Communities and Local Government/Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Hove (Ms Barlow). Interestingly, early in her contribution, she welcomed a general theme in the Queen’s Speech, on which I hope that the Government will follow through: the removal of many of the indicators used by councils in best value analysis. My constituency covers west Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly, and many of the best value analyses carried out by the Council of the Isles of Scilly are more expensive than providing the service under analysis. We end up with a bizarre, unintended outcome, because we have applied metropolitan norms to councils, such as the Isles of Scilly council, that clearly do not fit those norms. The debate was interesting in many ways. It started off with the predictable and tiresome tribalism that is inevitable during the opening exchanges in such debates, but interestingly, as the debate gathered pace, and as Back Benchers became more involved, a strong body of support emerged on the issue of climate change. I hope that the Government can work on that. Of course, there is debate about the style and regularity of targets, but I hope that when the Government introduce their climate change Bill we will build strong legislation on the consensus that has emerged today. I hope that we can concentrate on areas of agreement, rather than seeking to exaggerate disagreements which, on the evidence of today’s debate, are few. Many Members were disappointed that the Government did not express any intention to introduce a marine Bill in this Session. I had a discussion with the Minister for Local Environment, Marine and Animal Welfare last week, in which he said—I do not think that I am breaking any confidences, but if I am, he did not tell me that he was speaking to me in confidence—that the Government were mindful of elections to the devolved Administrations in Wales and Scotland. Bearing that in mind, it would not be appropriate to introduce proposals at this stage, but he said that the Government might introduce a White Paper in March or April next year. I am keen that they should do so, so that we can build on the strong cross-party consensus in favour of legislation and update the archaic regulations that fisheries committees and many other bodies have to apply. That is an extremely important issue, so I hope that the Government will act speedily to introduce such a measure.