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Compensation Bill [HL]

The noble Baroness is getting impatient. Meanwhile, back to the Bill, she must in future amend her assertions that this is only a clarificatory measure. It means—the noble Earl has planted this in my mind—that the House of Lords could not go back to the issues covered by Clause 1. Clause 1 is declaratory of the common law as it stands. The House of Lords can change from decade to decade but in future it will not be able to go backwards, so to speak, in terms of the matters covered by Clause 1. That will no longer be within its gift, so the provision is not purely clarificatory—it is fixative.