Clause 1
Consumers, Estate Agents and Redress Bill
10:30 am
Mark Prisk (Shadow Minister (Small Businesses and Enterprise), Trade & Industry; Hertford and Stortford, Conservative)
As the Minister said, the clause establishes in statute the new NCC and the new territorial committees. I shall consider their remit in clause 2 in more detail.
I will not revisit the principle of the proposal—the merging of various utility consumer organisations—which we debated on Second Reading. However, I want to explore the Government’s intentions towards the new council and its potential remit, now and in the future.
The Government consultation prior to the Bill addressed the issue of what were then termed regulated industries, not just gas, water and electricity, and included the entire communications industry and consideration of financial services. However, the Bill reflects a narrower interpretation, perhaps understandably, as it seeks to merge into the council only those bodies that we would naturally recognise as utilities: gas, water, electricity and, in this case, postal services. Furthermore, it acknowledges the timing problems for the waterindustry vis-Ã -vis the pricing review. The upshot is that it will not seek to incorporate either the financial services or the Ofcom consumer panels into the new council.
However, part 1 of schedule 1 on page 42 enables the Secretary of State to appoint members of the financial services panel and Ofcom to the council, despite the Government agreeing that at present it has “no plans” to incorporate such organisations into the council. The Government thus recognise the potential need for a wider remit.
That leads me to consider how the council might develop in the coming years. A regulated industry covers many things; hon. Members on both sidesof the Committee can think of a number of different industries that do not immediately and currently fall within the purview of the Bill. As such, a regulated industry could therefore mean many more things than we are debating and my concern is how the council might develop when it is established in primary legislation.
For example, many of my constituents, and, I suspect, those of Labour Members, want increasedand strengthened consumer representation in the railway industry, which is regulated, and they will have complaints about pricing, servicing and so on. Is it the Government’s view, therefore, that the new council could or should extend the remit to bodies or sectors beyond those named in the Bill? Does the Minister envisage other regulated industries being included in the future, and, if so, which industries?