Public Bodies Bill [HL]

One welcomes the steps that the Government are taking in the Bill to ensure that there is wider consultation, and the noble Lord’s Amendment 114 refers to the consultation that is necessary for the bodies listed in Schedules 1 to 6. Of course one welcomes this consultation, but with regard to the area with which I am particularly concerned—that of economic development—what sort of consultation will now occur on the Government’s policy of abolishing the regional development agencies, which are referred to in Schedule 1 to the Bill? To my knowledge, there was no consultation of any kind on that policy—indeed, rather the reverse. Soon after the general election, we were told that the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills thought that the regional development agencies should be saved, and there was a tremendous sense of relief about that in the regions, particularly in the north. Indeed, I am told that the Secretary of State said that to the chairman and chief executive of one of the leading regional development agencies in the north. Then, a few weeks later, it was suddenly announced in the Budget that these bodies were to be abolished. A few days later, a joint paper appeared in the names of the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government saying that the Government had decided to abolish them altogether and were now going to set up local economic partnerships. However, what consultation has occurred, and how is consultation now to take place in the light of the proposed new clause in Amendment 114 that the Minister intends to introduce? I should be very interested to hear his reply.