My Lords, I thank the Minister for her response and particularly for engaging with the reasons behind the amendment more than its technical perfection, which I accept it lacks. However, I will have to read carefully what she has actually said to see whether it is the reassurance that a number of noble Lords are seeking—from listening carefully to their contributions—about protecting the jewel in the crown, as it were, which is at the heart of what the Government and everybody are trying to achieve in the current environment. I will come back to that in a moment.
I also correct the omission of not thanking the noble Lord, Lord Morse—who is a good supporter to have in these sorts of issues—for adding his name to my amendment. I also tender on his behalf his apologies that because of timing he could not be here to speak to the amendment. He may get another opportunity to speak to the issues that lie behind it at some other point in the consideration of this legislation.
I thank all noble Lords for their contributions. They all added something to my knowledge and understanding of the issues I am trying to raise before
the Committee in the context of this Bill. I hope there will be a collective, maybe holistic, solution to the different elements of this problem that have been identified.
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, for pointing out to me the complexity of the area that I am in because of the different forms of organisations that will be involved. I am familiar with some of this, but clearly not as familiar as she is. However, I encourage her not just to assume that every takeover is a foreign investment. It appears to me that the more I go into this, the more that I discover that it is a not a foreign investment. I go back to the article in the Telegraph, which I quoted liberally. Ben Marlow, the chief City commentator of the Telegraph—to whom I am deeply indebted—says:
“Moreover, ministers repeatedly conflate real investment with opportunistic takeovers when they couldn’t be more different.”
He then goes on to give examples of what he thinks are real investment, and Nissan is right up there, as you would imagine.
I am impressed by that and think I understand it. However, I understand it even better when I read the Financial Stability Report of the Bank of England in October 2021, when it points out that there is a developing danger to our economy in the leveraged loan markets with:
“the trend of increased prevalence of looser underwriting standards has continued, which increases risks to end-investors.”
It goes on to say:
“Recent UK leveraged lending flows have in part been driven by a surge in private equity investment in UK businesses: 2021 private equity investment is on track to exceed its 2019 level, which itself was a strong year.”
In a broader discussion of the indebtedness of this country, it highlights this in particular, which suggests to me that these takeovers have been funded by leveraged loans.
Because I have an interest in sport, I have followed carefully certain takeovers that got a lot of coverage in the sporting media, and I can see how that could work. I am not totally convinced that these are all properly foreign investment. I agree that they have to be looked at on a case-by-case basis, but if the Bank of England is worried, I am worried.
I thank the noble Lords, Lord Fox, Lord Lansley and Lord Broers, for their helpful and supportive contributions, and my noble friends Lord Stansgate and Lady Chapman for their support. All speakers came at this issue from a different perspective, as did the Minister. This issue is worth taking away to see whether there is a holistic way to deal with it in this complex context.
Before I withdraw my amendment, I conclude by apologising to the noble Baroness, Lady Bloomfield, for anticipating that her male colleague would answer. That is not because I am inclined to look for men before I look for women in any context; it was simply because he was the Minister who wrote to me about this and the one to whom I responded. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.