Clause 5
Consumers, Estate Agents and Redress Bill
4:15 pm
Ian McCartney (Minister of State (Trade & Investment), Department of Trade and Industry; Makerfield, Labour)
Again, I accept that the hon. Gentleman has moved a probing amendment, and I hope that my explanation will reassure him and other members of the Committee about the intentions behind the clause.
The amendment takes a particularly bureaucratic approach to what we want to do. A statutory limitation on the new council’s spending is not the best way to ensure that consumer interests are met. Expenditure by the new council will be subject to a budget agreed with my Department each year, as is usual practice for non-departmental public bodies. As with similar bodies, it is likely that rolling three-year budgets will be reviewed annually to provide for as much planning certainty as possible. At the outset, therefore, there will be an understanding of the overall budget for the three years, but that will be reviewed each year to ensure that things are working effectively. To take up a point that hon. Members raised earlier, that will allow certainty about the planning process and outcomes, as resources will be dealt with in a transparent way to meet requirements.
Another important point is that the budget will be subject to close consultation—the hon. Gentleman did not raise this in his amendment, but I am sure that it relates to the intentions behind it—between the Department, the gas, electricity and postal services companies and, later, the water companies regarding their respective contributions. It is particularly important that those sectors are involved, since they are being asked to contribute significant resources to secure the NCC’s work, albeit for public interest reasons, to which we are all committed.
When, in a previous life, I introduced the national minimum wage, I always argued that we would need a Low Pay Commission. If we impose a wage settlement on employers and ask them to put their hands in their pockets, there is a requirement for them to be involved in discussions and decision making about the level of the settlement. For a different reason, the process before us is very similar: we are trying to ensure that industries are engaged at every level as regards their respective contributions.