Regulatory Enforcement and Sanctions Bill [HL]

My Lords, I would like to begin by thanking the Minister for introducing so thoroughly the Regulatory Enforcement and Sanctions Bill. We on these Benches are in full support of its stated aims; namely, "““for the reduction and removal of regulatory burdens””." However, I am yet to be convinced that, as drafted, the Bill will be able to achieve those covetable aims. As I said in the debate on the Queen's Speech, Her Majesty’s Government’s past record on deregulation does not give me much hope. This is the third piece of supposed ““deregulatory”” legislation to pass through Parliament since 2000. In 2001, Her Majesty’s Government introduced an Act that produced only 27 deregulations in four years. In the same period, more than 600 new regulations were introduced. Can we really now be confident of a Government with such an abysmal regulatory record? Perhaps the freewheeling new Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Jones, will surprise us all. He has certainly thrown around a lot of numbers today. The first major proposal of the Regulatory Enforcement and Sanctions Bill is to establish the Local Better Regulation Office. I understand from what the Minister said that it is known as the LBRO. The Department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform tells us it will be central to, "““the co-ordination of regulatory enforcement by local authority””." I welcome that, but I am nervous that the Department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform is in fact fobbing all concerned parties off. There is an apparent mismatch between the purpose of the Local Better Regulation Office described in the consultation document and that defined in the draft Bill. In the former, the Local Better Regulation Office is to, "““support local authorities to regulate more effectively””," while in the second, the Local Better Regulation Office is, "““securing that local authorities exercise their relevant functions more effectively"." So, already, the Local Better Regulation Office has been reduced from a co-ordinating organisation to having a policing role. Will the Local Better Regulation Office have sufficient power to achieve the Bill's brave objective of administering consistent, uniform regulation? We on these Benches are sceptical, and we will be moving amendments to reinstate the Local Better Regulatory Office with at least enough power to perform some role of co-ordination. What the Bill really manages to be consistent in, however, is confusion. New bodies are named but not properly defined, and the result is that these new hazy bodies seem to tread on the toes of existing regulatory enforcement bodies. It is left unresolved if a nominated primary authority will replace or just grate alongside the current home and lead authorities. This will inevitably create conflict and duplication of effort. Maybe the Government need to relearn that nursery lesson that too many cooks spoil the broth. In the Government response to the Bill, less than half of the responses approved of how the Bill handled communication between primary and enforcing authorities. The primary authority partnership is a system whereby a business located in one or more different local authority areas can select an authority with which it should deal on all regulatory and enforcement issues, which sounds great. But I worry that one local authority is not going to take kindly to another authority intruding into its traditional business remit. Let us imagine one of the Digby coffee shop chain has broken a fire regulation in Grimsby but the Digby Coffee Company's primary authority is Kensington and Chelsea, so it is therefore the latter's responsibility to fine, and claim the fine, of the offending Grimsby shop. Following the objection from Local Authorities Co-ordinators of Regulatory Services that a business's ““power to nominate”” a council to act as a primary authority interferes with a council's right to decide on its service provision, I cannot see that Grimsby council will not be aggrieved that Kensington and Chelsea is removing its former right to fine. And furthermore, if it is no longer Grimsby's responsibility that the premises of the Digby Coffee Company are flouting regulation, why should it then inform Kensington and Chelsea 200 miles away? This seems a hideously complex way of improving the way that a local authority regulates. My fictional example involving the Digby Coffee Company highlights how the primary partnership offers local authorities the chance of making money through being a primary authority. Of course, I see the advantage in creating a financial incentive to improve local authorities but I believe that the disadvantages are far greater. There is the likelihood that big, multi-site businesses will start bidding for the biggest, richest councils to get the best resources for their trade. This will leave the small single-site businesses unable to nominate a preferred council. As the Federation of Small Businesses anxiously points out, the Regulatory Enforcement and Sanctions Bill will result in small business trading at a disadvantage. We will be laying amendments to insist that the Local Better Regulation Office prevents local authorities from siphoning off resources to serve the large business community. DBERR advertises the Bill as a means of saving business ““over £100 million””. Are these figures right? And besides, should not the model authority be the one that helps small business most by imposing the lightest regulation, and not the lowest cost? Will the Minister forward amendments to guarantee that at least? The Confederation of British Industry, of which the Minister was the chief executive until so recently, flexing its muscles of independence, writes: "““The CBI fundamentally disagrees with the introduction of charges on business to recover costs for the Primary Authority and the use of discretionary requirements and stop notices””." The British Retail Consortium makes the concern even more explicit, arguing that a primary authority might exert upon a business a double taxation. Not only does business pay for enforcement services in its local rates, but it might also have to pay again as the Bill allows primary authorities to charge for their services. I wonder how the Minister will respond to his old ally's criticism of the Bill. To me, all the Bill does—if I may reiterate the initial concerns voiced from these Benches at the Queen's Speech—is to introduce more regulation in an optimistic bid to mend a broken system, and get business to pay for it. DBERR is the ministry where the needs of the consumer are also supposed to be addressed. As the former chairman of the National Consumer Council, as president of the National Consumer Federation and vice-president of the Trading Standards Institute, I am alert to the need of the consumer to be represented and of the disadvantaged consumer to be protected. So, I am uneasy. This Bill seems to have pretty much forgotten that the consumer even exists. As a typical piece of Whitehall legislation it takes a top-down approach, ordering a plan of action to an unprompted audience. The Bill needs to reflect and enable a dialogue and response to people's actual needs. It is not good enough that it is intended only that the board of the Local Better Regulation Office will include consumer representation. Consideration for the consumer needs to be written on the face of the Bill. We will be advancing amendments to specify more precisely membership of the board, making sure that it includes members who between them all have experience in a range of areas, including consumer affairs. We on these Benches will not let Her Majesty's Government wriggle out of its apparent intention, accountability. Throughout the code, little connection seems to be made between consumer interests and regulatory outcome. Do I really have to point out to the Government a basic point that without consumers there would be no business demand and therefore no call for regulation? The connection between consumers’ interests and regulatory outcomes is given insufficient weight throughout the code. Her Majesty’s Government would do well to keep in mind that it is not just business that gets unhappily entangled in the red tape of regulatory confusion, but the consumer. During the debate on the Queen's Speech, the noble Lord, Lord Jones, indicated he was going to rip off his jacket and rip into regulation. Can he then tell the House how many regulations will go as a result of the Bill? Where is the power for business to challenge regulation and instigate their removal? Where is the regulation ration for government departments? Where is the system for reversing the costs of unnecessary regulation on the bureaucracies that produced them? Where is the parallel to the Paperwork Reduction Act, or any of the specific deregulation proposals in other legislatures? Where in fact, is the beef? The noble Lord has not been five months in government and Whitehall has drawn the teeth he once bared for British industry and small business. His department is riddled with kryptonite and he needs to root it out. This Bill is all process and no action. It would have made a brilliant episode of ““Yes Minister””. What we had hoped for from the noble Lord, Lord Jones, was a tad more ““No, Sir Humphrey””. In a consultation document for the Bill, Her Majesty’s Government declared that they aimed to regulate, "““in a light touch way””." I do not see that this Bill manages this in any shape or form; rather, it introduces yet more regulations and more enforcement bodies, making tasks more and more onerous. Business and the consumer are being bound so tight they have no real place to move. Having read this Bill from cover to cover, all that I can ask the Minister is: is this really the future of regulation that he dreamed of when he was running the Confederation of British Industry? I dare say that it is not. We on these Benches, however, are in full support of the stated aims of this Bill and we will strive over the coming weeks to help the Government fulfil them—bruising though that experience may turn out to be.