I regret to report to the House the death of Peter John Law, Esquire, Member for Blaenau Gwent. I am sure that Members on both sides of the House will join me in mourning the loss of a colleague and extending our sympathy to the hon. Member's family and friends.

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Last year, the Public Accounts Committee asked the Home Office to notify it of the numbers of foreign criminals guilty of serious crimes who had been released without proper consideration of whether they should be deported. Last November, the Home Office told the PAC that there were 403 such foreign nationals. It now transpires that the number was more than 1,000, 160 of whom were recommended for deportation during the sentencing process, yet only five have been deported.

The Home Secretary briefed the press at 12.30 pm today and laid a statement in the House at 2.11 pm, so the House could not have been aware of the situation before the press. As far as I am aware, we do not have a mechanism to bring the Home Secretary to the Chamber to answer for that major Government failure. Can you give me guidance, Mr. Speaker, about how on earth we can bring the Home Secretary to book for not protecting the safety of the public?

I am on the record as saying often that I prefer Ministers to come to the House. When such matters appear on television and statements are issued, I have either been preparing for the Chair or have been in the Chair, but I promise the right hon. Gentleman that I will look into the matter and ask the Home Secretary to give me an explanation.

On a completely different point of order, Mr. Speaker. Last Thursday, as I am sure you are aware, the shadow Leader of the House said that the Prime Minister misled the House. It transpires that the Prime Minister was absolutely right when he said that

"in the Thames Valley strategic health authority area . . . in 1997, more than 2,500 patients waited longer than 13 weeks for their out-patient appointment; today the figure is none."—[Official Report, 19 April 2006; Vol. 445, c. 116.]

The point on which I seek your guidance, Mr. Speaker, is that in the past you were robust when Members used the phrase "misled the House". Indeed, last year, you asked two Members to leave the Chamber: the hon. Member for Tewkesbury (Mr. Robertson), when he said that the Minister for Employment and Welfare Reform, my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Margaret Hodge) had misled the House, and the hon. Member for Carmarthen, East and Dinefwr (Adam Price) when he said that the Prime Minister had misled the House. I hope it is still your view, Mr. Speaker, that that phrase is unparliamentary. Surely, whatever our differences, we should all treat each other as honourable Members.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. This happened last Thursday. It was dealt with, and we move on. Perhaps it is best that the term "misleading" never be applied to the comments of any right hon. or hon. Member.

Further to the point of order raised by the shadow Home Secretary, Mr. Speaker. I would have wished to table an urgent question this morning, Mr. Speaker, had the Home Office made its written statement early enough. It was my question in the Public Accounts Committee that led to the information—as it turned out, the inadequate information—being released. Given that the information that is now coming from the Home Secretary is that the foreign nationals released from prison without consideration being given to their deportation or removal included four kidnappers, four arsonists, 62 drug dealers, nine rapists and three murderers, it is hard to see what could be a more serious matter, in relation to which a Minister should come before the House. On many occasions, Mr. Speaker, I have heard you deprecate Ministers' failure to make a statement to the House first. I wonder whether you should perhaps consider further measures that you should take when Ministers fail to do that.

The hon. Gentleman and the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (David Davis) have raised this matter. To be fair to Ministers, I will look into it. In other words, I will hear the other side of the story. That is the best thing that I can do. On urgent questions, Back Benchers and Front Benchers are entitled to apply for an urgent question, but, of course, it is up to me whether I agree to it.

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I am desperately concerned about the safety of my constituents and other constituents in Hertfordshire. The chief fire officer of Hertfordshire told me this morning that, sadly, there is a dispute involving the excellent firefighters in Hertfordshire and that there is likely to be a strike soon. The chief fire officer has applied to the Ministry of Defence for servicemen and women to help to protect our constituencies with fire cover should a strike take place. I understand that, for the first time ever, the MOD has refused. Will a Minister come to the House to explain why the MOD is not going to protect our constituents when that dispute takes place?

The hon. Gentleman, like every other hon. Member, has a constituency to protect. My best advice is for him to call for a meeting with the Minister and put the case that there is a serious problem involving the fire services in his constituency and that his constituents must be protected.

Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. It is not just the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning) that is affected. Neighbouring areas, such as Bedfordshire, may be affected, as well. There is a degree of urgency about the matter that requires my hon. Friend to make the application to bring a Minister before the House, rather than just have a meeting. I would be very grateful, Mr. Speaker, if you understood that the concerns go wider than just my hon. Friend and his constituency.

I can only draw on my experience as a Member of Parliament. One of the strengths of being Speaker in the House of Commons is that I have to have a constituency in the same way as everyone else. My first port of call would be to demand a meeting between the Members affected, led by the hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning), and the appropriate Minister—whether that is a Defence Minister or the Minister for Local Government. There is a Minister in that Department who used to a fireman, so he will know about the matter. [Interruption.] It seems that the hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead used be a fireman, too. Well, it will be a good meeting. That is my advice.

I beg to move,

That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision with regard to notices of redundancy; and for connected purposes.

I applied to present this Bill some time before last week's announcement at Peugeot, because I have thought for a long time that something should be done about companies arbitrarily announcing redundancies. We have certainly had a spate of them doing so in the west midlands over the past two or three years. Hon. Members will remember what happened at Rover, and it happened again at Rover fairly recently. Coventry had the Peugeot announcement recently and the Jaguar announcement last year, and some hon. Members will remember what happened at the Standard Motor Company about 20 years ago.

Such things have happened to us over a long period. Nevertheless, I know that the Bill will not stop redundancy as such, but that is not really the issue: the Bill will certainly make it difficult to close factories arbitrarily, and some major companies are ignoring the social consequences of such decisions not only for their employees, but for their employees' families. In fact, the labour forces at Jaguar and Peugeot were increasing quality and productivity, and they were told in return that the companies would increase investment—certainly, in Coventry—but in both instances that never happened.

Only about 18 months ago, I had an Adjournment debate in the House about whether Peugeot would take a grant offered by the Government, which never materialised. Since then, the company has played cat and mouse with not only Ministers but its employees and their families. The announcement was a bitter pill for the families, but it was a slap in the face for the labour force. Companies are effectively telling their labour forces these days that, even if they improve quality and productivity, they might be down the road in a couple of weeks or a year's time. That is not very satisfactory. My Bill therefore aims to bring UK employment legislation into line with the minimum European standards on information and consultation.

The Bill has three main points: administration, liquidation and input into investment decisions through the labour force's representatives, which can take many forms. Employees must be part of the decision-making process during the administrative phase of a company and prior to liquidation. Very often, in those circumstances, employees are not treated the same as a preferential creditor or as the taxman. They are about fourth or fifth in the pecking order, and by the time it comes to them, they find that they have a problem. In some instances, they get only statutory redundancy pay. Only when employees are part of that decision-making process will they be able to provide meaningful input into the direction of any financial decision made by the company. Consultation post liquidation is simply lip service and, frankly, ineffectual in protecting employees' jobs and pensions.

As happens in some European countries, the Bill seeks mandatory consultation with employees, preferably under the umbrella of a works committee. Strict financial penalties should be applied to companies that fail to consult, and specific waiting periods must be observed between each stage of the process. In some European countries, the law requires companies or groups with at least 300 employees, as well as smaller companies with works councils, to hold negotiations every three years, as a means of informing and consulting their employees on the company's strategy and its expected impact on employment and work force and skills planning.

Companies in the UK are obliged to provide information only on issues consequential to investment decisions. However, the information should be given in such a fashion as to allow representatives adequate time to study and to make alternative investment proposals. The Bill aims to create a level playing field for investment decisions made by companies in line with their counterparts in Europe. We cannot allow a situation to continue where companies are easily able to uproot without fulfilling all their commitments to their employees.

Over the last 20 years, Coventry has seen the closure of the Standard Motor Company, Rolls-Royce at Parkside, Massey Ferguson and Jaguar. Coventry also had some input into Rover, and now we have Peugeot to add. We have doubtless all heard about the 2,300 job losses at Peugeot by 2007, which emphasises the weakness of employment legislation. Workers at Ryton have been excluded from meaningful consultation on the future of the company, which never confirmed whether it would take up the European grant of more than £14 million.

Employees were left out of the decision-making process and were used only in a "consultative exercise"—a trend that must be reversed. That and future decisions will have an inevitable ripple effect on this country's economy. The choice is clear: we should introduce the same employment protection that other employees enjoy in Europe. Without a doubt, we need a more proactive industrial policy and stronger employment laws, which would save jobs.

The west midlands contributed £77.3 billion to our wider economy in 2003. Until we show our determination to protect jobs in the west midlands and the country more widely, we will see a significant decline in one of the UK's largest regional economic contributors. I therefore urge the House to give its wholehearted support to the Bill.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Jim Cunningham, Mr. Geoffrey Robinson, Mr. Brian Donohoe, Mr. Jim Devine, Mr. Bill Olner, Mr. Brian Jenkins, Jim Sheridan, Anne Moffat, Christine Russell and Mr. David Hamilton.

Notification of Redundancy

Mr. Jim Cunningham accordingly presented a Bill to make provision with regard to notices of redundancy; and for connected purposes: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time on Friday 16 June, and to be printed. [Bill 171].

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

This is a short, two-clause Bill, which is designed to deal with technical problems that have arisen due to an omission in the legislation governing the powers of the Housing Corporation. Those difficulties arose following recent legal advice to the Housing Corporation, which has subsequently been confirmed to the Government. The advice makes it clear that the Housing Corporation board does not have any express power in legislation to delegate statutory functions below board level and that such a power cannot be implied by the terms of the statute.

Prior to that advice, the Housing Corporation and everyone else believed that the board had an implied power to delegate its functions. Indeed, since its inception over 40 years ago, the corporation has been acting on that basis in good faith. That means that the Bill needs to fulfil two functions. First, the Housing Corporation needs to be put on the same footing as other non-departmental public bodies and given the explicit power to delegate functions below board level. Secondly, the Bill needs to deal with any uncertainty about historic decisions made by the Housing Corporation to ensure that no problems about past decisions arise inadvertently either for the corporation or for housing associations and lenders.

The Bill gives the Housing Corporation board the express power to delegate its functions to members, committees and employees and it will have retrospective effect in deeming the corporation always to have had such a power. The effect will be to restore the status quo, bringing the corporation and other interested parties back to the position that they believed they were in before the problem was discovered. The Bill does not confer any new powers or functions on the Housing Corporation.

I had a bet with the Under-Secretary of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Canning Town (Jim Fitzpatrick), who will reply to the debate on the Bill, about the number of hon. Members who would remain in the Chamber at the point when I concluded my speech. On the current count, I am still winning the bet, but I concede that this is not the sexiest piece of legislation that the House has had to debate. Nevertheless, it is important for the Housing Corporation and those tenants who live in registered social landlord properties across the country.

I hope that the Bill will have widespread support from hon. Members across the House. I thank the Opposition spokesman for meeting the Housing Corporation and the Council of Mortgage Lenders to be briefed on the Bill. I know that they will understand that while this is a minor legislative change with technical effect, it is important for the operations of the corporation and for the decisions made by housing associations and lenders.

There are areas of housing policy on which there are strong differences of opinion between the parties, and I am always keen for an opportunity to debate those dividing lines, but on this occasion I hope that the whole House will support the measures. They are sensible measures that remedy problems with previous legislation for the Housing Corporation. It is important that the Housing Corporation can conduct its business effectively. The corporation is a non-departmental public body of the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, and was established under the Housing Act 1964 to oversee the housing association sector. Its legislative provisions, role and functions were updated and amended in the Housing Associations Act 1985 and in the Housing Act 1996.

Today the Corporation plays a crucial role in regulating nearly 1,800 housing associations that own or manage more than 2 million units of social housing and provide a range of other services to the broader community. The corporation also delivers the funding allocations for new social housing and shared equity homes in England through the national affordable housing programme, which for 2006 to 2008 involves £3.9 billion of investment to deliver an estimated 84,000 affordable homes.

I would hate the Minister to think that we were not all listening. I am grateful to her for giving way. Of the money that the Housing Corporation allocates, very little seems to come to shire districts such as mine, where there were two large-scale voluntary transfers. So we have two new housing associations; neither of them is particularly big, and neither of them is doing any new build. As a consequence, there is a black hole and the only way in which working families can now get housing is in the private rented sector, which just does not provide stability. I wonder how the Minister sees the Housing Corporation allocating funds to areas such as mine where there are working families in need of social housing, as in other parts of the country.

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point about the need for social housing but also for shared equity homes, which many people now want in order to make the first step on the housing ladder. The corporation allocates its funding according to the principles set out by the regional housing board, so I certainly urge him to make his concerns known to the board if he feels that distribution in his area is not appropriate. The Housing Corporation also works with bids that come in so he may want to talk to the newly established housing associations in his area about putting in bids for future allocations of social housing and affordable housing.

We have made it clear that we think that we need to increase the provision of social housing and shared equity homes across the country, and we are funding a 50 per cent. increase over the next few years. We also think that that needs to be a priority for the spending review, so I assure the hon. Gentleman that we are committed to increasing social housing and affordable housing across the country, and I urge him to talk to his local agencies about ensuring that there is an appropriate allocation for his area.

The decisions that the Housing Corporation takes around regulation and funding allocations have huge implications for housing associations, for lenders and most importantly of all for the tenants who live in housing association homes. The corporation has an impact on the lives of several million people, many of whom are among the most vulnerable in the country. Given these important roles in regulation and allocation of public funds, it is critical that they are able to operate without any legal uncertainty around the decisions that they take.

The Bill has two clauses. Clause 1(1) gives the corporation an express power going forward to delegate the exercise of its functions to individual members of its board, its committees, sub-committees and employees. At the time of the Housing Corporation's creation it was common for public bodies and other NDPBs not to be given an explicit power of delegation, primarily because such bodies took fewer statutory decisions and it was plausible at that time for all these decisions to be carried out by the board.

Since then, the vast majority of those bodies have become defunct or their founding legislation has been modernised and they have been given an explicit power of delegation. Similar non-departmental public bodies set up in more recent years that operate with public funding or with regulatory roles have express powers so that the board can delegate their statutory functions appropriately. English Heritage, which was set up in the 1980s, English Partnerships, the Audit Commission, the Commission for Social Care Inspection, and the Commission for Healthcare Audit and Inspection all have express powers to delegate.

When Parliament originally set up the Housing Corporation in 1964, there was no intention that it should have an express power of delegation. Is it not the case, therefore, that the Government wish to pass retrospective legislation, even though that was not originally intended by Parliament?

It was not practice at the time to include such an express power. After its inception, the Housing Corporation believed that it had implied power in legislation to delegate its functions to its committees and sub-committees, as other organisations delegated such functions. The legal advice that the corporation received at the end of last year made it clear that it does not have that express power, and that it cannot assume that there is such a power in legislation. However, the corporation has been operating on that basis for decades, and lenders, successive Governments and agencies that worked with it made decisions in good faith on the basis of that understanding.

Clause 1(1) is not retrospective, as it establishes a power for the future. It brings the corporation's powers into line with the vast majority of other such bodies. It allows for administrative efficiency, because it is clearly not practical, given the number of statutory decisions that must be made by the corporation on a day-to-day basis for all such decisions to be taken by the board itself. We have attempted to discover from old files why consideration was not given to updating the provisions on the Housing Corporation in the many pieces of housing legislation passed since 1964, including the Housing Associations Act 1985 and the Housing Act 1996. It appears either that there was administrative error about the need for such provision, or that there was genuine belief on all sides that the existing legislation was sufficient.

As I have made clear, revised legal advice to the Housing Corporation at the end of last year confirmed that there was no such express power. Since receiving that advice, the Housing Corporation board put in place alternative methods of working to ensure that all subsequent decisions were made by the board. That is clearly an impractical way for it to continue to operate in the long term, but I thank board members who had to put in considerably more time than they anticipated during those months.

I am interested in the number of board meetings. I believe that board members meet once a week for a meeting that is not exceptionally long and receive a salary of £250,000. I am not sure, therefore, that there is a significant strain for the directors.

The board has to consider a series of things that it did not expect to consider under the previous understanding. It will be able to operate differently as a result of the Bill. It is not a sensible use of board members' time if they have to make every single statutory decision. Board members must decide the most appropriate use of their time and which decisions should sensibly be delegated to committees, sub-committees or officers. That is a matter for them. It hampers their ability to do their job if the board has to run through every decision. Of course there are obligations with respect to the time that members put into doing the job, but if they have to take decisions that are not a sensible use of their time, they do not have the time to put into other aspects of the Housing Corporation's work that might benefit more from their input and experience.

Subsections (2), (3) and (4) address the historic decisions taken by the Housing Corporation and consequently by housing associations and lenders. Subsection (2) gives the corporation and Housing for Wales a retrospective power of delegation to any of its members, committees, sub-committees or employees. That is intended to ensure that statutory decisions already taken are not invalid just because they were delegated by the board on the presumption that it had an implied power to do so. The provision will remove any doubt about the validity of such decisions on the grounds that they were not taken by the board itself, and essentially restores what was assumed to be the status quo.

Although it is retrospective, the provision does not have any of the undesirable elements generally associated with retrospective legislation. No rights are affected by it and no parties are left worse off. It returns us to the position that everyone thought we were in until the end of last year. It is likely that without the retrospective provision, there would not be complete legal certainty about decisions, and the chances of parties being left worse off would be greater.

The House takes retrospective legislation seriously—that might explain why a number of Members are present—and it must consider carefully whether such legislation tramples over previous decisions. Perhaps in this case it does not, because of the nature of the Bill, but has the Minister fully considered that possibility?

We have taken the matter seriously. We considered seriously whether we needed legislation at all or whether there were other ways of addressing such concerns. We had extensive discussions not only with the Housing Corporation, but with the Council of Mortgage Lenders and other lenders. They raised with us issues of legal certainty and the difficulties that they would face if there was uncertainty about previous decisions, which might involve lending decisions and decisions about the transfer of resources. Even though we were able to offer reassurance—for example, about the provisions of the Land Registration Act and other measures—it became clear that the retrospective provision was necessary in order to end the legal uncertainty about past decisions. Many of those past decisions have consequences for future lending and investment decisions, it was important to ensure that we addressed concerns about uncertainty with respect to the past.

The role of subsection (3) is to validate past decisions taken or evidenced by a document duly executed under the seal of the corporation or of Housing for Wales. Subsection (4) provides that where the fixing of the seal has been witnessed by any member or employee of the corporation or Housing for Wales in the period prior to the Bill, it has been properly witnessed. The intention of these subsections is to end any uncertainty created by this technicality in respect of past decisions. The last two subsections effectively draw a line under past decisions of the corporation that have been duly executed under seal and authenticated by a member or employee of the corporation, removing any doubt about their validity. Consequently, third parties can assume that a decision properly executed by the corporation under seal is valid.

The Bill will have effect in Wales in respect of decisions of the corporation relating to housing associations in Wales before the establishment of Housing for Wales, and during the later period when the corporation's former functions were carried out by Housing for Wales. Since 1999 these functions have been carried out by the National Assembly for Wales and there is no question about the validity of such decisions.

The Bill will also have effect in Scotland in respect of decisions of the corporation relating to housing associations in Scotland before the commencement of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1988. That Act established Scottish Homes, which took over the Housing Corporation's responsibilities in relation to housing associations in Scotland. Those responsibilities were subsequently transferred to Communities Scotland, an agency of the Scottish Executive. At the end of March, the Scottish First Minister gave the go ahead to a Sewel motion proceeding through the Scottish Parliament. When that process is complete, it will allow the Bill to apply to Scotland. The corporation has never operated in Northern Ireland and as such the Bill does not extend there.

As I have said, the Bill is of a technical nature and rectifies an anomaly in the legal basis of the Housing Corporation, which is basically a result of its age. The corporation was founded in a less litigious age, when founding legislation operated differently from how it does today. As I have said, the Bill does not give the Housing Corporation any new powers. It will act to protect the Housing Corporation's legal position, innocent third parties and to ensure that those living in social housing have the proper protections to which they are entitled. I therefore ask hon. Members for their full support for this Bill and to help ensure its passage through Parliament as swiftly as possible.

I thank the Minister for her courtesy to Opposition Front Benchers in the discussion before the Bill was brought before the House. We had the opportunity to meet her officials, who went a considerable way in reassuring us about certain aspects.

The Bill is presented as a necessary administrative correction—a technical tidying up of existing legislation—which we are being encouraged to pass with as much expedition as possible. Hon. Members are understandably wary when they hear this Government commend legislation in that way. They suspect that an inferno of devils may lurk in the detail. The House's recent experience with the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill reminds us that it is often under the guise of administrative tidying up that Ministers try to smuggle significant changes by us. On this occasion, however, I am satisfied that the Government are right to want the Bill passed, and I sympathise with their desire, and that of many interested parties outside the House, to see it speedily enacted.

The Bill necessarily engages with two issues of principle—the principle of legislating retrospectively, which my hon. Friends the Members for Welwyn Hatfield (Grant Shapps) and for Wellingborough (Mr. Bone) have mentioned, and the principle of proper accountability and delegation of powers within the public sector. I shall say a brief word about both in due course, but first I want to explain why we believe that the Bill is necessary on practical grounds. I specifically want to address the practical consequences of failing to give it a Second Reading and of not allowing it to pass relatively quickly on to the statute book.

The stability and buoyancy of housing associations—their ability, therefore, to maintain and enhance housing stock, not to mention building the new housing that we need—increasingly depend on access to private finance. Although the Housing Corporation continues to support housing associations and registered social landlords with grant funding, private lenders have extended some £36 billion of loans to housing associations, which is a huge sum—one almost as big as the Chancellor's current budget deficit. That money has been lent on the basis that the loans are secured and that security depends on consents granted to housing associations under section 9 of the Housing Act 1996.

The 1996 Act allowed the Housing Corporation to give consent to the disposal of land by registered social landlords, and consent was so defined as to cover the sale of land, mortgages raised on that land or charges placed on that land. The giving of that consent has been vital in securing loans at highly competitive rates. Housing associations have been able to borrow at below prevailing market levels, because lenders have known that their loans are effectively secured on that land. Another factor that has helped in gaining access to finance at competitive levels is, of course, the regulatory function of the Housing Corporation, which has given lenders an assurance that the organisations to which they lend are effectively managed and following good practice.

The legal advice that the Housing Corporation received earlier this year, to which the Minister has referred, has placed housing associations' continued access to funding in jeopardy. Because the Housing Corporation did not have the power to delegate its functions below board level, the granting of section 9 consents is in question. An element of additional risk has been introduced into the lending process, and the security of lenders' money may be being jeopardised. If a housing association or other registered social landlord that had been granted a section 9 consent were to collapse financially, there would longer be the same absolute guarantee in law that mortgage lenders would have the first call on its assets.

Because that risk exists, and unless the situation is corrected, there is a risk that lenders might be under pressure to call in loans that are technically unsecured, and access to finance for housing associations would become more difficult. The cost of capital would rise and the losers would be those who rely on associations to maintain, improve and build the social housing that the country needs. The Bill seeks to avert that danger by giving the corporation the power that it always believed it had—indeed, that we all believed it had—to delegate functions such as the granting of section 9 consents below board level. As the Minister said, the Bill retrospectively covers all consents, given in good faith and unquestioned at the time, that allow housing associations to function effectively and to gain access to capital cheaply.

We are being asked to pass retrospective legislation, which I always think is very dangerous. Does my hon. Friend accept that another way of dealing with the problem is already being proposed for the Housing Corporation—that is, the granting of a general consent under section 9 of the Housing Act 1996? That would be quicker and would remove the need for the House to pass retrospective legislation.

I note my hon. Friend's point. I admire his desire to lessen the burden of legislation that the House has to deal with and not to breach the principle of resisting retrospective legislation. However, according to the best legal advice obtained by housing associations, the Council of Mortgage Lenders and the Housing Corporation, the Bill is necessary. It would be foolish for us to counterpoint our wisdom against the legal advice that all those bodies have received. It is important to ensure that we do not introduce additional risk into the lending process, potentially jeopardising the security and buoyancy of housing associations.

By passing the Bill, we will demonstrate our support for the work that housing associations do. They are innovative social enterprises—the best certainly are—and, I may say that their role and functions were considerably enhanced by the last Conservative Government. That is why it is such a personal pleasure for me to see one of the innovative Housing Ministers of the last Conservative Government, my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young), in his place.

By passing the Bill, we will underpin the smooth functioning of a market that helps to provide a social good—housing—to many of those in our society who are in greatest need. Not to pass it would jeopardise practical goods and undermine compassionate Conservative achievements. It would mark a backward step.

My hon. Friend rightly trumpets the achievements of housing associations, but their work often depends on the support of the Housing Corporation. Clause 2(2) says that the Bill extends to England, Wales and Scotland. I am worried that areas such as north Oxfordshire have fallen off the map and that we are a black hole as far as the Housing Corporation is concerned. We have two LSVT—large-scale voluntary transfer—housing associations doing good work on refurbishing and repairing that stock, but no new stock is coming on stream. Working families with children are effectively being condemned to live for ever in short tenancies in the private rented sector. Will my hon. Friend say what we will do to rectify that when we get into government?

I thank my hon. Friend for his helpful intervention and particularly for continuing to champion the interests of his constituents in north Oxfordshire. As I am sure he is aware, his parliamentary neighbour in west Oxfordshire, my right hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron), the leader of our party, recently outlined his proposals to ensure that a future Conservative Government will do everything in their power to increase social and affordable housing and to ensure that there is more private housing for rent and for sale. We believe that the most effective way of doing that is by tackling the resistance towards development that currently exists. Our analysis is that the Government, despite their many admirable intentions as regards increasing the housing stock, have not succeeded in overcoming people's understandable resistance to development. Specifically, we believe that the Government have not done enough to carry local people with them when they encourage development or to ensure that new housing is environmentally sensitive. They have especially failed to ensure that new housing development is matched by the required infrastructure.

Will the hon. Gentleman reflect on the number of Tory councils throughout the country that appear to object to building the housing that he claims is much needed?

I have reflected long and hard on not only Conservative but Liberal Democrat and Labour councils and independent councillors who are understandably suspicious of new development in their locality. The reasons for their suspicion and reluctance rest with the Government's failure properly to tackle their concerns by ensuring their involvement in the process through adequate consultation and to ensure that new housing is environmentally sensitive and, above all, that infrastructure matches new housing development.

I draw the hon. Gentleman's attention to Milton Keynes, where the Conservative hon. Member for North-East Milton Keynes (Mr. Lancaster) has joined me in welcoming the Government's investment in, for example, Central Milton Keynes station, which constitutes vital infrastructure, and in the biggest school building programme in the United Kingdom, which is being conducted precisely to meet need. Yet some Conservative Members, despite the provision of infrastructure, continue to oppose housing, apparently because they want the nice green view next door to their houses—built on what were previously green fields—to be protected. Will the hon. Gentleman bend his charm to those councillors—

Order. We are going wide of the business before us, which hon. Members should bear in mind.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for that necessary correction to the exuberance that both the hon. Lady and I feel when talking about housing and Milton Keynes. I am grateful for her compliments—I do not believe that I have much charm—but the people of Milton Keynes are best equipped to pass judgment on whether the infrastructure that the Government and others provide is adequate for their needs.

Before I was so politely interrupted, we were discussing the desirability of the Bill and the way in which it chimes with compassionate Conservative credentials. I recognise that some hon. Members retain an understandable reluctance to pass legislation, however well intentioned, that may have a retrospective application. Indeed, several hon. Members have raised that anxiety. I believe that the practical benefits of the Bill speak for themselves, but let me tackle that legitimate concern.

Retrospective legislation is unwelcome, and dangerous when it renders an individual liable to punishment for engaging in an activity that he had every reason to believe was legal at the time or inflicts a penalty on an individual for a decision that he had every reason to believe was legal when he made it. The desirability of retrospective legislation, which the Bill constitutes, was thrown into relief by the Finance Bill, which received its Second Reading yesterday. Clause 157 makes retroactive charges on specific trusts, placing a potential penalty on many individuals who wrote their wills, confident in their legality at the time they were drawn up. Indeed, according to the Law Society, the Finance Bill could

"affect millions of ordinary people"

and "amount to retrospective legislation" that "needs to be reassessed".

I hope that the Minister for Housing and Planning, who is not without influence at the Treasury, will encourage a reassessment of that retrospective legislation—not only because of the harm it could inflict on many ordinary people, but because the Government's willingness to legislate retrospectively with such promiscuity undermines their credibility when retrospective legislation, such as the Bill, is genuinely needed.

I hope that I can assure my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough that, in the case that we are considering, retrospective legislation is not about inflicting penalties but about removing the risk of incurring new penalties. In the period since 1985, which the Bill covers, not only the Housing Corporation but all those with which it did business—indeed, every interested observer—believed that it was acting legally in delegating decisions. So there is no sense in which the Bill opens someone to a penalty for engaging in activities that they believed to be entirely legal. Indeed, the opposite is the case.

Having considered the principle of retrospective legislation, I want briefly to discuss the principle of delegation and proper administration in the housing sector. The Housing Corporation's board currently has to meet weekly to ensure that it is acting within the law, and that bureaucratic burden is not conducive to the effective discharge of its functions. Although we want the bureaucratic burden on the Housing Corporation to be eased, we also wish that burden on housing associations to be relaxed. The Bill makes precise technical changes to the constitution of the Housing Corporation, but the House will be aware that other changes for the corporation are in the offing. The Elton review of regulation, and the Government's indication that they wish to merge the Housing Corporation with English Partnerships, suggest that this will not be the last occasion on which the House has an opportunity to consider the corporation's functions.

Many right hon. and hon. Friends, and many outside the House, in reviewing how the corporation has operated in the period covered by the Bill, will hope that future changes in its operation will address certain issues. How can we be sure that the rate of social and affordable housing being built will recover from the trough of the past nine years and reach the much higher levels of building that we enjoyed under the previous Conservative Government? How can we ensure that the welcome role played by private developers in supplying social and affordable housing is not restricted, as it is at present, by bureaucratic hurdles—not least the hurdles that they have to clear in accessing Housing Corporation funding? How can we ensure that there will be proper accountability to the House following the merger of the Housing Corporation and English Partnerships? How can we be sure that the level of bureaucratic compliance placed on housing associations is not so high that resources are diverted from maintaining homes, or supplying new homes, into ticking superfluous boxes, meeting a plethora of additional targets and complying with ideological fashions? I hope that the Minister will give us an indication of the Department's thinking on all those matters.

The Bill is a necessary measure to give those who deliver affordable housing, and those who fund it, the security that they need to continue their good work. I commend it to the House.

I should like to thank the Minister for providing the briefing to the spokesman who leads on Office of the Deputy Prime Minister matters for the Liberal Democrats. I also commend the Minister, as she appears to be following in the footsteps of Robert Dalgleish, a Liberal Member of Parliament for central Glasgow in the 19th century, whose great-granddaughter I met last week. I understand that he acquired a reputation for speaking in the House only when he had something to say. I commend the Minister for doing that, and I would commend that practice to other Members. She made a very brief contribution today, and I will do the same.

We could have had much fun with this legislative lacuna. The Housing Corporation has undoubtedly made a number of decisions, including consenting to loans, whose validity is questionable. However, this matter is much too important to jest about, and I am sure that if I were to go down that road, the Speaker would pull me up. This could also have been an opportunity to talk about the funding available to the Housing Corporation, particularly the funding available in London and the south-east to provide affordable housing in boroughs such as mine, the London borough of Sutton, where there are about 4,000 households on the council waiting list for affordable housing, of which there is very little. My office has now made four attempts to arrange a meeting with the Minister about this, and I hope that our fifth attempt will be successful.

There has been much speculation in the London borough election campaigns about the British National party increasing its share of the vote. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that that prospect might have nothing to do with its members being racists? It might be that people in the London boroughs are worried that they cannot get affordable housing and are hacked off that they seem permanently to be denied access to the housing market?

The availability of affordable housing is certainly an issue in the local council election campaigns in London, although I hope—as I am sure the hon. Gentleman does—that it will not prove successful in boosting the level of support for a party that has no role to play in a proper democratic society. There is certainly no evidence where I live that it is going to make inroads, and we shall be doing everything that we can, along with the other major parties, to ensure that it does not.

As Members will know, the Housing Corporation is a non-departmental public body that was established more than 40 years ago in 1964. Its function is to promote, finance and supervise the voluntary housing movement in England, and it has wide discretionary powers. As the Minister has explained, the need for the Bill arises from a failure to make it sufficiently clear in earlier legislation that the Housing Corporation had the power to delegate the exercise of its functions.

The necessary objectives of this short—indeed, diminutive—Bill are therefore clear: to give the Housing Corporation those powers, as the Minister has said, and to validate retrospectively decisions taken by the Housing Corporation's committees, officers and employees. The necessity for such legislative change is self-evident, and the Liberal Democrats intend to allow the Bill a swift passage. Before we allow it to proceed, however, we have a small number of questions, which I hope that the Under-Secretary, the hon. Member for Poplar and Canning Town (Jim Fitzpatrick), will be able to answer.

Can the Minister explain the likely impact of rejecting this Bill? The official Opposition's spokesman has done a good job in describing some of the possible impact, but perhaps the Minister will have identified other concerns, which he might or might not want to share with the House and put on record. The Bill confirms what every Member of this House knows—that the legislative process is prone to, if not hesitation, certainly repetition, deviation and omission.

Can the Minister confirm whether the need for the Bill has prompted the Government to undertake a review of all non-departmental public bodies? It has been explained that, more than 40 years ago, such a body appeared to be the norm. More recent non-departmental public bodies have been established in a different way with different powers. I hope that an alarm bell might have rung in Government as to whether a review is needed to consider if such action needs to be taken in relation to other bodies. Can the Minister confirm whether such a review has been undertaken and whether the Government have identified other bodies that, retrospectively, require similar legislation to be implemented?

This Bill, although a mere 22 lines long, performs an important function. To say that we welcome it would be overstating the case, but we do see the need for it, and the Minister is clearly getting us out of a fine mess. We will therefore support the Bill on Second Reading.

The House recognises that it is desirable to bring this business to a close speedily, as I suspect that everyone wants to get out to campaign in the local elections. In the case of Ministers, there is a new urgency, as today's opinion polls demonstrate that support for the Labour party and the Government has fallen to its lowest level for two decades. I recognise that it will be difficult to maintain oneself in order on such a Bill for any great period. I hope, however, that I can make one or two comments without getting out of order.

The housing market essentially comprises of three means of housing: home ownership, of which our home-owning democracy has probably the highest proportion of any country in western Europe; affordable social housing; and the private rented sector. For a long time, the policy on social housing was driven by district councils, but over time and under Governments of both hue, that responsibility has shifted to housing associations supervised by the Housing Corporation.

In a sense, where housing associations grew up and developed strength was something of an accident of history. In many areas of the country, housing associations emerged from the desire for large-scale voluntary transfer of former council property into housing associations. For the tenants of those properties, who moved via large-scale voluntary transfer into new housing associations, it was often a good deal, as those new housing associations could use funds to upgrade or install central heating and double glazing. Large-scale voluntary transfer has been a great success across the country.

The hon. Gentleman may talk about large-scale voluntary transfer, but in some recent cases it has been large-scale coerced transfer. Does not he agree that those affordable housing associations are much less accountable and in any sense democratically responsive to the group of 2.5 million tenants or more whom they represent? Is not that a step backwards?

I think that the hon. Gentleman is mistaken. Certainly the housing associations in my part of the country—including Banbury Homes, which is part of Shaftesbury Housing, and Charter Community Housing—have good tenant involvement. Only the other day, they organised an open advice day for local tenants at the Spiceball centre in Banbury, working with other agencies, including the district council, to explain such matters as housing benefit. I thought that that was a very good initiative, and I believe that tenants of both Banbury Homes and Charter Community Housing are very satisfied with their landlords. After all, the tenants had to vote, by a majority, for the large-scale voluntary transfers.

What concerns me is where the new social housing is to come from. The Housing Corporation is concerned about its members, committees, sub-committees and employees. My concern is this. When money is allocated through the regional housing boards, designated growth areas such as Milton Keynes and the Thames Gateway do extremely well, but shire districts are literally white on the map: they receive no money from the Housing Corporation. The Minister suggested that Banbury Homes and Charter Community Housing should apply to the regional housing boards, but the trouble is that those associations are below the size of those that the Housing Corporation appears to be funding. The Minister looks quizzical, but the corporation seems to have an unwritten policy of funding only certain areas.

My hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove) rightly referred to new development. Banbury and Bicester, in my constituency, are probably two of the fastest-growing towns in the country, and a great deal of new development is going ahead. The difficulty lies in the definition of affordable housing. Developers have sold a proportion of their housing at below market value for the first time, so for the first time it is affordable housing because someone buys it at below market value; but it is not affordable housing thereafter. We are not seeing new social housing being introduced as part of the planning process for new development.

Again, the Minister looks quizzical. Let me challenge her, as Minister for Housing and Planning. We have a huge housing development, which she has just decided not to call in, at Bankside/Bodicote. I shall be interested to see how much new social housing comes to that development as a consequence of the planning system. I suspect that very little will do so. As a result of all that, working families on low incomes with children are finding it extremely difficult to gain access to secure housing.

Has the hon. Gentleman asked his local council what section 106 negotiations they are having? It is possible for section 106 arrangements to cover the provision of social housing, and many planning authorities—especially in high-demand areas and areas where there is a considerable growth in new housing—are ensuring that they get very good deals so that new social housing is provided.

With respect, the difficulty with section 106 agreements is that developers are having to come up with huge amounts of infrastructure, such as new primary schools and contributions to new secondary schools. They tend to go back to the local authority and say "If any more burdens are placed on us, the development will become unviable." I invite the Minister, through the Government office for the south-east, to look at the Bankside/Bodicote example—a large new development with very little social housing coming through, using the planning system by way of benefit.

Working families on low incomes are finding themselves in a catch-22. They are told by the housing authorities that if they go on to the housing waiting list, they will probably have to remain on it for a very long time. If they move into the private rented sector, they are told that they are adequately housed, so they drop off the social housing list. However, the reality is that they are in semi-permanent housing in assured shorthold tenancies.

Those of us who are fortunate enough to own our own homes know that one benefit of home ownership—of the security of tenure that freehold gives—is that we can do things in our own gardens and houses that those in private rented sector accommodation cannot do. Under the Bill, the Housing Corporation has to cover England, Scotland and Wales, so by definition, it has to cover Oxfordshire. My worry is that at the moment, there is no sign of its covering Oxfordshire—it is invisible so far as Oxfordshire is concerned. Why is that so?

I therefore hope that we will see shared equity policies that will enable working families in Oxfordshire, as elsewhere, to get the secured tenancy that social housing provides, rather than their having to live for ever in the private rented sector. Such temporary accommodation may well enable social mobility by allowing people to move, find a job and get settled, but many families want then to move into more permanent tenancy. At the moment, such tenancy is being denied them in areas such as mine.

I begin by drawing the House's attention to my entry in the Register of Members' Interests, and to the fact that I am an unremunerated member of Rockingham Forest housing association. Housing associations play an extremely important role in our society. They provide housing for some of the most vulnerable people, and have grown in importance year by year. The Housing Corporation, which is the Government's governing body of registered social landlords and housing associations, regulates and funds RSLs.

Housing associations were created some 42 years ago, in 1964. Since that time, the Housing Corporation has funded almost 1 million new homes, and it has helped thousands of homeless people and others living in poor housing conditions. It regulates some 2,000 housing associations across the country, which, in turn, manage more than 2 million homes. It also administers the national affordable housing programme to build and renovate homes, in which it will have invested £3.3 billion by the time it ends. By no means, therefore, can the Housing Corporation and housing associations be considered insignificant; they play a crucial role in our society.

The Government claim that the Bill merely tidies what everyone already accepts as the current situation, but I have a number of concerns. Indeed, I am not entirely sure that I could support the Bill if it were pushed to a vote tonight. The Housing Act 1964 gives no indication whatsoever that board members should be allowed to delegate their responsibilities in respect of disposals to sub-committees and officers. All the work relating to disposals is performed by housing associations. None of it is done by the Housing Corporation, which simply rubber-stamps applications from housing associations, of which there are only some 100 a year.

The Housing Corporation's board of directors comprises 15 members, who take home more than £250,000 a year, plus pensions. Board members are required to work five days a month, on average—which is at least one day a week—and the chairman, who is paid more than £50,000 a year, is asked to work two days a week.

The 1964 Act requires the board to approve disposals; why are we being asked to change that arrangement through retrospective legislation? Anyone who looked at the original Act would conclude that the board must consider disposals. The directors are not underpaid and it is not as though they do not have the time to do the job. Although they meet only once a week, the board meetings are, I understand, very short. The Housing Corporation is not doing any of the work and has never refused a disposal from a housing association, so perhaps Parliament was correct originally and we should not pass retrospective legislation when there is no indication that Parliament wanted that delegation.

I understand the concerns that have been expressed, especially by lawyers, about charges, which are regarded as disposals under the Act, but section 9 of the 1964 Act provides for a general consent. The general waiver, as proposed only on 17 March by the Housing Corporation, would remove the need for retrospective legislation. That is not new, because that general consent has been used in the past. I am therefore very concerned about whether we need retrospective legislation, and I hope that the Committee will consider that issue in detail.

I had expected that the Government would suggest that the omission was just a drafting error and that this was an ultra vires matter that should have been in the original Bill. I could understand that, because since I have been an MP I have seen numerous examples of bad drafting, which have to be corrected. I sit on the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments and each week we have four, five or six statutory instruments that have defective drafting and have to go back to be changed.

The hon. Gentleman will accept that sometimes things are wrong and have to be corrected, in the same way as his party has now recognised that everything that it stood on at the last election was completely wrong.

I am not sure that I do accept that. However, if the hon. Gentleman is saying that the Government often introduce legislation that is badly drafted and wrong, I agree.

If the problem were due to bad draftsmanship over several years, I would accept that it should be corrected. However, the wider problem is that we do not have enough time to scrutinise legislation properly. So many times we face guillotines or programme motions that stop us considering legislation. I often sit here with an amendment list, but we discuss only the first few groups before the guillotine falls. If we had more time to discuss Bills, drafting errors would not occur. I suggest that the Bill proves that we should have fewer programme motions and guillotines and more time to scrutinise Bills properly, clause by clause.

As an aside to those remarks, it is interesting to note that if the Bill were European Union legislation, we would have no power to correct it. We have laws in this country that are badly drafted and inconsistent, but this House cannot correct them.

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that most drafting errors tend to emerge not during forensic debate in Committee or elsewhere, but from the resources of researchers and others who analyse Bills on behalf of Opposition parties? Would not that be a more appropriate use of Short money than make-up for the leader of the party?

If the hon. Gentleman is suggesting that if we had longer time to scrutinise the Bill we would not pick up such errors, I disagree. We should have more time to debate Bills and make proper decisions.

Another question is whether the House should debate unnecessary Bills. All Bills that come before us should be relevant and take all necessary objectives into account, but consideration of this Bill should be postponed. The fear of retrospective problems could be removed by the method of general consent, and in the future it will be quite acceptable for the board of directors to meet once a month to decide the matter.

Why is this Bill being brought forward now? On 19 May, the consultation on the proposal to merge the Housing Corporation and English Partnerships will end. Given that that process is so near to conclusion, why did the Government not wait until the summer, when they could have brought before the House a full Bill covering all the relevant issues?

What are we talking about with this Bill? A picture has been built up that the poor, underpaid directors of the Housing Corporation have a massive amount of work, but it seems to me that they have to deal with only 100 bits of paper a year. Anyway, they already meet five times a month, on average. I do not think that there is much of a problem, and in any case these matters can be handled retrospectively.

However, another question arises: why on earth does the Housing Corporation bother to approve disposals? It never rejects any, and all the work is done by the housing associations. The Bill would do better to remove the necessity for the Housing Corporation to approve individual disposals, while retaining its power to regulate housing associations.

This may be the wrong Bill at the wrong time, and I hope that substantial numbers of improving amendments are tabled in Committee. The Bill could be changed to take account of the performance and effectiveness of housing associations. For example, an index that has just been published shows that seven of the 10 most efficient housing associations deal with fewer than 1,000 properties. I have to declare an interest, in that Rockingham Forest is the 18th most efficient housing association in the country.

I fear that we may be wasting time today debating a Bill whose introduction could have been deferred, and whose contents could have been presented in a better format. I hope that the Bill will be looked at carefully in Committee.

I want to make two brief but important points about this short Bill. The first has to do with accountability, and the second with the Bill's retrospective nature.

On accountability, clause 1 provides very broad powers to all sorts of committees and sub-committees. It states that the Housing Corporation will be able to

"delegate the exercise of any of its functions to any of its members, committees, sub-committees or employees".

That is a very large responsibility to hand over to almost anyone who comes into any sort of contact with the Housing Corporation. By comparison, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Bone) pointed out, the present situation is very restrictive, in legal if not in practical terms. What is proposed is the opposite of the current legal requirement, which is that all decisions must be taken by a very small board of directors meeting about five times a month.

I accept that, in practice, that is not what has been happening since the 1985 Act came into force, although it has become much more common since the problem with that legislation was discovered in January. However, the Bill seems to be taking the legal position to the opposite extreme, allowing almost anyone with any sort of connection to the Housing Corporation to make a decision on the corporation's behalf. The Minister would do well to consider that point in some detail before the Bill completes its passage.

The simple fact is that the Housing Corporation is answerable to the House and thus to the Minister, which leads me to highlight a wider point that concerns me somewhat—the composition of the Housing Corporation and its accountability to this place. At the last count, the corporation was answerable to the Housing Commission, the Audit Commission, the Charity Commission, the Financial Services Authority, the Public Accounts Committee and something called the finance, management and policy review committee, which meets once every five years. That is an awful lot of lines of accountability, before we even get to the Minister and the House itself and I am concerned that as clause 1 allows such wide-ranging powers to such an enormous number of individuals, with only a vague connection to the corporation in some cases, we may be making the kind of drafting error to which my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough referred. We must look carefully at those lines of accountability and not simply take it for granted that we have got the legislation right this time.

My second point is about the retrospective nature of the Bill, which has already been touched on. Like most Members, I accept that some legislation can be retrospective, but I am concerned that the House should consider such legislation on every occasion. We should not enter into it lightly.

There is some expert opinion on the matter. Professor Charles Sampford has argued that

"many laws have partially retrospective effects. The issue is not whether those effects are retrospective, but the nature and extent of those effects and the reasonableness of their imposition".

In other words, will the Bill be reasonable in its imposition? Many, though not all of us, probably consider it reasonable in the circumstances, especially because its impact will be not on the rights of individuals but on those of housing associations. It is probably sufficient.

However, I give this caution. If we combine the two factors that I described—the potential for lack of accountability given all the different strands, including the Minister and the House, and the retrospective nature of the Bill—the Minister must be aware that he has to take into account not only everything that happened in the past, but everything that will happen henceforth. When so many people have accountability or authority in respect of the Housing Corporation, implementing retrospective legislation is an enormous responsibility. Those are the issues that most concern me.

Will the Minister consider whether the matter could have been handled differently? Could non-retrospective legislation have been used to tidy things up? I understand that in reality decisions were made as the Bill now proposes, although they were outside the remit of the law, as we have discovered, but in the light of my cautionary tales about accountability and the retrospective nature of the Bill I urge the Minister to ponder whether there might have been another way.

Would the hon. Gentleman care to contrast the model of accountability that he has just described, involving housing associations and a highly delegated Housing Corporation, with the rather more satisfactory model of local authority housing departments responsible, through elected councillors, to the community that they represent? Which does he think is the best way for social housing to operate and be responsive?

One thing that is quite obvious—it has happened since the formation of housing associations—is that a huge amount of private sector money has gone into building social housing. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman would agree that that is an extremely good thing. I do not have the figure to hand, but I recall that it is about £28 billion, as opposed to about £4 billion of public money, enjoyed in the context of the whole set-up, including the Housing Corporation. I am sure that he will recognise that it is the total amount of money that goes into funding local and social housing that is important, not necessarily how that funding takes place.

The hon. Gentleman touches on an important subject that I tried to address in my points about accountability. As he indicates, there are a huge number of bodies involved in the management of the situation. I worry that the accountability that should correctly come straight down to this place through the Minister is muddied in many ways during a process that involves the Housing Commission, the Audit Commission, the Charity Commission, the Financial Services Authority, the Public Accounts Committee and the finance, management and policy review body.

I wonder what would happen if, for example, the finance, management and policy review body, which considers these matters every five years, decided that the Housing Corporation was doing part of its job very badly, but the Public Accounts Committee decided that the Housing Corporation was doing that part of its job well. Where does the accountability lie? Is it with the Minister, or with the House in general? There are rather too many bodies involved for my liking. I wonder whether the Bill might have taken the opportunity to tidy that up somewhat. That may be the great missed opportunity that my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough referred to.

Does my hon. Friend agree that there is growing unrest in our communities about accountability or, more importantly, lack of accountability by the Government? Let us take the example of Milton Keynes partnerships, the unelected, unaccountable quango that has been charged with the delivery of the expansion of my city. Tomorrow night, I will present a petition to the House—

Order. I think that tomorrow will be sufficient unto the day. The hon. Gentleman is trying to invite his hon. Friend to depart from the narrow confines of the Bill.

I have tried to confine myself to the two clauses in the Bill. In summary, there are, as I have outlined, one or two potential missed opportunities in the Bill. Perhaps there should be third and fourth clauses to tidy up one or two of those things and, in particular, to narrow those lines of accountability. Further consideration of the retrospective nature of the Bill—and whether that could have been handled differently or in a better way—would have been most welcome. I simply ask the Minister to consider those matters this evening.

As other Members have pointed out, this is a very brief little Bill, which consists of a few lines. I think that the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) pointed out that there were 22; I have not counted them. Given that it is only a few simple lines, one might think, "Why do we need it?" We have run round the houses slightly in relation to some of the reasons why people might think that we need the Bill. In essence, the Bill is retrospective. We have been told that it will sort out a glitch or oversight in a system that has introduced doubt, confusion and perhaps even sclerosis and could introduce mayhem if things start to go dreadfully wrong.

The system is already complex, as my hon. Friend the Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Grant Shapps) has pointed out. It was supposed to be designed to ease the smooth running of our housing associations via the Housing Corporation. It is supposed to help them to discharge their duties effectively.

Housing associations serve our local communities but are not without their own problems, and the uncertainty that is hanging over them is not helping. Indeed, as my hon. Friends have said, some local housing associations have heavy burdens placed on them, and obligations are placed on them by the Housing Corporation itself.

The glitch or oversight in the earlier legislation—it was discovered in January 2006—is now promising mayhem or sclerosis, depending on how we look at it. Some hon. Members may feel that those words are somewhat wild in respect of a little 22-line Bill, but they should stick with what I am saying, because I should like to give a brief overview of how things stand.

We have been told that since the passing of the Housing Associations Act 1985, the Housing Corporation possibly has been operating by delegating its statutory duties below board level but without the express power to do so. That has caused some worry, and as the House is aware, that gap in the corporation's constitutional powers has come to light only recently. So we have had to undertake a finger-in-the-dike exercise, as referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Bone), who is no longer in his seat, to stem the flow of those delegated decisions that have been taken without express permission. As has been said, the result of that exercise is numerous board meetings that were possibly not happening before.

As the Minister, who is enjoying my speech, is probably well aware, under the 1985 Act, everything that the Housing Corporation wishes to do—from the allocation of large funding streams to registered social landlords, to the disposal of land under section 9 of the Housing Act 1996, which has been mentioned as one of the more contentious issues, or even possibly the switch to fair trade coffee, of which we are all in favour—would in theory require a board meeting. Those decisions are now delegated without express permission, and clause 1(2) seeks to get rid of that anomaly.

As I have said, fingers are rapidly being put into the dike, and I ask hon. Members to run with that thought a little and imagine any other business in which myriad decisions must be made at board level that would be made routinely by other delegated authorities, and we are being asked to stop the nonsense that seems to have occurred as a result.

Many Members would agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough, who said that we should not feel too sorry for those hard-pressed board members and that theirs is a rather easy lot for not bad remuneration. However, if they are asked back too regularly, we can even imagine en suite and dining facilities being needed in the boardroom to stop them running around the country in a sort of haphazard manner trying to ensure that they can attend their day jobs, as well as attending board meetings. Having spoken to them today, I understand that they attend two meetings a week, not the one meeting that has been mentioned; but even so, we might not feel too sorry for them about the increased work load that results from that glitch.

I will not try to labour the point too much to try to elicit too much support for those hard-pressed board members, but the reality is that that to-ing and fro-ing and confusion will inevitably have a knock-on effect on the efficient working of local housing associations, which await the decisions and are wondering whether they have been made correctly.

Those are housing associations such as the one in my constituency, the Hightown Praetorian, which is a regional housing association that provides a wide range of housing and support services for families and single people, including those with special needs. Despite difficult market pressures, the association is trying to deliver the social rented housing that other members have referred to in an area where land prices are prohibitively high. As the hon. Member for Milton Keynes, South-West (Dr. Starkey), who serves on the Select Committee on the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, knows, that is very difficult to deliver, but it is what we are getting from our housing associations.

Can the hon. Lady explain why she signed early-day motion 23, opposing house building in Hertfordshire?

I most certainly can; I am opposed to inappropriate development. Fortunately, I chose to ignore the rather throw-away remark about wanting to see a green field out of the window made by some hon. Members who oppose development, but I will not go down that route, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I could be seduced into arguing about why the proposal to put 15,000 houses in the green belt in my constituency is inappropriate, but I will not go there, or a 3.5 million sq ft—

Order. May I suggest that it would be inappropriate for that line of argument to continue?

I was carried away, Mr. Deputy Speaker, so let us return to the Hightown Praetorian housing association. It alone has 2,500 homes that are managed in Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire. It employs 350 staff and has an annual turnover of £15 million; clearly it is a large enterprise. It has a comprehensive set of development proposals for 450 extra houses. I am concerned that all that will be thrown into doubt if we do not resolve the matter today. Uncertainty about the funding will be damaging. The plans apply for the next three years and the association wants to know where it stands.

The homes that Hightown Praetorian provides serve a diverse range of needs; it offers homes under shared ownership, key worker and sheltered accommodation, a woman's refuge and a 24-hour support service. Other hon. Members have already questioned whether all the demands should be met by the local authority. I suggest, as my hon. Friend the Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Grant Shapps) said, that we need the diverse approach that the housing association offers. We have a 24-hour support service, as I said, and an emergency night shelter, called Open Door, in the heart of St. Albans. I visited it only two weeks ago, Mr. Deputy Speaker. If you ever visit my constituency, I can honestly say that it is well worth dropping in; the organisation has wonderful volunteers who provide soup kitchens for the homeless.

Discussions with Hightown Praetorian's manager revealed that the housing association was already concerned about its funding stream. How much more concerned will it be if the uncertainty is not resolved today? The association has taken many decisions since 1985 and it does not want them to be open to challenge or doubt. Clause 1(2) should resolve the problem. John Rouse, the housing association's chief executive, is very concerned and is doubtless watching our decision with great interest today. He has already written to all the housing associations and confirmed that new procedures are in place. He will advise them of any new time scales for decisions.

As other hon. Members would agree, it is always worrying when any business advises its customers of new time scales; it usually means delays. I do not want my local housing association to face delays, particularly in respect of the 450 houses it is intending to build in the next three years, so I am sure that right hon. and hon. Members will appreciate that we need to try to sort the muddle out. That is what the Bill is designed to do. Concerns have been expressed, but we require assurance and clarity.

I know that I am not alone—my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough has already said it—in generally abhorring retrospective legislation. Once we start going down the road of trying to tweak things that are in the past, we will face big problems. That applies to retrospective proposals for planning that seek perhaps to legitimise a building that has sprung up without permission or when the Chancellor attempts to claw back trust funds. People need to plan in the knowledge that the appropriate legal framework is in place and that no one will want to tweak it later.

I repeat that I abhor retrospective proposals generally, but this Bill is not primarily about that. I agree with the Minister who said that it was a tidying-up exercise and should be viewed in that light. Once we start to revisit and re-legislate, we will be in big trouble. It is highly reprehensible to pull the rug out from under the feet of people. The Bill, however, is about giving people more certainty about the future. I maintain my general opposition to retrospection, but the Bill will legitimise the current state of affairs, remove the element of doubt and uncertainty, free up the system and allow my housing corporation and others to get on with their business; there is much business to be done.

I do not give a resounding 10 out of 10 to all the dealings of the Housing Corporation—legitimate concerns about it have already been expressed today—or to all the activities of all housing associations. There are some good and some bad, and there are also some glaring inequalities in the allocation of funding, as in the case of Oxfordshire. Funding problems and inequalities also apply to various groupings. Housing associations should look more into that problem.

One glaring example of inequality is the plight of our ex-service personnel. Often the Housing Corporation or housing associations do not take decisions to help such people. If these organisations could be freed up from contemplating their navels and allowed to focus on relieving some of the glaring inequalities that underpin the plight of ex-service personnel who fall foul of the complex regulations, I would welcome that. Local connections are important. Many soldiers return to their locality, after being discharged from the Army and having been moved from base to base with their families, only to find that, unless they are homeless, they are not entitled, under housing association rules, to be placed on the register. They often face that difficulty only four weeks on from discharge. It is an impossible position to be in. I know that the Minister has already been approached about that problem, but—[Interruption.]

Order. I hope that the hon. Lady will accept the metaphor that she is stretching the elastic a little too far in the argument that she is now pursuing. She is getting too far away from the Bill.

I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker, but as you can see I am passionate about this, and I know that other hon. Members who support our armed forces feel the same.

I shall have to leave out the homeless ex-servicemen in my constituency, but homelessness is a big and glaring injustice. We must make sure that there is certainty and clarity now as a result of passing what seems to be a fairly minor retrospective amendment to the housing legislation. It should have been in place in the first place. If it allows housing associations and the Housing Corporation to get on with the job that they are supposed to do, it will have my support.

I am delighted to have been called in this debate as the Housing Corporation and the housing associations and registered social landlords that it oversees have a major impact on the lives of my constituents. According to the last census, 13.5 per cent. of Hammersmith and Fulham residents rent a property belonging to a housing association or another RSL, which is more than twice the national average. It is one of the highest rates in the United Kingdom, especially for a local authority that has not yet undertaken any significant large-scale voluntary transfers.

Our most important housing associations in Hammersmith and Fulham include the Notting Hill Housing Group, the Peabody Trust, and the Shepherds Bush Housing Association. Each has more than 1,000 housing units. The Notting Hill group alone has more than 4,000 homes in Hammersmith and Fulham. We have 49 different housing associations operating in all. The main RSL that will feature in my speech is the Notting Hill Housing Group. It has treated many of its tenants dreadfully in the recent past, and I wish to discuss the Bill's impact on them. Many tenants were treated so badly that they became activists in the general election for me last year, knocking on doors, stuffing envelopes and so on. In fact, they are the original Notting Hill Tories, converted to the blue cause not by lizards changing colour, as one sees on ridiculous Labour party leaflets, but by finding a candidate who takes an interest in their problems and complaints.

We all share an interest in seeing the Housing Corporation and housing associations operating effectively, so I welcome in general the Bill's provisions. However, I believe that we need a larger debate on the future of social housing and housing associations in general, and the Bill therefore represents something of a missed opportunity. Given the demand in the House for more discussion of these issues, it seems a great pity that a whole day of Government time has been allocated to debating essentially one paragraph of a technicality, even if it is an interesting technicality. I mentioned to many housing association tenants in Hammersmith and Fulham that this debate was coming. Certainly, a number are concerned that previous decisions made by the Housing Corporation may not have been legally valid. Equally, a number are interested in an opportunity to see some of those decisions reversed. So this kind of bureaucratic mistake does not reflect well on our public institutions, including Parliament, which passed the Bill in the first place.

I want to talk about some of the missed opportunities in the Bill, but first I want to mention its shocking cost—£1.50 for only 22 lines is the price recorded on the reverse by The Stationery Office, which represents incredibly poor value for money.

The first problem is the poor accountability of housing associations. The Bill is all about accountability, so this is indeed a missed opportunity. Let us contrast housing associations with councils as landlords. I am disappointed that the hon. Member for North-West Leicestershire (David Taylor) has departed because I want to say something about council management of homes.

The council has an advantage in being directly accountable in that it is, of course, elected. Obviously, it is not only its tenants who vote in council elections, but no candidate or local councillor can afford to ignore the voice of council tenants. In many London boroughs, the marginal wards can almost be defined as those that have a sizeable number of council tenants.

In the borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, the ward in which I live—Fulham Broadway—is a key marginal, largely because of the presence of the Clem Attlee estate, which is mostly council-owned. One of the most influential people in the borough is Val Barker, who chairs the Clem Attlee Rocque and Maton residents association, which she does very well, taking scrupulous care to remain politically neutral. Her voice is influential, but she does not have a powerful equivalent in neighbouring registered social landlord estates. We therefore need to do more to improve tenant involvement and RSLs' accountability to tenants. Council officers effectively deal with day-to-day matters on council estates, including repairs, the collection of refuse, the investigation of antisocial behaviour reports and so on. Most council tenants know that if things do not go well, they can call or contact their councillor. In turn, the council officer has a constitutional duty to address practical concerns by listening to the councillor, at the very least. That is not categorically not the case for housing associations. Better housing associations listen to cases brought by individual councillors, but many do not do so and go out of their way to obstruct councillors' inquiries.

To return to the Housing Corporation, such political influence is not afforded to housing association tenants. By contrast, private sector tenants, who lack council tenants' political clout, often have a more responsive landlord. We have all dealt with hundreds of cases in our constituencies involving nightmare private landlords. In my experience, however, I receive far fewer complaints about private landlords than about RSLs or the council, which leads me to conclude that private sector landlords are usually more responsive to problems and complaints.

The hon. Gentleman may be approached by not as many private tenants with problems as council tenants because his constituents believe that an MP has more influence over elected councillors, particularly if they both belong to the same party, than over private landlords.

The hon. Lady makes a good and valid point, but my experience in Hammersmith and Fulham does not bear out her argument about the number of people who complain about their RSL compared with the number who make an approach about a private landlord.

The Bill should include measures to improve accountability, not just in the Housing Corporation but in local housing associations. Tenant participation is still low in many RSLs. Tenants associations are packed with placemen who agree with the political direction of the borough in question, or are filled with people deemed politically acceptable to the individuals in charge. We need to strengthen tenants' rights and their participation in housing associations. Housing association tenants are the poor cousins when it comes to tenant power, and that must change.

Another matter over which tenants lack control, and which may be affected by the Bill, is the speed of escalating rent rises, especially in London. It is shame that none of the measures in the Bill will do anything to control housing association rent rises under Labour or make them easier to challenge. The Minister may guffaw, but I am about to challenge him by citing one of his allies. The central Government formula introduced by Labour in 2001 allows housing associations to raise rents according to a formula of the retail price index plus 0.5 per cent plus £2 a week—we were told that that was "rent restructuring". In practice, most housing associations have levied the maximum allowable annual increase. The Minister does not have to take my word for it—I urge him to listen to the words of my Labour predecessor in Hammersmith and Fulham, who told the House on 5 December 2001 at column 134WH:

"In my borough, the Government proposals will lead to higher rent increases in the next 10 years than in the past decade—I remind my hon. Friend that the majority of that was spent under a Conservative Administration—despite the fact that we have proved that London rent increases have been well above average during that time. The average rent increase in Hammersmith and Fulham over the past 10 years was 23.2 per cent., compared with the projection based on the current proposals"—

those proposals were for rent restructuring—

"of 29.5 per cent. over the next decade."

He went on to say:

"That will apply particularly to one and two-"—[Official Report, Westminster Hall, 5 December 2001; Vol. 376, c. 133–4 WH.]

Order. The hon. Gentleman is beginning to spin out of orbit so far as the Bill is concerned. This is not the appropriate platform for a general comparative discussion of rents and rates of increase. He should come back to the terms of the Bill.

I accept your guidance, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I was merely pointing out that great play was made in 1998 of rent rises. That was reversed by rent restructuring in 2001, which led to the Housing Corporation, having previously teamed up with councils such as Hammersmith and Fulham and being a backer of low rents—remember the words of my predecessor: tenants would, ironically, have been better off under the Conservatives—being metamorphosed overnight into a facilitator of inflation-busting rent rises. We are half way through the so-called rent restructuring, which will see housing association rents rise.

Does my hon. Friend agree that, with reference to the Housing Corporation, there are a great many omissions from the Bill?

Order. I am sure the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Bone) is trying to be of assistance to the hon. Member for Hammersmith and Fulham (Mr. Hands). However, as I have already suggested, a wider discussion about rents is out of place.

I agree, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I merely point out that my Labour predecessor was right. People are better off under the Conservatives.

That brings me to another aspect of the work of the Housing Corporation that is barely addressed but could be endangered by the provisions of the Bill—that is, the creation of more shared ownership housing in London. I had the great pleasure of welcoming my right hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron) to my constituency last month to look at a shared ownership scheme at Invermead close in Hammersmith, which we hope and expect to be successful. According to the census that I mentioned earlier, shared ownership is just under 1 per cent. of the total housing stock in Hammersmith and Fulham.

The Opposition support shared ownership schemes as a way of helping people on to the property ladder in expensive areas such as Hammersmith and Fulham. We need to consider how the Housing Corporation can encourage more shared ownership builds. Increased powers of delegation may help, although I believe that the shared ownership decision should probably be taken at board level.

Not all shared ownership schemes are a success. One in my constituency has been a spectacular failure to date. Two weeks ago I chaired a meeting of the residents of Mallard house in the new Imperial Wharf development in Fulham, together with officers of the housing associations. It is a pity that the Housing Corporation was not represented. Imperial Wharf is the largest residential housing development seen in west London for many years, with 2,000-odd homes approved so far. It is a flagship development for new Labour, the council and the Housing Corporation. Ken Livingstone described it as

"a template of what I want to see across London."

The scheme is half private, half social and is heavily funded by the Housing Corporation, but unfortunately the economics of the scheme do not work for local people. The private housing is extremely expensive. I have some recent property supplements in which homes in Imperial Wharf are advertised at £1.75 million, £1.35 million and so on. Few people can afford that. The social housing was funded by the Housing Corporation under delegated powers that may or may not have been proper. Even local Labour councillors condemn the poor construction and small size of that housing.

The biggest criticism of all, which should be of great interest to the Housing Corporation, stems from the price of the 15 per cent. of the units that are shared ownership, pitched at key workers. Those cost between £320,000 and £410,000 and the scheme is reckoned to be Britain's most expensive so-called affordable housing scheme funded by the Housing Corporation. In rent and mortgage, a typical couple appear to be paying £1,005 a year to live there. In a six-storey block, perhaps—

Order. The more I hear on this subject from the hon. Gentleman, the more I think it would be appropriate for an Adjournment debate, but certainly not for the debate on the Second Reading of the Bill. He is going far too wide in presenting his arguments.

Thank you for that guidance, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I was going to list the litany of complaints from Mallard house residents, many of whom are taking legal action.

Order. The hon. Gentleman should not argue with the ruling from the Chair; he should accept the guidance.

The debate on this Bill is being watched closely in Hammersmith and Fulham. Notting Hill Housing Group is one of the biggest recipients of funds under delegated powers from the Housing Corporation. About two years ago, I issued an appeal in our local papers for tenants who had suffered under the group and was amazed by the response. I received e-mails from people complaining about how the group had treated them, and the examples included walls that had fallen down not being repaired and other failings.

The Bill allows powers to be delegated within the Housing Corporation, which could set an unwelcome precedent for some of the housing associations that are administered by and were regulated by the Housing Corporation. It will be difficult to tell housing associations that they cannot have those sweeping delegated powers if the Housing Corporation is allowed them. Residents of estates such as the Chambon, Solon Housing's estate on the river on Carnwath road and Orbit's development at Gwyn close would not like to see increased delegated powers.

Notting Hill Housing Group has a famous history and an exemplary mission, namely to provide low-cost housing in areas of west London with expensive property prices and high private sector rents. It provides more than 11,000 affordable homes, more than 4,000 of which are in Hammersmith and Fulham, and it is taking a keen interest in our debate today.

Nothing prepared me for the public response to the appeal that I put out a couple of years ago. I am currently dealing with a number of Notting Hill Housing Group tenants who are experiencing significant problems and who are watching this debate closely to see whether the delegated powers will have an impact on them. For example, Collette Murray must share her bedroom with her son aged nine, because they cannot use their sitting room owing to the antisocial behaviour of the tenant below. Mrs. Jacobs of Shepherd's Bush road had had her floorboards up for eight years, until I inspected her property.

I am not sure whether my hon. Friend thinks that the delegated power assumed by the Housing Corporation is responsible for the disasters that he has described.

My hon. Friend may be right. There are some precedents on retrospective legislation—for example, the War Crimes Act 1991 was essentially retrospective—but the Bill may open a can of worms. As I have said, legal action is being taken against housing associations, some of which relates to funding by the Housing Corporation.

I am having some difficulty in following the hon. Gentleman's argument, because it is so wide ranging. Does he support his Front Benchers, who find the Bill not only acceptable, but necessary?

I support the Bill, but it could be more wide ranging. If it had been thought through properly, rather than being foisted on us suddenly, a lot more could have been included. I hope that it will be amended to include a lot of the matters that I have discussed in relation to the Housing Corporation.

Finally, I want to refer to a leaflet put out by the local Labour party four years ago called, "Tenants against Tory rent rises".

Order. The hon. Gentleman will seriously test the patience of the House if he goes down that route.

You are right, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Nevertheless, the Labour council has delivered on all the things that it said that the Conservatives would introduce.

The Bill is to be welcomed. However, it is a great shame that it does not afford us the opportunity to make other, much needed changes in the housing association sector—namely, more and better priced shared ownership schemes, an extended right to buy for housing association tenants and, most of all, greater involvement by tenants in housing associations and greater responsiveness to tenants by their associations.

This short debate has been more interesting than some of us initially expected. It has given Members an opportunity to show their ingenuity in talking about many problems that are related to the Bill, if sometimes a little beyond its scope.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove) said, we give the Bill our full support, because it is important to regularise the situation. The Housing Corporation has given a lot in terms of making grants and selling property. The most important reason for that, which my hon. Friend cited, was the £36 billion of debt.

The main problem as regards housing is historical, and dealing with it through this Bill is a sensible way forward. Generally speaking, post-war housing has been a great success for this country, given the challenges in the 1940s and '50s, starting with the slum clearances. We have now reached a situation whereby, on the whole, our population is well housed, although as Members of Parliament we sometimes see those who are less well provided for. As a whole, the statistics on central heating and so on show that people's housing is improving.

However, the fact that we are a nation of owner-occupiers and high and rising house prices creates a major barrier and a major divide. That is why the Housing Corporation is a very important part of the housing agenda in providing shared equity, key worker initiatives and housing associations that can provide for those who have no hope of purchasing or do not wish to do so.The Bill has our full support. It is important that it reaches the statute book as soon as possible. I do not suppose that its Committee stage or Report stage will take very long.

I do not intend to rehearse what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath. I know that many Members want to get out and canvass, so this will be a short winding-up speech. I thank the Ministers from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, who have been open in discussing the problem with the Opposition. Any amusement that one has about a problem popping up always disappears when we find that it started under the last Conservative Government. The Minister for Housing and Planning clearly set out the importance of the Housing Corporation, the 100,000 housing associations and the important programmes, missions and initiatives that have taken place over the years. She has our full support.

My hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath explained comprehensively why we support the Bill. He used the term, "compassionate Conservatism." It is interesting that a debate on a Bill that deals with an important social area such as housing has been attended mainly by those on the right of the political spectrum, who made some interesting contributions.

We heard a commendably short speech by the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake), who also mentioned the consensus on the Bill.

We also heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry). I hope that when the Housing Corporation reads the Hansard record of the debate, it will take note of his genuine concerns about the fact, or the perception, that those in need of housing in areas such as north Oxfordshire are not getting sufficient support. I am sure that if it does not, he will be vociferous on behalf of those of his constituents who feel that they should have more grant and be better housed.

My hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Bone) used his experience as a member of a housing association to express concern about the way in which the Bill is drafted. When one has a lot of consensus, it is sometimes useful if hon. Members stand up and put a different point of view. My hon. Friend the Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Grant Shapps) started by saying that he had two points to make and, surprisingly for a Member of Parliament, he made only two points. The first was his concern about the Bill's powers and the second related to the general principle of acting retrospectively.

My hon. Friend the Member for St. Albans (Anne Main) showed her ingenuity as a Member of Parliament of some experience by now by mentioning many housing associations and former service personnel in her constituency. She also made some pertinent points about the Bill.

My hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith and Fulham (Mr. Hands) also showed ingenuity by underlining the important part that social housing plays in his constituency and the number of housing associations there. I am sure that those whom he represents and for whom he campaigns will be pleased that he has managed to get on record his anxieties about the operation of some of those housing associations.

It has been a good debate. The Bill is necessary—let us hope that it reaches the statute book speedily. As my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath made clear at the outset, it has our full support.

I thank hon. Members for their contributions to this valuable debate. Before I respond to specific points, perhaps it would be helpful if I spent a few moments underlining and reminding the House of what my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning said about the Bill and its function.

First and foremost, the Bill is being introduced as a consequence of the discovery that the Housing Corporation did not have the express power to delegate its decision making below board level. It therefore gives the corporation board that express power to delegate and deems the corporation always to have had such a power. It will not give the corporation additional powers. The measure merely grants it a power, which it was always assumed to hold, to delegate below board level, thus restoring what everyone perceived to be the status quo. It brings all parties back to the position in which they believed that they were before the problem was discovered.

The hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove) and others asked about the housing and delivery review, part of which examines the roles and functions of English Partnerships and the Housing Corporation. I should make it clear that no decision has been taken at this stage to merge the two organisations. The review will consider several options, including closer working between the agencies, alignment of programmes and the creation of a new agency that draws together the skills, funding and objectives of a range of existing agencies and Departments. However, even if a decision to merge were the ultimate outcome of the review, it would not negate the need for the Bill, which deals with an immediate and pressing problem that must be resolved as soon as possible.

The hon. Member for Surrey Heath also mentioned reducing bureaucratic burdens on registered social landlords following any possible merger or the review. The Elton review of regulatory and compliance requirements makes more than 80 recommendations, which should lead to a reduction of at least 10 per cent. in the total administrative burden that the Housing Corporation places on RSLs. As I said, the Government have yet to respond to that review, but are committed to measuring and reducing the burden of regulation on RSLs and keeping it under continuous review, regardless of the institutional structure. However, I am glad that the hon. Gentleman concluded that he was reassured about the nature of the measure.

The Housing Corporation's total running costs for the current year will be £40.3 million. Did the Government consider removing the requirement for the Housing Corporation to rubber-stamp disposals? That would reduce regulation and costs.

I think that I shall disappoint the hon. Gentleman when I say no. I know that several of his colleagues asked why the Bill was not broader and why other items were not included. The measure deals with a specific problem, which was believed to be urgent and pressing, and it was therefore appropriate to tackle it as expeditiously as possible.

The hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) asked on behalf of the Liberal Democrats whether other non-departmental public bodies were caught in the same dilemma as the Housing Corporation. We have studied the situation, and we are not aware of any other bodies for which such retrospective legislation is required. As my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning said earlier, other bodies of a similar nature to the Housing Corporation already have, or subsequently had, a power of delegation. We perceive the Housing Corporation's situation to be a specific anomaly.

The hon. Gentleman also asked about the impact of rejecting the Bill, which is a consideration that has tasked those who have had a chance to consider it in depth. To reject the Bill would be to cast doubt on the validity of several classes of statutory decision already taken by the Housing Corporation, most notably the consent to dispose of land under section 9 of the Housing Act 1996. Lenders have expressed considerable concern about the lack of certainty over such decisions, and they could decide to take remedial action if the situation persisted, including re-pricing loans, preventing the drawing down of existing funds, or not taking forward new business. Clearly, that would have serious consequences, such as damaging the financial viability of registered social landlords or preventing new developments from going ahead. The Bill is designed to ensure a continued flow of private finance to the RSL sector, and to ensure that RSLs are financially viable and that tenants are protected.

The hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Bone) asked about general consents given under section 9 of the Housing Act 1996. Our view is that section 9 deals only with general consents for the disposal of land. There are also uncertainties about other matters, however, including the registration of RSLs and the consent to rule changes of RSLs. We need to resolve all those issues, not just those relating to section 9, which is why we did not think that it was an appropriate vehicle for dealing with this matter. The hon. Member for Surrey Heath specifically mentioned that point.

The hon. Member for Wellingborough also asked about the original legislation, suggesting that the board make these decisions itself, as well as about the pay of the Housing Corporation's directors. The directors' pay is in line with that of other bodies of this nature, including English Partnerships. When the Housing Corporation was established, its role and functions were very different. Today, it makes such a large number of statutory decisions that it has become administratively inefficient, and it would be a bad use of the board's time for it to take every statutory decision required of it in modern times. When the Housing Corporation was set up, powers of delegation were more readily implied. There was no intention in the Housing Act 1964 that the board should spend all its time on what could be low-level—albeit statutory—decisions, and the Housing Corporation now makes thousands of decisions every year.

The hon. Gentleman also asked about ensuring that we had adequate time to debate this issue. We do have more time now, should he wish to catch the Speaker's eye, although I do not think that that is necessarily the case. We have clearly had adequate time to deal with this matter today, and I am confident that the usual channels will ensure, as they always do, that we have a decent number of sittings in which to scrutinise the Bill in Committee.

The hon. Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry) raised serious questions about his own patch. They related to transfers, of which there have been three from Cherwell district council since 1995. I have to say to him that there has been a 36 per cent. increase in regional housing funding between 2004 and the allocations up to 2008. He raised serious concerns about the success of the negotiations between the local authority and the developers, and about the lack of adequate provision in respect of new developments. If I may be so bold, I should like to suggest that, were the officers of his local authority to seek assistance from the officials at the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, we would be very happy to have a dialogue with them to ensure that they are well prepared to get the best possible deal on future developments. If the hon. Gentleman wished to write to my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning about this, I am sure that she would be only too happy to deal with the points that he has raised in more depth, although they were perhaps slightly outside the scope of the Bill.

The hon. Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Grant Shapps) asked about delegation to members, sub-committees and employees, and whether that was too broad a power. We are advised that that is a typical power of delegation for a body of this nature, and for other organisations and public bodies such as the Commission for Social Care Inspection, the Commission for Healthcare Audit and Inspection and the Audit Commission itself. Such powers are necessary for the Housing Corporation to operate efficiently and effectively, and are similar to those for similar organisations.

But does the Minister accept that the scheme of delegation in the Bill is absolutely all-embracing compared with that for a local authority, which has a clearly defined scheme of delegation as to what may be delegated to officers from executive members and what may then be delegated to committees and so on, with clear financial thresholds? Surely such an all-embracing power of delegation cannot be right.

The hon. Gentleman makes a fair point that the powers are clear and extensive, but the local authorities with which he makes a comparison are a different case. We are talking about different powers and a different structure, and about that which is in place in similar bodies. We are therefore clear that the provisions are not only necessary but wholly appropriate.

The hon. Member for Welwyn Hatfield also asked whether the matter could be handled in any other way, without retrospective power. We have tried to demonstrate comprehensively that there is not another way. We have investigated alternative solutions, but the legal advice is that retrospective legislation is the only way to achieve absolute certainty. It is also the only way to give lenders to housing associations the security that they require to safeguard the housing association sector.

The hon. Member for Hammersmith and Fulham (Mr. Hands) raised many points, to some of which, obviously, I am not likely to respond. As part of his contribution, he asked about the accountability of registered social landlords in tenant participation. As he knows, RSLs are accountable to the Housing Corporation—he made that point—and must comply with the regulatory code setting out the range of expectations in relation to governance, management and financial viability, including expectations relating to tenant participation. The regulatory requirement is for all RSLs to have an appropriate tenant involvement policy. We agree that we need to make sure that we do enough, and more if necessary, to ensure that all tenants are able to participate in the affairs of their RSL. The Elton review makes several recommendations, which we will consider carefully in due course.

The hon. Member for Poole (Mr. Syms), like many of his colleagues, expressed support for social housing and for more of it. We would be interested in answers to the question of how the Opposition intend to fund that. In his usual gracious manner, however, he concluded that he accepted the need for and logic of the Bill, and recommended that his colleagues should support it.

We have spent some time—perhaps not as long as might have been anticipated—covering all the aspects of a very short Bill. We have also spent considerable time and effort over the past few months attempting to understand fully the concerns of all stakeholders, and to come up with an appropriate and effective solution. We have worked closely with not only the Housing Corporation but lender representatives, the Financial Services Authority and the trade bodies of RSLs in England, Scotland and Wales. Our officials have liaised closely with their counterparts in Wales and Scotland. I am extremely grateful for the positive contribution that those representatives have made quickly to resolve the issue, which, although technical in nature, has far-reaching ramifications, as everyone has agreed. The end result of that close working and co-operation is the Bill in front of us.

To conclude, this Bill is the only practicable way to address the problem that we discovered at the end of last year and to restore what was, until then, perceived to be the status quo. I therefore wholeheartedly commend the Bill to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Housing Corporation (Delegation) etc. Bill (Programme)

Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 83A(6) (Programme motions),

That the following provisions shall apply to the Housing Corporation (Delegation) etc. Bill:

Committal

(1) The Bill shall be committed to a Standing Committee.

Proceedings in Standing Committee

(2) Proceedings in the Standing Committee shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion on Tuesday 9th May 2006.

(3) The Standing Committee shall have leave to sit twice on the first day on which it meets.

Consideration and Third Reading

(4) Proceedings on consideration shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion one hour before the moment of interruption on the day on which those proceedings are commenced.

(5) Proceedings on Third Reading shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at the moment of interruption on that day.

(6) Standing Order No. 83B (Programming committees) shall not apply to proceedings on consideration and Third Reading.

Other proceedings

(7) Any other proceedings on the Bill (including any proceedings on consideration of Lords Amendments or on any further Messages from the Lords) may be programmed.— [Mr. Heppell.]

I am proud to rise to champion the cause of the Nuffield speech and language unit, which is based in Ealing. It is a centre of excellence that now faces the threat of closure.

It is right that the House and those interested in the subject should understand the background. The Nuffield speech and language unit is a part of the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear hospital, which in turn is part of the Royal Free Hampstead NHS Trust. Since 1971, the unit has provided specialist intensive therapy and teaching to children aged between four and seven with the most severe speech and language disorders. No provision of comparable quality for such children does or can exist in mainstream education.

It is important to understand that children typically attend the unit for an average of two years. The severity of their impairments means that they are not able to participate in, or be integrated into, mainstream education. Quite apart from its teaching and therapy work, the unit has established itself intellectually and professionally as the repository of excellence in research and good practice, and the Nuffield dyspraxia programme is used in countries all over the world.

The unit is small, catering for between 12 and 14 children. I have described the teaching and therapy that it provides, and the significance of its globally imitated dyspraxia programme. In addition, the unit is inextricably bound up with the Nuffield hearing and speech centre, which receives some 40 requests each week—from parents and professionals, by telephone, e-mail and post—seeking advice on speech therapy.

That is the background to the unit's significance. It is exemplary and deservedly celebrated, but is now facing the threat of closure. For the best part of five successive years, the unit has been either full or over-subscribed. As a result, it had become a net financial contributor to its parent trust. This year, however, it is suffering a lack of referrals for 2006–07 and so is falling into deficit for the first time.

Two factors explain the lack of referrals. First, the local education authority is resistant to the issuing of statements, and to agreeing to and providing finance for out-of-area placements. Secondly, there is a widespread and—dare I say it?—almost pervasive ignorance of the unit's existence. I attribute that ignorance to the fact that the Royal Free Hampstead trust has devoted a degree of energy to marketing the trust that is somewhere between minimal and nil.

I emphasise to the Minister that, on the strength of that one-year deficit, the Royal Free Hampstead NHS Trust is proposing to close this distinguished and celebrated unit.

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. I received a telephone call today from a constituent, Dr. Deirdre Lucas, a distinguished audiology consultant who has nothing but praise for the unit's special and unique work. She expressed in the strongest terms her fear that that centre of excellence and expertise could be lost for ever. It is without equal and, if we are not careful, we are going to lose a very precious resource.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who makes his point eloquently and pithily. In preparing for the debate, I became aware of Dr. Deirdre Lucas, but it is a pretty safe bet that she will not be aware of me. I know of her authority and expertise in the field. She is one of a number of people who are determined to fight the good fight to preserve the unit because she has professional knowledge of its indispensability.

My hon. Friend wisely used the word "unique", which leads me to the arguments against closure of the unit. The facility is unique. That word may be hackneyed; it is overused and frequently used inappropriately but it could scarcely be more appositely deployed than in respect of the unit. There is no other facility of its kind either in London or anywhere else in the country, so it is unique and it is also irreplaceable. However, the Minister does not need to take that from me. He can take it from the Royal Free Hampstead NHS Trust's consultation document, which puts the point clearly, stating helpfully that

"there exists no local provision which can match the therapy delivered by the highly experienced staff at the Nuffield unit".

Significantly, it adds that if the unit ceases to exist, the future potential of the children whom it serves will be severely damaged. I could not put it more effectively than that.

We are describing a vital national resource, which on my reckoning at least 16 local education authorities have used over the years. We cannot afford lightly, if at all, to dispense with existing centres of excellence. We should be proud of them. We should be defending them and building on them, championing and supporting them, and if they are under threat it is the responsibility of all political parties, including pre-eminently the governing party, to get involved: to take a stance, to lend a hand and not to back off—a point to which I will, in due course, return.

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. Does he agree that one of the problems is that to a certain extent the unit is seen as a Cinderella part of the national health and the education services? I have personal experience of the problem. My five-year-old son had a minor speech problem that was difficult to have attended to in the state system, so to hear that a unit with such national excellence is to close is extremely worrying.

I entirely agree. My hon. Friend reinforces the argument and the impression, which I am glad to say is correct and growing, that there is strong support for the unit.

We are entitled to look at the long-term outcomes of the Nuffield unit's work—for example, over the period between 1998 and 2003. I re-emphasise that we are talking about help for severely disadvantaged children. After two years at the unit, 41 per cent. of children are able to go on to mainstream education; 7 per cent. go on to local language units attached to mainstream schools; 38 per cent. go to the Meath school, a specialist school that caters specifically for children with severe speech and language disorders; and 13 per cent. go to other specialist schools.

Early intervention is of the essence. I underline that point. We have to ensure that children in special and intense need are assisted at an early stage. If we do that, help, treatment, therapy and teaching can be highly effective. What is more, that can result in cost savings in the medium to long term. On the other hand, if we intervene very late, there are grave risks, such as emotional and psychological damage, lower educational attainment, a persistent communication handicap and poorer employment prospects. For all those reasons, it is vital that children get a chance without the procrastination, delay and politicking that prevent them from getting the help that they need. We cannot simply intervene later and rescue the situation. Serious, grave and potentially irrevocable damage can be done to the opportunities and life chances of children who are so delayed or neglected.

I want to say something about the support that exists for the unit. My hon. Friends the Members for Kettering (Mr. Hollobone) and for Wellingborough (Mr. Bone) have already referred to that, but let it be underlined. A plethora of testimonials is now emerging in support of the unit. I call in aid first of all Pamela Williams, who is the chief speech therapist at the Nuffield speech and language unit and also chair of the Dyspraxia Foundation. Her words should carry weight and be listened to with respect by all hon. Members. She has said:

"In the event of closure, politicians should realise that no other facility will provide comparable treatment for this age group and these very vulnerable children will no longer receive the care they so desperately require."

Hers is not the only voice.

Let us listen to the verdict of the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists, which has publicly stated and communicated to me its belief that the demise of the unit would cause an "erosion of expertise" and a "loss of capacity", with the result that patients would be left "unsupported". Let us hear, too, the verdict of Janet Farrugia, a distinguished speech and language therapist of 25 years' experience. She says:

"The Nuffield has always been viewed as the gold standard for children . . . with oral and/or verbal dyspraxia."

Significantly and ominously, she goes on to add that children who go elsewhere for their treatment or education make "significantly slower" progress.

From the range of parents, I would like to cite in particular Dr. Tony Canas, who has founded the Friends of the Nuffield Speech and Language Unit. He is a truly remarkable man who is fighting as David against Goliath in the battle. He has set up a website and devoted an enormous amount of time and his considerable intellectual prowess to try to make arguments in support of the unit. He and his wife Angela have a son, Vincente, at the unit. They had to go through an enormous, debilitating, protracted, expensive and potentially soul-destroying battle to get their son into the unit, which they did, and he has now been there for the best part of an academic year. Tony Canas says:

"Vincente has made more progress in two terms at the Nuffield Unit than at any other time of his life."

That is the considered judgment of a range of people who know of the unit, who can see its benefit, who are alarmed at the threat to its existence and who are determined to protect it.

My hon. Friend is making such an overwhelming case that I will ask him briefly to do something slightly unusual in a debate of this sort. Will he put himself in the shoes of the people who are trying to close the unit and say what possible basis they could adduce for its closure in the face of such an overwhelming endorsement of it? It is hard to envisage any such basis from the testimonials that he has eloquently read to the House.

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend, who will have been a friend of mine for 23 years this October. We have often said that we have only one brain and we have thought it prudent over the years, in the course of our political careers, to share it between us. We each have an uncanny tendency to anticipate the thoughts and prospective pronouncements of the other, but I have to say, in all candour, that if he thinks that I am able to penetrate the inner recesses of the sort of extraordinarily contorted minds that could seriously contemplate a decision of this kind, I am afraid that he is elevating me to a level of intellectual pedigree to which I cannot realistically hope ever to aspire. I can only hazard a guess. The answer is almost certainly money, money and money again. I will return to that point.

So far, I have raised one argument against the closure of the unit; it is a centre of excellence that we ought to foster and support. There are other reasons why it is wrong to propose its closure. It is wrong to do so when the shortage of referrals could prove to be only short term. Yes, there is a downturn, but, last year, someone had to be turned away because the unit was over-subscribed. The trust consultation document helpfully observes that the

"apparent downturn . . . may be a statistical fluctuation".

Indeed it may. Is it not an extraordinary suggestion that one should close a unit with a proven track record and dramatic future potential simply on the basis of one year, which the trust calmly acknowledges in its document might be the result of statistical fluctuations? The misjudgment is truly breathtaking.

I said that the downturn might be temporary. I put it more strongly than that; it is wrong to close a unit when there is every prospect that there will be an increase in demand for its services in the future and an increase in the number of referrals. Why do I say that? I say it because there is no evidence whatever to suppose that, at any time soon, there will be a reduction in the number of children with severe speech and language disorders. Indeed, I suggest that the evidence probably points in the opposite direction. As a result of the increased survival rates of children who are born prematurely and who suffer significant complications as a result of that, there is every possibility that the number of children with such severe impairments will increase. There is therefore a very real chance of a greater demand for such services and for referrals to the unit in the future.

It is wrong to propose the closure of the unit when there has been virtually no marketing of it by its parent trust, which ought to have some responsibility for proudly proclaiming the unit's record, disseminating the evidence and seeking subscription to it. It is wrong to propose the closure of the unit when there is currently a Select Committee inquiry into statementing and other relevant aspects of special educational needs policy that are directly linked to the current plight of the unit.

The hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr. Sheerman) is the Chairman of the Education and Skills Committee. The Committee has taken evidence and will shortly publish its report. In accordance with the conventions of the House, with which the Minister will be familiar, the Government have a responsibility to issue a reply to the report within three months, and can be expected to do so. To propose the closure of the unit when the report has a direct link to the issues at that unit and before this House has had an opportunity to make a judgment seems to me to come fairly close to a contempt of Parliament.

It is wrong to propose the closure of the unit when either cross-subsidy from another part of the activities of the trust or relocation of the unit from Ealing to the central London premises of the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear hospital would offer a lifeline to this valued facility. Neither of those options has been other than flimsily considered in the consultation document that the trust has issued.

It is wrong to propose the closure of the unit when, as in the words of one distinguished therapist, there is the likelihood of an irretrievable—I use her words advisedly—loss of knowledge, expertise and good practice, which it has taken many years to accumulate. Finally, it is wrong for the trust to propose the closure of a unit, the running cost of which amounts to 0.2 per cent. of the total turnover last year of the Royal Free Hampstead NHS trust.

The Minister, for whom I have the highest regard—I feel sure that he has a glittering ministerial career ahead of him—has been listening with his customary courtesy. It is possible that he is thinking to himself, "Well, there's a certain amount in all this, but why is it a matter for me?" I do not wish to be unkind, because I like the Minister, but his private secretary telephoned my office last Thursday to report—I happened not to be there, but she gave the information to my secretary—that the Minister thought that I ought to be aware that a public consultation process was taking place in respect of the Nuffield speech and language unit, so he did not feel that he could say much and therefore that there was not much point in me proceeding with the debate. My response, through my secretary, was to say, "Well, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health—who is, of course, but a Minister—might not have anything to say, but I certainly do", as I hope that I have demonstrated so far this evening.

I want very simply to put two points to the Minister on why this is a proper matter for him. First, it is not local. If the Minister has in the scripted speech—very carefully prepared for him by others to whom I cannot refer in the Chamber—passages that suggest that the local configuration of services should be determined by local people on the strength of a local knowledge of local needs, he should delete those passages. If he is planning to say, "Well, it would be very presumptuous of me to say what should be decided by the trust", I urge him to abandon that argument.

The cap does not fit, and one of the reasons why there is such widespread, indeed almost pervasive, cynicism in the country about politics and politicians—we all have a duty to counter that cynicism—is that a lot of people think that, irrespective of party, we are all too ready to proclaim our successes, to boast and to invite praise, glory and congratulation, but when a problem arises, it is always someone else's fault; leave the responsibility to A. N. Other. That will not do.

This is not a local matter, local to the Royal Free Hampstead NHS trust or local to Ealing. I have already explained that the unit's services have been extensively used by a range of authorities, predominantly but not exclusively in London, and it is a unique national resource. So there is a relevance for the Government, and they should take a view.

Secondly, the form of the consultation has been profoundly objectionable, and it is a matter with which the Minister should concern himself. You will doubtless be aware, as the fount of all wisdom, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that under section 11 of the Health and Social Care Act 2001, there is a requirement in such circumstances for public consultation exercises to take place. There is an obligation for NHS bodies to ensure that either the recipients of services or their representatives are involved in and consulted on the planning and development of services. I think that it is section 11(2), but if I am mistaken, no doubt the Minister will advise me. Moreover, the provision goes on to explain that, where decisions to change those services are proposed or contemplated, there is a requirement to consult and involve those who will be affected. I am sorry to tell the Minister that, as far I am concerned, the Royal Free Hampstead NHS trust has chronically failed to adhere to the letter or spirit of its legal responsibility.

The trust's chief executive, Mr. Andrew Way, did not want a consultation process to take place, but he eventually agreed, under pressure, that it could. He then went to the Ealing scrutiny panel, for which legislative provision is also made, without telling the parents of children at the unit, to ask for permission to have a much shorter consultation than the 90 days that he would otherwise be obliged to accept. He was, I am pleased to say, turned down and a 90-day consultation, running to the end of June, is now in process. Mr. Way and his colleagues on the trust board have rejected the suggestions of consultees and other supporters of the unit and refuse to issue, even now, a list of the people whom they are consulting. They have decided to stage public consultation meetings on a week day between 3 and 5 o'clock in the afternoon and from 6 o'clock until 8 o'clock in the evening.

I suggest to the House, knowing that hon. Members are not ordinarily cynical, that those times are manifestly inconvenient to working parents and parents of young children. The thought arises in one's mind that Mr. Way and his colleagues might not be disappointed if attendance at those meetings turned out to be small. At the first meeting, the only parent who attended was Dr. Tony Canas who stood up passionately and rigorously for the cause of the unit. I believe that that is an absolute disgrace.

It is also a disgrace that the trust board has so far refused to consult the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists; a body that one might presume had some responsibility for potential recipients of the services under discussion. The board has also failed and refused to consult both the Association of Speech and Language Therapists in Independent Practice and the Association for All Speech Impaired Children. So far, one could be forgiven for thinking that the consultation is a sham, a farce and a disgrace and that Mr. Andrew Way and his cohorts should be ashamed of the truly despicable way in which they have gone about the matter.

rose—

I realise that I am expressing myself in my characteristically modest and understated terms, for which I make no apology before giving way to my hon. Friend.

I am sorry to intervene again on my hon. Friend, but there seems to be a parallel here with some of the sharp practices carried out in the New Forest and Romsey area in an attempt to close much-loved community hospitals. My hon. Friend might bear in mind the fact that when statutory consultations are abused in this way, the process of judicial review is always possible. If the person undertaking the review happens to be someone eligible for legal aid, the trust may find itself facing much larger and more irrecoverable legal bills than any possible short-term saving that resulted from the initial closure of a unit. I just mention that by the by.

I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for his advice, which might well come in handy in the weeks and months ahead. As far as I am concerned, this is but the start of the campaign to preserve this unit.

The Royal Free Hampstead NHS trust issued an annual report last year, which—sickeningly, from my point of view—carried on its front cover the slogan, "Specialising in Excellence". That should not be a slogan, a pious hope or a rhetorical statement of good intent for a honeyed future; it should, first and foremost, reflect the reality on the ground, current practice and existing achievement. In that context, it should reflect the medical and educational priorities of a proud parent trust. But it does not. On the strength of a one-year deficit, in the face of a continuing parliamentary inquiry into relevant matters, and with scarcely a finger lifted to promote the unit, Mr. Andrew Way and his trust board colleagues are seriously, in all conscience I am advised, proposing the closure of a unit which has done so much to help some of the most vulnerable and disadvantaged children in our society, and which could do so much more in the future.

If Mr. Way and his colleagues believe that the only way in which they can achieve overall financial balance—not within the unit but within the trust as a whole—is by picking on the most vulnerable children in the community, I honestly suggest that they should be told to clear their desks and pursue employment opportunities elsewhere. I appeal to the Minister, who I think is a compassionate, decent and humanitarian figure, to agree with me that there should at the least be a stay of execution in this case.

I ask the Minister from the bottom of my heart to instruct—yes, I use that word—the trust to do two things. First, it should write to all LEAs, to relevant GPs, to speech and language therapists, to educational psychologists, to paediatricians and possibly to others, on whom we can agree if he accepts the principle, to inform them of the services of the unit, its success rate and the advisability in many cases of a referral to it.

Secondly, I urge the Minister to instruct the trust board to look seriously, not with a pathetic, dismissive one-paragraph consideration, at the possibility of moving the unit from Ealing to central London in Gray's Inn road, thereby not only making internal cost savings through location within the hospital but opening up the potential of a much wider area from which applications and referrals can come, not least the eastern part of London. That is a sensible proposition and it ought, among others, to be examined.

The Minister will have noted that I have not launched some excoriating attack on the Government's inclusion policy. Inclusion can work for a significant, a large number of children. It is, with appropriate help and support, the right course. If I accept that, which seems to me simply to reflect the reality of the evidence, I hope that the Minister will acknowledge that, for a significant and vulnerable minority of children, inclusion does not and cannot work. Those children need additional help. There is nowhere that better provides it for children with severe speech and language impairments than the Nuffield speech and language unit. It must survive; I will fight to preserve it. I hope that I will be joined by the Minister and others.

I start by sincerely congratulating the hon. Member for Buckingham (John Bercow) on securing the debate this evening. I have long been a student of his contributions to the House. In this debate, as in many others, the House owes him a debt of gratitude for the compassionate and intelligent way in which he has aired this issue. I ought also to congratulate him on his recent accolade of Opposition politician of the year. His contribution this evening has underlined exactly why that accolade was well deserved.

As I am sure the hon. Gentleman will appreciate, I have prepared remarks which I would like to rehearse in a moment or two. The hon. Gentleman has brought a lot of information to the House tonight which, if I may, I would like to reflect on. I will share with him the brief that I have this evening. There are a number of points on which I will need to make further inquiries in the light of what he has said this evening because it presents a different picture from the one that I have been given.

May I apologise for my private secretary's remarks last week? Of course, this is a proper matter for me to consider, and it is absolutely right that the hon. Gentleman should make a contribution this evening.

I put on record my congratulations and thanks to the NHS staff at the Nuffield speech and language and unit for the standard of service that they have provided, as the hon. Gentleman said, since 1971. The unit has indeed changed the lives of many people in and around London. I shall not detain the hon. Gentleman long, as I wish to consider what action to take after tonight's debate. However, two points of context highlight the reason why he is right to bring this debate to the Floor of the House. First, we are in the middle of a process of transforming the NHS. Secondly, as part of that modernisation, we must continue to work to transform the life chances of all children. There is a substantial basis on which to build in Ealing and the parts of the capital served by the NHS trust, and much of that progress has been made possible by extra investment. I do not know how the hon. Gentleman voted on successive Finance Acts, as I did not obtain that information before I came to the Chamber, but he will welcome the fact that there are 590 extra consultants in the North Central London strategic health authority area; 2,200 extra nurses; 170 more health care assistants; and, pertinent to this debate, over 100 extra speech and language therapy staff. As a result, waiting lists have come down, which he will welcome. More than 4,000 people waited six months for hospital in-patient treatment in 1997, but that figure has fallen to zero as of February. Of course, that is not enough.

The Minister said that no one has waited more than six months for an NHS operation, but that is incorrect according to the Department of Health website, which says that 74 people are waiting for an operation.

I would be delighted to check whether that is correct. My information applies to the position as of February, but I will check it against the information on the web, which applies to the position as of December.

Further investment needs to be made in the NHS, which is why spending will rise to £92 billion in the next year or two. That is important, as there is still a great deal to do to modernise health services, given our aspirations to transform children's life chances. About a year ago, we published the national service framework for children, young people and maternity services, which was celebrated around the world as a benchmark providing specifications on the services that children should receive. It is not something of which the Government alone should be proud—it is something of which many people up and down the country can be proud, because it benefited from a wide-ranging input from organisations that have done a great deal to change children's lives. In the next 10 years, our ambition is to ensure that children with special needs, young people and their families should experience services that are based on their assessed needs; promote social inclusion; and, wherever possible, enable them to live ordinary lives. That ambition is shared across the House, but we admit that we have not quite fulfilled it.

Does the Minister agree that primary care trusts were the main commissioners of services provided by Nuffield—a point that has been superbly illustrated this evening? Many PCTs are in debt and many of them, including my own PCT, are unable to purchase such services. Many local education authorities, PCTs and other bodies believe that they are carrying out the Government's wishes and their agenda of inclusion, even though that has not been voiced by the Government, by not purchasing services from specialised units.