UK Parliament / Open data

Deregulation Bill

Proceeding contribution from Baroness Donaghy (Labour) in the House of Lords on Tuesday, 18 November 2014. It occurred during Debate on bills and Committee proceeding on Deregulation Bill.

I apologise to the noble Lord for interrupting but I wish to seek clarification. Clearly, on the face of it, it does look like double accounting, but similar things exist in other areas—for instance, in the construction industry, where there is a pre-qualification system. At the moment local authorities are given confidence in employing a company which might cover a lot of local authorities. There might be a very small strapped-for-cash local authority—as nearly all of them are now—but it is given confidence because the name of that company is on a register. It has already qualified to meet a certain level of standards. I am not sure that in the Minister’s answer so far—he may be coming to

it—he has explained how local authorities have the confidence to get to the pre-qualification stage of saying, “Okay, let’s look at these people with a view to hiring them”. I am not saying that they do not have the responsibility to inspect—of course not—but it could save a lot of time and money if there is already in existence a body of knowledge and a body of standards which local authorities can apply.

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
757 c120GC 
Session
2014-15
Chamber / Committee
House of Lords Grand Committee
Subjects
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