Speeches by Baldwin.

“Do the things I listed make it a credible investment platform for your members?”

“I will go back to Mr Threlfall, if I may, just on the governance question, because the economic and fiscal outlook from our friends at the OBR noted that the new debt measure that the Chancellor is using creates incentives for the Government to invest through loans and equity injections rather than through direct spend…”

“We certainly do hope that, yes.”

“Would you call them out then for having made these new investments—the ones I mentioned are all new—that sound more like the sort of thing you would expect from the Environment Agency?”

“We do not seem to have anyone co-investing.”

“What changes to governance would you want to see? I cannot see, with the current arrangements, how you can avoid that risk of it becoming a Treasury slush fund. Does anyone else want to come in on this particular topic? Mr Cummings, with your expertise on governance, would you like to see some changes in governance?”

“Fair enough. In terms of governance, I want to ask the panel about some of the recent announcements that the National Wealth Fund has made. There has been the closure of the Grangemouth refinery, yet we hear the National Wealth Fund is putting £200 million into initiatives around Grangemouth. There has been the situati…”

“It is a misnomer to convince the British public that this is an actual wealth fund. This is the Government borrowing at the Government’s borrowing rate and then investing alongside, at a 3:1 ratio, in projects to hopefully make us wealthier and to make the debt go down. It is not directly a wealth fund.”

“It is proper wealth as well.”

“That is going to be helpful for the chair of the National Wealth Fund as they go and find a new chief executive. Mr Cummings, I was very struck by the comparison that you made right at the beginning with the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund. The Norwegian sovereign wealth fund is a genuine wealth fund, is it not, where …”

“It is a huge pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Vaz. We start by discussing some of the amendments we have tabled to clause 2. In this morning’s sitting we had a thorough discussion of the issues relating to clause 1, and we also discussed some amendments to clause 2. I hope, Ms Vaz, that you will allow the …”

“On a point of order, Ms Vaz. I seek clarification: are not the remaining amendments in the group to clause 12?”

“What a welcome moment, Ms Vaz—my colleague from the Liberal Democrats, the hon. Member for Chippenham, supports the rationale behind the amendments. The swelling in support for our amendments gives me a welcome opportunity to test the opinion of the Committee on each of them. Question put, That the amendment be made.”

“Clause 3 deals with the enforcement provisions of the Bill. Clause 1 grants sweeping powers to the Secretary of State, and clause 2 defines the types of requirement there may be on products. Clearly, the regulations that the Secretary of State has so much freedom to enact will need to be enforced, but the wording of cl…”

“Clause 9 is one of the clauses that their lordships were particularly concerned about, because of its sweeping Henry VIII powers. Although I have not tabled any amendments to it, I reiterate the point that I made about relevant authorities, and I think it is only right that we test the Committee’s opinion on the clause…”

“I think the Committee may well return to some of these themes at a later stage of our deliberations. Clause 13 concerns the UK internal market, which is an important topic that deserves considerable further scrutiny and debate. Clauses 14 and 15 essentially clarify when the commencement will be for the various clauses.…”

“It is appropriate for me to put on the record how grateful we are for the scrutiny that the Bill received in the other place. We have just heard from the Minister how many changes had to be made because of the concerns raised by the Committee in the other place, which I have quoted extensively in today’s debates. We ha…”

“The hon. Lady puts some extremely important and valuable questions to the Committee. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s reply.”

“I am grateful that the Minister is as confused as I am by this; I thought it was just the lateness in the day. Perhaps the Minister would be good enough to write to me to point out where the erroneous “9” exists.”

“Forgive me, Ms Vaz; it is getting quite late in the afternoon. The Minister’s amendment to line 20 of clause 12 leaves out “7 to 10” and inserts “7, 8 and 10”. Could I clarify what the “9” is a reference to? In which clause is the “9” referenced? I am not following it, because clause 12 seems to have seven subsections.”