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Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

I shall make two points on the Minister’s comments. First, she said that the standard level of the levy needs to be set nationally to ensure that there is a proportionate contribution from business. Is it not the case that there will be different costs in different areas? That is in the nature of the diversity of the country and of local authorities. Therefore, to set a standard levy may not reflect that diversity. My second point is about Part 1—that seems so long ago that I wrote down the title of the Bill and then realised that we are still on it. We talked a lot about the need for police forces and local authorities to work in collaboration and co-operation, and I hope we will come back to this on report. In proposing that more resources go to local authorities, perhaps the Government will see that in the context of local authorities working with their police forces to deal with the impact of some of the difficulties arising from the late-night economy.