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Local Government (Devon, Norfolk and Suffolk)

I was pretty amazed when I realised that the Minister had taken time out from her doubtless busy schedule to write that letter, at the very moment when I had assumed she would be carefully crafting her eloquent, reasoned, closely argued and evidence-based response to the debate. Instead, she decided to write to the local authorities in the two counties concerned urging them to do what, ironically, they are already doing. She extols the virtue of joint working, and she and I are at one on that. The irony is that the two counties, and indeed Suffolk, which remains in some kind of municipal limbo, are all local authorities with excellent records in joint working. I shall take this opportunity to give some examples. Norfolk has an excellent and detailed shared services agreement and its LEAPP programme—lead, engage, aspire, perform in partnership. In Devon there is the integrated Devon concept and a series of joint local strategic partnerships, joint chief executives and joint service provision—all the things that the right hon. Lady is urging them to do, they are already doing without any need to be told by her. There is a joint growth point between Exeter and East Devon councils, which is important for these purposes because of all the growth outside Exeter. In Suffolk there is a pathfinder scheme for joint working. Those are not local authorities that require a lecture from the right hon. Lady about joint working. The letter says something about the Government's priorities, and indeed about their timing and public relations, but I do not suppose we should expect otherwise. It demonstrates that the Government have made, in the words of one response from Norfolk that I have seen, "a perverse decision". In the words of the Saffron Housing Trust—not a particularly political body, I suspect—it was "the least rational choice".