Consumers, Estate Agents and Redress Bill [HL]

This is a large group of amendments. Amendments are put into large groups, which sometimes makes it difficult for the Minister to respond on his feet. I am fully aware of that. We try very hard, when looking at the groupings that the Government have given us, to see if there is any logical way that we can get through them in a way that the Minister can give a reply that he feels comfortable with. I thank the Minister very much for the amount of work that he has personally done in trying to respond to these amendments. I must say that it has been a delight to have the support of the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill, for the first time in all these debates, on ““good”” and ““best practice””. It was rather brave of him to refer to sloppiness and slap-dash drafting. I am not sure that I would ever have the courage to accuse Her Majesty’s civil servants of slap-dash and sloppy drafting. I shall not line up with that one, but I am delighted to have the noble Lord’s support on ““good”” and ““best””. I think that ““best”” is best and I know that the Minister will go away and have a look at that point. I then had my wrist slapped by the noble Lord, Lord Newton of Braintree—my noble friend Lord Newton of Braintree—who picked up on the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Borrie, who was Director-General of Fair Trading when I was chairman of the National Consumer Council and is a man for whom I have enormous respect. To hear him being quoted made me sit up and start making a few notes. I will read very carefully what the Minister said in reply. I received a bit of a jolt at one stage, because I thought that he said something about the way that the legislation has been drafted, or the way that it will move forward, meant that it is possible for there to be only one ombudsman. I must have got that incorrect, or maybe I was dreaming, so I will read carefully what the Minister actually said. I am delighted to have the support of the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, who is, of course, the present chairman of the National Consumer Council and will be taking it forward through this enormous change. He is right to be concerned over a body that was never intended to handle complaints, whose duty was over many years, and during the years that I chaired it, to do the blue-skies thinking that no other consumer body worldwide was ever able to do. It was funded by the Government to take its time and to write good reports that we could build on. It was 11 years ago that I produced the piece of work that raised concern about the selling of sugar and fat to children through television advertising. It is only now that we see that work coming to fruition. Sometimes the best work takes a long time to get there. I am grateful to everyone who has spoken to the amendments. I am grateful to the Minister that he was able at this late stage to take so much time and trouble to try to give us all the answers that we would want. We will go away and consider them and I fully understand that some of the answers will have to be written. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. [Amendments Nos. 112 and 113 not moved.] Clause 42 agreed to. Clauses 43 and 44 agreed to. Schedule 5 agreed to. Clause 45 agreed to. Clause 46 [Membership of redress scheme]: [Amendments Nos. 114 and 115 not moved.] Clause 46 agreed to. Clause 47 agreed to. Clause 48 [Membership of redress schemes: supplementary]: [Amendments Nos. 116 to 121 not moved.] Clause 48 agreed to. Clause 49 [Approval of redress schemes: supplementary]: [Amendment No. 122 not moved.] Clause 49 agreed to. Clauses 50 and 51 agreed to.