My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, for his clarity and succinctness, and for the other comments that have been made in this debate. If I do not answer all the points exactly, I hope to do so during the course of a series of amendments that we have; for example, I shall have some more to say on quality a little further on. I shall try to look at these amendments in the round.
Amendment 50 seeks to remove part of the definition of the term “public body” from the clause, which relates to bodies that are not public authorities but have functions of a public nature and are funded wholly or partly from public funds. The definition gives an overview of the types of bodies that might be covered by the duty. The Government think it right in principle—and I think that there is agreement—that public authorities and other bodies performing public functions should be capable of being subjected to targets. However, this is only a power to prescribe; it does not oblige all those that fall within the other public bodies category to be subject to a target. Therefore, a particular body will be subject to targets only when the Secretary of State makes secondary legislation—just to be clear. Our intention is that bodies with a workforce in England of more than 250 employees will be subject to the duty.
My noble friend Lord Hodgson is absolutely right that bodies are entitled to clarification as to which bodies are in and which are out, and we will set out the full list of public bodies affected in a consultation that that we intend to publish during the passage of the Bill. That will be an opportunity for those affected to respond to the consultation. I am sure that it is not yet available, but this Bill starts in this House, and there is an interplay between what we are doing here, which is perhaps relatively narrow, and the emerging policy on apprenticeships, which coincides with it. The list of bodies will be set out in regulations, and we will bring those forward for debate in both Houses, following the passage of the Bill.