Localism Bill

My Lords, this is the first in a series of amendments on the position of standards committees. A small number of us might like to have seen the Standards Board preserved, but clearly that will not happen. The focus of this amendment and subsequent amendments, which will be moved by other noble Lords, is on the preservation of standards committees in councils. This amendment deals with the position on page 256 of the Bill of authorities which currently have such committees and it would amend the previous legislation to omit most, if not all, of those listed. It is probably an accident of grouping that it appears here rather than with Amendment 97, to which I have added my name and which the noble Lord, Lord Tope, will move. I assume that the noble Baroness will not be here. I apologise to your Lordships for the fact that if we go more than a few minutes past seven o’clock, I will not be here either because I need to get back to my home in the north tonight. In case that eventuality arises, I add my strong support to the requirement for standards committees to be preserved. We need a mechanism in councils that is independently chaired—other amendments go into the detail of how such a procedure might work—to retain the confidence of the public in the standards to be observed by those who represent them locally. I hope that it will not be the same as the standards regime in another place but experience suggests that there is a need for a properly constructed scheme under which complaints can be ventilated and dealt with speedily, locally and impartially to sustain confidence in local democracy. To that end I move this amendment and indicate my support for the subsequent amendments.