My Lords, following on from the comments made by the noble Earl about Scotland, I hope the Minister will encourage dialogue with the authorities in Scotland that have some experience of running these schemes. I am not saying the system is perfect but it would appear a bit absurd not to take advantage of the opportunity, through ministerial joint committees and what have you, to learn as much as can be learned and extract information about the experience in Scotland. I hope that might benefit and expedite the formulation of the scheme in due course.
An important point that I would like the Minister to confirm is that the provisions of this new scheme, which I greatly welcome, apply also to public bodies,
local authorities and housing associations. If it does not do that then it will not be as effective, so I hope consideration will be given to that question.
If everything that can go right does go right—if I may invite the Minister to be optimistic for a moment—how quickly does she think this could be done? I absolutely understand the commitment that she has made; she has made it clear that she is personally committed to the scheme, and I am sure she will do everything that she can to deliver it. However, we live in uncertain times, and it may be that she gets promoted on to further and better things and other Ministers come in. If that were the case, we might look to the new Minister for Financial Inclusion to continue her work.
By what milestones can we measure progress of implementation of the scheme? It is so easy for these things just to disappear slowly by desuetude and disinterest, and by the throng and press of other matters in the departmental in-tray for such things to slip considerably. Can she assure us on the efforts that will be made to ensure that it stays up to the best possible implementation timetable to get done quickly, and on what sanctions there would be if the single financial guidance body did not keep up to the timetable limits set in the Bill? We would be even more reassured that this is a useful scheme if we had some sense of how quickly it will be accessible to ordinary people in the United Kingdom.
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