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Local Authorities (Overview and Scrutiny) Bill

The hon. Gentleman raised that issue in an intervention on the hon. Member for Christchurch. I am happy to give the reassurance that I think they were working their way towards during their exchange. The formal designation relates to a district council and therefore the concept of a borough council has no impact at all. The purpose of the provisions is to avoid unreasonable regulatory burdens that would result from different bodies scrutinising separately. I hope that the hon. Member for Christchurch will recognise that his amendment would open up the scope for extra regulatory burdens on business and voluntary organisations and will not press the amendment. I listened carefully to the hon. Gentleman's comments, and I consider the amendments other than amendment 1 to be unnecessary. I hope that he will now agree not to press them, and to support my amendment 1, with which he seemed to have a great deal of sympathy.