Financial Services Bill

Debate between Lord Peston and Lord Eatwell

Tuesday 6th November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Eatwell]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Sassoon, has made it clear today that the non-executives will play a major role in the governance of the Bank. This amendment seeks to ensure that non-executives, essentially here in the court, are appointed with the consent of the Treasury Select Committee. The point is being reiterated. Given the powers invested in the Bank, including and especially the FPC powers that have previously rested only with the Chancellor or other elected persons, it is appropriate that there should be some political oversight of the appointments. The Treasury Committee is surely the right place.

What are the major arguments against this pre-appointment scrutiny? First, that the procedure will be unduly intrusive and onerous; and, secondly, that it will be too politicised. As a result, suitable persons will not apply. I think that the arguments in the context of what is being done in this Bill are ill founded. The Government decided to politicise the position of the Bank by giving it powers previously reserved for elected persons. The Government decided to load on to the Bank virtually all regulatory functions and control of monetary and credit policy. In this context, the Government should accept that the Treasury Committee’s scrutiny is entirely appropriate. Let us remember that that committee has played a serious non-partisan role for a number of years, both when chaired by my noble friend Lord McFall and now, as chaired by Mr Tyrie. The committee does an excellent, non-partisan, technical and difficult job. In that context, it could play an important role in monitoring those persons to whom the powers previously assigned to elected persons are now to be given.

While Amendment 2C relates to the non-executive directors of the Bank, Amendment 6B in the group extends the same principle to the independent members of the Financial Policy Committee. If anything, the point is even stronger here, because these are people who will be participating in decisions that directly affect individuals’ lives. The members of that committee will be making decisions about your mortgage rate and the availability of credit in general to individuals in society. It is therefore surely right that appointments should be subject to the consent of the political part of national governance, as represented by the Treasury Select Committee, which is handing over these powers.

Sometimes, we in Britain are a bit overly sensitive about appointments procedures. I remember that university appointments used to be totally confidential to appointments committees. Now appointees have to appear before the whole faculty and the students, give lectures to demonstrate how good they would be and defend themselves.

[Lord Peston]

Is that true?

[Lord Eatwell]

Yes, it is true. They have to do that prior to any form of appointment. Therefore, the sort of sensitivity I mentioned is overdone. Greater transparency and more robust procedures would serve us well. Most important of all, there must not be an abdication of powers that in the past were reserved to elected persons without some substitution of proper political oversight, as provided for in Amendments 2C and 6B. I beg to move.

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[Lord Eatwell]

My Lords, in the debate that we have just had we heard a lot about the values of the oversight committee and what an important job it has to do. The noble Lord, Lord Sassoon, made some comments about new Section 3C, perhaps inadvertently, while he was reflecting on the group of amendments that we have just looked at. The purpose of this amendment is to ensure that the oversight committee—or hindsight committee, as I think it should be called—has the resources to do its job.

We have to remember that the Bank of England has form in this respect. In the early days of the Monetary Policy Committee, independent members were deliberately starved of resources by the Bank in order to enhance the position of the executive members. We all hope that the Bank has learnt its lesson from the very negative publicity that that incident produced. However, we are now in different territory. The powers are greater, and the responsibilities are wider. Hence it is vital that the oversight committee should be well resourced. New Section 3C refers to the possibility of hiring people to conduct a performance review, but that is one step down the line. The committee needs its own staff to help determine exactly which performances should be reviewed, and who should be asked to do that sort of important secretarial work.

That is the purpose of the amendment before us. It can do nothing but strengthen the Bank of England, making the committee into an effective instrument of retrospective monetary and financial governance. I am sure that that is what the Government would like, so I would like to hear them accept this amendment, or at least give an undertaking to take the idea away and think about it with care. I beg to move.

[Lord Peston]

My Lords, I support this amendment in substance. The noble Lord will be delighted to hear that I also wish to make a couple of semantic points. My noble friend said that the committee should have its own staff. My view is that it should not only have its own staff but should appoint its own staff, thereby guaranteeing that the staff are its own, work for it and, to use the slang expression, are not “narks” of the governor. Therefore, the noble Lord ought to accept the amendment.

My two semantic points are as follows. First, I find the committee’s name most unattractive. Will the noble Lord ask the Bill team to look up the definition of “oversight” in the dictionary as it has a very definite meaning which I am sure the Government and the Minister do not wish to be associated with this committee. It may not be too late to choose a more felicitous name. I wonder whether I am the only person who has thought what a ridiculous name the committee has.

Secondly, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Eatwell on solving the problem with which, as your Lordships know, the noble Lord, Lord Barnett, and I are obsessed: that is, the “must/may problem”. My noble friend has solved it in a really interesting way. He does not use “must” or “may” but “will”. I would like the Minister to ask the Bill team whether it would consider going down the path of using “will” rather than “must” or “may”.

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[Lord Eatwell]

My Lords, I must say that I am very happy and I will now read through the Bill with great care and presume that wherever the term “Bank” appears, it means “court”. If that is so, I will check all the various clauses as we go along to ensure that “Bank” means “court” at all stages. If it means “court”, the Bill should say so and be clear—and that is what it is not.

[Lord Peston]

My noble friend should not really accept this, because no one reading the Bill could conceivably read the word “Bank” to mean “court”. “Bank” means the Bank, and the Bank, in practice, is the governor.

[Lord Eatwell]

With all due respect to my noble friend, these days, where matters are in dispute about the interpretation of Bills, reference is made to Hansard. The noble Lord has effectively amended this clause in his remarks by saying that “Bank” means “court”. On that basis, we have now clarified this section of the Bill considerably. We have had a successful debate and achieved something valuable.

Given the various comments on the name of the oversight committee, I must confess that until my noble friends pointed it out I had failed to notice the double entendre in that label. I thought that “oversight” meant to oversee or supervise. I take it as meaning “oversee”, and I will not go as far as my noble friends.

I will go through the rest of the Bill, note where it refers to the Bank and either write to the noble Lord or raise in the House those points at which there is ambiguity as to what “Bank” actually means. However, now that we are absolutely clear that in new Section 3D “Bank” means court, I am happy to beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Financial Services Bill

Debate between Lord Peston and Lord Eatwell

Monday 8th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Peston]

My Lords, we make the obvious point that getting it right is not the same as doing it quickly. We ought always to bear that in mind in your Lordships’ House. There is a straightforward solution to this. One is my noble friend’s suggestion for Report. Since I assume, particularly given the Leader of the House’s remarks, that we are not imminently in danger of being abolished, that we are still a self-governing House, we can therefore decide, if we wish to, one of two things: either my noble friend’s proposal, with which I strongly agree, that we would simply have Committee stage rules at Report stage for what is being proposed; the alternative is not to end the Committee stage until the Government can get their tiny mind around the Wheatley proposals and come up with their amendments.

I have read the Wheatley report. The proposals do not strike me as being intellectually very demanding—nowhere near as difficult as deciding on a railway line. Therefore, the noble Lord ought to respond positively instead of adopting this negative approach and remind himself that we will get only one chance to get this right. We ought to make sure that we do not bungle it.

[Lord Eatwell]

My Lords, I should make clear that I said that the Labour Party was broadly supporting the conclusions of the Wheatley report; not the Government’s policy because we do not know what that is yet. We look forward to seeing it. Perhaps we will support it; perhaps we will not. On the substantive matter, I welcome what I saw was the noble Lord’s support for a degree of flexibility at Report, referred to also by my noble friend Lord Peston. If it could be agreed in due course by the usual channels that for the Wheatley clauses a Committee-style procedure be permitted and the House agreed to that, then I think we could proceed with due speed.

Financial Services Bill

Debate between Lord Peston and Lord Eatwell

Tuesday 10th July 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Barnett]

We are talking about possible serious financial crises and stability. At the end of the day, the Chancellor will be held responsible if something goes wrong with financial stability. There could be as many teams as we liked, but the Chancellor would ultimately have to accept responsibility, even if he knew nothing about it. I am sure that any Chancellor—I am looking at one now—would know everything that was going on in his team.

I am confused about what the clause or the Bill will do to help us in this matter. My noble friend’s amendment might help, although we are told by the Minister that it could “excessively personalise”. I am blessed if I know what that is supposed to mean, but no doubt the Minister will tell us. At the moment, I am more confused than ever. I thought that I understood a few things about financial matters but, listening to the exchange between my noble friend and the Minister, I am confused more than ever.

[Lord Eatwell]

Perhaps before I sit down I can help my noble friend. We are discussing what is perceived to be an essential failure of the previous system. The failure was that the people responsible for working it did not take advantage of the tools that were provided. Here in the Bill, as the Minister pointed out, the Government have rightly insisted that the Treasury and the Bank convey information to each other, consult each other and act collectively when necessary. That is appropriate, and I commend the Government in that respect. I simply think that they have not gone far enough.

[Lord Peston]

If my noble friend were to ask himself who would know most about a macroprudential measure in the Bank, surely that would be the deputy governor, because that is his job. My noble friend is saying that the Treasury should consult. I would argue that the Treasury is sensible enough to know that it should consult the one person who would know what was going on.

[Lord Eatwell]

Just to reinforce what I said, neither the Government nor this side have entire confidence in the consultation procedure between the Bank and Treasury as it has taken place in the past. The Government are seeking to reinforce that confidence, and I wanted to reinforce it further. But at this stage I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

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[Lord Eatwell]

My Lords, I, too, support the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, in her amendment. I also commend the Treasury Select Committee on having done such a good job in presenting the arguments for appropriate scrutiny of elements in the Bill.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, pointed out, the measures which the Financial Policy Committee is to have in its hands are extremely powerful. Let us consider introducing a leverage ratio in British banking. That notion has not existed within the structure or organisation of British banking. It would change entirely the relationship between the liability side and the asset side of the balance sheet of British banks. It is a major measure which thereby deserves appropriate consideration of the sort set out in the amendment.

Let us consider also the other tool which the FPC is claiming as appropriate for itself: pro-cyclical provisioning. Pro-cyclical provisioning involves enormously complicated decisions, both in the banking sector and in accountancy. Accountants tend to be very hostile to the notion of provisioning since it can be used to hide profits. It is a standard procedure which was common in the Enron case. If we are going to formulate a structure of pro-cyclical provisioning which not only achieves the goals that the FPC and all of us want but satisfies the complex needs of appropriate accounting—we have seen recently how accounting can be misused in the banking sector—these measures require very careful scrutiny. As the noble Baroness said so clearly, a 90-minute debate, which is then a rubber stamp, is entirely inappropriate. The procedure set out in the amendment would not only provide that level of scrutiny but contribute to the public confidence in these procedures which is vital if we are to achieve the goals which we have set out for the FPC.

[Lord Peston]

My Lords, I remind the Committee by way of background that we are discussing adverse, exogenous shocks to the financial intermediation process. Those shocks are impossible to forecast and extremely hard to recognise even when they hit the system. My understanding of why we require macroprudential measures is that it improves the way in which the system works so as to be able to cope with those shocks. It is partly to protect the system of financial intermediation and partly to improve its effectiveness and efficiency—so we have no difficulty about that.

However, if we need these instruments, it follows that in a democracy—and I still include your Lordships’ House as part of our democracy—Parliament must be able to scrutinise them appropriately. As the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, is well aware, I am not an expert on all the different kinds of orders, and she simply lost me on them, but I ask her whether the measures set out in her amendment give Parliament, including your Lordships' House, a full right to scrutinise the introduction of the macroprudential measures and—here I got a bit lost—to amend them in the sense of saying to the Government, “We think that what you are doing is right, but you can do it in a rather better way.”? If that is what the amendment says, and I see the noble Baroness nodding, the Minister has a duty to the House to say, at the very least, that he will take it away and think it through.

Financial Services Bill

Debate between Lord Peston and Lord Eatwell

Tuesday 26th June 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Eatwell]

I think the answer is no. The issue is the straightforward drafting of the Bill. The problems, as I said, could be better addressed by proper redrafting rather than by piecemeal amendment. For example, the appropriate structure of the governance of the Bank of England in the 21st century, a matter to which the Treasury Committee paid particular interest, should be dealt with by a full rewrite of the Bank of England Act 1998 rather than by the cumbersome and opaque clauses before us.

Thirdly and most importantly, the Treasury Committee of the other place has raised a number of major objections to the content of the Bill with respect not only to Bank of England governance but to a number of other crucial issues of economic management, especially at times of crisis. Before today, few of these had been taken on board by the Government, although we will consider their proposal of an oversight committee later today.

I was delighted to read in the Financial Times yesterday that amendments derived directly from the Treasury Committee’s report of 24 May have been tabled by my noble friend Lord McFall, a distinguished former chair of the Treasury Committee, and by the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, perhaps the most tenacious opposition speaker on Treasury affairs for many a long year—my noble friend Lord Myners has the scars to prove it. Your Lordships’ House has a fundamental responsibility to pass those amendments so that the other place has the opportunity to consider amendments proposed by its own committee. This is a valuable constitutional innovation.

I recognise that a fundamental rewrite of the Bill would take some time, but the Treasury Committee has faced up to this issue, too, arguing that the legislation is proceeding with undue haste. I agree. I recognise that the planning blight that hangs over the FSA is causing problems, but the performance of the shadow committees and authorities has already been such as to give us confidence that delay will not be disproportionately damaging.

All this adds up to the fact that the Bill as drafted is a barrier, not an aid, to effective macroprudential regulation. This is not a party political issue. I say with all due respect that the noble Lord, Lord McFall, and the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, are not natural political allies. This is about getting the legislation right, which is what we on this side will endeavour to do.

The noble Lord, Lord Sassoon, and I worked well together to improve the Bill that established the Office for Budgetary Responsibility, and I hope that we can work well together to improve this Bill, although I would not start from here. When the Minister first speaks, I think he owes the Committee an explanation as to why the Government have consistently ignored the advice of the Joint Committee and the Treasury Committee on the structure of this legislation.

I turn—to the relief of the Committee, I am sure—to the amendments in this first group. Their fundamental objective is, I hope, clear: to set in train a wide-ranging restructuring of the governance of the Bank of England. The Bill gives the Bank remarkable new powers in macroprudential and microprudential regulation and in the assessment and management of financial crises. The structure of governance and levels of accountability should be appropriate to these new powers.

A key element in the structure of governance of the Bank is the court. As many commentators have noted, the current constitution of the court, its powers and resources are simply not up to the job. The Treasury Committee has paid particular attention to the role of the court, which is currently responsible for managing the Bank of England’s affairs other than monetary policy. The committee’s evidence sessions have exposed doubts, expressed by many witnesses, as to the court’s fitness for purpose as presently structured. A distinguished former member of the Monetary Policy Committee, in evidence to the Treasury Committee, described the court as,

“an historical legacy institution that now serves no useful purpose and creates the appearance or illusion of accountability or oversight where none exist”.

These concerns are especially important because of the role that the Financial Services Bill, as currently drafted, envisages for the court with respect to determining the UK’s financial stability strategy. In the context of monetary policy, where the Bank of England’s objective is to maintain price stability HM Treasury is required to write to the Monetary Policy Committee at least once a year to specify price stability and the Government’s economic policy. The annual Treasury remit letter fleshes out the concept of price stability in practical operational terms while avoiding undue rigidity. It strikes a balance between operational independence and democratic accountability.

A quite different model is proposed for financial stability. It is envisaged that the primary responsibility for determining and keeping under review the strategy for achieving the financial stability objective will reside with the court, although the court will be required to consult the Financial Policy Committee and the Treasury, and the Financial Policy Committee can, at times, make recommendations.

However, here we have a crucial difference in views—given the court’s role in determining the financial stability objective—on whether the court is up to the job. The view that the court should be abolished and replaced by a supervisory board was advanced by the Treasury Committee. In the face of the powerful arguments advanced by the Treasury Committee, the Government replied that they were not,

“at this time, minded to pursue the more radical changes to Bank of England governance recommended by the TSC, including the replacement of Court with a supervisory board. In general, the Government considers that the governance of the Bank should primarily be a matter for the Bank itself”.

This is astonishing. Indeed, it is nonsensical. As the Treasury Committee points out, the Government are the sole shareholder of the Bank, and many of the Bank’s responsibilities, functions and powers are defined by legislation. The Government do not regard the governance of private sector companies as a matter just for those companies. They really cannot wash their hands of this central issue.

Finally, the Bill grants major new powers to the person of the governor. It is important that the governor is backed up by a powerful supervisory committee to which he is accountable and is not an individual exposed on his or her own, so why a supervisory board? What is in a name? The whole point of this proposal is to recognise this necessary break with the past if we are to have a modern, effective structure of governance at the Bank of England. In the convoluted context of amendments to this Bill, we have been able to present only a sketch of what we on this side of the House have in mind, but we shall return to the matter on Report.

By accepting this amendment, the Government would acknowledge that the new Bank, with its new powers, would have a board to whom the executive is responsible and that is capable of performing an effective supervisory function. That should be its job: to supervise, to set strategy, to advise and review, not to run the Bank on a day-to-day basis and certainly not in the context of a crisis. These amendments are a signpost towards the new Bank with a new regulatory structure, and hence towards a truly effective regulatory system. I beg to move.

[Lord Peston]

I rise to support my noble friend. This is an immensely complicated Bill, and I certainly find it virtually impossible to follow. I cannot tell you how many hours I have put in trying to find out what almost any sentence actually refers to when it refers to some other sentence in the Bill. It contains clauses, subsections, paragraphs—I think I could find an infinite regress in there somewhere that went on for ever.

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[Lord Eatwell]

My Lords, these amendments raise some interesting and important issues with respect to the person of the governor. Despite the warm words of the noble Lord, Lord Sassoon, about degrees of consultation, balance and so on, the idea remains that the person will be endowed, under this legislation, with quite extraordinary powers and therefore the process of appointment should be more transparent and subject to consideration by democratically elected Members. If we are to accept an unelected individual having these powers, at the very least the appointment process should be transparent.

The idea that the Treasury Select Committee should express its views is a very good one, but I am not sure about this notion of a veto. That goes a little too far. We do not want to politicise appointments to the extent that has occurred in the United States, which makes me nervous about the suggestion by the noble Lord, Lord Turnbull, that appointments might end up being considered by the whole House, which would inevitably be whipped and become very political indeed. The Treasury Select Committee, although it may sometimes be eccentric, is not party political in quite that sense. It is a good idea that the Treasury Select Committee is consulted about an appointment and it would be a bold Chancellor who would ignore the committee’s views. Since the committee does not have a veto, it is less likely to have the propensity to develop into an overly politicised hanging court. That covers Amendment 5, which is one of the amendments from the Treasury Select Committee in another place put forward by my noble friend Lord McFall and the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes.

I am sympathetic to the idea expressed in the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Wheatcroft, and found the arguments put forward by the noble Lords, Lord Burns and Lord Tugendhat, convincing. The notion that the chairman should be consulted and that the degree of confidence in the relationship between the chairman and the governor should thereby be established seems to have the ring of good sense about it. The Government should take this matter under serious consideration.

My noble friend Lord Peston referred to the role of the House of Lords. Although the expertise in your Lordships’ House often comes to bear most effectively and positively on Treasury issues, in the context of an appointment of this seriousness and magnitude, one really has to turn to elected Members. If the constitution of your Lordships’ House changes in the future, then perhaps the House of Lords could have a role in this respect. However, for the moment, the Treasury Select Committee should be the focus of consultation—

[Lord Peston]

The noble Lord has rather lost me. Is he saying that he agrees that the Commons should have a veto but the Lords should not, or that neither should have a veto?

[Lord Eatwell]

I hoped that I had made clear that I was not in favour of a veto for the Treasury Select Committee, but was very much in favour of it being consulted.

[Lord Peston]

In that case, I really cannot see the noble Lord’s argument at all. I hate to disagree with anybody sitting on my own Front Bench, but if this is a matter of consultation, it is a matter of great significance that your Lordships’ House is treated as an equal House. This principle has been established beyond any doubt whatever, and I therefore find it quite unacceptable that whoever is speaking from our Front Bench would not take that view on this subject. I am sorry to say that.

Budget Responsibility and National Audit Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Peston and Lord Eatwell

Monday 6th December 2010 Grand Committee

[Lord Eatwell]

My Lords, my noble friend Lord Peston suggested to me that I should follow the introduction of this group of amendments by the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, by speaking now to Amendment 39. As noble Lords will be aware, this is simply an alternative means of achieving the objective that the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, seeks.

One of the most important aspects of any piece of serious economic analysis is that it should be capable of being replicated. If the OBR’s forecasts are to achieve the status that we on this side and, I presume, the Government hope for them, they must be capable of being replicated. This can be done only if full information is available at the time of publication.

The issue of replication is typically associated with the natural sciences, where replication of experiments is a fundamental requirement of any empirical scientific statement. However, the Minister may be unaware that it is now standard practice for any article published in a leading applied economics journal to provide the electronic address at which the data and other relevant information required to replicate the results in the article are available. In these days of large datasets and complex econometric models, data accessibility is critical to effective peer review—even effective assessment of whether any analysis or forecast should be taken seriously.

Amendment 39, in my name and the names of my noble friends Lord Davies and Lord Myners, will ensure that effective appraisal of OBR forecasts and other economic analyses are possible. As is made clear in the preface to the OBR report that we discussed last week, compiling the fiscal forecast requires detailed information from many government departments. That is why our amendment refers not only to data and methods but to costings, which the OBR are required by the charter to confirm. In other words, all the raw materials on the basis of which judgments have been made and forecasts have been constructed should be available for objective assessments of those forecasts to be made. This will not involve any significant extra burden on the staff of the OBR, since the data and costings must already have been assembled in electronic form for the OBR to do its work.

The noble Lord, Lord Higgins, raised an interesting point about the model that might be used by the OBR. We have been told that the Treasury will retain its own forecasting unit. We would like to know whether the forecasting model to be used by this unit is to be the same as the model used by the OBR, in which case any differences in forecasts would simply be matters of judgment. That would surely be a ridiculous duplication. It would be much better to develop alternative perspectives, since they can often throw fresh light on difficult problems.

In supporting the general line that the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, has taken, I simply add that we want to be in a position where serious researchers can replicate the approach and findings of the OBR in order to be able to evaluate them effectively.

[Lord Peston]

My Lords, noble Lords will be aware from my remarks last time in Committee that I would not have set up an OBR. I regard it as a waste of public money, to be perfectly honest, but I entirely accept that we are going to have an OBR, since the Government have a majority in the other place and in practice seem to have a majority in your Lordships’ House. Therefore, I entirely agree with my noble friend Lord Eatwell that, if we are going to have such a body, we might as well make it a better one, rather than a worse one. Therefore, we have a duty to scrutinise the proposed legislation and come up with a variety of suggestions, in the hope of persuading the Minister that we could make a better fist of it than the Government have done so far. There I echo the remarks of my noble friend.

On this group of amendments, I repeat something that I said last week. The OBR’s November economic and fiscal outlook report produced a series of forecasts that are not based on any recognisable or explicitly stated economic theory. This is forecasting without theory, which is slightly different from forecasting without a model, although the two are connected.

I have found it difficult to discover from the economic and fiscal outlook report what assumptions the OBR has made—and, presumably, will continue to make—about the way in which the economy works. The central issue as far as serious economics is concerned is whether it is assuming that the economy is a self-adjusting mechanism that will come to a full employment equilibrium—the kind of assumption that what I regard as obsolete economics used to make—or whether it is taking for granted, first, that the economy will not come to an equilibrium at all or, secondly, that there are multi-equilibriums and it does not know where the economy is going to go. Whatever the case, many believe that, wherever it settles, it is most unlikely to settle at anywhere recognisable as a place of full employment.

On a related matter about the facts and how seriously we should take the OBR forecasts as they are now, we have available, as the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, pointed out, the immensely helpful survey published by the Treasury of all the independent forecasts, to which I shall refer further on Report. I have analysed the independent forecasts statistically and it is interesting to note that, given the averages, standard deviations and the other statistical criteria, the forecasts of the OBR and the independent forecasters for 2010 and 2011 are much in step. However, it is extraordinarily interesting to note that the OBR forecast for 2012—that GDP will grow at 2.6 per cent per annum and will continue to grow at that kind of rate—is remarkably optimistic compared with the forecasts of the independent forecasters; it is statistically significantly different. The OBR has not discussed this matter, nor have outside commentators, but your Lordships—we shall return to this issue on Report—have to ask how the OBR has come up with this optimistic view.

There was a time when the Conservative Party believed in the free market—those days seem long gone—and would have taken it for granted that, as the independent forecasters overwhelmingly are in the business of making money from accurate forecasting, they have a tremendous incentive to forecast accurately. Therefore, if one had a choice, one’s normal inclination would be to say, “If you believe in the free market, you will choose the free market forecasts as opposed to the OBR’s forecasts”. We shall return later to the significant issue of the optimistic OBR forecast for 2012 against the rather more pessimistic forecasts of the independent forecasters.

There may be two good explanations for the difference: first, many of the independent forecasters do not look that far ahead and we may have a biased sample of what we get from the Treasury; and, secondly, the OBR may have more information—for example, it may be better advised on government policy—than the independent forecasters. I am not saying that necessarily the OBR is mistaken; I am saying that the difference is, from any analytical and statistical point of view, noteworthy.

Budget Responsibility and National Audit Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Peston and Lord Eatwell

Wednesday 1st December 2010 Grand Committee

[Lord Peston]

Amendment 9 is grouped with Amendment 15, which my noble friend Lord Eatwell will speak to. I have discovered that the more work one does jointly, the more thoughts one has. Therefore, one or two things emerge from this amendment that had not occurred to me when I tabled it. I will mention what they are, but that does not necessarily mean that we should debate them today: we might save them for Report.

The amendment covers the role of the two or more other members. They are referred to in the Notes as non-experts. I had not thought through the implication, because the word is not used in the Bill, that the OBR people are the experts. At some point I shall try to find a way by which we can discuss the distinction between expert and non-expert. I assure the Minister that this is a probing amendment for elucidation. I am asking what the point is of having these people. Given that we have experts, what do they contribute? They cost money—I assume that they expect to be paid—and they will have to be serviced with briefings of all sorts. The point of the amendment is to ask generally why we need this class of member; and, secondly, if this is what the Bill intends and if we are to have them, to ask the OBR, which will want to appoint them: “Can you tell us why you need them in this broad category, and why you need these specific people?”. I was intrigued by the Notes saying explicitly that these people will not be experts.

My other point is that so far, the only thing that we have any practical experience of, given the operation of the OBR, is that these people are not experts in the sense that they are not economists. I assure the Committee that there are other experts in the world. One or two of my colleagues, particularly in the United States, believe that economics will develop into a universal science that will cover everything in the field of human knowledge. I do not hold that view. It seems to me that although the experts so far are economists, I can think of other areas of expertise that would class people as experts for the purposes of the Bill. I do not expect the Minister to talk about that today, but I will raise it on Report. Statisticians and businessmen have wide experience and could be classed as experts in this context. The point of this probing amendment is to seek enlightenment. I beg to move.

[Lord Eatwell]

My Lords, I want to speak to Amendment 15 in this group, which is tabled in my name and that of my noble friends Lord Davies and Lord Myners. The amendment seeks to provide a specific and important role for the non-expert members who, in the Explanatory Notes, are defined as non-executives. The role of the non-executives is very important indeed because, as we have already identified, the OBR is a strange beast. It is independent in an important way, or at least we hope it is, and yet it is an essential ingredient of policy-making within a particular department, mainly the Treasury. So it is not really a non-departmental public body as we know many independent bodies because it is very much part of the Treasury, and yet it is also very much not part of it. It is therefore important that we bolster the “not” side of that equation to ensure that not only is there the reality of independence in a way that I know the Government are seeking, but also the appearance of independence, which will be equally important, especially in more tempestuous political and economic times.

Amendment 15 seeks to clarify the role of the non-executives in a particular way. What is striking at the moment is that the non-executives have no role whatever except that of being involved in audit activity and the production of the annual report; otherwise, they simply make the tea for the experts. We want to give the non-executives a particular role, that of bolstering and supporting the independence side, let us call it, of the OBR. It will be done by requiring the office to include in its annual report an assessment of how the OBR and the Treasury have adhered to the terms of the OBR’s independence as set out in Clauses 5 and 6(2).

Noble Lords will recall that Clause 5 makes the particular point that not only does the OBR have “complete discretion” but, as set out in subsection (2):

“The Office must perform that duty objectively, transparently and impartially”.

One of the oddities of the draft charter is that it seeks to define the terms of Clause 5(2) which are perfectly well defined in the noble Lord, Lord Sassoon’s, favourite reference book, the Oxford English Dictionary. I do not see why we need any further definition, but we will come to that in a moment. The non-executives can comment on these provisions, but more especially they can comment on the provisions of Clause 6(2), which is the really crucial piece of independence in the Bill—the independence of method and of forecasting approach. That is because, as we discussed on Monday, the Treasury is to retain its own forecasting unit and the non-executives will have the responsibility of assessing whether the mutual influence between the two forecasting organisations compromises the OBR’s independence.

It is important that the Government should realise that forecasting organisations influence each other to a considerable degree in respect of introducing new and different ideas, concepts, judgments and methodologies. Moreover, first-class forecasting units interact with one another. That is absolutely inevitable at any level of serious intellectual endeavour. For example, in economic forecasting, the very method used can have a significant influence on outcome, and unwarranted influence on the outcome can be exerted as much by a debate over method as over judgment.

The role of the non-execs is simply to stand there as defenders of the independent side of the OBR, and we could give them the responsibility of reporting on that independence in their annual report. They would then have a specific, valuable and important role.

I admit that Amendment 9, tabled by my noble friend, is cast in much more general terms, but I think that it is seeking to achieve the same ends. It is seeking to define a role for the non-executives. I suggest that the statutory role that we are suggesting—as guardians of the independence of the OBR—will be of enormous value to the Government, to Governments in future and to the organisation itself.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Eatwell]

As I have said, I understand that; but when you are in the executive position, as the very distinguished people you have been lucky enough to attract to run the OBR are, it is very easy, because you have to get the report out and do things, to be so immersed in the incredible pressures that you slip across boundaries. If non-execs are there, like a non-executive chairman with a chief executive, they could help with guidance and prevent that slip happening. If we give the non-execs this particular role, it will not only bolster the appearance of independence of the OBR—which is valuable in itself—but provide an important check in reality. Including that duty in the Bill would be so serious that I do not think that serious people would treat it in a formulaic manner.

[Lord Peston]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his clarifications, particularly in relation to the application of the exec versus non-exec issue. My noble friend Lord Eatwell has made a powerful case and I am glad that the Minister will at least reflect on how independence will work. Even though one felt very frustrated on Monday by the Minister’s refusal to give a much bigger role to the House of Lords, I can assure him that as long as I am alive, I and my noble friend Lord Barnett will find many a way of making sure that the OBR is subject to the kind of criticism that will ensure that, whatever else it is, it is definitely independent.

Having said that, I would like to come back to the question of expertise, but that can wait until Report. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Budget Responsibility and National Audit Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Peston and Lord Eatwell

Monday 29th November 2010 Grand Committee

[Lord Eatwell]

It is in the charter, which is referred to in Clause 1, and I shall attempt to find it for the noble Lord. I have a fresh copy here rather than my marked-up copy. Paragraph 3.1 of the draft charter states that an objective is to “promote intergenerational fairness”.

[Lord Peston]

My Lords, I shall speak specifically to the amendment in the name of my noble friend and myself, but what I say will also be very relevant to the other three amendments in the group.

Overwhelmingly, economists—I certainly include myself here—regard budget responsibility, or more generally financial soundness, as desirable, but within serious economics that desirability would be a means and not an end in itself. The end that one would have in mind in asking, “Why financial soundness?”, or, “Why financial responsibility?”, is the behaviour of the real economy. I know nothing in economics that tells anybody anything other than that the behaviour of the real economy is what we should be concentrating on. That is the specific purpose of my noble friend’s amendment and it is quite specifically the purpose of Amendment 2.

Noble Lords whose memories go back a long way will realise that the amendment in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Barnett is simply an echo or, perhaps more than that, more or less a restatement of Section 11 of the Bank of England Act 1998, which set up the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England. Essentially, it is derived from the very famous subject of that section. We wish precisely that to appear in this Bill. Indeed, it would be absolutely absurd for the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England to take account of Her Majesty’s Government’s economic policy for growth and employment—the real economy—and for the OBR not to do so. It is difficult to think that anyone could rationally have talked themselves into that position and I cannot believe that that is the position that the Government want.