Lord Porter of Spalding (Con)

I draw the attention of the House to my interest, as set out in the register, as a vice-president of the Local Government Association. I have nothing but sympathy for the Minister. She is having to do a very difficult job in very difficult circumstances, and to put a shine on something that we know is not worthy of being shined at the moment. I wish her good luck in her attempt to resolve the local government funding settlement battles she will face over the next couple of years. The same Treasury people who made the decisions last year will almost certainly be making the decisions next year, so the reality is that she will not have a bigger cake to cut. If she is going to choose to divide that cake slightly differently, she will have to make sure that she at least says sorry to the people who are going to lose. It is quite obvious that stopping the rural services delivery grant in this settlement is £110 million of essential money for a lot of councils. On the back of it, people will almost certainly be getting “at risk” notices in the new year, until the Government come up with some sort of compensation for taking that money away, if nothing else. When you go to the new homes bonus the year after next, a lot of people will be put at risk because many small, underpaid councils rely on that payment to pay staff wages.