Enterprise Bill [HL]

Baroness Wheatcroft Excerpts

Wednesday 25th November 2015 Lords Chamber

In those terms, we hope that the Minister has considered the utterly persuasive case that we hope we made in Grand Committee, has accepted that our shorter summary here is similarly compelling and will bring something forward either today or at Third Reading.

[Baroness Wheatcroft (Con)]

My Lords, I accept that the role of the Small Business Commissioner as drafted here is very limited, but that is not accidental. This is a move towards cultural change, and I agree with the Government that it needs to be taken in small steps. The Small Business Commissioner will have power—and it is the power, in the end, of publicity. Eventually, if large companies behave badly, the power to name and shame is in the legislation. We have seen that naming and shaming has an effect; equally, the power to be able to boast about doing the right thing is very effective. Noble Lords will have noticed how Lidl is making great play of the fact that it was the first business to pay the living wage without coming under any compulsion to do so. This is a first step. Should it fail, it will be open to the Government to extend the powers but, as a first step, it is right to have a complaints commissioner or Small Business Commissioner who will be able to offer advice to small business and, if necessary, mediate on its behalf with the large companies that tend to be the worst offenders.

As we all know, small businesses are the first to complain about bureaucracy. They do not want a massive bureaucracy to have to contend with; they want help and advice, which is available to them already in many different ways. The Small Business Commissioner would just be one more place where they can go for help, and it is right that it should be on a very specific thing, particularly payment. If we try to make this too broad, we will lose the impact and main aim of the Small Business Commissioner, which is to change the culture of those companies that will not play fair. It will take the right person in the role, but that person could be very effective in changing the culture.