Greater London Authority Bill

I was waiting for my noble friend Lord Jenkin. If the Minister will allow me to make a brief intervention, I should like to make it clear that I am not briefed by Westminster City Council. Indeed, I did not know that this matter was to be raised until I came back from the Scottish Parliament Statement a moment ago which, for those who did not have the privilege of hearing it, will be well worth reading in Hansard tomorrow. Therefore, I am speaking independently. I have views about affordable housing that are not dissimilar to those that I have already heard expressed. Mr Matthew Parris once devoted one of his parliamentary sketches to the fact that the Father of the House, Tam Dalyell, and I had both performed like dinosaurs and how very refreshing it was that there were still dinosaurs in the House of Commons. When the Mayor took office, he invited a distinguished former director of Shelter to carry out just such a survey across the whole of London. I am sure there are people in this Room who will remember that survey. I was still a Member of Parliament and was invited to attend the Westminster City Council session lasting a couple of hours in which the former director of Shelter asked questions and Westminster presented a case. When I saw the overall recommendation of the director of Shelter about what the percentage of affordable housing should be in such planning applications, I could not see how Westminster would be able to achieve it. I knew the district valuer’s views on land values in Westminster and the implications that they would have for how much affordable housing could be afforded and where it would go. There is some danger in this debate, particularly when we take individual cases, of getting bogged down in the same state of unreality as attended the Scottish Parliament Statement a moment or two ago.