Member

I take the Minister’s point that such undertakings may be vanishingly unlikely, and that the majority of enterprises we are concerned with are predominantly engaged in the manufacture of steel, but we have to ensure that the legislation we pass is fit for purpose not just in the usual case, but in all anticipated cases. I therefore hope that he will seriously consider amendment 21, tabled by my hon. Friend. It seems sensible to me to ensure that, in pursuit of what may be a perfectly rational Government policy to protect domestic steel manufacture, we are not encompassing in the Bill the possibility of any undertaking being liable for nationalisation when that undertaking produces little of its output in the iron and steel industry. Amendment 21 would mean that steel was a predominant feature of a business in scope of the Bill, not an incidental one.