---

Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Bill [HL]

People used to say, "Never ask questions unless you know the answers", but I do, I am afraid. I did not get all the answers that I was expecting from the Minister on these amendments. Having heard what she said—and I shall read it carefully in Hansard—I am increasingly alarmed and a little frightened about what the implications of these bodies might be. I have three quick points. When she was talking about housing there seemed to be an assumption that if a major housing regeneration were part of a regeneration of an area, which it often is, that function ought to be handed over to the EPB. I do not understand why we cannot have a body at sub-regional level—a group of councillors working together on regeneration—but with the district councils or unitary councils at a more local level still carrying out the housing functions as part of that regeneration. Clearly, that could happen, but the assumption of what the Minister said is that it would not and that if there were a big regeneration it would all go to the EPB.