London Local Authorities Bill [Lords] (By Order)

My hon. Friend makes a good point, but I believe that the basic premise is that abuse of the law is no excuse. If people are seeking to litter in London, they should take the consequences. I am sure my hon. Friend's constituents would do no such thing when visiting our fine city of London, however. Clause 6 corrects an anomaly. At present, only commercial premises are required to prevent the accumulation of litter outside their buildings. This measure allows all public buildings—whether schools, hospitals or police stations—to be covered by the legislation. Closing that anomaly makes all people responsible for keeping their buildings clear of detritus. Clause 7 includes the rather peculiar measure of the reintroduction of the power to install turnstiles in public lavatories. I never thought I would be elected to talk about public lavatories. I thought I had left that behind when I left Barnet council. However, this is not the old-fashioned, almost portcullis-type turnstile of the 1960s and 1970s; this is the modern turnstile that we are more used to in tube stations, which is fully disability-accessible. This measure will allow particularly the City of Westminster to use the revenue from the turnstiles to be reinvested in the provision of services, including those facilities themselves. We are asking our councils to do more with less and we expect public toilets, particularly in the centre of London, to help in that. This provision will allow the City of Westminster to continue to provide much valued services. Clause 8 is predominantly about the ““polluter pays”” principle. Those of us who live near fast-food establishments will be increasingly annoyed about getting up every morning to find a line of fast-food wrappers all down the highway or pavement. We are used to the people responsible being prosecuted for the litter they generate, but this measure allows councils to recover the costs from the commercial operator trading from the public highway. At present, the council can only recover the cost of the administration of issuing a street-trading licence. This allows the council to recover the costs of clearing and sweeping the highway, and particularly of taking away the litter generated by that street trading. In this age of austerity, if we are asking our councils to do more with less, we should allow them to recoup the cost of providing such services from those who caused the problem.