Baroness Armstrong of Hill Top (Lab)

My Lords, first I declare an interest as a recipient of a local government pension. I also congratulate my noble friend; having been a Local Government Minister for four years, I know how difficult any local government legislation is, as is anything that talks about devolution of any sort. I thought it interesting that the Liberal Benches concentrated on the very local—that is important—but there is also a need for bigger and wider authorities to do the really strategic stuff. I am reminded of the reason that we were able to attract inward investment in the north-east, at one time. It was precisely because of the amassing of land by the Tyne and Wear metropolitan authority, which was then demolished and disbanded by the then Prime Minister Mrs Thatcher, when we lost that strategic organisation in the region. I want to dwell on those more strategic things. First, and very quickly, I really support the attention given to the transfer of community assets. As many Members know, I am chairing an independent commission on neighbourhoods. I have used most Fridays in the past year to have another look at difficult neighbourhoods. Those which have been working on neighbourhood development have really made a difference when they have been able to use community assets and had more control to use them as income generators too, so that they do not have to wait all the time for the public sector to have enough money to fund their youth work and activities with the elderly, the lonely and so on. I really support the Government for pushing this on both sporting facilities and community assets. But I mainly want to talk about something that is also in the Bill that, again, I have spoken on in this House before: the need for better accountability and audit of the regional bodies and combined authorities. I know there are Members opposite who celebrate the end of the Audit Commission, but the reality is that that has left significant groups and areas in our society without any effective audit and accountability. In the north-east, we have particularly suffered from this. I know that when the first combined authorities elected their mayors, the then chair of the Public Accounts Committee brought in the—