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Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

That will be an interesting debate, which I am looking forward to. I want to deal with the amendments on administrative inconveniences, which form part of the definition of burdens. Amendment No. 9 would remove ““administrative inconvenience”” from the definition of what may be removed or reduced by order. Amendment No. 10 removes the qualifier ““administrative””, so that any type of inconvenience could be removed by order. I shall explain what ““administrative inconvenience”” would not cover, which, in a sense, is where the noble Lord, Lord Norton, is coming from. Some have argued that a Minister could have asserted that it was administratively inconvenient for the Government to have to provide free healthcare. Clearly, we do not see it that way. Clause 1(4) provides that burdens affecting only Ministers or government departments can be removed or reduced by order only if they affect the Minister or department in the exercise of a regulatory function. Providing free healthcare is not a regulatory function, so orders under Clause 1 could not be used to remove the Government’s duty to provide free healthcare. Therefore, the allegation made against this as a coach-and-horses approach to legislation does not stand. However, ““administrative inconvenience”” could include time spent by individuals filling in forms to comply with regulations, which does not go so far as to impose a financial cost on them, and could not be said to be—