Clause 41 - Payments towards local authority indebtedness
Local Government Bill
11:00 am
Mr Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight, Conservative)
I should like to assume that many similar points would have been made in debating this clause as were made during the debate on clause 40. I make that presumption in order to save time, but hon. Members may wish to intervene if it is untrue.
I wish to return to some of the answers that the Minister gave to some of the questions that were asked about clause 40 and to apply them to clause 41. I thank the Minister for the good answers that he directed to me on the income stream, even though they were answers not to my questions but, I suspect, to those of my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest, West.
In order to save time, I will not repeat my speech on clause 40, but I ask the Minister to go back over it and to assume that it was made in reference to clause 41. I wish him to explain how local authorities have got themselves into a position where they need to have debts written off. I understand the more recent history of that topic. My hon. Friend the Member for Cotswold referred to local authorities—some of them are Conservative-controlled councils—that have large debts because they have recently taken control of hitherto badly run local authorities, and my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest, West mentioned other local authorities that have failed to invest sufficient sums in the maintenance of their capital stock. Can the Minister tell me whether these authorities have a history of either having a large surplus or a particularly badly maintained public housing stock which has led them to need—or to feel that they need—to transfer the stock with a large overhanging debt? I ask that because I have a genuine desire for more information on it. Can he give the Committee additional information on why this clause might be necessary, in the context of the remarks I made in the previous debate?