Greater London Authority Bill
2:00 pm
Yvette Cooper (Minister of State (Housing and Planning), Department for Communities and Local Government; Pontefract and Castleford, Labour)
On a point of order, Mr. O’Hara. I want simply to put on the record an apology to Committee members. On Second Reading, we undertook to publish a draft order on the Mayor’s planning powers in time for us to be able to discuss it in Committee when we reached the relevant clause of the Bill. We published the draft order on Tuesday and made it available to the Chairs of the Committee, but unfortunately, due to confusion, it was not circulated to members of the Committee, although it should have been. I want to apologise to members of the Committee for that.
We did today, as soon as we became aware that Committee members had not received the draft order, circulate copies of the draft order. If any Committee members do not have a copy of it, they should please contact me and I will ensure that they receive a copy as speedily as possible, as we had wanted to ensure that Committee members had copies in time for the deadline for tabling amendments to the relevant provision of the Bill, which is the end of today.
I thank both Opposition parties, which I know have had discussions through the usual channels about the matter, for their understanding and for accommodating us.