Amendment 2 will have the effect of giving a 12-month period between a local planning authority being identified as performing poorly and the time when it may become designated. In Committee I suggested 18 months, my noble friend Lord Greaves suggested 12 months and we did not need to argue over that. I have settled on 12 months because part of the Government’s argument against the amendment at that time was that 18 months was too long.
There is a slightly different approach towards Clause 1 and designation. The Government have said that they want Clause 1 as a deterrent to local authorities. I prefer to see Clause 1 as an incentive. There is an important difference in thinking: a deterrent is something negative which implies punishment at the end if you do not comply, whereas I see incentive as encouragement, something positive, to seek to improve. That is what the Government seek to achieve as well. They are not out to punish local planning authorities—that has become very clear during the course of the many debates on this clause. They are seeking improvement too.
I suggest that there should be a 12-month period from the time when a local planning authority becomes aware that its performance is poor enough to warrant possible designation. It should then have the time both to take the necessary actions itself, if it can, to bring about the necessary improvements, to join with others in a peer-led improvement, on which the Local Government Association—of which I am not a vice-president—has a very good track record and which I know the Government have appreciated on many occasions. It also gives time for the Government and others to assess the direction of travel of that local planning authority. If it is improving at a significant rate, then to designate it at the end of that period would seem to be an unnecessary punishment. We should, rather, stimulate with greater encouragement.
This amendment is brought forward in good faith in the hopes of further helping the Government to achieve their objectives. The Planning Minister, Mr Boles, has said that he hopes that neither he nor any future Government will ever have need to use the provisions in Clause 1 because local planning authorities will have improved their performance and it will be unnecessary. The amendment allows a sufficient and reasonable time period to enable local authorities to bring that about themselves without suffering the punishment of designation.
I hope that when the Minister replies she will spell out how the Government see this as an incentive to improve, not a punishment to be inflicted for poor performance. When we look at the process in more detail we can see how that is being achieved. I beg to move.