Compensation Bill [Lords]

My hon. Friend is correct. Indeed, transparency is in the interests of the trade union and the solicitor. The whole idea of a loophole as regards commercially sensitive information is a non-starter—there is no rationale for it whatsoever. Paragraph 5 of the code refers to a third party. Who determines the identity of the third party, who appoints the third party, and who pays the third party? That would create a problem for any decent trade union, never mind a rogue trade union. Who would the UDM appoint as the third party to look after consumer complaints? One could come up with various suggestions. I suspect that if a union is doing something fundamentally wrong—in this case, ripping off tens of thousands of elderly miners and widows—it is unlikely to appoint a third party to handle complaints that is anything other than particularly well connected and sympathetic to it and to its aims. The ability to appoint a third party without further definition is a weakness. I remind Members that, whether we like it or not, the UDM is a certificated trade union and falls within this definition. We therefore need to ensure that the Bill and the codes of practice that go with it will fit the bad apple as well as the other 98 per cent. with whom there is nothing wrong. That is the dilemma that we face. We cannot afford to allow a renegade union such as the UDM, which has systematically been robbing my constituents and others, to get away with it—and even potentially to be able to justify it, and to have their expensive solicitors justify it—because of a lack of tightness in the wording of the draft code. The next problem with the code concerns redress. I have here the solicitors practice rules from 1990, with 38 pages of detail. Labour Members, and perhaps others, have been critical of the Law Society. I have seen a significant improvement in how it has handled complaints over the past year, particularly since I had to refer it and certain cases to the legal ombudsman, who produced a very critical special report. I made a whole series of complaints on behalf of my constituents about a firm of solicitors called Moss—one of the UDM solicitors. We not only need details about the regulations but about rights of redress. There is no point in having regulation without a clear right of redress. If, under the new regulatory regime, with self-regulation built in through the code, someone wants to challenge deductions that were wrongly made, it is essential, especially for people falling within self-regulation, that the regulations are watertight. That means having the right of redress, which is a basic consumer right. The Law Society learned that over the years and now specifies the amount of redress and how it should be funded. These cases are unusual. The volume of cases going to the Law Society is, to be fair, very unusual and the sheer volume has caused great problems. There will not be a great volume, however, in respect of ordinary, decent trade unions, which do not have many such complaints. Few complaints are made to the certification officer in the first place, irrespective of whether they are listened to and acted on. Other than the scandal of miners’ compensation, we are not talking about a large volume. That should be borne in mind when we are deciding whether to go for self-regulation or to impose regulation. A consensus should emerge within the House that unnecessary regulation and too much Government regulation do not represent the way forward. As I have argued on several occasions in the past and certainly in respect of an organisation such as the UDM, the definition of membership should provide the ability to ensure that claims handling is regulated by the regulator and that whatever is done for the real members defined by law is covered by self-regulation. I would be satisfied with that. My definition of claims handling for trade unions would arise where they go beyond their existing members and start to scout out, as the UDM and Vendside did, for further people—perhaps for ex-members or members of a former union or widows. Straightforward definitions help to solve many of the problems that lie within a code of conduct, however it is worded.