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Localism Bill

I will not, because I made a commitment that Members would be free to go to our late colleague's funeral. It is a shame that, although the Opposition say they support localism, they have hit upon an ingenious solution to oppose it in practice, which is to seize on any instance in which central Government intervene to pass down power and to focus on that intervention, rather than on the transfer of power which is its purpose. But the blindingly obvious fact is that the Bill is overwhelmingly decentralising. It favours the local over the central. Like the movement en masse on a Thursday afternoon of Members from this place to their constituencies, so the effect of the Bill is to see power leave Westminster and go where it is better vested, in local communities, and to give them their head. This is a significant Bill. I hope we will make continued progress in the House of Lords. I believe that we will look back in 10, 20 or 50 years and see today as a turning point. The tide of centralisation has turned, not just because of the Government's decentralising measures, but because communities across the country are demanding change. That change is already under way. The Bill will speed up the process and establish it in law. For its part in that change, I commend the Bill to the House.