My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, will obviously not be surprised to hear me say that what we do not want to be in this Bill is prescriptive—but that is in no way to belittle the importance of the issues touched on in this amendment. For example, we expect local planning authorities to adopt proactive strategies to mitigate and adapt to climate change, taking full account of flood risk, coastal change, and water supply and demand considerations. They must have a positive strategy to promote energy from renewable and low-carbon sources. While what we look for locally is set out in national planning policy and guidance, we have been very clear that local plans prepared by democratically accountable local councils are key to delivering sustainable development that reflects the vision and the aspirations of local communities.
Having said that, as we discussed in a number of our earlier debates, these prescriptive amendments go against the grain of the approach of the Bill, which is to start a conversation with each area about the powers and budgets that they would like to have devolved to them in order to improve their economy, deliver better local public services and build sustainable prosperity. We are definitely not in the position of trying to prescribe what they think they should be including and so we have no preordained list of powers which might devolve. In common with similar previous amendments, I am afraid that this amendment is out of step with the whole approach that the Bill is designed to deliver, and I would respectfully ask the noble Lord to withdraw it.
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