Commons Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. *251A: "After Clause 53, insert the following new clause—"    ““OPERATION    Natural England and the Countryside Council for Wales shall advise the appropriate national authority on the operation of this Act, and shall prepare from time to time a report on the effectiveness of statutory commons associations established under Part 2 in relation to— (a)   the discharge of their functions, and (b)   the extent to which they have had regard to the public interest in discharging those functions.”” The noble Lord said: I tabled this amendment to probe further how the legislation will work in an important area. The purpose of the amendment is to require Natural England and the Countryside Council for Wales to monitor the implications of the Act, particularly with regard to how statutory commons associations reflect the public interest in the delivery of their work as a whole. It would also require those bodies to make reports to the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the National Assembly for Wales from time to time, so helping those national authorities to determine if and when use of their powers under the Act may be necessary. The report of the stakeholder working group envisaged the creation of national and regional advisory committees to advise statutory commons associations and national bodies on the discharge of their functions in general and also to identify and disseminate best practice. That is not being taken forward in the Bill by the Government and, in those circumstances, the purpose of the amendment is to discover where the Government will obtain their advice and where the research will be done. The Bill as it stands contains various provisions—for example, in Clause 35—relating to situations where an appropriate national authority may intervene to protect the public interest. That poses a question as to where these authorities will gain the information on which to assess the need for intervention or otherwise, and in the amendment I suggest that Natural England and the Countryside Council for Wales should be charged with that role in the Bill. The Minister may say that that is not necessary because of how the process will operate in practice, but it would be helpful to have that information. The two bodies would be expected to report on where commons associations have been limited in delivering the public interest, whether it is due to operational or bureaucratic difficulties or difficulties in accessing agri-environmental schemes or any other ways. The amendment is not intended to be unsupportive of commoner interests; it is intended to be supportive of all the interests in the common as well as the wider public interest. I beg to move.