Regulatory Reform (Financial Services and Markets Act 2000) Order 2007

I thank the Minister for his detailed explanation of the order and congratulate him on still being in his post. I think that this is the first time that the three of us have had the delight of debating since the new Prime Minister came into position and the reshuffle took place. We are delighted that the noble Lord remains in the Treasury brief. This is by any standards a fairly minor measure; its individual components are acceptable to us and we support it. My question follows on from the noble Baroness’s last comments. Can we envisage further measures to reduce regulatory requirements in the financial services sector or are those who have been toiling in the vineyard to produce this measure hanging up their boots for another season, so that we should not expect anything else? The noble Lord said that a number of further proposals originally contained in the measure have been dropped, two of which relate to consultation. Have they been dropped for good or is there an intention to bring them back? The fact that the controversial matters related to consultation underlines the difficulty of deregulation. The easiest thing to suggest stopping is consultation. It is very easy to say, ““Oh, let’s not bother consulting on all that again””. Of all the regulatory burdens, the burden placed on companies to be consulted is probably the one that they worry about least. So my question is narrow: will the three elements of the original proposals which have been dropped come back or have they been dropped for good? Subject to that, we support the regulations.