My Lords, before the noble Lord, Lord Best, leaves the Chamber it is highly appropriate that this debate follows the Second Reading of the housing Bill, which he has just introduced. That Bill originated in the House of Commons and was led, designed and carried through by my very good friend Richard Bacon MP, who is not only an admirable MP but was my successor as Member of Parliament for South Norfolk. I know him and his housing interests very well. I am delighted that the Bill is making such good progress, and I am delighted to see Richard Bacon here with us now. It is also highly appropriate that he listens to some of our debates now: he is an admirable member of the Public Accounts Committee as well as the House of Commons, has written an extremely well researched book about getting value for money and avoiding waste in whole sectors of government departments, and is a very strong advocate of value for money. In fact, that is what quite a lot of our debates are about today.
The amendment that I am dealing with now is straightforward and probing. Clause 1(2) says:
“Whether the 0.7% target has been met by the United Kingdom in any year is to be determined for the purposes of this Act by reference to the amounts specified for that year in an annual report”.
Subsection (3) says what an annual report means, but it does not say who determines whether that 0.7% has been met, and it must do so. Is it just the department, or is it underpinned and independently verified from outside? We believe that it should be the latter, and that this is best done by the Office for Budget Responsibility, which has established its independent position for establishing and verifying such issues. I beg to move.