Localism Bill

My Lords, as always I am grateful to the Minister for her reply. I rather wish now that I had gone into each amendment in a little more detail, because they are worthy of discussion. I do not accept entirely the responses of the Minister, but now is not the opportunity to discuss them in detail. However, I am grateful for her willingness at least to consider the issues further. As I said, the amendments were suggested by the Centre for Public Scrutiny, which has considerable experience, and an obvious interest, in ensuring that scrutiny, by whatever system, works more effectively and that we learn from the experience of previous years in order to improve it. That is the sole object of my amendments, which I am sure that all noble Lords will share. We will certainly take the Minister up on her offer of further discussions, not just on the specifics of the amendments—she is sympathetic to some and clearly not to others—but to try to ensure that the Bill achieves what I hope it seeks to achieve, which is to grant local authorities more freedom to conduct scrutiny, to do so more effectively and to do so in respect of other organisations with whom they share services, help to deliver them or play an important part in local communities. Given the assurance from the Minister, I beg leave to withdraw the first in this raft of amendments and will try to keep up as we go through the rest. Amendment 45A withdrawn. Amendments 46 to 49V not moved. Amendment 50 Moved by