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Dormant Bank and Building Society Accounts Bill [HL]

I, too, have questions about the amendment and very much support the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Higgins. Perhaps I may build on the latter part of his remarks and speak in my role as chair of a major charity. We need to bear in mind that the most important task, if it is achievable, is for these resources to be returned to where they properly belong—not just in terms of people still living whose accounts have disappeared, but much more in terms of those who have died and may have left a will. Surely the first task is to do everything we can by transparent means to make sure that the resources get to where the person who originally owned them intended. As I read it, the amendment would seem to make that more difficult. In thinking about these matters we have a choice as to how much we go with the proper concern for confidentiality and transparency, which Amendment No. 24 would seem to open up. The debate as to how we balance those two things is important, but we need to hold clearly to the objective that the resources should go to where those who originally owned them intended them to be.