Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)

My Lords, I thank those noble Lords who have spoken in favour of the Bill. I welcome the proposal of the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson: that I phone up the Chancellor and explain how much money has been missing. Actually, it is quite interesting looking at the numbers, because there has been much celebration of the fact that the investment forum garnered £62 billion of investment. Well, £40 billion and counting has been lost because of this problem. If we wait until the FCA has come out with its rules and they have all been looked at, commented on, implemented and phased in—because it is going to take that long before they actually have hard effect—we are into 2027. That £62 billion will have been long overtaken by what has not been invested through listed investment companies. It is a question of, you can take a horse to water, but you cannot force it to drink. Strangely—or not so strangely, as the case may be—the competing industry of open-ended funds is swaying platforms and others to say that they have to continue with the old way and ignore the forbearance or exemption, because the consumer duty requires them to have those numbers on the front page, which is where you go to on the platform. That is their interpretation of consumer duty, so they delist them. If the listed investment company tells the truth and says, “Dear investor, you don’t have to pay these fees—they are already embedded in the company costs”, it is barred from the market. I am sorry to tell the Minister, and the Treasury officials who maybe helped with some notes, that they are behind the times. It has not worked. They can say it is a matter for the FCA and the industry, but the FCA will say that it is a matter for the industry. I really did not think that the conduct and stability of our markets had been handed to the industry. I thought it was up there as the No. 1 priority of the regulator, and that if the regulator did not do it, the Government had the right to investigate and launch an inquiry. It is not good enough. I know they have tried. It took us the best part of two years to get there, and yes, something has happened, but there is a competitive aspect to this that is distorting. If that continues, this Bill is a vehicle that might prove useful. I wish it were redundant, but it would be useful if it hung around for a while, for officials to draw inspiration from—which is where it actually originated. For now, it would be a good move to retain its availability and see if it becomes useful. Therefore, I beg to move.