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Sustainable Communities Bill

I strongly agree with my hon. Friend. It is interesting that although the concept of patient choice is being promoted strongly, not least by the Government, people will feel that that concept is meaningless if they are not allowed to choose the hospitals that they wish to retain. My hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip-Northwood cited the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who said last year that"““in the new century people and communities should now take power from the state””." Such rhetoric is easy, but the Chancellor has also said that the patient cannot be sovereign in the national health service. If the patient cannot be sovereign, who is? The Chancellor has also proposed that health care decisions should be administered by a quango—not the people at all. My second example relates to planning. My hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, East (Mr. Ellwood) said that a regional assembly is affecting planning decisions in his constituency. The south-east has the same problem, with the South East England regional assembly and its associated boards taking decisions on such things as roads. I am trying to persuade the assembly and board that they should introduce a bypass in Arundel, which has been promised by successive Governments but not delivered. However, it is difficult for me to make my voice heard because the unelected assembly and board are not answerable to the local community. When I asked for a meeting with the Minister of State, Department for Transport, the hon. Member for South Thanet (Dr. Ladyman), I was told that he would not be willing to see me until he had taken regional advice. The region tells me that it is unwilling to offer advice to the Minister because it is not certain whether it will be overturned. Such a system creates a vortex whereby local people are entirely shut out from a decision that directly affects them. More importantly, people are not being properly represented because quangos that are not answerable to local communities have been set up. My third example relates to the police. I became quite certain that the Bill represented a move in the right direction when I heard the Minister for Local Government this morning citing the police as an example of how additional devolution of budgets has been granted. I have been looking at police funding closely over the past year. It is clear that local communities have very little say over what happens to their local police force and the operation of community safety. Police authorities are almost entirely invisible from the local community and include unelected members. Community safety partnerships and crime and disorder reduction partnerships are completely invisible to local people. The constant refrain that I hear from local people—I am sure my hon. Friends and Labour Members hear this in equal measure—is that they do not feel able to influence the way in which policing operates in their communities. If the Minister was saying that there has been sufficient devolution of budgets to local communities and that communities really have a say on policing, he needs to think again.