Your Lordships will remember that I made a very long speech on the DPRRC’s reports and I would like to think that it was the power of reasoning within that long speech that led to these very welcome amendments from the Government. I suspect, however, that it is the reputation of the DPRRC and the rigour of its work that caused these changes to be made. For that, we should be grateful and pleased. It is a shame that the Government had to go through this process to do it, but it has happened.
We on these Benches also welcome the announcement made by the Minister on financial stability issues and bringing in the PAC and Treasury Select Committees confidentially on that. That is a common-sense approach, and it goes a long way to solving any issues.
On defining subsidies and schemes of interest and of particular interest, we are disappointed that the definitions are not brought into the Bill, but I hope that following the consultation process the Government will come back and, either formally or informally, inform the Front Benches and those others involved in the Bill of progress, so that when the regulation is made, we will in a sense have been brought into that process. This is a good set of amendments that we broadly welcome.
9.45 pm