UK Parliament / Open data

Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill

For the last time, the fundamental question is: are the Government sure that the supposed benefits outweigh the risks? We have not really coped with that at all today. There is a real risk. When the thing is not broken, why try to mend it? The competition regime has been very good over many years. In my opinion, the Government are taking a quite unjustifiable risk of running that regime into a brick wall. That is the question and that is why I am not satisfied that the Government have really thought this through if they cannot tell me that they have taken proper legal advice

about the risk they are running. For a very long time, the whole of business and industry has understood that this was done in two places. There was a reference from here and an investigation and determination over there. Change that and—believe you me—a lot of people, when they find out that that is what has happened, are not going to like it. If their lawyers come with them, there could be real trouble. I feel very strongly that the matter of risk needs to be dealt with. It is not a matter of efficiency or effectiveness—you can imagine all sorts of efficiencies, effectiveness and even economies—but a matter of risk.

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
741 c372GC 
Session
2012-13
Chamber / Committee
House of Lords Grand Committee
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