My Lords, I support the noble Earl, Lord Lindsay, and I wish to speak briefly to Amendments 99 to 101 in his name, mine and that of the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville. In doing so, I apologise for not being able to speak at Second Reading or in Committee. I sincerely thank my noble friend on the Front Bench and the noble Lords on the Lib Dem Front Bench for promoting and supporting our amendments in our absence. I also thank the Minister for being so very generous with his time in meeting us between Committee and Report, and for listening so intently to trading standards officers who do this work on the ground, day after day.

The effect of Amendments 99 and 100 would be to give new powers to trading standards officers to operate across national borders when necessary. Current legislation does not make it clear that trading standards officers in England and Wales can exercise their powers across the border with Scotland, even though this is an area of reserved powers. In fact, the current legislation implies that this cross-border enforcement activity is not permitted. It would be helpful if the Minister, in his reply, could make clear the exercise of powers across borders, so that it is at least on the record for trading standards professionals.

At a post-Brexit time when the UK is building up its new internal market in goods and services, and needs corresponding consumer protection, this current questionable restriction on pursuing officers makes it very difficult to enforce legislation where a rogue trader offends across a national border. I am sure the Minister will agree that, for the success of the new internal market, trading standards officers should be able to pursue and enforce right across the United Kingdom.

Amendment 101, to which I have also added my name, would be an opportunity to finally update trading standards officers’ powers of entry, as the noble Earl said. At present, trading standards officers are required to exercise physical powers of entry to premises before information access or the seizing of documents, which may well be needed in criminal proceedings. The amendment, which we support, would have the effect of changing their information-gathering powers to enable documents to be requested in writing and without the need for physical entry, and for those documents to still be used in criminal proceedings.

This would be a lot less hassle for legitimate businesses and traders, and would give them more time to source the required documents. For the small, overstretched band of trading standards officers, the requirement to exercise physical powers of entry across the country, in order to seize documents that they may need to use in criminal proceedings, is not cost effective for their cash-strapped local authorities. Rogue traders are not constrained by local authority boundaries, and trading standards officers may have to travel long distances to obtain documents physically. Their local authorities may not be able to finance such activity, and the case would therefore be dropped. I ask the Minister to think again on this matter, to sustain consumer confidence in the consumer enforcement powers of a UK-wide trading standards profession.