English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill: Government motion to disagree to Lords Amendment 36

**What happened:** On 21 April 2026, MPs voted on whether to accept or reject Lords Amendment 36 to the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill, a change made by the House of Lords to provisions relating to local authority governance and executives. The government asked the Commons to disagree with the Lords change, and that motion passed by 288 votes to 147. The result means the amendment inserted by peers was overturned, and the government's original text on local authority governance arrangements is restored to the Bill. **Why it matters:** Lords Amendment 36 was part of a cluster of Lords changes seeking to alter or remove provisions in the Bill that affect how local authority governance is structured in England, specifically provisions the government says are intended to bring greater clarity and consistency to local authority executive arrangements across the country. By rejecting the Lords change, the government retains its preferred approach, which includes a general expectation that councils will operate under a directly elected leader or elected mayor model rather than the committee system. This affects how council decisions are made in local authorities across England and has implications for democratic accountability at the local level. **The politics:** The vote divided almost entirely along party lines. All 287 Labour and Labour and Co-operative MPs who voted backed the government, while all voting Conservatives (79), Liberal Democrats (56), Greens (4), Democratic Unionists (3) and the Ulster Unionist (1) opposed it. The Conservatives framed the Bill throughout as a centralising measure, arguing that the Lords amendments represented sensible improvements to protect local consent and accountability. The Liberal Democrats similarly voted against the government. This division was one of several held on the same day, with the government defeating Lords amendments on mayoral powers, brownfield planning requirements, transparency in mayoral commissioner appointments, and other provisions by similar margins, all roughly in the range of 287 to 298 ayes against 144 to 155 noes.