London Local Authorities Bill [Lords]

I was describing people who would simply pretend that they had not received the notice because there would be no trace of it, but my hon. Friend is right that there would be another group—those who genuinely did not receive the notice. What happens in that situation? Does the local authority simply send people to close down an establishment even though the proprietor has no knowledge that that is about to happen? Could that happen when the proprietor has lots of customers inside their establishment, which would cause a great deal of embarrassment for them and damage any legitimate businesses they might have? That is a totally unsatisfactory state of affairs. If someone is having their business closed by the local authority and if their establishment is deemed to be unlawful, surely the least they can expect is a guarantee that they will receive the notice that makes that clear. Surely it is this House's responsibility to defend people's freedoms in this country, and to ensure that local authorities have taken every reasonable step to ensure that somebody knows about an enforcement that is about to take place. We should not allow there to be doubt as to whether someone has or has not received a notice. I am sure that Royal Mail does a fantastic job, but even it would not guarantee that every letter reaches its intended recipient. I ask my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green to think again on amendment 21 and also to think of the upside and downside for local authorities of defying it. I hope that he will reflect on that and decide, in the spirit of consensus that he has adopted, to accept it. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch on his diligence and hard work. Such things are very important to people. We see from the lack of numbers in the Chamber that other hon. Members have probably not even bothered to look at the provisions in the Bill, whereas he has gone through them with a fine-tooth comb and found where our individual freedoms are being put at risk by unnecessary local council bureaucracy and officialdom—and sometimes even worse. I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch for tabling the amendments, and I am delighted that my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green has accepted them. I do not know whether he has done so tactically to oil the wheels of the Bill or whether he has been persuaded by the case made by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch. I suspect the latter. My hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green is a reasonable man who listens to the arguments, and I genuinely believe that he has been persuaded by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch. I hope my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green has been persuaded of the merits of amendment 21 and that he will reflect on it while there is still time. I suspect that he will not change his mind on amendment 9, which is why I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch will find a way to press it to a Division, and that you, Madam Deputy Speaker, will find a way to accept that. I can assure my hon. Friend that if that happens I will support him in the Division Lobby, because I want to support and defend the fundamental freedoms of people in this country, not least those of people from my constituency who visit London.