Housing and Regeneration Bill

We can impose the statutory requirement to consult only on designated agencies. I think it means the collective person. I shall write to the noble Lord in case there is a bit of a loophole. I turn now not only to the substance of Clause 13 but to the range of amendments which have been tabled, particularly by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. I shall do this in the following way. Buried in the range of amendments is an indication that noble Lords are going to oppose Clause 13 standing part of the Bill, so perhaps I may continue as if this were a clause stand part debate, relate to the amendments as briefly as I can—although they raise important issues—and give my responses in that way. I hope I can do it justice. It is extremely important that we are as proportionate and collective as we can be. I am grateful for the way in which my noble friend Lady Ford described how this power, which we have inherited from previous legislation, has been used exceptionally in the past. When she was referring to the Milton Keynes partnership, she was talking not about the construction of Milton Keynes as a new town but about the partnership that we have put in place to take further the next stages of growth in the south-east in the context of Milton Keynes. It is a very specific partnership. The noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, raised a series of issues about the politics of partnerships and the inability sometimes of local authorities to address serious issues because they are incapable of doing so. Again, the noble Baroness, Lady Ford, drew on her experience. When we look at the very rare occasions on which we might use the powers of designation, this is an option that will already have been rejected by the Government, for the reasons my noble friend gave, because there are other vehicles and other opportunities. As we look across the growth areas in the greater south-east where we hope to achieve our ambitions for many more houses, because that is where we need them and where the affordability gap is greatest, we are looking at partnerships between local authorities—for example, in Corby in Northamptonshire—at partnerships that are UDCs and are appropriate for what is necessary; and at cross-border bilateral partnerships. Those are all perfectly sufficient for what they have to do. None of them raises issues of designation. That underlines the exceptional nature of what it is we are allowing for. The noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, said that he wanted to frame his response in the context of the issues he raised around Amendment No. 51D, which we addressed yesterday, and he is right to do so. At the heart of these many different amendments is the respect that we pay to local authorities. That issue is extremely important, and we have had an interesting and positive debate about it. The noble Lord, Lord Willoughby de Broke, is not in his place, but everything I want to say is about the essential nature of partnership in what we are delivering, and the designation power is not an exception to that. That itself constitutes a partnership; it is not an imposition. When it was agreed in Milton Keynes that this was the right and necessary way forward, it was done in partnership, as the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, has pointed out. It was not an imposition. That is how it would be conducted. How could we possibly go forward with some of these major challenges if all we had at our disposal were a power to impose? It would not work. That is the most important thing I want to say. We need to retain the option of using this power in case we are faced with circumstances in the future that mean this is the only way forward. I shall come on to the amendment that talks about ““necessary”” and ““appropriate”” in that context. Why would it be such a case? As I say, it is certainly not a question of taking powers away. If you look at where we are working in the growth areas, over 70 local authorities have volunteered to work with us on growth in the first round of the new growth points bidding. We are working now in partnership in different ways with 200 local authorities, half of all the local authorities in the country. Nearly all the major towns and cities are working with us on the growth agenda. They know that we cultivate partnership, and that is how we are going forward. They have the experience, but often they do not have capacity. That is where the point about skills comes in. Of course it is a question of growing more skills. Our planning departments and universities are doing their best. We are putting bursaries in and trying to create a cross-disciplinary flow of people to come into the profession. It is opening up in different ways. We are faced with local authorities that do not have the capacity and yet need it. We had a graphic example of that. They come to our department and say, ““Give us more help with this””. This is the ultimate way in which we would say, ““Okay, if this is the only way forward. We have a big challenge here. We need 5,000 or 10,000 houses, or whatever it is, and we need to build that community””. That is the sort of discourse we have.