Mr Nick Raynsford (Minister of State (Local and Regional Government), Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Greenwich & Woolwich, Labour)

I beg to move,

That—

(1) during proceedings on the Local Government Bill, the Standing Committee do meet when the House is sitting on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 8.55 am and 2.30 pm, except that the Committee shall not meet on Thursday 23rd January 2003;

(2) 14 sittings in all shall be allotted to the consideration of the Bill by the Committee;

(3) the Committee shall report the Bill to the House not later than Thursday 13th February 2003;

(4) the proceedings to be taken at a sitting shall be as shown in the second column of the Table below and shall be taken in the order so shown;

(5) the proceedings which under paragraph (4) are to be taken at any sitting shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at the time specified in the third column of the Table;

(6) paragraph (4) does not prevent proceedings being taken (in the order shown in the second column of the Table) at any earlier sitting than that provided for under paragraph (4) if all previous proceedings have already been concluded.

TABLE

Sitting

Proceedings

Time for conclusion of proceedings

1st to 6th

Clauses 1 to 19, Schedule 1, Clauses 20 to 42, Schedule 2 and Clauses 43 to 73

5 pm at 6th sitting

7th to 11th

Clauses 74 to 100, Schedule 3, Clauses 101 to 105, Schedule 4, Clause 106, Schedule 5 and Clauses 107 to 116

11.25 am at 11th sitting

12th and 13th

Any new Clauses standing in the name of a Minister of the Crown and relating to functions of the Audit Commission in relation to registered social landlords; any new Clauses relating to the repeal of section 2A of the Local Government Act 1986

11.25 am at 13th sitting

14th

Remaining new Clauses standing in the name of a Minister of the Crown, remaining new Clauses, new Schedules, Clauses 117 to 121, Schedules 6 and 7, Clauses 122 and 123 and remaining proceedings on the Bill

5 pm

It is a pleasure for the Committee to meet under your chairmanship, Mr. Griffiths. I have not yet served on a Committee of which you were Chairman, and look forward to the experience of the next few weeks with a great deal of enthusiasm and anticipation. You will be pleased to know that the Bill has a Welsh dimension. That is why the Under-Secretary of State for Wales is with me, as well as the Under-Secretary of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Mr. Leslie). We will

be touching on matters of interest to Wales throughout our discussions on the Bill.

This is a Bill of considerable importance. It incorporates key elements of the Government's proposals for implementing the White Paper that we published just over a year ago. It gives new freedoms and opportunities to local government and is wide-ranging. It includes a large number of measures that will be of interest to people concerned with local government and good governance generally. The Bill's spectrum spans some relatively arcane matters, which I suspect we will get on to quickly this morning, and some issues relating to local government finance. The Bill also ranges over a number of exciting and innovative new arrangements such as business improvement districts, which will encourage new partnerships and economic development opportunities.

Inevitably, some aspects of the Bill have aroused controversy, and we will undoubtedly have robust debates at various stages during our consideration of the Bill. However, I suspect that there will be broad agreement on some of the measures that will, I hope, achieve a better framework for local government finance, removing some of the extremely obscure and complex provisions that have bedevilled local government for many years and extending freedoms and opportunities to local authorities.

The Bill has already been scrutinised; it was published before its introduction in the summer, and the then Select Committee on Transport, Local Government and the regions was able to consider it. We have been able to respond to a number of the Select Committee's suggestions, and have made one major change: we removed provisions relating to our previous intention of combining the national non-domestic rate with the proceeds of council tax. That was largely welcomed. I believe that sufficient time is available to us under the programme motion. The 14 sittings will give us plenty of opportunity to consider the full range of issues, which, as I have said, have already been subject to detailed pre-legislative scrutiny.

The Bill will make important changes to local government, and it is important that it reaches the statute book in time to allow implementation of the new prudential system by 1 April 2004, if possible. That is what local government anticipates, so I hope that we will not have too many synthetic expressions of unhappiness from the Opposition about the lack of time. That would, essentially, be a cover for delaying tactics to try to prevent the Bill reaching the statute book—a Bill that is eagerly awaited by local government, which will extend important new freedoms to it.

The number of knives has been limited to ensure that the Committee can devote as much time as possible to the areas that it considers most important, while allowing reasonable flexibility to organise our proceedings in the most efficient way. The motion is sensible and I commend it to the Committee.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

I, too, wish to express my pleasure at having the

opportunity to serve in Committee under the joint chairmanship of you, Mr. Griffiths, and Mr. Conway, and my pleasure at once again facing the Minister. It is one of the peculiarities of this place that, whereas the previous Committee on which we both served was small but conducted its business in the cavernous expanses of Committee Room 14, the powers that be have decreed that this large Committee of 29 Members should be squeezed into one of the smaller Committee Rooms. I am sure that, 20 years down the line, I will still be trying to work out how such things are decided.

I am delighted that the Minister is in his place with his customary expression of happiness and enjoyment in his work—especially as he has at least two Bills and a fire strike to deal with, which I imagine is quite a management exercise. I hope that there will be a measure of consensus in our consideration of this Bill. However, if the Minister thinks that Opposition Members will accept that the Government's timetable allows adequate time to consider a large and complex Bill, I shall have to disappoint him.

Parts of the Bill are welcome—welcome on this side of the House and welcome in local government. However, as the Minister has acknowledged, other parts of the Bill are extremely controversial, and they are most unwelcome in local government.

The Bill is long—it contains 122 clauses and several long schedules—and we know that it will get longer. New clauses have already been tabled. One of them has Government support although, curiously, it is not in the Government's name. I refer to new clause 1, which will be very controversial and will warrant considerable debate in Committee. The Opposition will also be tabling a new clause that deals with the same area, suggesting ways in which other parts of legislation may be strengthened to ensure that the Government's intention in supporting the repeal of section 2A of the Local Government Act 1986 is achieved in practice. The issues raised will add to the time that will be required for deliberations on this Bill.

A new clause, which has yet to be tabled by the Government, will repeal section 19 of the Fire Services Act 1947. That may not be terribly controversial, but it will no doubt provoke a discussion on some of the wider issues that surround the future organisation of the fire service. Those matters will be dealt with in sittings 12, 13 and 14.

Before I move on, I want to ask the Minister about another possible new clause that I have been considering, which is not in any sense party political. I have considered tabling a new clause that would extend to local authorities outside London the powers that are enjoyed by local authorities in London to control establishments that offer cosmetic body piercing. Many hon. Members will be concerned by this issue and will be aware of the recent tragic death of a young man in Sheffield as a result of septicaemia contracted following a body piercing in an unlicensed establishment.

When the hon. Member for Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) was a Health Minister, in reply to a written question she said:

''The Government believe there should be primary legislation introduced to give local authorities outside London powers to regulate the hygiene and cleanliness of cosmetic body piercing businesses, when parliamentary time allows.''—[Official Report, 10 January 2000; Vol. 342, c. 53W.]

The Bill gives us an opportunity to do that. I have had a stab at drafting a new clause but the relevant section of the London Local Authorities Act 1991 runs to nine pages, so the issue is complex.

Would the Minister be predisposed to cross-party work to draft a new clause that could be moved in Committee or on Report to achieve something that the Government have said should be done when the opportunity presents itself? In view of the recent tragedy in Sheffield, I suspect that hon. Members of all parties would feel that the issue is ripe to be addressed. If the Minister can help us with that, it will represent yet another new clause, and I believe that further new clauses relating to registered social landlords are yet to be tabled by the Government.

The net result is that we will have just 11 sittings—27 and a half hours—before we reach clause 116. In the previous Committee on which the Minister and I served, we discussed the use of grammar and the English language, subsequent to which I wrote to the Minister for School Standards to see whether he agrees with the Minister for Local Government and the Regions about certain aspects of grammar and how they should be taught in our schools. Perhaps we can now move on to mathematics. If my mathematics serves me well, we have a fraction over 14 minutes to scrutinise, debate and decide on each of the first 116 clauses. The Minister is wrong if he thinks that those who will be affected by the Bill will consider that to be adequate time for parliamentary scrutiny of such an important and complex Bill.

In fact, the situation is worse than that because, according to the knives that have been inserted, we must reach clause 73 by 5 pm next Thursday, which, by my calculations, gives us just over 12 minutes to consider each of the first 73 clauses. That does not allow for these introductory discussions and any Divisions that might interrupt our deliberations. That is frankly a scandal.

The Government's only defence, which the Minister predictably gave, is that the Bill was published in draft and has been considered by a Select Committee. The Minister is right; the draft Bill was considered by a Select Committee. The Committee said:

''The Government promised to redress the imbalance between central and local government. This Bill fails to achieve that. It makes some small steps in the right direction but at the same time increases the power of the Secretary of State. Central Government seems to be terrified of trusting local authorities and allowing them their independence.''

It continued:

''The draft Bill is far too reliant on regulations. The Government should set out its intent on the face of the Bill, not through secondary legislation.''

The Committee concluded:

''The White Paper on which this Bill is based, raised considerable expectation about a change in the relations between central and local government. On the whole the draft Bill appears to be far from a radical overhaul and in many cases gives more powers to the Secretary of State. The way in which it is drafted could enmesh local

authorities in more regulation. We are furthermore concerned that aspects of the Bill centralise powers unnecessarily. We strongly believe that if local government is going to regain the public respect and authority it once enjoyed, the Government must be prepared to trust it much more''.

In other words, although the fact that a Select Committee has deliberated on the draft Bill is used as a reason why we have less time for scrutiny, the Committee's conclusions create a strong imperative for more time being given to scrutinise what it identified as a weak and inappropriate Bill.

Mr Edward Davey (Kingston & Surbiton, Liberal Democrat)

I agree with everything that the hon. Gentleman says, but the situation is even worse that he alleges. On Second Reading, the Chairman of the Transport, Local Government and the Regions Committee told the House that the Committee had had only a week to examine the draft Bill and make its considerations. Therefore, it is outrageous that this Committee has been allowed so little time to scrutinise the Bill.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

I agree entirely. This is a big, important and complicated Bill. This is an early test of the pre-legislative scrutiny system. If the Government are simply going to use the fact that there has been pre-legislative scrutiny as an excuse to curtail proper scrutiny during the passage of this substantive Bill, that system falls at the first hurdle.

The Labour-dominated Transport, Local Government and the Regions Committee has exposed the Government as spinning the exact opposite of what the Bill actually does. The Select Committee rejected many key issues in the Bill and it falls to us to deal with those weaknesses, notwithstanding the guillotines put in place by the Government.

We will do our best—I know that the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Mr. Davey) will do the same for the Liberal Democrats—to scrutinise the Bill carefully. Not all clauses will require the full 12 minutes of time allocated, but many clauses will require much longer. Frankly, I doubt that all of the clauses will receive scrutiny or debate in this Committee. Therefore, on a practical level, I appeal to the Minister to do his bit in trying to ensure that we have a reasonable chance of scrutinising the principal clauses by not chewing up the Committee's time reading out what he described in the context of another Bill as ''a load of guff'' from his brief. He should limit his responses to answering the questions of Committee members. If he can do that, hopefully we will be able to scrutinise the maximum possible number of clauses in the Bill.

It is bad enough that the Bill has been guillotined, which allows us a hopelessly inadequate allocation of time. It would be intolerable to listen to ministerial filibuster on clauses early in the Bill at the expense of an opportunity to properly scrutinise those further on. We will play our part in seeking to ensure that debate is constructive and to the point, but we will not dance to the Government's tune by passing over matters that require debate because of the timetable. If, at the end of the Committee's deliberations or the fall of any

knives, some of the clauses have not been debated, the responsibility will be the Government's alone.

Mr Edward Davey (Kingston & Surbiton, Liberal Democrat)

It is a real delight to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Griffiths, for the first time on a Standing Committee. My hon. Friends and I look forward to your guidance and that of your colleague, Mr. Conway.

In relation to previous Bills in this Session of Parliament, I have reminded the Minister of some of the marathon debates that he and I had to endure in the proceedings of the Greater London Authority Bill, which met for three months in a similar-sized Committee. The proceedings were fraught and went late into the night. We will not have that pleasure in proceedings for this Bill, especially with the motion before us.

I agree with much of what the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) said, but it was unfair of him to suggest that the Minister ever speaks ''guff''. Unlike some of his colleagues—not, I emphasise, his colleague in Committee today, but some of those who served on the Standing Committee for the Greater London Authority Bill—he is often to the point, clear and helpful to the Committee in its proceedings.

It is a great privilege to serve on the Committee with my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Sue Doughty), who is especially concerned about how provisions in clause 11will affect councils in her constituency. It is also pleasing to serve with my hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Dr. Pugh), who will be joining us shortly. He is an experienced council leader as well as a member of the Select Committee that scrutinised the Bill, so he should be able to help us.

It is a particular delight to welcome the hon. Member for Shrewsbury and Atcham (Mr. Marsden), who is a recent addition to the Committee. Plaid Cymru was not willing to take up its place and, since the Government Whips were kind enough to allow us to take it, we eagerly accepted it. My hon. Friend will no doubt be of help when we scrutinise issues regarding Wales.

The Minister will know that my colleagues I and voted for the Bill on Second Reading. We welcome much of the Bill, whether on business improvement districts, the reform of council tax, or the prudential capital regime, as far as those go. Despite the many welcome aspects, the Committee has a serious job to do, because vast improvements could be made, not least to the prudential capital regime that we will debate this morning. The Bill is a step in the right direction, but many more steps are needed before it becomes something under which local government will be truly free of unnecessary and onerous intervention from central Government.

I think that the Minister is keen to hear the debate and that he comes to the Committee with an open mind. I hope that he will listen to some of the arguments with respect to winning new freedoms for local government and that he will try to take the

Treasury influence away from such matters. Some of us have detected that Treasury officials and Ministers had their sticky paws all over the Bill before the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister published it and got it to this point.

As the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge said, there are a number of new clauses that have already been, or may be, tabled by the Minister. The hon. Gentleman may also be threatening us with some new clauses. That backs up the argument of both the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats that we need more time to debate the Bill. Some of us doubt whether the Government believe their own rhetoric when they say that the Bill is historic and will make sweeping changes to local government, but if that is the case, the Committee should surely debate it more closely than the 14 sittings will allow.

If the sittings motion is put to the vote, my colleagues and I will not support it—we did not support it during the Programming Sub-Committee—because we believe that the Bill is worthy of greater scrutiny. Unlike the Conservative Opposition, we came to that position from a belief that there is much of worth in the Bill upon which we want to build. Our position is different from that of the Conservatives.

Should Conservative Front-Bench Members criticise the Government for limiting the freedom of councils some of us will be impatient, because many Government and Liberal Democrat Members remember the kinds of controls and restrictions that successive Conservative Governments put on local government. There would be a degree of, and a smell of, hypocrisy were we to hear from the Conservatives this morning that they want local government to be freer of the shackles of Whitehall than the Labour Government propose.

I suppose that we should welcome sinners who have repented, but the 18 years—[Interruption.] The Conservative Whip accuses me of being a sanctimonious creep. I am not sure whether that remark is in order, but it appears that I have got up the hon. Gentleman's nose during the first sitting, so I mark that down as one-nil to us.

I hope that the Conservatives will not be hypocritical and that, should they call for greater freedom, they will preface their remarks by saying, ''We regret that we failed to do that during our 18 years.''

Mr Nick Raynsford (Minister of State (Local and Regional Government), Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Greenwich & Woolwich, Labour)

I shall respond briefly. I thank the hon. Members for Runnymede and Weybridge and for Kingston and Surbiton for their kind remarks and I look forward to renewing our acquaintance in Committee. We had a constructive engagement in the Committee that dealt with the Regional Assemblies (Preparations) Bill. We will consider that Bill on Thursday, and I must express my appreciation of the flexibility that has been afforded us, which allows us to concentrate on that Bill on Thursday instead of the present Bill.

The hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge rightly referred to the range of measures and the number of new clauses. He specifically asked about a

new clause relating to body piercing. We have sought legal advice on whether that would be within the scope of the Bill; we have not received an immediate answer, but I will let him know about that either verbally or in writing as soon as possible.

However, there are important new measures relating to fire, on which the hon. Gentleman commented, and to other crucial issues, particularly the universally incorrectly referred to section 28, the repeal of which we will come to. It is right that there should be space for consideration of those measures in subsequent sittings of this Committee.

There are 116 or so clauses in the Bill, but many of them are uncontroversial. The first clause, which we will come to shortly, defines the powers to borrow of local authorities, and it is significant that the Opposition have tabled no amendments to it. It is a sensible, practical, well-expressed clause that can be quickly agreed to. Therefore, the mathematical calculation that the hon. Gentleman has made might be inaccurate, because we will not require the 16 or 12 minutes—or however many minutes he has calculated that we have—to consider that clause, unless he speaks at length during the clause stand part debate, which I am sure that he will not.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

I certainly will not speak at length in the clause stand part debate for clause 1. However, I do have questions to put to the Minister about that clause, and I would caution him not to assume that if amendments have not been tabled, that means that there are no issues to be raised. I do not know how the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton has approached this, but I have chosen in respect of some clauses not to table amendments but to raise particular issues during the clause stand part debates, because of the limited time that is available.

Mr Nick Raynsford (Minister of State (Local and Regional Government), Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Greenwich & Woolwich, Labour)

As we go through the Bill, the hon. Gentleman will see that a number of clauses are broadly acceptable, so that no amendments to them are required—indeed, they would look perverse. Therefore, we will be able to make rapid progress at some stages. However, I accept his point that other clauses will be more controversial, so there will be a need for greater debate. That is as it should be.

All of us have experience of Committees where, after a great fuss at the beginning by the Opposition about a lack of time, as proceedings develop it becomes clear that there is not much of substance to debate, and we end up having lengthy and not entirely productive discussions about the appearance of the word ''but'' at the start of a sentence.

Mr Desmond Swayne (New Forest West, Conservative)

Will the Minister give way?

Mr Nick Raynsford (Minister of State (Local and Regional Government), Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Greenwich & Woolwich, Labour)

I am delighted to have stimulated the hon. Gentleman.

Mr Desmond Swayne (New Forest West, Conservative)

The Minister will recall that during that lengthy debate, much of the time was taken up by hon. Members from his own party—and not least by himself.

Mr Nick Raynsford (Minister of State (Local and Regional Government), Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Greenwich & Woolwich, Labour)

The fact that the Opposition had to focus so much energy, attention and time on the issue of the appearance of ''but'' at the start of a sentence

was an indication that the expressions of outrage at the shortage of time that we heard at the beginning of the Committee's proceedings might not have been entirely justified.

The only other comment I wish to make in response to the remarks of the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge is about the reference to a load of guff. My recollection of that—it might be incorrect—is that I had been prompted by hearing his colleague, the right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer), referring in the Chamber in an interesting way to his parliamentary and ministerial legacy of the 1990s as a load of guff.

I look forward, in the same spirit as the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton, to hearing the current Conservative party describing its legacy from the 1990s as a load of guff. That is our view of it. This Bill is designed to sweep away a lot of that guff, and I hope that we can make rapid progress with it.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

The guff that my right hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk, Coastal and I have referred to is the kind of stuff that comes out in reams from those neat little ring binders that Ministers tend to have.

I had not noticed that there are four Liberal Democrat Committee members. Given the way in which the Liberal Democrat Members seem to be collaborating with the Government on some of the most controversial issues that will be put before the Committee, that is telling. Now is an historic moment, because I suppose that the previous time when four Liberal Democrat Members were present in one Committee was in 1909.

Mr Edward Davey (Kingston & Surbiton, Liberal Democrat)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

I do not have time to give way at the moment. The Minister has not dealt with the substantive issue that was raised about the Select Committee's comments on the Bill. I urge my hon. Friends to vote against the timetable motion, and I hope that Liberal Democrat Members will join us.

Question put:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 15, Noes 9.

Mr Win Griffiths (Bridgend, Labour)

Before we proceed, I remind the Committee that there is a financial resolution and a ways and means resolution in connection with the Bill,

copies of which are available in the Room. Adequate notice should be given of amendments. As a general rule, I do not intend to call starred amendments, including those that may be reached during an afternoon sitting. I also remind members of the Committee to switch off their mobile telephones.