Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)

My Lords, I will raise a couple of broader points about where we are. A strong leadership system operates well when you have only two parties represented on a council. We are about to have local elections in which the number of councils elected with only two parties represented, and one party holding a clear majority, will probably be smaller than it has been for a very long time. Where we have multi-party politics, the need for co-operation and engagement among all those on council is of a different order than under the strong leadership model. If the Government do not recognise that, they are utterly failing to future-proof this Bill. On Motion F1, the noble Lord, Lord Robertson, is going around the country talking about the Government’s failure to recognise the very radical implications of the strategic defence review. He talks about the need for mobilisation of the population at local level to deal with the new hybrid, civil and other threats facing this country. If we want to mobilise local volunteers and local services, we will have to engage our local population. If we have only distant councils representing half a million people, the population in Bradford will not be mobilised and will remain as disillusioned and unengaged as before, and the SDR will fail.