My Lords, my remarks will change the atmosphere of “love fest” between the two Front Benches with regard to the “may/must” question. There seems to be a semantic problem here in that “must” appears in new Section (2) proposed by Amendment 107D, which one could interpret to mean must. Unfortunately, however, new Section (3) proposed by the same amendment converts “must” into “may”, because it says that if the measure is not in the public interest the “must” does not apply. That shows how difficult it is
to draft Bills, particularly in circumstances such as these. I assume that lawyers will flourish when they read “must” in proposed new Section (2) and then discover that the Treasury has decided that it is not in the public interest to publish a direction, and therefore “must” no longer applies. I thought that I ought to add that to the otherwise very pleasant interchange to which I have been listening.