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Legal Services Bill [HL]

I am happy to withdraw the amendment in its present form. However, the formulation proposed by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, has proposed would be an appropriate power for the OLC in these circumstances and one which I think the Government will seek following the Macrory report in many other areas of regulation. It is a discretionary power and it is to be left to the OLC itself to decide whether it would be appropriate. If it is to be restricted to where the balance of opinion suggests, to those complaints which have been upheld—the area I am mainly concerned about—I could envisage a situation where it was in the interests of lawyers to have on the public record the fact that they had been cleared of a mischievous complaint, but let us exclude that if we want to. I am concerned with the situation where the OLC is able to publish the names of those against whom a complaint has been upheld. If my noble friend says that it is already possible, that is fine in one sense except that in this new era of reputational sanctions being available to regulators, it might be helpful to include it in the Bill. However, I accept what she has said and we will take it from there. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. Clause 147 agreed to. Clause 148 agreed to. Clause 149 [Disclosure of restricted information]: