London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Bill

I have Amendments Nos. 77, 78 and 80 in this group. This group is all about relationships, and I have put my name to Amendment No. 32 because, like my noble friend, I saw that subsection (4)(b) in effect gives a mayoral veto. Frankly, if the situation ever develops to the point when the Mayor has to put his foot down in the way that the provision implies he might, we are heading for disaster. The successful achievement of these Games will depend above all else on people working together, co-operating and agreeing. However, in this instance, as my noble friend has said,"““the Mayor of London may direct the Authority to refuse an application””." As the noble Baroness said, the subsection refers to ““a specified case””—but all planning applications are very tightly and closely specified, so that presumably implies that he might do it in one instance or two instances, perhaps. We do not know how the Olympic Delivery Authority is going to work. Presumably the area over which it is the planning authority will be tightly defined; so within that it may have a strategic plan which would presumably be agreed in principle—and within that the authority may deal with it building by building, or it may not. It may decide to do the whole thing in a blanket way. Perhaps the Minister can tell us that the way in which the authority deals with the planning aspect is specified in greater detail than is specified in the Bill. It could be a master plan with detailed planning; it could be all sorts of things. We do not know at the moment. So the amendments have been tabled partly to tease that out, and particularly to tease out the relationship between the ODA and the Mayor. If we proceed by agreement, that is fine, but if the Mayor ever has to implement this provision, something will have broken down. We need to be very concerned about that. It may be that someone can foresee circumstances in which that might be justified, but I would like to have that spelt out, because it worries me a great deal. Amendments Nos. 77, 78 and 80 deal with a different aspect of the relationship—the relationship between the ODA and the Greater London Authority. I was fascinated on first reading the Bill, having read Clause (4)(2)(f) to (k) on page 3 suddenly to find on page 24, Clause 34(2)(a) to (f). The wording of those two parts of the Bill is precisely the same. So here we have the ODA and the GLA with identical powers in relation to the London Olympics. I entirely accept that the ODA is concerned with the main Olympic site and the GLA will be concerned, I assume, with a whole number of sites across London. But what is not spelled out in the Bill, as far as I can see, is the relationship between the ODA and the GLA—more importantly because there must be some arrangements somewhere for this, which I admit that I have not picked up. Therefore, the Minister will have the dreadful burden of explaining to someone who ought to understand something that he does not understand. Presumably there must be some arrangements for funding. The GLA may,"““arrange for the construction, improvement or adaptation of premises . . . the provision of services . . . undertake works of any description . . . acquire land or other property””," and so on. My noble friend picked up the point that the GLA may,"““take action in respect of places outside London””." That is quite a leap in responsibilities for the GLA. But presumably it is in relation only to the Olympics. The amendments that I have tabled try to put in a relationship between the GLA and the ODA, when they are working together, as one hopes that inevitably they will, to provide all the facilities that are required in London for the Olympics—much greater than the core site with which the ODA is primarily concerned. Because I have not been able to tease out that working relationship from what I have read, I thought it worth tabling the amendments simply to probe the Minister and give him the opportunity to explain exactly what the relationships are and how they will work. One accepts that someone in the end has to provide the overall plan and the drive to achieve it, but if there is not a great amount of co-operation and agreement, we are frankly heading for disaster. It was to avoid that that I thought we should have a bit more explanation, which I am sure the Minister looks forward to giving.