Member

One issue strikes me, although we have not discussed it, as very important in this debate. It is that when you have a strategic authority, a mayoral area, that is urban and rural, the population of the urban area will be greater than the population of the rural area. The consequence is that the number of councillors representing rural areas will be smaller than the number of councillors representing urban areas. So, alongside rural-proofing through embedding rural issues, as suggested in Amendment 310, I have concluded—I said this to the Minister a week or two ago when we had a discussion about Report—that there are two areas where competencies should be added. One is culture and the second is rural affairs.