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Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Bill [HL]

My Lords, I agree. Certainly, if the noble Baroness would like, we can table a whole series of amendments that would make this work. The pre-2004 position would need rethinking because the world has changed a lot, but it was much more local. I would like to see the development of a much more bottom-up approach. We did not table a lot more amendments, because we did not want to detain the House for a long while. If anyone wanted a lot more detail about what might happen if there were ever a Conservative Government, they could read the Conservative Green Paper on local government. Let us get back to this issue. I accept the noble Baroness’s integrity on this and I think that she really believes it will work. It might work in some places, but it will not work in a lot of places. We are creating a piece of legislation, like we did four years ago, which someone will have to redo in two or three years’ time, because it will not work on the scale that has been suggested. I do not think that we will get very far today, but I should test the opinion of the House to make certain that it is on the record. Division on Amendment 159A Contents 18; Not-Contents 102. Amendment 159A disagreed. Clause 68: Leaders’ Boards Amendments 160 to 160B not moved.