Care Bill [HL]

Lord Sharkey Excerpts

Tuesday 29th October 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lipsey (Lab)]

My Lords, I remind the House of my interest as the unremunerated president of the Society of Later Life Advisers. Why has this matter come up again at Third Reading? It is because there were discussions in progress between the Minister, the two co-signees of this amendment and me, which had not yet concluded and the Minister generously agreed that we could bring it up at Third Reading. I think that the time has been well used. Certainly on the principles of the matter there is now complete accord between the Minister and ourselves. We are all agreed that taking financial advice must not be compulsory but equally we are agreed that it is not enough for the local authority just to hand over a list of names of advisers and say, “Take it from there”. In the fashionable words of today, we are agreed that they have to be nudged into doing what is invariably in their own interests as well as that of the council.

We are agreed that there is an important role for independent, regulated financial advisers in this field. We are agreed—despite the fact that I have tabled an amendment—that there is no need to put this in the Bill: it makes very good sense to spell it out in regulations. However, we are also agreed, and the Minister will confirm this, that it would be valuable, not only for this House but for outside interests, if he were to spell out in a little more detail the Government’s intentions in this regard. We have reached a position of great harmony. I thank him for all the time he and his officials have devoted to it and the sooner the House hears from the Minister, after one or two comments, the quicker this issue will be seen to have been satisfactorily resolved. I beg to move.

[Lord Sharkey (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak very briefly in support of the amendment. The noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, spoke with his usual clarity in moving the amendment and I shall not repeat his arguments, which seem to me to be compelling. However, I will point out that the amendment now before us is in effect the last remaining part of a discussion that started at Second Reading, continued in Committee and on Report and in private meetings with the Minister and his officials. At the start there were, broadly speaking, two concerns about information and advice. The first was about the Dilnot recommendation that there should be an extensive public awareness campaign about the facts and the implications of the cap. Our concern was essentially about the leadership, the scale and the monitoring of this campaign. I am very grateful to the Minister and his officials for all the discussions that they have had with us over this issue.