Bournemouth Borough Council Bill [Lords]

We were debating this amendment a week ago and I was in the process of summing up the debate. I am pleased to say that since I sat down last week an important conversation has taken place between myself, Bournemouth borough council and Manchester city council about these two Bills. What has effectively come out of that conversation is that Bournemouth borough council and Manchester city council realise that the Bills go far too far and they are prepared to concede a series of significant and substantial amendments and concessions. Although I know there will still be people, particularly in the pedlar community, who think that those concessions do not go far enough, I have taken the view that as I am in a position of relative weakness—as reflected in the votes on these issues, where I rarely got more than a dozen of my Back-Bench colleagues to support the case I put forward—reaching a compromise that involves significant concessions, which could of course have been made much earlier or even several years ago, is a worthwhile achievement. I commend the flexibility of both Bournemouth borough council and Manchester city council in agreeing to those concessions, even at this late stage. One can imagine that people become rather entrenched and say, "If I give ground now, I shall look like a weakling."