My Lords, listening to what the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, said, and the earlier debate about safety, one thing that occurred to me was seeing the newsreel footage of the crash of the Hindenburg, just before the Second World War—a crash that virtually ended the airship as a commercial prospect. That is a useful reminder that what may be seen as the next new thing could be disastrously impacted.
The simple message, which seems so obvious, is that if entrepreneurs considering coming into the industry have unlimited liability, they will not come in. If there is no cover—particularly, as the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, emphasised, for third parties—that would
be totally unacceptable. The problem has been spelled out; the Government should face up to those contradictions.