matters. And if we are to reduce the number of MPs at Westminster in the UK government what better time to provide real devolution to the regions – shifting our governance towards the frontline and away of an over-meddling centre. Away from the hands of an over mighty executive in Westminster supported by an over bureaucratic and meddling Whitehall.

The time has come – the Walrus said! – for the centre to let go – set standards but free up the frontline. It is time to trust the frontline of professionals and users. It is time to accept that the real challenges are not of structure and reorganisation but of demography and technology.  And it is absolutely time to devolve power to the people and the regions as a way of speeding up ways of doing business, delivering for citizens better than before.

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Nic Dakin is MP for Scunthorpe

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Photo: David Sim