Richard, of course you are right if there is a conflict (i.e. totally incompetent drafting). In this case the Act requires the Sec of State to prepare Guidance and requires Local Authorities to have due regard to it.

If anyone can find a genuine conflict between the two the Act will have precedence. However one of the problems in the debates on the Act was that the Minister said all sorts of desirable things, which were not inconsistent with the wording but were not explicit in it. At least some of those items are explicit in the Guidance and so in those cases the current Minister has now fulfilled the promise in debate.

Richard P