Lord Stewartby: This amendment, in its present form, will not do, as a number of noble Lords said. But the thought behind it is important. I hope that one of the consequences of this short debate will be that the FSA will look at this area and see whether there are steps it can take to encourage greater transparency. There is no doubt that the with-profits element, whether of a life policy or a personal...
Lord Stewartby: I do not want to add to the Minister's already heavy burden, but could we have five Haringey bullet points at the beginning of each government amendment? That would make them a great deal easier to understand.
Lord Stewartby: I am not suggesting that he should dispense with the Treasury rhubarb, but we should all be helped by starting with such a punchy introduction.
Lord Stewartby: My Lords, I should like to support what my noble friend Lord Saatchi said. Like him, I have particular sympathy for the Minister. Indeed, I spent many hours in Committee in another place on regulatory Bills. They are always very complicated and difficult to handle, especially when they are dealt with single-handedly by a Minister. But the problem with this Bill is not simply its length and...
Lord Stewartby: asked Her Majesty's Government: Whether the Staff Officers' Handbook, Army Code 71038, issue 1, of July 1999, is a classified document; and, if not, why not
Lord Stewartby: Being surrounded by many who are experienced in the legal aspects of this group of amendments, I hesitate to do more than make one observation and ask a question. The observation refers to the regular user. I do not see how that can be objectively implemented. Some of what the noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, said was sensible. As chairman of a public company, I had recent conversation with a very...
Lord Stewartby: Is there a special reason for having this definition of "consumer" just for the purposes of Clause 129?
Lord Stewartby: I have some sympathy with the general purport of the amendments. While I note the observations of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Donaldson, about the wording of Amendment No. 60, I believe that the idea behind it has merit and hope that the Government will respond to it. Like my noble friend Lord Walker of Worcester, I am a little concerned about introducing "reasonable" into subsection...
Lord Stewartby: However--may I ask the Minister one more question? I am grateful for his assurance that there is nothing here which implies that non-executive directors' functions are limited, but will he reconsider the phrase, "the non-executive functions"? They are not defined in Clause 392 and therefore they do not have a special meaning within the Bill. The normal English language meaning of "the...
Lord Stewartby: I hope that the Minister can make it plain when he responds whether the fact that some non-executive functions are listed in the schedule is meant to imply that they are the only non-executive functions. I am very sympathetic to what my noble friend Lord Saatchi and the noble Lord, Lord Sharman, said. Clearly, one would expect the non-executive directors to perform much the same kind of role...
Lord Stewartby: I shall speak only briefly to the amendment because the arguments have been deployed in relation to the previous group. My particular concern regarding the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Newby, was the introduction of the term "chief executive", because it carries with it the implication that there can be no higher executive authority. If there were to be a director-general, I should be...
Lord Stewartby: When the noble Lord, Lord Newby, introduced his amendment, he said that he believed that everyone at Second Reading had been in support of the proposition which he was putting forward. I must say that I clearly recall having expressed some reservations about this matter myself. I should like to explain again why I believe that it is not at all self-evident that his proposed solution is the...
Lord Stewartby: My Lords, I begin by declaring certain interests in this Bill. In the 1980s I was the Treasury Minister responsible for two regulatory Bills, the Building Societies Bill and the Banking Bill which became Acts of Parliament in 1986 and 1987. Subsequent to leaving another place, I became a member of the then Securities and Investments Board alongside my noble friend Lord Alexander which lasted...
Lord Stewartby: My Lords, I also welcome the noble Baroness's robust first reply to my noble friend. Does she agree that the United Kingdom is in an unusual position in having no pretensions to be a super power but nevertheless possessing an effective military capability? It has a long history of respectable participation in international affairs and a distinguished record in peacekeeping and other security...
Mr Ian Stewart: I compliment my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr. Boscawen) and the right hon. Member for Morley and Leeds, South (Mr. Rees) on their speeches. They have both been Members of the House for many years longer than I have. It is sad for me that I, too, am probably making one of my last contributions to the proceedings of the House. I am profoundly grateful to the constituents of...
Mr Ian Stewart: The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. I could draw several other analogies. The only occasions when a common currency has been applied successfully throughout Europe were under the Roman Empire, when the currency was backed by the legions of the Roman army, and 200 years later under Charlemagne when the currency was imposed by military force. No other protracted period of monetary...
Mr Ian Stewart: The hon. Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) will live to regret the extraordinary performance that she has delivered to the House this afternoon. Instead of the clear commitment which she should give to the methods necessary to maintain sterling in the exchange rate mechanism, if there were a Labour Government, we have been answered by evasion and prevarication. When she was asked, by not...
Mr Ian Stewart: I can give two answers to the hon. Gentleman. The first is that in Germany a responsible financial and monetary policy has been pursued for many years. That is something which the Labour party seems unable to recognise as necessary for sound economic management. Secondly, we are not talking about the continuation of a wage system, with or without minimum wages; we are talking about the...
Mr Ian Stewart: The impact would be both early and severe, as my hon. Friend rightly points out. That is another reason why I suspect that the Labour party's commitment to maintaining membership of the ERM, with sterling at the present level, is not sincere. I suggest that if the Labour party wants to be taken seriously, it must look again at its contradictory policies. It says that it has massive public...
Mr Ian Stewart: I will do so but only briefly because it is not the subject of my speech. I did not hear the hon. Gentleman complain when the public sector debt repayment figure was large. That is something which his party never achieved. Of course, at certain points in the economic cycle there will be a surplus and at others a deficit. I believe that an acceptable deficit at this point in the economic cycle...