Dormant Bank and Building Society Accounts Bill [HL]

I am grateful to the Minister because he has given us a very clear definition of how the Government intend to make the apportionment. The logical thing is to put that in the Bill instead of having the repetitious wording that does not tell you anything. The Government could have a provision in the Bill saying that the money will be apportioned between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland based on population—end of story, that is all that there is to it. Perhaps they would like to think about that. I am saddened to hear the Minister’s definition of fairness as purely based on population. In my view, that is not a particularly good definition of fairness, nor is it actually one that the Government have used particularly in justifying levels of expenditure in Northern Ireland, for example in the past. Finally, one problem with charities operating and people operating for charitable purposes in Scotland and Wales is that compared to England few charities are based there—particularly in Wales. It is much harder if you are based in Wales successfully to make a charitable application as a result. The proposal in our amendment would have gone some way to rectifying that balance and I am extremely sorry that the Government do not see the strength of that argument.