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Greater London Authority Elections (Election Addresses) (Amendment) Order 2008

My Lords, I offer my apologies to the Minister and to the House—packed, as it is—for arriving late for this order. After all the time that I have been a Member of this House, I should have known that it is possible for the House to break for dinner business before 7.30 pm. It was only a fortuitous telephone call from our Whips’ office that encouraged me to come here at very great speed. I thank the Minister for introducing the order. Like him, and from my perusal of the order, I can see nothing of any controversy in it. On such occasions I sometimes worry that, when the original parent Bill went through the House, it was one of the opposition parties that demanded that the delegated legislation should be made a matter for affirmative rather than negative resolution. In this case, if it was my party, I apologise; but I do not know whether that was the case. I do not have any questions that need to be put to the Minister. I am only amused by Article 5, which talks about candidates of two or more parties putting together a joint manifesto. I can assure the noble Lord that I do not think that our candidate in the coming mayoral election, or any of our individual candidates for the Greater London Authority elections, will want to do a joint booklet with members of other parties.