Canterbury City Council Bill

My hon. Friend makes an important point, which was discussed in the last Parliament in the context of some Bills. For example, in the context of the Bournemouth Borough Council Bill, I raised it as an issue because I represent the adjoining borough and I was concerned about the knock-on effect of banning pedlars in one town and what would happen in an adjoining town. It has been discussed, but I am bound to say that the promoters of the Bills denied that there was ever going to be a problem. In that respect, there was general denial. On the point about entrepreneurial spirit, I can remember—with a bit of help from the Official Report for 14 January, when we last discussed the Canterbury City Council Bill—drawing the attention of my hon. Friend who was then on the Front Bench to the paper produced by Paul Braidford of St Chad's college at Durham university, which was all about selling in the street and pedlary as a entry route to entrepreneurship. That was an important paper and my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose), who was then dealing with such matters from the Front Bench, said that he had seen the paper—because I had only just given it to him—and that he was going through it. I hope that the Minister has looked at that paper, too. He has obviously mastered it, because he seems to have got the message that although pedlary might be based on ancient statute, it is still a unique activity in our country. It is a national means by which people who want to get out and try their hand at enterprise can do so.