European Union (Future Relationship) Bill

Lord Holmes of Richmond Excerpts

3rd reading & 2nd reading & Committee negatived & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & 3rd reading (Hansard) & 3rd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & Committee negatived (Hansard) & Committee negatived (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 30th December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con) [V]]

My Lords, the deal has been struck, and I would like to concentrate on the necessity for a digitally enabled 21st-century border.

For the last decade, the UK has had a comparative advantage in many of the elements of the fourth industrial revolution, not least AI, distributed ledger technology, fintech and cyber. As a result, on 1 January this opportunity—this advantage—now becomes absolutely imperative when it comes to our border provisions. Is my noble friend the Minister aware of the proof of concept around reducing friction in international trade, which I was fortunate enough to be involved in?

I know that we have a great opportunity to deliver at Dover. An excellent, forward-thinking chief executive runs the port there. Also, as other noble Lords have mentioned, there is a key need to get this right around the UK, and that absolutely includes Gibraltar. Will my noble friend the Minister update the House on our 2025 border plans? What will happen in 2021 at scale and at speed to get us to the place where we need to be to have a digitally enabled border right around the UK? Does he agree that, if we get this right, we can enter the 21st year of the 21st century digitally enabled right around the UK, not least at Dover, and look forward with pride from the white cliffs of technology?

Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Lord Holmes of Richmond Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 27th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Holmes of Richmond (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I start by congratulating my noble friend the Minister on the clear and comprehensive manner in which he has introduced this important legislation. I wish him luck in steering his first Bill through your Lordships’ House, but given his experience of and in the House and his leadership in local government, its success will not be a matter of luck.

I welcome the Bill, which is certainly a great improvement and a step forward on its predecessor. Perhaps I may gently recommend to my noble friend the Minister the recent report of the Select Committee on Democracy and Digital Technologies, on which I was fortunate to serve under the excellent leadership of my friend the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam. There may be much fertile ground for my noble friend within those pages.

Like others, I associate myself with the comments of my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham. If the Boundary Commission is to do its job in the manner in which it has been charged, it does indeed need to be insulated, so terms like “reasonably practicable” are nowhere near strong enough. Does my noble friend agree that a friendly amendment to tighten those words and put a time and date in would be an excellent improvement to the Bill? He as much as any of us knows that, in political parts, spring tends to come quite late, and often only when the leaves are truly browned off.

I want also to add my support to the protections to be granted quite correctly for Ynys Môn. Does my noble friend agree that, while no man is an island, it is certainly true that some constituencies are indeed just that?

Covid-19: Debt Collection

Lord Holmes of Richmond Excerpts

Thursday 23rd July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, noting the noble Lord’s title, I congratulate him on last night’s events at Anfield—all we need now is for Notts County to get back into the league, where they belong. He asked an important question. Local authorities should be sensitive. Obviously, with Covid, the ban on enforcement visits was imposed. As the noble Lord says, that is currently due to come to an end in August, but I follow him in urging restraint on all in the current situation.

[Lord Holmes of Richmond (Non-Afl) [V]]

With his vast experience in local government, does the Minister agree that we need urgently to review the council tax administration and enforcement regulations in the light of the current difficulties? Does he further agree that, post Covid, there is a key role for financial technology—fintech—to help with debt management and enable everyone to have a much greater sense of their finances and how best to manage them?

[Lord True]

Yes, a consistent understanding of the problems of debt using such techniques is extremely important. The regulations on council tax were promulgated, I believe, back in 1992—now a sort of Neanderthal age, when I was in No. 10. The Local Government Minister has announced that MCHLG will update its guidance to councils on collection and enforcement of council tax.

Finance Bill

Lord Holmes of Richmond Excerpts

2nd reading & Committee negatived & 3rd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & 3rd reading (Hansard) & 3rd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & Committee negatived (Hansard) & Committee negatived (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 17th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Holmes of Richmond (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow my noble friend Lady Noakes, and I agree with all her comments. I also thank my noble friend the Minister for the clear way in which he introduced the Bills. I ask him to join me in paying tribute to all our front-line workers, many of them in the financial sector, who have done so much for so many over this crisis period. Does he agree with me that we owe them all an enduring debt of gratitude?

Basic economics will always remain the same: we can either increase income or take out costs. I believe we have some significant opportunities to do both these things without having economically illiterate taxation or cutting support to people who often need it the most. I agree with many of the comments of my noble friend Lord Blencathra, the noble Lord, Lord Empey, and particularly my noble friend Lord Lamont, who as an excellent Chancellor had his term cut well before it should have been.

I will ask my noble friend the Minister about three areas: payments, central bank digital currencies—CBDCs—and sovereign wealth funds. On payments, has he had a chance to look at the excellent paper from the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures on the need to transform cross-border payments? As in domestic settings, we pay too much and it takes too long. Does he agree that the Government, as one of the biggest payers, could save multiple billions if we had a true transformation of our payments infrastructure? For example, can he say how much the DWP pays in fees and to intermediaries in making the billions of payments it makes year on year?

Does my noble friend the Minister agree that the current consultation undertaken by the Bank of England in relation to CBDCs is an excellent piece of work and could have truly transformational benefits for the UK?

Similarly, will my noble friend comment on the work undertaken to look at the potential for a sovereign wealth fund in the UK? We have needed one for decades; I believe we need it now more than ever. Is he satisfied with the level of fintech involvement in all the current government programmes? Could the Government do more to introduce more small and medium-sized enterprises into assisting businesses and individuals who need it most? Does he agree that if we truly deploy all the elements of the fourth industrial revolution—robotics, AI, distributed ledger technology and quantum—we could truly transform the payments infrastructure, take cost out and get income in? That would benefit state and citizen alike.

Covid-19: Public Wealth Investment Fund

Lord Holmes of Richmond Excerpts

Tuesday 9th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Agnew of Oulton [V]]

Infrastructure is a vital part of rebuilding from this crisis. I am unsure at this stage whether it will be done through the mechanism of a sovereign wealth fund. At the moment, we have the opportunity as a national Government to borrow cheaply, which, if invested well in infrastructure, could be a simpler approach than a sovereign wealth fund.

[Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con) [V]]

My Lords, we have a tremendous challenge but a real opportunity for an economic bounce out of Covid. It needs a whole-government, whole-economy approach. Will my noble friend salute the consultation currently being undertaken by the Bank of England around a central bank digital currency, and note the positive impact that this potentially could have for the whole of the country and the economy?

[Lord Agnew of Oulton [V]]

I certainly agree with the noble Lord that it is an extremely important consultation. As he implies, any serious crisis such as this gives the country a chance to look beyond the normal way of dealing with problems. I am very hopeful that initiatives such as he has mentioned will be much more evident over the next few months.