Legal Services Bill [HL]

My Lords, it is not in the Bill; it is the practice that is currently used by the Government. The Government have the commissioner, as well as a transparent process. The noble Lord himself has looked at the workings of the code of practice and so on, and that is the basis on which appointments are made. It is not in legislation, not least because the code of practice and the way appointments are made are updated from time to time, based on current best practice and best thinking. I am sure that over the years your Lordships’ House has had many debates, not least with the noble Lord, Lord Neill of Bladen, about making sure that there is an opportunity to update best practice and to be mindful of changes that could be made. It is not in the Bill; it is, however, the way in which public appointments are made where Ministers are involved. That has been the way of it, certainly so long as I have been a Minister. We follow the guidance on the basis of the detail I have already given about transparency, openness and so on. I turn to who makes the appointments. The noble Lord is right that the way the guidance works is that the panel is chaired by a senior civil servant, but it is not run by them, except in so far as they have a responsibility as chair to ensure that the processis followed properly, that people participate appropriately, that the candidates are treated fairly and so on. They may indeed ask questions themselves, because they have a clear interest, but earlier today in Questions we were talking about the importance of the senior Civil Service and of its independence, in the context of a desire, from the Liberal Democrat Benches in particular, for a Civil Service Bill. None the less, it is important—I think noble Lords would concur with this—that the senior Civil Service is independent, acts with probity and pursues this policy and practice appropriately. That is who chairs it. That is how the appointments have been made. To my knowledge there has been no suggestion that they are handled with anything other than independence and probity. In addition, there is an independent assessor from the Office of the Commissioner for Public Appointments who sits on the panel and makes sure that the OCPA code of practice is followed. So there is already a senior civil servant, plus the independent assessor who ensures that the code is followed, and then there has to be at least one other member of the panel, someone who the OCPA code says represents a public body or other industry groups. In this context that could include a consumer or legal professional, or whatever was felt to be appropriate. The guidance says, "““there may also be, where appropriate, a technical, medical or scientific expert when a specific area of expertise of applicants needs to be tested””." That would enable the panel to have the additional expertise of someone who had the necessary technical knowledge. Taken as a whole, the guidance ensures that we have the right level of expertise and of impartiality. When there is no final decision on the composition of the panel, there have been discussions about what kind of expertise there might be, and, through the implementation working group, what kind of individual might most appropriately be involved.