Consumers, Estate Agents and Redress Bill [HL]

I would like to speak to this amendment which also stands in my name. I am at a wee bit of a loss to know why this subsection is in the Bill because you would imagine that if you request information, you then have the chance to publish it. So why do we need to have Parliament’s permission in the form of granting the Government the right to publish if they so wish? It seems a rather unnecessary amendment. If the subsection is intended not to give the council the power to publish but, because of the existence ofthe word ““may””, to give it the power to refuse to publish, we are talking about something else; we are talking about giving the Government the power to waste the National Consumer Council’s time in getting it to produce a report which one would imagine would be of interest to more than Ministers and the Secretary of State. It is one of those pieces of meaningless verbiage which find their way into Bills because they have always done so. Therefore, I would have thought you either have the provision ““must””, or you do not have the subsection at all. If the National Consumer Council has some plus points—and I think that it has—one of the areas where it has been very influential is in producing well thought-out and well considered reports, whichhave on occasions moved forward discussions and government thinking. But if the reports are that worthy and that important, as I think probably they would be, it is not unreasonable that the rest of us should have access to them and that they should be published by the Minister. In some respects the Bill would be none the worse if subsection (2) was not present. But it is and in the form that it is written it is unhelpful. It could be a form of embarrassment to the Government and it would be better if they had ““must””. If they do not want ““must””, at another time and in another place it would be simpler just to withdraw the subsection. I realise that we are not pushing the amendment to a vote, and I am merely trying to be helpful to my noble friend because I think that this is the kind of issue that is just storing up trouble for the future. The nasty people along the other end of the building would have great sport with a piece of sloppy legislative drafting of this nature, and the Bill would be none the worse without it. But if we are going to have it, it ought to be ““must”” rather than ““may””. There is a danger that a cynical Secretary of Statein another administration might well take the opportunity that this subsection affords to involve the National Consumer Council in needless work to which we, the public and politicians, would never have access, because there would be no obligation on the Government to publish it.