Offender Management Bill

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Gibson, on putting forward such a positive case on national bargaining. We are privileged in this House by having people with such vast experience on the basis of their previous work, and she makes a lot of sense. It is about time that the Minister examined every argument put forward by the noble Baroness, and perhaps this is the time to go back to the drawing board and come back before Third Reading to what is appropriate in this instance. I shall not repeat many of the arguments that the noble Baroness has advanced, but under Amendment No. 4, proposed by the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, we were talking about replacing the role of the Secretary of State and bringing in the probation boards. We heard the arguments from the opposite Benches about how ineffective they were and why the Secretary of State should be in charge of these things. I am flabbergasted. Now they are reversing that role and saying that the boards are the efficient people who should be negotiating the national terms and conditions of probation staff. That is plain daft, if I may say so. I wish the noble Lord, Lord Warner, were here as I should love to hear the views of new Labour as against old Labour on the discussions that we are now having.