Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)

My Lords, I will be brief in closing as I suspect that the Committee is keen to get on to the next group. Across this group, with the focus on scale—looking at both the merits and the demerits—the consistent theme has been a desire to ensure that the framework we are putting in place is proportionate, intelligible and capable of accommodating diversity in the pensions market. There has also been the theme of “big is not necessarily beautiful” in the course of this debate. My noble friend Lady Noakes was supported in particular by the noble Baroness, Lady Altmann; they were assiduous in their questions on scale. I should just remind the Committee that the Minister for Pensions has stated that return on investment is paramount, so this has been a very interesting debate. What if suboptimal scale produces better returns than merely big scale? That was one of the themes in this debate. Is there not a tension here? I would say that there clearly is. From the remarks made by a number of Peers in this Committee, I think that more thought needs to be put into the threshold, including the criteria for reaching the threshold and whether the threshold level is right in itself. As the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, pointed out, a question on legal dangers has been posed. A number of issues here absolutely need to be explored further. I have no doubt that this will be done prior to Report—indeed, we will look at what we might bring back on Report. Several of these amendments seek reassurance that sensible exemptions will be exercised narrowly and transparently without undermining the policy intent; others are concerned with ensuring that innovation, specialisation and strong value for money are not inadvertently crowded out by rigid thresholds. Finally, there is an understandable concern that, where regulations will shape market structure and regulatory judgment over time, Parliament should retain meaningful oversight in how these powers are exercised. I am grateful to noble Lords for their thoughtful contributions on this group. I thank the Minister for her attempts to answer the questions covering the CDCs on exemptions criteria and on innovation. With that, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.