My Lords, I will certainly give this amendment a serious response, and I thank the noble Lord for the interest he has shown in the Bill. It is of course appropriate that we should consider the range of organisations to which social investment will apply, and I recognise that that range is huge and complex. Many different types of charitable organisations will apply for and use this power, but for many of them it may not be relevant. I should take this opportunity to point out that this was known from inception and that the drafting of the power has been undertaken with the intention of placing the minimum possible burden on those charities by which, at least in the first instance, it is unlikely to be used.
However, I want to set out the case for including as wide a diversity of charitable organisations as possible within the scope of the power. The power of social investment is a permissive one which is intended to encourage trustees who can see the potential of social investment but have lacked the confidence to take it further. By providing a framework in law, the power of social investment will give confidence to charity trustees to add social investment to their existing armoury. The Government intend the power to be available to the full spectrum of charities, subject to some technical exclusions around those established by legislation or royal charter. It is important to make the power as widely available as possible in order to encourage its use and the benefits that will flow from it.
Charitable independent schools fall within this spectrum of charities, and in their charitable activities they seek to further educational purposes for the public benefit in a wide range of ways. Many of them are providing significant support to their local communities across a range of actions. It would therefore be inconsistent to deny them the use of this social investment power. Indeed, to answer the point put by the noble Lord, Lord Lea, I think it would be wrong to do so. I see no
valid argument for why charitable independent schools should be arbitrarily singled out for exclusion from this power, and that is even more the case given their valuable existing contribution, as I have said, and their potential to do even more. It simply does not make sense to deny them the use of this permissive power to stimulate social investments. Indeed, it is encapsulated by the debate on this point so far. On the one hand there are those who appear to be doubting charitable basis for private schools overall as they do not do enough, while on the other hand there are some who are imploring private schools with charitable status to do more.
I would argue that the social investment power would enable them to do more. Therefore it is entirely justified that they should be able to use it. We should give charitable independent schools every opportunity to increase their contribution to public benefit, and using the power of social investment represents such an opportunity.
That is my serious contribution to this debate and, on that basis, I hope the noble Lord will be willing to withdraw his amendment.