I will bear in mind your observations, Mr Speaker, but I hope you will indulge me if I occasionally say something a bit different. I will of course spend most of my time on the amendment.
I want to set the matter in context. I volunteered to serve on the Bill Committee. I am told that it is traditional to have to be nudged into serving on Committees for Finance Bills, unless of course they are Ministers or shadow Ministers. I wanted to serve on the Committee perhaps because I am a bit geeky or because I am interested in esoteric things; perhaps it is because of my legal background that I am interested in these matters.
I also had a more serious reason for volunteering. We need to bear in mind that this country’s economy relies heavily on the financial services industry, and that a massive banking and financial crisis occurred in 2008, not only in the UK but in similar economies around the world. We know that the crisis started as a result of the collapse of Lehman Brothers and of the sub-prime mortgage market in the United States, which led to the collapse of many banks around the world. Economies like ours—in the USA, Japan, France and Germany, for example—suffered as well.
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It is important to consider these matters in that context, because they inevitably get caught up in the political debate. This Government have often stated that the financial crisis was caused by the Labour party. Indeed, the Minister said earlier that one of the reasons for the crisis was that the Labour Government had not put in place enough rules and regulations. I think it might be helpful if I remind him what his current boss and the Prime Minister have said about those rules and regulations in the past. I refer him to Hansard of 27 November 2006, when the right hon. Member for Tatton (Mr Osborne) said of the then Chancellor:
“In an age of greater choice, he offers more overbearing control; in an age of greater freedom, he gives us more interference…in an age of flexibility”.—[Official Report, 27 November 2006; Vol. 453, c. 835.]
The right hon. Gentleman also said in 2006:
“I fear that much of this regulation has been burdensome, complex and makes cross-border market penetration more difficult.”
The right hon. Member for Witney (Mr Cameron) said in 2008:
“As a free-marketeer by conviction, it will not surprise you to hear me say that a significant part of Labour’s economic failure has been the excessive bureaucratic interventionism of the past decade…too much regulation…to little understanding of what our businesses need”.
The Minister and other members of his Government often say that it was a lack of regulation by the Labour Government that caused the mess, but they need to realise that the Labour Government were trying to regulate at that time and that the then Opposition, who should have been supporting them, were carping from the sides and saying, “No, don’t do this.” A little trip down memory lane might be helpful for everyone concerned.
I chose to serve on the Committee, and I have chosen to contribute to the debate today because the financial collapse, the LIBOR scandal and other events have shown that the financial sector—an important part of our economy—has not got things right over the years. I will not go into the details of every aspect of the Bill, but my party has been pressing for various changes. The amendment that we won in the House of Lords covers the regulation of people employed in the financial services sector, and I would argue that there is a need for licensing. I am proud of the fact that those on my Front Bench are insisting that the amendment should be accepted and I ask the Government to reconsider their view.
I am a barrister, and I am subject to regulation. I have to have a licence to practise law, as do solicitors. Members of other professions also require a licence to practise,
including doctors, dentists and chartered accountants. They are all regulated by independent bodies that oversee cases of misdemeanour or negligence. Why should bankers not be subject to the same rules and regulations? After all, stockbrokers and people who work in commodities and bonds are experts in their field; they are not just pulled in off the street and told to start commodity trading, banking or whatever. They have had professional training and learned their trade.
The Financial Conduct Authority covers every aspect of the financial services sector, so what is wrong with asking for a licensing system? What is wrong with asking these people to take a professional exam? What is wrong with requesting that they should be regulated properly? If they commit an error—negligence, criminality and so on—why should they not be dealt with appropriately? Why should they not have a licence to practise? We have to re-emphasise how big a part of the United Kingdom’s trading is done by the financial sector. Given that, it is surprising that there has been no regulation of the people carrying out that trading. The Government are missing a big trick if they fail to regulate, because this is important. I do not see why people in this sector should be given a exemption. In all other professional walks of life, people are regulated. We could regulate properly and have it supervised by an independent body.
It is not enough just for a company to say, “You are fit to work.” That is just not right. We must have an outside, independent body—somebody removed from the institution—to say whether someone is a fit and proper person, and if they do something wrong they should be struck off. What is wrong with that? As a lawyer, I can be struck off if I make a mistake. Doctors, too, can be struck off, so why cannot bankers? Policemen can be struck off, and other people may be told to leave their job or are struck off and prevented from practising their profession, so why not bankers? Labour’s proposal is perfectly sensible and logical; it would be the right amendment to make.
The hon. Member for Chichester (Mr Tyrie), Chairman of the Treasury Committee, said that this Bill started off 35 pages long and now runs to some 180 pages, after some 192 amendments. That shows that the Government were not thinking things through properly when they were putting the Bill together. One expects some amendments as a Bill passes through both Houses and one expects the number of pages to increase, but the fact that the Bill has increased in size by more than 100 pages shows that it was not thought out properly and things have been happening as we have gone along. Again, that demonstrates that although the Government have done some things, they have failed to address one really important aspect of the whole thing: the regulation of the behaviour of the people involved.
It was individuals, not machines, making the decisions that caused the whole world to collapse, and the ordinary person in the street in my constituency is suffering as a result of the mess caused by a small group of people. We cannot let that happen again, so it is important that the people making these decisions—the people playing with our money—and the organisations they work for are held accountable and need to explain themselves. Proper training, and a proper certification system and licensing system, are a must for our economy.