My Lords, it would be wrong of me to let the noble Viscount’s concluding remarks pass, particularly as I was named. I also thank him for his considerable work on the Bill, his courtesy during debate, and his incredible letter-writing abilities. I have never been in receipt of so many letters, both by e-mail and by hand. Sometimes people actually checked up whether a letter had arrived that I had not even received. It was helpful to know that it was on its way. We even received three further letters overnight in anticipation of this debate. It shows the quality of the service that we received. I am sure that the noble Viscount will accept that that was not entirely his work.
I also thank the Bill team, although not all of them are present. I hope that my words will go back to those who are not here. The team has been extremely helpful in giving us information and facilitating meetings. I also thank my Front Bench team, the noble Baronesses, Lady Worthington, Lady Hayter and Lady Thornton, and the noble Lords, Lord Young, Lord Whitty and Lord McKenzie, who, along with our legislative support team, have taken much of the load off my shoulders and done a brilliant job in scrutinising the legislation. It has been four months—a considerable amount of one’s time—since we began consideration of the Bill. That explains why the choir has been bereft of our support during that time.
The Bill runs to 266 pages, which, as the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, reminded us, is a bit more than when it was first published. That represents a fair number of trees. This was never going to be an easy job. It is also important to put on record that the Bill did not come to us sanctified by work in another place. A lot of changes were added just as the Bill left the House of Commons, and the Government have added a number of measures while we have been considering it. There will presumably be further consideration in another place on matters such as health and safety, abolition of the Agricultural Wages Board and Midata, which were never discussed in the House of Commons. I should be interested to see what happens when the Bill comes back after Easter.
As the Minister said, the Bill is in a better shape from its time here. It was amended and concessions were offered on 27 major points, which is pretty good. I do not claim credit for them all but in the spirit of bipartisanship, I think we can agree that in most cases the changes were of benefit. There are one or two matters on which we divided, but I am sure that the Government will want to reflect carefully on whether they wish to change the will of the House, which was expressed in many cases narrowly, but nevertheless firmly. I hope that those matters will weigh heavily on the Government.
It has been a most enjoyable time, made better by the good responses that we have received, and I hope that the Bill will fulfil its purposes, even though in some areas it never quite lived up to its name.