My Lords, I shall talk to Amendment 16, which I am hopeful that the Minister will tell us is unnecessary. I also strongly support my noble friend Lady Chapman in the amendments she has tabled, and I shall speak to that shortly.
I support Amendment 16 simply because, in today’s global arena, setting an environmental, social and governance strategy is seen as an important benchmark for how responsible organisations operate. This will be a responsible organisation and should comply with the norm that is increasingly being imposed on all organisations that operate in the economic environment.
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I admit that I added my name to this before my research revealed that in September 2020 the Government published a procurement policy note, PPN 06/20, which requires key ESG-related themes to be evaluated in all UK central government procurement from 1 January 2021 through the use of a social value model. The social value model is divided into five broad themes, many of which have arisen in our debates this afternoon, each containing one or more policy outcomes to be achieved that must be evaluated, expressly, through specific ESG objectives. These are: Covid-19 recovery, tackling economic inequality, fighting climate change, equal opportunity and well-being. This procurement policy note applies to all contracts awarded by UK central government departments, their executive agencies and non-departmental public bodies which are regulated by the Public Contracts Regulations 2015.
I draw Members’ attention to paragraph 11(1) of Schedule 3 of the Bill:
“In regulation 2(1) of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 … in the definition of ‘contracting authorities’, at the end insert ‘or the Advanced Research and Invention Agency’.”
This procurement note applies to ARIA in respect of every contract it awards. Therefore, it will be obliged to impose an ESG obligation on everyone with whom it contracts. It would be a nonsense for it not to have an ESG obligation itself. I may have misunderstood this, but it seems to me that, while I will still support Amendment 16 until I hear otherwise, this may take care of the second half of it—indeed, it may take care of it all.
I hope I will be persuaded by the Minister that somehow or other this obligation is placed on ARIA, if not in this way, and that this amendment is unnecessary. If it is not, it seems to me entirely inconsistent with the legal obligations placed on ARIA not to have an obligation on it that it will impose on everyone else it contracts with.
I turn to the amendments spoken to by my noble friend, of which I am very supportive. They impact on the issues which occupy the other place today—maybe we should all stand back and wait to see how they play out there and then adopt whatever the House of Commons now requires of its Members. I support all these amendments, for all the reasons my noble friend explained to the Committee so well.