Lord Whitty: ...What is the end of this policy? That is the central point. As my noble friend Lady Hayter says, the end is consumer benefit. Like her, I recall us making that case at the Committee stage of the then Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill, which set up the CMA in its present form. We were not properly heard then. We need to be heard now. Even the reference to Adam Smith given by the noble...
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town: My Lords, I am pleased to see the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, in her place. We welcome what the Government are doing now because at the time of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill an amendment of ours was passed in this House to provide that letting agents should be regulated and be members of a redress scheme. The noble Baroness persuaded Ministers in the other place to accept part of...
Lord Wallace of Tankerness: ...that certain amendments, such as the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, had to be withdrawn. Indeed, I think the record will show that this House delayed consideration of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill to allow the Prime Minister of the day to make a Statement in the House of Commons on the cross-party agreement. Indeed, at a later stage, the Defamation...
Iain Wright: ...could have first-mover advantage, thanks to investments led by the Green Investment Bank. That would have positive effects for UK prosperity and employment opportunities. In giving evidence to the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill Committee in June 2012, the CBI told us something that stuck with me: that the bank could encourage “investment into technologies that are not entirely...
Ian Murray: ...our amendments in Committee to press the Government to do something about a particular piece of legislation, and the Government ultimately reject them. Of the 87 amendments that I tabled to the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill, 87 were rejected, although I was delighted that four or five came back as the Government’s own ideas on Report. That is essentially what will happen. The...
Fiona O'Donnell: ..., but I urge him to think about what more his Government can do to aid recovery in rural areas. Most of the conversation and discourse I have heard from Government Members—for example in the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill Committee—was about employment rights. The Minister seemed to think that the way to help small businesses was to erode workers’ rights, but I think that has...
Baroness Garden of Frognal: My Lords, I recognise the frustration around the Chamber over this matter. However, the debates during the final stages of the then Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill made clear that caste is a controversial and difficult issue, and that the Government would need to proceed carefully, involving public consultation. I believe that the Tirkey v Chandok case, which was unknown at the time...
Baroness Gardner of Parkes: I must thank those who have spoken on this issue and pay credit to the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, who got her amendment through on the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill. That was extremely valuable and will be most important for many people. The statement that I welcome most in what the Minister has just said is that she will be in touch with the Justice and Communities departments,...
Ian Murray: ...that I have been making. The Government do need a strategy for dealing with that. It seems a little like déjà vu. Mr Brady, you may be feeling that yourself. Two years ago, when we considered the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill, we had exactly the same debate about employment tribunal redress and the penalties for an aggravated breach. In that instance, an employer could be fined...
Ian Murray: ...or types of malpractice. We can see that these include some very serious categories of malpractice, which people may wish to raise under these whistleblowing regulations. Critically, under the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill—the Committee for which Mr Brady also had the unmitigated pleasure of chairing—the Government also added the public interest test. If, therefore, an...
50 Ian Murray: May I take you on to employment tribunals and the failure to pay sums? There was significant debate during the passage of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill, about two years ago, about the number of employment tribunal awards that are not paid. Most of that was, of course, to do with insolvency, but some was to do with just not paying. The biggest concern about...
Lord Stevenson of Balmacara: ...adorned in a triple crown in glorious blue to complement her other attributes. She would be a wonderful commissar for IP. More seriously, your Lordships will recall that during debate on both the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill and the Intellectual Property Bill, there were calls from around the House for the chief executive of the IPO to become an advocate and proselytiser for IP...
Helen Grant: ...on with introducing legislation to make caste discrimination unlawful, and that is exactly what we are trying to do. Many hon. Members will recall caste being debated during deliberations on the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill last year. It was the will of Parliament that a duty be imposed to make caste an aspect of race for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010, and we are well...
Lord Whitty: .... Other things that the Government are doing have undermined the ability to monitor consumer detriment. The information that the Minister gave me during the passage of the Public Bodies Bill and the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill indicated a cut of 20% to Citizens Advice’s resources for dealing with precisely this area of general consumer law. We have heard that trading standards...
Tom Blenkinsop: The Agricultural Wages Board was abolished last year by an amendment added to the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill at the last minute in the House of Lords. The Bill was then scheduled so that there was no time to debate the move in the Commons. Does the Leader of the House agree that the Government are deliberately weakening the ability of the House of Commons to scrutinise the...
Pete Wishart: ...Google is that we must deal with it. We must ensure that we address the matter. This Bill is good, but thin. I know that the Hargreaves process was dealt with in a number of ways. There has been the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill, statutory instruments and of course this Bill. As I have said, this is the first dedicated intellectual property Bill. The response from the design...
Baroness Oppenheim-Barnes: My noble friend will remember that in Committee during consideration of the then Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill I cited the amount of money that I made available to Citizens Advice in 1979-80 because of a small increase in its duties. It was £3 million then, which, in terms of what is being given now, causes me great concern. All members of citizens advice bureaux are not necessarily...
Chi Onwurah: ...change to a law that has existed for 40 years and saved many lives. I must confess that I am experiencing déjà vu because, as I have said, the last Bill Committee on which I served considered the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill. It, too, was full of attacks and policies based on anecdote, and here we are again. The Government have given up even pretending to tackle issues that...
Chi Onwurah: ...entrepreneurs and sole traders. Perhaps the Minister will present it. The evidence seems largely anecdotal. We have seen such a situation before. The previous Bill Committee that I served on—the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill Committee—tried to shoehorn in many proposals from the Beecroft review, which seemed to be entirely based on anecdotal evidence. Let us assume for a...
Iain Wright: ...see the hon. Member for Stroud (Neil Carmichael) in the Chamber. I consider him to be part of the sensible wing of the Tory party, but his speech tonight disabused me of that idea. He served on the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill Committee with me. I do not want to rehash the arguments we had in that Committee, but there was no evidence whatever for some of the stuff that was coming...
