Clause 47 - POWER OF OFT TO REQUIRE ACCESS TO PREMISES
Consumer Credit Bill
10:00 am
Mr Gerry Sutcliffe (Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Employment Relations, Competition and Consumers), Department of Trade and Industry; Bradford South, Labour)
Once again, I am grateful to the hon. Member for Tewkesbury for moving the amendment; I accept that it is a probing amendment. I do not wish to underline too much his concerns about the OFT, but I should set out how the OFT should behave when exercising its new powers under the Act.
The hon. Gentleman is of the view that nobody can control the OFT. The OFT is an independent regulatory body established under the Enterprise Act 2002 and is fully accountable to Parliament, reporting annually to the Secretary of State for the Department of Trade and Industry and appearing before relevant parliamentary committees. Indeed, several meetings take place between OFT officials, DTI officials and Ministers.