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Banking Bill

My Lords, I thank the Minister for setting out the Government’s response. It is difficult to accept their rationale for Clause 57. The Minister effectively says that there is a legal remedy. I think that he must mean judicial review, because there is no other obvious legal remedy available. That process, while available, is costly, cumbersome and not very well directed at a lot of issues. I am sure that anybody who has worked in government will know that you can avoid judicial review by going through a lot of processes that make it look as though you have considered everything, even if you have not. There are some real issues here as to whether the Treasury should have the power to specify things that are unreasonable, which the Bill allows it to do. The longstop is perhaps that no decent valuer would accept appointment if the Treasury had set unacceptable parameters in the compensation order. Of course, the Treasury might not want a decent valuer when the time comes, so we must see what happens. I will not press my amendments, but I am disappointed. However, I would be even more disappointed if the Treasury ever used this power in a way that seemed designed to tilt the result of the valuation. That would be unacceptable. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment 40 withdrawn. Amendments 41 and 42 not moved.