Saving Gateway Accounts Bill

My Lords, the Minister disappoints me. I invited him to give a rationale for having this very wide, if marginally fettered, flexibility. He responded that I had not given a good reason to restrict flexibility. It is not done that way round. It is for the Government to justify why they should have their flexibility. The Minister referred to some schemes going beyond 100 per cent, but only in very restricted cases where there was a specified purpose for the saving, which is not what this saving gateway account is currently drafted as, and nor could it be turned into such an account, given the powers in the Bill. I continue to believe that we should restrict the Bill to something that resembles saving, and I have thought hard about whether or not to seek the opinion of the House on that. However, since the powers in this Bill may not be exercised by the current Government for very much longer, and we have yet to see what the outcome of the next election might be, I have decided to trust the British electorate, and entrust the powers to a sensible Government, and on that basis I withdraw my amendment. Amendment 7 withdrawn. Clause 9 : Statements etc. Amendment 8 not moved.