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Investment Exchanges and Clearing Houses Bill

There is an element of truth in what the right hon. Gentleman says. I do not pretend to be an authority on financial markets, but it is my understanding that the decline in listings in the United States was taking place quite some time before the Sarbanes-Oxley provisions were introduced. That decline was prompted by, among other things, class actions and the fact that there are multiple regulators with different agendas. The decline of the IPO—initial public offering—market has been referred to; that was in evidence well before the Sarbanes-Oxley provisions came in. There is a simple interpretation of recent financial history in which that villainous legislation is responsible for every problem, but there is a lot of good academic research that suggests that companies that have listed in the United States have enjoyed substantial premiums; they have higher regulatory costs, but they also have higher levels of investor protection, which is a positive factor in the market. So there is a trade-off, and the situation is not as clear-cut as some Members seem to be implying.