Hallmarking Act 1973 (Application to Palladium) Order 2009

I thank the Minister for introducing the order. It does not seem particularly controversial, but I have a few questions. Some or all of them may have been asked in the other place when the order, as the Minister explained, was debated today. If that is the case, I apologise, but I would point out that it is impossible for noble Lords to have read Commons Hansard if it has not yet been produced. I venture to suggest that to schedule for an order to be debated in both Chambers on the same day makes a mockery of parliamentary procedure; a proper gap between the respective debates allows the benefit of questions consequent upon the answers given by the Minister in the other place. According to the Explanatory Memorandum: ""A reasonable amount of public interest in this order is expected as this is the first precious metal to be added to the Act since it was enacted in 1973"." The very next paragraph implies that consultation has been completed and that the Government have responded. I hope that noble Lords will forgive me for saying that. A cynic might suggest that either there has been consultation or that public interest is expected. To say both is to imply that the public have not been fully consulted. I am sure the Minister can explain that satisfactorily. We read that the United States does not have a hallmarking regime such as that in place here in the United Kingdom. The regulatory impact assessment suggests that the result of this is "very significant levels" of what it quaintly calls "under-carating". Can the Minister elaborate on this? Specifically, what volume of US unhallmarked goods, gold and silver for example, have traditionally been imported into the United Kingdom? I ask this because the answer might mean that essentially some of the problems envisaged under the voluntary scheme option referred to in the regulatory impact assessment exist anyway and will not be resolved if there is any quantity of US stock washing around in our system here. We are told that, within Europe, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Slovenia have prescribed palladium as a precious metal in broadly the same way as the provisions of this order. Can the Minister explain why other major European countries such as France, Germany, Italy and Spain are yet to take action, and whether this will give rise to problems analogous to the scenario I have envisaged in respect of US imports? The argument for including palladium in hallmarking regimes centres largely on an expectation of increased palladium jewellery sales, derived at least in part from advances in manufacturing techniques. The market price of palladium, however, has more than halved in the last 18 months, from a high of $579 in February 2008 to $250 at present. We must hope that this does not suggest that the commodity markets are not quite as optimistic about the future of palladium as the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform. Lastly, the department envisages a one-off cost to jewellery traders of £10 for each information sign they must alter, under Section 11 of the 1973 Act, to list palladium as a precious metal. Can the Minister clarify the source of this estimate, which to us seems rather low?