Financial Services Bill

My Lords, I, too, shall be brief but I should like to raise a general point. These procedures do not seem to have a great deal of pace built into them. There is plenty of opportunity for reports to be considered at the next meeting but the next quarterly meeting could be 90 days away. I get the impression that the Bill’s treatment of the council’s proceedings is a sort of construct in order to demonstrate to the markets and to the world outside that problems are being recognised and given due consideration. It seems to me that this is where the status of the council comes into question. If the council has contentious things to discuss, the minutes will become a very active ingredient in the debate about monetary policy, regulation, supervision and all such matters relating to the market. However, because the council does not have executive responsibility and apparently does not have any powers, it will be difficult to establish where its deliberations are leading in terms of action. I do not get a feel of that from reading the text of this clause but I get a general feeling that something needs to be done to sharpen things up a bit and to ensure that there is some time pressure, as proposed in the previous amendment. I think that that was a sub-plot of what we were discussing. All these very high-powered people on the council will have a sort of authority among them collectively, and indeed individually, and that level of authority is almost looking for an executive function to which to apply itself. Because the council is specifically not intended to be an executive body, we have to wonder how initiatives will be channelled into action which may be needed. I should very much appreciate the noble Lord commenting on how this looks from the Government’s point of view.