Dormant Bank and Building Society Accounts Bill [HL]

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, who was as constructive as ever and we will certainly take his points on board. However, we have consulted upon and extolled the virtues of the two priorities. He will recognise also that we are dealing with money that is certainly not the Government’s, but is private. Therefore, we needed to negotiate desirable outcomes with the organisations concerned. One priority is improving financial literacy, which has a role to play. There has been wide acceptance in our consultation that these are good priorities. The third will be made possible as we develop our work. Of course it is always possible to find good causes right across the board for expenditure. I would not vie with the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, on his ability to produce a list of good causes, but I think that I would come a good second to him. The Government’s objective is to get this scheme off the ground and be able to reassure all those participating in it that the money will be intelligently and usefully deployed. That is why the priorities have been identified.