Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill

I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention. I suspect that the R word—referendum—does instil a little fear in the Government. Why have the Government set district councils against county councils in a battle for survival that will cost the taxpayer dear? It cannot just be that they were stung by losing the chairmanship of the Local Government Association, and by the erosion of their position at successive local elections. Is not the truth that Labour is trying to do at the Dispatch Box what it cannot do at the ballot box?