Probate Services (Approved Bodies) Order 2008

I am grateful to both noble Lords for their responses. I shall deal first with the question of why this is an affirmative resolution, in answer to the noble Lord, Lord Henley. The comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, give the answer to that. It is always an important step when the law is changed to enable bodies to take part in legal practice when they have not been able to do so before. There are always a number of doubts and concerns surrounding such a change and it is important that Parliament should have the right to deal with orders that make such changes in a positive, affirmative way. I hope I do not embarrass the noble Lord, Lord Henley, too much if I commend his Government for having made these orders affirmative; it would have been a subject of potential criticism if they had been merely negative orders. The obligation is that consultation must be with the two bodies I have mentioned. The statutory approval process means that the Secretary of State has to seek the advice of the Legal Services Consultative Panel and the president of the Family Division, but no one else is consulted in the process. That is for these particular applications, but, before Section 55 itself was commenced, I am advised that a full consultation took place. I hope that deals with the queries that the noble Lord rightly raised. I take on board the doubts that the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, has expressed. I want to reassure him as best I can that, given the status of the LSCP and of the president of the division, all the matters he was concerned about have been taken fully into account. Indeed, so far as the conveyancers were concerned, he is right that there was initial concern over the lack of compensation arrangements, and the LSCP recommended that that application should be approved only if adequate compensation arrangements were put in place. It further recommended that the Secretary of State give consideration to legislation to amend the Administration of Justice Act to allow the CLC to extend its existing compensation fund to cover probate work. The endorsement from the president of the Family Division for that recommendation was received in February 2008, and ministerial agreement was given in the same month. In March the Courts and Legal Service Act 1990 (Modification of Power to Make Rules about Licensed Conveyancers) Order 2008 was laid. The order gave the power to the CLC to extend its existing compensation funds to cover probate work. That has allowed that body to make rules about paying compensation to people who had suffered loss, as I told the Committee a moment or two ago, as a result of negligence, fraud or dishonesty. The system, if I may say so, seems to work. The body that, by statute, has to be consulted on this made a recommendation. That recommendation was taken on board by the Government, and has now been put into force. There is confidence all round that that is a suitable body to get this right. The noble Lord, Lord Thomas, asked the obvious question—although I do not mean ““obvious”” in any derogatory sense—about why an organisation with ““Scotland”” in its title should want to do this work and why it should be entitled to. The name may be slightly misleading in that, as I understand it, a number of members of that body already do considerable work in England, even though the name of the organisation has ““Scotland”” in it. That is true also for banks whose names include the word ““Scotland”” but that have an important function in England too. The noble Lord may come back to me and say, ““Well, the Scottish legal system is rather different from the English legal system but that may not be so true about the banking system””. The fact remains, however, that some ICAS members already work in England as accountants. The ICAS plans to provide training, which is what the noble Lord was concerned about, through a variety of methods, including compulsory training courses at its examination centres and using solicitors who practise in England and Wales to assist with courses. The ICAS has also approached the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners about the possibility of members attending STEP training courses and, if that application is successful, would enter into a formal agreement. I mention those factors because the Government are satisfied that both bodies are eminently suitable for the work that they have applied to take on. While the noble Lord is of course right to express doubts, and while this is an important step, we are satisfied, as are the consultative bodies and the president, that this is a good move which will pay off. On Question, Motion agreed to.