Consumer Rights Bill

Lord Skelmersdale Excerpts

Monday 3rd November 2014 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

My Lords, this has been an interesting part of the Bill. The heart would be taken out of the Bill were we to listen to the very eloquent pleas made. When it was still a draft Bill I was visited by someone who flew all the way from America on behalf of the US Chamber Institute for Legal Reform who told us that we Brits did not know how to do our own law and should listen to them. I think they have been back a second time since then.

I will say only a couple of things. I have also had a response from the CBI which, again, cleverly managed to get a letter in the Times today. I would point to what I have seen as a draft response to the letter in the Times, which I hope will be published tomorrow, and which makes a couple of pertinent points. Before coming to that, I have to ask whether the CBI really wants businesses that have been proved guilty of running a cartel. All this kicks in once they have been proved of running a cartel or some other equally anti-competitive business and concerns whether they are able to keep the fruits of their crime. That is what those people who do not want an opt-out have to consider. We will otherwise continue with the case that the people who have been affected by the cartel do not get any compensation.

More than that, companies would have to pay back only what they gained by that breach of law, unlike in America, where damages can be three times the compensation owed to consumers. Not only are we not America—because, luckily, we are not America—but this provision does not even have the same basis as the American situation. Our Competition Appeal Tribunal, in which I perhaps have a little more confidence—

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees]

My Lords, I hate to interrupt the noble Baroness in full flow, but I suspect that she might be going on for a few minutes longer, and therefore I must tell your Lordships that there is a Division in the Chamber and that we will not resume until 4.55 pm prompt.