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Legal Services Bill [HL]

My Lords, I strongly support this amendment and I was pleased to add my name to those of my noble friends Lord Kingsland and Lord Campbell of Alloway, as well as that of the noble Lord, Lord Maclennan of Rogart. Partnership was very much a theme of the Joint Committee. We would like to see the Legal Services Board acting in partnership. The noble Lord, Lord Maclennan, has just raised the important issue of cost, about which one or two rumours are going around. Perhaps we could take the opportunity either in this debate or in a later one to try to put some credible figures to the stories which are running in the press at the present time. When the Government first looked at the whole issue in the light of Sir David Clementi’s recommendations, most of those involved in the process and independent commentators were considering a new, streamlined regulatory system to be put together reasonably quickly which, provided Sir David Clementi’s proposals were accepted, would be comparatively economical and thus welcomed by the professions. Indeed, it wasSir David Clementi who could see how a partnership would work. We have had a number of debates about this partnership that have already been referred to, but we are still waiting for the Minister to confirm how the new Legal Services Board will work. Will it rely on the frontline regulators to be in the front line and not be subject to day-to-day administrative interference? Obviously the Legal Services Board, in complying with the regulatory objectives, has an attitude in principle towards the way that regulation will evolve, but there is still a suspicion that unless we write something into the Bill along the lines of this amendment—and we are going to debate a number of subsequent amendments as well—we may well end up with something that duplicates, indeed triplicates, the existing system, which seems to be working reasonably well at present. The separation of the regulatory and representative functions has worked well, and some of the key individuals involved inspire confidence in the way the whole process is now evolving. If one’s suspicions about costs—transitional costs in particular—become a reality, one has to question whether it is all in fact worth it. In order to reach a conclusion about that, we need to hear much more from the Minister.