Commissioner for Older People (Wales) Bill [HL]

I shall offer briefly a contrary view to the one expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Roberts, on the commissioner’s report and on communications with Whitehall Ministers. An excellent and constructive development that has occurred since the Government of Wales Act is the useful and constructive relationship that Assembly Ministers have built up with Whitehall and Whitehall Ministers. I became very aware of that when we took evidence in the Richard commission, and in the contacts that we had during the period of that report with Assembly Ministers, who really valued that relationship. There were regular meetings, and the process of communicating views about Welsh matters in non-devolved areas, or areas that straddled devolved and non-devolved matters in some cases but in some cases were non-devolved, was felt to be invaluable and was growing with greater and greater success. It would be unfortunate if we opened up a completely different conduit now, with commissioners turning up in Whitehall. Surely, the answer is that the commissioner should send his reports to Assembly Ministers and that Assembly; if that report is then endorsed and if it raises issues about non-devolved powers, the real power and real strength would come from the Assembly Ministers and the Assembly itself in using the direct channels of communication to Whitehall to convey those views. That is a far better alternative than the one proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Roberts.