I, too, put on record my congratulations and thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood (Mr Spencer) for the sterling work he has done on introducing this important Bill. I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for North East Hampshire (Mr Arbuthnot) for his interest in the Bill and for giving me the opportunity to explain the Government’s position.
Local authorities should act in a reasonable, accountable and transparent manner. The Government have already taken action to make local authorities more accountable by improving town hall transparency in decision making—for instance, by allowing the public to report on town hall meetings by tweeting, blogging, and even, in some cases, filming those proceedings. This Bill adds to that transparency. It requires local authorities to put their health-and-safety related decisions about events in writing. We would already expect them to do that anyway. It is reasonable to expect that if an authority is advising someone of something, it does so in an e-mail or a letter.
This Bill adds to the accountability of local authorities. It gives the person who received the decision or the event organiser, if that is a different person, the right to request a review that the local authority must complete in no more than 15 days.