Saving Gateway Accounts Bill

I know the particular sensitivities of the noble Lord, Lord Myners, on the subject of nationalised banks. The noble Lord, Lord Newby, also referred to the fact that they have community investment funds or social responsibility agendas. Yes, indeed, banks have funds devoted to that but, of course, they have been leaned on for other things in recent years; for example, the provision of cash machines. In my experience, banks tend to think that social responsibility is their agenda and not necessarily the Government’s agenda. Of course, there are other calls on the banks waiting in the wings: for example, the funding of financial inclusion and financial education. At the moment, the Thoresen proposals, when rolled out, will be unfunded. Let us not pretend that there is an unlimited pool. Although banks are large organisations which have money that they devote to socially worthwhile projects, we cannot assume that the Government can highjack that. The Minister said that he had had a positive response and that he was making progress, indeed that the Government were confident. However, the Government have not given us any more confidence today that this scheme will get off the ground. I detect from those contacts that we have, for example, with those in banking, that there is still a problem in this making sense to the providers coming in. Doubtless we can return to that at a later stage. The elements of banks wanting to come in or not, which will come down to the costs imposed on banks, will be covered in later amendments. This is an important issue and if it is not resolved we may not be having a saving gateway scheme at all because you cannot have a saving gateway scheme unless there are some providers to provide the accounts. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment 19 withdrawn.