Lords Hansard text for 22 Jan 200722 Jan 2007 (pt 0002)

Gambling: Football

2.58 pm

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock asked Her Majesty’s Government:

What recent consideration they have given to representations from Football DataCo Limited on the effect on English and Scottish football of the directive on the legal protection of databases (96/9/EC) and the Copyright and Rights in Databases Regulations 1997 (SI 1997/3032) as interpreted by the European Court of Justice.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Trade and Industry (Lord Truscott): My Lords, the Government continue to hold discussions with Football DataCo on this issue with a view to identifying a way to resolve the concerns that it has raised.

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that, although this Question may superficially appear obscure and complicated, it is in no way party political—nor will it hit the headlines—but it is absolutely vital for football teams in Scotland and England, particularly the small ones, which have lost substantial amounts of revenue from the betting operators because of these changes? I ask my noble

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friend to thank Dick Caborn for the work that he has already done on this. I urge the Government to do even more and perhaps to bring in for football a system similar to that in racing, which would bring great joy particularly to small football clubs such as Elgin City, Forfar Athletic and Raith Rovers. Although I cannot guarantee that there will be dancing in the streets of Kirkcaldy, it will receive a very warm welcome.

Lord Truscott: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his question. He referred to the meeting with Richard Caborn; as a result of the meeting with Ladbrokes, bookmakers have already agreed to contribute around £3 million to help the Premier League and all the rest; they are already receiving a contribution. The sport is not necessarily poor; it has an income of some £1.35 billion per annum. Distribution and allocation of funds is a matter for the industry. On the horseracing levy, the situation in football is different. The horseracing levy existed before 1972—before we joined the European Union. A football levy could be regarded as breaching the EU’s state aid provisions.

Lord Newby: My Lords, does the Minister intend to involve internet betting companies in any future scheme, so that its scope would be broader than would otherwise be the case?

Lord Truscott: No, my Lords, the Government have no plans for that—it is a question for the sport—but I take on board his interesting suggestion.

Lord Lyell: My Lords, I thank the Minister for his encouraging comments on what he and his honourable colleagues are doing to assist. I declare an interest in one of the clubs mentioned so nicely by the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes. Does he agree that, while I and, I suspect, many of us are not up to date with every dot and comma of the directive and the regulations, anything that can be done would be of help to small clubs in Scotland? Many of us appreciate that this matter is far from the horseracing directive mentioned by the noble Lord but his efforts are particularly welcome, especially in my neck of the woods.

Lord Truscott: My Lords, I note what the noble Lord said. The Government will keep a close eye on this matter.

Lord Faulkner of Worcester: My Lords, on a slightly different, but very much related, topic, does my noble friend support the submissions made to the Gambling Commission by the Football Association and other governing bodies that they should be consulted by betting organisations on the sort of bets that are accepted on their matches and fixtures? This is necessary to further the integrity of the sports that they run.

Lord Truscott: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that suggestion, which is very valuable. We all, of course, want integrity in betting.

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Lord Kirkhill: My Lords, I put it to the Minister that my noble friend Lord Foulkes is correct in emphasising that the Government are interpreting a piece of EU legislation in a certain way. Other countries do not always take that stance. The outcome is certainly deleterious to the United Kingdom’s smaller football clubs.

Lord Truscott: My Lords, as we have made clear to Football DataCo, the creation of any new intellectual property right would require strong and full justification and it would be very difficult for the Government to open up the whole case of the directive again to achieve agreement between other members of the European Union.

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that although the voluntary agreement is welcome—it brings in £3 million to football clubs—it in no way compares with well in excess of £6 million that was available previously through the levy? Scottish clubs have thus experienced a reduction of 60 per cent, which affects small clubs very badly indeed. It does not have a huge effect on major clubs, such as Heart of Midlothian, Arsenal and Tottenham, but it is a serious matter for the small clubs that I mentioned earlier; I could mention many more. I urge my noble friend to talk to Dick Caborn and his colleagues in DCMS to see if more can be done to ensure that football is supported at every level with a proper levy from the betting operator.

Lord Truscott: My Lords, I hear loud and clear what my noble friend says but, as I said earlier, the distribution and allocation of funds is a matter for the sport to deal with, and it is not a poor sport.

Legal Services Bill [HL]

3.05 pm

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Constitutional Affairs (Baroness Ashton of Upholland): My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now again resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.

Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.

House in Committee accordingly.

[The LORD SPEAKER in the Chair.]

Clause 3 [The Board’s duty to promote the regulatory objectives etc]:

[Amendment No. 32A not moved.]

Lord Kingsland moved Amendment No. 33:

Clause 3, page 2, line 35, at end insert—

“(4) In assessing what is proportionate in the regulation of approved regulators the Board shall have regard, inter alia, to—

(a) the regulator’s resources (including voluntary resources) and the effect on them of the Board’s acts; (b) the effect on regulatory fees; (c) the extent to which the Board’s acts might discourage entry to or retention in the regulated sector;

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(d) the extent to which the number of persons regulated by a regulator might be reduced in consequence of the Board’s acts; (e) the extent to which the regulator might be disadvantaged and another regulator might derive an advantage, in particular through the movement between regulators of regulated persons as a consequence of the Board’s acts.”

The noble Lord said: This amendment has been inspired by the patent and trade mark attorneys, who are a much smaller body than most of the other regulators affected by the Bill. Their resources, premises and personnel, for example, are more limited than those of the Law Society or the Bar Council.

The wording of the amendment requires the Legal Services Board to act proportionately in respect of these smaller regulators in discharging its functions. What is appropriate for some of the regulators is certainly not appropriate for others. In particular, the board should consider the resources and viability of the regulators that will be affected by its decisions and actions.

Such regulators are, I suggest to the Committee, low-risk, non-consumer-focused professionals with excellent conduct records, and they should be recognised as such in the new regulatory regime. The regulatory costs to the associations, as well as to their members, are low, and they place a very low burden on the wider regulatory system.

One characteristic of trade mark and patent attorneys is of particular importance: they are in the unusual position of being able to opt out of their associations. These associations anticipate a real risk that over-regulation of those who have the freedom to opt out could well reduce or restrict entry to their professions. It is not currently mandatory to be a member of either of the two main professional associations connected with these activities in order to practise or represent clients. The members can leave the regulated system at any time they wish. The costs could clearly increase after the Bill has been enacted if members leave the system and, in those circumstances, the position of both the main regulators could, in time, become untenable.

The purpose of the Bill is to ensure more effective regulation of the legal profession. That is of course well understood, but one unwelcome side effect is to reduce the effectiveness of regulation in the more specialised or technical areas of the law. That is the background to the amendment. I beg to move.

Lord Campbell of Alloway: I support the amendment. It concerns proportionality, but proportionality is like a piece of a jigsaw: when this is put together with other amendments to the Bill, it serves, in effect, as a safeguard for the implementation of the Bill in a manner that can retain public confidence. It cannot and ought not to be dealt with in isolation. It is an essential safeguard to the implementation of a Bill that is designed for the control of legal services. If one reads it in context with Amendment No. 3A, which was not moved but which in my respectful opinion is an invaluable amendment—I hope that it will be moved on Report—and if one reads it in context with the public interest amendments to Clause 1 and with Amendments Nos. 32A, 33A, 34, 35 and 46 to 51, one has the pattern to which I speak.

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The amendment defines parameters within which the discretion of the LSB should be exercised. That is crucial because, as matters stand, it appears to have an absolute discretion, without means of ultimate judicial resolution. The LSB is set up under the aegis of the Secretary of State with a lay majority and a lay chairman. It has an almost absolute administrative discretion affecting approved regulators. Inevitably, some of the decisions of the board would be flawed as regards some of the grounds that have been set out in the judicial review amendments, Amendments Nos. 52 and 139F. It is a worrying situation. The drafting of the amendments to which I have referred—the judicial review amendments on which I shall speak later—will have to be reconsidered in consultation with my noble friends Lord Hunt and Lord Kingsland because to some degree there is an overlap with Amendment No. 3A and with the pattern of amendments to which I have referred.

In any event, perhaps the amendments will have to stand as a long stop against rejection of certain other amendments. It is not really acceptable, with or without this pattern of amendments, that the LSB should act as judge and jury in its own cause to control legal services without resort to any form of judicial supervision. I pay tribute to my noble friends Lord Kingsland and Lord Hunt, and to the noble Lords, Lord Thomas and Lord Maclennan of Rogart, for having devised this pattern. It is not easy to unscramble a parson’s egg.

3.15 pm

Lord Hunt of Wirral: I strongly agree with my noble friends. Indeed, it may reassure my noble friend Lord Campbell of Alloway to know that in the next group we debate the important Amendment No. 33A. In the mean time, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Kingsland on Amendment No. 33. It is vital to get the balance right and it will have given a great deal of pleasure to the Minister’s many friends on all sides of the House to see her happy, smiling face looking out at them from page 6 of the current edition of the Law Gazette. Underneath her beautiful photograph is the caption “Ashton not closing the door”. I hope that we are pushing at a door not half closed but half open. Although the Minister rejected the amendment tabled on the previous day in Committee—namely, that the board should act in partnership with the approved regulators—she will give careful consideration to how best we can reflect proportionality in the legislation.

I am even more encouraged by this week’s edition of The House Magazine. I make these quotations to show not only that I monitor these important publications, but that a clear message is coming from the Government. The Minister’s colleague Bridget Prentice, in her article headed “New champion in Chambers”, says:

“Good regulation of legal services should be tailored to the needs of the specific marketplace. It should be risk-based and proportionate”.

Later in the article she says, importantly:

“But it will not replace day-to-day regulators like the Bar Council or the Law Society—instead it will work with them to set high standards across the sector”.

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That is clear and welcome.

At Second Reading, in summing up the debate, the Minister said that,

Official Report

We were making the point about independence, but the Minister is returning to the theme of proportionality. That is what the clever amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Kingsland is all about and I am pleased to see fellow members of the Select Committee in the Chamber. Unanimously in our joint report we echoed the important phrase of proportionality. We reported that the OFT had told us that the appointment of the LSB as an oversight regulator would be,

The NCC, reflecting the views of consumer groups, was sure that,

Sir David Clementi told the Select Committee that he would not describe the model that he and the Government are adopting,

So the members of the Joint Committee reached the unanimous conclusion that,

I hope that the Minister will be able to give us some comforting words because, as the president of Law Society, Fiona Woolf, pointed out, the Bill does not reflect the theme of proportionality. Although she accepts the challenge of the Bill providing the opportunity to create a modern, efficient and enabling regulatory framework that protects the competitiveness and innovation of our law firms, she is concerned that overlapping powers are proposed for the professional bodies as regulators. She rightly said that that could invite confusion and conflict.

I hope that the Minister will give us some comforting words and say that the Government will work with us in Committee to try to find a way of ensuring not just a light touch, but that proportionality is maintained and that the Legal Services Board will be seen as the overseeing regulator but will leave day-to-day regulation to the Law Society, the Bar Council and the other key bodies. As we get into the Bill, we will discuss this in more detail, but some comforting words from her today would be much appreciated.

Lord Maclennan of Rogart: I hope that in this debate we will go beyond comforting words to a little more precision about how the Government intend to ensure that the general principle of proportionality, to which they have given assent, will be reflected in the Bill in a manner that reassures those who have been engaged in dialogue with the Government from the two organisations that regulate a relatively small number of specialist attorneys—the Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys and the Institute of Trade Mark Attorneys—that their particular problems have been recognised.

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I have been advised that those organisations have been in direct dialogue with the department and that the language of the amendment is particularly addressed to deal with their concerns. When looking at the Bill, one has to consider whether by embracing their concerns one may be opening up wider problems, but, on the face of it, the recommendations embodied in this useful amendment seem to go a long way towards spelling out the apprehended opportunities for a disproportionate response to the regulation of relatively small regulators. I view this as a valuable opportunity not only to probe the Government’s benevolent general intentions in these matters—“beneficent” might be better than “benevolent”—but also to probe how they are approaching this. We will come back to the issue of proportionality on the broader canvas on later amendments.

Baroness Ashton of Upholland: I found that an interesting debate. I have to confess that I did not know where the amendment came from, although I could see that noble Lords would want to have this debate not only at this point, as noble Lords said, but throughout the Bill’s passage. Perhaps I may say through the good auspices of noble Lords and through Hansard that I would be very keen to meet the trade mark and patent agents’ representatives, whom I have not seen, to discuss this further. They have been in touch with the department, but there is nothing quite like having the conversation oneself to seek to reduce concerns. I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Maclennan of Rogart. My nice comfortable little words may be all well and dandy but he would like something that goes a bit further.

At this stage in our deliberations perhaps I may say a little more about “proportionate” and take up the point about the “jigsaw effect” raised by the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Alloway—who discussed the subject with me earlier today. I think that that is a good way of describing some of the themes running through the Bill. When we eventually end this Committee stage perhaps he will reflect on whether we have covered all the elements of the jigsaw and on the possible discussions on that.

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