I welcome the opportunity to support the stance of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on his charge-capping measures. The courts have decided that he exercised his powers properly within the law. He made one or two telling points yesterday. I endorse his point that local government has no powers other than the powers given to it by the House. We must accept and respect that. They devolve from the sovereignty of Parliament and should be considered in that light.

It is often overlooked that, where there is a double mandate—first, to local government and secondly, to national Government—the national Government's mandate must prevail over that of local government.

I recently introduced a ten-minute Bill dealing with universal capping. One of my suggestions was that, when the national Government were fighting a battle against inflation, the local councillors could not be immune from tight fiscal management of their funds. Unfortunately, councillors feel that they are somehow immune, that they can turn their backs on the problems of central Government and the public's struggles against the high interest rates which are necessary to reduce our economic problems. But they cannot turn their backs and say, "We'll spend what we like, how we like," which totally ignores the problems we face as a whole.

The public must look at the local councillor who is as accountable as the Member of Parliament and as the Government of the day. One of the keys to that accountability is laid down in the community charge. The community charge cannot work properly, except in single-tier authorities. The local government elections in May in Westminster and Wandworth proved that, where there is one authority, it is clear what the public are voting for and they recognise where the services come from.

The best example of my point is my own county of Lancashire. The West Lancashire district council reduced its share of the community charge to just below the Government's estimate. Little credit was given for that, because the county council increased its share to £100 above what the Government's estimate was likely to be. As the notice for payment of the community charge was sent out by the district council and had its name on the top, it was the district councillors who stood for election who took the brunt of the public's displeasure over the size of the community charge. It was not their responsibility; the responsibility lay elsewhere. There must be a second plank of accountability in future.