Statistics and Registration Service Bill

No, there is no such example and no attempt has been made to justify the Government’s approach in that kind of rational, evidence-based way. It has simply been stated as a matter of principle that Britain should have pre-release, because we have traditions and they should be continued. That strikes me as a weak basis for an argument. Why are the Government so stubborn on this point, given that they have been so reasonable on so many of the other key issues? It is difficult to fathom and the perfectly reasonable question that the right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer) just asked has not been answered. We know that there are intelligent Ministers and officials dealing with this issue in the Treasury, so why cannot they get their heads around this problem? An interesting theory was advanced in the other place by the Conservative spokesman, who claimed to have been told that there was a serious division of opinion between the Treasury and the rest of Whitehall, with an unholy coalition of Ministers in other Departments determined to cling on to the existing pre-release arrangements. Apparently, the Treasury is willing to compromise because it can see the logic of the argument, but the other Departments are not. I do not expect the Exchequer Secretary to confirm that, but it provides a possible explanation for what has been going on. We feel that the Lords amendments are reasonable and we shall oppose any attempt by the Government to reject them.