Consumers, Estate Agents and Redress Bill [HL]

My noble friend Lord Borrie has just made most of the points I intended to make. The point of this group of amendments is flexibility for the new National Consumer Council. I would like the Government’s view on whether an amendment such as that in the name of my noble friend Lord O’Neill is necessary. The new council would need the flexibility, but not the requirement, to intervene in areas like the misleading selling of timeshare. If the present provisions do not allow for that, we need something like my noble friend’s amendment. Likewise, the present National Consumer Council has a responsibility for future consumers as well as current consumers, and does not really require a lot of definition. It is part of the long-run policy focus. We will come on to the issue of sustainability under a later amendment. I hope the Minister can assure the noble Baroness that this does not imply access to any sensitive information. My understanding is that that is not implied at all, and that this is simply what its predecessor bodies have been doing anyway. On the issue of business, I agree entirely with the point made by my noble friend Lord Borrie, who put it very well. Small businesses that are effectively equivalent to domestic and individual consumers need a champion, but the clause as it is currently phrased would give a wider range of responsibility to businesses in general, which I do not think is the intention of the Bill. I hope the Minister will allow the new organisation a bit of flexibility here over what is a small business that needs such protection, and what is not.