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Digital Switchover (Disclosure of Information) Bill

My Lords, Amendment No. 9 was originally my amendment in Committee. Since then, my noble friend Lord Howard has put forward Amendment No. 10, which is much superior to Amendment No. 9, but as they are a group we can debate them together. I realise, having received a letter from the Minister, that one cannot command the National Audit Office to do something; one can only prod, advise or otherwise encourage it, and that is what Amendment No. 10 does. This is important. Subsection 5(c) of Schedule 2B of the agreement between the Secretary of State and the BBC, which mentions the NAO, does not go far enough. My noble friend’s Amendment No. 10 goes further. For all the reasons we talked about on the previous amendment, we must remember that although it is licence fee money, the licence fee is a tax and this is taxpayers’ money. It should therefore be scrutinised. I support my noble friend’s amendment.