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Violent Crime Reduction Bill

moved Amendment No. 89:"Page 12, line 43, at end insert—" ““(   )   A local authority may not make an order designating a locality as an alcohol disorder zone if the whole action plan, or the majority of the actions contained therein, is being put into effect.”” The noble Baroness said: This is another amendment suggested, although not sponsored, by the Wine and Spirit Trade Association, the British Retail Consortium and the Association of Convenience Stores. We had a canter around the edges of this with Amendment No. 88 tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Addington. As the Bill currently stands, under subsection (8) of Clause 13, the local authority can make an order designating a locality even if the eight-week period following the publication of the action plan has not expired. My amendment would ensure that a local authority cannot act in a pre-emptive way. We would argue that an action plan should be allowed time to work and for its effectiveness to be monitored and assessed. I am not looking at the situation, as the Minister did earlier, in which nothing is happening; I understand that it is not getting worse. I am looking at a situation in which local businesses have signed up to the action plan and are working with good will to deliver it. I do not want us to be in a position in which the local authority can then simply ignore all the work that is being done and say that it will go ahead and jack in the period of waiting and designate the area. The Government have emphasised that they hope that the action plan would itself be the means to solve the problem of alcohol disorder and that the action plan should be allowed to work its course. That underpinned the arguments made by the Ministers in the other place. That would give local businesses involved in putting the plan into effect the chance to ensure that they can co-operate with each other and with the local authority to contribute to reducing the problems, and give them the chance that they want to avoid having the extra charges placed on them at the end. My amendment means that, if they are making a real effort but have not got as far as finishing the work that is supposed to be done in that period, do not clobber them by going straight into designation. I beg to move.