Banking (Special Provisions) Bill

Like the Minister, I am not a lawyer but my understanding of Pepper v Hart is that statements made at the Dispatch Box can be used subsequently in legal proceedings. I asked the question in respect of hybridity because the Minister is on record as saying that we are introducing this Bill with these wide powers in order to avoid the problem of hybridity. If Pepper v Hart applies to considerations of hybridity, and if I wanted to argue that the Bill was hybrid, I would point out that the Minister had told Parliament that he had made it this way in order to get round the problems of hybridity. That is rather like setting up tax-avoidance schemes with the express purpose of avoiding tax—something the Revenue tends to take as not being valid.