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Housing Corporation (Delegation) etc. Bill

I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I did bring those matters up in Committee. The Bill will require the board to delegate to individual officers or sub-committees decisions on the disposal—and registration, would you believe?—of housing associations. I find it extraordinary that we are giving the Housing Corporation the right to appoint an officer to approve and register a housing association. Surely the original Act of Parliament was designed to make the board make that decision. With all due respect to the directors involved, I do not think that they are particularly overworked. I understand that they have been meeting once a week to deal with business under the present rules, and something like £250,000 of taxpayers’ money is paid to them each year. So the additional responsibility would not represent a great strain. The Bill represents a missed opportunity. I understand totally why the Government have introduced it, but legislation introduced in haste and involving retrospection is normally either wrong or unnecessary.