My Lords, this has been a very disappointing debate. First, I am struck that all references to strikes have been about London strikes. For the vast majority who live in the rest of the country, life looks a little different. First, I am very sorry if the people of London are disrupted by Tube strikes, but that does not apply necessarily to the entire country. Secondly, when I go to Yorkshire I come across a profound disillusion with conventional politics among the different sorts of people whom I meet. Incidentally, that disillusion is deepened by the fiasco of the northern powerhouse, which even the Yorkshire Post occasionally now refers to as the “northern poorhouse”. What is now happening with museums rubs in the sense that the Government care about London and the south and not the north. The other day someone remarked to me that as we have a Government with six senior Cabinet Ministers representing Surrey constituencies and none representing any constituencies in Lancashire, Yorkshire, Durham, Northumberland or Cumbria, it is not surprising that they neglect the north altogether.
The noble Lord, Lord King, talked about disruption. Strikes disrupt people’s lives for a few days. What I hear from people in Bradford is that bankers have disrupted the economy for several years and we have all paid for it, yet the Government have no proposals to strengthen controls on the banking industry. Indeed, from what I understand from the Financial Times, they have just refused to renew the post of the current head of the Financial Conduct Authority because he was felt to be a little too tough on the banking industry.