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Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

My Lords, I would have been happy to add my name to this amendment, but I am afraid that I was too late to do so. It seems a well drafted amendment, achieving what is needed in simple language that we can all understand. I take it that we are all agreed that the independence of economic regulators must be secured and protected. They cannot do their job properly if they are liable to be leant on, especially by the Government. As I understand it, the Government accept that position. In his reply in Committee, the Minister said that the Government would be willing to give an undertaking that the independence of the regulators would not be undermined. That being so, I am at a loss to understand how they can object to this amendment. I have reread the reasons given by the Minister with great care, and can find only two in addition to those detected by the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth. The first that I hit on—at col. 1343 of Hansard on 19 July—was that the amendment would impose ““an unnecessary restriction”” on the regulators themselves. I find it difficult to envisage any regulator who wanted to undermine his own independence. The second reason was that the amendment would provide no additional protection, because the regulator could always be sacked for incompetence or misconduct. I find it impossible to follow that reasoning and I hope that the Minister will explain it in due course. In the mean time, I hope that the House will support this excellent and necessary amendment.