My Lords, government Amendments 21, 22 and 23 respond directly to our
Committee debates regarding the small business appeals champion and the business impact target. Regarding the champion, the noble Lord, Lord Mendelsohn, made a number of helpful observations about how it might work in practice. He was keen to ensure that any guidance issued to the champions should be laid before both Houses as well as published. I made it clear in Committee that this was already our intention and I am pleased to confirm it with Amendments 21 and 22.
I turn now to the business impact target. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, for his comments in Committee regarding the scope of the target. In particular, he raised concerns around the clarity of the coverage regarding voluntary and community bodies. I have reflected on this issue and I agree that there is more that we can do in the Bill to clarify it. I have therefore tabled Amendment 23, which is a relatively straightforward provision to simplify Clause 27(5). It will remove the current membership threshold of at least 21 individuals for unincorporated bodies that do not distribute any surplus to their members. As I am sure many noble Lords will be aware from their own work in the voluntary sector, such bodies can be adversely affected by redundant, ineffective or excessively burdensome regulation, just as much as businesses can. Therefore, including them within the scope of the business impact target makes a lot of sense. It will not harm the voluntary sector, but will help to ensure that any burdens from new regulations are minimised and that there is transparent reporting of impacts.
This Government have already made a number of changes that have made it easier to set up and run charities and social enterprises. Those include providing greater legal clarity on volunteer liability and supporting proposals to make criminal record checks simpler and less onerous. The amendment will mean that such bodies are not excluded from the definition of “small” and “micro” businesses in Clauses 33 and 34, meaning that they can benefit from any regulatory exemptions made by reference to that definition. I hope noble Lords will welcome the amendments, and I beg to move.