I welcome the spirit in which the hon. Gentleman makes his comments. It is fair to say
that we are hearing exactly the same sort of plea from local authorities, which are at the front end of dealing with this problem. He is absolutely right that we need to separate the short-term pressures from the long term, and we ought to be able to have a more sensible conversation on the long-term pressures. Yes, let us save the politics for the short term and have consensus for the long term.