Consumer Rights Bill

Debate between Lord Clement-Jones and Lord Pendry

Tuesday 24th February 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, as a signatory to the original amendment and a member of the All-Party Group on Ticket Abuse, I very much support Motion A1 and I am absolutely delighted that the Government do as well. To say the least, this has been a cliff-hanger. I hope that my noble friend Lord Moynihan, Sharon Hodgson MP, Mike Weatherley MP, and of course my noble friend Lady Heyhoe Flint, all get roles in a remake of “Chariots of Fire” for their efforts in securing this agreement, which will benefit music and sports fans immensely. My noble friend Lord Moynihan in particular has been incredibly tenacious in his pursuit of the right solution and I pay strong tribute to him. I also pay tribute to my right honourable friend Vince Cable, my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe, my honourable friend Jo Swinson and their adviser Ashley Lumsden, who have been instrumental in forging a deal in BIS and in convincing their colleagues in the DCMS to adopt the solution before us today.

When our amendment came before the House of Commons in January, my honourable friend Jo Swinson said:

“A careful balancing act is needed. We want to make sure that as many people as possible can access events, whatever their means. We want sports and entertainment in the UK to flourish. We … want to protect consumers and allow the ticket resale market to work as well as it can”.—[Official Report, Commons, 12/1/15; col. 657.]

I believe that these clauses will do all this. My honourable friend also criticised the previous amendment, which was passed by this House. She said that there were,

“difficulties involved in Lords amendment 12”.—[Official Report, Commons, 12/1/15; col. 658.]

She said that it would require sellers to provide their name, that it would enable event organisers to cancel tickets put up for resale and that,

“more stringent information requirements would go beyond the provisions set out in the consumer rights directive”.—[Official Report, Commons, 12/1/15; col. 660.]

Again, I believe that these clauses meet those objectives. These safeguards now set out in the Bill will be much more reliable than the assurances belatedly given by the secondary sellers or the information on their websites.

To be clear, this is not about closing down the secondary market. A secondary market that works in the interests of fans buying and selling tickets is reasonable; an opaque stock exchange with links to criminal activity is not. I hope that this amendment will ensure that the secondary market is the former. These transparency measures are good news for fans looking to buy tickets, and do not impose an unfair burden on sellers. It is also good to see that Ministers will support measures which uphold fair and reasonable ticket terms and conditions. Ticket terms and conditions must be fair in law, and the new Motion recognises this.

Just as a reminder, serious money is involved in ticket touting. A single Rugby World Cup final ticket is on sale on StubHub today for £59,000. No tax is being paid; the seller is anonymous, and may even work for the secondary platform; and the buyer has no guarantee about where the seat is. These amendments will introduce some much needed transparency, and then we will also have the statutory review, to which my noble friend referred, to ensure that the market is operating fairly.

I welcome that the review of the law and its effectiveness and what can be done to improve it, in particular as regards enforcement, is enshrined in today’s amendments. There are a number of questions for review, which my noble friend went through, such as: will this stop speculative sales? Rugby World Cup tickets were on sale on secondary websites before the organising body had even set the ticket prices and launched the application process. Is the £5,000 fine adequate? I hope that all this will include looking at how to tackle bulk-selling and how effectively to enforce the law against traders impersonating consumers to evade consumer law. However, that is an ongoing matter. We have come today to the right conclusion, and I congratulate all those involved.

[Lord Pendry (Lab)]

My Lords, it gives me great pleasure to briefly say a few words on this good news day for sports fans. It is fair to say that it has been a long time coming, but in the measures that we are adding to the Bill today we are giving greater choice and information to sports fans to help in the fight against those who commit fraud or seek to exploit the pockets of hard-working families.

My own role in this battle dates back two decades to 1994, when I led from the Labour Benches in the other place a campaign to have the then Government extend the provisions they were introducing to ban ticket touting at football events to other sports in the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994. We were partly successful in that we had reserve powers added to that Bill to allow the Home Secretary of the day to designate other sporting events.

Ever since then, together with other Members of both Houses, from all parties, I have called for more effective action as the problem has grown and grown, especially with the introduction of the internet, which created a fertile new environment for the problems we have heard explained so well by the proposer of this Motion. I therefore wholeheartedly endorse the measures being added to the Bill. Most of all, I pay tribute, as others have done, to the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan. He was battling 21 years ago in support of the kind of measure we have here now, and is still fighting as hard as ever to protect the sports that he loves.

I have spoken to some sports governing bodies today, and I know that they are hugely grateful for the enormous amount of time and effort that the noble Lord has put into this issue ever since the amendment was voted for by this House in November. There have been many hours of meetings with Ministers, Bill teams, lawyers and experts, and that shows in the well balanced and fair proposals that have addressed the concerns raised by the House. Certainly on this issue, I think that the House will respond favourably to the words of the noble Lord and the amendments. Through his grasp of how the sports sector works and of the way to get things done in this place, we now have an effective improvement in the law and, alongside it, a review that allows the matter to be considered in greater detail. I hope that the noble Lord’s expertise will remain on tap for the review; he will certainly add weight to it.