Housing and Regeneration Bill

moved Amendment No. 6: 6: Schedule 1, page 148, line 23, at end insert— ““( ) One third of the members shall retire three years after the commencement of this Schedule and shall be eligible for re-appointment. ( ) Thereafter, one-third of the members shall retire each year by rotation.”” The noble Viscount said: In moving this amendment, I shall also speak to Amendments Nos. 7 and 12. I return to some of the things we debated earlier this afternoon. The noble Lord, Lord Graham, said, ““Please remember the objectives””, which was a telling point. However, I suppose that it is true to say that they have not changed much. All of the objectives in the predecessor bodies are similar to the objectives in this Bill, which will be in the Act. The biggest single change is the creation of Oftenant by splitting out the regulatory functions, but that is more a matter of how to do it than whether the objectives are different. I was struck by a comment from the Minister when she talked about independence and having a strong board. That is very important. If the HCA is to perform better in difficult circumstances than its predecessors, the degree of independence that it has is very important. I was also struck by my noble friend Lord Brooke who said we should remember that Secretaries of State change and Acts of Parliament go on, Governments change and Acts of Parliament go on, and the predecessor Acts have done rather well. I believe the New Towns Act was in 1981 and in 1985 there was a change—and in 1993 we had the Urban Regeneration Agency. I remember that many responsibilities went to English Partnerships as a result of a manifesto commitment of 1997. It is important to remember that there are degrees of continuity and that changes are made. In those circumstances, how does a board have certainty? How can it understand how it will be selected and how much of a franchise it has? It seems to me that, reading the schedule as drafted, the Secretary of State can give a member of the board any kind of terms that he decides. That seems to me too discretionary and almost arbitrary. That takes me back to the numbers. I refer to my noble friend Lord Brooke, who said that it is quite good to know what the rules will be and not to be surprised by the rules because they are different in similar circumstances. As is frequently the case, I would like to see a minimum and a maximum, say, between nine and 15 on the board. I do not suppose you would want 15 and I do not suppose you would really want nine, but you certainly would not want six. After this afternoon’s discussions, the idea that six people could cover the waterfront for this £4 billion-a-year agency seems to be completely unrealistic. On Amendment No. 6, I am not in any way tied to the wording, but, from day one, the board should understand its own position. It would know at the end of three years—I prefer three years to five years—that a third of its members would have to retire. The Secretary of State will either reappoint them or not. From there onwards, each year, one-third of the members of the board will retire. Everyone on the board will know that that is the way it will work. I believe that three years is quite long enough for people who had the requisite experience when they were appointed to get their feet under the table and to become major contributors. I also think that working on the basis of one-third of members retiring each year is an extremely healthy situation. Everyone will know where they are and the Secretary of State will be free to determine how the one-third is dealt with. This is a very sensible system. How that is put into the Bill is entirely a matter for the Minister. Amendments Nos. 7 and 12 are probing amendments. Amendment No. 7 is a very small probe. I am perfectly clear that the chief executive of the HCA will be the accounting officer. Amendment No. 12 is more material. I need to read out a couple of things to the Committee. The English Partnerships financial statement said: "““The Commission and the Agency are sponsored by CLG which in turn is governed by HM Treasury””—" a rather wonderful sentence, that. It went on to say: "““There is regular liaison between CLG and English Partnerships to ensure that Departmental Expenditure Limits are met and to ensure that accounting treatment is consistent with HM Treasury guidance””." Last year’s accounts, published in July, state: "““Accounts Direction given by the Secretary of State with the consent of the Treasury, in accordance with paragraph 9, schedule 18 of the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993””." Where has the Treasury gone? It is not in the Bill. There must be a reason for that. It seems unlikely that the Treasury will disappear. It seems unlikely also that it will not continue to wish to exercise the same control over the behaviour of non-departmental public bodies which it has always exercised. High-spending non-departmental public bodies in the monitoring group usually face people not only from their sponsor department but also from the Treasury. The Committee needs an explanation as to how this will happen. If you were a cantankerous chief executive of a non-departmental public body, which I was certainly judged to be many years ago, you would look at this legislation and say, ““I don’t get letters from the Treasury. What’s this about the Treasury? I only get letters from the Secretary of State, because there is no mention of the Treasury in my Act of Parliament. I have no formal link. Parliament has not decided to give me a formal link with the Treasury””. A full explanation of the role of the Treasury in the face of the HCA and how it will change, if at all, from the way in which matters operate today, is needed. I beg to move.