It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Taunton Deane (Rebecca Pow), who rightly says that there are practical and positive measures in the Bill that we should welcome. However, I believe that the Bill could have gone forward and been even more practical and positive and offered even more flexibility.
As the hon. Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones) said earlier, she and I served on the Committee that considered the Small Charitable Donations Bill back in 2012. Indeed, the point about euros emerged as a reassurance to me, as I represent a border constituency in Northern Ireland. I pointed out that when a number of charities in my constituency raise money, whether with bucket collections or other ways such as church events, they find euros in their collections, and I asked whether they would have to sift them out or whether they could honestly declare them. In fairness, the then Minister, now the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, came forward with the clarification that that money could certainly all be counted.
The hon. Member for Clwyd South is right to say in that context that, when the 2012 Bill was being considered, the refusal to allow donations in the form of cheques or contactless or various other foreseeable electronic payments was odd. I wonder whether even now the Minister will consider allowing, in Committee, an enabling clause giving Ministers the power to permit payment by cheques and so on in future, so that these measures would not have to come back before the House. As the hon. Member for Amber Valley (Nigel Mills) said, he made that point in the Committee on the 2012 Bill.
In the Small Charitable Donations Act 2012, the Treasury was given significant powers to change things by order; it was given the power to change the connected charities amount, the community buildings amount, the remaining amount, and the capped total. It could amend the gift aid matching rule, abolish it, and reinstate it, if previously abolished, with or without amendment; it could even, by order, amend the meaning of “eligible charity”, and the limit on the value of individual donations. Sensibly, the Treasury was given the power to make significant working changes to the scheme by order. It seems strange that in this further bit of primary legislation there is not similar flexibility around, say, the use of cheques. That flexibility could be introduced in Committee.
I had the unusual experience of arriving in the 2012 Bill Committee to find that the Government had tabled an amendment to take up a point that I made on Second Reading. The penalty provisions stipulated that a charity that had suffered a penalty from HMRC would be barred from the scheme for a period, but there was no provision for an appeal against or possible overturn of the penalty, and where the penalty had been imposed but subsequently reviewed and set aside there was no provision to say that the period of barring would no longer apply. Sensibly, the Government listened. That proved to me that sometimes, when it comes to small Bills, the Government have a flexible ear and will listen to points made on Second Reading; in the case of small Bills, they can handily concede points, and indeed take the initiative and leapfrog Committee Members in making sensible amendments.
The Minister was right to say that some sensible working adjustments are made in the Bill, but they are
all ones that were advocated by members of the 2012 Public Bill Committee—not just by members of the Opposition, or by me, but in many cases by Conservative members of the Committee. Members were teasing out the implications with practical ideas. Many of us were concerned that the Small Charitable Donations Bill was in danger of tilting into becoming the petty conditions Bill, given the number of different traditions, trips and traps that people could get into. I still wonder whether the Government could be a bit more generous or expansive in how they take the Bill forward. After all, it is clear that the whole matching requirement issue still causes charities problems. We should listen to charities as we take the Bill forward.