Greater London Authority Bill

My Lords, I am grateful to noble Lords who have spoken in this short debate. I am bound to disappoint the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham. Obviously, we believe strongly in the importance of all public bodies engaging in consultation in the development and implementation of their strategies and policies, and we expect them to listen to the views of consultees and respond to them. That does not mean that public bodies have to act in accordance with the majority view of consultees, because a consultation response is one of many factors that public bodies need to take into account when deciding what action to take. The GLA is no exception to that. The GLA Act requires the Mayor to consult the Assembly, the functional bodies and the London boroughs on, among other things, drafts of or revisions to his strategies. As the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, said, we are strengthening these requirements under Clause 2, requiring the Mayor explicitly to have regard and respond to views within the GLA group—from the Assembly and functional bodies—at an early stage in preparing his strategies, before he moves to stage 2. Those two stages of consultation are very important. They are set out in the Act, which requires the Mayor first to consult the Assembly and functional bodies on drafts of or revisions to his strategies before consulting more widely in the second stage. There is a reason for that, as my noble friend said. That is to ensure that the views of the Assembly are formative. It is at the second stage that the interests of the boroughs are safeguarded, to use the term of the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham. He is specifically required to consult the London boroughs during that second stage. We believe that that has worked well. The voice of the boroughs is clearly heard, so I find myself unable to accept the amendment for two reasons. First, it is unnecessary. There seems to be an implication that the Mayor does not listen to the voice of the boroughs. The evidence is that he has a good record of modifying his proposals in response to consultation, having listened to the boroughs. For example, when he gave the go-ahead to the western congestion-charging zone extension following public consultation, the exact nature of the zone and treatment of residents’ discounts was significantly modified in light of the consultation responses. Also, in revising his transport and air quality strategies, the Mayor made changes to the boundary of the proposed low emission zone in direct response to feedback. Secondly, we would be in dangerous territory if we accepted the amendment. An explicit duty on the Mayor to have regard to boroughs’ views would set a precedent that other organisations might perfectly reasonably expect to apply to them. We might therefore find ourselves being harassed by other organisations that want the same powers. The Bill strikes the right balance in placing a duty on the Mayor to have regard to consultation responses from within the GLA group rather than from any external bodies, and only in the first stage of the two-stage consultation process. I know that that is a disappointing response, but I hope that the noble Baroness will feel able to accept it.