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Legal Services Act 2007 (Appeals from Licensing Authority Decisions) (No. 2) Order 2011

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bach, for that response. He is always very kind about how clear and thorough I am in explaining statutory instruments. He knows as well as I do that it is only because of the hard work of the people who sit behind me. I am very pleased that the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, and my noble friend Lord Dholakia thanked the Ministry of Justice and the LSB for their work on this. It is exciting. I pay tribute to the previous Government. The alternative business structures will produce changes which, I suspect, will be mainly to the benefit of the consumer in the provision of legal services. What we are trying to do with these orders is to put the last pieces in place to allow them to function. The noble Lord, Lord Bach, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, both expressed the concerns that were reflected during the last debate—that we have not got a single route here, in that the solicitors have decided to have their separate body. Whether it will cause the problems of a lack of consistency, we will have to see. What I can assure noble Lords is that the LSB will be carrying out further work, and looking at appeal arrangements, and the MoJ will be working closely with the LSB in relation to this. I also understand the question put by the noble Lord, Lord Bach: have we gone too narrow in this extension? As I explained, I do not think we have. However, let us see. The concern expressed last time was that the alternative business structures may allow criminal elements in that would corrupt the new structures. We listened in this Committee and have brought forward extensions, and now think that we have got things right. Again, the LSB will follow the new structures as they go in. So far, only one new alternative business structure has been announced. The Co-op has beaten Tesco; perhaps it should now be called Co-op law rather than Tesco law. This is an exciting development for which the previous Administration can take credit and which we have been pleased to help bring into being. We will discuss legal services in general in more detail when we get to the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill in a short while. However, as the noble Lord, Lord Bach, and I have discussed before, legal services in general are in flux. The ABSs will provide an exciting new dimension to them. On the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Jones, I can only draw his attention to the fact that the consultations were carried out by the Legal Services Board for England and Wales and the Law Society of England and Wales. I am sure that both bodies carried out their consultations across the geographic areas of their responsibility. If he can draw to my attention the case for them not doing that, I will be happy to follow it up. However, since they are both bodies that have an England and Wales dimension and were both charged with wide consultation, my understanding is that they will have consulted in Wales.