Localism Bill

I am grateful to the Minister for that intervention, but while their lordships add much to our debate, there is something to be said for letting the elected House deal with these amendments properly. He has brought them back from the House of Lords and more than 400 amendments are going through in three and a half hours. That does not strengthen the position of the elected House. The Minister also mentioned the core cities provisions. We welcome the powers to authorities proposed in the amendments, especially where they would improve local economic development and wealth creation and increase local accountability. We hope that the powers will be used to ensure better co-ordination on the ground. We note the duty on the Secretary of State to consider a proposal from local authorities for the transfer of public functions. We think that there is much potential in those proposals, but they have to be seen in context. As I said, this is a Bill that gives more than 142 new powers to the Secretary of State. It is not simply a Bill about devolving powers to local authorities. The Secretary of State retains, albeit subject to certain safeguards, an extraordinary power to repeal, amend, revoke or disapply any duty on local authorities. We do not intend to oppose the amendments, but we think they have to be seen in the context of the extraordinary Henry VIII powers that the Secretary of State still retains. I repeat that, however much the Minister tries to persuade us, he is not introducing an historic Bill that devolves lots of powers to local authorities. He is introducing a Bill that gives many more powers to the Secretary of State. Everything we debate this evening will have to be seen in that context. Lords amendment 1 agreed to. Lords amendments 2 to 13 agreed to, with Commons financial privileges waived in respect of Lords amendments 3 to 12.