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Building Societies (Funding) and Mutual Societies (Transfers) Bill

The Joint Select Committee on Delegated Legislation that examined the issue of hybrid instruments said that where those hybrid instruments were such that they might affect individuals, there should not be any removal of the right to use those hybrid instruments. Its concern was that although we have clear rules about what hybrid Bills are and the fact that people have the right to petition for such Bills, the Executive were trying to avoid the hybridity rules that relate to private Bills by trying to use subordinate legislation as the means for getting those hybrid instruments through. That is why the hybrid instruments procedure was initiated. It was examined by the Committee, which concluded that the procedure has"““for nearly 50 years provided valuable safeguards for private interests affected by delegated legislation and should be retained.””" That is what is important in the context of this debate: that procedure should be retained and not swept away. If it is to be bypassed by the provisions of this Bill, it is incumbent on the Minister to articulate clearly what alternative safeguards will be available to people who might be adversely affected. I turn to the other Lords amendments in this considerable group. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Fareham (Mr. Hoban) for raising a number of concerns that I had about their provisions, particularly Lords amendment No. 3. I hope that the Minister will be able to give us assurances about the insertion of a definition of an EEA mutual society, which as I said in an intervention, seems to be at odds with the Bill's definition of a mutual society. Surely a UK mutual society is also an EEA mutual society, because the UK is in the EEA. It would have been much clearer if the same rules applied everywhere. I hoped that the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Lembit Öpik) was allying himself with the Eurosceptic cause, but I can understand that his ambitions to become president of his party are unlikely to be realised—in the light of the leadership candidates—if he has such credentials. I do not blame him for suppressing them today. In any case, he expressed concerns and I hope that they will be addressed by the Minister.