§ Mr. Anthony GrantI beg to move Amendment No. 16, in page 15, line 12, leave out
'maintained elsewhere than in the United Kingdom shall' and insert 'shall or shall not'.It is now the turn of the hon. Member for Dudley (Dr. Gilbert) to come in for a little praise. This amendment is similar to the amendment which was introduced in Committee. The object is to permit assets technically maintained in the United Kingdom not to be accepted as such for the purposes of the requirements of the clause. These assets will not necessarily be of a dubious nature or improper in any way. There may be technical difficulties in relation to the monitoring of the value of the assets or the risk of their being realised abroad in spite of the share register being kept in this country.389 I shall give some indication of the way in which we envisage this power as modified by the amendment to be exercised. It is a specific requirement in the circumstances of a particular company that normally assets maintained in the United Kingdom are of such a nature as to meet the requirements of the clause. There may be circumstances, however, where there is doubt whether they can be realised in the United Kingdom or readily realised elsewhere, even though technically they are maintained here. The Department is enabled to direct that a particular asset cannot be treated as if it were maintained in the United Kingdom where there is doubt as to the security which it offers to the policy holder. This is apart from the application of the valuation regulations provided for in subsection (4) or the possibility of requiring under Clause 14 the realisation of inherently unsuitable assets. Nevertheless, the amendment represents a useful additional provision and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will agree that it meets his point.
§ Amendment agreed to