English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill: Government motion to disagree to Lords Amendment 4

**What happened:** On 21 April 2026, MPs voted by 298 to 152 to reject Lords Amendment 4 to the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill, supporting the government's position and overturning a change made by the House of Lords. Lords Amendment 4 concerned transparency in the appointment of mayoral commissioners, and the government's successful motion to disagree means that the Bill returns to its pre-Lords wording on this point. This was one of several Lords amendments the government moved to reject on the same day, with similar results across each division. **Why it matters:** Lords Amendment 4 would have placed stronger accountability requirements on the appointment of mayoral commissioners, the individuals appointed to support mayors of combined authorities in exercising their new powers under the Bill. The government's position is that draft guidance on appointments and remuneration is sufficient, and that placing such requirements on the face of the Bill is unnecessary. Critics, including Conservative MPs, argue that guidance alone does not provide the same level of legally binding accountability as statutory provisions, and that expanding mayoral powers without matching transparency requirements risks creating poorly accountable governance structures. The Bill as a whole represents a significant transfer of powers from central government to mayors, combined authorities and local communities across England, covering areas including planning, transport, licensing and local governance reform. **The politics:** The vote divided almost entirely along party lines. All 298 Labour and Labour-Co-operative MPs who voted supported the government, while all 152 opposition votes against came from Conservatives, Liberal Democrats, the Green Party, the Democratic Unionist Party, the Ulster Unionist Party and several independents. There were no Labour rebels. The Conservatives framed their opposition as a defence of local consent and proper accountability, arguing the Bill is in practice centralising rather than devolving power. The Liberal Democrats and Greens joined them in the Noe lobby. This pattern repeated across every related division on 21 April, with the government winning each one by comparable margins, underlining the government's commanding Commons majority and its determination to restore the Bill to the form it preferred before the Lords made amendments.