Regulatory Enforcement and Sanctions Bill [HL]

My Lords, as noble Lords are aware, there has been considerable discussion about the regulator's requirement to bring forward a case to a criminal standard of proof. That is a requirement. I hope that the noble Lord will be satisfied with that given that this was debated at some length earlier. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Lyell, asked about the need at all for variable monetary penalties and why they are there to capture benefits of non-compliance, particularly if the more serious offences are to be prosecuted through the criminal courts instead. They would be useful in instances of non-compliance where a business has inadvertently breached regulations and corrected its breach quickly but has made a significant financial gain or competitive advantage. I mentioned the case of Citigroup, where a fine significantly captured the competitive advantage that it had gained from non-compliance. In that circumstance, a regulator might decide that a variable monetary penalty would be a more appropriate and proportionate response than a criminal prosecution.