My Lords, I declare the interest that I did not need to declare in my previous amendment, which is that I am president of the Local Government Association, which supports both these amendments. I see them as complementary to our earlier debate on nationally significant infrastructure projects.
I very much hope that wherever a local authority wants to get on with it and do these things, we should give it every possible encouragement. I hope that these amendments are both acceptable to the Minister but would just add that it is likely that housing associations would play a very significant role in the development corporations. Many local authorities will not themselves be undertaking development on such a scale, and
co-operation and partnership with housing associations will also be incredibly important in making the development corporations work.