Member

I turn briefly to the amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, concerning the establishment of a joint committee. The proposal, of course, is unobjectionable, and may have certain modest advantages. London Councils already includes a joint committee, because the Transport and Environment Committee is already a statutory joint committee. I always thought that more use could be made of that for the purposes referred to by the noble Lord. It is also true that the current system for grant distribution—whereby a lead borough takes the grant from the Government, manages it and distributes it to other boroughs—has worked, despite being a little clunky. I do not object to this joint committee, but it is a little insipid. It is not going to change much: the change is modest and administrative, and might achieve very little. My fear is that it is masking the direction that the Bill is taking us, and we should be going with some rapidity.