Mr.
McFadden: I recognise the challenge. My old boss, the
former Prime Minister, was referring to the great Whitehall machine
when he talked about having scars on his back. In the Bill, what we are
talking about is important but in a different way. It is about how
local authorities and organisations enforce regulation. The challenge
for LBRO is to ensure that the two weaknesses identified by
Mr. Hampton, those of inconsistency and inflexibility which
I mentioned a couple of minutes ago, can be dealt with. Not all of that
is done through the clause and we will go on to talk about the
different powers that the LBRO uses to carry out its
functions.
We believe
that it should be an organisation with teeth and I welcome the hon.
Gentleman’s indication that he agrees with that. Some of the
amendments before us might, if passed, reduce the LBRO’s powers
to be effective and could leave us with a weaker organisation. I do not
want that to happen. The message from business is very important.
Business wants to see clarity and consistency in the enforcement of
regulation. It is one thing to have a debate about the substance of a
regulation and whether it is necessary, but it is another to lack
clarity about how that will be enforced in different parts of the
country. That issue is an essential part of LBRO’s
work.
However, it
is not just about how LBRO works at local level. An important part of
its job will be to speak to the regulators and to central Government
about the regulations. It is not only an “eyes downward”
organisation at local level; it has an important upward voice. The
Government believe that currently there is a gap there, which LBRO will
be able to fill. It has an important role, both in advising central
Government and in ensuring consistency in the application of regulation
at local level.
Mr.
Prisk: I am grateful to the Minister; it has been a useful
exchange. Clearly, the LBRO is one of the principal elements of the
Bill, and all the powers and subsequent clauses in part 1 relate to
whether it will be able to fulfil its task. I remain sceptical about
its ability to fulfil that role, but I hope that it achieves it. I hope
that the Minister’s sunny optimism will be proven right and I
would be more than happy to—I was going to say buy him a pint of
Guinness, which perhaps after Friday’s marvellous result would
be even more appropriate. I am happy to be proven wrong, but at the
moment I am not entirely convinced. However, the clause is there and I
am grateful to the Minister for putting on the record the
Government’s confidence in the ability of LBRO to do this with
the resources and powers that it has. On that note, I will delay the
Committee no further.
Lorely
Burt: May I confirm that we are discussing schedule
1?
The
Chairman: No, we are not.
Question
put and agreed to.
Clause 1
ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedule
1LBRO:
supplementary
Mr.
Prisk: I beg to move amendment No. 17, in
schedule 1, page 38, line 13, leave
out sub-paragraph
(3).
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss the
following amendments: No. 18, in schedule 1, page 38, line
17, leave out sub-paragraph
(5). No.
19, in
schedule 1, page 38, line 20, leave
out
‘special’.
Mr.
Prisk: These are probing amendments and seek to put
certain details on the record, which I hope will enable the
implementation of the legislation to be improved. Amendment No. 17
seeks to delete subsection (3) on page 38. Its purpose is to ask the
Minister what we mean by Welsh Ministers. Are they members of the Welsh
Executive, Ministers of the Crown, or both?
Amendment No.
18 is another probing amendment, which relates to paragraph 3(5) of the
schedule. It
states: “LBRO
is to pay to or in respect of the ordinary members such sums as the
Secretary of State may determine by way of or in respect of
remuneration allowances, expenses, pensions or
gratuities.”
I am not entirely clear
what that text means; perhaps there is an additional or a missing word,
or a typographical error. I am not sure, but I shall be happy if the
Minister would clarify that. I have three or four different
interpretations of it, and I would be interested to hear the
Minister’s reply as to whether there is an additional
“to” in
there. Thirdly,
amendment No. 19, relating to paragraph 3(6),
reads: “If
the Secretary of State thinks that there are special circumstances that
make it right for a person ceasing to be an ordinary member of LBRO to
receive compensation, LBRO must pay to that person such compensation as
the Secretary of State may
determine.” Can
the Minister explain what he regards as those “special
circumstances”?
Lorely
Burt: I am a little confused by these amendments. I am not
entirely sure why the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford maintains
that they would make enforcement more effective by taking out any rules
regarding how the LBRO should be composed. If amendment No. 18 means
that LBRO members would not be civil servants, why does he want to
delete
that?
Mr.
Prisk: These are entirely probing amendments. I have no
wish to delete them, and it is not my wish to move them. My purpose is
clarification of the
Bill.
Lorely
Burt: That is fine. I wait with bated breath what the
Minister has to say in
response.
Mr.
McFadden: We had a debate about the basic purpose of LBRO,
and schedule 1 gives significant detail on how the organisation is
proposed to be established and run. I shall briefly answer a couple of
the questions asked directly by the hon. Member for Hertford and
Stortford. The term “Welsh Ministers” means members of
the Welsh Executive.
He asked
about the wording in paragraph 3(5) of the schedule. As I understand
it, this is absolutely standard wording for describing payments to
people doing this kind of work, so we see nothing unusual about that
wording. The whole schedule is designed to give effect to LBRO and to
enable it to carry out its work, in seeking to support local
authorities in developing an approach consistent with the principles of
better regulation.
The
schedule—or rather, the Bill—will, as well as the
functions that we have talked about, also help to give LBRO a role in
preparing lists of priorities for enforcement for local government,
which can be an issue, given the number of different priorities that
central Government gives. In terms of the specifics of the amendments,
I am glad to see that they were probing, because the effect of
approving the amendments would be to neuter the body from the
beginning, so I hope that the answers that I have been able to give on
the subjects of payment and Welsh Ministers have been
helpful.
Let me turn
to the third of the amendments, amendment No. 19, which asks about
“special circumstances”. We have deliberately set up the
body to operate independently of Government, bringing the expertise of
its members to bear on issues raised by local authority enforcement.
The wording of “special circumstances” follows well
established precedents, and I shall mention just a few. For example,
similar measures were included in relation to board members of Natural
England in the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act 2006. The
Value Added Tax Act 1994 specified that there can be
compensation: “If
a person ceases to be a chairman of VAT tribunals and it appears to the
Lord Chancellor that there are special circumstances which make it
right that he should receive
compensation”. There
is similar wording in the Criminal Justice Act 1988. The Bill follows
those models and provides for the possibility of cases where the
provision of some form of compensation is appropriate. Such
circumstances would be
rare. I
hope that I can clarify things for the hon. Gentleman. We do not
believe that there should be a presumption for compensation to be paid.
That is why “special” is used. Board members will come to
the end of their contract naturally or could be removed for any of the
other reasons set out in the schedule, including committing a criminal
offence or failing to comply with the terms of their appointment. In
the vast majority of cases, it would not be right for compensation to
be paid. However, it seems prudent to us for the Bill to allow for
unknown contingencies. The reasons for that inclusion means that we
have used “special” to describe circumstances in which
compensation might be paid. I hope that that helps to clarify the
point.
Mr.
Prisk: I am grateful to the Minister for providing those
clarifications. As he knows—I know you know, Mr.
Chope—one of the purposes of probing amendments is not
necessarily to change the legislation, but to make sure that those
putting it into practice understand the
Government’s intention. Often the Bill cannot provide that.
Therefore, the purpose of the three probing amendments and of a good
number of others is to use our deliberation to get that clarification
on the
record. I
am grateful about amendments Nos. 17 and 18. I am particularly grateful
for the recognition and clear statement that there should be no
presumption about payments under sub-paragraph 3(6). On that
basis—the hon. Member for Solihull can unbate her
breath—I beg to ask leave to withdraw the
amendment. Amendment,
by leave,
withdrawn.
Mr.
Prisk: I beg to move amendment No. 20, in
schedule 1, page 39, line 39, leave
out subsection
(1).
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss the
following amendments: No. 21, in schedule 1,
page 39, line 40, leave out subsection
(2). No.
22, in
schedule 1, page 40, line 3, leave
out subsection
(4).
Mr.
Prisk: These are, again, probing amendments—bated
breath or otherwise. Let us look at page 39, dealing with paragraph 8,
on committees surrounding the operation of LBRO. Amendment No. 20
removes the provision for LBRO to establish “one or more
committees”. The provision is perfectly reasonable, but it would
be helpful to know the Government’s intention or wish concerning
the scope of those committees. It would help us to know the
limits. Amendment
No. 21 is similar. It seeks to delete sub-paragraph
(2): “A
committee established under this paragraph may include persons who are
neither members nor employees of
LBRO.” The
clause permits anyone to be on such a committee and, as we learn later,
that is a paid position. Money comes from the public purse. Who
appoints? What will the basis of those appointments
be? Amendment
No. 22 is about paragraph 8(4), which is at the top of page
40: “LBRO
may pay sums by way of or in respect of expenses to or in respect of a
person who is a member of a committee or of a sub-committee established
under this paragraph but who is not a member or employee of
LBRO.” That
is a wide statement. Given the heightened public interest in expenses,
to what are the rules for those arrangements subject? What independent
oversight might there be, should things go
awry? 11
am
Mr.
McFadden: The amendments relate to the capacity of the
Local Better Regulation Office to appoint sub-committees. One example
of an important sub-committee that one would expect an organisation
like this to appoint is an audit committee. We would also hope to allow
the appointment of expert advisers to that committee and to pay its
members. This is an independent body, operating at arm’s length
from the Government, and it needs that independence to create the right
governance arrangements for its statutory role. If I may refer to
similar organisations and parallels in other legislation, both the
Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment, created by the
Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005, and the Serious
Organised
Crime Agency, created by the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act
2005, have similar powers to create
committees. The
LBRO will not necessarily stop with an audit committee; it might wish
to appoint an advisory committee, to advise it on issues raised by one
or more of its functions. It should be a matter for the LBRO to decide
whether it wishes to go down that road, but it may set up committees
that will help it achieve its objectives. I hope that that gives some
clarity on the purpose of the measure.
The hon.
Gentleman asked a couple of specific questions. LBRO itself would
appoint the individuals. Payments would be governed by the usual public
money rules. As will be discussed later, LBRO has to account to both my
Department and Parliament for its expenditure in the normal way. It has
been granted a budget for the next few years, pending the approval of
the legislation in Parliament, but any expenditure on paying people on
its committees will have to come out of that
budget.
Mr.
Prisk: I am grateful to the Minister for responding. I
have no wish to try to instruct the LBRO in advance regarding specific
committees. Our purpose is to clarify exactly how this will work and
what recourse there would be for Government, and thence Parliament, to
ensure that it is operating in an effective way. I am not overwhelmed
by the Minister’s response. I accept that there is an
established principle and I presume that Nolan was the process that he
was referring to as regards public deliberation. I do not know whether
he wishes to consider that. I have no wish to press the amendment to a
vote because I am well aware that it would prove a nonsense, but it
would be helpful if the Minister reflected on clarifying which
particular rules he refers to and whether he feels able to consider any
advice that may be forthcoming. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the
amendment. Amendment,
by leave, withdrawn.
Mr.
Prisk: I beg to move amendment No. 23, in
schedule 1, page 41, line 2, at
end insert ‘no later than 30 days after its
receipt’.
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss
amendment No. 24, in
schedule 1, page 41, line 25, at
end insert ‘no later than 30 days after its
receipt’.
Mr.
Prisk: These two amendments deal with our ability to hold
the LBRO to account. Members of the Committee will realise that the
annual report of the LBRO is the principal document that the House will
have in order to consider the performance of the organisation that the
Bill establishes. I am trying to ensure that our scrutiny is timely. I
therefore wish to insert a phrase to both paragraph 12(5) and paragraph
13(6). Paragraph 12(5) of the schedule
states: “The
Secretary of Sate must lay before Parliament a copy of each
report” —that
is, the annual
report— “received
under sub-paragraph (2)(a).”
My amendment would
insert the
phrase, “no
later than 30 days after its
receipt.” I
am sure that it is not the intention of Ministers to unduly or
deliberately lay such documents significantly later than
that—six months or a year or so—but if we are to
scrutinise these matters as a House, it is important that we have the
documentation within a reasonable time. I think that 30 days is a
perfectly reasonable time within which we could expect those documents
to be forthcoming. If scrutiny is to be effective, it must be timely. I
hope that the Minister will treat the amendments in a positive way, as
these are matters that should be pressed.
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