6300. CHAIRMAN: So it is not on the transcript?

  6301. MR LEWIS: No.

  6302. CHAIRMAN: I see.

  6303. MS LIEVEN: My Lords, can I just mention one thing because I think it may be that we are going off down a bit of a wrong tack here? We have been in negotiation with these Petitioners for some time over what Mr Lewis would describe as a Petitioners' agreement, so that is assuming that the big picture commercial agreement falls by the wayside, we construct the station, there is no financial contribution from Canary Wharf and we just treat them like any other Petitioner. There have been drafts going backwards and forwards on that, as your Lordships can imagine, and that I think is partly the basis of the unilateral offer which Mr Lewis is now touching on, but that agreement would make this amendment being proposed by Mr Lewis irrelevant. The undertaking would mean that there would be no possible ground on which to amend the Bill.

  6304. CHAIRMAN: I cannot see how we can know that until we see what the undertaking is.

  6305. MS LIEVEN: No, but, my Lord, what is being discussed in that agreement is that we commence the work on the station within a limited period, so the notice to treat would necessarily be served well within the five years. I do not want to get into it any more, but in my submission (1) it has nothing to do with the case for or against the amendment that Mr Lewis is putting forward, and (2) I would very strongly urge the Committee not to get into the drafting of agreements between Petitioner and Promoter because it is not possible that one clause could be put up. I cannot remember how many pages it is; about an eight or nine page document. You can imagine the kinds of legal caveats that are in there, but, critically, it has all sorts of safeguards for both parties covering a series of eventualities. It is not possible to pluck one clause out of it and look at that. It would involve the Committee going through the minutiae of this agreement and, I have to say, opening the door to a lot of other Petitioners who have similar types of agreement who might also say, "We would like the Committee to adjudicate upon them".

  6306. CHAIRMAN: Sorry—is this the unilateral undertaking or the agreement?

  6307. MS LIEVEN: My Lord, what is in existence at the moment is a draft Petitioners' agreement with CWG. It is completely separate from the commercial agreement about them building the station.

  6308. CHAIRMAN: Yes, but where does the unilateral undertaking come into this?

  6309. MS LIEVEN: That has arisen this morning. Mr Lewis has suddenly suggested that he could produce to the Committee some kind of unilateral undertaking such as one might get in a planning inquiry.

  6310. CHAIRMAN: Yes, but you have had notice of this, have you not?

  6311. MS LIEVEN: Yes, we have the travelling draft, my Lord, of a potential agreement between us on the issue of what happens to North Quay if the commercial agreement falls away, and the terms of that agreement are not at the moment acceptable to us. All I am saying to your Lordships is (1) that agreement makes the proposed amendment to the Bill irrelevant and (2) I would urge the Committee not to get into the minutiae of negotiation between Promoter and Petitioner which arises up and down the line.

  6312. CHAIRMAN: No, we are not going to. That is perfectly all right; we are not going to, but we have now been offered a unilateral undertaking, the nature of which I simply do not know.

  6313. MS LIEVEN: My Lord, in my submission, we are all under strong pressure to try to get this Bill finished in this Committee by early May, and to go down the line of Petitioners putting in what were negotiated agreements as unilaterals and then asking the Committee to adjudicate upon parts on them is not a line which I would urge the Committee to go down at all, but I am sure the Committee has that point.

  6314. CHAIRMAN: I think there is a fairly basic point about this, Mr Lewis. If you had wanted to take this point in front of the Committee there should have been something about it in the petition, but I do not remember there being anything of the kind.

  6315. MR LEWIS: In terms of North Quay?

  6316. CHAIRMAN: Unilateral undertakings.

  6317. MR LEWIS: It certainly was not mentioned in the petition.

  6318. CHAIRMAN: That does make a difference, you know.

  6319. MR LEWIS: The petition sets out in general terms the Promoters' concerns about the use of the North Quay site. It is obviously a matter for the Committee to decide whether or not you think our petition is drafted in broad enough terms for us to raise these points of detail now, but generally speaking petitions are drafted in a fairly broad sense, because otherwise there would be endless documents setting out every single detailed aspect of the Petitioner's case. That is my justification for not referring to it in the petition, because I simply do not think it is necessarily required under the Standing Orders of the House to do so. Obviously, if you think that the fact that we have not raised it specifically in the petition precludes us from mentioning it to your Lordships now that is your decision, but I would urge you to consider otherwise. I should say as well that it is not something that, as Ms Lieven says, we have suddenly foisted on the Committee now. It is a suggestion I made, I thought, to assist the Committee in the deliberations arising from the question that you put to me. We did not intend to put any sort of unilateral undertaking before you today—I suppose that explains in a sense why it was not in the petition—and we would be reluctant to do so. We are only doing so because of the invitation that was made to assist.