Dormant Bank and Building Society Accounts Bill [HL]

I shall speak to Amendment No. 16, but before I do so, I say that we, too, are here to widen the Bill so that it presents greater opportunities. We, too, had bother with the Public Bill Office, as did the noble Baroness. It may well have been operating by the rule book. Eventually, we managed to come up with an amendment that was agreeable to it. In a way, the problem was not the Public Bill Office, but the Government losing faith at an earlier stage. The Bill was going to be called the unclaimed assets Bill, but was then renamed the Dormant Bank and Building Society Accounts Bill. It has been narrowed by the Government, which is why we are in this difficulty. Many Members will have seen the report of the Treasury Select Committee in the other place. It had seen a document from the US state of Vermont, where 110 different forms of orphan asset were listed. We are talking about two: bank and building society. I approve of the amendment that the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, has been able to table, but it needs pushing a little further to bring in other things. The reason for that are the words ““financial services””. I am not clear about their precise definition, but owning a share, and dividends that follow shares, may not be financial services. Many things are financial services, but there will be other forms of orphan asset; that is, an asset that has been abandoned and should be looked at if a review is to take place. It is a very gentle approach—I wish it were otherwise. It is interesting that the Republic of Ireland, even though it started reclaiming unclaimed assets only three years ago, is now on to its third Act of Parliament to pursue orphan assets. It takes time, with the conflicting ideas that Governments want to pursue. It would have been far better if this matter could have been dealt with through orders, once the bank and building society side of it had been successfully completed and we could move on to other assets. If this is the only way of doing it, I hope that we can move in this direction.