Housing and Regeneration Bill

I shall just make a few comments to follow on from the interesting point raised by the noble Viscount. He is absolutely right in the example that he gives, but I should like to suggest a couple of things. I explained that there was one example when the powers were used in Milton Keynes, but there were at least three other examples when Secretaries of State were encouraged by other people to oblige English Partnerships. There were three other new towns in England in which the record on affordable and social housing was absolutely abysmal. These authorities had failed signally to meet the targets that were agreed and various policy planning guidance. It seems rather peculiar that, in almost every aspect of public service, if a local authority signally fails to meet its obligations, central government invariably does something about it and yet we do not do that in planning. I am not suggesting that we should be that aggressive about it but I find it quite puzzling that the Government have to account for their performance in providing housing for young families and people who cannot ordinarily afford market housing and yet local authorities do not seem to have to account for that. I would not want noble Lords to think that I was being naïve or starry-eyed in suggesting that this power might be used benignly; I was simply relating my own experience. In other circumstances in which Secretaries of State might have been entitled to take a more aggressive view, they simply declined out of respect for the local democratic process in cases in which that process was massively failing local communities.