Charities Bill [HL]

My Lords, I would like to add a few words. The noble Baroness, Lady Scotland of Asthal, said—I think on 28 June last, at col. 189—that, perfectly reasonably, the Government had made all sorts of amendments and improvements to the Bill, which is true, and she drew attention—which is quite fair—to the addition of the words,"““proportionate, accountable, consistent, transparent and targeted””," and then said that she did not think that adding ““fair and reasonable”” was necessary. One point that seems to be different is that made by the noble Lord, Lord Dahrendorf—and indeed by myself last time—that one does not want to be too legalistic when looking at the adjectives which have already been added to a very important clause. One thinks of the vast number of non-lawyers in the voluntary sector who will from time to time have cause to try to understand this Bill. ““Fair and reasonable”” is a time-honoured phrase that has a resonance in a way that some of these others do not. I should be comforted if in answering the debate the Minister could give an absolute assertion that the words ““fair and reasonable”” add nothing whatever to the words ““proportionate, accountable, consistent, transparent and targeted””; and, secondly, that in the context in which the noble Lord, Lord Swinfen, wants them inserted, which is in the commission’s regulatory duties—because new Section 1D(2)(4) refers to the principles of best regulatory practice—he is quite sure that the need for those words and for the words ““fair and reasonable”” does not crop up in any of the five other general duties of the commission; for example, in the fifth general duty, which is not that of regulation or performing its functions as regulator but managing its affairs, and so on. If the Minister could give an absolute assertion that the words are literally redundant in all circumstances that would at least be in Hansard on the record, although I still think, for reasons mentioned previously, that there is no reason on earth why the Government should not agree to these additions, given the nature of the voluntary sector.