It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Jones. I congratulate Mr. Simpson on securing this debate. He, like many hon. Members, has pursued this issue throughout the process, on which local authorities in many parts of the country have embarked. Some issues were settled earlier on to the satisfaction of some and the dissatisfaction of others. In these three counties, however, the process has been particularly poorly handled. It has dragged on, and the goalposts have changed repeatedly. The Government's guidelines have been altered, and various bodies have been asked to examine a problem that is essentially of the Government's own making.

The hon. Gentleman referred in his opening remarks to the chaos that has been generated by the process, and I agree with him. We have a process that effectively paralyses local government at a time when it faces hardship, particularly in the provision of services. Speaking both on behalf of my party and in a personal capacity, I wish to say that there is a logic to unitary local government. In some places, it works very successfully. We have just embarked on the process in my own area in Cornwall. The issue facing us today is not necessarily one of two-tier authorities or unitary authorities being better able to cope with the problems facing an area. It is about how one considers the process of change and whether local people or local organisations have been able to influence the debate on matters that deeply affect them.

It is perhaps also important to reflect on the fact that the areas where these issues were settled some time ago were sticking to the Government's original timetable. Although the process may have been chaotic in the parts of the country that we are discussing today-the three counties of Devon, Norfolk and Suffolk-people in other areas may well look back and think differently.