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Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister. Does she accept that one of the reasons why we have had such difficulty with this is because of the clear, unambiguous remarks made in another place by the then-Minister, who is on record as saying that the proposals in the Bill are intended to relate only to the local authorities that are under consideration? We have wasted quite a lot of time having a debate around that, whereas if he had been much more clear and had enabled the noble Baroness to be clear in Committee about the exact status of the proposals, we could perhaps have saved ourselves and the House a great deal of time.