Compensation Bill [Lords]

The Minister has been extremely generous with her time, and I was reluctant to intervene, except that she has made a very important announcement: the decision that the Department for Constitutional Affairs will regulate the claims management industry. Given what she said about how that will fit with the legal services reforms planned by her Department, will she be a little clearer about the timeframe she envisages for the introduction of the regulatory framework? Given the mood of the House, does she agree that if in the meantime the unregulated claims management industry is to continue, there is a great deal more that the Law Society could and should do, through its code of conduct, to influence its members’ choice of whom to work with in managing claims?