Banking (Special Provisions) Bill

moved Amendment No. 7: 7: Clause 10, page 10, line 27, at end insert— ““( ) No provision may be made in regulations under this section which would have the effect of depriving any person of rights to use capital losses incurred in connection with a transfer of securities under section 3 or of property or rights under section 6 in the computation of that person’s liability to capital gains tax or, in the case of a person liable to corporation tax, the computation of that person’s liability to corporation tax on capital gains.”” The noble Lord said: I declare my interest as a partner in the national commercial law firm, Beechcroft LLP, and as president of the Chartered Insurance Institute and the other entries in the register. I am merely seeking to probe the Government’s intention behind Clause 10. I understand that the clause is intended to ensure that the nationalisation of Northern Rock, or, as the Minister seemed to imply last night, any other financial institution, does not have an unintended effect on tax revenues. I understand that any steps taken under this Clause will be based on a tax analysis report which will be produced in a few months’ time. I wonder whether the Minister could just answer a couple of questions. First, will the tax analysis report be made public? Secondly, how far will the Government go to ensure that their tax revenues are not damaged by this nationalisation? The specific case that my amendment anticipates is that current shareholders in Northern Rock will potentially make a significant loss upon nationalisation. It would be natural for them to seek to offset that loss against any profit they might have made on other assets in their portfolios. Surely, the least the Government could do in these difficult circumstances is to avoid taking steps that might deny them this. I beg to move.