Clause 25 - Information
Fire and Rescue Services Bill
9:25 am
Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede and Weybridge, Conservative)
It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair again, Sir Nicholas.
The clause deals with the information that a fire and rescue authority might be required to supply to the Secretary of State. My instinctive concern, when we are dealing with a local service that is accountable locally, is that the Bill will create the wrong relationship between that body and the Secretary of State. Clauses 25 to 27 are grouped under the heading ''Supervision'', and this clause puts the fire and rescue service under an obligation to submit various reports and returns to the Secretary of State.
I do not like provisions that suggest that the relationship should be that of the schoolboy sending in his prep for marking by the headmaster. I accept that some information must be available centrally, not least so that Ministers cannot hide behind the time-honoured convention of rebuffing questions from Members by saying that information is not collected centrally. I hope that only sensible data will be collected under the clause. The explanatory notes give examples of sensible, unexceptional and acceptable information that the Secretary of State can collect, such as the numbers of fire deaths and casualties, information that it is useful to have centrally.
The Bill, however, gives the Secretary of State a wide power, so amendment No. 100 would require a fire and rescue authority to submit only those reports and returns that he ''reasonably'' requires. I have learned over the years that the Secretary of State always acts reasonably. That is not in any sense a comment on the behaviour or inclinations of the current incumbent of that office—