Mr Paul Burstow (Sutton & Cheam, Liberal Democrat)

I shall start by trying to square the circle that the hon. Member for New Forest, West has attempted to draw with respect to amendment No. 226. Our aim in tabling the amendment was to add to subsection (2) the category of district councils. The rest of the clause deals with order-making and regulation-making powers that will dictate how each tier of government is to discharge its function. To enable the Minister to keep his promise to set out the way in which district councils may participate, it seemed sensible to us that the Bill should provide for them to participate in the first place. The Minister could then, in regulations, specify how they were to do so. In view of that, it might be argued that amendment No. 245 is more prescriptive and inflexible. Simply making the necessary addition to the list of bodies that can be involved in the scrutiny process allows for greater flexibility.

I pray in aid the parliamentary briefing from the Democratic Health Network, which has drawn attention to the fact that district councils have an important contribution to make. They have a role in environmental health and they have housing responsibility, not just as strategic planners but often as providers. Those issues are part of a health improvement agenda and a health inequalities reduction agenda. It is slightly puzzling—perhaps the Minister will provide clarification on this—that the remit of the oversight and scrutiny committees seems to be focused very much on the provision of services by trusts, whereas it might also have included the wider questions of health inequalities and health improvement. Will it be possible for those matters to be dealt with in the regulations?

We consider that there is a case for participation by districts in what is proposed. Perhaps it would be better for them to be organised jointly with their county authorities, but on some occasions specific reconfiguration issues might have more of an impact on one local authority and population than any other, so that locally based scrutiny of the proposals by the district council in question would be by far the most appropriate exercise of the powers under the clause.

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