Legal Services Bill [HL]

My Lords, I was not going to respond to this amendment, but I know something about government lawyers because I have responsibility for them; and I thought that, with my noble friend’s agreement, I ought to respond. Having listened to both the noble Lords, Lord Kingsland and Lord Hunt, I noted one absolute omission from anything that they said. They have not at any stage pointed out what the benefit to the public would be or what the need for regulation of government lawyers is that is not presently catered for. There are anomalies, and I can go through them if the House wants, but at the end of the day there is a real, practical issue here. The amendment seeks a substantial sum of money to be paid by taxpayers to the Law Society without demonstrating what the public benefit would be. That is a difficult thing to justify when that would be the effect of the amendment. The Government are the principal consumers in the case of those offices listed under Clause 184, not the public at large. To that end, the existing system adequately provides regulation for government solicitors. I know from my own responsibilities that there is a strong and proportionate system of regulation applying to government solicitors which includes comprehensive training and development programmes, ensuring that high standards are maintained across the Government Legal Service. The head of the Government Legal Service is the Treasury Solicitor, who is responsible for what takes place. Clause 184(5) also ensures that any government solicitor who exercises a right of audience or conducts litigation is under a duty to the court to act with independence in the interests of justice. I come back to the point: I have not heard a single shred of evidence to suggest that there is a problem with how government solicitors carry out their duties under the existing regime, or information which supports the case for the public purse to meet the cost of different regulatory arrangements to those already provided. I am sorry to disappoint noble Lords, but I ultimately find it hard to accept that the taxpayer should make this additional sum of money available for no benefit to the public. I therefore invite the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.