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Regulatory Enforcement and Sanctions Bill [Lords]
12:00 pm
Pat McFadden (Minister of State (Employment Relations and Postal Affairs), Department for Business, Enterprise & Regulatory Reform; Wolverhampton South East, Labour)
This clause is also important because it deals with the priorities for regulation at a local level. Over the years, different priorities have been given to local authorities to enforce. Local authorities have said to us in the past, quite fairly, “We are being asked to do a lot of different things. A list of things that we are asked to do by all the different Departments would be long.” With that in mind, the Government recently asked Mr. Peter Rogers to conduct a review of the different local authority enforcement priorities, and to give some sense of priority to the priorities, if I may put it that way. He produced an extremely valuable list, and the clause will ensure that it is updated over time.
It states:
“LBRO must...publish...a list specifying matters to which a local authority...should give priority when allocating resources”
and that local authorities
“must have regard to the appropriate list”.
Of course, rightly, subsections (5) and (6) state:
“LBRO may not publish”
such a list
“without the consent of the Secretary of State”
or, when relevant,
“without the consent of the Welsh Ministers”.
I do think that this is an extremely—